The H and K Food Experiment: 1 week of Meatless

Holly and Kelly: On the way home from grocery shopping, in which we grossed in approximately $56 for about a week's worth of food, we decided to partake in a wee experimentation of food challenges. The first one? One week with no meat. However, it's not entirely without meat; we currently have two meals planned, one with fish and the other with eggs in it. Other than that, no meat. Nothing. No chicken, no red meat, no bacon, nada. No. Meat. You might ask, why are ya'll doing this? Well, we've read numerous web studies and through word of mouth have heard that not eating meat supposedly makes you feel better, have more energy, and not to mention meat is expensive these days.

We're just not eating meat. We're not changing any other of our activities of daily living, which means Holly is still going to walk to work and we're still going to do ReFit on Monday nights. And we're going to a work potluck for Kelly's work and have decided to not eat meat there, which we are certain will be quite challenging. So there you have it. One week without meat. At the end of the week, we will report back and see how it went. How we felt, how tempted we were to sneak in a cheeseburger, that sort of thing. We're going to see if our weight changes as well. Wish us luck; the challenge begins tomorrow!

A Generalized Life Update #2

Kelly: So I've been at my new job gig for a little over a month now, and so far things are going really well. Our patient numbers (census) have been high for a while, which has made things crazy but so far nothing catastrophic or earth-shattering has happened. For the most part everyone has been calm, somewhat happy and haven't made any ridiculous demands. I really enjoy the staff I work with and we all have a good time and love what we do. I really enjoy the patients too, and gone are the days of constantly feeling like walking on eggshells. When working in psych, things were so unpredictable all the time, and you just never knew what may set someone off. So there's that. It's pretty smashing.

Secondly, Holly and I have been in the process of trying to find a house to rent. We can't quite afford swinging to buy one yet, but it's time for a change. We've been at our townhouse for a little over 2 years now, and a series of circumstances have left us ready to go. It's been overall a somewhat frustrating process, in terms of finding a house and making phone calls to prospective rental companies/landlords. We've learned the term "single family" does not apply to twin sisters, which sort of stinks for us. Neither one of us can really afford to live on our own, nor do we want to. We've had a lot of closed doors, but as of today two more prospective options have opened up. I'm not really trying to keep my hopes up, but there's a part of me that is optimistic that one of these two will work out. On the way home after just driving by to look at a neighborhood in where one of them are, we prayed while driving, and soon after came across the number of another house to rent. God is good! I'm going to make a phone call tomorrow to this other house and hopefully things will be in our favor. So that's what's going on in our lives for the time being. Thanks for hanging with us!

Holly: I spent all of last week traveling for work-related events: building two high tunnels and a VISTA training/networking/catching up weekend in Pikeville, KY.  Got to reconnect with a lot of VISTAs from my Atlanta training, and meet some more, all of who are doing some pretty awesome things in northern and eastern Kentucky. Speaking of VISTA, things are going very, very well; I am still really happy there and I'm learning more and more as every week passes.  I have about three and a half months to go until my term ends, and I feel like the second half has just flown by! As for post-VISTA....well, they liked me so much they decided to offer me a full time gig!! Yep, you are totally reading that correctly! :) I've known for quite a while now but have been essentially sworn to secrecy, but I think I've kept it a secret for long enough! I am beyond excited to transition into this new role and I am still blown away at just how much God has worked for good when He called me to do this crazy thing almost a year ago! I don't know any of the logistics yet, but...yeah, there it is!!

Yoda and Wiley (our pet babies) have been with us for three years now.  We still love them to pieces and they still drives us insane.  They've brought us so much joy and have kept us ridiculously entertained.  Neither of us are in relationships still, and we're still ok with that (Although I'm plotting...) And lastly, we're spending Memorial Day weekend in Indiana! You may remember when we went to their wedding almost four years ago! Yep...their little girl is due in July (their first!!!), and we are all BEYOND excited :)

So that's basically it.  Pray God will have His will as we continue to search for a house, and that all will go well for our dear Ashley and her little Nugget :) Thank you all for continuing to journey on this crazy road with us!

And just in case you need a laugh, which I'm sure you could always use one, you can watch this video that Kelly and I can't get enough of!

