Everyday

Yesterday we celebrated our four year Wedding Anniversary. It was a really special day filled with surprises for both of us 

The very first surprise was for me from Curtis. He set up a whole spread on our coffee table. He put out a bunch of romantic movies and games and activities for us to do and then made me a nice breakfast and some coffee. The movie part was special because he doesn’t usually like to watch movies during the day.

The first surprise that I couldn’t wait to give Curtis was a slide show that I made him. I have made this a new tradition in the last few years to create a simple slide show of our year together. This year I felt like the one I made was really special because it was a really special year. We did so many great things together including going to Rome, Venice and also home for the first time in two years!

The song in the video is called Everyday and it is about celebrating life everyday. I had heard it before, but I heard it again for the first time in a long time about a month ago and this time I heard it differently. So much so that it made me teary. I especially love this part of the song:

Everyday of our lives,
wanna find you there, wanna hold on tight
Gonna run, while we’re young
and keep the faith
Everyday, from right now,
gonna use our voices and scream out loud
Take my hand;
together we will celebrate,

I realized all the days when I am so negative and Curtis always tries to point out the positive things about our life. He also tries to make me laugh everyday.

I tend to take things quite seriously and it is really wonderful to have Curtis in my life reminding me to celebrate simply because it makes life better and because we are called to live an abundant life, that doesn’t mean hiding our real feelings. It means loving with abandon, when I am hurt, I cry and he comforts me, but then he guides me towards the good things and reminds me how blessed I am.

You can view the video here on youtube: Curtis & Katina’s Anniversary Video 

The whole day was very special. I couldn’t wait to give Curtis his gift since I bought it this summer in America. It is called “The Book of Us.” It is a book in which they ask 150 questions about your relationship from the very beginning. I took time to answer as many questions as possible and was so excited to give it to him. He was happy to receive it and we read through it together throughout the day, laughing, crying and reminiscing. We decided to make it an anniversary tradition to read through it and update it together.

After we watched a movie together we went to a local restaurant that has delicious Hot Chocolate. Then we went to dinner at an amazing Italian Restaurant in town called Mozzarella where we ate some awesome four cheese pasta and creme brulee, which was so delicious I am determined to try to make my own creme brulee, so stay tuned!

After dinner we went home and Curtis had another surprise waiting for me!

He also wrote on a bunch of balloons the things that he loves about me and scattered them around the room.

It was a very special day with many reminders of how blessed we are to have each other!

My heart is full

Last week was filled with good things; things that filled me to overflowing with love, joy and peace. For the first time in a while I feel so much peace and joy and unity with my brothers and sisters around me. I have been struggling a lot since I returned here, constantly seeking to find refuge in the things of this world. Only finding small moments of peace when I am alone with ‘Dad’, or Curtis. In that I have been blessed. I have been gaining understanding on some things, but failing to live them out. Only this weekend did I have a breakthrough, one of forgiveness and understanding.

I am aware now that I was the cause of my own loneliness. I felt so alone here, away from family and friends. In a world of different languages and mixed cultures. It all felt so foreign and unfriendly. Until the other day. Thank you to those of you who have been asking Dad to strengthen us. He truly has. He has broken through my cold heart of stone and filled it with good things. He has filled me with his love and understanding, with more joy, patience and contentment with life here. I truly feel peace for the first time in a long time, and for this I am truly grateful.

Life changing cookies

Do yourself a favor and make these cookies. You NEED them. I haven’t been this excited about a recipe in a really long time! These things are DELICIOUS, ochen fvakooszna, as we say in Russian. But back to the cookies, they are caramely, creamy, spicy and ridiculously good! Yes mom, I am aware the caramely is not a word. The dough tastes like chocolate chip cookie dough with a fall kick, sans chocolate chips. But the actual cookie is SO much better than the dough, unlike, chocolate chip cookies, at least in my opinion. Dare I say, these cookies are better than chocolate chip cookies! For me, that is saying a lot, since chocolate chip cookies are my absolute favorite.

So, here’s the deal, these babies are pretty simple, but I got the recipes for the cookies and the icing in two different places. This cookie recipe just seemed so much more delicious than the one that was paired with the caramel glaze and since I didn’t have any cream cheese, I decided to make the caramel glaze instead and it turned out to be the most perfect melt-in your mouth goodness that you could ever imagine. If you LOVE caramel as much as I do, you WILL love these cookies! I also used half white sugar and half brown sugar in the cookies and I think it emphasized the caramely goodness even more. Yes, I said wrote it again.

Pumpkin Cookies: 

Adapted from:House of Hepworths

Combine:

½ Cup Butter

¾ Cup white sugar

¾ cup brown sugar

Add: 1 egg

Mix in: 1 cup pumpkin

Now add: ½ tsp. vanilla 2 & ½ cups flour

And then add: 1 tsp. cinnamon 1 tsp. nutmeg 1 tsp. baking soda 1 tsp. baking powder ½ tsp. salt

Now, bake @ 350 for about 10-12 minutes.

Caramel Glaze

Source: Simple Girl at Home

3 tablespoons butter

1/4 cup milk

1/2 cup brown sugar

1  teaspoons vanilla extract

1 cup confectioner's sugar

Cook butter, milk and brown sugar until dissolved.  Cool and add confectioner's sugar and vanilla.  Spread over warm cookies.

