Staying the Course

life lately

2011-12-04T14:57:00.006-05:00

lately i've been doing little mini-blog entries on facebook, but today it is just too long for a simple status update. i need to ramble about life lately. this may be a record-breaking entry.

on my birthday of this year, we found out we were going to have another baby. JOY! we realized quickly that our [fabulous!] house was going to get very, VERY crowded around christmastime, so we decided to start looking for a slightly larger home to move in to. we spent the better part of the summer readying our space to be put on the market and searching for a new place to call home. we asked a good family friend to be our realtor and walk beside us as we searched for a home and tried to sell ours. we looked at a couple of houses in the same area where we were living, and as he learned about what we were looking for, he suggested a house in another part of town that he had listed. it was not a part of town we had originally wanted to pursue, but the house was really nice. over 2000 square feet. 3 bedrooms. 2 baths. a really spacious finished basement where the kids could safely play while this mama did laundry (something that could NOT happen in our current "scary basement"). not to mention the three "it would awesome if's" on my list: it was on a dead end. the back yard had tons of woods. it had wood burning fire places. *dreamy sigh* the house seemed to be in really great condition, even if it was completely stuck in the 70s, so we made an offer on it - a relatively low offer compared to what she was asking - and she accepted it!! so then we waited on the contingency to sell our own home.

the day our house hit the market, we went to the mountain cabin for two weeks - our longest visit yet. it was a MUCH needed rest. we had just a few little nibbles, but nothing too promising. as we waited for the contract on the east ridge home to expire, we continued to keep our house sparkly and ready for someone else to fall in love with, and we continued to watch my belly grow as our daughter prepared to enter the world. when the contract on our offer expired in september, we re-evaluated keeping our house on the market vs. staying where we were. we made a pros-cons list of both sides, and decided to keep our house on the market, and if it sold, we would renew the contract on the other house.

"if it hasn't sold by the end of october, we're taking it off the market." we all agreed that was a relatively safe distance between closing on everything, getting settled in, and the arrival of sally ann, due christmas day. on october 27, we got an offer we could not turn down! so we renewed our offer on the other house, expecting everything to fall into place quickly and expecting to be settled into a new home by the end of november.

then we had the house inspected. several big, and some dangerous, things were revealed. the roof had sustained damage in all the storms in the past year (she had not been living in the house for about a year) and needed to be fully replaced. the back deck couldn't hold more than 2 people safely because the supports were too narrow. the basement-crawlspace had a pretty bad leak. the electrical breaker box (or something...) was deemed "dangerous" and in desperate need of replacing. while a dampness inspector (there's an inspector for everything, btw) was looking at the basement, he barely knocked into one of the main-line water pipes, and it busted open, causing water to pour everywhere!! that revealed that the main-line water pipe was completely corroded. not to mention the kitchen didn't have a dishwasher, which would make life pretty near impossible with a toddler and newborn in the house! in order to install the dishwasher, we would have had to cut away the existing cabinets. in order to do that, because of something having to do with the way they were built, we would have to get all new cabinets....domino after domino lead to realizing we needed to do a full kitchen renovation.

when we saw all that the inspection revealed, we picked the biggies (it revealed more than i listed, but those listed were the biggies) and we added those to our offer, asking her to repair them before we moved in. this is a very customary practice in purchasing homes, but she was confused by the whole process. instead of agreeing to do some or all of the repairs, she said she would do none of them, but lower the price of the house. that would have been great if we had been planning on purchasing the home with cash. but we didn't have $6000 laying around to repair everything!! when she got our answer, she asked us to get some estimates since she lives out of town with her daughters.

enter my super-hero husband. not only has he been a wonderful husband (putting up with my pregnancy mood-swings), an involved and loving father, and an excellent teacher, he has assumed the responsibility of meeting inspector after inspector, contractor after contractor to get the lowest possible price (but still the best quality of service!) for the owner of this house. he's basically been running a marathon for about 3 months now. once all the numbers were in and we were convinced we had a good amount for her, we made our final offer and waited to hear what she would say. all the while watching both the closing date of our own home the birth of our daughter creeping closer and closer.

let me add here that our realtor, our good family friend, had been truly AMAZING this whole time. every time we called him, he was there, even if it was after hours. he has been patient in explaining things we didn't understand. he has been kind and informative to both us and the owner of the other home. he has just been a true champion (no pun intended...his last name is champion!) for example: he met chris at the house one morning to let him and a contractor in to get an estimate, and while the three of them were there, another contractor called saying he could be there in 30 minutes. chris had to get back to work, so instead of standing by and letting chris reschedule, he offered to stay and get the estimate from him. i don't think other realtors do that.

at this point in the story, we have had two wonderful thanksgivings with two wonderful families, my belly has grown to the point of gigantic (it is just impossible to roll over in bed now!), and we're wondering where we're going to lay our daughter's head in just a few weeks.

a few days after thanksgiving, nana had a heart attack. nana is chris' grandmother - our only living grandparent between the two of us - and she is NOT just a grandmother. she is a remarkable woman that we are all very close to. a few years ago, i, her granddaughter by marriage, went to spend fall break with her by myself. i could seriously write a book about her! no matter her circumstances, she is always positive, always looking to your need and not hers, always making everyone around her feel incredibly loved. these and a million more are the reasons we decided to name our daughter after her - sally. so to say "our grandmother had a heart attack" is just about life-shattering. and add that to the roller coaster we were already riding, and we were right in the middle of some pretty amazing rapids.

so after our final offer on the other house, two days went by. five days went by. eight days went by. we closed on our house and wrote a rent check to its new owner, assuming that we would close on the new house within the time we were renting from him. after a week from our offer, we still had not heard an answer from her, so we assumed she had decided to turn us down. our contract had expired anyway, so we moved on mentally knowing we would get our earnest money back, and we started looking to our alternatives. my sister offered for us to live in the house that she and her husband are renovating for FREE until we found something more permanent. free rent during a time that i will be on maternity leave and not receiving income? yes please!!

on december 1, less than 4 weeks away from the anticipated arrival of sally ann, we heard from our realtor. the owner of the east ridge house had accepted our terms. after all the praying we had done, we had both just assumed that God would make the decision for us and just make it go the way He wanted it. but now we had two really great options, and we had to CHOOSE??? i think my eyes were big with shock for at least 24 hours.

we prayed. we sought council. we prayed. we made pros/cons lists. we prayed. we cried. (okay it was really me who did the crying). we prayed. and prayed. and prayed. finally, we decided that if we went with the other house and started the renovations and updates that needed to happen, there was no way everything would be done before sally's arrival. we couldn't close until the week of the 5th anyway, which means construction couldn't start until after then - which would be 2 weeks before her due date. (and she will likely be early since i'm already 3cm dilated and 50% effaced....!!!) in the words of one of my husband's co-workers, "YOU ARE CRAZY if you think you can renovate a house with a newborn and a toddler. you think this house [my sister's] is just a coincidence? THIS. IS. GOD." so we risked ruining a relationship with a dear friend (our realtor) and making a sweet old lady (the owner of the house) angry and frustrated, and decided to walk away and move into my sister's house. if she had accepted our offer even just a few weeks earlier, we may have gone with it. but the timing just ran out.

so now i move to the part of the story where i get to talk about how deeply and WELL we are loved.

i never dreamed that we would have a baby shower for this second baby. we seriously have everything we need (except for that dern double stroller!), and who throws a shower for a second kid? my best friend jency shirai, that's who. she offered to give us a shower in her newly remodled home! they moved in, and just about a month later, she threw the best shower EVER. we invited just a few close friends and family, so it was small and intimate, and we got some of the best PINK things! sweaters, ruffly shirts and pants, hair bows, gowns, dresses, leggings! what do i do with all this girly stuff?? :) the most overwhelming part about the shower was the "double stroller fund". jency asked people to bring money to donate toward the double stroller. she said "the slatens aren't comfortable asking for this. so they're not asking. i am!" hah! we got over half of what we need for that stinking expensive thing!!! WE ARE SO BLESSED.

the date of jency's shower was planned long ago in the late summer, so i had been looking forward to it for a while. december 3rd. all of our house stuff dragged out and dragged out and dragged out so long - guess when move-out day wound up being for us? december 3rd. seriously? SERIOUSLY? but i decided it wasn't really that bad since i'm 9 months pregnant and can't really help move anyway...

chris sent an email out asking for help, and BOY did we get it!! we had...oh man. i think more than 10 people show up to help pack up the uhaul, and most of them had trucks that got loaded up too! they showed up at our house in the freezing cold (literally freezing) at 8am on a saturday morning when they could have been home with their families or sleeping in. we were absolutely floored by the outpouring of love. WE ARE SO BLESSED.

and THEN! after the shower was over, jency called and asked if she could come help clean up our house. i shouted "NO!!! you have served us enough today!!" but she ignored me and came over anyway. at the end of our move-out day, jency and nathan were the only ones left. jency was packing last minute boxes while nathan cleaned our [disgusting] shower. WE ARE SO BLESSED.

today:
- nana is doing okay for having had a heart attack at age 97. she's moving from the icu to a regular room, and the last i heard was doing much better than any doctor anticipated. that's nana. always pulling through and surprising us! (apparently they had her as good as buried when she was 85 and had complcations after surgery...) we are so blessed.
- all of our stuff (good grief we have a lot of stuff) is at my sister's house. we're staying with chris' parents until she and her husband can get a few things fixed, and then we'll move in there full time. we are so blessed.
- i'm having more braxton hicks contractions than i ever thought possible, and i'm just wondering when this precious baby girl will make her appearance! we're all hoping she comes just a little early to spare herself a christmas birthday. chris' dad's birthday is christmas day, and he keeps saying "let's all hope she's not born then! it stinks!" whenever she comes, what a christmas we're guaranteed to have!! we are so blessed.

at church yesterday during the part where the pastor leads us through confession, he was guiding us to pray certain things to God. at one point, he said, "and now, if you can, talk to God about how you are disappointed in Him...how you feel like He has let you down...be honest, and cry out to Him..." i literally laughed because there is NOTHING i have to be disappointed in. even with all these rapids of life, we have been beyond well taken care of. we sang a song that i must post the lyrics to. as i was still floating on the outpouring of love that so many people had given to us, no matter how good our friends are to us, Jesus truly is the greatest.

