on waiting

this afternoon i was waiting for the cross town bus.  generally, i have good luck with that bus, it's usually right on time.  today is was late.  so late! and it was freezing... literally.  boy was i happy to see that bus when it pulled up at the stop...

most of the time my journal sees the product of my waiting; of the hoping, praying and sometimes, the aching.    the outcome of waiting is positive; happy and worthwhile.  the end of waiting is the beginning of deep breathing and hopeful prayers. suddenly the blessing of waiting is clear and i laugh and think life is easy! ...all of that waiting quickly forgotten.  this afternoon on my way to trader joes i started to think about all of the incredible things that have happened lately, while i've been waiting.  all of those things i set aside while waiting for that thing!  that thing i'm just waiting for!

and then.

then a big smile, a GIANT crazy-person smile, found it's way onto my cheeks and right there on the cross town bus i just felt like all of those things, ALL OF THEM!, will come our way in good time.

now's the time for deep breathing!

now's the time for hopeful prayers!

and that's all i have to say about that.

"blessed and fortunate"

it's difficult to have a conversation with my mom without having your grammar or word choice corrected.  (hi mom! i love you!) most often, i hear her correcting me or someone else when we say something like "man, you are so lucky".  

luck? no. never.

"luck is in vegas", she says.

"you are blessed and fortunate", she says.

while i would argue that luck and fortune are one in the same ;), as the years have passed i too have silently corrected when i hear people talk of their "luck" when what they're speaking of can really only be described as blessing straight from heaven.

jeremy was able to spend the week of thanksgiving here in the city.  it was a much needed break from his wacky travel to and from phoenix and more importantly, so nice to have someone to send "to do" lists to throughout the day and to come home to a clean apartment. jeremy would make such a great housewife...

anyway.

our first thanksgiving apart from our family out west wasn't nearly as painful as could be expected.  it was pretty wonderful, actually.  we had dinner with incredible friends and the city was so beautiful that day.  on friday, after spending a few hours at the office, i met jeremy in midtown and we had lunch and did a little christmas shopping. we ran into dear friends from provo on fifth avenue (what are the chances?!) and walked home to make dinner along with the 7UP jello that was missing from our thanksgiving dinner.  

on saturday we took the 6  to the D, way out into brooklyn and met up with mormon helping hands. we put on our yellow vests, and went to work.  when we arrived, the only open spots were on a team of people from the spanish branch who had driven up for the weekend from virginia.  jumping on board that team was the best decision we made that day.  i have never seen a harder working group of people in my life.  i have so much love and respect for those good brothers and sisters i worked alongside that day.  the fact that i was laughing while shivering and clearing out sheds filled with water logged treasures really says it all.  our team  did all we could in two homes and while there were many others from the mormon helping hands group out and about that day, and have been for weeks now, there is still so much work to be done.  you wouldn't believe how much hope and how many smiles i saw out there.  

after one day of clearing and cleaning and shoveling and sweeping and hammering, i was exhausted.   

on the train home i just kept thinking about waking up to that mess everyday.  having to gut my home and start from scratch.  i'm pretty sure i couldn't do it.  i find myself feeling overwhelmed by my own tiny challenges as it is.

that night when we went to bed jeremy and i talked about our new friends from the spanish branch in virginia.   about bob's sheds and how we accidentally threw chris' radiator covers in the dumpster which led to some pretty serious dumpster diving...  and how blessed and fortunate we are.  to have met such incredible people. to have the opportunity to serve. to be safe and warm in our teeny tiny home in manhattan.  

when jeremy left me tonight for phoenix he told me that this was the best thanksgiving ever.

it had nothing to do with the baby carrots we ate at the odeon in tribeca on thursday.  

and everything to do with our time spent in brooklyn.

oh, sandy

on saturday afternoon in arizona, i heard about the super-storm headed for the east coast.  i was supposed to start work on monday so i decided to get on that plane, just in case the storm turned out to be nothing and monday would actually be a normal work day. 

well, guess what guys? it wasn't. 

my flight ended up being the very last flight into the city before they started canceling flights left and right.  

!!!

i got home, picked up some groceries, a large cheese pizza, and a pack of coke. (i've never been in a huricane, okay?! pizza and soda sounded like necessities!) (i can humbly tell you right here, right now, that i was wrong. THEY ARE NOT NECESSITIES.  yuck.) 

anyway, so here i am on my couch, watching the city get beat up by sandy, and according to the reports i may not be going to work until wednesday.  

maybe.

heaving a long, heavy, melodramatic siiiigh

and now, here are a couple photos i took on my walkabout before sandy came and ruined everything:

also, look at this!

oh, and just to remind everyone where i could have been:

alright, pity party is over.  i feel a little better, don't you?

...

fall break in manhattan

last week three of my favorite people in the world came and stayed in my 500 square foot home.  the only positive thing about helping them pack up their things on saturday was discovering that my apartment is huge! ;)

the day before they arrived, i got a phone call from the live with kelly and michael! intern.  i guess they liked my yellow note/envelope and offered us tickets to wednesday's show.  yes, duh! kelly wasn't the only "celeb" we woke up early for last week...buddy's number one fans insisted we get to the bakery in hoboken before 9am "to beat the crowd", they told me.  HA! i wish i had a photo of the bakery when we walked up to it...EMPTY, NO ONE IN SIGHT.  which, obviously, was awesome...but mostly hilarious.  what can you do, we're super fans.    ? 

other highlights include (but are not limited to): eating an excessive amount of burgers (!!), the excitement/surprise over the multiple h&m locations in the city (peri, i'm looking at you), turning around to find my mom making friends with ... everyone?,  SOMEBODY i'm related to dancing town the street after mom forced her into a decent pair of walking shoes, changed her world, i guess (chloe!!), huffing it through two boroughs without taking a lunch break and the grouchiness that started to kick in in the middle of the brooklyn bridge (ahem, jeremy), and coming THIS close to putting a puppy on hold (moooooomm)... and on and on. 

and now, here's an explosion of photos because...well, because what is a blog for if not photos?

