{Travel} Louisville, KY & Nashville, TN--Part I

Preston and I had a slim window during his spring break to get away for a couple of days.  We took advantage of our proximity to other states and ran off.

We started in Louisville, Kentucky to visit the Latter-Day Saint temple.  Once our time at the temple concluded, we ventured over to none other than The Harvest House, where we were staying.  When Em announced on her blog that they were opening up their home to guests, I knew it would be perfect for our little getaway.  And it was.  I could have relaxed in their home all evening it was so cozy.

Obviously, I was a little more than excited to stay here and meet Tim (Em was out of town), one of the writers of those sweet, inspirational daily letters.  Their home is stunning.

This banana bread was one of the best loaves I've ever had.  Serious.  I've got to get my hands on that recipe.

Pres and I were so tired from all the work leading up to the getaway that we laid on the bed just taking in the peace.  The light coming through the windows was perfect to refresh and encourage us.

We spent a night on the town taking in the Bohemian shops and restaurants and enjoying Blues music.

The next morning, when it was time to go, we were sent off by an energetic and friendly River. 

Thanks, Louisville, you were fun!  On to Nashville...

A Weekend Getaway--Chicago & Michigan City

We were blessed to recently meet up with our good friends also hanging out here in the Midwest, plus a few more, at a beach house on Lake Michigan.  Though there was still snow on the ground, it was the perfect place for our weekend adventure.  Preston and I enjoyed an afternoon at the Art Institute of Chicago--knocking off a must-see--before eagerly joining our friends. 

Over the weekend, we:

 played far too many rounds of Pirates Dice and Celebrity

 talked late into the night about our past undergrad days and our future dreams

ate pretzel M&M's until we were sick

enjoyed a windy day in Chicago with the best deep dish pizza yet (once again thanks to Lou Malnati's)

stepped dangerously onto the frozen lake for a squinty picture

and bade farewell energized and grateful for lasting friendships.

It wouldn't be a get-together without a photo bomb by Cody.

Thanks for adding to our collection of valuable memories with you all.  Until next time.

On Sweaty Palms, Gravity, Anger, and Faith

It has been nearly two months since the tragic shooting at Purdue. I revisited my journal entry, looking for my account of a bizarre dream I had the evening of the shooting.  Here is what I found:

I had a very frightening dream last night--a dream that compares to only two others in the way it imprinted me.  Perhaps it formed from the shooting and my threatened safety and my prayers to God to help this country and this world.  Perhaps it formed from my recent viewing of Gravity.  Perhaps it formed a long time ago.  The dream was long and twisted, but the noteworthy part of the dream was my time at “Pacific Rim.”  This “Pacific Rim” was not the rim that the world knows; it existed in an entirely different sphere, at the outer most edge of the earth.  Shaped like a shallow, wide vase made out of rippled and uneven red sandstone, its mouth opened up into the galaxy.  Around the rim of the vase were eight waterfalls, staggered--four below and four above.  The lower four waterfalls fell in long, thin streams down, down, down.  The upper four waterfalls were the attraction for all the tourists who visited this Pacific Rim of my dream.  Because we were at the top of the earth and due to the earth’s spin, these waterfalls did not bubble downward, but swept sideways from their mouth to make an impressive, frothy stream of water that circled the rim.  It was exquisite, watching water defy gravity in such a way.  Though it was night and the galaxy above was as dark as ever save the billions of stars that dotted the sky, below, where the lower four waterfalls fell eternally, was light--the kind of light that sparkles from a diamond back-lit by fire: blues, greens, pinks, yellows, purples.  The light was warm, invigorating, and absolutely lovely; it has marked me.  Hooked to the walls of the Pacific Rim interior were metal rings a few inches in diameter.  These rings circled around the entire mouth of the rim, hundreds of them.  Visitors were to grasp these rings with their hands and work themselves all the way around the rim until they reached a stream of glowing water in which they would submerge in order to return to earth as we know it.

I journeyed to this Pacific Rim not as myself but as an adolescent blond girl, a girl who had just lost her father in an accident that occurred in my dream preceding this one.  He fell from some great height to his death, and I watched it happen.  He was a strong, kind, respected figure.  I was with a petite blond mother in a pink velvet sweatsuit, and a brother, who was also Preston.  We journeyed to the Pacific Rim because our father loved this place--revered it--and we sought closure and peace following his death.  This Pacific Rim was a sacred place for many people--a Mecca of sorts.  A once in a lifetime opportunity.  But for me, the dreamer, it turned into a nerve wracking, terrifying experience.

The hundreds of tourists visiting the site had their gear, having prepared for a long time to journey around the rim.  We were encouraged on by guides, lifted inside the vase by some contraption and urged forward beneath the stars and other-worldy waterfalls.  The mother moved first toward the small rings, solemn and determined in her journey around the rim.  It was her way of coming to grips with the loss of her husband.  She moved quickly and I never saw her again in the dream.  As I took in the Pacific Rim, its eternal waterfalls and its magic light, I was overcome with its beauty.  I stepped onto the sandstone, my shoes gripping the gritty rock, and grabbed my first ring.  Preston was just ahead of me.  The beginning of my journey was fueled by the surrounding beauty.  The energy was warm and light.  I could hear the reverent exclamations around me—this place was stunning.  Only God could have created such a place.

As I moved from ring to ring, carefully placing my feet on the rippled sandstone and curling my fingers around the metal, I noticed a fatigue in my fingertips.  My legs started to shake and for the first time I realized that I was not fastened to anything.  No one was.  We all relied solely on the strength of our legs, arms, and fingers to get us around this rim.  If our strength failed, we would fall, rolling down the sides of the rim and into the eternal light below.  It would mean death, just like the father's.  Why was I not given a rope?  Why was no one else concerned?  People moved steadily above and below me, their hushed chatter happy.  I, however, was panicking.  I did not want to join this father.