A Nurses Week post

Kelly: This was actually Holly's idea! Today begins Nurses week, a celebration of nurses past and present. It starts today and ends on the 12th, which is the birthday of none other than Florence Nightingale. It means I'll get a nice spiel at work about how appreciated I am and a lovely present (there is NO sarcasm in that previous statement whatsoever) :) It was Holly's idea to come up with our favorite nurses, real and fictitious. Since we share the same favorite fictitious ones, I figured I would share my favorite real ones! I honestly have too many to name; 4 come to mind, and I hope they know who they are. Due to privacy reasons I'm keeping their names anonymous. Unfortunately, because of my schedule change I no longer work with these awesome nurses anymore, but I am indebted forever to these individuals. They've taken me under their wings, mentored me, challenged me, and I have thoroughly enjoyed working with them. Some have become strictly colleagues, while some have become very close friends of mine. I've learned so much from them, and they've learned some from me too....I hope. Hahaha! So cheers to the four of you I have in mind; thank you for being there for me and helping me grow not only as a person but as a professional too!

Holly: We have two fictional nurses that we admire, one of which has been with us for a while, and one who has just recently entered our lives. 

Our first shout-out goes to Carol Hathaway, from the show ER.  I personally love Carol because although she is really good at what she does, she has a big heart for her patients and their families, which sometimes gets her into trouble.  One of my favorite episodes, and the last one to feature her as a show regular, involves a woman with end stage cancer. Carol violates her DNR order, just so her two young daughters can say goodbye.  This particular situation causes Carol to evaluate some of her own choices, and in what is quite possibly the most romantic notion ever, she gets on a plane to Seattle, just to find out if Doug still loves her (Guess what? He still does, and they live happily ever after!) 

And secondly, we would like to honor none other than Abigail Morgan. We met Abigail, honestly, just a couple of weeks ago; she can be found in the show Forever.  Abigail was the wife of Henry, the show's main protagonist, and she was an army nurse treating prisoners of concentration camps during WWII.  Unfortunately, her story does not have a happy ending and, without revealing any major plot spoilers, we discovered that Abigail possesses a fierce and loyal love for her family, despite Henry's immortality. And bravery. Oh, was she brave.

So there you have it, folks! Remember to take some time this week (and every week!!) to thank the nurses in your lives! They do a lot :) 

As for me, I'm pretty stinking proud of this "real" nurse on the right of me :) 

The Christian Music Industry: The Grrs and the Greats

Holly: Just in case you didn't get any recent memos, we're pretty into music.  Or, more specifically, Christian music. Duh. I think we first sort of really got into it after attending ICHTHUS for the first time. Kelly will mention it later, but if you don't know what that is, you should educate yourself: it's glorified worshipful insanity at its absolute best. Since getting out on our own, we've also had the great fortune of attending quite a few Christian concerts, and I've noticed several very positive attributes and trends towards them. First off, the ticket prices are very affordable. Example 1: we attended a K-LOVE sponsored Christmas concert (where yours truly finally got to meet the one and only Jeremy Camp, a long sought-after dream of mine since about the tender age of 14), and it was $28 for him and three other artists.  It cost us $25 to see Matt Maher and I Am They last week, and it was $10 for Winter Jam last month.  We saw for KING & COUNTRY in Winchester on the 4th and it didn't cost us a penny!! DID I STUTTER? Plus, everyone else who performed at the Christmas concert stayed afterwards to talk to fans. Which brings me to my next point: Every single concert we've attended, someone has stayed afterwards. Did you hear that? Every. Single. Concert. It's awesome! Do you really see that anywhere else? I'm willing to bet not.

He was really nice, and he gave me a hug :) 

We found out (while attending Winter Jam, actually), that the Eagles were going to be in Lexington in July. We thought it'd be a fun surprise for our folks, so we looked up tickets.  Imagine our surprise when we found it was going to cost us, for the worst possible seats, a pretty $185!!! Say. What?! Actually, while writing this, we checked prices again: anywhere from $188- $426. You have GOT to be kidding me! And with the experiences and moments we've had at our shows...you can't put a price on those, especially to the tune of three flipping figures!

Kelly: I generally find the Christian music industry very appealing. We have been blessed to have attended several concerts over the years which have been super amazing! Case and point, ICHTHUS. If you don't know what that is, you should definitely get into that; it's a weekend of music, speakers and camping! It will change your life. However, it's frustrating when I'm listening to the radio driving to work and I hear one song then turn it back on driving home and hear the exact same song again. One time I was driving to and from Richmond in a span of about 4 hours in between being in and out of the car and I heard one song three times. Really? Is that how it works? Yet I remember hearing a few songs that I only heard once or twice and was like "hey, what happened to that song?" I'm the first to admit that I have no idea how radio stations pick their music, but perhaps maybe a little bit of variety every now and then would be nice. Most of the time I find myself getting bored with the same selections that I hear over and over and over.

I've also found that I'm not alone in my thoughts of this as well. To be fair though, that's why I have a lot of my own saved on Spotify, Pandora or my iPod. Yet sometimes I even find my selections a bit redundant. On the flip side, there is some AWESOME Christian music out there!!!! I find myself sometimes when I'm listening to a certain song, it just gets me at the right time and I just find myself totally immersed in the presence of God. I just have to stop whatever I'm doing and just worship. Still I have songs I hear that give me goosebumps. There's so much power in that, and I can't describe it any other way. And that's all I have to say about that. I love Jesus music, but I think it's important to remember to love Him before the music.

