Family History and the Best Christmas Present Ever

I've always wanted to give the perfect gift--the kind that lights up the receiver's eyes and makes them look up in delighted surprise. The kind that you spend weeks dreaming about because it's so perfect.

But I'm going to be honest--most years I'm still shopping for presents the week before Christmas, or even on Christmas Eve, which is generally not the time to find the perfect present. Just in case you're wondering.

This year, however, was different. One day I was sitting in Sunday School at church. The lesson was on Family History, and my good friend teaching. Now, just in case you're wondering, I'm not one of those people who generally receive visions in Sunday School (nor do I know any of those people). But during this particular lesson, friends, I had a VISION. I don't remember what the teacher was talking about (something related to family history, I'm sure), but all of a sudden I saw, in my mind, a vision of a book. An ancestor book, to be specific, to give to my nieces and nephews for Christmas. And with a few modifications (because I can't draw and clipart images of girls chasing coyotes are hard to come by), I made that vision a reality. Friends, behold: the Sunday School vision of the ancestor book.

I put pictures of the entire book in so that you, too, could enjoy the fruits of my vision, and also because it was a heck of a lot of work and I want people to see it! The pictures all have velcro on the back, so it's a matching game as well as a book. And I think I finally gave the perfect gift--it was a complete surprise so no one was expecting anything like it, but it will be used for years to come (I hope)!

And judging by their reactions, I think my nieces and nephews (and their parents!) liked it.

Even Peter liked it, although you wouldn't guess it from this picture...

And I'm happy to report that my perfect gift giving streak didn't stop with my nieces and nephews' present. My sister Losaunne is an avid biker, so for her present I donated to an organization called Bikes for the World. It was the amount needed to fix up and send a used bike to someone in Africa or the Philippines. Judging by the look on her face, I think it was a good present!

Painting my Apartment: The After Pictures

I'm sorry to keep you all waiting so long to see what my apartment looks like now that I've painted it. But there are lots of reasons I haven't been able to take the pictures until now. For one thing, it gets pretty dark at night because the lighting isn't that great (for pictures). So after work doesn't work, which leaves Saturdays and Sundays. But guess what? Between the flooding, carpet cleaning, windows getting replaced, and pest control coming in to spray, my apartment has been a huge mess for a very long time. It's been rough, guys. But thankfully I got some pictures today. Please note that this was a LOT of work. But it's so much better than the rainbow cave!!

The front room/bedroom (any ideas on how to make my bed look more couch-ish so it looks like a front room instead of a bedroom? I'm planning on putting pillows across the back...but any other ideas?)

Don't worry, I'll put a real picture over the piano that fills up the wall a little better--but doesn't the Chinese calligraphy look nice?

I like to call this area by the closet my "family room"--thus the random overstuffed chair.

Kitchen

There are two shelves over the sink. Remember when there was just one? The other one was on the left side of the room, near the fridge, about hip level. What the? It was in the most random place. I think this works much better (especially since there are no cupboards above the sink!!).

Bathroom

My landlord replaced the toilet seat two weeks ago. But apparently they don't make toilet seats in 70's pink anymore!

My New Apartment and its Humble Beginnings as a Rainbow Cave

Ever since I finished my MA thesis, writing has been incredibly painful for me. So painful, in fact, that I can barely write emails! If I have to write more than a few sentences, I have to take a break, go get some chocolate or walk around the block, and then come back in to write another paragraph. And this, my friends, is why I have written very little on my blog since June. Thankfully I only have to write a little at work, and it is in very short sentences or occasionally a short paragraph, so it's giving me time to recover.

Recover from what, you might ask. Well. If simply saying "I'm a recovering grad school addict" was not answer enough for why my brain is fried and my motivation shot, I'll have you know that in the last two years I have moved 12 times between 3 countries/territories and three states, I took graduate classes at 3 universities in 3 countries/territories and in 3 different languages, did a 2-year MA program in one year, and wrote a 101 page thesis in a month. ONE month. So I got a little burned out after grad school, and writing was one of the things that took the hardest hit.

And if you think I'm being a bit extreme, I feel like it's kind of like giving blood. You have to wait a little bit after giving blood to give blood again, right? Because your body needs to replenish its store of blood. I'm only exaggerating a little when I say that it felt like grad school, and especially the period of time spent writing my thesis, felt like one long blood-letting process. I clearly needed some time to replenish my energy supply before I could write again.

So what have I been doing with myself for the past few months? Giving my new apartment a complete makeover! My very cheap, well-below-market-value apartment in an incredibly convenient location (and did I mention that I have my OWN apartment? That's the best part!!) had some issues. A LOT of issues. And after I had the landlord replace the doors (the front door was a bedroom door, with no deadbolt and no threshold or weather stripping! Disgusting bugs were waltzing into my apartment THROUGH THE FRONT DOOR!), fix the air conditioning (who doesn't want to go through August in DC with a broken A/C?), and fix the ceiling lights (their wires had rusted through), I decided to tackle the walls. 

