Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Very Excited
It has been a LONG day. We packed all of our belongings into a container to be put on a ship and taken over the water to Kona early this morning. Hoping we get settled fairly easily. I'm looking forward to fresh Macadamia nuts and Kona coffee. Moreover, I'm especially looking forward to being permanently based somewhere (for the first time in years) and having Isaac home every day. Woot!
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Succinct
I did something long overdue. I had our website domain name changed to something less ridiculous to type in:
New domain name, same website. Will add more guest info in a week or two.
New domain name, same website. Will add more guest info in a week or two.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
130 to go!
130 days to go until the Schaefer-Giguere Wedding of 2010!
Actually, it will possibly be the Schaefer-Giguere Wedding of the century...or maybe even all of eternity (exciting). I wonder how many Schaefers have married Gigueres in the past. Hopefully none. I want my kids to have a deep gene pool, and inter-marrying does not normal offspring make. In case you were wondering.
At any rate, I'm doing my best to plow through the check lists. According to TheKnot (wedding guilt-monger that it is) I'm about 2 months behind on a ton of check list items. According to rational human beings who live in the rest of society however, I am ahead of the game. Who to believe?
We are looking forward to seeing so many faces that we miss and love this summer. We hope you guys bring your good vibes and par-tay attitudes. Just for you, we'll practice staying up past 10pm for the next 4 months.
For those guests who received a save-the-date (invites will be on their way soon-ish), we've been keeping the website updated with information we hope will help our out-of-town buds plan the trip easily. Head straight to the "Guest Information" section.
Or, you could also put trip planning off until the last possible minute. Whatever suits your style.
I am hoping (but not promising) to have the rest of the guest information fully updated in a month...or so.
Click Here to visit our TheKnot website.
Actually, it will possibly be the Schaefer-Giguere Wedding of the century...or maybe even all of eternity (exciting). I wonder how many Schaefers have married Gigueres in the past. Hopefully none. I want my kids to have a deep gene pool, and inter-marrying does not normal offspring make. In case you were wondering.
At any rate, I'm doing my best to plow through the check lists. According to TheKnot (wedding guilt-monger that it is) I'm about 2 months behind on a ton of check list items. According to rational human beings who live in the rest of society however, I am ahead of the game. Who to believe?
We are looking forward to seeing so many faces that we miss and love this summer. We hope you guys bring your good vibes and par-tay attitudes. Just for you, we'll practice staying up past 10pm for the next 4 months.
For those guests who received a save-the-date (invites will be on their way soon-ish), we've been keeping the website updated with information we hope will help our out-of-town buds plan the trip easily. Head straight to the "Guest Information" section.
Or, you could also put trip planning off until the last possible minute. Whatever suits your style.
I am hoping (but not promising) to have the rest of the guest information fully updated in a month...or so.
Click Here to visit our TheKnot website.
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Aloha, Maui.
We're saying aloha [goodbye] to Maui and aloha [hello] to the Big Island this month. Another move so soon. Here's the announcement! It's official, we're setting off for bigger---and hopefully better---things. Kona or bust.
Now that everything is all caught up, maybe I'll give the blogging a rest for a while.
Now that everything is all caught up, maybe I'll give the blogging a rest for a while.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Out with the delicious, in with the soy
My doctor gave me a HUGE list of food do's and don'ts based on my cholesterol, accumulated iron in my blood, and my blood type.
It looks something like this:
Never eat your favorite foods again.
Ever.
Don't even think about it.
Ok, so it's not actually that rigid. But if I really want to get my cholesterol down, and keep my iron down at a "safe level" and just be a more fine-tuned machine, I really have to cut out the things on the "avoid" lists and work in more of the things on the "highly beneficial" lists.
What does this mean exactly? It means that I am more-or-less a vegan now. Not for 100% of my meals, but probably for at least 90% of them. The only kinds of cheese I can have on an "infrequent" basis are goat cheese, feta cheese, or mozarella. No more milk, cream, or butter for me. No more yummy French cheeses.