Jesus what a Friend for sinners!
Jesus lover of my soul;
Friends may fail me, foes assail me,
He, my Savior, makes me whole.

Refrain
Hallelujah! what a Savior!
Hallelujah! what a Friend!
Saving, helping, keeping, loving,
He is with me to the end.

Jesus what a strength in weakness!
Let me hide myself in Him.
Tempted, tried, and sometimes failing,
He, my strength, my victory wins.

Refrain

Jesus what a help in sorrow!
While the billows over me roll,
Even when my heart is breaking,
He, my comfort helps my soul.

Refrain

Jesus what a guide and keeper!
While the tempest still is high,
Storms about me, night overtakes me,
He, my Pilot, hears my cry.

Refrain

Jesus I do now receive Him,
More than all in Him I find.
He hath granted me forgiveness,
I am His, and He is mine.

Christmas Card 2010

2010-12-05T17:46:00.001-05:00

Wisemen's Journey Christmas

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it's a bird, it's a plane, it's TIME!

2010-10-06T09:15:00.002-05:00

goodness time goes by. i was doing pretty well with posts, but then life happened i suppose. right now i should be vacuuming and cleaning in general, so i figured it was the perfect time for a blog update. :)

i would try to post some pictures but...big sigh...our computer crashed. hard drive fail. all the pictures and videos of shepard - gone. we haven't gotten a second opinion or had a specialist look at it, so there might be some hope left. i'm using mom's computer, and i just don't want to dump the new pics onto her computer. anyway...

shepard is 4 1/2 months old, and he's more fun than ever! he's reaching for everything, putting most things to his mouth, drooling, interacting, talking (read, shouting), rolling over, trading stocks and bonds, etc... he's just so grown up and humongous i don't know what to do! he's wearing 6 month, and even some 9 month clothes. the bins of clothes that he has outgrown are multiplying. his favorite things to do are to "grouch" (it's this non-fussy, shouting/growling, and it's so ridiculously cute i can't stand it!), lie on his back and kick his feet with unprecendented speed (think, riverdance), and be outside. he can be fussy and about to have a meltdown, and just stepping outside will instantly cure him. i laid a quilt in the front yard yesterday afternoon when he was starting to get fussy, and when i laid him on his back, he was all smiles and kicks!! he really is a nature boy.

we took him to the aquarium last week. chris and i love the aquarium and had a membership when we lived within walking distance a few years ago, and have been playing with the idea of getting another membership as soon as shepard was old enough to enjoy it. well, we went ahead and got the membership simply because we wanted to go!! it was right at shepard's nap time, and we were just going to browse around while he snoozed in the stroller. but he started to freak out like he often does when he's sleepy (goodNESS this boy fights sleep), so chris just took him out of the stroller and was going to "trick" him into thinking we weren't trying to make him sleep. but the kid was wide-eyed with wonder for over an hour in the aquarium!! he could not get enough of the fish!!! it. was. AWESOME. i am absolutely tickled that we can go to the aquarium and shepard will be happy!!!

it is getting easier and easier to take him places. he just chills and is a happy boy! this morning we went to greenlife (did you know you can get a pastry and coffee for 99 cents if you get it between 7:30 and 8:00? awesome!!) and he was the happiest thing in the world just sitting in my lap while i ate my muffin and read. then we walked on the bridge (an every-[non-work]-day occurance for us!) and he just snoozed along with the rocking of the stroller!!

another new thing is COLD AIR!! this morning was his first real cold experience. it was in the low 40s [glory!] and he had on his new red coat jacket and an awesome red winter hat that someone gave him along the way. i also had a big blanket over his little legs. he was PRECIOUS all bundled.

i guess i should stop mindlessly rambling and go get some stuff done. of course, as soon as i start, shepard will wake up hungry. :)

changing more than just sheets

2010-09-08T16:05:00.004-05:00

shepard just discovered his feet on sunday and he plays with them all the time!! shepard fell asleep on his own earlier today!!!! (only about the third time ever) shepard just rolled over a few minutes ago!!!!!! (FIRST time ever!!) he also just peed all over his sheets, bumper and books while having a bit of naked time in his crib.

we're having a good day!!!

before sunrise

2010-08-30T05:35:00.002-05:00

there is only one thing in the world that would make me happy before the sun comes up. i'll give you one guess what (who) it is.

the past two nights we have tried letting shepard sleep without being swaddled. we still put the swaddler around his body to give him another layer, but we leave his arms out. yesterday, he woke up crying at 5:30, and i was just going to feed him early. (we like for his first feeding to be between 6 and 6:30) but by the time i had gotten my head together and used the restroom, he had already gone back to sleep! and he slept until 7:30!!!!!!! wow. and then it was the first time he had woken up in his bed happy. at 7:30 he was just rolling around cooing and talking. awesome.

this morning, he woke up cooing and happy and talking at 5:00. ouch. since he wasn't unhappy, i just took the monitor out to the couch and listened to him/dozed. anyway, he's a little early riser, but i think the unswaddling thing is working!! HE'S GROWING UP!!!! :(

we have so many awesome new pictures, but i have to clean the house up this morning. (plus it probably won't even let me upload pics...) you'll just have to wait!!

off to start the day!!

90 days

2010-08-19T14:30:00.004-05:00

today our baby is THREE MONTHS OLD. whew. that's insane.

and that's all the blogging i got done on thursday! hah! now it's saturday morning, and i'm watching my sweet baby boy sleep on his back with his arms and legs all sprawled out. he's officially sleeping in his room in his crib by himself. no more pack and play beside our bed!!! for one thing, he's three months old, and "they" say to start doing what you're going to do with routines and schedules and stuff by about three months. also, he's outgrown his "bassinet" attachment of the pack and play!! it says to stop using it when your kid can push up on hands and knees (not even close to there...) or is 15 pounds. whichever comes first. my kid is a BEAST!!! so anyway, this makes me very sad. i like having him sleeping right beside me all night long!! i do not like him being in his own room!!!!!! WAH! my baby is growing up. way. way. way. too. fast.

several hours have passed since typing the above, and now i'm listening to chris play the guitar to a full-tummy'd shepard. he is mezmerized by his daddy's playing! it's awesome to watch.

some ways shepard has changed recently:

sucking his hands. one day last week, he just stuck them in his mouth!! and now he can't keep them out. it's all he wants to do. when he's eating, he'll push the booby out of his mouth and suck on his hands. when he has the passy, he'll push it out of his mouth and suck on his hands. he's a little obsessed.

rolling. not rolling over. but he's started rolling side to side in his crib so much that he'll start with his head at one end of the crib and wind up with it at the totally other end. one day last week, it was about time for him to wake up and i realized i hadn't looked at the monitor in a while. when i did, i couldn't tell what he had done. he wasn't moving so i knew he was still asleep, but it looked like he was on his side, which would be a first. i very quietly opened the door and peeked in to see what was going on, and there he was. peacefully laying with his eyes open, on his side, with his foot sticking out through the slats of his crib! BAHAHAHA!!! i almost died laughing. (if blogger will straighten up and let me upload pictures, see below for a shot of it!)

grouching. he's been talking for a while now, but now he furrows his brow and growls and groans and complains. it's different than crying or fussing. i call it grouching. it's hilarious!! i don't know if he's actually angry, or if he's just experimenting with tone and inflection. i need to get it on video and post it.

sleeping through the night. (!!!) he sleeps through the night more often than he doesn't lately, and this makes us both very, very happy. :) :) :) his last feeding is usually around 9:30. i usually have to wake him up to give it to him, and he almost always eats in his sleep, which is just adorable. he's usually laying in his crib for the night by 10:30 at the latest, and most of the time we have to wake him up at 6am for his first feeding. it's funny too b/c when we wake him up, he almost never cries for food. he will just lay in his crib and smile and laugh and coo at us for a while!! it's SO awesome to wake up to!!!!

some ways i have changed recently:

i have muscles. if you know me, your jaw just hit the ground. i have always had issues with my arms and weakness and pain (well, i still have issues with pain sometimes...my answer lately is "olbas analgesic salve" - LOVE it!!!) but the other day, i was sitting on the ground with my knees to my chest and my arms crossed on my knees. i felt a weird lump in my bicep area and was genuinely freaked out for about a minute. i rubbed it and rubbed it and rubbed it thinking "oh my gosh...WHAT is that???" it was hysterical when i realized, duh, it's a MUSCLE. wow. i've never had one of those in my arms before!!!! awesome! i have a little 15 pound weight that i'm carrying around all day long. i would hope i would get a muscle or two!!!

blogger is being retarded. well, i don't know if it's blogger or our computer (which SUCKS, btw). but either way, i can't get pictures on here right now. check facebook if you're dying to see the latest.

making crap up

2010-08-16T22:23:00.003-05:00

there have been times in the past that i've wanted to be able to add minutes or hours to my day. add a child to my life, and that desire is multiplied by a gazillion!! there are not enough hours in the day to spend with this child. not to mention to get stuff done.

stuff. blech.

i'm weary of the spoils of my ambition, and i'm shackled by the comfort of my couch. i wish i had the courage to deny these of myself and start to store my treasure in the clouds. 'cause this is not my home. i do not belong where the antelope and the buffalo roam. (a little ap to drive home the conviction)

so last night's blog originally started off with something to the effect of "it's late and i should be in bed." repeat that for tonight!! (i don't know why i get the itch to blog late at night when i should be sleeping.) to sum it up, it basically said that work is going fine, shepard has done great being with his grandmothers while i'm getting the year started, and that i'm pretty sure we'll all be fine in the longrun. *groan* but i have such a hard time leaving that little face!!! have you SEEN him??

this thursday, shepard will be three months old. good grief. i remember saying that we would start putting him to sleep in his own room in his own bed at three months. i said we would really start solidifying the routine/schedule at three months. i said we would start simply putting him down for naps and helping him learn how to soothe himself. what's funny is that i feel like he's ready for all of that!! he's already sort of started to self-soothe, which is just amazing. here's to a good transition week!!!

thought for the night: how many times a week do you wake up and realize that you're going to have to just totally and utterly fake it? meaning, fake smile, fake enthusiasm, fake friendliness to everyone. does faking it count? i mean, if i'm totally dying on the inside and hating the world, and i'm fake nice to people, does that make me a liar? or a nice person? just wonderin...