Preston stood by me urging me on, compassionate in my distress.  I kept moving, my hands getting sweaty.  My rings started to get smaller and thinner.  They had gaps in them, like my hooped earrings, and my fingers kept slipping through the gaps.  I had to take precious moments to rotate each ring for a good grip.  I began to really panic, being too far along to turn back but yet so far away from my destination.  The stars looked menacing as I stared at the abyss both above and below me, having nowhere to go but to the next ring.  But I was shaking so badly that I could hardly get my fingers into the feeble ring.  And those fingers were so sore, rubbed raw.  My shoulders ached as I carried the weight of my body.  I could not find a grip for my feet.  I reached for a ring that was too far and ended up barely grabbing it, my fingers curled backwards.  As I released my weight, I slipped, my body spinning to face the center of the rim as I hung from the two rings.  As if on a cross.  As my sweaty hands slipped, I looked up to the sky above me, seething.  I could not do this.  Why was I here, and where was my help?  Why would someone who loves me let me get into such a situation?  I had no strength.  I had no tools.  I had no companion.  I had nothing.  I was utterly alone and the light below me and the heavens above me laughed.

Somehow, I maneuvered off of my cross.  Preston was there again, encouraging me.  The rest of the journey was exhausting and faithless.  The rings continued to shrink until I was sure they could not hold my weight.  But they did, and I eventually reached the flowing river that stood as portal to my safety.  I entered with shaky relief, giving only one last look at this idolized Pacific Rim, my emotions peaked and frazzled, my injuries fresh.  When I finally woke up, my thoughts rested on the idea that a life without faith, without hope, is not a life worth living.  But those desperate emotions were too real and too recent.  I had to remind myself that I know a life of faith, and that God has not abandoned me.

{Recipe Share} Deep Dish Chocolate Chip Cookie

When I'm really happy and excited about life, I like to express it in my cooking.  I love to make delicious dishes.  When I'm sad and stressed, I like to express it in my cooking.  I need to make delicious dishes.

And so, really, all the time I just love food.  Especially dessert.

I'd eaten the entire loaf of pull-apart cinnamon bread the day before and wanted something to top off our Sunday dinner, so I decided to try this Deep Dish Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe.  Yes, I got it on Pinterest, and yes, I approve.  It really is as easy as she claims.  (Although how she and her family manage to eat this once a week is beyond even me.  Someone call a nutritionist asap...)

{This} is the recipe.  I would maybe even recommend going a little lighter on the amount of chocolate.  But maybe that's because I ate this the day after an entire loaf of pull-apart cinnamon bread.  Anywho, enjoy.

*NOTE: I don't have an iron skillet (though I would love one in orange, everybody...) but this recipe worked just fine in my glass dish.  I melted the butter and sugars on the stove in a nonstick pan first and then transferred it to this dish to finish making the recipe without a problem

{Book} Paris In Love (Eloisa James)

As I have mentioned, my schedule is all over the place right now.  If I have any time to read at all, it usually comes in 5-10 minute increments.  When such is the case, I usually skip reading altogether because it's just too hard to get into a book and out of it again in such a short time.  But luckily for me, Paris in Love is the perfect book for "incremental reading".  The story is constructed in snippets--a memoir built out of social media posts and little records jaunted down here and there from Eloisa James' time in Paris.  And so, picking the story up and putting it down again in 5 minutes time is very easy.  By finishing a paragraph, I can finish an entire thought process.

This little excerpt from a moment between James and her husband is one of my favorites, and gives--I think--a great sample of the book's wit and charm:

"Last night I asked Alessandro if he ever lies in bed and thinks about chocolate--say, about the way dark chocolate feels in your mouth, or how different it is when spiked with orange peel.  He said no.  Then he said that the only time he thinks about food in bed is when he wakes up in the middle of the night and wants steak.  Somewhere in that clash lies a profound truth about the difference between the sexes."

Also, James likes to talk about food as much as I do.  So naturally, I enjoy her book.

Happy reading, friends.

{Dear Martha Anne} Lately

Dear Martha Anne,

Well, hi.  I've completely abandoned you, I know. Life took off and I was left hanging onto its tail and running as fast as I could, eating dust. Life is still running, but I've found my stride (for now) and hopefully can maintain this pace for a while.

Where to start?  How about the weather.  It still sucks and I wanna run away.  Okay, no, it is not that bad, but my sense of time has seriously been disrupted.  My body's seasonal clock does not know how to handle 5 degree weather in March.  And I can only get up to go to the gym in pitch-black freezing madness for so many months out of the year.  So let's hope Winter and Spring have a little talk, and Winter decides to be nice and share 2014 with the others.

What else?  Even though it's still a frozen spectacle outside, I guess a part of my biological clock is still functioning: Spring Cleaning, beginning with haircuts for everyone (dog included).  One of us is not enthused about this...

It's definitely time for the both of us to lose a few inches.

I can't believe  As soon as I typed that, I realized it's not true.  I can believe, and I knew to expect, how fast time would pass for us here in Indiana.  I decided awhile back that my gallery wall is done.  It is not complete, or exactly as I'd have it, but it is as finished as it will ever be.  The two pictures at the top are redundant (from 2012 and 2013), and the frames are not all perfectly straight or evenly spaced.  But I still really like this wall.  It reminds of two things: one, that our time here is really brief; and two, that it is still worth enjoying. 

So on that note, I hope you enjoy today for all that it is worth.

Much Love,

K