2014 Recap + New Year Goals!

Hey friends!

I've been encouraged by reading the blogs that some of my friends have started, so I'm resurrecting this old, abandoned blog. Much has happened since I posted last in 2011! Some not so great things, and some very awesome things!

The Best Thing That Happened

In June of 2012, I attended the wedding of a friend from college. The wedding was in the Keys and lots of college friends were there. There also happened to be a cute boy that caught my eye. This boy was the groom's brother. I knew both the bride and groom from college. I didn't keep it a secret that I thought Aaron was cute, and mentioned it to one of my friends who was a groomsmen. He reintroduced me to Aaron, even though we officially met the night before the wedding when everyone was hanging out. Aaron and I started talking and ended up talking the whole night. Well, the next day I had to drive back to Naples and Aaron was headed back to Columbus, OH.

We continued chatting, thanks to awesome technology and I decided to go up to Ohio to visit Aaron and my family that live up there. Well, we hit it off and continued dating long-distance, flying back and forth to see each other practically every month until Aaron graduated from grad school and moved down to FL. Then he proposed to me in November of 2013 and we were married 5 months later in May of 2014.

This was one of the biggest things that occurred in 2014. I became a Mrs!

The second biggest thing was that we bought a house! 

Yes, we are homeowners. It has been so fun, so far. I loved being able to get all moved in before Christmas so that we were able to spend our first Christmas in our home!

I love living in our new home and I love our neighborhood.

It's 2015, guys!

Like most people, the New Year inspires me to start fresh and make goals. I've started off really well with my goals to get back on track with running and working out, but in addition, I've decided to eat better. I'm really excited to do the Advocare 24-day Challenge starting on Wednesday! I've never done any type of diet like this before, so it will probably be a bit of a challenge, but also a great way to get myself in gear with making healthy choices. I've already started with drinking more water and eating less processed foods and more fruits and veggies! In fact, yesterday and today I've only drank water and a small amount of black coffee!

I went grocery shopping yesterday and tonight to buy a bunch of lean proteins and fresh fruit and veggies. I'm going to have to be all about meal preparation in order to keep to eating the right things. Aaron grilled some chicken tonight, so I've got extra chicken for some other meals this week!

Here's what my shopping cart looked like tonight:

Anyhow, I'm going to use this blog to posts all sorts of things. I will use it to share recipes and workouts, home projects, my own personal thoughts, and music/book reviews.

Stay tuned for more and please comment if you have a blog and I will be sure to follow you!

Peace and love xx

C'est la vie.

{This post is one that I wrote while I was still in Madrid, but never published. At the time I didn't think I was finished writing it, but after rereading it just now I think it's just fine the way it is :) I wrote it as I was preparing to leave. I've been home for a month now!}

It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power. 

-Alan Cohen

I came across this quote one day whilst searching on google for encouraging quotes. I really liked this one when I read it 2 years ago before I moved across the ocean to live in the great peninsula of Spain. Back before I knew what no pasa nada meant and that when ordering something in a bar or coffee shop you'll get funny looks if you try to say "Can I please have a muffin?" Instead, you just say "Give me that muffin.. {please}. But the 'please' isn't required. 

There's a lot of things you learn about a place after you go through the daily interactions of life with the people. I like the line in the quote by Cohen that says, "in movement there is life... ." Things don't happen without a movement; a force that acts on a situation and causes an effect. If you don't like the place you're at in life, you have to actually do something for things to change.  There's something to be said for being still and simply being in the present, but change requires some sort of kick in the rear end, a sweet taste that leaves you wanting more.


I don't like dwelling on changes. My life changed a lot when I moved to Spain two years ago, and now I'm facing changes again as I prepare to move back to the states. The hardest part about this change is having to say goodbye to the wonderful community I've had here. I know that God will place equally awesome friends in my life, and I will carry these ones with me into the future, but it sucks to think that things won't be the same. 

I won't be able to just hop on the metro and meet my friends in the center of Sol. I won't be able to look forward to every Tuesday night with my small group. 