I can not eat sherbet or ice cream anymore, but I may have yogurt and frozen yogurt.
I am not supposed to eat meat anymore. I can, on an infrequent basis, have chicken, game hen, or turkey, but I can't make it a regular habit.
I must say "goodbye" to fried foods and a list of oils and greasy frying things. I will say "hello" to more things like grapeseed oil (which is excellent for pan-frying, I just found out), and EVOO.
There is a long list of fish that I am allowed to eat (hooray!), however, I can't eat it raw (cause of the iron thing), and most of it is fresh water fish...which is not easy to come by in Hawai'i. So I may as well not get my hopes too far up about that one.
No more of some of my favorites: oysters, clams, squid, crab, or lobster.
Fear not! The list has opened my eyes up to all of these other foods in the world I have a tendency to ignore.
I have learned that attempted taste-alike soy-based "cheeses" are disgusting. If it's the flavor people go for, it would taste just as good to melt plastic over my veggie burger. Totally disgusting. I'd rather just live without cheese all together and use a slice of avocado instead.
Veggie burgers are actually delicious. As is Pad Thai with tofu. Chocolate soy milk is truly amazing, and eating more fresh vegetables and fruits is definitely making me feel better already. Getting my proteins from beans and soy and eggs. (Thank God I can still have eggs!). I love the excuse to have almonds and walnuts nearby at all times, too.
Taking lots of B-vitamins since I'll be eating much less meat.
Going to keep up with my daily workout routine. I may have to be eating double over-time to keep enough protein in my body to keep building muscle, but I guess it's all a learning process.
In 8 weeks, I will get to see if this is all working and making me more healthy! It's a big change, so I really hope there's some pay off for it.
It looks something like this:
Never eat your favorite foods again.
Ever.
Don't even think about it.
Ok, so it's not actually that rigid. But if I really want to get my cholesterol down, and keep my iron down at a "safe level" and just be a more fine-tuned machine, I really have to cut out the things on the "avoid" lists and work in more of the things on the "highly beneficial" lists.
What does this mean exactly? It means that I am more-or-less a vegan now. Not for 100% of my meals, but probably for at least 90% of them. The only kinds of cheese I can have on an "infrequent" basis are goat cheese, feta cheese, or mozarella. No more milk, cream, or butter for me. No more yummy French cheeses.
I can not eat sherbet or ice cream anymore, but I may have yogurt and frozen yogurt.
I am not supposed to eat meat anymore. I can, on an infrequent basis, have chicken, game hen, or turkey, but I can't make it a regular habit.
I must say "goodbye" to fried foods and a list of oils and greasy frying things. I will say "hello" to more things like grapeseed oil (which is excellent for pan-frying, I just found out), and EVOO.
There is a long list of fish that I am allowed to eat (hooray!), however, I can't eat it raw (cause of the iron thing), and most of it is fresh water fish...which is not easy to come by in Hawai'i. So I may as well not get my hopes too far up about that one.
No more of some of my favorites: oysters, clams, squid, crab, or lobster.
Fear not! The list has opened my eyes up to all of these other foods in the world I have a tendency to ignore.
I have learned that attempted taste-alike soy-based "cheeses" are disgusting. If it's the flavor people go for, it would taste just as good to melt plastic over my veggie burger. Totally disgusting. I'd rather just live without cheese all together and use a slice of avocado instead.
Veggie burgers are actually delicious. As is Pad Thai with tofu. Chocolate soy milk is truly amazing, and eating more fresh vegetables and fruits is definitely making me feel better already. Getting my proteins from beans and soy and eggs. (Thank God I can still have eggs!). I love the excuse to have almonds and walnuts nearby at all times, too.
Taking lots of B-vitamins since I'll be eating much less meat.