...

best 10 dollars i've ever spent

last week i headed to the temple after an interview.  i had been living in this city for just a few weeks, alone for the most part, and as soon as i walked into the temple i felt like a new woman.  in my rush, i realized that didn't have any cash with me and before i could leave to run down the street to the atm and surely miss the session i had hurried to make, the security guard pulled out his wallet and handed me a five dollar bill.  with a big grin on his face he assured me that he didn't need it anyway.  i promised him i would repay him and headed into temple with so much happy in my heart and gratitude for his generosity.

   

two hours later i walked over to bed bath and beyond to get cash back.  i grabbed some mini twix bars and two five dollar bills and dropped the bars and one of the fives of with my new friend.

  

as i was leaving the temple, my dad called and so i was a bit distracted when a man wrapped in a burnt orange robe came up to me and asked, "donation?"  

with my dad talking in my ear and my head saying "five dollars?!"/remembering my survey of world religions course (best class at byu, i'm telling you) and knowing that this gentleman lives off of the generosity of others as he travels around sharing his message of peace, i handed him the other five dollar bill and he handed me this:

   

and just like that, my worries went away and my prayers were answered...in broken english and re payed in twix bars.

...

sideways bubbles

nonsense.
that's all.

   

put a rolo in it

as soon as jeremy got into the taxi tonight i texted my mom-in-law and asked her for her cookie recipe.  

i needed a quick fix to drown my "i'm a widow four days out of the week" woes.

while i was picking up the ingredients, i decided that chocolate chips, crisco, and sugar just weren't enough to cure what ailed me and threw a bag of rolos into my basket. 

i am happy to report, as i sit here eating the best cookie that has ever come out of my oven, that the rolos were totally worth $5.00. (I admit that only because I have a feeling that jeremy wont read this.  testing...testing...)

this photo should be received with a round of applause.

i firmly believe that anything with chocolate should be salted, amen.

and now i'm ready to start the week!



karen's cookies + rolos

3/4 c. brown sugar
3/4 c. sugar
1 c. crisco (JUST DO IT)
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp salt
2 1/4 c. flour
2 c. chocolate chips

mix the ingredients in that order.
take a small ball of dough and form a ball around the rolo.
(only use enough dough to cover the rolo so it can spread through the cookie!)
and last but not least, do not forget to salt your cookies.  ever.
bake at 375 for 9-11 minutes.

a visitor

i had my first city visitor!

my husband!

haha!

(ha.)

really though, jeremy was in town for a hot minute before hopping in a cab headed for newark. 

wahhh.

i made the most of my time with him by using his muscles to schlep groceries home from costco, using him as a buffer at the ward picnic, and most importantly, throwing all of my pent up hilariousness at him. 

this whole set up we have going on here is far from ideal, but i'm pretty sure it's made jeremy love me 1000 times more! (and vice versa) 

after sneaking (it's not sneaking if five people there know your name!) out of the picnic early we strolled down central park west and ended up at china fun for dinner followed by a little tasti d lite for dessert.

this was the look on jeremy's face while i was explaining to him the magic that is rainbow sprinkles on tart yogurt (MAGIC).  (aka, he hadn't seen me in ten days and anything i said was GOLD!!)

walking into time square on a saturday night is a horrible horrible horrible idea...

never mind. 

grand central station

yesterday i had to cross through grand central to get to 45th.

it was my first time in the station and in my rush to get to an interview i got about half way through before my mouth dropped. i whipped around and craned my neck in attempt to take it all in.  woah.

here are the two photos i took from my phone...before my eyes fell from the ceiling and i noticed that i was keeping company with tourists.  please, i've lived here for two weeks now.

i shoved my phone in my bag and huffed it to my interview, but not before making a mental note to hurry back and spend more time with the tourists in grand central.

...

one week

this city is a dream.  a very dirty and smelly, but beautiful and incredibly exciting dream.

it's jolting to step down from my building and be here.  right here in the middle of it all.

wow, guys. wow.

...

so, we moved.

we made it! after a year and a half of telling people that we were thinking about making the move, and then "we're moving back east in august", all of the sudden here we are.

well, here i am.  jeremy is in florida for the next ten days for training and i'm here hustlin'.  

two blocks south.  

!!!

Klynveld, Peat, Marwick, and Goerdeler

he did it!  my boy got the job.

jeremy's phone rang during sunday school this morning.  

after class we went outside in the freezing cold and listened to 

the best voice mail i've ever heard in my 22 years of life.

we laughed, i cried, it was better than cats.

and then we went our separate ways for the last hour of church.

these wilsons are new yorkers.

merry christmas and a happy new year!

hustlin'

boyfriend (husband) is in new york for the second time this month on an interview tour, which will continue into next month.

Q: do you know what this means?  

A: i bought a jump rope, cleaned the apartment, wrote my missionary, ate too much candy, and i've watched not one, but TWO ridiculous "chick flicks"!

here here!

just kidding (not really, i did actually do those things...and it was wonderful).

what it actually means is that my boy is hustlin'. and he's good at it too.

however: i'm starting to wonder if he's really just going to new york every other weekend to meet scott for shakes at the shake shack....

scott?...

hmm, just as i suspected. 

p.s.- thanks for the photos, jeremy!