giving up. or, love is risky.

what if we stop having a ball?

what if the paint chips from the wall?

what if there's always cups in the sink?

and what if i'm not what you think i am?

what if i fall further than you?

what if you dream of somebody new?

what if i never let you win and chase you with the rolling pin?

well, what if i do?

cause i am giving up on making passes

and i am giving up on half-empty glasses

and i am giving up on greener grasses

i am giving up

what if our baby comes in after nine?

what if your eyes close before mine?

what if you lose yourself sometimes?

then i'll be the one to find you safe in my heart.

cause i am giving up on making passes

and i am giving up on half-empty glasses

and i am giving up on greener grasses

i am giving .... i'm giving up on greener grasses

i am giving up .... for YOU.... i am giving up

lately, i've been thinking about love. and marriage. and what it takes to really "make it." to have a love -- and a marriage -- that stands the tests of time, cultural influences, familial and scheduling pressures, raising children (or not), career choices, the loss of friends and kindred, the change of seasons, and myriad other things.

i've been realizing that i have all these little buried fears and insecurities that have to do with spending myself so completely on one thing... on one PERSON. it's a fearful act of trust and faith to be married. and i am such a flawed, frail individual.

i suppose that's the part of the question that only has one Answer. that somehow, i must reach out to the One who is Love incarnate... to give me strength to be more honest, more sincere, more trusting, more hopeful, more faithful, more sacrificially giving than i have the heart to be in my own power. and i must choose to do this day in and day out. to give myself up to the questions, to defy my own fears and just keep walking.

i look around and see examples of incredible longevity and joy. and i also see deep brokenness. i want my life, and our life together, to be the former.

i'm desperately hopeful. and, once again, i'm giving up.

six days + counting...

i love traveling by myself. there's just something so completely wonderful about setting off on one's own, carry-on in hand, seeking adventure + good food.


the thing i love most about traveling by myself is the people watching. you can people watch when you're with someone, but it's just not the same. there are certain social requirements that come with traveling as part of a group. but when you're by yourself, you can just allow yourself to get swept up into the mob. you can stop + smell the roses without worrying about inconveniencing or annoying your traveling companion. in short, you don't have to be polite if you don't want to. you're free to explore + experience at your own pace.

in six days, i leave our lovelygreenspringtime twin cities for the east coast. mel + cody moved to ivycoveredhistoricbuildings princeton, nj last june. this will be my first visit to them. i'm totally geeking out about getting to see the princeton library. and take walks around the quaint little college town. and make food with mel in their little kitchen. and have long talks with the two oaks family members over a fantastic bottle of wine.


i'm trying to prepare myself for the inevitable itch to move to a new city that always creeps up when i travel anywhere. i love hearing new accents. i love finding new cafes and coffee shops. i love that eye-popping feeling when everything around you is fresh + unique + altogether different from your everyday life.

mel + i have planned a quick jaunt to NYC while i'm there. thanks to our sisterwiththekillerhookups, kim, we've got a sweet room at a posh hotel that's really close to the brooklyn bridge. we'll take the train from princeton into penn station early on sunday morning + do the manhattan/village/ellis island thing while the city is quiet(er). then on monday we'll do the brooklyn heights thing, walk the bridge over to manhattan + do the central park/met museum thing. depending on how tired our poor little feet are, we'll take the train back to princeton either at 4pm or 4am tuesday. we're playing it by ear (or foot, as the case may be).

speaking of playing it by foot... i bought some new walking shoes in preparation for the many miles i plan to walk across the great island of manhattan. friendly blog reader, meet my new shoes. shoes, be polite. say hello.

they look pretty ugly in the pic, but they're actually danged adorable for walking shoes. so flippin' comfortable + lightweight. i'm in danger of writing haiku in their praise. i'll try to keep that ill-conceived urge to myself, though.


so, i have the shoes. i have the plane ticket. i have the hotel reservation. i have the PTO. (i am grateful to you, oh thankless, mindless desk job. i love you for your benefits. we can still be friends once i've used you for them, right?)


the thing i'm most looking forward to? being silly + enjoying warmbowlofhonestysistertime with mel. yes. it will be good for the soul.


new jersey, here i come!



(mel, i promise not to embarrass you -- or myself... or the rest of the sophisticated population -- with the dressflyingintheupdraft thing. not this time, anyhow.)

oops! i did it again...

or, more precisely, i didn't do it... again.

it's been months since my last post. i always have the best of intentions. then i get busy, or what have you... weeks pass. then i have this sense that my next post had better be something really special to make up for the weeks + weeks of not writing anything at all. it's a defeatist cycle, really.

so, here i am, with nothing cool to say. no cool pictures. nada.

i have some fun birthday stuff to share (tim was 28 on the 28th of february - i turned 32 yesterday). but i have actual pictures to add to those, so i'll hold off.

mostly, i want to note a few small things:

1) i've discovered a new artist: lenka. love. her.

2) i also love the advent of 40 degree temperatures in minnesota. people (including me) pull out their toeless shoes, ditch the parkas + drive with the windows down. it's pure bliss.