Going to keep up with my daily workout routine. I may have to be eating double over-time to keep enough protein in my body to keep building muscle, but I guess it's all a learning process.
In 8 weeks, I will get to see if this is all working and making me more healthy! It's a big change, so I really hope there's some pay off for it.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Doctor, doctor, gimme the news!
Had a meeting with my doctor today because my blood results were in. The aim was to confirm a diagnosis of hypoglycemia (which was confirmed). He had my overall health and nutrition tested in case there were other things that needed to be addressed. Today I learned that...
-My Vitamin D levels are low. Surprising, since I live in Hawaii of all places and spend hours and hours outdoors every day. Apparently sunscreen also blocks Vitamin D, and I wear sunscreen every day. Easy to fix.
-My overall mineral and vitamin nutrition (besides blood sugar and Vitamin D) is really good.
-My immune system is very healthy.
-My LDL (bad) cholesterol levels are "shockingly" high.
Let that last one be a newsflash to skinny people like me. I eat well, I am a long distance runner, I work out every day, but my cholesterol level is still not desirable. Partially genetics, partially my love of fine meats, shellfish and French cheeses. (What can I say? It's hard to say no to a good hunk of brie).
If in doubt, and even if you're not, maybe it's a good idea to have your blood cholesterol tested. Being young, fit, skinny, and health-conscious may all seem like they're going for ya, but cholesterol is a sneaky little devil.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a list of "beneficial foods" and "foods to avoid" the doctor gave me and I'm going to have to go to battle with the contents of my fridge.
-My Vitamin D levels are low. Surprising, since I live in Hawaii of all places and spend hours and hours outdoors every day. Apparently sunscreen also blocks Vitamin D, and I wear sunscreen every day. Easy to fix.
-My overall mineral and vitamin nutrition (besides blood sugar and Vitamin D) is really good.
-My immune system is very healthy.
-My LDL (bad) cholesterol levels are "shockingly" high.
Let that last one be a newsflash to skinny people like me. I eat well, I am a long distance runner, I work out every day, but my cholesterol level is still not desirable. Partially genetics, partially my love of fine meats, shellfish and French cheeses. (What can I say? It's hard to say no to a good hunk of brie).
If in doubt, and even if you're not, maybe it's a good idea to have your blood cholesterol tested. Being young, fit, skinny, and health-conscious may all seem like they're going for ya, but cholesterol is a sneaky little devil.
Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a list of "beneficial foods" and "foods to avoid" the doctor gave me and I'm going to have to go to battle with the contents of my fridge.
Saturday, February 27, 2010
Tsunami
If you checked any news source today, I am sure you heard about our Tsunamis. I have not been able to check the news myself, because I was evacuated.
My neighbor came downstairs at about 6 am to wake me up and tell me that a Tsunami was predicted to arrive at about 11am. We live about one block from the shore, so it didn't take me more than a few minutes to snap awake start to panic.
A few minutes after that, civil defense sirens began to go off, and they went off several times after that (about once an hour or more) for the next 5 or 6 hours. I could hear them all the way inside of the valley and on top of a mountain.
At the sound of the sirens, I panicked...as in, the screaming, sweating kind of panic you see in movies when people are getting attacked by aliens from outer space. I was genuinely afraid. I did not know that the first siren was simply to wake people up so they knew to get to an evacuation area soon.
I got me and my neighbors up to the IAO Valley. Two of us decided to hike to the top, another meandered off and did his own thing. The hike was nice, but super hot...and in my panic I forgot to bring sunscreen, so the greatest injury I incurred today was sunburn. Otherwise, I am alive and well.
After the state of emergency was declared in the clear, I came back down from my high place and headed home...but police would still not let those of us who lived lower into our homes for another hour. Roads were blocked. From where I was on the mountain, I could at one point see that the water was sinking away from the shore before a wave hit. It was kind of odd, and a little hard to believe that I was really witnessing it. The waves, however, came in fast but were small. From what I have overheard and been told, there is some damage in Kahului Harbor. The upper part of my neighborhood is undamaged.