I won't have to encounter the brightly lit men that come into every bar and shop trying to sell you over-sized glasses, a million different light-up gadgets and red roses. 

I won't have to deal with awkward bus drivers and locutorio (internet cafe) workers that will find any excuse, such as learning English, to try to get a date.


The hardest part about change is facing up to who you are and what's going on inside you. Change makes us realize how not in control we are. We can be sailing smooth and then hit a wave or encounter a storm that makes us see that we need God. We know we need to let go and trust God, but that's easier said than done. But it's so much more rewarding. Sometimes we need to step out on a limb and listen to what God is telling us to do, even if it's the last thing we really desire to do at the moment. God can change our desires, simply put. Some days I don't even know what I really desire. I tell God one thing and I really want to mean it, but my heart seeks other things to satisfy. I run to people to meet the longing I have to feel loved and admired. It's good to have friends that love and care for you, but ultimately it should be God that satisfies every thirst and every need.

Update- Life in Madrid

Hello to you, whoever you may be.

It's been a while since I've updated, but more than that, it's been a long time since I've spoken to a lot of my friends at home. I've been seeing lots of blog updates by people on facebook, so I thought this would be the best way to share with everyone what has been going on over here in Spain :)

If you're not in the loop, I've been living in Spain for a little over a year now. I'm working as a teaching assistant in a bilingual school in the Communidad de Madrid. My school is actually located outside of the city but I live in the city and commute to work, an hour by bus each morning. You may think that's a crazy amount of time, but I'm used to it and I enjoy sleeping on the ride home, or reading a book. 

I really enjoy my school and the people that I work with, I'm pretty sure I'm not meant to be a teacher though. I studied Journalism and would like to have a job in the future that is in this feild. I like kids and I do learn a lot everday, but I'm not passionate about teaching. I think I might enjoy teaching more if I were the actual teacher of my own class. Some of the little kids at school will not listen to me when the teacher is gone, because they view me as an assistant and because I'm only allowed to speak English to them. But anyhow, I am thankful for all the teacher's out there. It's a hard job, and you've got a big responsibility!

I love my living situation in Spain. I am living in the room where my boyfriend lived last year. He rented a room in an apartment owned by the nicest Peruvian lady. He also had another teaching assistant flatmate who was American. Both of them moved out after the year of teaching, and I took the opportunity to ask before I went home last summer if the room might be available when I returned. It turns out that it was :) I live with Milagros (my Peruvian landlady) and a guy named Tomeo who is from Mallorca. It's a nice quaint piso with 3 bedrooms, 1 bathroom, a kitchen and a living room. I love living with Spanish people because it gives me the chance to practice a lot. I've learned a lot from Milagros. She's really great to talk to and she always helps me to understand things, or find the word that I'm trying to say but can't remember.

Speaking of my boyfriend, he's currently in England. We met last year working together. He was the other assistant at my school and he's from Grimsby, England. This year has been a little tricky with living in 2 different countries, but we've been able to visit each other lots and have lots of fun times. I went to his house for the Christmas holidays and it was really fun to be able to celebrate with his family and experience all of the British traditions. There was also snow, which was fun at first, but the cold and grey/dullness got old after a few days! I didn't know the sun could set SO early. You'd wake up to grey skies, and then it would be grey all day and the sun would set before 4pm! Not cool.

The best thing about this year has definitely been being part of an awesome community group from my church here. I go to an international, English-speaking church, called Oasis. I've made some really, really amazing friends from this church. We currently have our services in the chapel of a Lutheran school here, but we've just bought our own property and soon we are going to have our very own place to meet, which is really exciting!! The new location is going to be in the center of Sol, which is much much closer to where I live. It will be a great thing to have a place to use whenever, for whatever reason. After our services at the school, we always have to clean up quickly and we only have a short time to eat refreshments and socialize..so we move things over the the bar across the street when we get kicked out!

My community group has helped me grow a lot this year. I am really sooo thankful for them. Each week we write down our prayer requests and then put all of the papers in a hat and draw names for the person we will be praying for that week. I think this is a great thing, cos we're all committed to praying for someone! These past few months I've been praying and seeking God's will for my future, and I still don't know for sure what lies ahead, but I know that I'm going to keep following His lead.

