Shopping for School Supplies!

Freshly sharpened pencils, notebooks, erasers, paperclips...the essentials for starting the school year.  Definitely not the key words of June...and for sure the most empty aisle in the entire store!

Yet, as one of my school years comes to a close, another is just beginning.  Today I went out to buy a few things for Spain... I could probably buy it there (at a marked up price of course), but I want to come fully assembled, ready with everything.  Just in case.  That's just my style.

My goal was to get some skirts, sandals, all my school supplies, an umbrella, and some pjs for under $30 out of pocket.  And I did--very, very craftily.  So craftily in fact that I will tell you.

What I got:

• 2 pairs of Steve Madden Sandals
• 2 pairs of PJ pants (one short, one long) and a tank
• 2 skirts and 2 matching tops
• 2 notebooks, 1 hard-cover folder, 1 notepad, 40 mechanical pencils, eraser, metal clips, led refills, and post-it notes

What I got for my husband as part of his b-day present:

• 1 Collared Shirt
• 1 Graphic Tee
• Addis athletic shoes

How I did it:

• COINSTAR:  These machines ROCK.  You take all of your loose change sitting around the house dump it into one at your local grocery store and cash out.  The key is, most people want cash, and the machine takes 10% of your total.  No thank you!  To avoid this surcharge, take a giftcard.  It's 100% money in your pocket!  A mason jar on our table totaled over $70.  (We've been saving up for about a year or so).  Cha-ching!
• BECOME A TEACHER:  Basically, you can assume that all your students will fill your pockets with Target gift cards.  And this is a fact.  I had a few leftover from students just waiting for the taking.
• ROLLBACKS AND COUPONS:  Target does have lots of clearances... you just have to know where to look.  Don't buy your items as eye level (because they are the most expensive).  Lots of them have sticky coupons right on the items.  For example, some of the sticky, clear post-it notes had a coupon on it for $1 off, but it's on ANY of their products.  They put it on the most expensive one.  Take it off, and buy the cheapest one.  Easy! 
• REGISTER REWARDS:  Off Broadway shoes gives you 10% back of your previous total on your next purchase.  I had about $8 in rewards leftover.
• AAA: New York and Company gives you an automatic 30% off if you are a AAA member.  I used my expired card to get it because the lady was nice.  Yusss!  PJs were 50% off, plus my 30% off, making them 80% off!
• SHOP THE CLEARANCE RACK:  Ummm...duh? ;)

Here's the booty:

Gettin' ready for school!!  Can you tell I love color?

love&family :)

This weekend was a great one.  We flew into Baltimore, MD for Charlie's cousin's wedding.  It was a CRAZY afternoon, trying to get to the airport by 4:40pm, but we somehow managed.  I was worried about recreating a scene from Home Alone, but luckly, we avoided the frantic, airport mad-dash.

Baltimore is a beautiful place--- it's historic, trendy, and scenic.  I think I loved it so much because it reminded me of Europe? ;)   

We spent Friday evening at a bar downtown enjoying bluegrass music, crab cakes and family.  By all accounts a winning combination.  It was so good to see everyone and kick-back.  Sometimes being so far away from family I think it's easy to fall into a groove, work ourselves into the ground, and when we come up for air, we forget how good it feels.

The next day we spend touring Baltimore with the family! Our shirts were sticking to our backs and the overcast sky was somehow relentlessly sunny...but it was a great time.

The wedding the next day was beautiful...and I can honestly say that I danced to every song...which was the plan.  It was a blast.  It was held at a beautiful, historic home (where Will Smith got married) and the ceremony was in the outdoor garden.  The vows were lovely, the night was a blast, and it was well-worth our trip to see everyone and share in true love.  Who DOESN'T want to be a part of that?

Here's the happy couple!

The flight back home wasn't so perfect...we battled a 3 hour delay due to the weather, but no matter.  We had a deck of cards, good books, and a Droid Incredible.  There's nothing a little Double Bexley and Bejewled can't cure. ;)

25th birthday surprise.

I turned 25 on May 25th. My golden birthday! I knew the next weekend that Charlie had a surprise planned for me. He just told me: "I have all the plans taken care of. Trust me."

That's when my wheels started turning... in my normal "wifely" way.