"Priyatova appetita!"  (Russian for- "Have a nice meal" or Bon Appetite)

All good things

Come from Above..

The last couple of months have been difficult, SO. VERY. DIFFICULT. We continue to struggle with busy schedules, but also the last week or so has brought some relief, excitement and overall good things! As I said in my last post, there are always things to be thankful for, and it is important to find those things at all times. But right now we have some really major pra!se reports going on!

Let’s start from the very beginning ♫ a very good place to start ♫. I have been working in the cafe way too much the past couple of months and have really desired to have someone to help take the load off. In the beginning of the year I overcommitted a bit because I didn’t realize what a strain it would be to learn Russian, teach English and work at the Cafe. I was extremely frustrated with the lack of time for Russian practice and study. Since then I have felt very tired and overwhelmed with all of the work that I have been doing.

You may have also noticed my lack of communication and blog involvement, which is something that I really love, one of those things that really gives me joy. Another thing that fills me up, is meeting with friends here and I haven’t been doing much of that lately either. I was working a lot of hours, and becoming very frustrated. I felt like I had lost my purpose here and also felt very disconnected with friends and family back home as well.

I had voiced this to our manager at the cafe and he was understanding and knew they needed to find someone local to work as a barista, so that the Native English Speakers who work at the cafe could spend time speaking to students, which is something that I love to do  But we weren’t sure how long it would take to find someone, they thought it could possibly take another month or so. But Dad’s timing in this situation was swift, and exactly what I needed!

Two weeks ago when I was closing the Cafe on a Friday night, I said to Curtis, I don’t think I can take more than two more weeks of this schedule! I was so tired every friday night when I got home and the weekends usually weren’t much easier, full, with meetings, gatherings etc. Then back to work on Monday, then Tuesdays is our sabbath, but it seemed that every Tuesday we had to do something, whether it was a meeting, sanitation tests for the cafe (loooong story) or planning for classes, that made it feel a lot less like a sabbath day.

I am not saying this to complain, we really tried to make the best of it while it was like that, and at times I DID complain. Not gonna lie, I was like a whiney little baby at times. But there were many times when I thought, I love everything I am involved in for the most part, but there is just tooooo much of it and no time to breeeeath!

So, all that being said, we have found an amazing little asian solution to the problem. Her name is Janna, she is family, and she works in the cafe with me now  I L.O.V.E HER sooooooo much! She speaks very little English and our relationships is all in Russian! PTL! My Russian is THAT good now! Two pra!se reports there! We found someone for the cafe and some of my cafe time has turned into Russian practice time!!! OUR DAD IS AMAZING! He is our PROVIDER! He is so VERY fa!thful!

I have been aspiring to learn Russian the past two years, last year I spent a little time each week building vocabulary, and this year I finally have the time to put in the hours it needs and it seems to really be flowing out of me.I feel like it is finally happening because I know what to do to learn, I have the confidence to practice and I also found that listening to Russian on my ipod (thanks mom  ) really helps.

Now, I feel more like part of our team, since more than half of them are Russian speakers, and life in general is just easier. It is also an amazing accomplishment for me to have this new relationship completely in Russian. The only others that I have had that with these last couple of months is my teachers, but talking with Janna is so easy and really fun. I am so thankful for this beautiful and loving girl that is helping in our cafe now 

The next pra!se is from Curtis, a little bit shorter. He has been working to put together curriculum for his second module of classes for Global Citizenship. A class that is much more than a simple English Class. He and our director have been talking about this for sometime now and have not been able to find any inspiration until recently. The other day they sat down in a meeting, and by Dad’s gr*ce, two hours later came out with ideas for an entire semester’s curriculum! Before their meeting they asked for inspiration from Dad and they surely got it.

So, we really have a lot to be thankful for, a lot to pra!se Dad for, so many answers! We are also thankful to you who have fa!thfully been interceding for us. We are truly blessed to have you all in our lives! So, we want to say thank you from the bottom of our hearts ♥

Attitude of Gratitude

I am really beginning to understand what a gift life really is. How we must rejoice in what we have been given. So much of life is about taking joy in everyday things and being grateful to Dad for what he has given us. Since Thanksgiving is coming up and we are going to be gone during that time, I am actually going to be teaching a whole lesson on gratitude this week. The lesson is based on an article about a study on gratitude. They found that if people record what they are grateful for every day, they will actually have a much higher quality of life.

It is funny that it took these psychologists years to figure out what Dad has been telling us since the beginning of time. TO GIVE THANKS!

Psalm 100

⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving
and his courts with pra!se;
give thanks to him and pra!se his name.
⁵ For the L*RD is good and his love endures forever;
his fa!thfulness continues through all generations.

With that said, this practice isn’t always that easy, and it’s definitely not natural, especially when life throw trials your way. It’s easy to focus on the negative and think about how we are missing out on life. It’s easy to think ‘I deserve better.’ But it’s difficult to remember that in reality, we have been given so very much!

To look at what we have been given, when we have been asking Dad for one specific thing for so long is even harder. It can seem like He is holding that back from us. But when we take our eyes off of that one thing and fix them on Him, he helps us to see the many other good gifts He has given us.

Then life really does become easier. We begin to see it’s beauty once again despite it’s pain. We may still feel the pain, but it’s sting becomes much weaker.