chris got some hilarious pictures of me and the little guy tonight. i'll post them soon. :)

state of rebellion

2010-08-15T21:53:00.006-05:00

oh. my. gosh. i had the longest blog entry yet, and i just lost it. i am SO not going to try to recreate it. too bad. so sad. life goes on. at least the pics are still here.

growl.

i'm flying!!

blue dipes make me feel tough!!

yellow dipes make me happyyyyyyy!!!

cry me a river

2010-08-10T08:17:00.003-05:00

it's 12:20 am on tuesday...or i guess really it's wednesday at this point. orientation for school starts tomorr...i mean, today, and i am LOSING MY MIND. i haven't cried this much in a long, long time. i can't believe i agreed to go back to work part time. my entire life - all 31 years - i have always said that it's my dream, my goal, my plan to STAY HOME once i had kids. a couple of years ago, i started this job teaching preschool. when my boss passed around the little survey saying, "where do you see yourself in 5 years?" i went to write "at home with my kids", but paused. for the first time in my life, i paused and said, "whoa! i don't know if i want to be home with my kids! i LOVE this job!!!" which is GREAT! it is so good that i love my job. right? yes.
well, last year when i got pregnant, i decided that i would go back to work part time as a little compromise. WHAT WAS I THINKING????????????? why would i ever want to take time away from spending with my kid to spend it with other people's kids?

i know it will be good for me, good for shepard, good for the grandmas that are keeping him. but the thing that's getting me is that he is just SO young. not even 3 months. i wish i had told them that i would come back part time once shepard was, like, 4 months or something. GAH! this is so hard. the hardest thing i've done in a while...if not ever done.

just LOOK at this guy!! why am i leaving him??????? he is JUST starting to settle into a nice routine.

note: if my boss or any of my co-workers read this, know that i'm super emotional, and remember that i'm completely sleep deprived. my next blog post will probably be about how much i love being back at work and how shepard is doing beautifully with his new schedule. i'm just saying...!

freaking out about haley!!! sorry girl. :)

i'm worried. i think he's joined a gang!!

hanging out with dad before he leaves for work!

i'm such a bad mom. i wanted a picture of him in his awesome baseball outfit, and he really didn't want one...but i took it anyway. sorry buddy!!

oh no...why is this sideways???? turn your head and just LOOK at that smile!! he's just so proud about busting out of his swaddling AGAIN.

entranced.

swinging with daddy!

chillin'.

thinkin'.

bubbles!!

it's the end of the summer

2010-08-05T11:13:00.003-05:00

i realized something the other day. i am not a housewife. i am a stay at home mom. (save the 10 hours a week i'll be in the classroom) so when the clock somehow reads 6:00PM and the dishes are still piled up in the sink, and i still haven't vacuumed, and the clothes still aren't folded, because all i've done that day is take care of shepard, my day is a success!! when i realized this, i felt a weight lift off my shoulders and i said a little prayer of thanksgiving. whew!

shepard's latest amazing feat is sleeping through the night!!! yes, yes, yes. it might have just been a fluke. but last night, little guy slept from 11:00 until 6:00. he usually wakes up for a 3am feeding, and he was grunting like crazy last night right at 3, but when i stood up and went to get him, he was very obviously still asleep. he was totally comatose between half-hearted grunts. so i tiptoed back to bed and cautiously went back to sleep. about an hour later, the same half-hearted grunts started. i watched him for a little while, but then laid back down. i didn't even get under the covers b/c i was so sure he would wake up starving any minute. an hour later at about 5:30, i woke up on my own and thought he had died for sure!!! when i gently put my hand on his beautifully breathing chest, i almost YIPPED out loud! if he woke up right then, i would consider it sleeping through the night. i laid back down, and lo and behold, when my alarm went off at 6:00, it woke him up too. a-ma-zing. i unswaddled him and took him to our feeding spot on the couch and looked at him. "you're growing up little man!!" i said. his response? BIG GRIN!!! i love that kid.

he is also very consistently smiling at his parents like CRAZY. all the books say that he will prefer us to anyone else, and it has been SO amazing to witness that the books are right!! he doesn't mind going to other people at all. but when he sees or hears either one of us, it's a huge face-squishing smile! *wow* makes me cry just thinking about it!! i LOVE that kid!!

today is chris' first day back at school for a week of inservice before the students start back next thursday. so i consider today my first real day of stay-at-homeness. today marks the beginning of me getting both of us on a real, set schedule. regular feeding times, regular bath days and times, regular grocery planning and shopping. or at least it's when i start figuring out when all that is going to work best for us. and it's been awesome because i have actually been motivated to DO things between his naps and feedings. usually i just want to veg out and either watch tv or get on the computer. you need to know that shepard sleeps for literally only 30 minutes at a time. here's what a day looks like for us:

6:00 am - feed shepard
~6:45 - awake time for shepard, breakfast for me
~7:30 - shepard to sleep
8 - shepard awake
8:00-9:00 - more awake and play time for shepard
9:00 - feed shepard

and it starts all over and repeats until 9 or 10 at night. did you see that? the only time without shepard was from 7:30 to 8:00. do you know how fast 30 minutes goes by when you're trying to get something done??? and you could set a clock by this kid! he is so eerily accurate about that 30 minutes. but good news is that he has started to be willing and able to either sit in his little seat or lie on his playmat for at least 20 minutes during the hour before his next feeding, so i can sometimes get some more stuff done. but usually we're either reading books or swinging on the porch swing or just hanging out and talking. have i mentioned that i love that kid?

wow. i haven't uploaded pictures from the camera in forever. sorry about that...new pictures of our little man soon!!

i started blogging at 12:00. it is now 12:36 and he is awake. wow. a long nap!! hah!

i walk the line

2010-07-31T07:13:00.002-05:00

when it comes to middle of the night feedings, there is a fine line between asleep and awake. the ideal experience is for shepard to wake us up, but for him to be just enough awake to nurse, but just enough asleep to go straight back to sleep when he's done. a couple of nights ago, i got too caught up in getting him to eat that i woke him up completely. he was ready to play!!! which means when i tried to put him back to sleep, he pitched a fit and woke up everyone in the house. oh bummer. but last night was perfect. he ate a little and went back to sleep so fast i didn't even have to rock him. now the IDEAL ideal situation will be when he doesn't wake up at 3am anymore...we're hoping it will happen soon.

he's been chewing on his passy and bottle nipple rather than sucking on them lately. could TEETH be right around the corner for him? oh man!! he really is growing up too fast!! he LITERALLY changes every single day.

yesterday i had to go into school to clean up the room a bit before visitors come next week. chris had to go to rehearsal for a wedding, so he couldn't keep him. i was fully expecting our trip to be a disaster because he hates his car seat so much. i was just bracing myself for a few hours of crying. well, someone stole shepard and replaced him with a perfect angel! he was awake the entire way to school and didn't make a peep. he sat in his carseat smiling and happy in the classroom for about 30 minutes with people coming in and out to see him. then he laid on his playmat for about 20 minutes cooing and kicking. once i fed him and he played on the mat a little while longer, he started to get fussy and then started all-out crying. i figured i would have to go home since i forgot the swaddler. but i rocked him just in my arms and shushed in his ear for approximately 2 minutes, and he fell fast asleep! i laid him in his carseat and he slept for about 30 minutes!!! who are you and what have you done with shepard?!?!? it gives me hope that maybe, just maybe he's maturing a little so that he doesn't scream every time he's not being held!!! of course, then i went to bilo and he refused to stay in his carseat. so i had to shop with one hand. my arms sure are getting stronger!!

hutchmoot is next weekend, and we were thinking about trying to sell our tickets. when chris was in nashville a few weeks ago, ap was telling him that we HAVE to still come, and that we have to live our lives no matter what our kid does. well...he hasn't heard shepard pitch one of his fits, has he?? but the past few days have given me hope!! hutchmoot - here we come!!! we'll see how he does....:)

the touch, the feel

2010-07-28T20:28:00.005-05:00

the slatens have officially gone CLOTH! the best part is that my wonderful, amazingly generous cousin is letting us use all her cloth diapers that her youngest has grown out of! YES! shepard looks awesome in his little cloth dipes, and it just makes sense to use diapers that you can re-use. already in his short life, we have gone through SO MANY disposable diapers. i honestly feel guilty at the amount of grossness we have added to landfills, and we only used them for about 60 days. wow.

all of kendall's diapers are white b/c she bought them before they know what gender their precious little josie was, but about a month ago, i bought 3 colorful ones to try out - 1 of 3 different brands. those are going to be his "going out" dipes. :) and i might buy a few more just to have a few more on hand. i was really hesitant to start using them at first because they're pretty intimidating if you don't know how to use them. but the thing is, using them really is just like using disposables, only you throw them in a laundry bin instead of the trash. and washing them is super easy. i've always heard people say that cloth diapering is "addictive", and i know what they mean now!! (i have a picture of him in his cloth diaper, but it's still on the camera, and it's late...so i'll post one later)

this past weekend was the "meet shepard party" that i've been talking about having with my preschoolers ever since shepard was minus-6 months old. it was at the coolidge park fountain, and we had SO much fun! well, everyone except shepard. he was pretty miserable. he ate his first meal late in the morning, so he went down late, so he only slept for about 20 minutes before the party as opposed to the regular hour. and it was hot. and it was time for him to eat again. he was so hot, tired and hungry, that he couldn't eat, and all he did was cry cry cry. poor guy. but he did finally fall asleep with his daddy. bless him! he was so miserable!! but the kids seemed to have a good time, and it was SO GOOD to see them all again. :)

the glider has officially been taken back. we have a HUGE credit at BRU since we bought it with gift cards. we're thinking about selling the gift card to someone who will use BRU credit, but i'm honestly tired of them. every single time i've taken things back there - various things from our registry that we have wound up not needing - they have tried to not take it back. (you have to either have a receipt or have registered for it for them to even think about taking it back) it's always "this isn't showing up on your registry!" then we actually print the physical registry and they're like "oh, wow. there it is..." today when chris took the glider back, they actually said to him that their system was showing that we had already received credit back for it. are you kidding me? we have the receipt in hand and the actual [crappy] glider sitting in front of them. gross. don't shop there. they're annoying.

shepard weighs 13 pounds now. that's the 80th percentile. he's a BEEF CAKE!! :)

in other news, i drank a glass of real cow's milk this morning. *GASP* see, when shepard was a few weeks old, he went through these spells of S-C-R-E-A-M-I-N-G in absolute pain and he used to get these little red-rash things all over his body. they weren't baby acne either. so i stopped doing dairy altogether just to see if it made a difference. the thing is, i was also eating a whole lot of prunes (no reason...you know...ahem...) which are supposedly very gas-inducing, and i stopped eating them at the same time. well, he stopped screaming. after a couple of weeks, we said, you know, it could have been the prunes. so one day i tried some cream cheese on a bagel to see if he screamed. and he did that night. and the red rash came back. huh. so it IS the dairy. so i continued to stay away from dairy. well, then he had screaming episodes where the red rash came back even when i wasn't on dairy. so maybe it's just gas or something. so today i tried milk. and so far so good!!!!!!! are you kidding??? tomorrow i'm going to do milk again, and maybe a little cheese. slowly my friends. slowly.

our date night this week is going to be with forrest and alex. guess where we're going????? I CANNOT WAIT!!! :) :) :)

how he chooses to sleep on my shoulder most of the time. i always have to force his head to turn sideways!!