A surprise? Are we going on vacation? How long will we be gone? Should we let the apartment know? Do I need to pack a bag? What do I wear? Do I need to grocery shop this week? Do I need to buy anything special? What will happen with Luna???

"Trust me, Kathryn."

"I know...but..."

I was excited but anxious about it because nothing seemed to be planned.  I hadn't seen Charlie working on anything!  Come Saturday afternoon, the day the "festivities" were about to begin, I was confused. Charlie told me noon, and then 5:00, and then 6:00, and then it was close to 7:00... I was getting mad. Where is the plan? Are we leaving? Did you actually plan ANYTHING!?!?!?

Then a got a text with this picture inside:

A late birthday text?  Still confused.

Then I realized (with Charlie's prompting), that was OUR APARTMENT DOOR! My best friend in the world, Susanna (and her new baby and her sister!) had driven all the way from Michigan to surprise us for the weekend!! I couldn't believe it. I cried when I opened the door-- The best birthday present EVER!

I hadn't met her son, Sam before...but I loved him instantly.  Just as an "Aunt Kathryn" should.  I don't think you realize, until someone really close to you has a baby, how incredible they are and how special the gift of being a mother is.  It was so moving to see Susanna and how she has grown as a mother... and share that with her.  Sam's little smile melted me away!

The first day we went to the pool and soaked up the sun. :)  Sam got to go in the water for the first time!  Dinner was a night uptown.

The next day we went to Discovery Place and messed around like kids.

 I feel so thankful and blessed to have shared these precious moments with my best friend as she raises her son and spend such concentrated time together when there are normally so many miles between us :)

Sigh.  Did it really have to end?

3 semanas... 3 weeks...

I seriously cannot believe how fast time is passing. Has it really been this long since I've done an entry?  Am I really 25 already? It seems like it was just the beginning of spring, and now it's almost June. We've had lots of rain so the leaves on the trees are green and lush, the grass is actually GREEN, and flowers are everywhere. The heat radiates of the pavement, and you sweat walking from your car to the store. Yes, I think summer is almost upon us.

I can't believe I leave for Spain in 3 weeks time. (And I still need my hotel and transportation!) This is my task for tomorrow afternoon.... Madrid here I come.

My emotions are distinct this go-around. I always feel a very specific way right before I leave for Spain. I feel happy to leave, stressed to have to do it, and eager to return to my second home :) I'm calmer than I was a few weeks ago. The workload for my master's program is a stressful reminder that I'm not going to have much of a break this summer, and that sucks, but I look forward to the fact that I'm going to be learning in a new way that I never have before... in the place I love most in all the world. I look forward to the challenge and dread it at the same time. For some reason, the word "Masters" STILL seems so distant to me. Is that really me? Kathryn? Getting her MASTERS? That was always something that you do when you're "like thirty"... I'm with people twice my age who know more about the world than I do, and I hoping my little Albion college degree measures up!

And yet, I'm sure I'll be with others who are thinking, "Geeze, everyone is half my age, fresh out of college, and I haven't taken a test in 15 years."

We'll see. :) I look forward to learning from everyone.  The cool thing is we all bring something different to the table.  Somehow, I think I'll be listening and learning a lot this trip :).

I'll be staying HERE if you are interested to see it.  It's in Spanish, but you can see pictures of the residencia.  I'll be sans the IKEA decor...obvio.  But you get the idea.

Tonight Charlie and I ate at a Spanish Grille in the Ballantyne area...the Sangria was good as was the paella.  Far better seafood than I was expecting.  I wanted to order more tapas, but I'll get to do that soon enough... and the ones in Spain vienen con un plato de acetunas.* :)

*come with a plate of olives

There's an app for that!

I must preface this by saying I have never had an "spakin' new technology" anything.  Every phone I've every owned made a call, sent a text, and took a few crappy, blurry pictures.

That is until yesterday when I became the proud owner of the HTC Android Incredible.  They just hit shelves Thursday... needless to say, last night I was completely consumed for 5 hours straight learning it's ins and outs.  I was creating my own google calendar, connecting my phonebook to facebook pages (yes, I can spy on you!), and downloading every free "app" under the sun.  It was great.  I talked with Charlie via an internet Skype service, viewed constellations from where I was standing on my phone, hit up the cheapest gas station, added widgets on my different phone interfaces, read a Spanish comic book, made photo frames of Luna, checked my e-mail, created a grocery list....

