Party

Today’s #reverb10 prompt: Party. What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010? Describe the people, music, food, drink, clothes, shenanigans.

My favorite party of the year was our OH! Canada Olympic Opening Ceremonies party. It wasn’t wild or crazy but rather fun and, I think, well planned and themed.

Since the Olympics were in Canada this year we wanted to hold a Canada-themed party and invite people over to watch the opening ceremonies. We put up paper Olympic rings and torches all over the apartment and even had red, black, blue, green and yellow streamers. It is kind of hard to have food and drink with a Canada theme, but we did our best. From Canada we ordered Old Dutch potato chips in Ketchup, Salt & Vinegar, All Dressed and Dill Pickle, Coffee Crisp candy bars and Smarties chocolate candies - on a side note my mom lived in Canada during her junior high years and so she helped us pick out some yummy stuff to get, and her help only cost us a few Coffee Crisp bars. Ha! To supplement the Canadian food we had a veggie tray and ordered Canadian Bacon pizza. Yum!

We also had Canadian-themed drinks at the party. For beer we offered Molson and Moose Drool. We also offered some mixed drinks which I got recipes for on the Internet but renamed to be more Canadian.

One the food and drinks were ready we turned on the TV and watched the opening ceremonies in HD! Everyone seemed to have a good time and also seemed to appreciate the Canadian-themed food and drink, as well as the decorations.

We hope to make these Olympic opening ceremonies parties a tradition in our household and will try to theme the food and drink to the host country. I’m thinking tea and crumpets for the Summer 2012 Olympics in London…

Beautifully different

Today’s #reverb10 prompt: Beautifully different. Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different - you'll find they're what make you beautiful.

This one was hard for me… I’m not so good at this, so I asked my lovely husband what makes me different. He said, “I am considerate of others and am always thinking of others’ needs and trying to make people comfortable.” What a sweet guy! I think I’ll keep him around.

I really hope that others would also describe me as considerate. I do try to think of what others needs are and what others would want, and I really hope others see that too. I know that sometimes I do things with good intent and then it backfires on me and I look like a total goof. Things like this happen to me all of the time; I really do have the best intentions with things and somehow it backfires on me. Everyone else may not see or know what my good intent was, but at least God does - he knows what is in my heart. This is where my blog title comes from, the song “Dandelions” by Five Iron Frenzy. It is my favorite song ever. EVER! Check it out:

OK, so it’s not a real music video but it has the lyrics.

The line “Dandelions, you see flowers in these weeds” is what I interpret as seeing the good (or good intent) when something looks bad. It’s the theme song for my life and, therefore, my blog title.

I don’t know if all of this makes me different or even beautiful, but it is what makes me who and what I am. I will always continue to try and be as considerate as I can and hopefully I can learn from the mistakes I make. I love knowing that no matter how many times I mess up in life, have good intentions backfire or make a goof of myself God knows what is really going on inside of me, sees the good and forgives the not so good. It’s an amazing gift that I am happy to accept.

Community

Today’s #reverb10 prompt: Community. Where have you discovered community, online or otherwise, in 2010? What community would you like to join, create or more deeply connect with in 2011?

The best thing that happened to me this year was finding new community with my co-workers at the job I started in May. These women are absolutely amazing, and they welcomed me into their world with open arms. The work hard, love fiercely and would do almost anything for each other, and now, I’m in the club, too. Recently we hired a man (the first ever) for an open position in the organization. It’s interesting adding testosterone to our mix, but he’s fitting in well and even puts up with our mood swings and hormonal episodes. It’s a great group to be a part of and I am so happy that they all (even the guy) love and accept me for who I am and all encourage me in work and personal life. It certainly makes going to work that much better! I couldn’t be happier!

In 2011 I would love to dive deeper into the blogging community and make some online friends. The problem is, I don’t know where to start! There are so many blogs out there and I don’t know what to search for or who to follow that I may have some things in common with. Even if I find a blog I like to read, that person may or may not find my blog interesting, which is ok, but kind of kills the two way conversation. I’ll keep posting on my blog and try harder at looking for other bloggers with things in common with me and hopefully things will just click. I guess you never know what can happen!

Make

Today’s #reverb10 prompt: Make. What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?

Lately I have been really crafty - and I don’t know where it is coming from.

The only time in my life when I would consider myself to have been crafty would be first grade. There was thing thing called “centers” time and my BFF, Kelly, and I would clean out the craft center by making all sorts of paper, pipe cleaner, glitter, felt, popsicle stick, etc. crafts. I remember the craft center being shut down for a week because we used up all of the supplies AND we still had to choose different centers the following week so other people could have a turn at the craft station. Lame.

Anyway, in the past few weeks I have made/designed countless holiday photo cards for friends and family, an advent wreath and, last night, I made my very own Christmas card holder. Every year we get a lot of Christmas cards from family and friends and I could never come up with a fun way of displaying them, outside of taping them on the wall (and re-taping them every time they fell off). Also, the card holders that you can buy are either really expensive or really bulky and hard to store the other 11 months of the year. So I needed a unique solution.

The other day I thought of displaying cards like laundry on a clothes line, except in a cuter way. I went to the craft store and bought holiday ribbon/rope, clothespins, decorative stickers and gel bumpers. I stuck the gel bumper on the gripping part of the clothespin (for a stronger hold), put a sticker on the top of the clothespin, hot glued the bumper and sticker on and hung the ribbon/rope on the wall using 3M clips and… voila! Custom and cute Christmas card holder! Now if only we would get some Christmas cards in the mail to display…

Let Go

Today’s #reverb10 prompt: Let Go. What (or whom) did you let go of this year? Why?

This year, I would like to think that I let go of control in some areas of my life. Yes, some. I (and many members of my family) are control freaks and it is really hard for me to feel like I don’t have a firm grasp on everything that is happening in my life. This lovely character trait has certainly contributed to my anxiety with Dave’s graduation.

I want to know when he will be done, what job Dave will get, where (geographically) Dave will get a job, when we will buy a house, when we will take our dream trips to Europe and the Wizarding World of Harry Potter, when will we have kids, etc., etc.

But this year, I have relinquished the idea that I have any sort of control over these things.

I have no control over when Dave will graduate. I have no control over what job he will get whenever he will graduate. I have no control over any of these things. So I let it go… and gave it to God. I need to trust tat God has control and he won’t let me fall or give me anything I can’t handle. There is a plan for our lives, and I don’t get to have control over it. It’s hard for me to accept it, but I’m doing my best.

Dave will graduate. Dave will get a job. We will buy a house. We will go on an couple awesome vacations. We will have kids. But the details are up to the big guy, and it will be Ok that I don’t have control of any of it and that I let go of control of all of it.

"I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted." - Job 42:2 (NIV)