simple supper

we made this for dinner the other night:

and it was amazing. and super easy.

all we did was take garlic toast (sourdough bread with butter, crushed garlic, and parmesan cheese baked in the oven for about 10 minutes or until golden brown), top it with basted eggs and some of my tomato sauce. soooooo delicious, satisfying, and comforting.

high rollers

on saturday night, we went to congregation ale house to share a burger and drink some beers.

i enjoyed a glass of framboise (one of my favorites) and the dark, gothic décor.

overall, we really liked this place, and we'll be back! all the food was great, except for the dessert. ugh. it was AWFUL. we ordered a chocolate molten tart, and i swear the brownies i make out of the box are better. not good at all. but the burgers, fries, and pretzel were delicious.

and after that, we decided to really go hog wild. we went to target. 'cause that's what cool people like us do on a saturday night... go to target... and take pictures of themselves...

(ahhh, gotta love how the fluorescent lights in target turn everything a sickly, jaundice color.)

yeah.

(this is what i look like when i'm reading, on the computer, or concentrating on something. terrifying, right?? i look like i'm trying to bore a hole through the pages with my laser beam eyes.)

but seriously, target on a saturday night is my favorite. it's not busy, but the people who are there are always interesting to watch. we actually spent an hour there on new year's eve last year.... and it was hilarious and so much fun. i highly recommend it.

so that's what a couple of high rollers do on a saturday night. take notes.

this is me lately.

i'm a shaggy-haired monster.

my hair hasn't been this long in more than 3 years!! it's totally shapeless and ridiculous looking. all i can do with it is put it in "toddler tails" (aka pig tails that are so short they make me like i'm 3) and an "up-do" (this is just me pinning the mullet-y bit in the back up with some bobby pins).

ever since i started wearing my hair in the little teeny-tiny pig tails, i have become more and more convinced that the majority of men are perverts at heart. the menfolk really dig the toddler tails.

especially benjamin franklin.

jasmine's guide to making friends

after writing this post, i received several emails and a couple of comments asking for some advice on how to make more friends and how to end friendships that are dragging you down. instead of individually responding to each person, i decided to write down all my thoughts on the subject and to go into more detail about what i actually did to make more friends. these are just my opinions and my experiences, but i feel like i was really successful on my quest for friendship.

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i honestly didn't really make tons of tangible changes to make more friends. i didn't join a bunch of clubs or stand on street corners trying to get friendly looking girls to hang out with me. i think the biggest change i made was in my attitude. i recognized that i really needed friends and that friendship was something that was very important to me. i accepted that i would have to be really open and willing to live through potentially awkward situations in order to find more friends. if someone expressed an interest in hanging out with me, i went for it. if i was interested in hanging out with someone, i dove in and asked them if they'd like to get coffee or go for a walk some time. the biggest change i made was my openness. i truly believe that the act of recognizing a need for change in your life is a very powerful thing. it's the first step to making progress. it sounds totally trite and cliché to say, but it's really really true. that's why therapy works!

i also prayed about it. i know that God brought some people into my life at just the right moments.

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as far as more tangible things go - i did make some changes. here are some things you can try:

1. make yourself more aware of the people around you. i made sure that i used opportunities to socialize as much as i could. if there were girls i liked in classes i was in, i spent a lot of time chatting with them, i worked on group projects with them. i made one friend in a tennis class by always partnering with her when it was time to pair off. (hi, colette!!!) i made myself available.

2. blogging is another really great opportunity to make friends. build your online friendships with people who you feel a connection to. if an opportunity arises to meet up, and you feel safe about it, GO FOR IT. finding blogger friends is amaaaaazing. they understand a part of your life that other "non-bloggers" might not get. but remember that you need in-person friendships too... not just online friendships.

3. invest in the people you already know. get back in touch with people you may have fallen out of contact with. hang out with friends of friends or with your significant other's old co-workers or current co-workers or college roommate's ex-girlfriends. look for the people in your life that you're interested in pursuing a deeper relationship with... or for the people who look like they'd be fun to grab a cup of coffee with!

