some undeveloped thoughts about my job

Some things I thought about while at work today:

- At Starbucks, a big part of knowing our product (and, consequently, selling our product) is sampling. So, as part of my training today, we sampled three coffees, one from each of our three regions. As far as details for the sampling goes, I’ll leave that undescribed — these are, after all, undeveloped thoughts. ANYWAY, my thought was, as we sipped coffee from tiny ceramic shot glasses, and nibbled complementary cakes and scones, that this was a whole lot like communion. The whole ‘ceremony’ and procedure of the sampling, the circle of three or four partners joining in on the sampling, and the ‘reflection’ - oh this tastes like this, this goes well with this, I think this about this coffee. So, as I drank coffee today, I mused and thanked Jesus for His sacrifice. Communion isn’t confined to the church setting, is it?

- Because I’m an introvert, I naturally dislike small-talk. If I don’t have anything important to say, I keep quiet. There are too many loud, narcissistic people in the world who think what they have to say is interesting and important… or just talk to fill the silence. I’m ok with silence. However. I’m getting to the point where I can “turn on” an extroverted side of me. Today at work, I made small-talk! I said more than I thought was absolutely necessary! I joined a conversation when I heard the name “Idina Menzel” and gave some input on how awesome she is and why I love musical theatre!

- I’m quickly becoming acclimated to the Starbucks scene (in Idaho Springs), predominantly because the people I work with are so stinking nice. I feel at ease, so I’m quick to enjoy myself, quick to learn, and quick to be friendly to other people.

- Although everyone is nice, attitudes and language sometimes flash and flare. I want to be a light in my workplace. I want to do little things that people may or may not notice. I want to be on top of my game (I’m LOVING learning formulas and ratios for drinks… something so therapeutic about it) and really excel at this. I want to be in a position to encourage.

on our way to target

we saw:

-purple mountains
-a herd of elk
-a black bear, uncomfortably close to the road
-an ambulance and a number of tow trucks
-my workplace
-gorgeous sunset
-some fun animal-shaped statues on the top of a hill
-a diaper on the road

we listened to a playlist containing:

-the Glee version of “Friday”
-Billy Joel
-Dashboard (I snuck one in!)
-TSwift
-Ben Folds & Regina Spektor
-Jason Mraz & Colbie Caillat
-Chris Brown
-Paul Simon

manic wednesday

Remember how stressed I was about updating my information, government websites, etc? Well… it’s not for no reason, promise!

Woke up early to head to the Social Security office.
Goal: update my last name. FINALLY! Fortunately, that only took about forty-five minutes, and the guy sent me on my way to the DMV to update my license (aka get a Colorado license).

Arrive at the DMV.
Goal: update my last name and become an organ donor. (Eerrggh, Kevin and I had a conversation about this, and he guilted me into it. However, I’m keeping my blood!) Again, another long line, sat for a while, marveled at the thing that is government bureaucracy, and waited for our numbers to be called. Kevin thought he might as well get his license updated as well, since we were there. At our number, we stepped up to desk, behind which sat a rather young man.

He talked us through the information, I showed him all my new papers… this whole process took about ten minutes. After I took the eye sight test, he groaned slightly and said, “I thought this might happen…” I was freaking out inside, thinking that I had failed the eye exam. Oy. But then he continued, “You said you just came from the Social Security office? Well… we’re linked in to their system, and it seems that it takes a few days for their computers to update your new name into the system. So… I can’t give you your license yet. But when you come back, the form is partially filled out, so it won’t take as long!” As if five minutes of talking to one person is enough to outweigh the thirty or so we sat/stood in lines and will likely have to repeat within the week.

“However, I can take care of your license situation since you didn’t have to change your name, sir,” the youngin’ said to Kevin. Kevin handed him his DE license, and the kid typed some stuff into his computer. After a minute or two, he groaned again, stepped back from his desk and went to a back office to speak to a superior. Sheepishly, he walked back toward us, and said, “Well, we can’t seem to connect to the state of Delaware right now. It seems Delaware’s system is down.”

