Moving on...

Life has changed and been wild the last so many months. I find myself now, engaged to the best man I have ever met and moving with him to a strange town in a new state. My mind still doesn't truly comprehend it all the time. Just imagine, a year ago I was in a totally different place and would have laughed if you told me this was coming!

We are moving to Portland, OR because Dave will be getting his Phd in Microbiology at Oregon Health and Science University. I plan on finishing my undergrad at Oregon State just as soon as I can! Starting on Monday we are loading a truck up with our posessions and driving with his parents. It's going to be grand! Then, after a few days of un-packing and seeing my new home (ah!) I will fly back to Colorado to work a little bit and then get ready for our wedding on Sept. 5th. There's a lot to do and a lot of people to see and spend time with so it's going to fly by fast I think!

My sisters have been gone the majority of my relationship with Dave and I think that is one of the harder things for me. I wanted to call them right away once Dave proposed and yet, I couldn't, they were in New Zealand! Had to settle for emailing instead. I am looking forward to them coming back to the states about two weeks before the wedding! Which I am sure will just add to the insanity (have you ever seen my sisters and I together, it's crazy enough) of weddings and extra people and things to do! So exciting though.

I have finished my last shift at the bookstore I have worked at now for two years. It's been such a great job and a blessing to my bookshelves... I packed away all of my books last week and realized how many there now are because of this job! Sad to leave.

With all the craziness of life and the scheduling insanity that my life has become I have hardly seen any of my Fort friends and now am leaving them! I count my blessings in each of them though and the important roles they have played in my life and time here. I am really trying to get together a little hang out/party thing so we can say goodbye. :(

Someday soon I will start up my reviews again of great books I have been reading. There are so many it's hard to keep up!

Kara

Book review, again!

I just read (I know, I am on a good streak!) another excellent book. It's full of interesting points and ideas and it's a bit controversial-which is why I picked it up of course. The book is called Marry Him; The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough by Lori Gottlieb.

I first heard of this book because my boyfriend sent me a review on it and it looked super intriguing! The premise of the book is that most women are too picky. See? It's controversial already!!! Her point though is that she knows a number of single women in their 30's and 40's that want a family and marriage but are breaking up with wonderful and seemingly perfect men for ridiculous reasons. And she's one of the women doing this. Her book follows her through meetings with match makers to talk about this problem (of women not finding their perfect mates) and to see if she can work on her own dating dilemmas. Lori also meets with a dating coach, goes through speed dating events, online dating, and talks with Rabbis and counselors. By the end the book can be boiled down to the point of: don't look for Mr. Perfect (at the beginning of the relationship) because you are not Mrs. Perfect. And being good enough can truly be Good Enough. It can even turn into Perfect.

I liked reading this book and highly recommend it to any woman. (I also recommend He's Just Not That Into You which is a completely different issue!) I think that Lori has some excellent points and while it may not be the answer or solution for everyone it's good to understand them.
It's a great way to re-evaluate how you view relationships, how your girlfriends view relationships and even in many ways how to change that a little bit!

I finally read a book!

I actually read 2 of them! I last wrote on the bookstore's blog (oldfirehousebooks.com) about how I didn't have any time to read and consequently hadn't actually read a book in forever. It was mostly full of whining and ridiculousness... Well let me tell you, blogging about it inspired me and I went out and read like crazy over the weekend. I somehow found the time once I had committed to reading to read! And it was wonderful. I read while brushing my teeth, while getting dressed (although the process did take a little longer than usual), as I walked around my house. I read while eating breakfast, cooking (tricky cause I tended to make more of a mess than normal), and cleaning! It was glorious.

Now to tell you about the books I read: Left To Tell; Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust and The Art Of Eating In.

Left to Tell is about Immaculee Ilibagiza and her escape from the Rwandan genocide. She is one of 7 women that hid in a small bathroom when the killing started. The Tutsi women hid for 3 months in a neighboring pastor's house(he was a Hutu). One thing that amazed me was how through the whole ordeal they could hear everything that was happening in the outside world. Immaculee heard people she had grown up with calling her name, looking for her to kill her. She heard so many people die and when they finally escaped the bathroom and made it to a French base she found out that every member of her family had been murdered. What struck me about her story and what she does now is the forgiveness and peace she has found. She speaks about Rwanda and how true peace will be found when they can love and forgive the people who committed the genocide.