4. don't be too picky. not all friendships have to go super deep, and not all friends need to match up to every item on your perfect friend list. sometimes you really just need someone you can exercise with or shop with or have a glass of wine with. not every friend needs to be your very best friend.

5. be willing to spend time apart from your boyfriend, husband, fiancé, etc. you NEED a life outside of him. he needs his own life too. in fact, he needs you to have friends! friendships with other women offer us something that men can't offer us. women understand each other. we like to listen to each other and offer our own experiences as advice. we LOVE to talk about anything and everything - past relationships, current relationships, issues from our childhoods, dreams, goals, magazines, dieting, celebrities, the bachelor, CLOTHES, everrrrything. your significant other probably doesn't want to be the only person you share this stuff with. he probably doesn't care about some of the more frivolous topics that interest you. find someone who does care about yoga or sewing or mountain climbing or cooking. it's much more rewarding than talking your husband's ear off about the pair of shoes you want at anthropologie. ;)

6. go out with other couples. ask your husband or boyfriend to set up a double date with one of his friends or co-workers and their significant other. this doesn't always work out... but you'll probably eventually find a couple (or half of a couple) that you like.

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and finally, as far as disconnecting from current friends or ending friendships... this one is really hard. sometimes it's just a matter of disengaging. you might have to start distancing yourself from friendships that may not be the best for you. it sucks to just stop calling someone, but sometimes it's the only way. try to do this without being passive or dishonest. try to handle it how the wisest person you know would handle it... even if it feels really uncomfortable.

whenever possible or necessary, handle things directly. if you have a particularly toxic friendship or relationship in your life, end it. break up with them. it feels REALLY awkward to do, but sometimes it must be done. the friendships that i lost this year were ended directly. it was horrible, but i felt so much peace once it was done. i really weighed my options and considered them carefully before doing anything. once i realized that we didn't value each other the same way and that our friendship was making me feel terrible, i was willing to put up with the consequences of losing them. it will still hurt, but it may be the best thing for everyone.

when you allow someone to treat you in a way that makes you feel bad about yourself, you're the only person to blame. you're not a victim. you are responsible for the relationships you choose to have. if anything in your life is bad for you, it's your responsibility to get rid of it. take ownership! it will empower you!

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and now i'm going to end this post with the cheesiest thing i will probably ever say on here:

to have a friend, you must be a friend.

friendship

about a year and a half ago, i blogged about wanting more friends in my life.

after i wrote that post, i started focusing on friendship more. i started thinking about what i actually wanted and how i could get it. i started pursuing more friendships and nurturing the ones i already had. and i started praying about it.

two things happened:

1. i lost two friendships that i thought were the most important in my life.

and

2. i gained more friendships than i know what to do with.

i think the whole process of seeking friendship really caused me to analyze what friendship means to me. how did i want my friends to treat me? what kind of priority would i give them in my life? how did i want to treat my friends? how often did i need to socialize? how deep did i want to allow these relationships to go?

i learned a lot from focusing on friendship. i learned to have more respect for myself when it comes to my friends. i learned that i shouldn't hang onto friendships that make me feel bad about myself. just because i had been friends with some people since childhood didn't mean that i had to remain friends with them forever. people grow apart. they find other people that mean more to them, and that's okay. i need to feel valued in a friendship. i need to know that my friends respect me and want to pursue a relationship with me. if i put up with anything less than that, the consequences are my fault.

while losing friends is a really sad experience, i actually felt really empowered by it. i was dumping energy into people who didn't value me as much as i valued them. cutting those ties freed up energy i could place somewhere else...

...and i did!

i honestly feel like my life is overflowing with friendship now. i don't feel lonely anymore. i don't feel like i have sooooo much time and nobody besides levi and my family to spend it with. now i wish i had more time to give to my friends! i really cherish them, and i hope they know how much i love them. i'm going to focus on loving my friends more this month and being supportive of all the things they want to do and accomplish.

did you hear that? i just unofficially declared june national friendship month (this is on top of it being national jasmine's birthday month), so go out there and show your friends a little extra love! :)