Just our luck! Fortunately, Kevin and I laughed it off (though we weren’t laughing twenty minutes later when we were in hot pursuit of a replacement phone charger - don’t ask, because you can probably guess) and headed out on other errands.

Well, Mr Colorado DMV, we’ll be back. Just you wait.

In other news, I started work at Starbucks today! Woohoo! All the “partners” I met today were super nice, the store manager is awesome, I got to sample a lot of cookies and coffees, and received three new, blessedly green aprons. I was told I needed to remove my nail polish… which made me incredibly sad. I haven’t had blank nails since sophomore year of college, I think. Ah. Well. The things one gives up for work. Like free time. And an NCIS marathon.

For dinner tonight, I whipped up a curry chicken and rice dish that was probably the best thing I’ve made so far… ever! Kevin agrees, so you know it’s true. He added a fruit salad, and we drank ice water out of our mason jars. I love drinking out of mason jars. Just makes a place feel like home.

I promise to upload some pictures of our apartment - fully furnished! I’ll get around to it… sometime… :)

how to find a church: kevin-and-anna style

How to find and join a church in twenty steps or less!

Saturday

Step one: Search online for churches in your area.

Step two: Find a church that publishes all of their doctrinal stances in their “Our Beliefs” section. Note: these stances include inspiration of Scripture, an exhaustive support for a biblical view of the Triunity of God, the Lord’s Supper, Baptism, and Eternal Security. Things to love: (besides all of the truth!) “In the essential beliefs, we have unity… In the non-essential beliefs, we have liberty.”

Sunday

Step three: Visit selected church; park in the visitor space right out front.

Step four: Find yourself greeted by an elder and his wife, introduced to a young man who will be attending school in the state you just left, and seated near the front of the sanctuary.

Step five: Enjoy the worship band’s reprise of their VBS music from the past week. Entertaining, funny, and watch them own it.

Step six: Fill out visitor’s card to place in the offering plate as it passes by.

Step seven: Watch and listen as the pastor preaches from a balance beam, making the connection from the training and obedience of an Olympic gymnast to our training and obedience as Christians following the coaching of the Holy Spirit and Scripture.

Step eight: Meet and greet both Lead Pastor and Associate Pastor and their wives and children after the service.

Step nine: Delight yourself in the refreshments provided downstairs in the foyer while meeting other members of the church and finding out more opportunities to get involved with the church and surrounding community.

Monday

Step ten: Receive a phone call from an elder, asking whether or not he can answer any questions about the church. Ask questions about church leadership and the community.

Tuesday

Step eleven: Go out for coffee with the pastor. Get a tour of the church and grounds, and discuss any number of important theological issues facing the American Church today. Leave encouraged.

Step twelve: Fill out your information for the church’s pictorial directory. Email said information, and attach a current picture!

Step thirteen: Walk the prayer walk behind the church. Be amazed at the beauty of the terrain, and the grace of the Lord you serve, who is faithful to hear His children!

Step fourteen: Attend worship team practice. Play drums, piano, sing… whatever you’re good at.

Step fifteen: Go out for ice cream with the pastor and his wife. See the sites of the small town in which they live. Talk about bear and elk sightings, and mountain lion attacks.

Step sixteen: Borrow two mattress pads from the pastor and his wife, because your air mattress requires to be pumped up twice a night.

Step seventeen: Consider yourself part of the body, and begin planning small groups, summer activities, and more worship team practices.

update: goals of 2011

I wrote out this list at the beginning of 2011, and it is now a full six months since then. Care to see how I’ve done in meeting my goals? Read on! Emboldened are those items I’ve been faithful to complete.