OH!

finally zonked out! check out how his hat matches his daddy's shorts!

some of the kids playing in the fountain!

naps with daddy are the best!

check out how beefy i am!!

sittin in the bumbo doo bee doo

2010-07-26T19:40:00.004-05:00

whenever shepard sits in his bumbo (see below) i sing a little song (sittin in de bumbo doo bee doo) and he always smiles. then the silly little song gets in my head and i sing it all day with all sorts of words. "eatin up my good lunch doo bee doo." "driving to the store-oh doo bee doo." "i'm losing my mind doo bee doo." etc...

so in my humble and uneducated opinion, i think that a $400 glider rocker should not break after just two months of use. are my expectations too high? there's this crazy awesome feature (or so i thought) on our glider where you can pull a lever and it locks in place. something i was really looking forward to using once shepard is pulling up. i've worked in the nursery at church where there's a glider rocker, and we're constantly making sure the little boogers aren't pushing it around b/c it's SO easy to pinch (more like sever) a finger. anyway, the way it works is...nah. it's too hard to explain. i'll just say that the pieces that are supposed to come together only when the lever is pulled have somehow gotten so close to each other that they knock against each other every time we rock. MADDENING. absolutely maddening. chris says he's going to take it back to babies r us and leave it there. they can have it! we're done with it!!!

the part that stinks is that we have a little boy who FIGHTS sleep EVERY time we go to put him down, save the middle of the night when he eats in a coma anyway. the rocker really does seem to help him relax, and every time we're somewhere else and he needs to go down for a nap, it's an even bigger challenge when we don't have a rocker. add to that a mommy whose arms are weaker than olive oyl's and you've got a pretty miserable situation. *sigh* God is good. all the time. we'll see how it goes until we get a new rocker!

well, it's been 30 minutes since i put him down, and CUE THE BABY. without fail. you could set a clock by him.

more later!

hanging out with uncle forrest - check out my neck control!!!

sittin in de bumbo doo bee doo!

look what i figured out with my fingers!! hah!

wide awake and seriously considering crying on our walk...

but he finally fell asleep!! huttah!

happy accidents

2010-07-23T13:29:00.005-05:00

so i had a wreck today with shepard in the car.

*SHOCK VALUE*

the real story is that i loaded the both of us up to go to coolidge park to take a walk (the 2nd day in a row we've actually done it!!) and i was so focused on talking and singing and keeping him distracted and happy, that i *BAM* backed into the honda. BIG sigh. the bad news is that the nanawagon (what i was driving) has a giant crack in the bumper. the good news is that it's a 1992 station wagon that we'll probably never trade in. the other good news is that the honda - the one we probably will trade in soon - wasn't hurt at all! sheesh. what a ditz.

in other, better news, CHRIS IS HOME! you may not have known he was gone. i don't like to broadcast it when i'm home alone. you know. stalkers. he was in nashville all week recording his two new songs with ben shive, his [awesome, amazingly talented, ridiculously fabulous] producer. i could ramble and rant all day long about how awesome a songwriter my husband is. his songs are always so thoughtful, catchy, fun, beautiful, meaningful. i LOVE his music! and you will too!! his first album came out in 2004 and you can get it on itunes or amazon.com. this new album will hopefully come out sometime in the spring. you are gonna LOVE it. the new stuff absolutely blows me away.

i started this post on friday. it's monday. oh well...

pondering these things

2010-07-22T12:29:00.003-05:00

usually when we sing to shepard as he's going to sleep, he fusses and would rather us "shhhh" in his ear. (see "happiest baby on the block" techniques) which bums me because i love singing to my baby!! well, last night he was SO happy after his awake time, and kept the mood through his diaper change and swaddling. when we sat in the rocking chair, i laid him on his back on my legs (which i will not be able to do much longer - that guy is getting LONG!) i quietly sang "you are my sunshine" and "you can always come home to me" to him, and he absolutely gazed at me in wonder with a huge smile on his face! A. MA. ZING. i melted. and i totally understood what mary meant when she pondered these things in her heart after Jesus was born. i love that kid.

in one of the recent blogs, i mentioned that he has started "talking". well - wow. in just the past day or two, his "speech", i suppose, has totally taken off! he will fix his eyes on something in the room and just coo and talk! i cannot wait to hear him actually say words. it is hilarious and wonderful and amazing!! i have yet to get it on video. i swear that kid KNOWS what a camera is and stops his cuteness the second he sees the camera on him. it is SO weird.

we had a breakthrough moment this morning! we must get in the habit of going for a walk on most mornings, so i just DID IT this morning. this time i attached one of his little toys that makes noise to his carseat, hoping that his presence would create some sort of calm in his life. well, he cried in the car, cried in the stroller (which is just his carseat snapped down into our jogger), but would stop when i would take him out. we had a little talk, and after a minute, i put him back down into it. he sat bewildered for a little while, and right before we turned onto the walking bridge, he started crying again. i looked at him and asked "what changed buddy?" and just kept asking that. he stopped crying, looked up into my eyes, and held onto his little giraffe. hah! i think it was an accident that his little hand wrapped around it, but it was still pretty cute. then, about 20 seconds later, he was asleep. GLORY!! i got a walk in and didn't have to a) carry him and push the stroller with one hand, or b) stroll with a crazy screaming baby!

he's hungry!! he actually SLEPT until the time for his next feeding!! no 30 minute nap for him this morning. once again - GLORY!!!

happy boy!

he really does enjoy listening to stories! we are reading about joseph and his rainbow coat from "the Jesus storybook bible".

so happy with gan!

car time vs. bath time

2010-07-20T10:28:00.004-05:00

yesterday shepard pulled his trademark move and woke up 30 minutes to-the-minute after i laid him down for EVERY nap. you could set a clock to his accuracy! it was almost like, "3...2...1. cue the crying!!" well, i *know* my child usually cries in his car seat, but i also know that he will sleep in it if he's nice and relaxed. after one of his wake-ups, he was still so sleepy, but every time i laid him back down, he would wake back up. so i decided we would take a drive. i got him sleepy, put him in the car seat and off we went. 30 minutes later, i was about to turn back onto our road and he literally threw up because he had been crying so hard. the ride would have lastest shorter than 30 minutes, but by the time i realized he was NOT going to fall asleep, we were already 10 minutes or so away from home, which meant 10 minutes or so BACK to home. not to mention the fact that the car was completely out of gas, so he had to endure a fill-up. *sigh* bless his heart! WHY does he hate his car seat so much??? the second i got him out of it, he stopped crying. we sat on the porch swing for 20 minutes in beautiful peace.

this is not good b/c christopher and i are travelers. we go everywhere! three things are about to happen. 1) shepard will get used to his carseat and ride in peace b/c we go so many places. 2) shepard will not get used to his carseat and will continue to ride in agony while we go so many places. 3) we will stop going so many places. *sigh* i have a feeling #3 will win.

in contrast to his feelings about his carseat, check out how he feels about his bath! he hasn't exactly figured out how to splash and play in the water, but he sure does seem to love the feeling of the water. :)

however, to dry him off, you'd think he was in the carseat again. is it because he wants to stay in the water? because he's cold after getting out? or because of the towel's texture?

gan (my mom) has taken a few days off work and is helping me out while chris is out of town for the week. (he's recording his new songs in nashville with ben! WAHOO!!) and she just accomplished what i thought was impossible. shepard woke up after 30 minutes of napping, and she put him back to sleep!! and he's still asleep after a full hour!!! a-ma-zing. way to go ganna!!!!

in completely other news, please visit this website and watch/listen to this song. i promise it will not disappoint. and when you're done with that song, head over to andrew peterson's website and order his new album!! it's definitely going to be his best one yet!!

60 days

2010-07-18T20:16:00.009-05:00

*disclaimer* i can't seem to ever get blogger to align things correctly. forgive me if the spacing is weird!!

chris and i mentioned the other day that we really wanted to start journalling about shepard's days. i'm inspired to journal from reading anne lamott's "operating instructions" - one of the most hilarious and wonderful books i've EVER read. (iseriously could not read it in bed after chris had gone to sleep because i was constantly waking him up from laughing out loud.) anyway, inspired though i may be, i'm always overwhelmed at journalling b/c i'm always behind. i started a paper journal (remember those? they involve using some sort of writing utencil to record one's thoughts) when i found out i was pregnant, and i claimed i was going to keep track of all the little fellow did inside me. well, there are approximately 5 entries. maybe more. but certainly not enough to count as a thorough journal! anyway, overwhelmed though i may be, HERE I AM. i just have to start. so there. it is hard to start though, b/c i could ramble for DAYS about the first two months of his life. i'll pick a few highlights...

tomorrow, july 19, shepard will be two months old!! simply amazing. it truly does feel like we were just in the hospital. forget that, it feels like yesterday that we found out we were pregnant! i have never experienced anything like parenthood before. (duh) people say it, but you don't really understand until you do it: parenthood is the most wonderful, exhausting, exciting, terrifying, fun, frustrating, natural, and hard thing you'll ever do. i look at shepard's little face and fall in love more each time. sheesh.

he has started "talking" to us, which is just so much fun! whether he's happy or crying, his little sounds are more than just a BLAT! they have inflections and changes in volume and personality. when i realized that he had been doing that for a while, it hit me that whoa! this little baby is going to grow up to be an actual person who can talk and ask questions and give opinions and stuff. whoa!

some ways that he has changed recently:

- he doesn't make sweet little sighing squeaks when he's nursing anymore :,(

- he can scoot backwards.

