What defines you

 

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the novels by Paulo Coelho, check him out if you are looking for an insightful read that teaches you a little about yourself. I discovered Paulo Coelho during a time in my life when I needed inspiration to be, expect and love better. Reading his works did just that. He is a wonderful author and his stories encourage you to not only look at your own life, but also how you are living it.

The above quote is a wonderfully written expression reminding us not to let the struggles and hardships experienced over the course of a lifetime define our whole being.

Don't misunderstand, I realize that the bumps and road blocks that I myself have experienced in my life have indeed helped to shape the person that I have become, but in no way have these experiences defined me as a person. I am not sullied by the negative things that I have experienced. Or at least I try not to be. It is quite a difficult task to remain the person you want to be without letting the negative experiences you go through in life consume who you are or will become. So often a person presents past wounds to explain the person they are today. It is a choice to let these wounds consume your life and being rather than making peace with, learning from and moving on in a positive way. Just think how much easier life would be if something that happened two, five, seven, ten, twenty or more years ago was not still affecting your actions, feelings and being today. On the other hand, it is quite another thing to simply say, "forget what you have gone through." I personally don't think you have to forget past hardships, but simply don't let them decide the person that you will become. It's not fair to you or those that want to have the pleasure of knowing the real you.

Just some food for thought today.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Dressing up is fun

It is growing closer to my favorite time of year! If you've been reading my posts you know that my favorite time of year is fall~ October and November especially :) I have loved dressing up for Halloween since I can remember. Getting to pretend to be anything you want is such fun! My mom always did a good job of making sure I had a fun, handmade costume to wear. She even made me a clown! Good thing I love clowns...oh wait...no, no I don't ;) I also remember being Super Girl, which was awesome! Thanks mom:)

Now a days I come up with my own costumes and try to make a point of being creative :) I don't usually buy cookie cutter costumes if I can help it. I like creating my own outfits. I'm a pretty silly person and enjoy picking fun characters and costumes. I was stoked to find a fabulous Rainbow Bright costume, one of my favorite childhood cartoons, to wear in 2008.

In 2009, I chose to be Wenda from Where's Waldo for a Halloween party with my college friends and actually found my Waldo at the party! One of my good friends Katie dressed up as Waldo without knowing I was going to be Wenda. It was awesome :)

 

In 2010, I wanted to be super original so I decided to dress up as Mother Nature :) That is the Mother Nature from the tampon commercials lol :) My costume turned out amazing and was a hit at the party I attended! Best of all, everyone understood who I was as soon as I offered the ladies their "monthly gift." Super fun!!

In 2011, I went a new route and talked my roomie Alicia into dressing up as Woody and Buzz from Toy Story with me :) I wanted to be Buzz Lightyear-Space Raaaaaanger and Alicia was stoked to be Woody! We made an awesome pair and it was so much fun pub crawling around Portland as partners in crime :)

Last year in 2012, I wanted to go as Tippi Hedren from the film The Birds, but I had trouble finding the perfect dress for the costume soooooo instead I went as your typical Portlander and simply "put a bird on it:)" Well, I actually put a few birds on it as I had put in quite a lot of effort cutting out my birds and wanted to rock them! You can imagine how great this costume was received while pub crawling around Portland :) It was a hit! So much fun to be original and silly!

 

This year, I have a few different ideas I am toying with for Halloween this year....a few that include convincing my amazing boyfriend to partake! I haven't made a decision yet and don't want to ruin the surprise so this is where we will end tonight. Happy almost Halloween friends!

 

 

 

 



 

 

Funny how things work out

I should fore warn that I will be talking about "mushy love stuff" so quit reading now if that's not your cup of tea :)

In recalling my best kiss ever, I can honestly say without a doubt in my mind that it was mine and Adam's first kiss on New Year's Eve. Well, NYE for those of you who don't consider it the next day until you have slept (that's me) or New Year's Day (aka January 1st, 2011) for those of you who start your new day at midnight. I believe our first kiss occurred around 4 a.m., but you will have to talk to Keli Meadows about it as she would remember angry driving me home afterwards :) Love you Keli!

