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book club: harry potter menu































As I mentioned earlier, we had the second meeting for my Gospel in Fiction book club this week. It was a lot of fun and the menu made it even better. As you can see above in the photo we had (clockwise from L to R): golden snitches, cauldron cakes, quidditch players pie, magic wands (in the background), butterbeer (I finally found a delicious recipe, which I will share in another post) and Deathly Hallows cookies. The best part is, we had even more than what is pictured here! We also had: chocolate covered worms, pumpkin ravioli, fish & chips, and Mrs. Weasley's rock cakes.

Can you even imagine a better menu?! Oh...yea, and the book discussion was great, too!

yes or no?

I always, always fall for these kinds of things. Should I jump on the bandwagon or not? Even though I'm 2 (almost 3) days behind for March? Am I boring everyone to tears with my post-a-day blogs? Please, tell me! Please leave a comment, for crying out loud. What should I do?!

Thanks to my friend Liz for pointing me toward this nifty right-up-my-alley photo-a-day challenge every month (gasp! every month?!). Now, what to do.....

mr. president was here!

Not only was he in New York City today, he was on my BLOCK! It was a spectacle, for sure...but pretty neat thinking about the president being right outside in my neighborhood!

crowd waiting to catch a glimpse

just a few of the police barricades to close the street

what I assume to be the president's motorcade!






























































the street entirely blocked off with the police force. (this is before the sanitation trucks full of sand arrived)























Read more info about the reason for his visit on My Upper West blog. 

cape town: top 10 photos

The one sad thing about it being March now is that it means my 29 Days of Cape Town posts are over. I really enjoyed documenting my trip and revisiting those 10 days in Africa that are sadly getting more distant as the time passes. For a final, wrap-up post (even though it's March 1!), I decided to post my top 10 favorite photos from the trip (er, 11 actually because I couldn't decide on only 10...). I will always have these to quickly look back to and remember all of the wonderful pieces of this trip. I hope you enjoy these particular ones, too, as much as I have.












hellllllo, march!
































I have somehow survived another February (which, in my mind, = winter...) in New York. I documented it last year, too and firstly, I can't believe this post has been a year and secondly, that it's MARCH! 

I'm not complaining, just noting. Hey, I'm pretty much well on the way to summer now...

"ask me a question"

Tonight was the second night of Redeemer's Open House for the new home of Redeemer West Side's congregation and building on W83rd Street. For those of you who don't live in New York, this is a pretty big deal. Not only is every inch of space you can barely-call-your-own extremely tee-niny anyway, it's rare to even be able to legitimately call a place your own (aka, own it). Redeemer's new very-own building that has been in the works for years and years is finally opening. There were open houses last night and tonight and the first church service(s) will be this Sunday!

I volunteered with the children's ministry to help people check in and get acquainted with the new very-hi-tech system for registering. (There is mostly sarcasm in that statement, but some seriousness. It's very hi-tech for Redeemer.) In return for our volunteer services, they kindly required that we wear these buttons as big as my face that said "Ask Me a Question!" Very lovely.



In Tim Keller's brief address to the congregation and guests tonight, he reminded us of the days when Redeemer met on Sunday afternoons in someone's apartment on East 73rd Street in 1989. In those days no one was talking of a superstar pastor of a church with 5,000+ attendees every week. This very blessed church sure has come a long way! Psalm 127:1 is mighty powerful.

[by the way, I took most of these pictures from Bethany!]

leap day comic

I found this postcard (along with several others!) on Slate's website today. They have a series of vintage Leap Day postcards pointing out the tradition that I mentioned earlier about a girl being allowed to propose to her boyfriend on Leap Day. I found these postcards to be pretty cute.

Read more about the tradition here.

happy leap day!

I'm dying to watch this movie, Leap Year, again today in honor of this very strange holiday. Apparently in Ireland, a woman can propose to her boyfriend on Leap Day instead of having to wait for him to propose! The movie was cute and lovely (with beautiful scenery); although, the day makes no sense to me at all. However, if there is actually something like this worthwhile that comes out of the once-every-four-years holiday, maybe I should start looking into that...?!

day twenty-nine: from the air

These were my last views of Africa and first views of America. Bittersweet feelings.

view from the plane.

such a clear view of the townships in the lower half of the picture.

sunrise as we were getting close to New York.

never tired of the view

I met some friends for dinner last night near Times Square and glanced over to see this view of the Chrysler Building as I was heading there. As much as this crazy city wears me out at times, I don't think I'll ever tire of seeing these sights on my way to a casual Tuesday night dinner with friends....

day twenty-eight: boarding the plane

























Although we were all exhausted and excited to be back in New York to our family and friends, it was a sad feeling when it came time to board the plane back to the US of A. We had a Sunday night flight back to American that arrived in New York at 7am on Monday morning. This is (part of) our team as we were lining up to board the flight from Cape Town to Johannesburg, the first leg of our trip. Lots of mixed feelings and thoughts to process as we left after such a wonderful 10 days in Africa...