I'm in Ukraine and I'm blogging about it!

Ok, ok, I finally did it... I created a blog. I swore I'd never have a blog until I had some seriously blog-worthy things to blog about. Things like a new husband that I travel the world with (ok, I'd TOTALLY settle for just the husband...) or children running around and doing adorable things. But alas, here I am, blogging even though I have no new husband or adorable children to blog about.

However, as it turns out, I am now living in a very foreign country where I don't speak the language and where I hope (cross your fingers) to be finding a job soon. So, since I have lost connection with my most prized worldly possession (my cell phone), I thought blogging would be a great way to keep everyone informed about my crazy gypsy-like life and also a way to be in the know with all you other bloggers. Also, I am a terrible journal writer and I hope that blogging will be a way to keep track of the things that happen over the next few months. We'll see how it goes!

One other side note - I also swore that I'd never become one of those over-obsessed blog maniacs that stalks everyones' blogs and spends WAY too much time making their blog just-so... So we won't even talk about how long I spent setting up my blog, sorting through backgrounds, changing the colors, debating over fonts and trying to make it perfect. And we also won't talk about how I hope to become a professional blog-stalker ASAP.

So, I really don't have a ton to talk about, and I definitely don't have a ton of pictures to post unfortunately, but I wanted to put up a few, just to get my blog rolling. The problem is that my camera is, well, ghetto, and has a hard time functioning on a consistent basis, so my pictures are few and far between. But the pictures that it has taken have been fab, so I won't complain too much... :)

My little adventure started two weeks ago when I went on a quick little vacay with two of my favorite gals - my bestest friend Averi and a dear friend from school, Rachel. We had a ball and it went by too quickly, that's for sure! But here are a few pictures (I won't bore you with a ton since most of you probably read Averi's blog anyway and she posted some already).

The London Eye, Big Ben, some scaffolding...

Me and Buckingham Palace

Me and Ave and Buckingham Palace. I really just included this one because I enjoy the breezy-haired man on the bike...

Rachel, Averi, and I at Stonehenge

I like taking pictures like this...

Bath is such a lovely place...

I ♥ Jane Austen so this picture was a must!

Ave and I on the Christmas Floor at Harrods.... I LOVE THAT PLACE!

I'm a Harrods mannequin, can't you tell??

So, after a fun week in London with the girls, I flew off into the Ukrainian sunset. I'm living with my sister and her family and have lots of time to spend with my new baby niece and 3 nephews (I'll post pics of them another time after I get some good ones...) I also get to spend some quality time with one of my favorite sisters!! :)

This is a picture I took the second day I was here - it's the view from the kitchen balcony... Pretty amazing, I must say!

Although, this is what it looks like on an average day - usually hidden behind all the fog! I have to say though that even though I am TOTALLY missing the beautiful and warm Arizona weather, I am loving the feeling of Fall and the way the trees look. The colors have been amazing!

The last thing I want to talk about is the temple... When you live in the US, you can find an LDS temple just about everywhere. Most people don't have to drive more than an hour or two to get to a temple (although the closest temple to my home growing up in Colorado was about a five hour drive). But here in Europe, temples are fewer and much farther between. In 1998 they announced that a temple would be built here in Kiev, which was amazing news to the members of the Church here. Members have been traveling about 30 hours roundtrip to get to the nearest temple (in Freiberg Germany, I believe), and some of them never get to go in their life time. We drove to the temple site on Sunday to see its progress, and this is how it looks so far, and what it will look like after completion. They hope to have it completed by September of next year. It really is amazing to think that a temple is being built in a former-Soviet Union country - what a huge achievement for the Church! And what a huge blessing to the people here! I'll post progress as we see it.

Ok, that was a really really really long post, I do apologize. Hopefully I'll blog frequently enough so that my posts don't bore everyone to death! :) So, until next time...

Me, Gypsy Girl

In the first 19 years of my life, I only had two addresses - both of which were in the same little town, and both for nearly equal amounts of time. In the 9 short years since then, I have resided at 16 different addresses, the latest of which is in Kiev, Ukraine. 
People have been referring to me as a gypsy recently, perhaps because my bags are never fully unpacked when I finally "settle" somewhere. I was once told that I need to "put my anchor down" - that I'm too much like a bird, flying off in every different direction. 
I've thought about that a lot and I don't know if there is something inside me that craves the constant change or if I just don't have anything significant to let my anchor down for right now, but either way, I tend to go where the wind blows. And apparently it's very windy where I stand! 
What can I say? I'm a wanderer at heart...
So thus begins a new journey, and hopefully some experiences that I can look back on and be grateful for the way they changed my life.