The Perfect Fit

I never realized how much Papa actually cared about what I love doing until now. I guess after watching Soul Surfer and several other videos about Bethany Hamilton, especially her documentary “Heart of a Soul Surfer,” I should have picked up on that. The way that he gave Bethany her dream of glorifying him while doing the one thing that she absolutely loves! I don’t have such a passion I guess, I mean something so clear-cut, so I guess that I doubted that he cared about the passions that I do have.

Over time, especially my time overseas, I have seen him giving me many of my hearts desires, even ones that I didn’t realize that I had. He has been revealing my passions to me, as well as allowing me to live out those passions as a part of his work.  It is a beautiful thing the way that he has been unfolding my dreams ever so slowly and placing my desires before me to take hold of.

This past week I have seen this more concretely than any other time. I have held this desire, this hope inside of me for some time now. I have thought about it and dreamed about it several times, but continued to push it back in my mind and in my heart because most of the time it seemed impossible or impractical. But now I have seen this dream realized and I couldn’t be more excited and more in awe of the Father’s love for me and knowledge of who I am and what my passions are.

I can remember two years ago when hearing about the café project thinking about how I really wanted to be a big part of it. As you know it has taken time for the opening of the café to come about for various reasons, but it did in September 2011 and since than I have been working there.  I have been loving this part of my work and feeling less and less passion for my role as a teacher and more passion for my role as part of the Café team.

But it didn’t seem practical to work in the café more full-time and there were a few different things stopping me from saying that I would do it, such as my need to spend several hours studying language. I also never expressed to my leaders that this was a desire of mine, and in some ways I didn’t realize that it was a desire or that it could even work.

You see, they have been looking for a local operations manager for some time now and they finally found one a few weeks ago since our current manager will be leaving for the states. He will be gone temporarily, but when he comes back he plans to commit more time to another project that he is working on, therefore there is a need for a permanent manager who can do what he has been doing and work along side him as he continues to lead the vision of the café.

The operations manager that they found seemed like a perfect fit! He was friendly, he spoke great English, and he loved the job… Until, he got a better offer in another city. After two weeks of training he notified us that this wasn’t the perfect fit for him, he had found something better.

When I heard this, I was thinking, “What are we going to do our manager is leaving in a few weeks for the states and we have no one to do it, except… ME!” This seemed like the only easy solution and the more I thought about it and talked with Curtis about it, the more I realized that this was my dream. We also found quickly that the timing was perfect because we had just gotten a new teacher from the UK who could teach my class while I work in the Café.

As quickly as I realized this, my dream was realized. I talked to our manager the next day about it and everyone in leadership agreed that it was a perfect fit and that it was most definitely orchestrated by our father in he*ven. They know me and understood that this role fits with many of my passions.

I could not be more thrilled about what Dad has me doing. I really feel that this has been perfectly orchestrated and that it truly fits who Dad made me to be. It suits many of my passions including: coffee, baking, decorating, socializing, loving and communicating with people, creating new things and the list goes on and on. I am also a good point with language and will be able to do much of the needed communication in Russian, which will give me even more practice than I am getting now.

Please talk with Dad for me as I enter into this position. I am so excited about it, I know that I love doing most of what it takes to fill this role, but I am sure that it will be trying in some ways too. I am also entering into a leadership position and that is no small thing, so I could really use your chats in this area.

Thank you all so much for your continual support! I cannot tell you how excited I was to share this news with you. I am in love with being in the cafe, working with people there, helping with the vision and coming up with new food and drink ideas. I love the café team, our excellent baker, magnificent barista and two energetic young volunteers. I love the atmosphere and want to work on communicating the vision through the design. I am just so excited and couldn’t think of a better place for me!

A few days of rest

Can make all the difference. The last couple of days have been so refreshing and wonderful! I have been reminded of all my blessings. Mostly my wonderful husband, my best friend, whom I treasure above all earthly things. I continue to see more and more how great he really is, how he treasures me and truly sets a g*dly example for me and spurs me on towards good things.

We had such a great time together just doing whatever we wanted to do! I started by making blueberry muffins (Thanks grandma   on Tuesday morning

After being greeted with beautiful roses and a loving note from Curtis.

Once we ate we decided to work out together. I have been doing THIS workout and I asked Curtis to join me, he danced around the house while I did the first eight minutes on the bike and then we did the rest together. It was so much fun, we were both so worn out in the end, but ready to relax all day!

After that we started our two-day campout on the living room floor! We began by watching “Letters to Juliet.” About half way through I decided I wanted to bake something sweet to eat after dinner, so I made these: Peanut Butter Cup Marshmallow Blondies! Delicious! (Note: I changed the Marshmallow fluff to regular marshmallows and they turned out great)

After that we finished the movie and when we turned off the movie we saw that “Dumb and Dumber” was on TV in Russian. It was so funny! I forgot about all the classic lines in that movie. It was fun to watch together as we both reminisced about our obsessions with it when we were younger.

By then we were ready to take a walk. The weather was nice and sunny, so we walked to my favorite Italian Restaurant for dinner. We had a lovely dinner together and then returned home to watch more movies and play cards.

It was a special Valentines Day, but the fun continued on to Wednesday. For breakfast I made fruit smoothies for us and they were so delicious! They had practically no added sugar but were delicious nonetheless, just natural yogurt (Kefir), milk, fruit (frozen strawberries, peaches, berries, banana and pomegranate seeds) and a couple teaspoons of honey.