I have not even glanced at the houses down the hill and by the water, but I imagine they are suffering minimal damage, if any.
Isaac is on Kauai, but has been in touch and I know that he is safe. Despite being apart from me, he was still a strong head of our household, keeping me on the phone all morning to keep me calm and help me determine the safest and fastest route to safety. I am thankful that in just a month or two, there will be far fewer chances that we'll be separated during an emergency.
Thanks for the concerned calls, texts and etc. I am still off facebook, so if you sent me a message that way I won't read it until after Easter. If it happens again, I plan to do what I did this time (minus the panicking): hike to the top of a mountain. I was surprised to see only 3 other people up there. I kind of expected to see a crowd.
My neighbor came downstairs at about 6 am to wake me up and tell me that a Tsunami was predicted to arrive at about 11am. We live about one block from the shore, so it didn't take me more than a few minutes to snap awake start to panic.
A few minutes after that, civil defense sirens began to go off, and they went off several times after that (about once an hour or more) for the next 5 or 6 hours. I could hear them all the way inside of the valley and on top of a mountain.
At the sound of the sirens, I panicked...as in, the screaming, sweating kind of panic you see in movies when people are getting attacked by aliens from outer space. I was genuinely afraid. I did not know that the first siren was simply to wake people up so they knew to get to an evacuation area soon.
I got me and my neighbors up to the IAO Valley. Two of us decided to hike to the top, another meandered off and did his own thing. The hike was nice, but super hot...and in my panic I forgot to bring sunscreen, so the greatest injury I incurred today was sunburn. Otherwise, I am alive and well.
After the state of emergency was declared in the clear, I came back down from my high place and headed home...but police would still not let those of us who lived lower into our homes for another hour. Roads were blocked. From where I was on the mountain, I could at one point see that the water was sinking away from the shore before a wave hit. It was kind of odd, and a little hard to believe that I was really witnessing it. The waves, however, came in fast but were small. From what I have overheard and been told, there is some damage in Kahului Harbor. The upper part of my neighborhood is undamaged.
I have not even glanced at the houses down the hill and by the water, but I imagine they are suffering minimal damage, if any.
Isaac is on Kauai, but has been in touch and I know that he is safe. Despite being apart from me, he was still a strong head of our household, keeping me on the phone all morning to keep me calm and help me determine the safest and fastest route to safety. I am thankful that in just a month or two, there will be far fewer chances that we'll be separated during an emergency.
Thanks for the concerned calls, texts and etc. I am still off facebook, so if you sent me a message that way I won't read it until after Easter. If it happens again, I plan to do what I did this time (minus the panicking): hike to the top of a mountain. I was surprised to see only 3 other people up there. I kind of expected to see a crowd.
Sunday, February 21, 2010
Aloha, Pete!
As I wrote earlier this week, Isaac's brother, Pete has been in town visiting us. We've spent hours every day at the beach, but Pete also got to go do some early morning whale watching, and go on a few adventurous hikes with us.
Isaac loves to be in the water
Isaac and Peter at the beach after body surfing for a few hours.
Humpback waving aloha?
Showin' some tail.
Jumping!
Ike & Pete on one of the bridges on the "Swinging Bridges" hike.
Me and Pete posing next to a bamboo grove.
Not sure if he knew his picture was being taken...
Isaac and Pete taking a minute to pose while swimming and playing under a waterfall.
Wednesday, February 17, 2010
Da News, Brah
I talked on the phone to one of my dear friends last night who said that she was disappointed that there weren't any recent updates on my blog. I thought I was doing pretty good, but since she said something...
We have a house guest right now. Isaac's brother is in town. I am loving his company. Nothing like a teenager to make you realize how old you're getting. Lots of beach time. He seems to have the same love of boogie boarding I do.
