Friendship after 30 and beyond

Andrei and I got together with some old friends recently and shared our mutual nostalgia for our friendships in our 20s, and current lack of adult friendships.

At first I was thinking it was some sort of parent-life thing. But one couple at the table hasn't had children and is having the same issue. We were all (except for the husband from Moscow) in a small group together about 10 years ago, led by Andrei. Of course we remember it as a Golden Age. Was it? I'll have to peek at old blog posts and see if I alluded to anything. I do think it was a fruitful period of Christian fellowship and spiritual growth, as well as liking to hang out socially. Something about the combination of regular meetings+openness+many of us not married yet, seemed to foster deep relationships. Okay, they weren't perfect, but even just going around the circle sharing honest prayer requests, and following through...that was something we could count on at the time.

But attending a small group now? Although our current church has a small group, we aren't able to commute during the week at this point. You'd think we'd be hosting, like we did before kids...but after the church conflict, it's been hard to find the emotional energy to make those kinds of commitments.

"I don't want to go and waste my free time listening to everyone talk about something that isn't interesting to me," was one person's comment. It sounds cynical, considering we are talking about Christian fellowship! But when you take away the relationship, that might be a good point. I can think of many Bible study discussions where several people went off on their own tangents and in the end it felt like we talked about...nothing. So if I were a newcomer, I don't know if it would make me want to come back. But when it's a regular thing and you really want to be there, you don't look for perfection.

If we're forced to let go of past configurations, we have to find a new format. But making new friends is so...tedious. Why is it harder as an adult?

I catch glimpses on social media of friends attending Bible studies or other gatherings of friends. So clearly, some of my peers still have the hang of it. Or...are they just keeping up friendships from long ago? Or forming connections naturally with colleagues, neighbors, or fellow parents at their kids' schools? Does it ever happen easily?

March Survey/Selfie

Welcome to April. We have arrived! Looking back at my February posts, it already seems like a long time ago! We are over the hump now and on to Spring. We might get more snow, but the daylight is here.





What I've been...



Reading: Little Town on the Prairie (read-aloud), First Art for Toddlers and Twos (MaryAnn Kohl), The How Not to Die Cookbook, The Well-Trained Mind, Teaching Through Movement: Setting Up Your Kinesthetic Classroom

Watching: Still Jeopardy! Thinking about giving up Netflix. There are a few shows I would still watch if I had the time, but maybe not worth paying the monthly fee.

Cooking/Eating: Went on a veggie kick, making more salads and things. Hard to keep up. Made some veggie Vietnamese spring rolls a few times, yummy! Keeping up with the Asian theme, I also made a simple lemon ginger soy chicken recipe a few times, really liked it. Oh, for Purim we made Hamentaschen.

Listening to: John Michael Talbot (Come to the Quiet), Kids' Praise.

Striving towards: Organizing papers.

Looking forward to: Spring, of course!

What David (6.5 years) is up to: Learning to sound out words, watching Wild Kratts, observing the ants coming out of hibernation.

What Sophia (2.5 years) is up to: Calling everything "mine," doing "ugga mugga" nose rubs like on Daniel Tiger (Mr. Rogers), changing her outfit every 10 minutes (often independently).



Your turn!

Hobby pruning

I promised myself that if I did some paper sorting I could do a new blog post.

Remember hobbies? When I got married I swore I would never let myself forget how busy I was when I was single. And by that I mean look down on unmarried men and women as if they had lots of free time on their hands. We all have plenty to keep us busy. And who made it a virtue to be busy, anyway?

But, I will say that I was SHOCKED to open up all my old notepads and skim through them. Detailed notes from sermons, grammar from studying several languages (mainly Greek, French, and Italian) for FUN as well as formal Russian courses. Notebooks full of Bible passages and questions that I had written down meticulously. A Calligraphy instructional guide along with several pages of my attempts. And of course there were all the notes from lesson planning for teaching English, and different ministry projects I was involved in.

Although looking at the notes made me jealous of my past self as if I had lots of free time, I know that isn't necessarily true. Obviously I had the time to study some subjects on my own, but I might have done that by waking up earlier, or using the time in the late evening. Although there was blogging and Skype, I managed to find time for other pursuits. And I was my own master, setting my own schedule.

It's interesting to think about why people have less time for study when they get married and/or have children. I think for one thing, there is always the possibility of work being interrupted. It may take longer to shut out distractions, and someone could need something at any moment. Our brains also fill up with the tasks that go along with caring for other people in the household. Intellectual (emotional? mental?) fatigue. And while I had plenty of late nights as a single person, sleep deprivation as a parent is just different. I still make foolish choices by staying up too late, but there are plenty of other reasons that parents don't get enough sleep. Just like with concentrating on work, it may take a while to get settled for sleep, and then you could get woken up at any moment by someone who needs something, so I'm not sure how deep the sleep really is.