We had another great day of relaxing, watching movies, playing games and just remembering how much G*d has blessed us! I also made this hummus for dinner 

Today I was sad to see him go to his language lesson, but I ended up having a great day again! It was really relaxing just being by myself and doing whatever I wanted to do. I ended up calling some friends that I haven’t talked to in a while, painting my nails and making this granola.

Then sat down to watch “You’ve got mail,” which I decided is one of the greatest romantic comedies ever! And I don’t care if I showed “Sleepless in Seattle” on Monday at movie club, I am still going to show “You’ve got mail” next week. I seriously love Tom Hanks as an actor, but I was thinking, “Who is actually attracted to Tom Hanks?” I don’t know many women who are, but man, is he lovable! He is really up there as one of the best.

Tonight we also had a great time with some friends. Our language is really moving along because I didn’t think twice about asking our friend and his wife over and I knew that neither of them spoke English. We had a great time with them and their precious daughter.

Well, I hope that you all had a Happy Valentine’s Day and were reminded of the love that surrounds you, especially the everlasting love that is offered from above.

Lovin' Life

Seriously! At times I complain or talk about difficult things about living overseas. But today I was reminded of the many things I love about life here. Today was great because I didn’t have to teach. I was just working/hanging out in the cafe (which I have been helping with a lot lately, but in a way that I really love) and also doing movie club, which was also fun.

Today was just filled with love, from students and people that I work with. I genuinely love being at work with my friends and co-workers. I really feel like part of a team/family here. We have so much fun together, but we also invite others to be a part of that family. It is not closed with no admittance to outsiders.

I got to share that love with some girls over coffee this afternoon. I also got to serve in ways that brought me life and joy. Loving people, making things beautiful and absolutely enjoying life. It was a magical day in so many ways, including the snow falling gently throughout the day as I watched from the warmth of the cafe. Feeling blessed to work in such a warm place, warm in more ways than one 

What my life is like

I never imagined that my life would be like this. That is what I was thinking as I was trudging through the snow this morning to get to work. I didn’t really imagine life overseas very often, but I guess if I did, I would have thought of it in a warm climate, like somewhere in Africa or India, not the freezing Siberia-esque life that I have been living lately.

All that to say, it’s really not that bad. The temperatures got down to -8F last week. I could never have imagined going out for a walk in that weather before, but here it is obligatory if you want to get to the bus stop or to the store.

I could complain about it all day, but in reality I have actually gotten used to life like this. I just sometimes cannot believe how our life has turned out. It is crazy in some ways that this is the new normal. There are also many things I am grateful for, such as a warm apartment and the warm cafe where I work. Instead of being out in the cold all day I got to watch my co-workers dive face first into the snow and then I sipped warm coffee while waiting for non-existent customers on this snowy day. The view is not too shabby either, eh?

A little experimenting

It has been a while since I posted about a new recipe. I have tried several in the past month or so, but have been quite busy and had very little time to post anything. I really love trying new recipes and sharing them here as much as possible. I was reminded of that tonight when I tried two new simple recipes for dinner and felt quite refreshed and satisfied when I finished preparing.

There are just some things in life that really fill us up and give us joy, making something delicious is one of those things that really fills me up.

Tonight I made Crispy Corn Cakes & Roasted Cabbage Wedges which both turned out delicious. I didn’t have any green onions or fresh corn for the corn cakes, but they were still great.

This weekend I made snickerdoodle bread for the girls group on saturday. The recipe was super easy, but the finished product was delicious! Like the perfect piece of Cinnamon Toast. (Photo credit: www.lilluna.com)

Every Tuesday I try to make something special for breakfast, so last Tuesday I tried this amazing recipe for Baked Oatmeal. It is baked oatmeal with strawberries, banana and chocolate chips! It was perfect, even better than it sounds!

Last, but not least, my very favorite of all! I have already done this several times as a snack when I am craving something sweet, but somewhat healthy, Apple Nachos! These are amazing, sweet, crunchy and perfect!

I hope that you have a chance to try some of these recipes. The ingredients are simple, but the combinations are perfect!

Soul Surfer

Talk about making lemonade. Seriously. This girl has amazing fa!th and character! Lately I have been getting so much inspiration from this film and from Bethany Hamilton’s life. Particularly how many obstacles she has overcome to do what she loves and what believes Papa wants her doing: Inspiring lives and being a huge light for him.

I realized that my all time favorite films are true life stories where people have been put in difficult situations but yet they overcome the odds, not just by winning, but in their attitude. Even in the end of the film Bethany doesn’t win the competition, but her attitude is what wins, she says “I wouldn’t change what happened to me because then I wouldn’t have this chance in front of all of you, this chance to embrace more people than I ever could have with two arms.”

Of course there are periods where these people want to give up or just quit, but the fact that they continue on and work hard to overcome the odds and in the end have a positive attitude is what really inspires me. I definitely have times when I just want to quit, just stop trying to do what I know G*d wants me to do and just live life all for me. But those moments don’t define me, it is the moments when I get back up, even if I just walk through life a little lost for a couple weeks or months. The fact that I get back up and keep going eventually is what defines my life. This is true in Bethany’s story and many others as well.

If you haven’t seen this film I cannot recommend it enough. Watch it and be inspired by this young lady as I and many others have been. Also don’t miss the documentary “Heart of a Soul Surfer” which is also included on the DVD under Special Features.