winter break in pictures.

Here's what our winter break looked like:

We played some games. Josh and our cousin Robert were on a team for Yahtzee. 

We opened some gifts. This is our cousin Mary in her newly acquired Broncos outfit.

Layla is learning a lot about nutrition and is doing a sugar detox. 

Josh and Uncle Gary taking a break from the present opening shenanigans. 

Christmas meal. You can see Gregory and Ruthie in the mirrior :)

Robert, Mary, and the dog's cage are great playmates.

Layla, Josh, my mom, and I spent an afternoon in St. Louis one day. We got lunch at Seoul Taco on the Loop, which was amazing, then did some shopping and walked around the Laumeier sculpture park.

Layla turned 20 on January 2nd! We celebrated her life with an awesome sushi dinner at Wasabi and then ate cake (red velvet raspberry with buttercream frosting) and opened presents back at home.

 It was so good to be with family and friends!

year in review: 2014.

When I think back on 2014 the first thing I notice is that I started and ended the year with my dear friends from college. We're all a bit scattered across the country now, so getting together at New Years when we're all back in the St. Louis/Edwardsville/Greenville area has been the best time for a reunion. I've seen various friends from our tight-knit college group at different times throughout the year, but being (almost) all together like this is a special treat. In the first few days of 2015, I find myself thinking a lot about relationships and feeling incredibly grateful for the friends and family who are invested in my life. 

2014 wasn't the most exciting year of my life by any means. (Two years ago I graduated from college, got married, and moved to Norway!) Nevertheless, it was a good year with lots of learning, laughing, crying, new friends, old friends, painting, singing, weed-pulling, and pottery-making. 

Here are some monthly highlights from 2014:

January: We visited my family for a bit after Christmas and on the day of our planned depature a snowpocalypse hit Greenville.  We couldn't drive home to Wichita on that day so we got to spend some extra time with family, which was really special for me. I remember playing a lot of NERTS and having an inpromtu dance party. That was fun.

February: Josh and I took a short, but sweet visit to Seattle to participate in SPS discernment weekend and hang out with the Cranstons.

March: We went on a spring break trip to Kansas City with some friends from church. There was lots of relaxing, some kite flying (and watching), and some art viewing.

April: For me, the most notable events in April were Palm Sunday and Easter Sunday. This year I felt more able to fully realize the significance of Jesus’s death and resurrection. I remember singing and waving my palm branch on Palm Sunday feeling like Jesus was right there amoung us. Also in April, Josh and I dug up a little plot of land and planted onions, tomatoes, beets, and peppers, which we planned to can.

May: Josh turned 24 and finished writing his Master's thesis! Elise and Tyler came to Wichita to live and work for the summer, which was awesome. The three of us, along with a group of 15 or so, started work with Legacy Art Corps to prepare for the Legacy summer camps. We kept our garden growing.

June: June was possibly our busiest month. In the beginning of June I started an Ignatius prayer study with a group from church, which focuses on the inner life and connecting with God. In mid-June, Josh, Mikey and I traveled to the East Coast to visit Michael, Kelly, Niqui, and Jordan. While there Josh successfully defended his master's thesis and graduated from the University of Oslo with a Master's of Philosophy in Culture, Environment, and Sustainability. Woohoo! Go Josh! After our trip out East we stopped in Greenville for a while to hang out with my family. One evening we had a dinner on the back deck to celebrate Josh and sent Chinese lanterns off into the sky.

July:  Layla came to stay with us in Wichita for a week, which was super fun. I turned 24. Josh and I celebrated our 2nd year of marriage. We harvested lots of onions, which we cured in the green house, and lots of beets, which we canned.  It was a good month!

August: Josh and I went to the PNW where we hung out with Josh's family on Whidbey Island for a Kline family reunion and spent a few days in Seattle. After the reunion I started working at Woodman Elementary again and Josh went on tour with his band, The Radio Soul. In late August our friend Benny came to visit us. We met him in Norway and he’s German, so it’s extremely special to get to see him! In August we had SO many tomatoes.  We canned some, but we were still up to our knees in tomatoes. We were all so tired of eating them until discovering this recipe:

Preheat oven to 325 F, cut tomatoes in half and set them on a greased baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle parsley, salt, pepper, minced garlic over top and bake for a couple hours. Enjoy fresh out of the oven!