3) went out for sushi + local funk music the other night with a girlfriend. i think that might be one of the best (and least expected) awesome combos ever. i'm just sayin'.

4) NYC guidebooks make for fun reading. it's like diving into the oxford english dictionary... way more information than a single brain could ever hope to hold, but lovely for that same reason.

okay... more soon. i promise!

the first christmas

here we are. the year 2010. tim + i made it past the buffeting of the holidays, our hair + emotional capacity a little worse for the wear, but otherwise breathlessly grateful. contented, even.


we didn't mean to, but ended up doing four christmases. five, if you include the one that we celebrated "just for us." mel + cody were home from princeton. rachel was home from montana. we just really didn't want to miss anything. i will say, though, that this year was quite a bit less hectic than the previous one.


the tuesday before christmas, we went to a singalong that grandma joyce led at the pines (their senior living community). it was awesome. i mean it. then we went back to mom heaner's place to exchange gifts + consume mass quantities of christmas cookies baked by rachel + linda. uncle peter was there, too. we missed having jonathan in the mix, though... dang, we miss that guy!

we celebrated christmas eve with mark + kathy. just us + them in burnsville. we ate the best beef stew i've ever had, exchanged gifts, laughed a lot. then we went to the christmas eve service at their church + afterward drove around to look at christmas lights.

it was snowing like crazy when tim + i left for north minneapolis. in fact, i can't remember a whiter christmas than 2009's.

christmas eve night we spent at home, lights low, christmas tree + candles glowing. we read the christmas story out loud to one another. i cried at the part where john leapt in elizabeth's womb when she heard mary's voice. that part makes me cry every single time. i don't know why, exactly. but i love it.

christmas morning, we woke up + sang happy birthday to jesus (just like we always did when i was growing up) + had birthday cake for breakfast. we opened our stockings + our gifts to each other. we laid on the couch + just enjoyed being with one another. it was lovely.

then around noon, we left for momma k's house. kim + mitch, mel + cody, mom + the heaners. it was quite a crowd. we ate a feast fit for kings, drank lots of wine, played board games, took lots of pictures + talked our heads off. a very kieffer christmas.

we got to spend a night on the town with melody to celebrate her birthday (ON her actual birthday, no less!). matt's bar for juicy lucy's -- tim's first ever -- then to psycho suzie's for tots + some very strong tropical drinks.

on sunday following melody's birthday, we went to tom + elle's to celebrate with mel + cody, kelly + art + maddy + adam. good food, adorable kids, fun gift swap/steal.

for new year's eve, we had our friends bud + rachel cushing + kim kieffer over. we played board games, watched monty python, drank lots, ate even more + had a generally rowdy + amazing time. the perfect way to ring in the new decade.

this past weekend, after celebrating the first decade of the new millennium, we spent some lovely time with the adam + sarah kieffer clan, went to a housewarming party for our dear friend, rachel, and finally made a stop at our neighborhood library.

we've been meaning to visit the library for months now. tim needed a library card. and i needed the comfort of being surrounded by shelves and shelves of nothing but books. (i could never, ever switch to kindle. sorry amazon.) our library is in an abandoned brewery. i know... right? how much happier a place could there possibly be?


sunday, we stayed at home the whole day. we read our new library books, watched a kung fu movie (i heart donnie yen) + ate leftovers. it was lovely. i felt completely relaxed + so connected to tim.


today is the coldest day of the winter so far + i've a flat tire to show for it. i made it to work just fine. but was alerted to the deflation by a concerned co-worker. i'm glad it didn't pop on the highway. i'm endlessly glad for a husband kind enough to offer to drive to plymouth from fridley + change it for me in the subzero temperatures. stinkin' cars. stinkin' tires. gracious God. loving husband.


i've been thinking all day about how much things have changed for us since we got married. in some ways (all the best ways), nothing at all has changed. we still like each other. i mean, really, genuinely like each other. we still laugh at all the same ridiculous jokes we laughed at before. we still like to hold hands. kissing hasn't lost any of its appeal.


really, though, our love for each other HAS changed. i remember thinking on our wedding day that i couldn't imagine loving tim any more than i did at that moment in time. but i DO love him more. i loved him then with every part of my heart + mind. but now that love is a part of my very body. i love him in my bones if that makes any sense. i'm doing a terrible job of describing it. mostly, i think, because it's a mystery to me. but i like it. i like our love. and i think that's a good thing.

lazy sundays

yesterday was lovely.

tim + i decided to be heathens for the day. we skipped church, slept in + generally indulged our need to just be together. no appointments, no dinner plans, no interruptions... just us in our little apartment... enjoying each other on a sunny december sunday.

on our last date night, we went and got our first christmas tree. it was such a perfect evening. we went to the most unromantic place possible to pick out our tree: the home depot. but it was a slow night there. so we pretty much had the store (and the tree lot) to ourselves. it was snowing, those big, quiet flakes that fall so slowly you can almost see them dancing, and the orange-y parking lot lights made it seem like we were in a really huge snow globe.

