Meet our Godson!

This past winter, our cousins Derek and Megan Rund asked us to be God parents for their second child. As soon as they asked, we were ecstatic! We could not wait to meet this new little baby and have continually prayed for this baby for months.
Well, Tuesday, September 21, 2010 Timon Paul Rund was born! He shares his birthday with his amazing mom! How cool is that?
When he was two days old we got to go and meet him. We are so in love with him and miss him already! He is a sweet baby boy that we feel so honored to have the privileged of praying for him and being a part of his life and his journey to knowing Jesus Christ.
We will see how long we can stand it before we go back down for another visit.
Enjoy some pictures of us meeting Timon (pronounced like Simon with a T)!

Vacation

Oops!

I guess life got a little busy and we did not post pictures and stories from our quick vacation to North Carolina. It was soo wonderful to get away for a few days and play in the ocean!
Enjoy a few pictures!

Seriously... how beautiful is this?!?! Thank you Jesus!

It felt so great to be at the beach!

we enjoyed our first beer at the beach!

Meals, Vacation, and Jobs, Oh My!

Hello Blogging World!
I came up with a novel idea yesterday before grocery shopping. I always go through recipes and buy lots of items, and often, we don't end up eating that meal before 1/2 the ingredients go bad. This frustrates me. I got a sudden idea to take our calendar and write what we were having for dinner for the next two weeks!
I have no idea why I did not think of this before, sure it takes away the predicableness of life - but you usually know what meals you will need to eat out and how many to plan for in the few weeks to come. This is great especially with me starting school again in a few weeks. :( Kirk will always know to get started, or just when to heat up a lovely, delicious, lean cuisine.
In other news - in just a little over 2 weeks Kirk and I get to go on vacation! I cannot tell you how happy we are - we can almost smell the beach. We are going to Southport, NC where my dad just bought land and will build and move down there someday soon! We have not been to see it yet, so we are looking forward to seeing his new home!
Also - a week from today, Kirk will start his new job at Nationwide. He got promoted! He's excited to do something else than answer phones - from what I understand, he is now doing out bound calls and follow ups!
Life in the Fissel household is great!

Lunch

Recently, I have really gotten into how much things cost and ways to save money. (I guess graduate school costs will do that to you!) Really, it isn't something new for me, I have always been frugal and enjoyed saving money.
Last week I ran to the grocery to get one item - bread. Boring, I know. We always get the same bread and I never thought about the cost. It rang up as $1.67. As I was driving home I thought, I wonder how much that is per sandwhich. I got home and started number crunching. Now, I have always heard that packing lunch vs. going out for lunch saves you money, but I had no idea and wanted to figure it out.
In our loaf of bread there are 18 slices (not including the ends - yuck - who eats those!). So: 1.67/18 = .093 cents per piece of bread! Of course every sandwich has two pieces of bread, so that's $.18 for the bread.
I continued on trying to figure out how much we spend on each lunch we pack.
We started buying items in bulk. We love healthy fruit snacks, Target has really good off-brand Welch's fruit snacks for around $7 with 50 pouches, which equals $.14 a pack! We also always pack chips, we started buying the pre-packaged baked Lays green pouch, again depending on the sales for the week it's around $7 with 20 packets = $.35 each (in the store for one alone it's $1).
Some items are hard to get a good read on how much (i.e. carrots, celery, peanut butter, jelly, etc.). However, my estimated cost for each lunch came out to $1.50 - $2 MAX per lunch. Going out to a CHEAP lunch usually runs you about $6-7 dollars. Per month packing lunch then saves you: $90 a month, and $1080 a year, and if there's two of you that's about $2160 a year - just from packing lunch!
I don't know about you... but I sure can think of about a 100+ ways I could spend $2000 a year!
Just some thoughts to get help others start saving money.
What are tips and ways you have to save?

The 4th

Ahh... The famous Perrysburg fireworks finale!

Well, not only was it the 4th of July this past weekend, it was also the celebration of 4 years of dating for us! Back in 2006, Kirk officially asked me to be his girlfriend during the Perrysburg fireworks. (Perrysburg, OH is where Kirk grew up, it was always a tradition for him to go to the fireworks on the 3rd of July so that is the actual day we began dating.) It was a special night, and so, we go to Perrysburg every year to revisit the "scene of the crime".
This year we got Barry and Paulette to join us and the four of us had a blast this weekend celebrating America... and Kirk and Holly!
Here are some pictures from our weekend! Enjoy!