September: We got a cat! Amelie was the cat of Josh’s cousin April, but due to cat conflict in her home she gave Amelie to us. In September I started doing yoga regularly, which was wonderful.

October: I flew to Chicago to hang out with Layla and my parents at Trinity for a long weekend. I got to see Layla play soccer and we went on several walks near Lake Michigan. Over the summer I partnered up with my friend Kelly to create The Winsome Press. In October we sold our art and handmade goodies at a couple handmade markets and we opened an etsy shop.

November: My parents met us at Lake of the Ozarks State Park for a wonderfully relaxing cabin weekend. We celebrated Thanksgiving with our family and friends here in Wichita. Josh's parents came for the long weekend, which was extra special.

December: Josh started making an electric guitar (out of wood) with his cousin Dan. This is a new and exciting venture for Josh. This semester we joined a choir; we prepared songs to sing at a candlelight Christmas worship service at our church. My favorite song was Ave Marie by Biebl. This month, of course, we celebrated Jesus. Josh and I drove to Greenville to be with my dad’s side of the family for Christmas. We had a great time playing games (NERTS, ping pong, soccer), talking, opening gifts, and just general hanging out. 

 2014 was a pretty great year! I'm enjoying the fresh start with 2015 and look forward to all this year holds for me. 

thankful for...

photo taken in Tønsberg, Norway

Happy Thanksgiving, dear friends!

This year I am giving thanks for....

A warm home and garden produce

My husband and the ways we’ve grown together over the past couple years

Pottery, painting, sewing, knitting, and creativity

Friends, new and old, near and far

Legacy Ministries

The chance to visit my sister this Fall and see her college world 

Students who remind me why I want to be a teacher

My family and how they love, support, and encourage me

The ability to bike to work

All the birds along the river that make my ride to work more enjoyable (the other day I saw two bald eagles on my way home!)

Opportunities to travel, experience different cultures, and meet new people

God, prayer, and our church family

The inspiring beauty of nature

What are you especially thankful for this year?

cabin weekend with parents: 2nd edition.

A cold spell hit Wichita this week. On Wednesday I biked to work. I knew it would be cold, but wasn't really thinking and I just went for it.  Oh man, was it frigid and windy! I heard later that the wind chill was at -1 degree. I took a long, hot shower afterwards to warm up and then drank a cup of steaming hot tea.  Today I woke up and saw pure white as I glanced at the window. I can't deny the beauty and peacefulness of snowflakes drifting down from the sky, but I am so glad that all this cold weather hit our area after our annual cabin trip with my parents.

Over veteran’s day weekend Josh and I met up with my parents in Lake of the Ozarks State Park.  We had beautiful, sunny weather, which made the hiking just glorious. This was pretty much a repeat of last year’s trip; same cabin, more hiking, more good food, and definitely quality time together. We had a prayer service on Sunday morning and sang Taize songs and hymns together. This year we even went to a movie; we saw Interstellar. It was interesting and aroused a lot of discussion. Have you seen it?

A highlight of the trip for me (other than hanging out with my parents and Josh) was our hike on Sunday. We were walking past open fields of tall grass and up and down rocky hills. We stopped at a natural spring to cook our quesedillas and eat on the flat rocks. Somewhere along the trail I was filled with awe and peace. I felt so refreshed, energized, and grateful for the beauty of creation.

Another highlight, oddly enough was discovering wild persimmon trees along the road that runs through the State Park. One morning while walking, I noticed the orange fruit hanging on a bare tree. We saw evidence of a deer nibbling on the fruit and we decided to try it too. We were hit with instant cotton mouth! I love persimmons, but it seems hard to get them at the exact right ripeness when they won’t attach your mouth with dryness. Nevertheless, I was delighted to identify the plant and to see that fruit is growing in the forest.

I tried some new recipes I found through the internet and wanted to share them with you. Sometimes I need a little inspiration for camping cooking and I’ve found good recipes at dirtygourment.com. 