the tree lot attendants were so adorable when we told them that it was our first tree. they cut off a little bit of the trunk for a "fresh cut" and saved the little cutting for us. they said we should make an ornament of it... isn't that the cutest? good grief... it's the home depot!

anyhow, we decided to wait to decorate the tree until we had a little more time to really enjoy it.

so, on sunday, after a leisurely breakfast, i turned on some christmas tunes, made some hot cocoa + we were off. it was really fun to dig out all the old ornaments, passed to us from our loving moms. i have one of those "baby's first christmas" ones from 1978, a glitter-bespangled wooden star of david that i made in kindergarten, a hollowed-out egg with papier mache all over it (probably made in my brownies/girl scout days), and a noodle angel. tim had this gorgeous hand-blown glass tree topper. and i have to say, our tree is just perfect. it's short + fat + full of all the wonder-filled memories of christmases past. tim + i laughed + told stories + laughed some more.

after tree decorating, we did some thank you notes (still working on them from the wedding -- we're such slackers!), some laundry, some dishes, some cooking... i started work on some christmas gifts that i'm sewing. we snuggled up on the couch + watched part of the very depressing vikings game. and we finished up season 4 of lost. yes. we're addicts.

and then, to end the day of luxuriation in style, i took a very, very long, very, very hot shower.

it was a perfect sunday. perfect.

good grief!

i've been slacking off... it's been nearly a month since my last post.

yesterday was the two month marker of being a married woman. tim was saying that sometimes it feels like we've been married two minutes, and sometimes it feels like two years. and he's right. it seems so natural to be together. but so new, too.

blah, blah, mushy stuff, blah. the point is, we're married. it's going well. we still like each other a lot. and from all accounts, that's a good sign.

we've been working our financial plan for the past month. it's gone pretty well. i've enjoyed the challenge of living on cash only. and i really appreciate all the communication that is necessary to make a budget (and a marriage) work.

the past few weeks have been s o . d a n g e d . b u s y ! we scheduled ourselves solid and found that it was really taking a toll on our energy + physical health, not to mention our mental health. tim came down with a cold. and i ended up in the emergency room on monday -- i have the i.v. bruises to prove it! we're both okay now. lesson learned.

we've begun a TIME budget... just being intentional about alone time, together time, family time + friends time. we'll see how it goes. but if the money budget is any indication, i'm looking forward to a serious reduction in stress levels for both of us.

we're hosting thanksgiving at our house this year for the moms, the joyce grandparents, uncle peter (mom h's younger brother -- a recent addition to the MN-dwellers), mom k's friend + former client, marge. hopefully, kim + boyfriend, mitch, will be able to stop by. but even without their company, we'll have a full house.

i was planning on brining the turkey, but realized the only place that's protected from the elements + still cool enough to store the turkey is the spider-infested garage. yep. brining is out. so i've switched to a orange rosemary recipe (though, per usual, i will depart from said recipe rather widely). i'm pretty excited about it.

i'm a little nervous about the gravy + the stuffing. historically, my attempts at gravy made rather poor showings. and i never eat the stuffing, so i'm fairly inept at making it.

* m m e h *

i guess that's what "the joy of cooking" is for.

i still have a whole bunch of hawaii pictures to post. AAANNNND all of our wedding pictures.

p.s. if you took pictures at our wedding, we'd love, love, love to see them. you can send them by email to lisaheaner@gmail.com if that suits your fancy.

over the moon: our honeymoon in hawaii (part one)

day one on molokai...

we were literally the only people on this two-mile beach

on the far west end of molokai
breathtaking

a little windblown, but loving it

tim thinks this looks like a verizon ad

can you see the little yellow + black striped fish?

they were everywhere in the tide pools

super old, gnarled trees in the park

that bordered the two-mile-long beach

the halawa valley river ends in the ocean here

on the extreme east end of molokai

this is looking out toward the ocean

halawa valley -- looking up toward the mountains

my husband, flaunting his pectorals

at the halawa inlet

it's so green + gorgeous there

the view from our condo's balcony

the kalaupapa peninsula

the amazingly weird + ancient-feeling forest
up near the kalaupapa overlook

you can't even tell where the ocean ends + the sky begins

looking down a sheer cliff to the black sand beach

on the mountain top

kalaupapa overlook

we went out to the overlook twice in one week
and must've taken about three thousand pictures there

sitting on the wall at the overlook

the phallic rock

yes, we were there.

we went ocean kayaking + snorkeling

this is lisa about to disappear into a mangrove tunnel

the mangrove tunnel -- it was spooky + totally amazing

resting in the shade of the ancient fish pond

we happened to be there for the annual

women's outrigger race from molokai to oahu

women come from all over the world

to row 40 miles of the most treacherous spans of open ocean on the planet

we got up way early to drive to the far side of the island

to see the start of the race

this is taken at the harbor where the race started

a panoramic view of the harbor

it was way fun climbing around on all the lava rocks,

exploring the tide pools,

searching for sea glass... we could have stayed all day!