The Art of Eating In by Cathy Erway is Cathy's account of her two year stint of not eating out while living in New York City. She realizes as she goes about her daily life how often she eats out and how much she is spending on it so she takes an eating out vacation. She decides to learn to cook and shop for no decided period of time while committing to not eating food from restaurants (she does have a few stipulations that allow for breaking the rules). The book is mostly just a story of how her life shaped up, the sharing of her struggles and joys throughout the project and at the end of each chapter she shares the recipes talked about. It's a light and easy read I thought, full of interesting facts and recipes.

I am so excited to have made it through both books! (granted, I had very little homework over the weekend and I kinda neglected everything else in my life...) I hope this inspires or encourages you to pick up a book you have meant to read for a while and just haven't found the time.

My sisters

Today, in about an hour and 45 minutes, my sisters will be on a plane headed to New Zealand. That's right, they are headed down under for six months. And I will miss them. Here I am in a town I love, doing things I love, with people I love (minus the girls now of course) and my heart says, GO TRAVEL!!! Get out of here. See the world. Experience life and stop living day to day here in one place. Then my brain has to have a chat with my heart cause, well, I can't leave as of yet. It sucks but it's reality. I am back in school for a reason. Yes, it's taking forever and costing more money than I have or make but someday it will be worth it I am sure. Trouble is, til then my heart keeps yelling at me and that's not fun. Working at a bookstore doesn't make it all that much easier. I am surrounded by stories of people doing something other than what I am doing right now!!! And I don't even have time to read those stories anymore. This is a depressing post. My heart is sad, it's being left behind. It doesn't have an adventure to go on right now. It has to wait. And that my friends is pretty hard.
I can't wait to hear from my sisters about how much they love New Zealand! They are going to have so much fun. And it's going to be the adventure of a lifetime. I am so excited and nervous and happy for them!!!! I will miss them, and the adventure but I think I can try living vicariously through them and remember that I will see them again soon.

The need to prioritize

Have you ever found yourself in a place where you have a hard time making time for everything you have to do? I noticed today, I am not very good at making sure I make time for the right things. And when you are rushing to get stuff done it seems to take five times longer! Today I got stuff done. But not enough. There's just not enough time for everything I want to do, need to do and have to do! It is crazy. Mostly all I want to do with my time is see Dave. And a couple other people scattered in there as well! :) I miss him when he isn't around or when I have to stay away to get stuff done! Homework has become my nemesis. It's terrible. I have more work than I know what to do with. And not enough brains to master it all! Which makes me wish even more that I was just spending that time with Dave-he doesn't make my brain hurt!
Important things in my life:
Homework
Work
Dave
Family!
All the stuff that has to get done, but I avoid doing (laundry...)

Boyfriend...

Isn't Boyfriend a funny term? It seems to put you back in junior high or something when you use it. I suddenly find myself with one and am questioning what to call him instead of Boyfriend. Seriously, how horrible is it to use a term we giggled and dreamed over when we were ten. My barbies had boyfriends. I think it is funny to introduce someone at my age (which is still very young) and call them your boyfriend. I have been brainstorming new titles and can not come up with anything. If you have any ideas, well, feel free to contribute.
Things to call someone you are dating instead of Boyfriend:

• Significant other (boo! that sounds creepy and old)
• Special Friend (again, really? feels like you have to be divorced and hiding a relationship from your toddler to call someone this)
• Boy Toy (haha!)
  
• Make out pal ( I may end up going with this!)
  
• Partner (this one is tricky, you could be a cowboy or gay to use it!)
• My man.... (too possessive?)
  

I honestly can't think of any other options. Maybe there is something out there that would be perfect for the introductions. I really need something so that when I introduce him I don't have to say, "this is my boyfriend,..."