Fun in Sun.

(I know how to rhyme?) 

Consistency on this blog would be great, wouldn't? It's Monday night, and I've been away from school for 9 days and it feels like forever! Last week was vacation and today was Memorial Day. I would like to say I'm caught up in the "sleep" department, but I'm not sure if that's the case considering I woke up from a two hour nap at 9 pm today. Sheesh. I went to Florida with my campus ministry, so I guess I'll share pictures from that. Pictures are fun. 

we're a fun group

Also, I would suggest you follow me on Instagram or just check my profile to see what I've been up to if you're the type who enjoys pictures. 

Well, I guess I'll keep peeling away at my sunburn and get some sleep, because real life kicks back in tomorrow. 

Grapefruits and Gold

I'm trekking along on my little sugar fast. It's not going as well as I would like, but I haven't given up. I've decided that if I can avoid chocolate, ice cream, cake, and DONUTS until June 22nd rolls around, I'll be happy. I've cheated in too many little ways: a little lemonade here, some frosted mini-wheats there, a pb&j, and recently, a caramelized grapefruit and gold-leaf fruit tart. 

I love grapefruits. After a long day at work, there's nothing more satisfying than coming home and slicing up a grapefruit. I went to a restaurant with my friend and saw boiled grapefruit on the appetizer menu. We waited an hour to get seated at this restaurant and I was craving some grapefruit.  I ordered it right away, no need to read the description. The grapefruit did not disappoint! The only downside- it was boiled in sugar. I paid 6 dollars it and like I said, grapefruits are the B E S T. I went for it. Wouldn't you?

Incident number two

The time is 9:30 pm. I'm sitting at a fundraising table for our City Year Gala in Columbus Circle. I ate a wonderful and fancy meal at the gala, but the portion was lean-cuisine sized. I had to do a bunch of greeting, socializing, chanting, and setting up for this event, so I needed a little more than arugula salad and fancy cheese to keep me alive and well. The program was running late and then the emcee announced that dessert was coming out. 

uh-oh.

Out comes this beautiful thing:

I couldn't let it sit there in front of me. It was so beautiful. It had gold on it! And I needed a boost of sugar to keep me going after my looong day of work. Once again, I went for it. 

Restaurant: Jacob's Pickles (highly recommend)

What is City Year? Check here

Photo Hunt: Fire Escapes {CC 8/23}

As mentioned in this post about NYC, I have an attraction towards fire escapes. Fire escapes are all over NYC, and they come in many different shapes and designs. 99% of the time they seem completely unnecessary, but we all know they are vital to fire safety. Second bonus, if you get locked out, you may have a chance getting back inside via the fire escape. I know friends who have done it. Even though I don't have a balcony, I have a fire escape to chill on and that's enough for me.

Pictures were taken in SoHo and the Bronx.

On a related note, this plant-shelf from UO is awesome!!!

Check out other photo hunts in the blog world:

30 Things: New York City

A list of things that make me happy in New York City, in no particular order and all unique to me.

1. The Endless skyline.  

2. Winter is 10x less cold and snowy than it is in Minnesota (where I'm from).

3. The small spaces. It requires you to be creative with your space and purge your stuff. Hoarders are not welcome here.
4. There are lots of places to by plants. Most of the time you can find plants for sale on the streets, and sometimes you'll discover plant shops like this one:

5. I can afford living here. I didn't think that was possible before.
6. I don't feel lonely in the city 99% of the time and I have made some great friends here.

7. Pictures of James Franco are all over subway stations. I melt every time. He's on Broadway too! 

8. Redeemer Presbyterian Church and the Table Church.

9. All the parks that have the word "square" in them. Madison Square, Bryant Square, Washington Square, and Union Square! 

10. The millions of coffee shops and bakeries. Not including Starbucks. That's a whole 'nother monopoly. It's the city that never sleeps.

11. People I love in Minnesota are only a facetime or phone call away.

12. Art comes in many forms. A pool of grass? A Belly crawl? You'll find it all. 

13. There are some amazing companies, specifically start-ups, that are located in NYC. Some of my favorites are Etsy, kickstarter, Warby Parker, Harry's, Dormify, and Pencils of Promise. There are so many more. 

14. I can get cheap fruit everywhere. Like on every street.

15. I live right by the east river. In fact, I live on an island! How magical.

16. The subway system. I can go wherever I want, whenever I want, and not have to worry about gas or parking. When I'm feeling productive I can even read or write on the subway.

17. All the fashion. And I'm not even that into fashion! New York is an incubator for fashion design.

18. All the art! I think every famous artist that has ever lived has a piece of work somewhere in New York. The MoMa alone will overwhelm any art buff.

19. The fire escapes on apartments. I think they are the coolest thing. They're always the first thing I notice about NYC buildings and apartments. 

