It is time to smile

From time to time I love looking through my old pictures, which brings lots and lots of memories of good times. I can’t look through our engagement pictures without laughing. The day that we decided to take pictures, my husband, then fiancé, didn’t show up. I was so unbelievably upset that I thought that he was protesting against taking pictures. Thankfully his apartment was near the location for engagement pictures, so I stormed to let him know my piece of mind. We I opened the door of his apartment I was relieved to see that my husband was not protesting he was just napping. He decided to take a quick nap before the pictures and forgot to set the alarm. So when he woke up he had a huge line imprinted on his face from his nap.





Thankfully our photographer, Charles Davenport, was very patient with our late start and worked with us to mask the long line on Daniel’s face. We had so much fun taking pictures and were thrilled with the results.



Later on my girlfriends and I decided to have a fun outing before graduating from USC and once again Charles Davenport was able to capture the fun moments. He was snapping fun pictures that we were very pleased with!







If you live in South or North Carolina and looking for affordable, fun and great photographer to capture precious moments, I would highly recommend for you to contact Charles Davenport. I promise you won’t be disappointed with the result!

I am on vacation!

It has been wonderful to not worry about school work this week, however it has been most wonderful to finally go on a vacation and have time off from work and home responsibilities.

This week we are spending time at Hilton Head with my American family. I came up with a brilliant idea to take this week off from blogging and posting money saving tips. It is my hope that you understand my break this week and my desire to spend time with my family.

I love looking for house decorations while enjoying my vacation

We are on vacation right now and it feels wonderful! Beautiful weather, good food and family time have been so relaxing that I really would like to extend our vacation for a month or so. I am sure my boss at work would be keen about my idea.

One of the simplest things that I have been enjoying is TV. OK…I know sounds silly, but because we don’t have TV at our home, it has been fun watching home decorating shows with my American mom. Perhaps my favorite room that I can’t wait to decorate when we have our own house would be kitchen. Maybe I feel this way because I spend a lot of time in there trying to master bread baking techniques along with creating other yummy recipes.

So the decorating shows led me at night to search for different items online…I also must admit that I have really enjoyed having access to internet! I began my search with tables. My husband thinks that when we have our own home we will have two kitchen tables. I am still trying to figure out the theory behind him wanting two tables. But I decided to start searching anyways and came across some beautiful drop leaf tables. Perhaps if I had a million dollars we could then buy all the tables on the website.

Until I have a million dollars, I think we will stick with having only two tables per my husband’s request.

I am done with school!!!

(all the magazines that I will read on vacation)

It is done. It is over. It is complete.

After I graduated college, I had no plans of continuing my education. However, once Daniel and I got married, the word “masters” began to creep in our every day conversation. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to spend hours on homework all while working full time and being a wife full time. However, my husband encouraged me to consider, especially once we found out that my amazing employer will reimburse 100% if I maintain A average.

I decided to give a try and applied to Southern Wesleyan University located 45 minutes from our home. Class would meet 1 day a week for 4 hours. The idea seemed ok, considering we didn’t have children and my husband was still in school. I I would work 8am to 5 pm and would go to school 1 day a week from 6 pm to 10 pm. Plus we wouldn’t get further in debt with student loans, if I studied hard. So I applied for the program, was accepted and began my class in November 2008.

I have to admit that during the first class I was a bit nervous. On my way to school I wondered if I could juggle school, work and family. I also wondered if I will remember how to study again. But I met some wonderful people in my class and the fear quickly dwindled away. For the next two years I poured sweat and lot of hours into studying business. There were days that I wanted to quit, because I was exhausted physically, mentally and spiritually. There were days that I felt that I made a big mistake by going back to school. There were several days that I cried driving from school, because I had no life outside of studying. But there were also many days that I was grateful that my husband believed in me achieving my goal of finishing MBA program.

So today I am happy to say that this past Tuesday I took my very last MBA class. And I feel like a burden has been lifted off my shoulders. Although my graduation is in December, I am so happy that I will have one month to relax and actually read non school related books. I am thrilled that I can start cooking and spending more time with my husband.

I just wanted to share with you what is going on in our lives.

Abby and a blueberry bush

I was so thrilled the day I ordered a blueberry bush from Gardens Alive catalog. The best part about my bush was that it was free. Sometimes during the summer the company ran a special $25 off any $25 order coupon and I was able to snag a miniature blueberry bush for nothing out of pocket. However, I was informed by the sales rep that my bush will either arrive in late September or early October. Since I didn’t have to pay anything, I didn’t really care when I would receive my berry bush.

