wise no more

For years I wanted to join the club of having my wisdom teeth taken out but my dentist continually dashed that dream by saying I would never have any to remove. I was so jealous of my mom and brother who HAD to eat ice cream, pudding and pasta for all of their meals and got to lay on the couch and watch all the tv and movies their hearts desired.

This past Sunday, I JOINED THE CLUB!!!! One day over the summer a wisdom tooth grew in and my dentist decided it needed to come out.

I must admit the experience seemed to be anticlimactic. I was awake for the entire procedure, my mouth still hurts a few days later and while I was having to eat soft not hot foods Mikey was eating things that smelled sensational. I was willing to do anything to eat regular food as the wisdom tooth diet proved to be less awesome at 25 then it seemed at the age of 14...EXCEPT for ice cream

In our house we eat out of ice cream bowls about this size, enough for 1 scoop as Mikey does not require large amounts of desserts. I figure this is a good excuse for me to practice eating in moderation.

This week however I have had the excuse of eating ice cream out of our cereal bowls! oh the joy and bliss of this experience!

As my pain subsides I am realizing I will lose the excuse of filling the cereal bowl with anything other than cereal and must revert back to utilizing the ice cream bowls we were so generously given by Dana and Addie.

So long sweet heaping amounts of ice cream, so long the wisdom of my tooth...hello real life and moderation

there is hope!

Though I spend more time watching seasons of TV series on DVD each day than I would like to admit; tonight I took a time out from season 1 of 24 (I'm saving the last three episodes for tomorrow) and we happily discovered that there is hope to me becoming a decent cook. Lucky Mikey!

Tonight I took on homemade lasagna and cinnamon cake with homemade icing...and garlic toast (from the freezer section of the grocery store).
I forgot to document this momentous occasion before eating dinner...better late then never.
I am scheming to consider this cinnamon cake to be acceptable for both after dinner dessert AND breakfast...We'll see how convinced I am of that in the morning.

I was skeptical at best about the outcome of this evening's undertaking. Thanks to Judiann (momma) Meyer, these recipes were foolproof!

So come on over and dine with us! We cannot wait to have you here.

Royal Caribbean ...more like Royal Mexico!

After our joyful union ceremony and celebration we were so blessed to be lovingly sent on a royal honeymoon cruise to the Mexican Riviera. We felt spoiled to no end, for two graduate students to have a week where we not only got to rest, relax, not think about studies, and have no responsibility to make decisions or answer to anyone...it was like a glimpse of heaven. Not to mention it was great having a week vacation with my bestie.

I had never been on a cruise. I loved the beautiful water, the gorgeous non-nasty-smoggy-LA-hazy-brown sunsets, TOWEL ANIMALS, excursions, room service, buffets, lobster, swimming.

A few highlights...

Mandatory emergency drill...we all like sheep were herded to our rightful life-saving boat and waited for everyone else to get there as well so we could take our bulky orange life vests off
Obligatory "we're on a cruise!" picture from our balcony and the sunset as we said good-bye to L.A. and our first little towel animal compliments of Miguel.


first port: Cabo San Lucas
awaiting the yellow catamaran
realizing how massive the cruise ship is
enjoying all the appetizers and drinks we could have every wanted on the way back from snorkeling to the ship.

second stop: MazatlanLearning the fine art of making tequila
eating a marvelous traditional lunch at 'Spectacular'
we were supposed to go souvenir shopping-we got side tracked at the beach
and the next towel animal

day three: Puerto Vallarta
A day of sun
sand....and we ended the day with...
Samurai sloth...though others thought he was a monkey...a tail-less monkey.

We had a splendid time thanks to Ricky and Bev! Sometimes it was hard to wrap our minds around how we got to a place of receiving such a gift and were so refreshed by having time to just be.

If you haven't had the privilege of meeting Julie and Beverly then your life is lacking. We are blessed to have the two greatest Mom's in the world. You can try to argue with us but I assure you, we will disagree with you for the rest of our lives. These two are hands down the best. We are so continually blessed by them and love them dearly. We wish we could have celebrated them in person today but instead we were left with phone calls, text messages and cards that will arrive in Texas fashionably late. Go ahead and tell Julie and Beverly how awesome they are!

becoming a mills

It's true!
The day finally came and went...March 21, 2009. We became Mr. and Mrs. Michael Mills. :)
what a happy, joyous, delightful and humbling day that was.


Look at what a big family we formed! and this is only the members present. it was almost overwhelming getting to share the time and experience with so many of our family members




having our friends and community around us was like a dream come true. being out here in california is a fun, hard, challenging, growing wonderful adventure...but our hearts still hold a significant space for our community from our lives pre-California. there was not enough time in the week that we were home to spend adequate time with our loved ones. we could not have asked for more faithful friends to stand alongside us and support us in our marriage adventure.

we even had the blessing of have our community in california represented there through 7 precious friends from Fuller...using precious spring break time and gradschool loan money to extend to us a picture of the meaning of love.

whether people were there with us in person or just in thought and daily love we appreciate you so much!

my newest simple pleasure

these make me very happy to even think about
they make my feet happy to wear them

my feet will be happy on our wedding day!

5 months later

I just posted a blog about something I had already blogged about...it's clearly been a while. Perhaps the worst part about it was that I think I liked this more recent one better than the old and out-dated one. I guess my personality is changing.