- he reaches for things.

- he SMILES all the time - especially when he sees his parents!!

- he doesn't scream NEARLY as much as he used to! :)

- he seems to have stopped taking a bottle. this is NOT good for the girl who wants to go back to work part time...

- he will lay and play on his play mat for up toabout 20 minutes by himself!

- despite being 2 months, he's wearing 3 month clothes.

and now for some pictures:

the first time mama caught me smilin on camera!

i'll get you, you dirty monkey!!

i do NOT like tummy time, mama.

i LOOOOOVE my daddy!!!

chillin' with my jungle friends.

sleepin' in my uncle's old room at gan and grandfather's house!

stylin in my suit and hat!

cheeeeeese!

my first photo shoot in the really awesome outfit that gan bought me!

i was screaming at mommy by this time in the photo shoot. she's a torturer and will do

anything to get a foot shot.

check out my muscles!!

i love taking baths, but drying off always makes me feel a little crabby...

spending some good time with my great-grandmother, nana. she sounds like she knows what she's talking about!

shepard

2010-05-21T18:58:00.021-05:00

i loved kirby's entry about her labor and delivery so much that i decided to do my own! thanks for the inspiration, friend. :)

shepard slaten was due to enter the world on tuesday, may 25. but i kept telling people that i really thought he was going to be early. i didn't know why, and i still don't know why. maybe it was just a 50/50 chance of being right about it. maybe i just KNEW. but he was early indeed. he was born at 11:44PM on wednesday, may 19. HOORAY! it was quite a journey getting him here.

all my life, i've always joked with people saying that the minute i go into labor, i'm going to shout out joyfully, "bring on the drugs!!!" but as soon as i actually was pregnant, my thinking changed, and i'm not sure why. i really wanted to labor naturally for some reason! chris and i took a childbirth class at the hospital. the first night we watched a video of a birth - ALL the details included - and i told chris on the way home to go ahead and check me into the looney bin - that i STILL wanted to go natural, even after seeing the video. there was just something about the way that the diagrams of what the mother's body does and what the child does during the labor process that screams out "GOD MADE YOU TO DO THIS!!!" and while, yes, even with an epidural, my body and his little body would still be actually DOING what God created us to do, i just wanted to do it naturally. for some reason.

anyway, i was on the fence about it since i had been so gung-ho about epidurals my whole life and just not sure if i could handle going through it naturally. when i talked to dr barker about it, he said, "i will tell you one thing. if you decide to go naturally and you wind up getting an epidural, you simply cannot think of yourself as a failure. so many of my patients do that." best advice EVER. i also heard from everyone and everywhere that i must remain flexible about the laboring process b/c it rarely goes exactly as planned. so as the day grew closer, i had a flexible mindset about the whole thing.

chris and i ran across "the bradley method" of laboring along the way, and that's the route we wanted to go. in a tiny nutshell, it's all about focusing on relaxing and breathing normally and letting my body just do its thing. it's also very "coach" oriented, so chris had to be knowledgeable - almost moreso than me - about the whole process too. we practiced a whole bunch of relaxation techniques, learned about the stages of labor and how to tell when i was in which stage, etc. we were planning to labor at home as long as possible and really be in tune with which stages and phases of labor my body was passing through when.

until tuesday night, may 18, at 11:45PM - that's when my water broke. all day that day, i had been having braxton hicks contractions as usual, but this time they weren't quite so painless. sometimes i even had to stop what i was doing and sit down. nothing was taking my breath away - they just felt like regular ol' "lady" cramps. no big deal...but i worked on finishing up our hospital bags. just in case.

so that night, right when i laid down to go to sleep, i started to have another painless braxton-hicks contraction and i said to myself, "here goes another one" - nothing out of the ordinary there. but then i felt a huge and sharp POP in my abdomen. it wasn't painful. just a pop. my eyes shot open and i laid there for a minute. when nothing happened, i thought it was nothing. but a few minutes later, i said to chris from the bathroom, "yeah, i'm pretty sure my water just broke." to which he replied with a loud and hearty, "HAHAHA!!!!" and flipped the lights on!!! adrenalyn rush for both of us for the rest of the night!!!

i will say that after the initial excitement wore off, i shouted out, "SERIOUSLY???? this means we're losing a full night's sleep!!!" since we were JUST laying down. bummer.

we called our doctor who knew how we wanted our labor to go and was totally supportive, and he told us we had to be at the hospital in no more than 6 hours. when your water breaks, apparently there's an increased risk of infection since that barrier to the baby is broken, so they want you in the hospital asap. so much for laboring at home. bummer.

so we finshed up packing like chickens with our heads cut off, and feverishly tried to finish reading some of the bradley book. at one point chris came into the bedroom, left the bedroom, came back into the bedroom, all the while with a huge smile on his face saying, "what am i doing? what am i doing? i don't know what i'm doing..." he wasn't at ALL the frantic idiot father from television. he was the adorable, excited father!! it was SO cute. i loved it.

around 1:30AM or so, we laid down and tried to sleep, and we actually succeeded for a bit. i had a few sort of painful contractions, but nothing too awful, and nothing regular at all. around 4AM, we started getting the car ready. we got to the hospital at about 6AM, and they put us in a room so they could check to make sure my water had indeed broken, since i didn't have the proverbial GUSH. sure enough, it was broken. so they checked me in. dr barker showed up around 9AM (10 hours after my water broke) and gave us the news that, since i hadn't had any kind of regular contractions, he would have to start me on pitocin. really? are you sure? pitocin? dangit. i appreciated him so much though b/c his attitude towards us was like he was breaking bad news to us since he knew that it was not what we wanted. see, pitocin skips over all the first stages of labor and throws you straight into transition labor. that's the stage where your contractions are SUPER strong and SUPER close together. it's supposed to last anywhere from 30 minutes to 2 hours, and comes after many hours of manageable labor. and the thing that's supposed to be the driving force to get you through transition labor is that it comes right before pushing, so you're basically done when the labor is at its most painful. but not with pitocin. bummer.

after we were in the labor and delivery room, jency showed up, camera in hand. i wanted her to be in the room with us so she could take pictures since i wanted pictures but didn't want chris to be worrying about taking them. she was amazing!! it was so so so great to have her in there the whole time. she even helped coach me through for a while when chris went to get lunch. talk about a best friend!!

so around 10AM or so, my induced contractions started. they were 2 minutes apart and ridiculously painful every time. the part that made it so unbearable was that the pain was in my back most of the time instead of my tummy, and i just wasn't ready for that. but chris was the most amazing coach i could have ever asked for. every time a contraction would come on, he would go through the scripts the bradley book taught us, and it always calmed me down and reminded me how to make it through. he was a rock star!! i seriously could not have done it without him. but after a few hours, things literally started going blurry and i almost couldn't breathe at all, let alone breathe normally and deeply through each contraction. when you're in transition labor for hours with the end not being close, you start to lose your mind!!

around 1PM or so, i decided i could not handle it anymore, but i was only 2cm dilated - which was just a joke!! contractions like this are supposed to be happening when you're 7-9cm and helping you round the corner to the finish line!!! so i begged my nurse to give me something. anything. which i had said initially that i would NOT do since anything that goes in my IV reaches the baby. but i had suddenly decided that he would be just fine. :) so i got something - don't remember what it was - that made me blissfully sleepy and i was totally and completely passed out - think, vivid dreams and deep sleep - in between contractions. still 2 minutes apart!! the pain wasn't any better, but i could at least rest a bit between them, which was SUCH a gift since i hadn't slept at all the night before. jency and chris were laughing at me b/c i was so loopy and would ask questions, and then fall asleep, and then have a contraction, and then ask if i had asked a question, and then fall back asleep. this lasted for about 2 hours.

the next time my nurse checked me, she said i was 5.5cm, and i literally screamed, "EPIDURAL!" one of the main reasons i didn't want one was that they insert a NEEDLE into your SPINAL COLUMN literally WHILE you're having CONTRACTIONS. seriously? good lord, no thank you. but jency and chris said that every contraction i was having, i was being super still anyway. and my wonderful coach was helping me so much with my breathing that it was making them more bearable, that i thought maybe i could handle being still. chris was supportive of me getting the epidural, too, even though it wasn't in the plan. things just weren't working out for me to be able to "bradley". so i asked my nurse if the anesthesiologist was new or in training, and she laughed. he's apparently been doing it for something like 30 years and he's the best in town. bring him in!!!!! enter: steve.

i seriously considered naming my child after him. he was so wonderful. gentle. kind. professional. amazing. and he gave me wonderful, beautiful, glorious drugs. the nurses kept telling me that i had the perfect epidural, too, since i could still move my legs but not feel contractions. hooray! after the epidural took effect - around 4PM - i had my mind back and i could concentrate on what was happening, and most importantly, rest. with the amount of non-sleep i had had, i needed to rest so i had enough energy to push!! it was truly the best decision EVER. if i had had normal labor and not transition labor for 6 hours, who knows. i may have been able to handle it. but the pitocin...whew. it changed the game. bummer.

so my body contracted and did it's job for a few hours. i asked dr barker when we would have to start thinking c-section since my water had been broken for so long, and he said if i hadn't progressed well after about 20 hours of the water breaking they would have to consider it. shoot. that hour was coming up fast. but the good news was that i WAS progressing. slowly, but still progressing. around the hour where i was afraid he was going to wheel me out to cut me open, he gave me an antibiotic instead. hooray! something actually might go according to plan for us!!

