I Love The Seasons of Life

Wise people have often said: "All things come to pass."  I truly love that seasons come and go in this life.  Not just seasons like summer and fall but seasons of grief, sadness, and all emotion.  We endure much, but there is always a season of rest from all trial.  

Basketball season this year as a coach was definitely a season of many highs and lows.  If you were to measure our success by wins versus losses, then we failed.  We only won one game. We lost over ten games.  If you were to measure our success by attendance at practice, we also would be considered failures.  

But I don't consider this season a failure at all.  I first hand saw many successes.  From the fact that a most players couldn't do layups at the beginning but could at the end, to how they learned how to break a press, to how they became much better at shooting free throws, to how we were molded into a team instead of a dozen individuals, we were a success.  Oh how I did love basketball season, even if I am very grateful for a new season of leaving school before 4 everyday and of not having to drive long distances for games.  

I love successful seasons!

I Love a Good Project

 February is the month of love.  We often tag this love as romantic, but I think sometimes you just have to love stuff and that love can awake you and it is magical.  Happy love month!

"Love comforteth like sunshine after rain."

                                -Shakespeare 

This post cannot be limited to one thing I love, it consists of a few things I love. 

I have always loved bikes. I remember being young and how having a bike gave me new found freedom. The wind in my hair, sunshine on my face and reflective revolutions of the tires and pedals added to that freedom to leave my house and be on my own. 

 My current ride is a Trek commuter style bike. It has thin tires for quicker riding and a comfortable seat. I installed pedals that are flat on one side for casual riding and clip-less on the other side so I can wear my fancy biking shoes and pretend to be all serious about speed. 

I have mentioned this before, but a wise woman said to me in the past few months that the right number of bikes one should own is the current number they own plus one. 

I have been looking for a cruiser type bike. The kind that would allow for me to just ride slowly especially on rides with my kiddos. While searching for one, I found these old bikes for sale and I went down a rabbit hole of looking at vintage bikes and came up with a crazy idea to buy one that I would have to work on before I could ever ride it. 

Well. I bought not one but two 1961 Schwinn Travelers to fix up. 

I have started the labor of love on the bike Reuben will ride along side me. It is dirty and tedious, and I love it. There is nothing like Schwinn chrome as it shines again with some elbow grease. It is as if those 60 years of rusting and dulling are just erased. I indeed do love a good project. 

I also love old classic things. I also love my Gramdma Huven, who is classy but never seemed old.  I feel a huge connection to her now just as I did before she died a few years back. 

Here she is at the age of 16 in 1941. I cannot completely guarantee that the bike she is on is a Schwinn but it does have similar fenders and I did a little research and that bike looks a lot like the 1940 Schwinns. So, even if that bike isn’t a Schwinn, I’m going to pretend it is just to further the connection to her and to generate smiles as I think of those simpler times and as I look forward to this spring and the first cruise I get to do on one my classic bikes. 

The time spent in repairing and polishing is well worth it as I am learning and finding purpose in these projects. 

I love bikes,

I love old things,

I love a good project, 

I love my grandma,

And I have a very new love for all things Schwinn.  

I Love...Groundhog Day.

February is the month of love.  We often tag this love as romantic, but I think sometimes you just have to love stuff and that love can awake you and it is magical.  Happy love month!

"Love comforteth like sunshine after rain."

                                -Shakespeare 

"Watch out for that first step........it's a Doozie!"

I am not sure you and I can be friends if you do not know where that quote is from.  If you haven't watched Groundhog Day with Andie McDowell and Bill Murray, stop what you are doing right now and go watch it.  I mean it.  Right now.

Groundhog day to me isn't just about some rodent that is trying to be a weatherman.  I do love Punxsutawney Phil, don't get me wrong.  In fact, I would love to be in Punxsutawney some day on Groundhog Day to cheer him on, but there is more to just hearing the fabricated prediction of a late or early spring.  I think there is a bit of hope that comes from that prediction and from the whole tradition surrounding it.

I love spring and February 2nd comes around just in time to remind us that winter won't be here forever and that spring will come, it always does!  Sometimes in the dark of January and February we forget that and Phil reminds us!

I always need that reminder.  So thanks Phil!

I am exhausted...

     I had grand plans of making this last, Who am I?, post about some of my amazing ancestors and where I have come from.  But guess what? January has been the longest ten years of my life and I am just tired.  I think crazy March teacher tired has already set in and I am exhausted.  

    I think I felt this exact way last year.  It was around the time our cherished Papa passed away.  Basketball made me tired and I also was just stuck in the routine of teaching day in, day out.  I got grumpy.  I didn't know exactly where to put all my sadness.  I went dark for a few weeks.

    So, this time around, I think I am going to battle the dark.  I am going to a movie on Friday with Reub.  I am also starting a project tomorrow.  

    I have always wanted a cruiser type bike, I began searching for my birthday present to myself(of course you have to start early).  I have always been obsessed with all things old, especially from the late 50s and early 60s.  So, it just seemed right to buy an old bike to fix up and make amazing.

    So, you may hear about those adventures here and there in the future on this here blog space.  Because I bought this: 

1961 Women's Schwinn Traveler

    And the man who sold it to me, really wanted this to go along with it:

1961 Men's Schwinn Traveler

    So, I guess I have two projects to do.  I am planning on starting this endeavor tomorrow.  Something real good is about to come out of this winter.

    So, 

I am tired

I am in a funk

I am in need of a project

        (or two)

I love bikes

I love old things

I will now be a restorer of old bikes

I always have purpose

(and so do you!)

    

I am a hat person.

 January Theme: Who am I? 

The hat collection(well part of it)

    

    I only have one head, but I probably own close to fifty hats.  My dad used to say something about having only one head so why did I need more than one hat.  Of course he would also always ask if my shirt was waterproof, and then proceed to tell me: "Well, it should be because that hat sure is a pisser!"

    I am pretty sure my obsession with hats happened when I was tiny.  See, I have very Scandinavian skin;  I am very white.  With skin like mine, I have always joked that I just think about the sun and I get sunburned.  My parents always had a hat on me to prevent such problems.  I think I got used to it and it became a comfort to me.

    If I am not working, I am wearing a baseball hat.  I think partly this is due to comfort, but it also helps tame my naturally crazy(or curly) hair, and to be honest, I am lazy.

    Why not wear it at work?  Well, I can get away with it seeing I am the Physical Education teacher, but I still feel that I look a bit more professional when I am hatless.  I often do wear one on Fridays when it is a more casual dress day.

    While dating Reuben, he noticed all my hats hanging on the wall of my tiny living room.  He asked: "What's up with all the hats?"

    "I like to wear hats."

    "Why don't you wear them then?" (He had never seen me with a hat on)

    "Well, I didn't think it was cool for dating, I was trying to impress you."

    "You should wear the hats."

    And that was that.  Reuben appreciated the fact that I am very, very low maintenance.  I liked that he didn't care that I wasn't the girliest girl in the land.

    He also bought and hung these fancy hat hangers.  It is true love!

    Each different section is a different type or category of hat.  I am not that organized of a person, but I do like my hats (semi)organized.

    There is the Dodger section(my favorite baseball team):

There is the baseballism.com hat section:

    There is the hats from the baseball stadiums I have visited(My life goal is to get to all the MLB stadiums):

There is the hats from Wisconsin section(plus a random San Diego hat!):

Then lastly there is the important to me, but doesn't fit into the other categories section:

Home is where you hang your hat, you know.  Good thing I have so many hats so that I can be at home wherever I may go!