The first time we met Joel :) 

Choosing to choose

Kelly: Sometimes I take mini social media breaks. It's good for my health, hence I threw in the "internet safety" label in this post, the safety being for me. It seems like every day I see more and more negativity posted, and I'm kind of at my breaking point. I've had enough, so I don't feed into it anymore. It just makes me wonder about the choices we make, I make in my day-to-day life. And lately it seems like poor choices are glorified more often than good ones. I think we actually wrote about something similar to this, and the question we posed was why is it bad to be good? Anyway, I'm digressing a bit, but I want to share a small tidbit of something from my nursing school days.

I was working with a nurse and she had been working at her current job for a while. I asked her if she enjoyed it and she said she had always wanted to work with kids but felt "stuck" doing what she was doing. I asked why she not pursue working with kids; she didn't answer. The way I see it is this; we are all victims to stuff happening, good stuff or bad stuff. We can choose to be victims of the bad stuff and we can choose to display all the good stuff every day, multiple times a day. Or we can choose to have a bit of modesty, ask God to help during the bad stuff and praise Him for the good, instead of spraying it all over social media like a hay-wire sprinkler. On our birthday, which was just this past Thursday, I posted a selfie and mentioned I was going to get ready for some fun. 46 likes on Facebook. A while ago I posted something about reading the Bible and how much it meant to me. 2 likes, maybe 3. Choices, there is such power in them. We can choose what grabs our attention, and it can influence us in good ways or not. As for me, I'm more conscientious over what I post on social media and ask myself  "do all my friends/followers really need or want to see this?" or "is this going to encourage them and make them happy?" Am I glorifying my Maker or something else? Choices, like I said, it's a power we have, free will. Choose wisely though.

Holly: "If you're free to choose, then you're free to accept the consequences of your choice. Be wise in making decisions & responsible in owning them." 

The above is a retweet from Tony Nolan's 18-year-old daughter Christy.  Talk about wisdom beyond your years! I think this tweet sums up perfectly general decision making, whether they're good decisions or not-so-good ones.  I do agree with Kelly in that poor decisions do seem to be encouraged and praised more than good ones...here's our thoughts on why it's "bad to be good."  While we're at it, here's our thoughts on selfies and other social media stuff. 

I've recently adopted a philosophy that if you don't like something in your life, then change it.  I read a lot of stuff on Facebook about how person X hates their job, person X hates where they live, person X is just pissed off for no reason, really, person X has a co-worker/roommate/significant other/friend that drives them crazy/makes them mad...I don't really need to go on.  Trust me, I know what it's like to not be happy with your current circumstances.  But I believe life is too short and too much of a gift for it to be spent being miserable or otherwise unhappy, and I don't understand why anyone would want to live that way.  Is it really easier living in your own unhappiness/drama than deciding to take the time to try and change that one thing or things? What makes these situations worse is enablers, or others who just feed into it.  Allow me to give an example (bear in mind this is just an example; Kelly is quite happy and content with life right now): 

Kelly: Angsty status about general life unhappiness/work drama/traffic jams.
me: Oh sis, you must be irate right now.  They all suck anyway! 

All right, I think ya get the idea, because you've probably seen it at some point or another.  I don't have a valuable solution for stopping enablers/negativity, so I just choose to ignore it and do my best to spread my joy in my little social media circle.  Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.  I read somewhere that life is 10% what happens to you and 90% of how you react to it.  How will your circumstances and attitude influence the choices you make? How will YOU choose to choose?  

Jesus and NUMB3RS

Holly: About four and a half years ago (ish) I came across a Facebook note I wrote after I watched one of my favorite episodes of ER.  I tied in the plight of the episode to that of Christ's sacrifice on the cross.  You can read the whole thing here...and if you can't for some reason...well, sorry about your luck :P

Fast forward to last night.  I still binge on ER every now and then, but last night I was watching another one of my favorites, NUMB3RS.  Kelly and I have mentioned it on here a few times.  I was watching one of my favorites, "Friendly Fire", and again, I couldn't help but notice a parallel between my faith and this show that I really enjoy.  I jotted this down not long after.  Every day I'm learning that God really is in all things :) Enjoy, and happy Easter!


Good Friday, 2015.  Sometimes it’s hard for me to see the “good” in it.  This is the day that Christ gave up His life.  To sit and watch Christ die a most terrible death is something I don’t think I’ll ever be able to wrap my head around.  So much heartbreak.  Thank goodness that this particular story has a happy ending!  I am so thankful that because of Jesus, death doesn’t have the last word! 