We went to Webber's on Friday night - such a scenic and great restaurant!
Being goofy before the fireworksBarry and Paulette joined us - they are the best in-laws ever!

While waiting for the fireworks to start - they made me my first clover necklace!

Garlic

Interesting title you say? Well, Kirk and I are not great about cleaning out the fridge. Recently, we noticed that we did not have a lot of room in our fridge, so we cleaned it out yesterday. Sadly, a lot of groceries that we bought we only 1/2 used before the expiration date came. While cleaning out produce, and the like, I came across this garlic! I had no idea that left by itself in a cold fridge - apparently, this is what garlic looks like.
Interesting.
Just had to share!

It's Been Three Months....

Well, I am said to say, it's been to long since we have blogged. I guess in starting this I thought we would do updates frequently, but life has gotten a hold of us and sadly, our blog has been neglected. I have now already finished my first semester (Summer I), and I start more classes (Summer II) on Monday! I am loving being a student again. I have missed learning, and have loved studying, being at lectures, and learning how to be an awesome school counselor! Perhaps my favorite part of being back in school, are the people I have met, I been really blessed, I truly love being around the people I take class with. I know the future holds a lot of work, but I am excited and embrace all of the challenges!
In other news, Kirk has been with Nationwide for a year now! How crazy is that?!? He loves the people he works with, but is excited to move up! We continue to receive new that that is coming soon!

Inside the beautiful Grand Ole Opry Hotel!

We also celebrated our first anniversary in March. We took a long weekend to Nashville (about a month before the huge flood). We had a blast and enjoyed going to all the bars with live music, and getting a taste for the southern culture.

This was our anniversary dinner at Morton's Steakhouse - so delicious!

I also began working as a Mary Kay Beauty Consultant in March. It's been scary, but very exciting and fun to be around cosmetics and pamper women to help them feel as beautiful as they are!
Other than that, we continue to live life to the fullest! We are incredibly grateful summer is here! We enjoy our apartment that over looks the pool, and hanging out poolside whenever we have the chance.
We are grateful for our marriage, and feel incredibly blessed by each other daily (well, ok, almost daily - we have our not so good moments too!).
Promise - it won't be three months before our next post!

Graduate School on the Horizon

The title pretty much says it all. I (Holly) will be starting Grad School in just two months! I will be starting a two- year process to obtain a Master's in School Counseling. This has been a dream of mine for about six or seven years now. I can't believe it's here, it's both exciting and scary all at the same time! I will be continuing to work part time at Heritage Christian Church, while taking classes at Capital University - however, my degree will be from University of Dayton.
I cannot image what all this is going to mean for our lives, it's been wonderful being out of school for two years, so I am sure that the adjustment back to school will be a difficult one. Although, for a month now Kirk and I have learned to adjust to his new hours of working from 11:30am - 8 pm. It hasn't been completely easy, but we seem to be in a routine and enjoy the time we do have together so much more!
Kirk has been so supportive of my decision to go back to school, I really cannot thank him enough, as this has now become his dream as well, that one day very soon, I will work in a school, and together we will begin to love on the community God puts us in!

3+ Feet of snow

So I guess I always assumed that living in Ohio, we got some snow once in awhile, but nothing like 3 feet! Well, I have been proved wrong. In just about 10 days, Columbus has been blanketed with huge amounts of snow. I have been trying to enjoy the beauty that it brings, because it is beautiful, however, it does create a problem of parking, etc.
After me complaining about not seeing the ground till April, we decided we needed to embrace it. We got all dressed up and took a walk to the gas station right by our apartment. It was fun, and an adventure, because as soon as I started walking over the huge piles of snow I took a face plant down and had a hard time standing up. It was hilarious and we were both laughing hysterically. It was good medicine for us to get out and get some much needed - Coke Zero! :)

We have been in our new apartment now for 1 month! So crazy, because we are still working on hanging pictures and putting it all together. However, are really enjoying the extra space and mostly, the luxury of having TWO BATHROOMS. Seriously, it's a saver for our marriage.
Kirk will start to work his new hours this coming Monday, he will now work 11:30 - 8 pm. This will be a big adjustment for us, but we recognize that it's just for a season in our marriage, and that it's not forever.
We are planning a trip to Nashville for our 1st anniversary - in just six weeks! So crazy, this year has gone so fast! We are excited for a much needed vacation!