If I Had A Twin

If I had a twin this would be her...Guess if we were twins our parents wouldn't have named us both Angie! Here we are cheesin' at the Alumni Reception on Sunday night honoring two outstanding former track and cross country athletes from ISU. The weekend festivities for the NCAA Cross Country Nationals didn't disappoint-alumni party on Saturday night, Sunday night reception, and Monday the race. We even got to take in a sycamore bball game on Sunday. Race day was freezing but true CC weather.

Attic Treasures

Last week we had to venture into the attic because we kept hearing noises in the night-critter noises to be exact. Anyway-although our quest into the attic didn't turn up any good animal scat or glowing eyes we did find this awesome chest. Once I laid eyes on the chest I could hardly wait to get in down speculating on the treasures it held. It didn't disappoint. The top shelf held a large brown envelope addressed to the husband of the former owner of our house when he was stationed in California in the Coast Guard. In the envelope were old pictures and army memorabilia. But the sweetest item was a love letter from his wife. It was like a letter straight out of the "Notebook", and I couldn't help but think of them the rest of the night, and about how their lives once were. She is always so sad when she talks about the house she left which is now ours. Although I'm excited to call her to tell her about my find, I hope it doesn't make her too blue. There were also the original house plans in the chest and how much they paid for the land and to build the house-incredible!

Plastic Part II

My second gripe on plastic after the plastic water bottle usage comes the use of little plastic lunch baggies. While I was home on Friday night visiting my parents and brother-my brother proudly displayed a new man lunch bag that he purchased from REI on a recent trip to St. Louis. While the bag was very cool and green (like I said-a man bag), his baggie usage wasn't so cool. Apparently he uses 4-6 plastic baggies to separate everything into their respective food groupings, for example-using two bags to separate the pickles from his sandwich each day. God forbid the pickle juices co-mingle with the sandwich-ha! An article I found online on how to make a garbage free lunch noted that one reusable sandwich container can take the place of more than 200 plastic bags used over the course of a year. I'm a fan of reusable plastic or glass lunch containers. I'm not "baggin" on Todd, cause even I use the baggie when it's convenient.

Does everyone know about Pandora besides me. Brady introduced me to it this past week and it sure did make my work day better. Pandora is an online radio station thingy (free). You type in an artist and then it gives you a medley of songs like that type of music. I for instance typed in O.A.R. and got a great compilation of tunes including DMB and Counting Crows. Apparently Todd also knows about Pandora and when I was home we jammed out to some 80's (a small dance party was had in my old bedroom amidst the retro wall art, which Todd keeps threatening to paint over).

Spirit & Place

Sunday night Brady and I went to a presentation by the Spirit and Place Festival which runs through November 16th. This was the first time we have attended an event sponsored by Spirit and Place but the overall idea of S&P is to explore different ideas and creativity linking the arts , humanities and religion, and there are events all over town every day of the two week event. The presentation we saw was a panel discussion on the Spiritual Mandate for Creation Care. It was interesting but we didn't hear anything to life changing. The earth is going to pot, what are we doing, why don't Christians care and why should we worry about it anyway if it's all going to blow up one day soon. Well, a few of the panelist kept going back to a verse in Genesis, Genesis 2:15, God took man and put him in the garden to work it and take care of it. My favorite panelist was Matt Krick, a pastor from Mars Hill church in Grand Rapids, MI. Mars Hill did a great sermon series on God is Green that I could lone out thanks to Steph. Matt also provided a cool resource list of some books that he recommends. Try out "The Mad Farmer Liberation Front" for fun, a poem by Wendell Berry. Too long to post on the blog but a good read.

This week is busy-three jobs, a paper due next Wed. and a business plan coming to fruition. The Berry Nook may take it's small step into production in the spring-I think we're going to plant between 200-300 strawberry plants around our house for starters. Anyone want to come help plant? or till?

Indianapolis Monumental Half Marathon

Well, we survived the mini this morning-although I can tell I'm going to be very sore tomorrow! It was a fun, flat course-passing through many neighborhoods in Indy that I had never been through. Brady was a good encourager and coach for me when I wanted to take it easy and cruise in-he insisted we must finish strong. He did get a little excited about a free chocolate Gu that was handed out towards the end of the race. I expressed that there should be no more talking in my dilapidated state and that he should go on, obviously feeling much better than I, but he insisted on staying by my side even when I got mean-ha!

Congrats to my former ISU teammate and friend Jeri for winning the woman's division! And thanks to our friends Alyssa and Travis for cheering us on! Go Trees!

Will the Real Indy Step Forward?

Typically Brady hates Halloween but this year was not the case. I was really surprised how much he enjoyed his stint as Indiana Jones on Friday for his work office party. He even put the outfit back on to go over to the Darlings to watch a Harry Potter movie that night! In his defense-he did make a darn good Indy! Although next year I hope to not be awoke by our bedroom lights being turned on and hearing the theme song to the movie Halloween morning! Ha!