One thing I have loved and been so blessed by in living in California has been our visitors. Granted if we lived at home we would not "need" visitors, rather we would just live in community with these people. Since the distance does exist, these times with sweet friends from home is inexpressibly needed and treasured.

Joy Vick came to town!!

days after getting engaged, days after moving to a new apartment, my CA life was in boxes but I got to take a time-out and enjoy sweet time with a friend...the beach, bean town, relaxing, good food and WICKED...it was a wonderful time!


Next came LZM...

Laura Zandstra closed out our summertime with some new experiences. Sure a trip to the beach but also we went to the taping of AFV!!!!!! she had an awesome tv debut in November where they deemed her laugh worthy of having a close up shot on the show-awesome. we ended the weekend with a trip to Temecula to visit her aunts, one of which owns a hot air balloon. We spent a spectacular day going for a ride in the hot airballoon then wine tasting for the afternoon.



I feel so spoiled to have had these times and experiences with such good friends.

We're excited about our visitors to come!!!

we all wear masks

in lieu of halloween we'll talk about masks...

I'm sure we all would like to think that we don't wear masks...but we do. Some masks we have worn for so long that we do not even realize we still wear them. They become seemingly comfortable to us because we wear them so often and for so long that lose sight of the real "me" that is underneath. Often it is only in those special moments with certain loved ones that we find the comfort to take off our masks and are free to just simply be. i desire to be one who makes you feel comfortable enough to just be...

The Mask: Please Hear What I'm Not Saying [author unknown]
Don't be fooled by me. Don't be fooled by the face I wear. For I wear a mask.
I wear a thousand masks, masks that I'm afraid to take off, and non of them are me.
Pretending is an art that's second nature to me, but don't be fooled, for God's sake don't be fooled.
I give you the impression that I'm secure, that all is sunny and unruffled with me, within as well without.
That confidence is my name and coolness is my game, and that I need no one.
But don't believe me. My surface is my mask. Beneath dwells the real me in confusion, in fear, in aloneness.
But I hide this. I don't want anybody to know it. I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear being exposed.
That's why I frantically create a mask to hide behind, to shield me from the glance that knows.
But such a glance is precisely my salvation-that is, if it's followed by acceptance, by love.
It's the only thing that can liberate me from my own self-built prison walls.
It is the only thing that will assure me of what I can't assure myself-that I'm really worth something.

But I'm afraid to tell you this; I'm afraid that your glance will not be followed by acceptance and love.
I'm afraid you'll laugh, and that laugh will kill me.
I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that's really nothing and nothing of what's really everything, of what's crying within me.

Please listen carefully and try to hear what I'm not saying, what I'd like to be able to say, what for survival I need to say,
I'd really like to be genuine and spontaneous, and me, but you've got to help me.
You alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic and uncertainty, from my lonely prison.
It will not be easy for you.
A long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.
The nearer you approach me, the blinder I may strike back. I am irrational-I fight against the very thing that I cry out for.
But I'm told that love is stronger than strong walls.
Please try to beat down those walls with firm hands, but with gentle hands-for I am very sensitive.
Who am I, you may wonder.
I am someone you "know" very well, I am every man you meet, I am every woman you meet.



whether I am with friends, in class, at work or with clients I am surrounded by masks and donning some different mask of my own. let's be intentional, to be real, to be judgment free and abundantly loving enough to take off our masks and accept the maskless lives of others.

the 21st is our new 22nd!

After two or three years of excitedly celebrating the 22nd of each month due to all the loved ones that have birthdays on the 22nd of different months, Mikey and I are embarking on the love of yet another day of the month: the 21st!

Not only is the 21st a wonderfully special day because Natalie Joy Pope was born on April 21st and deserves to be celebrated on the 21st of each month at the least (daily may even be more appropriate)

But also on August 21st we got engaged! (this picture is moments before)
if these reasons to celebrate are not enough, we will be wed on March 21st! (this is moments after)
so though you may have thought that Mikey proposed a day early, or that we should get married on Sunday so it will be the 22nd, we have decided to embrace yet another day of the month to celebrate!

a lesson in baking

In my last few days at my old house in Altadena, I got on a cookie baking spree....from scratch. One night when Mikey was helping me mix in the ingredients and we were just imagining what would happen if...
what would happen if we left out baking soda?
how would they taste if we left out the salt?
what would happen if we left out the flour?
..doubled the vanilla?

We thought this would be something we could ask a grandmother or even our mothers, as it was clearly information I was going to have to provide in years to come to questioning children and grandchildren.
As it came time to eat the dough and bake some of it as well everything looked and tasted as expected. I thought we were good to go.

Little did I know that I was experimenting with one of our imaginary questions...gaining good "grandma knowledge". I went to the oven to check on the baking cookies and was completely disappointed with the sight I beheld upon turning on the oven light. The cookies smelled delicious but were surprisingly flat and dark on the pan. What in the world had happened?

Mikey went through the ingredients together and I couldn't come up with what had happened.
....30 minutes later it hit me. I had only put in maybe 1/2 of the flour the recipe called for. I had been cutting it all in half to make just a half-batch of cookies but instead of using the 1/2 scoop i was using the 1/4 scoop and thus the cookies were an apparent disgrace.

rest assured even though they look kinda funny they still were quite tasty.