Recently, Fictoris wrote a blog about learning Social Networking skills from small towns. In his blog he states that everyone knows everyone and their second cousin in small towns. Now if you’re not from North Dakota or a lesser populated state, a small “town” to you maybe a town of 50,000 people, or even 100,000 people - depending where you are from. But here in good ol’ ND, small is about 500 people or even less! The main thesis of his blog was to learn from the individuals in these towns that take a general interest in their neighbors/friends/citizens.

Can social networks learn something from this small closeness of a community? Can individuals learn something from the web of people and their connections in a community?

Social networks have been around far longer than the internet has, but now it seems like whenever we hear “social network”, we have learned to think about Twitter or Facebook. I have expressed a fear in lack of communication and social skills in people thanks to all that is capable because of the internet. And living with a self-proclaimed nerd, it is not an easy fight to win. Sometimes I think people have forgotten about face to face communication and the bonding that you can really only get through interpersonal socializing. Both social networks online and any individual can learn so much from a community that is made up of 90% of people over 65 years in age. These are the people that have seen the process of technology and the changes it has had on the world. These are the people that have seen and learned so much, and yet still are able to find that bond - that closeness - that link, to each individual they encounter.

Now I am in no way disapproving of online social networking (I’m on Twitter and Facebook and yes, sadly at one time MySpace). I just hope that people also remember their bonds with other individuals through other social networks besides the internet. And whether online or face to face, show an interest in whomever you meet and be part of something no matter how big or small you think it may be.

I have always thought that I was born in the wrong decade.

This is my list of five of my favorite leading men and little tid-bits about them. There is no particular order because how could you chose from these five fabulous men?

I got this inspiration from Project Wedding:

I've known for a while that I want to use this idea. So today I tried/attempted a couple to see how well they would go. This is what I got and need opinions:


Sorry about the photo...anyway, these are my color options. The purple is a nice mix between dark and light, and the green is a nice kelly green. I am personally a fan of the purple...


Next, are legs or no legs? I found that if you do not have something that helps you fold or cut little, it is very difficult to do the legs. Especially if you like things close to perfect.


The backdrop is next. I chose a darker like pattern and a colorful like pattern (see below) to see what would look best. These will NOT be the finalized backdrops, but I just needed color options to judge against.


In all, I found that I liked the purple, without the legs, with the darker backdrop. My fiance, Fictoris, is pretty much happy with whatever I pick out. The information I am going to put on the four sides include: Disposable Camera information, Kisses for the Bride and Groom (its a little poem that refers to people singing songs instead of clinking their glasses for PDA), a photo of us, and a little couple trivia. You can find more options and ideas from the Project Wedding website.

Please remember that things will be done a lot nicer for the wedding. I was just trying to get an idea of what options I had and how long each one would take for me to make it (which was by the way, about 10-15 minutes when I got the hang of it). Enjoy!

Where I live we have been living out of porta-potties for the past 2-3 weeks due to severe flooding. Yes, I said porta-potties. Anyway, good news is that we have been issued to use minimal water. Which means we get to go to the bathroom! However, that little things that you don't think twice about are affected. For example, cooking and cleaning. It is very difficult to cook without being able to use a little bit of water, whether it be to us it in the meal, to clean up or to wash vegtables. I thought making a pizza and a salad would be fairly easy to do without water. Stupid me.


I really thought this would be fairly easy. I bought pre-made dough/flatbread that came with the pizza sauce, pizza cheese, pepporoni, and mushrooms. Under normal circumstances, I would have totally made my own pizza sauce, but again no water=no dirty dishes for a while. And if I could make dough in my apartment, I would have done that too (see my previous blog post about me and dough). I used a plastic bowl and bottled drinking water to cleanse the mushrooms. Anyway, the pizza did turn out pretty good and was fairly easy to do!


Then I craved a salad... I usually just buy pre-packaged salad to begin with, but always have to rinse it. So I grabbed a strainer, my jug of drinking water, the salad and headed to the bathroom (where things are plugged). I drizzled the water over the salad and cleaned it the best I could.

I have found a new love for raspberry salad dressing. It works quite well with the salt in croutons, seeds, cheese or whatever you like to use. I use croutons and feta cheese and it was delicious (please excuse the plastic bowl and fork...oh, and the yellow counter tops!)


If you wanted to know...

Pizza
Package of pizza dough (I was lucky to find stuff that came with the packaged sauce too)
Package of pepperoni
1/2 lb of Pizza cheese
1 cup of mushrooms

Raspberry Salad
Package of any type of salad mix you like
1/4 c of Raspberry dressing
Any toppings you prefer (I used Texas Toast Croutons and Feta cheese)

...To learn how to make these:

1) Canned Salsa - First of all, I've always wanted to learn how to can foods. Surprisingly though, my family has never done it (at least from what I know of). Lucky for me my future parents-in-laws are not only growing numerous types of peppers, but they also know how to can. I asked my future mother-in-law if she would teach me to can salsa.



2) Fondant - I've always been fascinated by using/decorating with fondant. There are many recipes on the internet about making homemade fondant, but I think I'll start with pre-rolled fondant and learn from there. Perhaps I should practice for my wedding because I want to be able to make my own top of the cake (the rest of the cake will be cupcakes!).




