Summer 2011 Bucket List

I have big plans for this summer. I don't start my assistantship till July, and after May I am pretty much done with my job on staff with Greek IV. After finding a summer job of baby-sitting, yes I had to find a summer job as 25 year old, I started to stop stressing about finances and just got EXCITED for a fun, relaxing few months this summer. Once August comes my assisantship will kick into high gear and then comes classes for the next 2 years so I want to take full advantage of the months ahead. Check out my summer bucklet list and get ready for fun posts of my future adventures:

1. Do the blob at Rockbridge (summer camp with InterVarsity). I missed out last year, but I MUST do it again this year!

2. Set up two of my friends with each other, both of which will remain nameless. Love is in the air.
3. Memorial Day Weekend beach trip, lets make it a tradition.
4. Win the annual bacche ball tournament at the York family beach week. Grandma and I didn't do so hot as partners last time...
5. Luke and I want to make the "line-up" for making dinner at beach week. It is tough competition...
6. See lots of friends get married: Allison + Mark, Anna + Jordan, Chad + Rachel, and Ashley + Jake. I'll be sad missing out on the celebrations of Bekah + Bruce, Shelley + Charlie, and Kristin + Jon.

This dress is ready to make it's debut...

7. See my little bro graduate from Appalachian State!!

8. Get crafty.
9. Go to the Harrisonburg PUBLIC pool at least 5 times. The people watching there is unreal.
10. Skinny Pinks every Thursday night at Clementines.
11. Big Love Beach Weekend--I've never been to VA beach before!

Some Big Love ladies...

12. Celebrate sweet Katie's 30th birthday!
13. Go on walks at Purcell with friends and chat about life.
14. Luke and I want to go on a weekend trip to a bed and breakfast somewhere in VA.
15. Eat lots of corn on the cob.
16. Start running more again.

remember when I used to be able to run 13.1 miles?

17. Spend sweet time with God in the mornings.
18. Do something with pictures on my computer: photobook, print them, etc.
19. Hike and go camping in the national park.
20. Trivia nights.
21. Walk to Kline's with the house mates!
22. Work more at buying local food and produce (just for you Stace)
23. Salsa dance at the artful dodger.
24. Wine down on Wednesdays. A Greensboro tradition I'm still trying to get going in the Burg!

25. Start praying for my future classmates.
26. Win Mexican Train Dominoes at least half the time, win Nerts at least 1/3 of the time, beat Luke at Gin Rummy 100% of the time.
27. Move into a new place!
28. Finish all seasons of Alias (we are almost done with season one).
29. Watch "So You Think You Can Dance" religiously.
30. Girls' Trip to Boston! Stace, Linds and I just booked our tickets to go see Emily in June :)


31. Celebrate our one year anniversary--even though I have to work that whole weekend.


32. Finish the summer by seeing App State beat VA Tech in football over labor day weekend.
33. Volunteer at the first annual Harrisonburg Impact Camp: a mission week for middle and high school students from various churches in the area as they come together to serve our community!
34. Buy a car.
35. Help my sweet friend, Abby, move to the BURG!! She is the new Greek IV staff!

36. And of course, spend time with LOTS of family and friends, come visit us!!!

I could just keep going, but I need to stop...

Comment with any suggestions or additions to the list above! Summer 2011 here I come!!!

Easter Snapshots

Easter lunch with the Logan clan. We did it buffet style at the country club...I can't think of a better way to celebrate our Savior's resurrection than joining around a big table of family and copious amounts of food. He has risen! He has risen indeed!!

p.s. later that day I took the best nap of my life...food coma. big time.

Connie and her new boo John, we are big fans of him!

Of course I cannot forget the fun from the night before...

It is always a fun treat to see these lovely Sigma Kappa ladies when I come into town. We had a blast just sitting down, eating pizza, and chatting for hours.

My little, she is just so great.

A great weekend to be thankful for family, friends, and the Lord for all his goodness to us!