...and then I got a phone call from my mom.

...and the phone didn't work.

And so, I spent about 30 minutes on the phone with "Steve" from Verizon Wireless trying to figure out the reason behind my problem.

What are the odds that the "Incredible" do-it-all-phone that has an application for everything under the sun can't make a phone call?  Apparently pretty high in my case.  I guess in the first wave of phones they are trying to "get the kinks ironed out"...and if it happens again I need to restart the phone.  If the problem persists they will order me a new one.  Oh joy.

In the meantime, though...I will be enjoying the many features the phone has to offer...and keeping up with the news at work. 

I suppose that's what you get when it's "very expensive."


P.S.  If you did not get the last joke then you did not spend the better part of your childhood in the 90s ;)

Lipstick empowerment.

Mornings have been really hard for me this week.  Usually the morning is a calm, quiet time, but in the last few days I've been feeling really stressed, that was repressed during spring break, but emerges again with the start of work and getting back to, well, "life."  My morning shower consists of me talking to myself about everything I have to accomplish, the order I have to accomplish it in, and how I know I won't be able to get it all done. 

That's where the lipstick comes in.  I have a million tubes just sitting around that I haven't used in ages.  Remember when that really ugly brown color was "in" in the late 90s?  (I know it's gross that I still have makeup from this long ago...).  That ugly brown "caramel mocha" just became my morning empowerment.

I began to write encouraging verses, sayings and quotes on my mirror... the words I need to hear.... to stare back at me and lift me up.  Maybe I need to hear about peace.  Maybe hope.  Maybe I need to be reminded to believe in myself... it's very liberating.  And surprisingly fun to write on a mirror.  Try it sometime.

So scribbled across the top of my mirror are the simple words, "for the battle is the Lord's" (1 Samuel 17:47)... from the most powerful story of David and Goliath.  I read it the other day in it's entirety for our Starting Point group, and it is my new favorite of the moment.

Happy mirror writing :)

la nube de ceniza...

...aka..."the ash cloud" preventing airlines from flying ANY PLANES in Europe.  Traveler's nightmare :(.  I was reading in El Pais that there was a time in the 1800s when this volcano erupted for an entire year. Hmmm....let us hope that June is clear for travel. Don't the pictures below just make your skin crawl? I think that's just about the worst headache imaginable....I feel so bad for these people.  Mother nature is a forced to be reckoned with.

I love traveling visiting new places.  Who am I kidding?  Traveling is HORRIBLE!  Jet lag, missing/almost missing connected flights, tons of people, crappy and expensive food, airplane headaches... blah.  Somebody want to invent teleportation?

Still, with each international (and national) flight that I take, I learn more tricks of the trade that make it a little more bearable.  I don't know what helps you...but this is what helps me...

1. DON'T GET ON THE PLANE.  Okay, you need to get on the plane, but what's the rush?  Everyone wants to be first in line to be on the plane with a 13 hour flight ahead of them...take a back seat.  You've got lots of time to sit.
2. DON'T SIT IN THOSE AIRPORT CHAIRS.  Sit on the floor by a window.  So much better.  Try it sometime.
3. PACK YOUR OWN FOOD.  It's like $10 for a sandwich.  This seems obvious to me.
4. AISLE SEATS ARE THE BEST.  Window seats seem like the winning place (views and a place to rest your head), but they are more cramped, and with the aisle you have the ability to stretch your legs out.  Just don't trip the flight attendant.  They are pretty good at stepping over you, though.
5. NAB THE BLANKETS AND PILLOWS, STAT.  The flight usually only have a limited supply, so if they aren't already on your seat ask for one right away.
6. BRING YOUR OWN HEADPHONES.  They charge you $5 for the in-flight movie and you can use you i-pod head phones to watch.
7. GO WITH THE FLOW.  There's not much you can do to change a delayed (or even canceled flight).  So sit back and ignore the stressed around you.
8. DON'T TAKE NAPS WHEN CROSSING TIME ZONES on an overnight (new time) flight.  Sleep if you can...if you get a wink, great.  When you arrive in the "morning" stay up a normal day and crash at local time.  You will be delusional, but it will help you adjust faster.