Okay, that was kind of a tangent. I definitely miss devoting more time to study, but I'm looking forward to doing more activities as a family together as the kids get older. One friend recently posted a comment on FB to the effect of "poor new parents thinking it will get easier." I know each age has its difficulties, but I think the future is bright! I know it will make such a difference (both good and bad?) just having kids know how to read! Lately David has been more into puzzles and we've learned a few card games. And as he gets into school subjects, I'll be able to dive into learning again, too. Might have to sneak some of my favorites in there!

As for the fate of my papers, I threw a lot of them away. Do notes serve a purpose beyond a year or so? My first instinct was to save them because they represented so many hours of dedication, but to be honest, 1) I couldn't understand most of them without the original context, and 2) they had already served their purpose at the moment when I was writing them down-that was part of the actual learning process.

As I was going through my pile of Important Documents, a few actually went missing...including our marriage certificate! Ugh! How does that happen? You might think something could be lost in the piles, but in actuality I normally have a pretty good sense of where things are. So, not sure what to do about that. I feel like I've had many moments lately of missing things that have been purged, but that is a story for another post.

Spring cleaning /KonMari/ Changing seasons

This was going to be a short and sweet "everyday life" post, but it ended up taking me a long time to explain a few photos!

Do you do spring cleaning? There are always a lot of projects around this time of year.

Some of my projects aren't so fun. In my Konmari tidying (using the term very loosely), I'm done with my own clothes and books and need to tackle papers. I got all the important documents out of the cabinet and they're sitting there waiting for me, but tonight I decided to blog instead. :)

Maybe tomorrow?

Another category is old CDs. I already discarded some that required older versions of Windows. But I have to go through all the ones that might have files and photos, even though I probably have already copied a lot of them to an external hard drive. It's going to be tedious going through each one. I guess I'd better really discard the CDs this time so I don't have to sort them ever again! I'm keeping some music CDs for now, though.

Not looking forward to this, either.

February Survey/Selfie

So it's been a whole year since I did one of these. Not that it's a bad thing, just feels like time flew by!

Rocking the sick toddler

What I've been...



Reading: Charlotte Mason Homeschooling Series, "The Out-of-Sync Child," "Tired of Being Tired," "The Well-Trained Mind," "Mere Motherhood," and The Chronicles of Narnia and Little House on the Prairie books (with David)

Watching: Jeopardy! on Netflix, Disney's Chronicles of Narnia, Madeline (animated)

Cooking/Eating: Too many baked goods! Bagels, blueberry muffins, chocolate cake, etc etc etc. I need more winter veggie possibilities...end up resorting to frozen ones and just sauteing them.

Listening to: Audiobooks, Mozart, and the occasional worship playlist.

Striving towards: Too many goals!

Looking forward to: Getting done with colds and doing some spring cleaning and getting ready to start Lent.

What David is up to: Saying cute things, carefully constructing arguments, defending himself against his sister, playing with dragons and other toys, and still learning the alphabet in two languages.

What Sophia is up to: Fighting for her rights (started hitting recently), talking a lot, a little potty training here and there, changing her outfit 10 times a day, playing with dolls, singing all the time, flinging puzzle pieces across the room, and helping me cook.

In February we celebrated Sophia's half birthday (2 1/2), Valentine's Day, and Russian "Men's Day."

(more photos after the jump)

Sleep and SAD-can YOU ignore the weather?

Last year I was all about fighting the winter slump. I read at least one book on SAD, which primarily focused on light therapy. I schemed about changing the light fixtures in our apartment, and bought various "happy" lamps.

The happy light I bought (Phillips?) turned out to be the wrong voltage and my father in law fixed it up for Russian use, but it's the kind of thing where you want to have it sitting on a table near you, and I have 2 very curious/destructive kids. So I haven't wanted to risk having it out on a table, and there it sits in the closet! :(

I also got 2 "sunrise" alarm clocks. They're off-brand because I wasn't sure if I would like it (and again, things get broken quickly around here). I've tried them a few times and even though they claim to brighten gradually, I'm pretty much awake with the first hint of light, and then it feels like I'm at the dentist's or something with a bright light in my face. So, it doesn't feel the same as sunshine. A few times I tried just shining the light in my face when I first woke up to send the message to my body that IT'S DAYTIME NOW despite the dark outside. I didn't find it to be effective, though.

So those were my experiments from last year.



Fall 2018 

This year my online fitness group did a walking challenge again during the month of November-get outside every day. I did this faithfully for the first two weeks or so. It's supposed to a) help you get more daylight to keep your body in rhythm and b) give you lots of fresh air/positive exercise vibes.

Well, November is definitely the month when it all starts-the grey, dreary weather and desire to hibernate. The walks didn't feel like they helped at ALL.

On my way to the clinic not knowing I had appendicitis.