Target is magic

I just came home from a shopping trip at my local Target. It was my first trip there since they revamped and added fresh foods and an expanded grocery section. If you know me, you are aware of my love affair with Target. My reason for going today was to exchange the Ninjago Ice Dragon that Steve and I had bought for my niece's birthday for the Ninjago Earth Dragon because someone had already bought the Ice Dragon for her. (She is obsessed with dragons. My niece is awesome.) Unfortunately, the Earth Dragon seems to have disappeared between last weekend and this weekend. There was no trace of it in the store. Not even on the little cards on the shelves. So I ended up getting her the Atlantis Angler Attack because she was an angler fish for Halloween a few years ago and she is, as previously stated, awesome.

With mission "Hannah's Present" accomplished, I was free to wander the store. This is a rare treat since Steve doesn't have the patience to wander Target. He likes to focus. In and out. That's not how you Target! (Yes it's a verb now.) Especially after a redesign!!! I have to take in all the newness! Stuff is in different places! There's new stuff to be seen! I wandered around texting Anne for about two hours. It was glorious.

Highlight of the night: the frozen section has the new LED lights that dim when no one is in the aisle. So when you go through after no one has been there for a while, it's MAGIC!!!!!! You know how in the Billie Jean video, when Michael walks down the street and the sidewalk lights up as he steps on each block? Just like that. It made me ridiculously happy. Some woman ruined it for me the first time because I was just starting to bask in the amazing-ness when she barged ahead of me and lit up the rest of the freezers. Jerk. I waited for the freezers to turn off then RACED down the aisle with my cart. I told Anne about the excitement (via G Chat.) Her response? "You need to get out more." She may be right.

Natural face exfoliator

I am starting a new series where I try things out so you don't have to. It will be my human guinea pig series.

Today, I am testing out a simple natural exfoliator.

The recipe:

1 tablespoon baking soda
1 tablespoon orange juice (freshly squeezed)

Mix and apply generously to the face.

Haydia before. Please note that I have not showered. Don't judge me.

I used a soy sauce bowl to mix everything in. 

All mixed! You'll have way more than you need. If it gets too thick, add more orange juice, and vice versa.

Tingly!!! I left it on for 20 minutes. 

This was taken right before I got in the shower to wash it off. Maya wasn't budging. Sorry. 

I wet it before I washed it off and gave my face one last scrub. You could feel the baking soda scrubbing your face.  

Done! After I washed it off, I moisturized as usual. My face is still tingly, super soft, and slightly pink. I can see a difference in the way my skin feels and looks. I will definitely be doing this one again. 

Mini calzones

I've been making an effort to cook more lately. Last night, I came home late, having done battle with tech service at Verizon, and was in no mood to cook, but I knew I had no food in the house. I had seen a recipe on Pinterest for simple calzones that I had to try.

Ingredients:
1 package crescent rolls
1 package mozzarella (or pack of string cheese)
1 package pepperoni (I used turkey pepperoni)

Roll out the crescent rolls onto a foil lined baking sheet, sprayed with cooking spray. On each roll, at the big end, place 3-4 pieces of pepperoni and one string cheese or string cheese sized chunk of mozzarella. Roll up the crescent roll. Repeat for all the rolls. Bake at 350 for 12 minutes. Serve with pasta sauce for dipping. Dinner in less than 15 minutes!

Next time, I want to make dessert crescent rolls. I have Nutella. I'm going to spread it in the rolls and bake as usual. It should be amazing! Like breakfast chocolate croissants!

I also bought my first pumpkin pie of the season. I'm so glad it's fall!

I can't help but remember

For the last 10 years, I tried to pretend that this day was a day like all others. I almost succeeded today, but the news coverage has been more overwhelming than usual. Every channel I turned on this morning had the memorial on. I went out for breakfast and everyone there was talking about it.

Since I can't escape it, I choose to think of the aftermath. Not the angry, "get those bastards at any cost" mentality that came out of some. I choose to think of the outpouring of love. The feeling of solidarity. That the attack was an attack on all decent human beings. That only a monster could do what they did. 

The following is an article I recently read on the Mental Floss website, titled "We Are All Americans: The World's Response to 9/11," written by Haley Sweetland Edwards. This is how I choose to think about today.

A decade ago this week, people all over the world stood shoulder-to-shoulder in mourning, solidarity, sympathy and friendship with the people of the United States. Here are a few of those international reactions, both organized and spontaneous, that occurred in the days following September 11, 2001. 