One of my favorite lines in Donal Miller's book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, says: The ambitions we have will become the stories we live.

I think this is so true. You can look at someone's life and see how the way they live reflects what they want most in life. What I want most is for my life to reflect Christ's love for His people. I want everyone to see how awesome God is and how much He wants for His creation to accept His unconditional love and abundant life. His way is really so much better than ours.

That is all for now. :)

Doing good makes the heart feel good.

Image taken from Catering Azeri Jana webpage

 Tonight was our weekly "sandwich route." Every Friday night a group of us from church get together to make sandwich bags and go around to talk to our homeless friends and give them a little food. We go on the same path each week and have gotten to know some of the people pretty well. I have only been going for the last 5 weeks, and I really enjoy it. Sometimes it's hard. Of the people we talk to, some of them don't speak Spanish or English very well, so our communication is very limited. Other's are drunk and mumble, and it's hard for me to understand their Spanish.

Tonight was a good night. There were 5 of us. The weather was nice and not as cold as it has been. Everyone seemed to be in a good mood, (which was a nice change from the week before when a few of the people were drunk/on substances and were acting a little rowdy so we couldn't really speak with them.)

The first group of guys we always visit are 3 Spaniards in their 30's and early 40's. They are usually good fun to talk to. They enjoy talking to us and tonight Alberto even played some guitar for us. The next guys we found in their usual tunnel walkway were both busy doing different things. The one man that is always laying in his sleeping bag was actually asleep, so we left a bag next to his belongings; our other friend was making a home out of cardboard boxes and thanked us while he went on working.

The next group we encouter in Plaza Mayor are 5 or 6 people that are all from the Czech Republic. Some of them don't speak Spanish very well, but find ways to tell us stories using the little they know and hand signals with noises. I usually end up talking to the most outgoing, talkative one of the group, but this time I had a chance to talk to a gentleman probably in his 50's called Paul. Paul was a bit more reserved than my other friend, sitting in a chair and smoking a cigarrette. He told me he goes back and forth between Spain and Italy. He told me of walking up and down the coast of Spain, stopping for dips in the Meditteranean Sea and sleeping on the beach. He told me how Venice is beautiful and the food there is delicious. He kissed my hand as we said a hurried goodbye because another group came at the same time with food and there were too many of us crowded around!

Tonight was a good night. Sometimes it's difficult to find the words to say. These are people who have been through difficult times and have lost loved ones. They sleep out on the streets when the temperatures are freezing.  I hate not knowing what to say to comfort them, but I am so thankful for the opportunity to show them love. I am thankful to be able to serve them in this small way. I hope that we make a difference and they know that we truly enjoy speaking to them. It's not about giving them a little food so that we can feel better about ourselves. We want these people to know the love of Christ. We want them to know that there are people who care about their lives and that they are worthy of being loved. And it really does feel right when you are out talking to people who are lonely and ignored by much of society. Jesus came to serve others, and to hang out with the people who society rejected or looked down upon, and so I'm really thankful for this outreach of my church that gives me an opportunity to spend a few hours each week not just focusing my self.

One Pack Rat's Perspective.

Hello again blogspot. It's been almost a year since I've updated you, and for that I am very sorry. I can't make any promises, but I would like to try to give you a little more tlc.

Last time I updated this was right before I was moving to Spain. Almost a year has passed so that I've been to Spain and back, and will be heading back over there again in a little over a month's time.

With this time being home, I decided that I need to be strong and downsize the amount of junk I have in my life...and I have a lot! It adds up over time. After living away at college and acquiring enough stuff to fill a bedroom, and then moving to a foreign country and collecting even more stuff there, I realized that my already full bedroom at my house could not handle weight of my desire to hold on to things.

I'm really not so bad that I need to be on that new show on television called Hoarders. I just have a slight problem with letting go of silly things like teenage notes from my high school best friend, old magazines, and an assortment of memorabilia from menus from neat restaurants to old concert ticket stubs. I like to look at these little things and be reminded of different times in my life.

