Every Day Life: Going Bananas

By Beth M

Growing up a pastor's kid I wasn't allowed out on Halloween night. I thought it was just my dad being mean, but seems he had other reasons which, as an adult, I can understand, even if I don't agree with them. My kids go trick-or-treating every year; it's just a fun night for them. Dressing up is always fun.

Last year on Halloween I thought how fun it would be to hide in the bushes by our front door and jump out at people when they come. We get mostly college kids, living right next to Philadelphia Biblical University. My mom works there as do several of our neighbors, and the kids like to visit the professors on Halloween. I debated what kind of costume to get for this year's Halloween, the Scream guy, Jason, werewolf, etc. but settled on a gorilla. It wasn't until a few weeks before Halloween this year that I finally got it though. Lara and I just happened to be in Target, I had dragged her back to the seasonal section where there were some Christmas decorations up. I love Christmas, started decorating early sometime about the year my brother and I decorated the whole house for Christmas, including tree, cookies and music, while my mom was at a faculty workshop in August. But that's another story. This story belongs to the gorilla suit.

Click to read more ...

Every Day Life: Time Change

By Lara

Anyone who knows me knows that I abhor time change. I would be perfectly content to live my life within the normal parameters of Eastern Standard Time regardless of the change of seasons. I have no need for it to be light out until 9 PM in June. While I was sitting at my desk today enduring the longest Monday on record in the history of the world, I started to think about the strange occurrences that tend to follow me around that thwart my best efforts to prepare myself for the shock to my bio-rhythmic system.

Last year during time change, I tried to go to sleep early to take full advantage of my extra hour. Part of my problem with time change is my love of sleep. I intended to maximize the time that I could be snuggled under the covers with my cat. I'm sure that I was asleep by 9:45. It was cozy and warm.

Click to read more ...

Every Day Life: How Do I Love Thee, Let Me Count The Ways...

By Beth M

As Lara has mentioned in her most recent article, we don't get to see each other a lot. We live 101 miles apart and both have jobs and families and lives away from each other. This is why we like to make the most of the time we can spend together, from scheming how to best take over the world to vegging out watching Lord of the Rings commentaries. Lara probably knows me better than anyone, save my mother, and even then it's pretty close. We've been friends since the 6th grade, which was 20 years ago now. WOW! That makes us sound so old! But, if recent history is anything to go on, Lara and I will never "be old" in the traditional sense of the word. We will continue to have as much fun as humanly possible as the years go by. We will continue to, in the words of my 14 year old daughter, "have too much fun."

For my next article, I've decided to take a more serious note and tell you all some of the things I love best about Lara. Now, some of them might be funny, or confusing to you, but they mean something to us. And this is in no way a comprehensive list. That would take too many pages and I'm pretty sure my fingers would fall off from typing long before I ever got to the end. Also, Ginny probably wouldn't want an article THAT long on the blog! We all need a friend like Lara in our lives, so here we are, 25 things I love about Lara:

Click to read more ...

Every Day Life: Renaissance Festival

By Lara

As many of our faithful readers know, Beth and I have put a lot of thought and effort (and flexibility) into our new list. With that flexibility comes the sad truth that we do not get to see each other as often as we would like to. Therefore, we will not be able to write about an item from the list every week because we haven't necessarily accomplished an item from the list every week. That brings me to this week's article. It was suggested that I write about "every day life." I think I can handle that.

This weekend, I managed to wrangle two of my co-workers into attending the Maryland Renaissance Festival with me. I have been to the fair before (usually tied tightly into a time-period costume), but my co-workers had not. I tried to prepare them for the experience without scaring them away. If you have never been the the Ren Fest before, please understand that it tends to attract some very eccentric people.

Click to read more ...