while i had the perfect epidural, i could feel just the tiniest little bit of pain on my left side with each contraction. then it expanded to my back. it wasn't bad enough to even have to breathe through. but after about 4 hours, it did get a lot worse. so i asked the nurse to "up" the meds. steve came back and i told him that i liked how i could move my legs. he looked at me with his kind eyes and a smile and said, as he increased the medicine, "sorry. you can't have both..." and i felt the cold of the medicine running through the line. *sigh* oh well. so from then on, my lower body was deader than dead. you know how your lip feels when you get it numbed for the dentist? it feels all swollen and huge and you're like "what is THAT???" when you grab it? that's how my legs felt. it. was. so. weird.

i don't remember the exact times with the exact cms. all i know is that every time he came to check me, i was only a tiny bit more than the last time. the real kicker was that around 9PM, i was 9 cms. hooray! pushing to begin soon! he came back at 10:00 and i was so excited. but he literally said to me, "nine and a half..." NOOO! good grief. but i did finally make it to 10cm around 11PM, and my nurse paige - who was the most AMAZING person EVER - asked if i wanted a mirror, and i actually hesitated for some reason. but she said, "no, you want a mirror. i'm going to get you one." WOW. it was SOOOO amazing to watch.

after about 40 minutes of pushing, shepard walker slaten was born into the world at 11:44 PM - 23 hours and 59 minutes after my water broke. and his daddy got to catch him! chris said it was the most amazing thing he's ever done. it was so unreal to see this alien-looking, living creature come out of my body. seriously God??? you are SO stinking creative!!!!

after shepard was cleaned up and things had calmed down a little, dr barker was standing by the bed and asked if he could pray over us. are you kidding me? yes! so he did, and when he got to the part about the creation of life being such a miracle, he said it always overwhelms him, and he choked up a little. UNbelieveable. he delivers babies all the time, and yet he still gets overwhelmed by the miracle that God allows us to be a part of. LOVE HIM.

one of the coolest little serendipities about my labor story is that one of my dear friends who had moved back to chattanooga about 6 months before, delivered the same night in the room right beside mine! little molly was due the week before me, and since she was late and shepard was early, they have the same birthday!! talk about a sweet addition to such a miracle of a night.

a word about parkridge east. if i had created a world where i labored and delivered with the perfect hospital staff, it would had been RUBBISH compared to how we were treated. chris keeps calling it "disney world service" because it was above and beyond amazing. everyone - EVERYONE - was so kind, considerate, patient, professional, you name it. usually in situations where you're dealing with lots of different people and any kind of service, at least one person or experience will be below par. but not here. i told chris i wanted to have another baby as soon as possible just so we could go to parkridge east again. seriously!! the cherry on the top is that last week, we got a card in the mail from parkridge congratulating us on our new baby, and ALL of my nurses (we were there so long we had 4 or 5 different ones...) signed it, along with dr barker. are you kidding me????? so if you're reading this and you're going to have a kid and you're thinking about going somewhere else, don't!!! go to parkridge east!!!!!

sorry if this seems a bit choppy...trying to type the story out over the course of several days, in between feedings and naps makes it a bit hard to make it consistent. speaking of feedings, little guy is waking up hungry!! :)

SPRING BREAK 2010

2010-03-29T12:02:00.011-05:00

never in my wildest dreams would i have ever thought that an unborn child would (or COULD) move around THIS MUCH inside my belly. there have been moments where i have almost shouted out in almost-pain because he has pushed against my skin SO hard. i have had to have serious conversations with him, letting him know that, no, in fact, he canNOT exit my body through my belly button. dude. little guy is a MOVER!!! i'm loving it. i can't wait to see his little body moving around in real life person!!! if i had the camera, i would take a video of his antics, but alas. christopher has it. maybe soon. you will not believe it!!!

spring break has SPRUNG for the slatens and so far, we are doing spring break the way spring break needs to be done. saturday morning, chris and i woke up, had a simple breakfast (which is hard for me on saturdays...usually i like to go all-out with pancakes, eggs, sausage, omelettes - any or all of those combined) and then went to greenlife for laundry detergent. we left our car parked there and went for a walk - from greenlife to renaissance park to coolidge. we had alot to get done that day, so we didn't plan on staying out that long, but we wound up walking around for well over an hour. it was PERFECT BLISS!!! i love that man more than i ever thought possible. we sat on a big rock that was almost level with the water for a while, and just chatted. it was cold out, but we could tell it was going to warm up to the perfect spring temperature.

on the way back from coolidge, we headed up to frazier avenue for different scenery. we rounded the corner, and chris said, "i THOUGHT i smelled donuts!!" ah, julie darling donuts. i had been hearing about it for MONTHS but hadn't made it by yet. i said, "OOOOH! let's get one!!!" so we went in, and my life hasn't been the same since. picture the best donut you've ever had. now multiply it by a million, and you still haven't reached the pinnacle of how delicious julie darling donuts are. chris got a chocolate cake one - BEST EVER. and i'm a chocoalte snob. i got a buttermilk one, and it was so freshly hot that it fell apart when i tried to pick it up. i almost cried when i ate it.

so we ate our donuts while walking back to the car, and got our day started. what was our day? packing. chris had to pack for 3 things all at once. saturday night through monday morning, we were in knoxville for a few concerts in the big ears festival. (more on that later...) we stayed with my beautiful cousin and her new husband in their AMAZING house. i'm so jealous and inspired by how she has it decorated! it was so good to just get to be with them for a day or two.

chris left this morning to head to nashville to do some work on the album with the unbelieveably talented ben shive. pray for them! they're doing amazing work, they are.

a long time ago, i knew chris would be in nashville for our spring break, but i realized that i NEEDED the beach. this RARELY happens. so i talked my parents into taking this gigantic pregnant lady to the beach! we made reservations in savannah for wednesday-sunday (yes, this is easter...we're all okay with it) and i can barely breathe i'm so excited!! AAAND we get to see the crowders! (my aforementioned beautiful cousin's beautiful sister and her family!) perfect.

the best part about it is that chris is only working with ben through wednesday, so he'll leave nashville early thursday morning and drive to savannah to join us!!! HOORAY!!!!

so let's talk big ears for a minute. colin slaten - the amazing brother in law that he is - mentioned this festival on his facebook page a while back. long story short, THANK YOU COLIN!! we saw vampire weekend, my brightest diamond and the national. two words: HOLY MOLY. these are all three what i call "chris' bands" b/c i'm not the biggest fan of any of them, but i'll listen to them when they come across the ipod. the vampire weekend concert was, in a word, FUN!!! i didn't realize how much i liked their music. the national was, in a word, LOUD. ouch. theirs was the music i knew the least, and i while i did enjoy the concert (good GRIEF they can rock!!!), i wished it had been just a tad bit quieter. plus it was about 12:30 at night, so i was a bit sleepy. my brightest diamond...deep breath. wow. i don't really have words for her. phenomenal. breathtaking. extraordinary. these sort of come close. i cried simply because she was SO GOOD. wow.

so here's to hoping that an amazing weekend of amazing music inspires chris and ben to great heights this week!! hear hear!

ps - you know that's NOT my belly in the first picture...right?

germ-x rant

2010-02-24T14:09:00.002-05:00

have you seen the movie "as good as it gets"? you know one of the opening scenes where it shows jack nicholson washing his hands over and over and over again? he keeps getting new bars of soap, proving his true OCD-ness. (here's the clip on youtube) i'm afraid i'm slowly turning into this character! every time i leave a store or open a door at school or do anything really, i get out the hand sanitizer or [preferrably] go wash my hands and say "i've gotta get the swine flu off my hands!" i feel like it's EVERYWHERE! chris was sick a few months ago. he never went to the dr, but our family dr gave him tamiflu just in case - basically just because i'm pregnant. so we don't know for sure that he had it, but every single symptom of swine flu matched his symptoms. and i took care of him the whole time. also, i know i've been in kids' faces talking to them that have been diagnosed the next day with the swine. so i know i've been exposed to it, but i haven't had it, so does that mean i'm immune to it?

i got a flu shot once...in high school...and i proceded to get the flu. seriously? i figured if that was going to happen, why get the vaccine? people tell me it's because i had already been exposed to be before i got the shot, but i just don't know. i haven't gotten a flu shot since, and if i wasn't pregnant, i wouldn't even be worrying about it. but i'm worried. very worried. God tells us not to worry, but here i am. every day. wondering if this kid's gonna give me swine flu. i wonder if touching this door knob will give me swine flu. i reach to take a bite of my snack or lunch and freeze, thinking, have i washed my hands lately? do i need to tell you that my skin is cracked???

i know my reasons for not getting a vaccine don't really make sense...i mean, maybe they do. i don't know. you just hear so much about vaccines and immunizations being bad for kids. and it just seems like so many unnecessary chemicals to pump through a tiny little baby's body. and my reasoning for not getting it is that the swine flu vaccine is so brand new, and there have been several recalls, and they have no idea how it effects in-uetero children b/c no kids have grown up having had it! *sigh* paranoid, jack nicholson me.

i was praying about it on the way to school today, and i realized that i'm terrified - almost to the point of tears - of both options. i'm beginning to feel and understand the STRONG motherly instincts to do anything to protect this little one growing (and currently sqirming) inside me. i'm terrified of doing anything to hurt him. which means i'm terrified of not getting the shot and getting the swine flu - possibly giving myself horrible complications since pregnant women are at such high risk for "complications" from the swine flu, especially ones further along in pregnancy. but i'm also terrified to get the shot b/c i don't know what the chemicals might do to my little man.

do you watch "LOST"? did you see the scene where dogan wants jack to give sayid a pill? sayid says, "jack, if you want me to take that pill, i trust you." jack yells at dogan, "WHAT'S IN IT???" dogan tells him it's medicine to cure sayid's "infection". to test dogan's honesty, jack swallows the pill, at which point dogan freaks out and hymlics it out of him. "now will you tell me what's in it?!" asks jack. dogan says, "it's poison." i need a jack to find out for me.

so anyway, lately, i've been thinking i had ducked under the radar and was going to make it through this pregnancy without getting the flu AND without getting the shot. but it's making a serious comeback. i had heard that it was supposed to come back in a wave that was worse than before, but i had hoped it was a rumor. yesterday, i got a text from the kindergarten teacher who hadn't been feeling well that she did indeed have the swine and she wouldn't be back until monday. her husband also has it. two kindergarten kids went home with fevers today. i feel like it's all around me. i feel almost certain i'm going to get it. it makes me want to stay under the covers and not come out until little shepard is here. *whine*

should i just buck it up and get the vaccine? why can't God send planes to write messages in the sky?