Top (7) Reasons to live in a basement

I have realized recently that I need to start talking more about life living in basement since that is the theme of our blog and all. So today I started thinking about somethings the typical person would think would be disadvantages to living in a basement; however, Luke and I have twisted those things into BENEFITS. Check out our reasons why:

7. There is a drain in every room. Mopping? Great you have a drain. A flood in the basement? Awesome, there is a drain. Your fridge starts leaking (frustration from last week)? Awesome, wipe it in the drain.

6. Ugly floors. So ugly you can't tell that they are dirty, less cleaning for us :)

5. Poles. We have 2 poles in our living room. Enough said.

4. Low celings. In fact, I can reach our ceilings by simply standing up and putting my hands in the air. No heels, chairs, or ladders are needed to change those light bulbs!

3. Moisture. Being married to a guy with a dry skin disease, its perfect for him!

2. It is small. At any given moment during dinner, we can grab anything we need that we forgot to put on the table all while sitting down. We can reach the fridge, the silverware drawer, the napkins, the dishes, and even the "pantry" (bookshelf) from our dinner chair. We can even pull stuff out of the oven...beat that.

1. Up-stairs neighbors. Yes, we hear them walking around, but for us it is music to our ears! We love our upstairs housemates!

Is it sad that my original plan was to create a top ten list and then I realized there were actually only 7 things I could think of? BUT, we LOVE our cellar. So many fond memories of our first year together. We are sad to leave it in July, but excited for what's to come. Wherever that is...pray for us as we try to find a place to live in the burg!

Yum Yum's

More than likely if you have ever visited Greensboro or driven by you have been to Yum-Yum's, a local hot-dog place that has been around for over 50 years. It is directly on the campus of UNCG and always has a line out the door. They are known for their delicious ice-cream and nuclear red hot dogs. For a long time I avoided the place thinking that red hot dogs were just not right...but boy was I wrong.

Luke and I love visiting Yum Yum's when we are in town and this trip was especially fun with Matt, Evan and Lila! Lila is just growing up so quickly and it was so fun to spend the weekend hanging out with her and the rest of the family!

Yes, thats a diet coke in a glass bottle...how lucky am I?!

I guess the boys were too concentrated on eating their THREE hot dogs to smile.

Ahh, Lila, the cutest thing ever. And we are THRILLED to have another niece or nephew on the way!! They are due in November, congrats Evan and Matt :)

Lila loves her Uncle "uke"

The whole fam. After seeing this picture I am reminded of where Luke got his white socks with black shoes habit...

JMU DUKE.

The word is officially out...yours truly is going to be a JMU Duke. I never thought that I would stay in Harrisonburg longer than my commitment with Greek IV (3 years). I certainty never thought I would become a JMU student. But there a lot a of things I have been wrong about in my life:

I said I would go anywhere on staff but JMU.

I said I would never marry Luke Logan (and oh how I love him).

I said I would never live anywhere but NC (sorry parents).

I said I would never join a sorority (haha thats funny).

And I am sure there are many other things I have said I would never do... but its funny that the things I have said never to are now some of the biggest blessings in my life. Had I really never gone on staff at JMU, or married Luke or joined a sorority I would have missed out on God's best for me.

So now I am leaving staff and this amazing ministry on campus that happens to have the coolest people I know... to pursue a career in student affairs. I am pumped for this new journey and what is ahead for me in the world of higher education as Duke. But, I hold on to this...I will NEVER root for JMU in football

.

Rainy Days

Yesterday was a rainy day. And by rainy I mean monsoonish. Sadly, I had big plans to go to Crosskeys Vineyard for the day while my favorite compy, Stacey, was in town. Too bad we were rained out instead of wining down....

so instead Luke, Stacey and I stayed in our pajamas for most of the day and watched classic movies that we had never seen before (thanks to Netflix)

First up was The Big Chill, a movie my dad had been recommending to me for years because he said it reminded him of our friend group from back home. Which means most of us will end up addicted to drugs, single/divorced, cheating on our significant others, suicidal, and/or castrated. Hmmm hope that is not the case. Needless to say it was quite an interesting and entertaining movie. Very different from what I expected, but funny for sure.

