Even More Wedding Pics!

More Wedding Pics

I've had requests for more wedding pics to be posted, so here are a few!

Leftover Night!

Okay, learning how to cut some recipes down to two servings is hard enough, but even more difficult is trying to guess how many servings Michael will eat each night! Some nights it is barely one, and other nights it's at least three! My estimates were off once again this week, so tonight I am designating as "leftover night" because I hate to see that food go to waste! Michael has this thing though where he won't touch leftovers unless someone else prepares them for him and doesn't tell him ahead of time that a leftover is what he will be eating! So, shhhhh!!! Don't tell him it's a leftover night!

This was my first "week" of classes. It was really only three days, and I have only one class a day! Yesterday I was at the shelter for five hours, and today I was there for three. I did my first screening on a potential resident! The shelter is such a nice place to work because it's so laid back there! If you make a mistake, it's no big deal at all! Yesterday was interesting because the volunteers in charge of the soup kitchen lunch at the shelter couldn't come, so all of us case workers got to stir five gallons of chili and slice cucumbers covered in ants (don't worry, we did wash them off first!). Then we found some leftover (HA, that word is popping up a lot today!) hot dogs which we sliced up in and threw in the chili. The meal ended up being "Chili-dog-cheese-fries" which were actually quite good, with a side of cucumbers, tomatoes, potato salad, and donated Fred Meyer sheet cake. The soup kitchen aspect of the shelter is open to the public for breakfast and lunch five days a week. The shelter's residents are served dinner as well. It's really low key compared to the Lebanon Soup Kitchen, where a food handler's card is required to work with the food and 10 people are needed to keep the stomachs fed at a fast enough rate. We were able to serve our clients with just 3 petite social workers preparing and serving the meal!

I can't share details about any of the clients at the shelter, but I would like to request prayer for these families! Some of them need so much help getting back on their feet, and I hate it when we just don't have the resources to help them! I feel so blessed that Michael and I got such a wonderfully comfortable start to our life together!

One month goes by fast!

Today completes one month of married life for Michael and me. How could I have accomplished so little in that much time??? I guess I did go on a honeymoon, move my life over to Nampa, Idaho, set up a new apartment, change my name with numerous business entities, sign up for a new semester of school, etc, etc, but I still feel outta place as there is nothing that I HAVE to do each day. For example: Michael HAS to go to work. I have to . . . check the mail? Do dishes? Hmm. . . Well, school starts tomorrow, and then it'll be totally different! I'll HAVE to go to chapel, HAVE to go to class, HAVE to do homework! Okay, I want my month of nothing back!!

The search has begun for a new job for Michael. In a little bit I'm off to find a place I can fax his resume from. I feel so bad for him each morning, as he goes off to a job he hates and just comes home exhausted each day! We enjoy the paycheck, but it's really hard on our relationship to not even be able to talk to each other because he's too tired to think! It probably wouldn't be so bad if he wasn't doing such monotonous tasks each day and his supervisor would spice it up with a little variety besides the usual hoeing, digging, or sod-repairing (for ten hours straight each day!!! :P). We know God provided us this job, and we have been trying to remain grateful for His provision, but we have also been praying for a transition if it's in His will! Please pray for us in this as we decide what to do.

This afternoon I begin my first-ever-adult-like-in-the-real-world internship! I wish I could call it a "job," but sadly they are unable to pay their interns this year, at least until a grant goes through (hopefully!!!!!). It's a case manager position at the Community Family Shelter run by the Salvation Army in Nampa. Since it is my senior year of college (WOW!) I'm required to do 200 hours of internship each semester. So I'll be keeping track of homeless families while they stay at the shelter and assisting them in finding resources for what they need. I'm really excited about it! Oh! I'll have to find out what the rules are concerning sharing my faith! I know in government agencies this is definitely a no-no, but since this is funded by the Salvation Army . . . hmm. It probably still has to be restricted since it is also partially government funded.

Well, I need to get going on some more cookies! Snickerdoodles this time, which are more fun for me. :)

Laundry, Dishes, and Baking, Oh My!!!

The weeks since the honeymoon have definitely opened my eyes up to the real world! Sure, I was pretty much on my own last year, well, with a couple of girl roomies, but at least then I only had to take care of myself! I had no idea that two people could go through THAT many dishes that fast! And Michael's not even here for one meal of the day! It probably doesn't help that I've decided he needs homebaked cookies in his lunch, so there's always cookie sheets in the sink.
Does anyone have any dinner recipes to recommend, that use hardly any dishes in the making of them???
Thank you, Rachelle, for reminding me that I would still be doing dishes even if I was single out on my own, just now I have someone coming home to me every night! Maybe God did know what He was doing by bringing this change in my life right now. :)
The pic is of my first kitchen as a married woman. I've been brave and already tackled several new recipes on this minute counter space, from citrus chicken (I think I used too much cayenne pepper, but my guests really liked it!) to my first-ever upside-down pineapple cake (which Michael doesn't care for, but that meant more for me! yum!).
I'm serious about the recipe request! Feel free to email me if you have any good ones!

Okay, here are the pics, finally! Computers can be so frustrating!!

Wedding Pics

I've included some of my favorite wedding pics! Somewhere . . . I'm not sure if they'll be above or below this message! (Remember, I'm new to this!!)

I'm new to this!!

Since Michael and I got married and then moved away from so many people that we'd like to stay in touch with, I thought maybe this was an idea to update everyone all at once! I've fallen in love with Rachelle Shultz's blog, and so thought I'd give it a go myself! Mine won't have pictures of incredibly adorable children on it (hopefully not for a few more years!!!) but I'll do my best to make it an enjoyable read. :)

Today is Saturday, which means I get Michael to myself for an entire day!! He's been working ten hour days, five days a week, and then comes home at night too exhausted at times to even have a conversation! Since school hasn't started, my friends haven't arrived to Nampa yet, so I end up being starved for someone to talk to most of the time! Thankfully, Michael got half of yesterday off so now I've had him with me for almost 24 hours straight! We were up late watching movies last night so we're still in bed and it's now just past noon! I LOVE Saturdays!! :)

Yesterday I finally cut my hair. I was growing it out for the wedding, but finally decided I was sick of it! Michael got a haircut, too, but it doesn't matter; he still wakes up with the most unrelenting cowlic (sp?) every morning! We both opted for a new style, but his looks the same as his old one, and I look in the mirror and wonder where all of my hair went!

Michael and I both miss all of you incredibly, but there is one who cannot read this who we miss as well! That would be the dog, Buddy. Every year when I come to school I go into pet withdrawals, and this year it's even worse because we have pics of Buddy that remind me of that fluffy, burping, goofball of a dog that I got so incredibly attached to this summer! I can't wait till we can live in a place that allows painting the walls, dishwasher installation, but most importantly a canine companion!!!