Eight

Today is going to be a meme day for me. Mamachristina tagged me a few weeks ago with this Meme of Eight, so here goes:

Eight things I am passionate about:

1. My Jesus, who loves me far beyond what I deserve and has blessed me overwhelmingly.

2. My Man! I love how he can be a hubby, father, thinker, leader, grillmaster, floor-mopper, poop-changer, swing-pusher, massage-giver, and my best friend. All rolled into one amazing person.

3. My Savannah. Sometimes it still seems surreal that I am her mama. It seems that should be something that only grown-ups get to do…and then I realize that I am, in fact, grown-up, and that I have been blessed beyond measure with this curly-headed child with a stubborn streak like her daddy and a penchant for carbs like…well, like me.

4. My family. Which consists of my parents, my older sister, and 3 younger brothers. We had some good times growing up, and now when we all get together (which is rare – we are spread across the entire country), we always re-create some of those good memories. Jamming on the piano and drums and sax. Playing Pictionary and Uno. Putting together a puzzle, which is a great family project and a good way to get people talking. And of course, they all think Savannah is a rock star, which is just fine in my book.

5. Friendships. I tend to believe that quality matters more than quantity in this area. So, although I have a ton of acquaintances, I only have a few really good, close friends. And it works for me. I truly believe I have some of the best friends in the world, the kind that would drop everything if you needed them, the kind you can just lounge around with while in a state of total frump, and they don’t care.

6. Finances. I am somewhat of a nerdy person when it comes to money. For sure, I wasn’t always this way; there was a time in my life where I frivolously spent money that I didn’t have. It wasn’t until we had been married for over a year that we heard about Financial Peace University, and we went through the course. That was absolutely the best and most freeing thing we could have ever done. We paid down what seemed like an enormous amount of debt in a fairly short time, and we are now debt-free except for the house. Which we will hopefully be done with in a couple of years. Waahoo….I cannot wait for the day when I don’t have to send in a monthly mortgage payment. The thought of paying all that interest just about kills me.

7. Recipes. Notice I didn’t say actually cooking or baking. But I love collecting recipes. Of course the purported thought would be that I end up actually making the recipe, but honestly, I have a couple of binders full of recipes that I have never tried and that I may never get around to trying. But I love pouring over them, imagining how they taste. A lot of them look delicious, but I know I can’t make them because they won’t be the least bit helpful in my quest to lose weight and become healthy. I think I have a slight (and weird) addiction, because even when I do try a new recipe and it doesn’t turn out to be a winner, I still can’t throw it away. I hang on to it like an old sweater from the 80’s that you know you should toss. Yeah, I know. Makes no sense, not even to me, so I don’t expect you to understand.

8. Books. I love, love, love to read. When I was younger, we would go to the library every week, and I would check out stacks of books and devour them. Obviously, I don’t read as often as I would like to now that I’m in charge of running a real household with an actual husband and baby, but I never turn down the chance to get a new book. And if I really, really love a book, I will re-read it over and over. And over. Like 15 or 20 times.

Eight things I'd like to do before I die:

1. Go to Greece and Italy. Those are my two dream countries. I have a lot more on the list, but those are my top two. If any of you have ever been to either of those places, please tell me so that I can grill you for info.



2. Before I met and married Ricardo, I was on the path to becoming a missionary in Honduras, where I was going to work in an orphanage. Two things that I dearly love are missions and children, and so one day I would love it if we could give enough money to build a new orphanage.

3. Design and build my dream custom home. Which would include a huge, awesome kitchen. And I would love to be able to pay cash for it upfront, no mortgage payment, no interest.

4. Live on a couple of acres of land. Preferably with green, verdant grass and an excess of leafy trees scattered over the land. And my fantasy is to have a long windy lane, with graceful trees on either side that bend their branches towards each other to form a canopy of shade that my children can play under. Dreamy, no?



5. Fly an airplane. I realize this is a bit far-fetched. And I blame it on my dad, who used to take us to air shows when we were young, and from whom I acquired the love of flying machinery. I love heights and flying and the feeling of freedom (did I mention that I went sky-diving once?). I doubt it will ever happen, but it’s still something I would love.

6. Own a grand piano. Oh, how this would make my very soul happy. I love to play, and have been playing since I was 4 years old; but right now, I don’t even have a keyboard to practice on . I can picture it now; it is a gleaming black baby grand, sitting in my dream house, which of course has a music room.


7. Take a photography class and purchase a really good camera. I love being able to capture the little every day things, but I am not good at it. And my camera has the longest delay imaginable, so I miss a lot of good shots that would doubtless otherwise be destined for greatness were it not for the ineptness of my camera. Or possibly the camera operator.

8. Go to this bakery in Wisconsin.
We just saw a show on PBS about Wisconsin, and they featured this place. I have never, ever in my life seen pies like this. Ricardo was seriously ready to jump in the car and head cross-country just to get a slice after the show ended. And this picture doesn't even do it justice...the pies looked unbelievable on the program. (I realize this is such a frivolous thing, but it is 12:30 in the morning, and my brain is refusing to cooperate with the eight things I must do before I die).



Eight books I've read recently:

1. Sweet Caroline
2. What to Eat
3. As Sure as the Dawn
4. Making Children Mind Without Losing Yours
5. Shiloh Autumn
6. Sheet Music
7. Mrs. Mike
8. Total Money Makeover

I am not going to tag anyone, but please feel free to grab this meme and do it yourself if it looks fun, or if you need some good filler blog material. Whatever the case may be.

Mamachristina was also kind enough to bestow upon me this award from Arte y Pico.

Thank you so much! Christina has an awesome blog where she is chronicling her everyday life as well as her incredible weight loss journey. She is a huge inspiration to me.

I am passing this award onto the following bloggers, most of whom I have just gotten to know. I love to drop by their blogs, and they always make my day when they stop by mine to visit:

Sarah at Life in the Parsonage
Jennifer at The Miles Family Adventure
Jenn at A Country Girls Ramblings
Jennifer at Taking My Time
Tracey at Grace comes by Hearing

And the rules to go along with it:

1. Pick five (5) blogs that you consider deserve this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also for contributing to the blogging community, no matter what language.
2. Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog to be visited by everyone.
3. Each award winner has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award itself.Award-winner and the one who has given the prize have to show the link of “Arte y Pico” blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award (http://arteypico.blogspot.com/)