One beautiful Saturday morning, I checked our mail and was greeted by a postman with a big box. On my way home I was trying to figure out what could be in the box, since I wasn’t expecting anything exciting. Well, I totally forgot that several months back I ordered a blueberry bush so I was super excited when I opened the box. I decided not to delay and plant the bush right away in a huge flower pot. I filled up the pot with organic soil, nicely dug a hole and planted my soon to be fruitful bush.

Once the task was complete, I went inside to wash my hands. As I was glancing through our kitchen window, while wiping my hands, I notice Abby (our dog) sniffing the bush. I stepped outside and noticed that the dog tried to help me with the bush by digging around the plant. Sternly I warned Abby with “No”, but apparently silly dog though that I wanted to play with her. Note to myself…I need to work on my stern voice. I had to tell Abby several time to leave the plant alone and finally I thought she understood.

That same Saturday I had to drive to Atlanta to speak about the Operation Christmas Child. I had a fabulous 2 days meeting wonderful folks and sharing the story that the Lord has written for me. On Sunday we (my husband and I) stayed at the hotel and Daniel drove me to work on Monday morning. I totally forgot to tell Daniel about my exciting freebie, so on my way home after work I could not wait to show him our family blueberry bush.

Anxiously I waited to arrive home, but my excitement quickly went away when I saw this…

I saw an empty pot and the blueberry bush was gone. I gasped. Daniel thought something was wrong with me. Trying to keep serious face I told him all about the missing bush. He started to laugh hysterically, but it wasn’t that funny to me. Abby at that moment was jumping up and down wanting attention. And I was trying to figure out should I laugh it off or stay upset. Finally I shared my feelings with Abby, but apparently she once again interpreted my stern voice as invitation to pet her.

At the end of the day I learned a lesson. Life is short, laugh when you can and be glad that the blueberry bush was free (thanks to a coupon).

I want to get to know you

I feel so giddy when I check my blog and see that you have visited me. Seriously, I come home and tell my husband all about the blog world that “so and so from Canada said today this and so and so from South Carolina said that.” Never in a million years have I thought that I would meet you and start building a friendship through the world of blogging. So I want to take a moment and THANK YOU for taking your time to read my rambling and taking your time to leave a kind word through comments.

Since you take your precious time to stop by my blog, I thought that today would be a great day to get to know each other a little better. My plan is to share with you two things about me and in return I would love for you to share two things about yourself. PLEASE… I really do care about getting to know you!

The first thing you should know about me is that I am a huge Gamecocks fan, who loves the game of football. During my first college football game, I thought that people running on the field are silly. Seriously, who want to get squashed by 300 pound football player for the sake of holding a football…not me. After a few games, I started to learn slowly the rules, although I am still far away from being a pro. By junior year of college, I was in love with this sport and loved spending my Saturdays cheering for my team with the most wonderful friends in the world.

Today I rarely watch my Gamecocks play…well…because we do not have cable at home. But I faithfully read sports page of the local newspaper every Sunday after church. When I do have a chance to watch the game on TV, neither my husband nor my American family likes to be in the room with me. Wonder why?! Because I am very verbal and enjoy screaming, jumping and running next to the TV as the running back heads for the touch down. OK, enough about football.

Besides watching football, I love to draw. I find the movement of a pencil in my hand incredibly soothing and relaxing. During high school years, when I took art as elective, I fell in love with drawing hands. Why hands, you ask? Because you can express all sorts of emotions through different movement of a hand. Although, I rarely have time to indulge in hand drawing now days, I do cherish the freedom of expression through art.

Now that you have learned two facts about me, I would absolutely love to hear from you. Would you be so absolutely amazingly wonderfully great and leave a comment sharing a few facts about yourself?

3 years down and many more to go

To most July 28th is just another day, but to me it is the day when I said “I do” to my sweet Daniel. While I should be happy that today we are celebrating our 3 year anniversary, I must admit the day is bitter-sweet. Instead of celebrating this milestone together, I am celebrating all by my lonesome. My husband is in Washington state attending a military camp and I will spend today re-watching our wedding ceremony, eating lots of chocolate, looking through the “books” and pictures.