We were trying to identify who would be who from our friend group. Some of our thoughts: Stacey would be the one to try to get one of our friends to lend out their husband so she could get pregnant as a single woman (haha just kidding Stace). Of course Lindsay would be the domestic wife and Emily the crazy yoga girlfriend who tends to be inappropriate and no one knows what to do with her (again I am just kidding)


Next up was The Graduate which I never knew was about the infamous Mrs. Robinson. After watching the movie, which made me really sad and uncomfortable but still entertained, we realized how many other movies play off The Graduate. Who knew that was where the wedding scene from the classic Wayne's World was from?! It left us wondering as they were driving away on the bus, were they happy or not (note photo below) Hmmmm....



So, after the 2 classic movies were over, we decided to watch some episodes of a show that is surely going to be a classic...Jersey Shore. I went two years without watching one episode of that show, but now I find myself wondering whats going on with Ron and Sammie Sweetheart and thinking that Snooki is really endearing (please don't judge me). Really, have I stooped this low?!



Although our plans were messed up because of the weather, we still had a great time with Stace this past weekend....so here's to you Mrs. Robinson and rainy days!

Dumplins or Dumplings?!

I had the opportunity to go and speak at UVa's Greek InterVarsity chapter this past week. And the lovely Miss Lindsay Thomas, one of the freshman girls in my small group, came along for the ride! Since she is a Charlottesville native, I thought we should grab a quick dinner at one of her favorite restaurants.

When she was describing some different places we could go to on the Corner (street with lots of restaurants, shops, etc across from UVa) one stuck out far above the others. There was a small place that you could go to and their main dish is dumplins. Of course my automatic thought was tht I was going to be walking into a a little southern cafe with a big southern woman with white hair (Paula Dean style) was going to be making chicken n' dumplins all day long...

much to my surprise, turns out the place was called "Marco and Lucas" and there were was not an old lady serving southern style dumplins. Instead, there were 2 small Asian men serving DUMPLINGS, not to be confused with DUMPLINS. And my oh my was it DELICIOUS!!!!

There were about 5 things on the menu: dumplings, 2 types of noodles, and a soup. Most people just need dumplings to fill them up, but of course I had to get sesame noodles too, and a diet coke (oops it was a drink 2 kind of day). The total was $7.00. And if I would have just gotten the dumplings it would have only been $3.00! Talk about a steal!

Check out this meal:




For the record, I'm not exactly sure what was actually inside of the dumplings, and after asking the UVa students about it it seems like no one really knows. But I just won't ask...

Lovely Lindsay enjoying her meal:

I'm so glad I found this place and plan to go everytime I am in C-Ville. I can't wait to introduce Luke to it, although he might prefer the Paula Dean type Dumplins with his southern taste buds.

"You know I like my fish fried..."

...a cold beer on a Friday night,
a pair of jeans that fit just right,
and the radio up..."

Gotta love some Zac Brown Band! I must say I do love some good fittin jeans, dancin to the radio and an occasional cold beer on a friday night...

but today I will focus on my great love for fried fish. This is actually a newer joy of mine. I actually did not like fish at all until I studied abroad in Australia and spent the first night at a market where my only option for dinner was seafood. So I caved and had the BEST fried baramundi and chips in my life!! Still today nothing can top it...

So you can imagine the excitement I had when I heard that Grandpa's Ruritan club was having their famous fish fry on the same weekend I was planning to be in Raleigh for Brian and Luann's wedding party (which was fabulous). By the way, Luke was 10 times more excited than I was--he is a country boy through and through!

Grandpa was excited to see us all there! He has been a ruritan club member for a long time! And I am pretty sure he knew everyone there...he is an awesome grandpa and I am sure the whole community loves him!

Check out the healthy eating we did last weekend (not to mention all the BBQ and dips we ate late that night, oops):

Those hush puppies were just incredible! Melt in your mouth kinda good...

Wish we had a picture of all of us being ready, but this is all we got!

I took this picture right as I sat down to eat...notice I had already been nibbling in the line. It was just too good to wait for!

And to top it all off...

the never-ending dessert table! Have you ever seen a dessert table like that?!

Next time there is Ruritan fish fry in your neck of the woods, I suggest you check it out! It is for a great cause and the food is delicious!