I think so many of us, myself included, forget that Jesus walked this earth as a human.  He was human! I think there’s such a strong sense of fragility and vulnerability in this.  I was reminded of just that- the fragility of being human- this evening, while watching one of my favorite episodes of Numb3rs.  I think I’ve seen it half a dozen times by now.  A longtime mentor of Don’s, Fox, is under suspicion after a bank robbery that ends up with two federal agent fatalities.  Don backs him and defends him 100%...until the end, when the data Charlie has drawn up becomes too overwhelming to ignore- things are stacking up against Fox, and definitely not for the better.  In a stand-off between Don and Fox, Fox’s true colors come forth and the complete truth behind the robbery is revealed.  For the first time in years, we see Don’s guard drop and his coming to grips with reality- is someone he’s looked up to for so long really capable of such things?  As Fox reloads his firearm, he says that he can’t and won’t go down for this, this that would most assuredly end his career as he knew it, and he would rather take matters into his own hands than allow Don to turn him in.  I won’t reveal what happens next, but let me just say that it destroys Don (And me too!).  The armor finally cracks.  For five seasons we’ve seen Don shouldering the weight of his team stoically and effectively, burying any and all emotion for the sake of justice and doing his job.  But the end of this particular episode, maybe the last 5-10 minutes, it really does something to me.  It’s so powerful, yet there’s a moment subtle enough to miss if you’re not paying attention.  It’s a heart-wrenching reminder that we are human.  We fall.  We break.  We are rattled and moved by events in our lives and sometimes there isn’t anything else to do but let our guard down.  That moment just stops my heart.

The truth is that we are broken people, much like Don at the end of “Friendly Fire”.  We are not immune to tragedies that may occur in our lives, and we are not immune to how we may deal with said tragedies.  However, I’m thankful that I can run to God when life becomes too much.   I’m thankful that He understands the humanity within us.  He knows!  There are plenty of circumstances in this world that warrant apologies, but you should never have to apologize for being human.  Like I said, God understands, and He can handle it.  Newsflash: No one expects you to hold it together all the time.  I need that reminder often.  And that includes you too, Don!  (Anyone else felt like giving him a hug at the end there, or was it just me?) 

 

We Choose Jesus Above Us: Winter Jam 2015

Holly and Kelly: So there we were, barreling through the traffic that is Winter Jam, on our way to meet Tony Nolan (which we did) and out of nowhere we saw THIS AWESOME GAL walkin on by. Kelly grabbed her by the arm and a 30 secondish screaming session began! We have not seen this awesome lady since her wedding day...which we wrote about right here! That was the middle of a pretty awesome night of worshiping Jesus through music, laughter, friends, a bit of testimony and a lot of fun! 

!!!!!!

Ah yes, Winter Jam.  Making its debut here on the H and K Chronicles, our last attendance of this rockfest for Jesus was four years ago, before we were legally old enough to drink, and before H and K was even a thought.  Needless to say, we had been looking forward to this for quite some time. Adding to the excitement of it all was us bringing along our host student, Anna, and two of her friends; Anna had never been before!   We met Anna over the summer and it has been such a blessing getting to know her and letting her into our little craziness called our lives.  We were particularly excited to see for KING & COUNTRY (duh), Jeremy Camp (big duh for Holly), Newsong (Arise My Love, hello?!), and Skillet (hard rock music with a good message...yes please!).

Far and away, the best one we've attended!  Yeah...that's pretty much it.  We got to say hi to Tony Nolan for a few minutes.  If you have not heard his testimony or heard him speak, do yourself a favor! We were pretty far up in the stands, but we certainly didn't let that stop us!  All in all a good night of friends, new friends, laughter, good music, good messages, and most of all a wonderful night of giving it all back to the One who gave it to us in the first place. How great is our God!

Here's us with Tony Nolan :) 

Joel from fK&C bringin' tha word!

Arise My Love!!

Party on stage with Family Force 5

I love his heart for God! :) -H

"Those nights kept me right." -Skillet

And last but most definitely not least, we found ourselves meeting face-to-face with yet another familiar face, Joel from for KING & COUNTRY. He remembered us! Right when we got up there to get our picture, he waved us away for a second and said "hang on. I think I'm going to sneeze." We parted in opposite directions of where we were standing, and....nothing happened. He said "I think you all jinxed it." He even had on a little UK patch on his shirt :) We think Joel is pretty rad!

Until next time! 

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Bottom line: if a Winter Jam ever rolls into your town (or nearby), GO. Run.

The fact that we woke up with crazy headaches and barely any voice= worth it!