20. Elf was filmed here, and that's one of the best movies. 

21. People want to visit me... Even though I know their real motive is visiting the city ;)

22. Holiday festivities. There's currently a Big Egg hunt going on all over New York City and the eggs are beautiful! Let's not forget what goes down on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years!

23. The amount of NYC tourist buses I see go by. It reinforces that I live somewhere special.

24. The majority of really good slices of pizza cost .99 cents per slice. 

25. I've said this before, but the ONLY Target in Manhattan is two blocks away from me. Life is complete. It also makes NY feel a little more like my home in Minnesota.  

26. The smell of the Nuts 4 Nuts carts. I don't even like nuts that much, but the aroma of these carts get me every time.

27. Parks like this one exist. Those are two of my 6th grade students at Washington Park. Aren't they adorable?

28. A bunch of movies and shows are filmed here. It's pretty normal to find streets and parks closed down because of filming. 

29. All the bridges. Brooklyn Bridge, Manhattan Bridge, Williamsburg bridge. They are all beautiful. 

30. The culture and diversity here is like none other. You'll meet every type of person on this planet in this one city.

That was fun to write. Stay tuned for my next post which will be 30 things I hate about New York City.

Just kidding! What's there to hate about it?! 

And I certainly wasn't kidding about James Franco. 

10 Days?!

I guess I started the sugar fast 10 days ago. I thought it's only been 5 days. Weird how that happens. I've been pleased with my ability to say no to so many foods. This week at work the desserts and treats kept rolling in. There were two birthdays, multiple potlucks, donuts for breakfast... my coworkers love their sugar! I still said no to it all.

What have I done instead?

Fruit! I bought 6 cartons of blackberries (sadly, I finished those 6 cartons in 2 days. I was desperate), tons of grapefruit, strawberries, mangoes, bananas, all that good stuff. I've made some yummy smoothies too. This morning I had an avocado-blueberry-banana-smoothie. It was creamy and sweet. 

I've been inspired by recipes from inmybowl.com. I definitely want to try making the green grapefruit smoothie and Peanutbutter Banana Smoothie.

The hard stuff:

I'm pretty sure I cheated when I started drinking lemonade and realized it wasn't sugar-free. 

I had dried clementines that tasted way too sweet. I looked on the ingredients and saw they had sugar in them. I guess dried fruit isn't always natural.

I had a little bit of sugar free dark chocolate. Is that cheating??? 

The other hard part about doing a sugar fast is filling the void. Filling the void looks like eating extra carbs or dairy. grrr.

Stay strong, Abby. 

Boston

I enjoyed a 3 day trip to Boston over Easter weekend. The East Coast is a great place for taking trips to other cities. Everything is so close! I stayed with my good friend from high school, Leah. She was a great hostess, and she took me everywhere!

The Democratic Donkey at Boston's Old City Hall along the Freedom Trail. I felt like Jesus on it...in a cheesy kind of way.

Wellesley College has a lot of spirit when it comes to Marathon Monday! Pretty much every girl comes out to cheer on the runners for hours and hours. Their motive? kisses. hundreds of kisses. This is an All Girls School after all. Notice the signs? There were all sorts of clever signs along what's known as the Wellesley Scream Tunnel. 

Ducks and bunnies. Both have marathon spirit. I thought Quack was quite charming.

Yes, that is a man hanging upside down by a rope. Rest assured, it was just a show. It wasn't a historical show either. Just a show.

Isn't that sunset beautiful? 

The good 'ole Freedom Trail. Red bricks or streaks of red paint run for 2.5 miles throughout Boston, representing the Freedom Trail. This city is a living American history book!

Together! That's us on a swan boat and that's us cheering at the marathon.

A camouflage tree at the Arnold Arboretum and the best ice cream I have ever had. I ate some on Saturday night and loved it so much we came back on Sunday night. worth it. 

Because this post isn't complete without pictures of us with a man in his underwear. a fake man. 

Well, that was fun! I got to Boston via a Greyhound bus. The ride was 4 hours and it cost about $25 each way. I stayed Saturday afternoon to Monday Evening. 

A Birthday Cupcake

Birthday cupcake? What are you talking about? It's not your birthday. Do you even like cupcakes?

Well, this is my way of holding myself accountable to not eat desserts until my birthday on June 22nd. Last year I did a 6 week sugar fast, and it was easier than I thought. I'm going to do it again this year because my body needs it. I'm pretty convinced that sugar contributes to things like acne, fatigue, sickness, and weight gain. I also love the self-control that I develop from fasting from something. I suppose I could have done this fast for lent, but I wasn't motivated enough to do it then. There are also no "sugar holidays" between now and my birthday which will make it easier. 