In London, the Star Spangled Banner played during the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, while traffic came to a standstill in The Mall nearby.
In Beijing, tens of thousands of people visited the U.S. Embassy, leaving flowers, cards, funeral wreaths and hand-written notes of condolence on the sidewalk out front.
In Moscow, women who spoke no English and had never been to the U.S. were captured on film sobbing in front of a makeshift tribute on a sidewalk, and every single church and monastery in Romania held a memorial prayer.
In France, a well-known newspaper, Le Monde, ran a headline reading, “We Are All Americans.”
In the Middle East, both the Israeli president and the Palestinian leader condemned the attacks, and made a show of donating blood.
Kuwaitis lined up to donate blood as well. Jordanians signed letters of sympathy.
In Tehran, an entire stadium of people gathered for a soccer match observed a moment of silence, and in Turkey, flags flew at half-mast.
In Berlin, 200,000 people packed the streets leading to the Brandenburg Gate.
A thousand miles south, in Dubrovnik, Croatia, schoolchildren took a break from classes to bow their heads in silence.
In Dublin, shops and pubs were closed during a national day of mourning, and people waited in a three-hour line to sign a book of condolences.
In Sweden, Norway and Finland, trams and buses halted in tribute, and in Russia, television and radio stations went silent to commemorate the innocent dead.
In Azerbaijan, Japan, Greenland, Bulgaria and Tajiskitan, people gathered in squares to light candles, murmur good wishes and pray. And in Pretoria, South Africa, little kids perched on their parents’ shoulders holding mini American flags.
Firefighters in Hungary tied black ribbons to their trucks, firefighters in South Africa flew red, white and blue, and firefighters in Poland sounded their sirens, letting loose a collective wail one warm afternoon.
Cubans offered medical supplies. Ethiopians offered prayers. Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan offered their air space, and dozens of other world leaders called the White House to offer their support.
Hundreds of thousands of people in Canada, Albania and Sierra Leone marched in the streets in shows of solidarity, and mosques in Bangladesh, Yemen, Pakistan, Libya and Sudan trembled with clerics’ condemnation of those “cowardly” and “un-Islamic” attacks.
Lebanese generals convened to sign letters of sympathy, and in Italy, Pope John Paul II fell to his knees in prayer.
Albania, Ireland, Israel, Canada, Croatia, South Korea and the Czech Republic all declared national days of mourning, and the legendary bells of Notre Dame echoed throughout Paris.
In Italy, race car drivers preparing for the upcoming Italian Grand Prix silenced their engines, and in London, hundreds stood quietly during the noontime chimes of Big Ben.
In Belgium, people held hands, forming a human chain in front of the Brussels World Trade Center, and seventeen time zones away, strangers in Indonesia gathered on a beach to pray.
In India, children taped up signs that read, “This is an attack on all of us,” and in Austria, church bells tolled in unison.

Read the full text here: http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/99665#ixzz1XfiNV4nl --brought to you by mental_floss! 

If you get a chance, also check out the Mental Floss article about Gander, Newfoundland, and some of the many unsung heroes of 9/11.

The power of positivity

At my last job, one of my coworkers was an almost impossibly positive person. My work bffs and I referred to her as Sunshine because it seemed as though nothing could get her down. She was a genuinely happy person. If it rained, she would talk about the delight of walking in the rain. If it snowed, she talked about going home and building snowmen. She was the master of looking at the bright side of life. At first, I thought it was an act, or sarcasm, but she was genuinely a positive person. As a sarcastic East coast girl, I did not understand. It made no sense. She's... happy? Like, all the time? She... finds joy in everything? I didn't know people like this existed!

Thinking about her, I realized that I had a lot to learn from her way of thinking. I've struggled with depression for most of my life. I've been medicated. I've been to therapists. But it's my way of thinking that's been my main problem. I realized that I had to change.

When faced with something new, I don't want my first reaction to be negative. It's been hard to retrain my brain. I have mental battles when I want to be mean, but I force myself to be nice. It's been working. Instead of being unwilling to accept a situation, I've made an attempt to find the good in whatever it is I'm faced with. It's reformed my whole outlook.

I have lots of things in my life currently that I can be down about, but I choose to look at what I have to be happy about. Yes, the problems and the crappy stuff will be there even if I ignore them, but I choose to stay positive. And that choice keeps my head above water. I have my bad days, and I do allow myself a good cry every now and then. But after that, I go back to positive thinking. I remain me, just a happier me. Haydia 2.0, if you will.

It's a big change, and it seems to be working. I feel happier. I'll report back on this in a few months.