3) Homemade Knoephla Soup - For those non-Germans that don't know what Knoephla soup is...it is one of the best (in my opinion) soups out there. Knoephla means "dumpling". You can buy frozen packaged dumplings and thaw them, but it really is not the same. I would like to learn to actually make the dough. Also, my first and last attempt at Knoephla followed a recipe that required a couple pounds of butter...I learned and will modify my next recipe to completely X out the butter all together.


4) Poultry - I would LOVE to learn how to cook any type of poultry. I have yet to even make a Turkey. I have cooked Cornish Game Hen but that was a long time ago. Up in North Dakota Pheasants and Ducks are plentiful and would love to be able to make fresh poultry. I have eaten Duck before and it is delicious (then again, it was wrapped in bacon). Either way, for some reason poultry intimidates me. Beef and pork is easy...but poultry (aside from chicken) is scary. Also with poultry comes fresh eggs and I've heard those are very tasty to cook with also.


5) Sushi Rolls - Being a ND girl, I hope you don't think that I don't know what sushi tastes like because I do and I love it! In fact, I might just go eat some tomorrow. Fargo, ND has a fabulous sushi restaurant (wow I spelled restaurant correct without spell check!) called Yuki Hana. I've heard great reviews from people all over the nation, including ones that are right next to the ocean. I would love to be able to make my own sushi rolls. Pioneer Woman does a fabulous job at keeping her fans updated with her sushi making and it looks not only delicious but fun!


6)Pastries/Bread - I was never one of those people that could walk into my house and smell homemade bread, but boy do I love that smell! I would love to make my own pastries and bread products - all the way from doughnuts, white bread, honey bread, sweet bread, sour dough, puff pastries - you name it, I want to do it.


7) Creative Foods - I am not exactly sure what could come up in this section, but every now and then I stumble across websites that makes me say "Man, I wish I could have thought of that!" How you all do it, I have no idea, but someday I hope to have people saying about my stuff "Wow, I should have thought about that!"

And so that concludes my list. I noticed that I kept saying "I would love to..." or "I wish I could..." and am now thinking to myself "No! YOU WILL!" I will attempt everything on this list someday, some sooner than later. I would like a bigger kitchen to do this in though because currently I live in a one bedroom apartment (unless its under water by now).

If any of you know any great recipes for any of these foods and wouldn't mind sharing, I would happily attempt them! I also promise that I will keep posting all the foods that I attempt to make. Who knows, maybe Grandpa's Apple Pie is just around the corner.

Photo credits:
1) www.ww-recipes.net
2) www.pastrychef.com
3) en.wikipedia.org
5) blog.craftzine.com
7) http://so-me.coolcats.fr/2009/02/rainbow-man-needs-a-cake-today/

So, originally I was going to post something about things I'd like to learn how to cook/bake, and maybe I'll get to that later. However, as of now, there are many things going on in ND and the places where I'm at in ND. Valley City, ND and numerous other towns are being evacuated because of intense flooding. As of now, I'm staying Jamestown at my parents place awaiting the flood. However, Jamestown is now anticipating severe flooding.

Fictoris and I made the decision yesterday morning to get out of Valley City, ND even though we were not exactly in the flood plain (the flood plain ended on our street). Valley City State University (where we go to college) has basically been cut off from the world thanks to dikes and rising water. They made the announcement this afternoon to continue with courses online for the remainder of the school year. Many understandable questions arose from this - such as, "What if I don't have internet?" Many students do not have internet access 24/7 and I am one of them (parents got rid of it when I went to college 3 years ago). Currently, I have to go to a coffee shop to get online (thats where I'm at now).

It has not necessarily been a stressful situation, but more of an annoyance. For as technological VCSU is, email services and other academic items have been more or less, down. I agree that officials are doing an amazing job at keeping citizens, students, faculty and staff informed. However, their means of getting that information to us is a bit of a nuisance and I know there are many students that still have thousands of questions.

Hopefully, I will be able to post some photos later of not only Valley City but maybe Jamestown, ND. I hope everyone is doing well and staying safe. Thank you to everyone who is working hard in this difficult situation.

Well, here it is - The Contest! Fictoris and I have been engaged for about a month and a half now. We wanted to do something creative, unique and something that no one else has. So here is your chance to win $100 to create a design that will go onto our wedding invites!

We aren’t going to give many details about ourselves beyond what is on our blogs as we want anyone who enters to not feel limited by us. So we want you to go nuts and make an invite! We will be giving away $100 dollars cash for the invite we pick. The deadline for entries is May 25th, 2009 and we will pick the winner by June 1st 2009.

Rules:

• Send us a mock up right away, afterward we will ask for a high quality .psd or .pdf file.
• You do not have to put the information in. Just give us an idea of what it would look like.
• We have the right not to pick a winner.
• We will not use your design if we do not pick it.
• You need a PayPal account or something to that extent for us to give you the money.

I am really excited to see what everyone can come up with. Send your entries to fictoris@gmail.com and we will get back to you soon. Make sure to Stumble this and tell any of your friends that are aspiring designers!