1) journal weekly (in my journal, not my blog)
2) teach like I mean it—student teaching was rough, but I can say with confidence that I started each day as if it were on purpose!
3) graduate PBU (get certified, succeed as a teacher, all that jazz)
4) see an obscene number of friends get married!—and still so many coming up!
5) move away (pref. to Colorado!)
6) twice a month, write a letter to a different dear (if distant) friend—sadly, I’m not succeeding at this. On Monday, my notecards and stamps will arrive with the rest of our stuff!
7) get a piano—still in the works. :/
8) learn 5 new pieces by Chopin—dependent on #7. :/
9) read (and appreciate!) a Russian novel
10) finish reading the works of Shakespeare in its entirety!
11) write something worth reading
12) go hiking & camping with Kevin on a mountain
13) see sunset and sunrise on said mountain
14) learn to knit and/or crochet
15) research Trivits heritage
16) learn German… begin learning German

17) learn to cook - not really Julie & Julia style, but kinda
18) give people the benefit of the doubt, every time—definite improvements!
19) learn and play a number of different card games
20) acquire painting supplies, use said supplies

21) learn to love Kevin more than I love myself; support him; dream with him (aka be an awesome wife!)—definite improvements!

22) learn when and how to be a follower rather than a leader (and vice versa)—definite improvements!
23) read through the Bible again—in progress!
24) have Kevin teach me Greek—in progress!
25) sing somewhere 
26) grow a garden (even an herb garden, come on!)
27) learn to exercise (& do it regularly!)
28) remember to not be too serious

29) study up on world religions
30) …get a new and decent job.

13/30 is pretty dang close to half! Here’s to finishing the list by my anniversary! :)
How are you doing on your New Year’s resolutions?

our day at apartment depot

Our project today started small: find some bookcases to house our books.

First place we checked: the thrift store a block away. We bought a sort of burgundy bookcase that needed a ton of cleaning, and a yellow wall picture (love!). After meeting a few friendly elderly gentlemen who run the thrift store, one of the men accompanied us to the warehouse down Colorado Blvd to see if there were any other bookshelves they could hand off to us……. he was an interesting character, to say the least. The only thing that seems to come to mind about the conversation content, though, was his excitement over legalized medical marijuana. This guy was probably sixty. Typical.

Next, we headed to Evergreen’s Habitat for Humanity shop, at the man’s suggestion. There, I found my favorite reading chair in the world, and we decided to purchase 13 cabinet doors. These we would paint, distress with sandpaper and nail to the wall with L brackets. Instant bookshelves!

So… after a bit of a drive (and a stop to a non-existent Starbucks - bummer), we arrived at Home Depot. We couldn’t have been any more out of our element. However, with the help of a friendly Home Depot employee (or two… or three….), we purchased L brackets, plenty of screws, sandpaper, and two awesome colors of spray paint. Can you believe we spent about two hours trying to find the right things for this relatively small project??

Back home, we set to work! Spray painting in the back of Kev’s truck, we worked together AWESOMELY as a team! After maybe twenty minutes, though, my “trigger finger” started hurting, and Kevin took over as head spray painter. :) I took pictures.

All in all, it only took us about five hours to paint, assemble and mount the shelves. Good thing an NCIS marathon was on…

journey to colorado

Kevin and I are currently 1/3 of the way on our journey across the nation to our home in Colorado. That means we drove 15 hours, towing my little Mazda-pig behind Kev’s truck in the blistering heat from DE to MI. Although I managed to finish my book, Stonehenge, before sunset, I tried to keep conversation with Kevin (to keep him awake, of course) and tried to block out the music and sermons he insisted on listening to. Not that I was TRYING to block out the sermons… they were some good ones… I mean, good messages and all… I just had to finish my book! Priorities! I had to finish before sunset, and I had to finish so I could give it back to my brother - it was his library book! So.

HOWEVER, I don’t want you to think I was ignoring my husband. Oh no - we discussed favorite moments at PBU, favorite profs, the very distinctive laughs of different profs, theological issues raised by the sermons I was trying to block out…

Some highlights of the trip:

-Kevin’s favorite moment was when his paper for senior seminar was praised by Dr Krewson and submitted as the representative paper of his class (with maybe the work of one other student).

