Dreams & Life

I have the kind of personality that always feels like I could be doing more. I'm a bit of a perfectionist and want to achieve big things every day. The motivation will be lacking here and there, but most days I can come up with some productivity to make me feel like I at least achieved something that day. Even if it was just ironing three of John's shirts, or watering the garden. I feel better about myself and I feel better about my day!

I also think a lot about my long-term achievements. These are harder for me to think about, because they just seem so small. I don't have a degree, I haven't really moved up any corporate career ladder. I've done some traveling and got some good years with YWAM under my belt, but that's about it. I feel like I am creative, and I really enjoy work that involves creativity, so I've been thinking about how to expand on some achievements in my life that involve creativity, and things that I love doing. We've also been thinking about the 8-5, being a slave to a company/employer type work we've been doing the last few years and are ready to branch into something else.

Hence, my new plan! I am very good at making plans, strategising the best route, writing to do lists, and figuring out what needs to be done. I've been getting better and better at actually turning that plan into reality, and this is one plan that I really hope I can make work.

I love photography, and have always considered photography to be a hobby. I've done some decent pictures and feel like I've improved a lot in the last few years. As we've been looking at trying to get part-time work as we move to Redding, I've been thinking more about how nice it would be to be my own boss, make my own hours, take vacations whenever I want to. Enter Photography plan.

I'm hoping to become a professional photographer. I'd like to start with family portraits and hopefully weddings, and then go from there. My main plan initially is to build up my portfolio, build a website, and then when we get to Redding, get the word out and hope to find some clients! I already have some friends lined up for family portraits, so I hope I'll have enough for a decent website. If you'd like me to take some informal family portrait pictures for you (for free!) in the next 3 weeks to help me achieve me my new goal, please let me know!

Here are some recent kiddy portrait pictures that I like:

Go West, young couple!

I figured, "What better way to announce some big news, than on my blog?"

Yes, in case you haven't heard by now, John and I are moving to California at the beginning of September. We are going to do the School of Ministry at Bethel Church, in Redding. Redding is about 3 hours north of San Francisco, 3 hours south of the Oregon border, and three hours east of the Redwood Forest and the coast. My brother, Sam and his family will still be out there (he did the school last year) and we are super excited to be spending this next year with them. We have really been missing family this last year and a half and are ready to be with family for a bit.

We're excited to do the school for multiple reasons. We feel like it will be a good next step before heading back to YWAM, and it will really help take us deeper in our relationship with God and with each other as well as really refining some character issues and continuing to center our identity in God.

We are also excited to be around family as my brother and his family will still be there (he did the school last year). These last two years we have really missed family a lot and it will be so nice to get to live near family and to see them every day.

Our plan is to move at the beginning of September. We are sad to leave Colorado and our home here in Fort Collins, and we'll miss our friends a lot, but we are excited for the next step and feel confident that this is what we are supposed to do next.

So that's what we're up to next!

NYC - Day 3

Today, we decide to follow our VRBO host’s suggestions and go to Brown, a café about a block away from our apartment. It’s this cute little non-descript place with a tray of the best looking pastries this side of Europe. We sit, order Americanos and two pains en chocolat and enjoy the quiet music and pretend to be New Yorkers. The pains en chocolat are heavenly, and the coffee is strong. With food in our bellies, and caffeine in our blood stream, we take the subway up to Penn Station to meet Bekah, who took the train down from Connecticut to hang out with us in New York for a day!

We take the train down to Battery Park and Lower Manhattan to take the free Staten Island ferry. The Statue of Liberty is closed to the public (except to go to the island and gift shop, but apparently the security lines take forever and it turns it into a whole day affair), but the ferry takes you within 350 yards of it. We decided to take the ferry there and back to take pictures, to see the Statue of Liberty, and to see the Lower Manhattan skyline. It was actually quite relaxing and rather fun! We were off our feet, it was free, and we had about 15 minutes to just hang out on Staten Island before taking the next ferry back.

We had arranged to meet John’s cousin, Will, for lunch. He lives out in Brooklyn and invited us to head down that way to eat lunch at this great little restaurant. I had a delicious salad that was nice and refreshing as the weather had officially gotten hot and humid! He then takes us to this great little park, where we sit and chat, and we get to see a bit more of Brooklyn. We finish up with some delicious ice-cream, a quick trip to his apartment, and then back on the subway to Washington Square Park. Will heads off to work and we stop for a drink and a rest at the park, while taking pictures, and enjoying some initially refreshing rain, which later cranks up the humidity even more.

We hop back on the Subway, make our way to the Flatiron building, the building that John and I were the most excited to go see. We take more pix, grab a smoothie, sit in the park and relax some more. We then go drop off Bekah at Penn Station then make our way home, stopping by to get dinner. We finish the day in bed, eating pizza and beer. A great third day!

