Necessary Cleaning

I find that the more I experience life, the more I learn about myself, as it should be, for if we do not learn more about ourselves, we are not truly experiencing life. Recently, I have been discovering a new-found interest in understanding more about the world and history. For example, last night Tony and I had the opportunity to watch Lincoln in theaters. It was incredible to watch the political side of the Civil War and to get a glimpse in the life of Lincoln. I wish I had a bigger comprehension of life, or desire to learn more about things before me and beyond me, earlier in life. I had this great beginning put together last night, but I forgot it so I hope that does it justice.

I just remembered it! Awesome! So, back to learning more about myself. Other than that stated above, I have also been learning about my home-managing skills. In fact, I have learned that when I haven't had time to clean the apartment, my stress level increases significantly. The idea that I don't even have time to take care of the little things drives me crazy. I have had the same to do list for the last two weeks and I think I've finally completed most of them this weekend finally. More about that later.

Now onto the purpose of this blog: informing friends and family about the joys in life here in Iowa.

To start off with, the weekend of 2/23 found us traveling to the land of Michigan to witness the start of a life between Tony's sister, Heidi, and her new husband Chad. It was nice to see family again. Overall, the weekend was filled with setting up the church for the wedding, cleaning up and relaxing. We truly wish Heidi and Chad a wonderful, God-centered marriage!

The bride walking down the aisle

The new couple!

The always needed picture of us

The month following was a long time ago. To dig up and remember what we all accomplished. Let's see. The following weekend I had the opportunity to help throw a baby shower for a friend of ours. No offense to anyone, but it was a great shower. One of the best if I do say so myself. That weekend also brought the end to a miserable cold, I think Tony gave it to me. One of the unfortunates of living in such close quarters. It also happened that I had a pretty extreme allergic reaction to something starting that Saturday through Tuesday morning. At least we think it was an allergic reaction, to what I have no idea since it has never happened before or since and nothing in our lives changed. Trust me, we thought long an hard about what it might have been. Take it from me, a very itchy rash all over your body for 2.5 days is not a pleasant experience. Thank goodness we had some benedryl on hand, expired or not, it works.

Two more weeks to cover. Actually, two more weekends. Our weeks are relatively straight forward.

• Monday night: dinner with friends (4 other couples and Brad) where we eat together and spend some time hanging out and praying for one another.
• Tuesday night: we usually travel to the other side of Coralville for some time with Sami and Ben watching Arrested Development together.
• Wednesday night: I catch up on homework and Tony usually spends some time on his computer fixing it, or not.
• Thursday night: attending a small group with the 20 somethings group at church.
• Friday night: this starts the weekend :)

On to the weekends. Last weekend was a difficult one. The apartment not being cleaned was wearing on me, homework was piling up in preparation for the end of the first half of the semester and spring break, and I just wanted to sit and cuddle with Tony. Friday night we were all set on hanging out with some friends, typical dinner and a movie. Couples date. However, this was pushed back to the following night and Tony and I got to cuddle up together to watch something I don't remember. Much needed comfort after an emotionally trying day and week. The rest of the weekend was spent doing homework and hanging out with friends.

I have also realized lately that I am a selfish person. I want Tony all to myself. I really don't want to sound like that cheesy couple, but honestly, the more we spend time together, the more I want to not do anything with anyone, but rather, keep him all to myself. 

Speaking of keeping him all to myself. On to this weekend! (Almost done. Don't worry.) 

Little quick detour. So as stated before, I was feeling the stress of not cleaning the apartment and my homework was taking a significantly longer time than expected. It also happened that we offered to host small group on Thursday. I was dying. I needed to get away from it all. So, what did I do? I did. I just left work early, I wasn't really focusing anyway, so that I could tend to my business. It's amazing what a little cleaning can do. It was amazing!! And the best part is, it's still clean. I felt so much better. Mission accomplished and small group was great. 

Back on the highway. Tony and I had been planning on having a date weekend since it was the beginning of spring break. So what did we do? Do I even want to admit it? Sure, why not. He got off work a little early on Friday, picked me up at work and we drove on over to the library to pick up some movies. We ended up having a true movie marathon and watched all five movies in the Twilight Saga in one day/night. Fun times. Saturday was lazier than it needed to be, but we had the chance to bless (if you could call it that) some of our friends by decorating their apartment before they came back from out of town. Ended it with dinner and Lincoln, as stated above. Great movie! Spoiler alert. He dies. Sorry.

Well, here we are. Back to the grind. Tomorrow brings another week, we'll both be at work (I've got a lot to accomplish this week) and the world keeps on turning. This weekend was great. Knocked most of the things off my to do list. Spent about 4 hours today baking and cleaning (mostly simultaneously. Apparently I'm a very clean baker) to send some treats on their merry way and finally got around to writing this very long blog post. (I just can't put multiple posts in, I don't know why.)

Baking frenzy! Horrible picture, but Tony was wearing an apron