-My favorite moment was when Dr Toews didn’t know what an “apiarist” was, and I was able to tell him very confidently (thanks to an episode of The Office)… he told me to go to the head of the class, “whatever that even means.” I am so proud of that moment. That Iinstructed Dr Toews.

-Favorite profs shall remain nameless (although it shouldn’t be hard to guess at mine….)

-Kevin is exceptional at imitating Victor Jacobs’ and Dr Schnittjer’s laughs. And it just about killed me.

-Theological issues dealt with the necessity of there being a literal Adam and which aspects of the Gospel are “essential” to teach to a new or non-believer.

-The sermons we listened to: three by Ravi Zacharias, and one by John Piper. You know what’s up.

And now, we lounge at my parents’ home in Michigan. I laid out by the lake today, got a bit of a sunburn on my nose, and read some of my book. Currently reading Our Search for Happiness by M. Russell Ballard. Somehow, I got roped into lifeguarding for a group of 8th graders from my old middle school on their annual year-end outing to our camp. Ah well. I’ll never say no to more sun. Or gas money.

Friday AM we leave for the next leg of our journey — from MI to IA.


June 3, 2011

After two days of relaxation in Michigan (read: two days of sunburning & reading), we head out tomorrow on another 12-14 hr drive to another lake house in Iowa! Pray for safety and alertness — we’re leaving in just over four hours. You read that right: we’re leaving at 4 AM. And Michigan hasn’t bought into the whole Dunkin Donuts craze yet. Apparently notall of America runs on Dunkin. Much to the sadness of all involved in early morning car rides, I’m sure.

Boy am I sunburnt.

June 9, 2011

Our journey from IA to CO was expedited (sort of) due to the Missouri River flooding: Kevin and I were planning on leaving Monday morning around 2, but left Sunday night at 10:30.

Some conclusions and observations:

-Nebraska is lame (smelly and buggy and boring).

-I cannot fall asleep to Ravi Zacharias, but I *can* fall asleep to John Piper. I think my ears perk up to an interesting accent.

-Kevin rubs his head in a rather distinct manner/pattern when he’s getting sleepy and trying to stay focused.

-I am surprisingly alert from 2:30 to 5 am.

-People are way nicer out west than on the east coast.

-As we crossed into Colorado, Kevin didn’t cease smiling (he set the GPS to calculate altitude…which continued to rise as we passed Denver).

-Good omens: Kevin saw a deer almost as soon as we crossed the border into CO, and I saw a rainbow.

-Mountains? Yes, we think so.

(I had taken pictures - a lot of ‘em - but… I make it a habit of deleting pics from my camera as soon as I put them on my laptop… and my computer crashed before I backed it up on the external hard drive… so… you’ll have to wait on that!) We arrived at 11:00 am and moved our stuff into our new and completely excellent apartment by 11:30. We live above a coffee shop with free wifi (yes yes yes), and across the street from Beau Jo’s Pizza. We’ve come to anticipate an almost daily visit to the local Walmart. Oy.

Recently, we:

-Bought a 32” TV (we basically had to: our landlords pay for cable!)

-Were blessed to meet Dave S. in Java Mountain Roasters (the coffee shop downstairs) who was reading his Bible… and proceeded to have an excellent discussion about school districts, his church, Denver Seminary, CCU and Billy Graham.

-Met Will, working at ModMood Vintage Furniture, a Mormon with whom we struck up a conversation about religion and life across the States. Very cool guy.

-Visited Denver Seminary and met Cheryl in the Registrar office. I want her to be my… aunt, or something.

-Are anticipating the arrival of our furniture and such on Monday!

-Have applied for work in Idaho Springs… I had an interview at Starbucks today that went really really well!

-Are reading through the letters of John together. Loving the focus on fellowship and togetherness that is brought about by mutual love of Christ and acceptance of the Gospel. We pray we are able to demonstrate that sense of unity to our new community out here in CO!