                                                      (our engagement pictures)

One of my favorite things to do from time to time is to open “our book”. Let me explain! The first several years of our relationship, which was long distance, we documented our thoughts in “the book”. One day Daniel brought a journal and asked if I wanted to keep it for several weeks and write my thoughts down. Then when we see each other again, he would take it and keep it for several weeks writing his thoughts down. And I am so glad that we did that, because now several years later I love reading our love letters to each other and laugh from time to time!

                                                 (ladies who were a part of our wedding)

                                                   (enjoying that yummy cake)

But my husband creativity did stop with “the book”. Daniel always expressed his feelings through actions and not so much through words. About a year into our dating he showed me a “memory” book. He bought a photo album and used the slots to fill up with pictures of us and other items like tickets from concert, movies, cards that I have sent him and he even cut out a picture of oatmeal cookies from the package that we used to bake cookies together. Although on the outside Daniel looks tough at time, he does have a soft, creative, and caring spot that I adore!

                                                     (my sweet Daniel at the military camp)

There are lots of qualities that I adore about Daniel and I am thankful to be able to call him my husband!

My mama and I

My mom is back in Belarus, but the precious memories filled with laughter and joy are with me in the US. During my mom's visit, we went to Hilton Head to visit my American family and had a blast.

During my mom's visit we also sent out e-mails to companies asking for coupons. The result...2 coupons for free packages of coffee and a can of coffee that arrived in the mail. Furthermore, we received a letter from a compay with $100 worth of coupons for steak. I will write a seperate post on that...woot...woot.

During my mom's visit, we picked blackberries and made a blackberry jelly. I will share a post on that too. We had quite a few laughs since neither of us knew how to work the canning system.

I will treasure every second that I spent with my mama and I look forward to see her and my dad next summer. I am praying hard (and will ask if you can join me) that everything will work out for my dad to come for a visit also.

Down the memory lane

As I was pondering through our quite house before my mama's visit, I looked back at my college years realizing how God has richly blessed me with friends.

I met Suzanne at church in high school, but outside of our youth group we never hung out. Even though we were just acquaintances, Suzanne’s big heart was easy to spot. During our senior year of high school, I found out that I was accepted to the University of South Carolina and would be required to pay out of state tuition. My sweet Suzanne made a video to Oprah asking to help me. Even though we never heard back from the talk show host, Suzanne’s thoughtfulness meant to me more than she would ever know. On a side note, God opened the door for me to attend USC as an instate student. What impossible with men is possible with God.


When it was time to move in to a place that I would call home for the next 8 months, I learned that Suzanne and I would be sharing not only a dorm, but also a calculus class together. Intended to study together for calculus, we quickly learned that we had much in common. Frequent trips to Starbucks (even though I hate coffee) to talk about the boys instead of math, kept us pretty busy. During the next 4 years Suzanne and I became best friends and roommates. We cried together and laughed together, but most of all she has always been there for me during the good times and the bad times. Now we are 3 hours apart both married to the guys that we dated during our college years, but the distance has not interfered with our friendship. I know that I can call Suzanne at any time and she will laugh with me, cry with me and pray for me. Her friendship is priceless to me.

I met Jill through Suzanne my freshman year of college. It only takes 1 minute being around Jill to realize that the girl is full of energy. Her laughter is so contagious that she can make the saddest person laugh with her in no time. We all learned quickly that Jill hates the color pink but loves to teach dance classes. During the next 4 years Jill became a friend, who is very dear to my heart.


And I must tell you about Lindsay! Being one year younger than the rest of us, Lindsay joined USC when we were all sophomores. We met her through a mutual friend and fell in love with the girl. You can never have too much Lindsay time…she is funny, loving and most of all the best person to watch a USC football game with. Many times my husband doesn’t understand my passion for football, when I jump of the couch and run a long side the running back to help him score a touch town (on TV of course). But Lindsay gets it! We can be a little bit too vocal at times during the games, but she is my best football buddy and will always talk to me about QB mistakes and new recruits.


And I can not leave the rest of the gang out… Charlie, Ben and Quel have made our college years memorable. Becoming friends our freshman year, we all (Suzanne, Jill and later Lindsay) hung out together creating everlasting memories. Enjoying each other’s company, we spent time watching TV together, hanging out together or cheering on our gamecocks together… the bond was unbreakable. Looking back I am so grateful for the friendship of 6 special to me people whom I will forever call my friends.

Just pictures...