Ash Wednesday | Cyclones Game

Can I be an honorary Catholic for today?
... Or really, for the next 40?

Ok, so I guess I don't need to be a Catholic to participate in Lent, but it's that time and I've already read dozens of proclaimed Lent sacrifices from some of my friends. Chocolate, Facebook, smoking, wine... everyone's got their own vice they're planning to cut out for the next 40 days, and here I am trying to decide if I should or shouldn't get onboard. Again. Every year.

I decided I wanted to do something this year, but struggled with exactly what... until Marianne came up with a genius idea that I quickly and totally decided to borrow. It's really a brilliant idea, and when I asked her if she'd be offended if I did it, she just laughed and told me to share it!

It'll go something [well, exactly, really] like this:

and here.. we.. go!

Simple, right?
Actually, for the most part, yes, it looks like it will be.

Since I'm all about making everything as crafty [and sometimes consequently complicated] as possible, this is how I went about it:

1. Pick 40 names. This was probably the hardest part for me, for a few reasons. First, I got to about 29 or so and started drawing blanks. I managed to slow my brain down and add the rest, but I started to worry that maybe I didn't even have 40 peo-- well, nevermind. I have them. THEN, I struggled with the idea of accidental favoritism, like... how I would decide the order in which I did these. I decided to do this the old-fashioned way: write all 40 names on little paper strips and fold them in half...

40 names.... and... go.

... and stick them in a jar. Accidental favoritism problem solved.

names in a jar, for fun, easy picking.

To take this one step further, I thought that rather than take up space in each little note with the explanation of what it's all about, I took the corny route and put together a little card to throw in each one. I have no doubt some of my friends will laugh at this, but hey, I'm not mass-producing the notes themselves, so hopefully they'll at least appreciate that. (:

a bit corny, sure, but we'll go with it

Today was of course the first day of Lent, so that meant the first note went out today.

day 1 - done! (:

I feel good about this one. We shouldn't need a reason to occasionally reach out to the people who are sometimes obviously close to us to remind them that we appreciate them, but I'll take advantage of Lent and put my heart into it.

If you think this would be something you'd wanna do, well, it's only day 1, but I wrote & sent off the first note, and I'm so glad I did. There are going to be some tough notes written throughout this, which will probably speak to me just as much as I'm hoping they will to their recipients. This could be good... really, really good ♥.

I'll be excited to share, in 40 days, the order in which these names were drawn, and how this impacted me. Call it a mini social experiment, if you will. Day 1, done!

That was how the day started.
The day ended with dinner & a Cyclones game with some of my favorites: Rob, Becky & Paul.

these people ♥

Cincinnati hockey has never really peaked on my radar, but I've concluded that I love pretty much any type of visibly competitive sporting match, especially when it's a contact sport. As soccer players, Becky and I decided that that love comes by nature ;).

There are always the die-hard fans with clever shirts:

There are also the beeramid makers [which we all enjoy watching]:

beeramids!
=SUM[$1 beers + thirsty fans + window ledges]

And then.. there's us: 

the guys...

... & the gals

Caaaaah-lassssyyyy... we know. Haha.

We ended up losing the game in shoot-out, but for what it was, we had a great time with awesome people.

And Becky, my awesome friend that she is, gifted me with these little guys! These were carved out of a single piece of wood; she brought them back from her recent trip to Nepal. They aren't really functional, but I love them and will absolutely be putting them on display at home.

hand-carved wing-in-wing owls!

It's been a good night. Rob and I realized we had never been to a hockey game together, which is weird since STL is all about the Blues over there. Meh. The benefit of mediocre general interest here is that tickets in the 4th row back from center ice were still just $13 each. Awe-some.

first cyclones game with the best friend (:

It's almost Thursday, which means almost Friday, which means my friends from Illinois & Virginia will be here before I know it. YESSSSS.

On that note, g'nite (:

xo | cmd