Adam and I met in October of 2010, officially our second meeting although I don't recall too much from our first a year or two prior, through mutual friends I had gone to high school with and whom he had gone on to meet and become friends with at Oregon State University. The love spark wasn't exactly instantaneous -we actually seemed to disagree on EVERYTHING :) He was, and is, a soccer freak as well as a HUGE Timbers' fan while I was still upset that baseball in Portland was no more and secretly blamed the Timbers for kicking my Portland Beavers out of town. He hates mustard, I love it. You name it, we probably disagreed about it at first. However, we did share a mutual love for music, dancing, good brews, delicious foods, adventure and fun, which would eventually be some of the many things that made me realize just how awesome and amazing he is ;)

Anyhow, we started hanging out as friends for the first month or two in groups big and small and it wasn't until early December when I realized that I actually missed him when he wasn't around and wanted to spend my time with him. I was the one who initiated our first one on one contact, asking him to meet me for hotdogs and beers at Zac's Shack (which is now 'our' place:) after a weekend movie with friends. The most amazing thing was...he actually showed up!! (I was SHOCKED to say the least as my track record for having guys blow me off was stellar at this point). We quite literally closed the place down talking and laughing and it was all gravy from there :) He would meet me before work for coffee on days I wasn't subbing or for beers after work - he alternated between swing and day shift. It was a whirlwind of texting, talking, and simply enjoying getting to know each other.

We were both invited to a friend's New Year's Eve party and I'm pretty sure all of our friends thought that our first kiss would be when the ball dropped. Yep, you read that right, we took things slow and it has worked out brilliantly thus far :) However, all the eyes watching would have made for an awkward first kiss so we shared a friendly hug instead. Overall, it was such a fun night! He asked me to be on his beer pong team-which is a HUGE deal. We laughed and brought in the new year surrounded by amazing friends, something I desperately needed for various reasons that I will not go into at present. Adam had plans to go home and catch a VERY early soccer match on tv and I simply refused to go to sleep and let this awesome night come to an end so we sat next to each other on the floor, against the wall while most of our friends slept in various locations around us and talked. Keli was my ride home, we were supposed to stay the night too, but decided to just drive home since most of the good spots were taken and she was able. Adam and I walked out of the house together to say goodbye and there on the front steps he turned to face me, pulled me into a sweet hug and kissed me :) It was exactly what I wanted our first kiss to be. I remember the weather was windy and freezing and yet I barely felt the cold except to snuggle closer to him...which was part of my plan anyways :) Not even a car ride home with an annoyed and sleepy Ms. Meadows could wreck what had turned into a fabulous night. Three years this December and we are still going strong and each kiss feels like the first. I'm grateful you came into my life Adam Sapina :)

9 randoms

 

I have had quite the headache today (continued from the weekend blah) sooooo on that note, I am boycotting thinking too hard. Instead, you get to learn some little known facts about Rachael.
Should be interesting...maybe? :)

*If I could spend a week anywhere in the world, I would choose to travel around and see the sights of Europe with Adam :) It's been on both of our travel to do lists for quite some time so why not go together? See some sights, drink some beer/wine, watch some footy, and mingle:)

*I prefer blue ink to black even though I never have a blue pen on me. Weird, I know.

*October and November are my favorite months because I get Fall, Halloween, my birthday and Thanksgiving!

 *I love playing Cribbage and Sorry :)

*When I'm bummed I love to listen to Paramore and Yellowcard because I can rock out and sing my head off, which is one of my most favorite things to do...sing my head off.

*I am still rocking a picture from my 30th pirate birthday party last year as my desktop photo. It makes me smile and say aaaaaarrrrrrggg :)

 *The inspiration for the title of my blog came from my favorite Shakespearian play, Much Ado About Nothing. It's a chaotic love story where a few people gossiping and spreading rumors for fun and revenge almost ruins many a romantic lives. Perfection.

*Cheese is what I want to eat when I'm hungry. Like always.

*I chose 9 randoms because 9 is my favorite number. It could be 9, 99, or 999, as long as it is all 9's.

"You're on again?? Sweet, I'll watch."

My list of 10 movies (in no particular order of preference) that I could pop in or stumble upon on television and watch anytime, anywhere.

10. The Proposal: Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds are hilarious. "Why are you naked!? Why are you wet?!" Enough said.