babies rule

2010-01-23T11:28:00.003-05:00

i don't know if people stalk my blog or not. but if you're reading this, i'm just gonna go ahead and apologize for: a) the lack of updates. facebook tends to take most of my "updating the world" time. b) the lack of anything other than baby-related things in any posts to come. it's the only thing on my mind lately, so there's not much room for much else in my brain.

we're going to register for baby stuff today. i asked for suggestions on fb and got SO many wonderful responses. it's really great to hear from people who have done it before and have gained some wisdom from the process. God has SO blessed me this year at school with one of my kid's parents. she and i seem to have the same beliefs and stands on certain parenting issues (even though i'm technically not a parent yet...) and she's so generous with her advice and time!! and she speaks my love language - long rambly emails. :) i'm a big nerd and have made a giant spreadsheet with all the tips and suggestions people have given - complete with categories so i can sort them. you can mock me. i'm used to it.

i've ALREADY been blown away by the generosity of people around me. people at school have already scheduled my work shower; several moms from school have offered to loan, give or sell [for a GREAT discount] things; one of my kid's grandmothers (actually, the same kid whose mom gives such great advice! - what a giving family!) out of the blue handed me this huge baby-gift bag stuffed full of hand crocheted blankets and caps. SERIOUSLY?!; a friend that i haven't seen in years has offered for us to go rummaging through their house and pick out anything we want. simply amazing. i can't wait to offer this same kind of generosity and awesomeness to friends who have babies!!!

material things i'm excited about:
-i can't wait to own one of these.
-i can't wait to hang two prints in the nursery that my mom is generously giving us. (can't find a picture online...)
-i can't wait to get rid of these and get some of these!

that's about it. everyone keeps asking me all excitedly what i'm going to "do" the nursery in. i don't really have a plan, and i don't plan to have a plan. the kid's gonna have some cute bunny pictures on the wall, a colorful blanket, and some white shutters in the windows. other than that, i don't really want anything! simplicity rules!!

deeper things i'm excited about:
-i can't wait to look into my baby's eyes for the first time.
-i can't wait to sing, tell, read to him about how much Jesus loves him.
-i can't wait to smell that baby smell.
-i can't wait to eavesdrop on chris interacting with him.
-i can't WAIT to be a mom. i could go on and on.

babies r us, watch out. here we come. :)

70s Christmas Ornaments

2009-12-24T10:15:00.002-05:00

i had a dream that our baby was 3, and i met him at the church nursery for the first time. it was bizarre! we hadn't abandoned him or anything, just hadn't met him yet. we have a name in mind (in real life) that i'm not ready to announce since we're not 100% set, but let's just say it's little timmy for the sake of the story. in the dream last night, i saw this ADORABLE little boy with straight white-blonde hair cut into a bowl, green overalls and red shoes. i said "little timmy?!" and he looked up and shouted "MOMMY!" and ran to me. all i could do in the dream was say his name over and over again and hold him close. it was awesome. i want a kid. good thing...

speaking of baby, he's moving around regularly now!! after i had the worst stomach bug i've ever had, he started kicking and swimming and flipping - whoo! even enough that chris can feel him. it's AMAZING. i'm loving this business of growing a human. it's fascinating!!

i'm sitting here on christmas eve looking at our amazing christmas tree. it's enormous (well, for me at least - forrest would say it was tiny since it's not scraping the ceiling...) and fat and only cost $20 at lowes. thank you lowes. we have a few new ornaments that we've collected since being married, but most of them are old ornaments that our parents have either rejected or had the heart to pass along to us. some of chris' classics: a CREEPY mickey mouse with gloved-hands that spin and no eyes. yes. no eyes. *shiver*; a little marching soldier; a white, lacey (but metal) violin. some of my classics - i apparently did more looting at my parents' house than he did: a santa driving a truck loaded down with christmas trees - it actually rolls around and i remember playing with it when i was a kid; a styrofoam/cloth drum; my favorite little clay drummer boy; all the old vintage hallmark carousels; and the crowning glory - our angel. she has a green burlap dress with white panty-hose wings and a plastic molded head with a 70's hairdo. GLORIOUS. i love her. as long as she is in-tact, i will never have anything different on top of our tree.

i wish i could post photos of all of these glorious ornaments. but alas, our camera is gone forever. no where. lost. vanished. i'm going to the store today, including a trip to (shiver) walmart, and i'm tempted to buy another one...without asking chris...we'll see what i decide.

speaking of "vanished", one of my 5 year old students used that word the other day. i put in a christmas video for them to watch and was looking for the case for video that had been in the machine. i was making a big deal about it being missing and couldn't believe i couldn't find it. preston shouted out with a LOT of feeling and expression, "mrs. slaten! it just VANISHED!!!" it was HILARIOUS. i love my kids.

God looked at the people He created and said "there's only one way for me to show them that i love them..." Jesus left His throne, all the glory of heaven itself, to come down here to dirty, nasty, smelly earth, just to show us that His Father loves us. but He didn't swoop down as an angel or a grown man or something easy for Him. He came down as a little baby. people had to change His diaper. He had to learn to walk, to talk, to tie his...uh...sandals. absolutely phenomenal. thank you, Lord, for loving us so much. may this Christmas truly be about the One that it is celebrating!

three little words

2009-12-11T13:45:00.010-05:00

my whole life, i have always said that when i have kids, i want boys. all boys! no girls allowed!!! but when i got into teaching preschool and realized how fun little girls can be, i decided either would be really nice, for lots of their own reasons. since being pregnant, i haven't had a hunch one way or another as to which one this will be! someone told me that the mom is right 80% of the time about the gender, but i said "what if i don't HAVE a hunch?!?" one day i would say, "he...his...him....." and the next i would be saying, "her...hers...she....." i started really thinking it was a girl since i was having VERY vivid dreams about once a week that we had a little girl, and all the crazy "tests" came out as girl (the silly ones - string and ring and chinese gender chart) haha. like those are accurate. we had TONS of girl names that we liked, and not really any boy names that we liked.

so when we went to get our 16 week ultrasound on wednesday, and he said,

"it's a boy,"

i said "WHAT?????" i wasn't disappointed AT ALL, but i was definitely surprised!! A BOY!!!!!!!!!! it's really a boy. i wasn't aware that anyone from my generation in my family was capable of making a boy!! (my aunt and uncle have 6 grandkids - ALL girls!) i'm going to have a son. i have no words to express the emotions that go along with that phrase!!!!!

when i found out i was pregnant, i was beyond excited. when i had the ultrasound where it moved, the pregnancy became more "real" to me. not in any way that it wasn't real to me before, but to see it actually MOVE around, was...wow. it was amazing. but now that i know it's a boy...WOW. i can call it by name - or at least by gender - and know that that's who i'm talking to for sure!! (or at least i'm 75% sure...the dr said there's about a 25% chance it's a girl since it's still kind of early...apparently girl "parts" can be swollen while they're still developing at this stage, so there's a small chance it's a girl...but i SAW it man. it's a BOY!)

i will say i was tempted to keep it a secret from the general public b/c i don't want this boy to be overrun with BLUE. but i think it will balance out in the end. it's more fun to shout it from the rooftops anyway!

so if you're reading this and you have brilliant boy names, let me have it! sock it to me! don't hold back! we need some ideas, because everything we come up with is just sort of "eh." my k4 kids have named it "gizmo sillyface", and unfortunately, i keep calling it "gizmo"...i'm scared of getting used to it. so quick! send some ideas my way!!! we want it to be different, but nothing too terribly rare. easy to spell and pronounce. meaningful - either in literal meaning or because of family heritage, preferrably both. fitting for a child and an adult. i know, high hopes. but it will come. and we have plenty of time.

in other news, my k4's SHINED this morning! (or is it shone?) we had our christmas program, and i cannot even begin to describe how amazing they were. they stood where they were supposed to, sang the songs perfectly, didn't mess around or goof off, remembered the verse they memorized...it was AMAZING!!! not to mention they were beyond adorable in their natvity costumes. i wish i could post pictures of them, but i'm not about to post someone else's kid's face on my random blog! you'll just have to come over to my house if you want to see pictures or a video. :)

potato soup day

2009-11-13T22:23:00.005-05:00

my nana (pronounced nonna - very important) died 5 years ago this past august. it was really weird when she passed away since we saw her ALL the time. i lived with a roommate in the same apartment as her - there were only 4 apts, not one of the massive ones - and our apt was her old apt that i grew up going to. we moved in when she moved downstairs, right below us. she was so intermeshed into our lives that it took a long, long time to get used to her being gone. and apparently, i'm still getting used to it. i left work early today - probably shouldn't have gone at all - because of a sore throat and overall icky feeling. on the groggy drive home, i thought about food we had at home. three potatoes. mmm. maybe i'll call nana to get her to make potato soup....whoa.

blame it on being sick. blame it on being pregnant. but the thought just went through my head to call my grandmother that's been dead for 5 years!!! of course, she did make the most amazing potato soup ever. i attempted it, and it just doesn't make the cut. *sigh*

in other news, i have an announcement! FIRST TRIMESTER OVER!!! glory. everyone swore to me that i would find my energy again, and i must be honest and say that i doubted them. but really, almost to the day, i realized i wasn't having to sit down every 5 minutes, that i could dance around with my 4 year olds without breathing hard, that i wasn't taking deep breaths and sighing every second, that i wasn't in bed at 7:30 every night. hello energy!! i'm not running marathons or anything, but i'm not exhausted anymore. thank you Lord! but i will say that i seem to have lost my patience. it's just GONE with the kids. i'm trying to decide which is worse to not have - energy or patience...every time i decide on one, i change my mind. hm. they're both awful to lose...

we had our 12 week ultrasound this past wednesday, and IT. WAS. AMAZING. the first one at 8 weeks was truly miraculous. i've been excited to be pregnant, have been totally "in" the moment and knowing what was going on. but now it's different. almost more of a reality...even though that phrase doesn't quite explain it. the baby isn't a blob on the screen anymore. it has a very distinct head, body, arms, nose, eyes, etc...and the best part of all - IT MOVED!chris had our camera and caught it on video!! he (or she) was very still and i hadn't even thought about it moving. i've read that it is, even though i can't feel it, but i just hadn't thought about it. and i was already amazed at the baby-ness of it, and then JUMP! it was like he twitched or jerked or something - maybe he was asleep and we woke him up! wait wait! i'll try to post the video!!! then after that, he was flexing his neck and moving his arms around! chris said it looked like he was rubbing his eyes. :) :) :) it was remarkable. what an amazing miracle and priviledge that we get to take part in!!