Lunch: quinoa and kale salad with quesedillas-- We bought pre-made guacamole to add to our quesedillas. If you have backpacking stove and skillet these are easy to make on the trail. 

Dinner: skillet lasagna--We started with homemade marinara sauce, which was delicious! Make sure to cook all the veggies first. We skipped that step and it was a mistake. Cooking a lasagna in a skillet works well when the vegetables are hot; the cooking is really just to melt the cheese. 

Snack: banana granola bars-- These didn’t really stay together like bars, but ended up more like granola. Still, this was delicious and I recommend the recipe.  

I love those parents of mine and am always thankful to spend time with them.

the winsome press.

I’m so excited to tell you about my new creative project, The Winsome Press. This is a new thing that my friend Kelly and I have been working on for some time now. It started last Spring when we both wanted some motivation to make more art. We started giving ourselves weekly project ideas, which later morphed into a decision to focus on getting better at painting with watercolors. Over the summer we both practiced watercolor painting and it was fun! We learned some things and enjoyed being more creative. Somewhere along the way we were asked to participate in a craft fair here in Wichita and we decided to start an etsy shop. So now we have The Winsome Press. This is a way for Kelly and me to paint and be creative, and also to share our creativity with you! You can take a look at our etsy shop here. 

I had a fun time kicking off our new business at Craftacular, a handmade market, in Wichita a couple weekends ago. I was unsure how this would go. Would it be worth all the effort? Would anyone buy anything? Josh helped me with the set-up and display quite a bit; during the first hour we debated over where I should stand and how much I should talk to people. Do people want to chit-chat while they’re shopping? The first hour was a bit slow, but eventually more and more people stopped to look at our art. And finally, someone bought something! I told myself before the show that if one item sold I would be happy.  That first purchase boosted my spirits and I felt more confident to greet and talk to people that walked past or stopped to look at my booth. I ended up having a great time chatting with shoppers and other vendors. I was especially blessed by visits from family and friends who came by the craft fair. 

It was a good experience to participate in a craft fair, but now Kelly and I are focusing our attention on the online marketplace. We look forward to sharing more about our creative process with you here on my blog in the weeks to come. And if you’re interested, check out our etsy shop!

around here.

Here's what's been going on around here this fall.

It's apple season and my housemates have gone apple crazy. Josh, Lauren, and Daniel have been making applesauce on and off for weeks. We have tubs on tubs of the stuff in our garage freezer and Lauren and Daniel are bringing back more apples from an orchard today! We hope to have enough applesauce to eat all winter, spring, and summer. It's wonderful!

Josh is a bread baker. Look at this loaf! The night Josh made this loaf we happened to do "highs and lows" (aka "pows and wows"). This beautiful and tasty loaf of bread was my high for the day.

We have a cat. Josh has been advocating for getting a pet cat for a while now. We tried to get a kitty last spring, but it didn’t really work out. When we told our woeful story to Josh’s cousin April over the summer she offered to give us one of her cats. Her two cats were not getting along, so towards the end of August she drove from Ohio to Kansas with one of her kitties. Now we have Amèlie! The transition was pretty tough. Amèlie hid under the couch for the first three weeks, but now she lounges all over the house and makes us laugh by playing with twisty ties. She has the softest fur! We love her.

I'm enjoying this tasty coffee roasted right down the street from where Layla goes to school.

Last weekend I was with my parents and sister in Chicagoland, walking along Lake Michigan and watching Trinity International University Sports. I sure do love my family.

I am getting ready for a craft fair next Saturday, hence the messy desk. There's lots to do and make, but it's lots of fun. I'll share more on this later.

What's new with you? Do any of you have a newfound skill or a new pet?

Happy Saturday!