Look, this is what I came home with after living abroad: (the rest is still in Madrid!)

What a fun time I had going through all of this. First off, anyone who knows me well enough, knows that I am a procrastinator. I've gotten better over the last few years, but there are some things that I will always put off until I can't put them off anymore. I didn't conquer the arduous task of sorting through this mess for a few weeks. Whenever I needed something I just dug through the clothing to get what I wanted and then piled everything back in!

A few weeks ago I decided it was time to do some seriously overdue spring cleaning in my bedroom. I cleaned out my desk, the boxes under my bed, and the clothing in my closet (although I know there is still clothing hanging up that I will never wear and need to get rid of). I had to let go of a lot of things that were just taking up space and not being used. I put the nice things that I could give away in bags, and they ended up going to my church for a garage sale to raise money for a mission trip. :)

This summer for me has been about organizing my priorities. I've learned that I can only do so many things in one day, so it's important to set my mind to a task and work on accomplishing that one thing instead of overwhelming myself with an extensive list. I've also realized that in order to keep things organized, I have to make an effort to pick up after myself everyday. If I leave things out of place each time I use them, then I slowly make myself a bigger task I will later have to face, rather than if I put each thing in its proper place after I use it. I know this may seem like common sense, but I have to repeat these ideas to myself so they will stick.

One of the biggest things I've been working to change is my understanding of what it looks like to be a follower of Jesus. Just like with keeping my room tidy, I have to make an attempt everyday to choose Jesus over myself. If I'm honest, when I wake up in the morning my first few desires are to go pee, find something to eat and to check facebook. I know that I have to stop and give some time to God first, or the rest of the day I will be more preoccupied with myself than with anything that he wants me to see.

I started reading the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan last week. This book has already opened my eyes to so many things that I had heard before but never really thought about. I recommend this to anyone who wants to know what Christianity is really about.

Last night as I was reading, I wrote down this thought, that only when when our hearts are aligned with God's heart will our actions be fruitful and our words be uplifting rather than degrading. This involves everyday making a decision to actually live out the calling that God has given us. We can't sit around waiting for tomorrow, because as cliche as it is, tomorrow is not promised to us. Today, and right now are all we can be sure of. Therefore, starting right now, I'm going to do my best to live a life that glorifies my Savior, and points people to His love.

1 Corinthians 10:31 "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all for the glory of God." (ESV)

voy a madrid.

I found out two weeks ago that I was accepted to be a Language and Culture Assistant in Madrid, Spain! Since then I have been running around accomplishing the many tasks required of applying for a visa...there are so many parts. I am just about done now, just waiting for my police records (or lack thereof) to come back from Tallahassee where I had to send them to get the Apostille certification, or something like that.

Anyhow, I am going to be teaching young children at CEIP Miguel de Cervantes in a pueblo de Madrid called Valdilecha. Valdilecha is about an hour southeast of the center of Madrid, but I am probably going to live in the city and commute to work.

I haven't yet decided whether I want to live with other auxiliares de conversacion or with spaniards. A mix of both would be cool, but i'm not sure if that will be possible, or work out. I am talking to a returning auxiliar right now about moving in with her and her friend, but I need to see if where they are going to live is close to a bus station that would take me to Valdilecha. There's so much to figure out, but I think it will be much easier to deal with these things once I am over there.

I am a bit nervous to arrive in Madrid and navigate around all by myself. I know it will feel exhilarating to me when I accomplish a small feat like getting on the right train and finding the hostel I plan on staying in.

I will try to update this blog more often from here on. I've been very bad about it. Today has been a very dreary and lazy day. I'm about to go get coffee, because I just cannot wake up! I think it's partly due to the fact that it's been grey & cloudy all day. I have a 40% off Borders rewards coupon that is tempting me in my hotmail inbox, but I know I shouldn't spend $ . I don't know if I can resist using it though. We shall see. xx

Listen & Love.

Streaming of Imogen Heap's new album, Ellipse... :) She is just so talented!