Isaac and I went on a whale-watching tour a few weeks ago. Did I already blog about that? I think I did. See a previous post (I don't remember which).
I love Maui. It is beautiful. No wonder so many people come to visit here...although I'm not a fan of outsiders acting like this place exists solely for them and having no regard for those of us who live here. No wonder the locals are so hostile to outsiders and newbies.
As for the island... I feel like I have seen most of it. I don't feel quite at home, although I do have one grocery store I particularly love, and one sandwich deli I especially love. Both places are the only places I can go and feel recognized. Perhaps that's just a testament to my love of tasty food. Despite my access to delicious goods, I haven't gained much weight. I haven't weighed myself either, but everything fits the same.
The aforementioned sandwich deli made me realize that even I, a former pork hater, can love pork. It was a euphoric awakening. The Southern Squealer = life changing. Unfortunately, I still don't particularly love pork in most of its other forms. The semi-inconvenient wait for the kitchen cooks to make it is totally worth it.
Um... what else? The wedding countdown has hit the 5 month mark. It seems like we just got engaged yesterday. In reality it was August. Where has the time gone?! Soooo much to do!
I am hoping to have Dax here no later than April. Gee willakers, I miss that pup. He is my sunshine when skies are gray.
Most new news: I have given up facebook. Cold turkey for 40 days. If that goes well, I may suspend my account FOR-EV-ER. I waste too much time on it. Same as TV for some people. Just uses up time you could have spent doing something you'll actually remember one day. I needed to cut myself off. Long overdue. Feel free to check in on me and make sure I'm sticking with it.
That's all for now. I guess I'll be using this to post pictures for the next few weeks. So stay posted!
We have a house guest right now. Isaac's brother is in town. I am loving his company. Nothing like a teenager to make you realize how old you're getting. Lots of beach time. He seems to have the same love of boogie boarding I do.
Isaac and I went on a whale-watching tour a few weeks ago. Did I already blog about that? I think I did. See a previous post (I don't remember which).
I love Maui. It is beautiful. No wonder so many people come to visit here...although I'm not a fan of outsiders acting like this place exists solely for them and having no regard for those of us who live here. No wonder the locals are so hostile to outsiders and newbies.
As for the island... I feel like I have seen most of it. I don't feel quite at home, although I do have one grocery store I particularly love, and one sandwich deli I especially love. Both places are the only places I can go and feel recognized. Perhaps that's just a testament to my love of tasty food. Despite my access to delicious goods, I haven't gained much weight. I haven't weighed myself either, but everything fits the same.
The aforementioned sandwich deli made me realize that even I, a former pork hater, can love pork. It was a euphoric awakening. The Southern Squealer = life changing. Unfortunately, I still don't particularly love pork in most of its other forms. The semi-inconvenient wait for the kitchen cooks to make it is totally worth it.
Um... what else? The wedding countdown has hit the 5 month mark. It seems like we just got engaged yesterday. In reality it was August. Where has the time gone?! Soooo much to do!
I am hoping to have Dax here no later than April. Gee willakers, I miss that pup. He is my sunshine when skies are gray.
Most new news: I have given up facebook. Cold turkey for 40 days. If that goes well, I may suspend my account FOR-EV-ER. I waste too much time on it. Same as TV for some people. Just uses up time you could have spent doing something you'll actually remember one day. I needed to cut myself off. Long overdue. Feel free to check in on me and make sure I'm sticking with it.
That's all for now. I guess I'll be using this to post pictures for the next few weeks. So stay posted!
Saturday, February 13, 2010
A Double Dose of Happiness!
Earlier this week, Isaac's sister, Alicia, gave birth to twins! She stuck to her guns in the delivery room and birthed both babies naturally, without an epidural or any medication. Word has it, she's the talk of the hospital!
Welcome to the world, Claire and Gwynne! We can't wait to meet our wonderful little nieces!
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