Making Things

Look what Russ and I made:

Isn't it beautiful?

I am pretty proud of this. Russ' family all paint and they all have these beautiful paintings hanging in their homes that they've painted and I've always wished I could paint like the Henrys.

Russ is an awesome husband though and his love language (verbal encouragement) comes in when he encourages my creativity in different ways. I may not be able to paint but give me some twine, mason jars, and a hot glue gun and I can sort of maybe make something.

Russ put the wooden frame together. We went to Home Depot and–yes, I am going to brag a little–it was attractive watching him pick out wood pieces and actually know which ones should be used. It's handy having a handy man around (pun intended). He nailed it all together and stained it. I came in only close to the end when the plants were involved. I mostly just hot-glue-gunned my fingers together and complained to Russell that the hot glue gun was hot. I also bought the fishing line.

But the idea behind this Succulent Plant Frame was something we saw in a coffee shop once on a lunch date. We tweaked it a little and made it our own. Also, Russ has a hobby of building things with his hands and gardening. This included both and it was nice being able to do this with him.

Making Friends

We've been in Carlsbad for just over seven months now. Overall, it's been good for us to move here and learn how to adjust and settle in a different city where we don't know lots of people. It's definitely forced us out of our comfort zone. It's definitely forced me out of my comfort zone. Let's just say I grew up always surrounded my a majority of Asians. That isn't the case down here. It's a slight culture shock if anything else. There's only one close boba store and not much of a variety when it comes to trendy and/or Asian cuisine. Yes, food plays a big factor in my comfort levels.

Besides the food, it's colder here because we are living closer to the ocean; there are no 24-hour donut shops; recently found out that Carlsbad is mainly filled with retirement communities; and there aren't as many malls as I was used to in Orange County. I am learning new discoveries everyday. Like how North San Diego County and South San Diego County like to distinguish themselves from each other.

Anyways, while down here Russ and I found a great church (that financially supports Center Church in Irvine which was where Russ and I were going to) that has great community. We love it. Our weekly community group is filled with young couples who all have little kids under the age of two. Community group is always lively and always filled with real conversation that I am thankful for. They make me feel more at home down here. We met a few more people from our church when we went to our Pastor's open house. I even got invited to a Nancy Drew book club (!!) after revealing that I was obsessed with Nancy Drew. How awesome is that?? I've always wanted to be part of a book club outside of college.

Church has been our main source of friendships down here. Our spiritual lives are being cultivated and at the same time we get to meet some of the most interesting and sincere people we wouldn't have met otherwise.

Russell's brother and sister-in-law live in Oceanside (city next to ours) and it's been great having them nearby. Having family close by helps tremendously in terms of feeling at home.

I've made a couple of friends through my job. However, my walking buddy at work recently ended her contract because she's moving to Japan with her husband. Here's a picture of me with her on Halloween. Ignore all the gore in the background. Our department went with the theme of "CSI Investigation".

Cindy and I

[SIDENOTE: The contracting company I'm with and the medical company we're currently under totally get into the spirit of Halloween. I've never seen a company like this. It's spectacular. Whole departments picking a theme and sticking with it (Disney, Legos, Google Maps, etc.). Here's my department's "dead body" buffet:

Ribs for his ribs, and sausages for his intestines...

It's kinda gross yet fascinating, isn't it?]

This has been a challenging season for me yet so rewarding in all the new relationships I get to make. It's true, when you get older you have less friends since it's all about quality not quantity. But moving to Carlsbad definitely enriched the quality and the quantity of friends I've made. It's been an answered prayer and a blessing.

A Listography of Updates

Hey guys! There haven't been much big events I've had to blog about, just small activities and celebrations here and there. I've compiled a bulleted list (since that's all the rage these days) of quick highlights:

• We participated in a pumpkin carving contest with our bible study group. I gave up after taking out the pumpkin guts, and our friend Simeon helped carve out my Harry Potter pumpkin for me. Russ went for the abstract. Neither of us won. 

Top Left: Russell's (one-eyed octopus with a top hat); Top Right: Mines (Harry Potter);
Bottom: All the pumpkin submissions. The ninja turtle on the far right won.

• I was sick on Halloween so Russ and I were unable to do the original plans we had on that day. But we were still able to stop by Joe and Kristen's place for about an hour to celebrate Halloween/Oktoberfest. Complete with outfits!
  

  

  Heinrichs!



• I submitted my first short story in my creative writing class. Luckily, we can do it anonymously. When they were reading it out loud in class, I was starting to get woozy and I was sure the professor would stop reading and say it was a horrible story with horrible writing and whoever wrote it should get up and get out. But, none of that happened. They liked it! There were parts they said needed to be improved on (which I totally agreed with) but overall it wasn't horrible. The story was about tomatoes.


• Russ and I are now school loans debt-free!!!! THIS IS EXCITING. This year, my goal was to get rid of those school loans and we reached that goal one month in advance :) We can now splurge....or not, since holidays are coming. But we did have a nice dinner in a French restaurant as a celebration.


• We are also traveling over the holidays. We'll be gone for about a month in total. We've booked hotels and stuff already. So excited.



• Oh, and here's a random picture of me. I really liked my outfit so I texted it to Russell. He said I looked very London...