Family Reunion on Whidbey Island

I got to spend my last week and half or so of summer on Whidbey Island (and a couple days in Seattle) with a crazy and wonderful group of about 18 Klines and 9 Ivanyis. This was a family reunion for Josh’s mom’s side of the family (the Klines). Josh’s grandparents, Bruce and Kay, have a strong connection with the Ivanyi family from Hungary, so nine Ivanyis joined us as well. Whidbey is an island in Puget Sound; a couple hours in the car and a short ferry ride from Seattle and you're on Whidbey. One evening our cousin Karly led us in “Pows and Wows”- a way of sharing our highs and lows of the week. All 27 of us shared a pow and wow of our week; after each persons’ pow we said “kerpow” in a sad voice and after each wow we shook our hands in the air and said “wooo.” It was a silly and fun, but also real way to connect and share how we were feeling. Since positivity is one of my top five strengths, I will first share my pows from the week and then end on a happy note with my wows.

Pows:

My Great Grandma Z died this summer, which is a big pow in itself. The pow this week was that I missed Grandma Z’s memorial service while I was in Seattle. I already had my plane ticket for the family reunion when found out the date of Grandma Z’s memorial service. I decided to stick to my original travel plans because I did not want to miss out on quality time with Josh’s family. Nevertheless, I was sad to not be with my extended family to process Grandma Z’s death and to celebration her life. Her memorial service was on Saturday and the sadness hit me hard on Sunday. Grandma Z (who I also called "Pally") was really special to me. We wrote letters back and forth for most of my life (at least after the age when I could write letters) and I also felt loved and encouraged by her even though we were miles apart. It was quite a bummer to miss her memorial service, but talking with family over the phone has helped me to process. I also read some of my letters from her, which was a comfort.

This is Grandma Z. at her 90th birthday party.

A smaller pow is that Josh left Seattle a couple days earlier than me to go on a 10 day tour with his band, The Radio Soul. I missed having him around in Seattle and I missed him the following week in Wichita. My other, even smaller pow is that I spent a lot of time in the back seat of the van as we drove around Whidbey Island and to different places around Seattle. I tend to get carsick, so that was not super fun. It feels a bit silly sharing these little pows, but I think it gives you a more accurate picture of my experience.

Wows:

Just being on the island was a big highlight for me.  I loved spending a large chunk of each day outside. Some of my favorite activities were waking up and walking along the bluff before breakfast, moonlit walks along the beach, an invigorating bike ride, making a sun shelter on the beach from driftwood and a blanket, hikes along the bluffs, playing botchy ball one evening with 20 people from our group, and hanging out in the open field in the afternoons (kicking the soccer ball around with Josh and Elise and doing a no-handed cartwheel, which I haven’t even tried to do in years!)

We had a morning prayer service each morning with hymns, Taize songs, scripture reading and prayers of the people. I loved the time to connect with God and with everyone in prayer. This helped me feel more like a part of the Kline family.

I loved getting to know some of the Ivanyis better. Josh and I met many of them last year when we went to Budapest, so it was nice to spend more quality time with them. I spent a lot of time playing with little Sari who is three years old and babbles on and on in Hungarian. I had only a few Hungarian words that I could say to her:  béka frog), szia (hi and bye),  jó éjszakát (goodnight). We had a good time together though; we played hide and seek, I spun her around, and we’d take her stuffed frogs for horse rides on our backs. Gabor Ivanyi and his wife Moni stayed at the Cranstons’ house with us for two days after Whidbey, so I got to spend a lot of time with them. They are quite good at English, so we could have interesting conversations and joke around together. They are both hilarious and very good natured. Gabor cracked me up on the first day when we were introducing ourselves. All the men in the Ivanyi family were asked to introduce their immediate family; Gabor stood up and said “I am my wife’s husband.”  In Seattle Gabor and Moni taught us some Hungarian card games and they told us that we must visit them in Szeged, Hungary. 

Josh actually flew out to Seattle a week before I did, so one of my wows of the week was getting to spend time with him again! That week was the longest amount of time that we’ve been apart since we got married and it was hard for me. I was glad to be in his presence again. 

Putting rocks on each other's faces turned out to be very relaxing.

My final wow was doing yoga, led by our cousin April. I’ve fallen out of my yoga habit this summer and it was nourishing to my body and soul to do yoga again. One morning a group of us did yoga in the living room at our place on Whidbey Island and then back in Seattle April, Karly, Elise and I did yoga in Karly’s backyard by the light of the full moon. So peaceful and inspiring!

So that was my week on Whidbey with all the ups and downs. It was a beautiful week!