9. The Replacements: Oh Keanu...you do know how to make an entertaining football movie! The cast alone is enough to hold your attention and make you laugh. Plus, the heartwarming story of reject football players who get the chance to live the dream one more time ;)

8. Despicable Me: "MINIONS! ASSEMBLE!! Liiiiiiiightbulb. It's so fluffy I wanna die!! Quiet down FISH! I asked for a dozen cookie robots, not boogie robots!" This movie is fan-freakin-tastic! If my some weird reason you have not seen this, do it. do it now.

7. Iron Man: The first of the trilogy was awesome. I do enjoy the 2nd and 3rd installments of this popular Avenger, but the 1st movie is my favorite :)

6. Any of the Harry Potters: I.LOVE.HP. Hands down my favorite books series. I enjoy everything about the characters and how this wonderfully magical story unfolds. The cast for the HP films was exactly who I pictured in my mind while reading the series :)

5. Mulan: This is my favorite Disney movie. Not only is Mulan a phenomenal female heroine, but her side-kicks Mushu, Khan and Cricky are hilarious! Best side-kicks ever! Well done Eddie Murphy, you make an excellent voice of a dragon;p

4. Any of the Star Wars: Who wouldn't agree that the Star Wars story isn't amazing? Old films rock, newer films are good too, just in a different way.

3. Double Jeopardy: The description of this movie is enough to spark anyone's interest. Added bonus, you get to watch Tommy Lee Jones and Ashley Judd in a criminal, murder, adventure!

 

2. Forgetting Sarah Marshall: HAHA! This movie is so great for so many reasons. Not only do you get to see Russell Brand singing ridiculous songs, but the comedy sarcastic funny. Sure to be an entertainer no matter what your mood!

1. Any of the Indiana Jones (except the newest): It's difficult to pick a favorite. I love the Indiana Jones with Sean Connery, but the Temple of Doom is soooooo good and reminds me of my childhood :) I love them all. Harrison Ford is dreamy. Boom.

 

Oktoberfest!

This afternoon, my parents, Adam and I spent an hour and some change at the Oaks Park Oktoberfest in downtown Sellwood. What a fun surprise this event was! Don't get me wrong, I wasn't doubting that a holiday celebrating German beer, music and brats would be lame, but I was impressed with how well Oaks Park pulled this event together! We got our stamps, my dad bought the beers with script once we were in and we started drinking and jamming to those 'ump pa pa' beats! There were booths with crafts and interesting things to see and buy whilst we wandered with our beers. As always, there was intriguing people watching in Portland. My parents also bought us lunch, they rock like that, which consisted of delicious brats covered in sauerkraut, mustard and ketchup.

In an exciting turn of events we were informed that more wiener dog races would be occurring during the time that we were there!! This was the event that I was MOST excited about, but I thought it was only happening from 12-2 p.m. We made our way closer to the river to watch the sweet, little pups race :) I've never seen so many wiener dogs in one place!!! It was such fun to watch them practice and race! Totally worth twenty minutes out of my day :) Thanks for the invite to celebrate Oktoberfest mom and dad! Adam and I had a blast :) Cheers to celebrating more Oktoberfest next year!

                                      

Falcon throwback Friday

For today's blog post I spent the better part of an hour writing and reflecting on dreams that I have had (the sleeping kind) as well as dream analysis of said dreams. However, my mistake for the day was assuming that my writing was auto saving (as it has done forever, I swear) when really I had to go and manually save, which I did not. So yup, you guessed it. Finished a great post, about ready to edit and share when it disappears to the place where typing goes that I can't find (I'm a teacher, not a computer wiz) and I choose a few select words and sigh. I'm frustrated with myself and thus everything I attempt to write hereafter is sub par for my standards.

I'm determined to not only post today, but to feel good about what I am sharing. Thus, I invented 'Falcon throwback Friday:)" No poetic words or deep thoughts today...my brain is double ffed-fried and frustrated ;p Instead, please enjoy some adorable pictures of when I first got my little furry friend, Falcon, over four and a half years ago :) You'd never believe she was ever that small!!

Happy Friday friends!

 

 

I love this bunny! :)