Rules:

• I can't eat foods where sugar or corn syrup is included in the first 5 ingredients
• I can let breakfast slide 1x a week. Say I really want a muffin, and that's my only breakfast option, I'll do it. I need to have a little slack with breakfast because eating an egg isn't always realistic. However, donuts or chocolate-filled croissants (etc.) are not acceptable. I ultimately want to give up desserts for the next 2 months.
• Artificial sweeteners are okay. Mainly because I need Diet Coke to survive on certain weekdays. #6amlife

I don't really want to publish this, but if I don't I probably won't make it through this fast. That's the nice thing about putting your life on the interweb. So here it goes. Let's make it happen! To hold myself extra accountable, I'll be posting about the fast in some capacity probably once a week. 

Have you ever done a fast? Do you have resources or tips? 

A Cheesy Spring Photo

My friend made me pose for this.

Spring has sprung here and I like life. Today I went searching for Easter eggs with a little friend (literally little, she's only 9 years old). Searching for Easter eggs really means walking all over the city looking for, and then scanning the QR code, on  fancy egg sculptures. Today was also a Monday and it happened to be a Monday that I was not in a middle school. Hallelujah for one day of spring break! I do not mean day one of Spring break, I mean one day of Spring break. That's okay though, people with real jobs don't get a spring break either. I guess you could say I have a real job.    

There are 260 eggs "hidden" in New York City. We have found 60 eggs so far. 

Life After Death?

Would you consider yourself a religious person? Quite simply- what do you believe happens when you die? Have you always believed this? Do your current beliefs align with what you were taught as a child? And if not, what was the turning point? This week, talk about your religion or spiritual beliefs (or perhaps your lack of), and try to sum up, if you can, what you believe happens "next."

~Sometimes Sweet Blog (find out what she has to say about life after death)

I believe, without a doubt, that there is life after death.  I can't imagine going through life day after day with uncertainty about what would happen when I die. I think I would be an anxious wreck. Death is a guarantee in life, and there is no way around it. I think it's foolish for people to not question or ponder life and death at some point in their life because death has major impact on our lives. Life is fleeting and uncertain. I could die today. Despite human's mortality, we are not like a tree or a bug. There's more to us. Science alone cannot explain the human race. We are too complex for science. Science can explain the life of a flower, but there is no way that atoms and "natural" happenings and LOTS of time created billions of diverse, brilliant, and creative humans. No possible chance. There had to be a mastermind out there orchestrating it all. Because I can't depend on Science for the answers to life's deeper questions-- specifically human life-- I have to turn to something more than the study of biology. 
Those who know me, know that I am a Christian. I have a feeling that most of my readers are also Christians and probably believe the same thing that I do about life and death. If you aren't a Christian or are unfamiliar with Christian beliefs and the gospel, these verses summarize the gospel and attaining eternal life well:
 "9This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us." 1 John 4:9-12

Jesus died for us. We believe. We follow. We live eternally with Him. 

I believe those who have the covering of Jesus in their hearts will live eternally in Heaven with God. This means they have accepted Jesus' forgiveness for their sins. We cannot possibly do enough good things to be welcomed into Heaven-- good works will not get us to Heaven. No one on earth could possibly measure up to God's standard of perfection. Jesus was perfect and he came to be the perfect sacrifice for us so that when we accept that he died and forgave us, we can be confident that we belong to God and will live with him forever when we die. Check out Hebrews 10! Because of this, death does not scare me. I can actually be excited for the day that I die because I will live with my Creator and be completely redeemed and made new. 

Read more:
This article, written by John Piper, explains why Christians should look forward to death:  It is a great gain to die: five reasons why. It's filled with scripture. 

I would love to hear what you have to say. Throw out questions or tell me a bit about your beliefs about death. If you don't have beliefs, you should! 

Monday & I'm Not White

Happy Monday. I started the day off right with a diet coke pepsi in hand (Ashamed, but I needed that caffeine). It was an interesting day at good ol' Hunts Point Middle School. We kicked off math class with introducing algebraic functions. Do you know what functions are? If so, good-- you were awake during Algebra II class. If you don't, that's unfortunate, but maybe normal??? I mean I remember learning about functions when I was in 10th grade, not 6th grade. Sometimes I think the curriculum we use is too ambitious for 6th graders. 

During lunch one of the students complained, 

"Miss- I want real food. I want Burger King or McDonalds or something."

I guess yellow sticks, shiny buns, and mystery meat is real food?? Maybe she just wasn't feeling the turkey sandwich.

During 8th period a dancer from the Bronx came and taught my class hip-hop. I learned some crazy moves. Some of the students loved it. Most of them found it too challenging. He was trying to get us to dance at like 100 steps per second. Ya'll should have seen me-- dance is not one of my strong suits.

During After School Art club we were playing Lady Antebellum in the background. One of the students complained and said she doesn't like "white people music." Then she went on to say she doesn't like white people. I talk with this girl a lot so I looked at her and asked, 

What about me? ...You like me.

"Yeah, but you're not white."

Yes I am, what do you mean?

"I thought you were Japanese or something."

I'm clearly white.