Monday's Long-Winded Post

This weekend was spent recovering from Friday's bike ride. Although, we weren't in as bad of shape as we thought. A little sore, and a little stiff...but now, by Monday we're hardly thinking about it.

On Saturday, we went to a cute little bakery that is nearby. It is such a cute place. The type of place that inspires me to want to open my own someday. The only thing is that we can't read or speak Lithuanian, so we have to guess what we're getting based on how it looks and then point to it. So, being it was lunch time, and we were very hungry, we were looking at the pastries that would be more filling. There were some that looked like they had cheese and mushrooms in them, so Steve got one of those, and that's what it was. I got one that was big and fluffy, and didn't seem to have anything questionable seeping from it (no surprise filling...or was there?). Well, the big fluffy part of the pastry was definitely delicious...but the filling was...are you ready? A hotdog. Luckily, it was lunch time, and I was very hungry. And, luckily, I will eat hotdogs. But if you've been paying attention, you know that I had already eaten a hotdog just the day before. So I wrote it off as a fancy, ketchup-less corn dog. Pastry dog. One of the neat parts about this bakery is that it has a sense of sacredness. It wasn't open on Friday because of a holiday, and it's never open on Sunday. Another neat thing is that you can sit at a little table and look out the screenless window out to a cobblestone street. Also, Steve got a cup of Espresso there, and it was amazing. The coffeeshops in the U.S. need to come and take notes.

After the bakery, we walked down the street some more and went into a bookstore. Now, I am a sucker for bookstores, and have a hard time walking out of them empty handed. I thought this would be the exception, because all the books were in Lithuanian. After some looking around, I discovered a Lithuanian copy of the Catcher in the Rye! Classic! I held it in my hands for a long time before setting it back on the shelf. I decided that I would learn some Lithuanian first, and then reward myself by getting a novel to practice reading later.

On this whole Saturday adventure, we were really on the way to the grocery store. Having no car makes for a lot of mini trips to the grocery store. You have to be able to carry everything home. Something I will take back with me to the U.S. (no, not walking EVERYWHERE....well, maybe) is to use and reuse our own grocery bags. So easy to do, and beneficial for everyone. We shopped around and decided that we were going to make pizza (something we love to make from scratch). Right away when we got here we bought a jar of red sauce for pasta, and it tasted just. like. ketchup. With this in mind, I thought, why don't we try to make our own sauce? (we already make our own dough) So we got some canned tomatos and garlic and tomato paste...and well, I don't want to ruin the whole recipe for you, but let me tell you, it takes a little bit of time, but it's so easy to make, and it turned out tasting like pizza sauce.

Sunday we slept in, because we went to church that has its service in the evening. It's the only all English speaking congregation in the area, and is comprised of mostly LCC people. I liked it. It was familiar and comfortable. Also, it was nice to fellowship with coworkers and colleagues in a nonwork environment.

After, we went to this really...unique...restaurant with a group of people from church (it is just as affordable to eat out as it is to eat in your own dining room. This way, we get to try some authentic dishes that we wouldn't even know existed). The look of the place was as if you carved a big tunnel into the ground, and then created walls and ceilings with bricks. The place had a lot of character, odd shaped tables, good food, friendly waitress. It's the type of place where, if/when you come visit us in Lithuania, we might have to take you. I got an almond latte there, and it was made to perfection. I'm telling you, U.S. coffeeshops, you need to take note.

Afterward, we walked back in the pouring rain. A friend of ours was nice enough to lend us an umbrella.

Today, Monday, was a really busy day for both of us. We're working hard so that we can be ready when the students get here. Tomorrow is a new staff/faculty orientation day, so that should be a good time and informative.

We also got an email today that told us we're a little over halfway in our support raising for the year. Praise God! Thank you so much to everyone for all the different ways you support us. We appreciate the prayers, financial help, and the fact that after all this rambling, you're still reading this post. Thank you thank you thank you! It means so much that you're interested and supportive of our life and times in Lithuania.