Now, I am sure that there are a lot of people that would love to move into a basement apartment with a lime green-dark grey-white-yellow-dark navy blue paint job, but I felt like I was living in a disgusting rainbow cave. In case you wonder what it would be like to live in such a rainbow cave, here are a few pictures of before and after-the-primer.

Special thanks to Ginette, who helped me paint the kitchen. Isn't that lime green just amazing?

Kitchen post-primer

Bathroom cave. 70's pink tub, toilet, and sink, and dark navy blue walls. Totally fashionable.

I liked to call this yellow "fever yellow" because it made the lighting in the front room look sickly

And special thanks to Julie who helped me paint the front room!

I know that you are all dying to see the "after" pictures, but I'm going to save those for the next post. It was a crazy long process, y'all, and I'm going to let you experience some of that "is this ever going to end and will my walls ever look normal" feeling for yourself. Also that was a lot of writing, and it's time for me to take a break now. :)

A degree! A job! A house! A car!

I know I have been terrible about posting. One post a month is obviously way more than I can handle at this point in my life. But guys, I seriously have so many things to write about, it just gets overwhelming sometimes. And I've been so busy!

So for a quick update: In June I finished my thesis and moved out to DC (hallelujah!!). Finishing grad school felt great--so much so that I didn't even mind not really having a job for a few months! But thankfully, still breathing a sigh of relief that grad school was over, I got a job! In the middle of all that excitement, I had to register my car and get Virginia plates--a process that took several weeks, 6 trips to the DMV, and several trips to several different mechanics. But guess what? My car is registered now!

Oh, and just a few weeks ago my diploma arrived in the mail. So it's official--I'm now Master Breanne!

As for my housing situation--in the past three months I have moved four times. Four! That's more than people who are running from their parole officers. Seriously. But I finally found my own (!) apartment in DC for a great deal and in a great location. And it had a million things wrong with it--including a non-secure front door that allowed nasty bugs to waltz right in to my house. But I got those replaced and have been slowly fixing up the rest of the house. But it keeps me busy, y'all!

Anyway. One day I will tell you, loyal readers, the stories behind these facts. But for now, here's a random picture to distract you from the fact that this post is quite boring and non-informative.

A Weekend Trip to New York

At the end of 2012, when I was living in Jerusalem, an awesome family, the Vogelmanns, moved to Jerusalem and joined our branch. They had 5 very funny, smart, and sarcastic little kids, so needless to say I was thrilled. Since I was working in the Primary at that time, I got to see their kids each Sabbath at church, and they often invited me over for dinner after church. Over the next several months, I often went to their house to babysit, play with their children, or just hang out. Dinner conversations tended to stretch on until 1 or 2 in the morning, their children never seemed to run out of energy no matter how many times we wrestled, and I never had to search hard for an excuse to go over and visit. 

Although they lived quite far from my apartment (a journey that involved a military checkpoint and almost an hour of drive time round trip), they were always willing to give me a ride home. This might seem like a small thing, but I'll never forget what it meant to me to have someone give me a ride when getting home was always such a hassle and involved switching modes of transportation several times. And although their family also struggled with some of the difficulties of adjusting to life in Jerusalem, I always joked with them that God sent them to Jerusalem to preserve my sanity! They definitely became like family to me, and it was great to have some surrogate nieces and nephews around while I was so far from my own family.

After months of expectation, the Vogelmanns came back to visit family in New York this summer, and naturally I planned a visit up there to see them. It had been just over a year since I'd seen them, but it was like nothing had changed--we still stayed up until 1 in the morning chatting, and I had plenty of chances to give piggy back rides to the kids! It was wonderful to catch up with them and I'm already looking forward to next year when they come back again!

The 5 kids and both parents were staying with the grandparents in a 2-bedroom apartment in downtown New York City. They were kind enough to let me have the whole living room to myself while the kids and parents all slept in one room and the grandparents slept in the other! 

Kevin's parents live on the 34th floor of an apartment building in Lower Manhattan right on the banks of the Hudson, and the views from the balcony were exquisite. I always thought I would be overwhelmed by the big city life (I'd suffocate without space to breathe!) but I think if I lived in a place like this it would be manageable!

I was thrilled to see the kids--and even more thrilled when some of them started calling me "Aunt Breanne." One of them even told me, "Breanne, you're kind of like our aunt."

Margaret has perfected the disinterested sneer look when you ask her to smile for the camera. Ain't nobody gonna tell her what to do! I had to laugh at Truman's expression--looks like he's learning from Margaret!

And this gem of a picture, with the creeper in the lower left corner. I laugh every time I look at it. What was he doing on the playground anyway?

I'd been to New York once before hand hit the major tourist spots and I'm sure I'll go again, so this trip we just did things that would be fun for five kids that have been traveling and staying with relatives for the past five weeks. Things like going to the park and wandering through Chinatown. It was great!

Maya took this picture of me. I was pretty impressed!

Sunday morning I went to the Chinese ward in Chinatown. It was a really neat experience--especially when the Relief Society president found out that I speak Chinese and immediately asked me, "Do you want to take a job in New York and move up here and help our ward?" I'm not planning on moving any time soon (I did just move a couple of months ago!), but if I do move to New York I'll at least know my way around the parks and Chinatown!