NYC - Day 2

With our bodies aching and feet a-hurting, we get up again to face the grand city of New York. Today, we decided to do the mega-touristy tour-bus thing. We decided that our bodies hurt too much to walk around again, and we wanted to sit and see everything. We take the subway to the bus stop where we can buy tickets, but get distracted by a really big H&M. We head in and find tons and tons of clothes. I ended up in the changing room (this is British for fitting room) with 38 items of clothing. After trying all of them on, I end up aching as much I had done the night before after walking around New York for 12 hours straight. I was very glad that we were going to be bussing it the rest of the day!

After buying way less than 38 items, we head to the bus stop, and start our tour of the city. We only did the downtown loop which surprisingly covered almost everything we wanted to see anyway. We go past the Empire State Building, quickly zip through the Flatiron district then decide to eat lunch in Greenwich Village where there was a Gray’s Papaya on the corner by the bus stop (a hot dog place that had been recommended to me). We get the “Recession Special”, two hot dogs and a yummy juice drink for $4.75. We sit outside on the curb and enjoy our lunch!

We head back on the bus and take it south, towards Lower Manhattan and the financial district. We barely make out the Statue of Liberty through the trees, but we see lots of other sights on the way. We then head east, going right past the neighbourhood our apartment is located, and get to see a lot of the tenement buildings that now house young up and coming Manhattanites, but formerly housed thousands and thousands of immigrants. We eventually head further north, seeing the Trump Tower, the Waldorf Astoria among other sights. Once we hit Fifth Ave and Central Park, we decide we’ve had enough of the bus and we want to explore Fifth Ave.

We head into Apple – the coolest Apple store, actually the coolest store I’ve ever been to, then pop into FAO Schwarz (as seen in “Big”). We then walk about 15 miles (at least that’s what it feels like) to get to a Best Buy to purchase another card for our camera (our current one was only letting us take 150 pictures at a time), then we make our way all the way back uptown to the Guggenheim. We were surprised by a really long line that snaked all the way around the building and to the side, but fortunately we went through it quite quickly! The museum was showcasing a lot of Frank Lloyd Wright’s designs and scale models for buildings that had and hadn’t been constructed. Being in there was really cool, but after seeing the third floor of architect drawings and an increasing back and foot ache, we decide to head on to dinner.

We catch the final tour bus down to Times Square where we find a pizza place that had been started by an Albanian family, and now has multiple chains across the USA. We decide we’re tired enough, and head home to our lovely apartment with its comfortable and gorgeous shower, to wash off all the humidity from our bodies! Day 2 done with and we’re loving it!

New York - Day 1

(Pix to follow)

I woke up wishing John was one of those people who jumped out of bed as soon as their alarm went off or as soon as they were nudged by their wife. Alas, he is not. We slowly get ready, hit up some delic Jewish pastry that our “landlady” had left out for us and drink orange juice, we are ready head out into the city.

We make our way first to Soho, to wander around there and do some shopping. Initially disappointed by the small H&M we find there, we hit it big in Uniqlo, a Japanese store that I had gone to many times in Japan. We wandered around some more, looking in fun little discount stores as well as Top Shop (sadly, way too 80’s style) and stopping to use the loo at Starbucks. We then have a delicious lunch at Café Gitane, in Nolita, a Moroccan inspired restaurant recommended by the Lonely Planet NYC.

We start to slowly make our way uptown to the Guggenheim, where the gonyc website had told me that they do free (or pay what you wish) hours on Friday night from 5-8pm. After taking our time by Central Park and taking pictures of the very cool museum building, designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, we finally go to enter the building, where we are told that the museum is closing! Then we see a small sign right outside saying that, as of last weekend, they have moved their “Pay What You Wish” night to Saturday nights. We rush down Fifth Ave (well, sort of rush, we were in a bus, so it was a bit slow!) to get to the MOMA (Museum of Modern Art), because their free night was also on Friday night, but we had chosen the Guggenheim. We make it there by 6, giving us two wonderful hours to enjoy the amazing paintings and sculptures they had on offer. We both really enjoyed it (and would definitely recommend it over the Guggenheim, if you have to choose) and I really enjoyed seeing the paintings I had studied in the Art Appreciation class I had taken this last semester.

By 8pm, we were starving and ready to have dinner, but our feet were killing us. We followed again a Lonely Planet NYC suggestion and make our way west of Times Square to Marseille, a lovely Art Deco French restaurant that served my favourite beer, Hoegaarden, on tap! We had a lovely dinner, then hobbled home to bed.