New Experiences

This year has been a battle with the limitations of the 24 hour day....Granted, I do not have to spend any part of those 24 hours knocking on doors for fire drills, confiscating alcohol bottles, or calling Campus Safety about a fight, but things have been busy. Below I have some words of advice and some stories I wanted to share with you.

Lesson #1: Partake in finding those hole in the wall places and enjoy the community!
This past weekend I spent 10 hours on a my CAPTA analysis and then headed to East Lansing for the weekend with my family. I hit the road with an overnight back sans my laptop and books and reveled in the fact I would be away from the books for approximately 32 hours. I had my first Crunchy's experience-sounds super divvy and greasy but the food is great, the drink specials astound, and it is the perfect way to get in the mood for a college football game. While we did not indulge in the bucket of beer, we did enjoy our pre-game celebration. Believe me-we'll be going back.

Lesson #2: Meet new friends, even if its just for the night!
Readers, this is not a suggestion to partake in one night stands or to make some wasted friends at a local bar. Go sit in a college football student section! I graduated from a small liberal arts Catholic college-our basketball games were probably the most well-attended events. Going to MSU and sitting in the upper bowl with thousands of my not-so closest friends was fantastic. This community has its own way of communicating: listening for the cue of the band or slamming our cabooses onto the metal bleachers to row together or to calling out the one Wisconsin kid sitting with his rather embarrassed girlfriend. Green and white were the appropriate colors in dress and bottle water and hot pretzels and hot dogs were the foods of choice and convenience to stave off the effects of the mass consumption of alcohol that occurred earlier in the day. My throat is sore because I bled green that night.

Lesson #3: Take the time to eat a bowl of chili at midnight.
AKA celebrate the little and big moments in life. After the game nine of us sat around my sister's and her friend's apartment eating white chicken chili and replaying every note worthy play from the game. Talking until two in the morning and then sleeping until it was actually light out was a treat as well, especially for a girl that gets up at 5:30 to work with 3 to 6 year old children. :-)

Moral of the story: take the time to enjoy life. Often I find myself saying "I don't have time", "I will never have time", "I shouldn't take the time". But guess what? You should take the time and reward yourself every once in a while. My friends find something rewarding this week to do for yourself-it'll make you a happier, more patient, and more loving person.

Curtains are in.

Yes, that is right, the curtains are almost done--actually officially 50% done. Don't worry once I am able to master my picture taking ability and figure out how to post to the blog, you will see their loveliness. So far the roomies have been pretty impressed with my spectacular sewing skills. So much so that I am rethinking that whole MRS degree idea.

I of course had to fight with the bobbin. For those followers who haven't had to fight with a bobbin on a sewing machine, its where the thread for the back side of the fabric comes from to complete the stitch. I've heard that my Grandma had issues with the sewing machine, and I am convinced that it must have been this whole bobbin thing. The bobbin is what broke my needle in the first place, and it hands down I think the most complicated mechanism on the whole machine. I know Elizabeth feels my pain. We also had our own issues with bobbins, during the historic sewing of aprons. (Perhaps this historic sewing was really the start of the future Mr. and Mrs. Ireland!--but then it was probably Appalachia--flooded with memories right now!!!!)  That was before the days of Facebook, so I  don't have a picture of those easily available.

So eventually the bobbin, after probably 10 attempts, was successful. None of this had to do with actually winding the bobbin. See there were no empty one's so I used the tan thread bobbin Grandma had made, who knows how long ago, and even that didn't even lead to easy success (Hence why I am convinced the bobbin was her issue all along!)

Anyway that's that for the blog today.

Hello Broken Door Handle!

Well friends, September has come and gone, and so has summer. While I am looking forward to seeing the street as all the leaves change, I am dreading the four letter s word. On the note of S words, the toilet has been doing sooo well these days! And I didn't have to replace the floater ball, or the flusher or anything! It's like magic/ I shortened the chain on the flapper valve. It's like a whole new world. Well, it would be better for the sink to stop dripping, slowly but surely.

This week has had is characteristic breaks to it. Like the door knob on the front door. Thank you to Dani who came home last Friday after having pulled off the handle. I called the landlord Saturday and was asked, "Well you still have the handle, right?" YES, of course I have the handle, what do you think I'd do with it? Chuck it at your house? Try to catch a squirrel? Maybe throw it through my windshield?While it is a cool antique, and I could use it to make a cool hanging shelf out of it, I would much rather be able to open my door. Geez.

Additionally, we have been operating the sink using the spray nozzle for the past few days. The lever popped off. Don't worry, I didn't throw that away either, and I did just figure out how to get it back on...the sink is now functioning normally. Other than that life has been pretty ho-hum around here. We all have been able to take advantage of ArtPrize, to it's full extent, and have had a few visitors join us to see it, Dani and I have had random friends show up, while Lydia's family was down for the day last weekend. Oh, sadness too. Bill and Bella are gone. Our life is now one chihuahua down. Mia is pretty happy to be the reigning chihuahua upstairs, I just know it. She is the queen once again. Welcome the new girl, Erin. She walks loud, it might interrupt my beauty sleep We'll see. Ooh, and I got excused from Jury Duty! While I was pretty excited to serve my home Township of Shelby, this is just a lot less work. I've also had the joy of e-mailing with Terry Kowal, the lovely clerk of the Twp., I decided I should vote and get an absentee ballot. One day Shelby, I will serve on a jury for you, just not for my VISTA year. Back to the laundry!