oohooh! and since that video worked (i've never posted a video before!!!) i'll post this one too...

it was also the first time we've seen the doctor that's going to be with us the whole time. i usually see the p.a. of the office, but from now on it will be dr. barker, and we are SO happy with him. i'm so excited!!! he said that the next visit - in 4 weeks - we'll be able to tell the gender. WOW!! i cannot wait. every time i decide that i want one (boy or girl) i change my mind and want the other for one reason or another. then i go back to the previous choice...then back again...i just don't care which one we get!!!! either one will be phenomenal. i just hope and pray that he or she is healthy, happy, and comes to know the Lord.

off to clean the kitchen. how does it get so bad so fast?

my newest love

2009-11-05T14:26:00.006-05:00

i have fallen in love again. this time it's with an article of clothing, or maybe it's just an accessory. it's the BELLA BAND!!! goodness. it's fabulous, and i wish i had invented it. at 11 weeks pregnant, my belly is starting to expand just a little - enough to make my regular pants really tight. but i tried on maternity pants yesterday, and i am definitely not big enough for those. awkward phase!!! answer? the bella band. observe:

*note - this is NOT my belly...

all you do is pull on your regular pants that can't button anymore, leave them unbuttoned, maybe even unzipped a little, and stretch that bella band over the waist and VOILA! it smooths out the edges AND holds your pants up. it has worked marvelously for me today, and i'll probably have to go get one in another color as well. thank you target!

in other news, have you discovered "just veggies" yet? i'm munching on them right now. they are SO delicious and give me my veggies for the day, which is just fabulous. you can eat it like popcorn or you can throw them in soup or ramen to add just a few veggies to the mix! bravo!! i love them!!! my dear friend audrey introduced them to me. well, i guess i sort of just stole them from her since she was snacking on them, and she only just turned 2 so she couldn't defend her snack very well. but i did wind up buying my own eventually. :)

in final news, wait wait don't tell me - HERE WE COME! :) :) :)

weekend highlights

2009-11-01T20:24:00.005-05:00

this past week was the longest week in the history of the world. we were going up to the mountain cabin with chris' parents! we haven't been up to the cabin with them in TWO YEARS. i knew it had been a long time, but while we were there, i looked it up and it had been 2 years...shameful. we left after work on friday and got back this afternoon. there were several highlights.

since i'm still in my first trimester, all i do is sleep, talk about how tired i am, sit down, breathe deeply and sigh, sleep and talk about sleeping. so all i wanted to do this weekend was, you guessed it, sleep. no hikes for this trip! while not many naps were taken, lots of sitting around was had by all!! it was lovely. right when we got there, the cabin was warm with a fire, and dinner was perfectly ready - pot roast with broiled veggies. are you kidding me?! we got there, hugged the parents, sat down for 5 minutes, and then sat down to one of the most delicious dinners i've ever had!! GLORY! i said, "now THIS is my kinda vacation!!" and then the next night we had steaks grilled outside. wow the food was good!!!

they taught us a marvelous new game introduced to them by the lovely jane neall - mexican train dominoes. i won't try to explain it here, but just know that it is beautifully addictive and so so fun!! it's one of those games that you can play for a little while, do something else for a few hours and then come back to it later. the highlight of the game experience requires some explanation...i will explain that the winner gets rid of all his dominoes and gets a score of zero for that round. everyone else adds up the total dots of their remaining tiles that they didn't play, and that's their score for the round - lowest score in the end wins. an average score for someone who doesn't win is anywhere from 5-30. no big numbers. well, one round i didn't win and my score was 140. that is one-hundred-and-forty. GOOD GRIEF!!! if you know how to play, we were playing double-ones, and i never even drew a one out of the boneyard!!!!!!! i think i had about 25 tiles and had only played tiles on the "wild" trains. *sigh* it was HILARIOUS. we laughed for a long long time, and i officially went down in the record books. haha!!!

we took little banjo with us - his third trip to the mountain! but it was his first trip when it wasn't just chris and me. we learned that we should only take him when it's going to be the two of us. not that he was a nuisance. we just thought he does better when it's just us. but the banjo highlight was mostly our fault, not his: late this morning, chris and i were reading on the front porch, and he came to the front door and started crying. i said "oh i wish we could bring him out here!" a few minutes later, i got him and just held him out on the porch. we thought there would be no harm in letting him down to explore for a little while. he's NEVER run from us when we were trying to get him, so we figured he wouldn't bolt into the wilderness. well...he didn't bolt from us, but he got REALLY spooked and it took us a while to get him. he just kept circling and circling and circling the house and would NOT let us catch him. every time he would come to a window, he would reach his little paws up and cry. he really just wanted back inside!!! chris thought it was because he (banjo) thought we were "hunting" him, b/c we basically just followed him around everywhere he went. he eventually just sat under the front porch and wailed in a deep gutteral cry that i've never heard come from his little body! i crawled under the porch and he let me pick him up. when i handed him off to chris though, he started flailing around - which is REALLY unlike him - but we finally got him back inside. *whew* BAD decision on our part...and mostly my part since it was my idea. as he was recovering under the bed, we noticed that all his little paws were really muddy. they've never been muddy before!! poor little buddy...

the greatest highlight of the entire weekend was gaining an hour on saturday night. GLORY!!! i love that day every year. it's probably the last time we'll be able to enjoy it until our kids are old enough to enjoy it too...babies don't know about daylight savings time...*sigh*

guess what...???

2009-10-23T13:06:00.003-05:00

1) remember how nathan helped us move furniture around?
2) remember how we had to go to the mall to run some errands?
3) remember how i've been craving certain foods?

answers as to why:

1) we had to get the tv out of the 2nd bedroom, which meant we had to move the HEAVY bookcase on the other side of the den. why? someone is moving into the 2nd bedroom in about 7 months.

2) i had to buy some "bigger" clothes.

3) pregnant people crave certain foods.

we're gonna have a baby!!! on may 25, we'll welcome baby slaten into the world. holy smokes we're excited!!!

more to come...

food cravings

2009-10-20T09:36:00.003-05:00

happy last morning of fall break everyone! *sigh* since chris has been sick, i feel like we haven't done anything, which is okay since he's BETTER. glory. he woke up yesterday without a fever. that was the first time in SIX days. we were both relieved. he felt so good yesterday, actually, that we cleaned the house (man it needed it...and we're not really done...), went to see a movie (where the wild things are) and walked around the mall for a bit! it was glorious to just be out of the house. i ran some errands in the mall while chris played in barnes and noble. i asked him what he had been up to when we met back up, and he said "just being out of the house..." bless him.

i just ate a whole grain eggo waffle with peanut butter, sliced bananas, honey, cinnamon and ground ginger on top. GLORY. it was SO GOOD. i'm seriously considering making myself another one.

remember those oatmeal chocolate chip cookies i made the other day? remember how when i ate 3 of them, i had troubles? nathan came over last night to help us move some furniture around, and his "payment" was 6 of those cookies. he said "oh boy!!! i'm gonna eat one right now!" about 5 minutes later, they were ALL gone. NATHAN!!!! honey - you're gonna be hurtin. his reply: "i was hungry!" bless him.

have you ever craved one kind of food and only one kind of food? whenever i think about what i want to eat (except for my eggo creation that i'm about to go re-create) the ONLY thing i want is mexican. sometimes i go on a chinese kick. sometimes a burger kick. right now, it's mexican. from taco bell to taco mamacita. bring it on!!! why is that?

off to eat another breakfast, and then to school. yes, i know it's fall break. but our comments for our report cards that go out monday are due tomorrow...but, our boss won't be there tomorrow...hmm.............very interesting.

something is better than nothing

2009-10-17T12:35:00.003-05:00

it's fall break. i had yesterday off, and chris and i both get monday and tuesday - huttah!! our plans were for him to finish up his p/t conferences on friday afternoon and then head to cowen to visit nana. then on sunday we were going to keep going on to nashville to spend some time with the shives so chris and ben could get some studio time in. well, guess what? none of it is going to happen. last monday, i was home sick. tuesday we were both home sick. wednesday chris was dressed and ready to go to work and he randomly took his temp and it was still up - 101.4. *sigh* i got a zpack and knocked mine out. but chris, since he had fever and muscle aches, got tamiflu....oink! oink! i've just sort of been praying that i don't get it...but i'm beginning to think that it's not actually the flu. we probably had the same thing, only mine stayed in my head and his went down to his chest. poor thing can barely sleep because he's coughing so much. i need to call the dr to see if he needs an antibiotic. he's sleeping right now. long story short - no fall break for us. sorry nana. sorry nashville. bummer.

last night i baked a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. holy smokes. i was CRAVING them, and i wound up eating 3 of them...oosh. sorry tummy. it was a bit much for me. and now i have about 3 doz cookies in my kitchen...i need to start halving recipes...

i really like flowers. i worked an emmaus walk last weekend and when i got home, there was a beautiful arrangement of flowers - including red rovers! my favorite fall flower! - on our kitchen table. bless him. it brightened my day, and they're still in there!

i've been watching cooking shows on "create" all day today. it's pizza day - every show makes their own version of pizza. i'm dying! i want pizza so badly!!! instead? sweet potato and cottage cheese. mmmmmm!!!!!

sorry i never blog. i just don't think about it.....

life lately

2009-08-11T21:35:00.002-05:00

well, obviously, i've stopped blogging regularly. in fact, it's been so long since i've even been to this site that the blog address didn't even automatically pop up when i started typing, and our history usually stays for several weeks. is anyone even out there?

life lately has been amazing. chris and i finished stumbled across the finish line of our first year of teaching. it felt like we were catching our breath and laughing at the same time. laughing out of madness of a crazy-whirlwind school year for both of us (neither of us have teaching degrees. ie, no experience. ie, we "wung" it all year!!) but also laughing because we both LOVE TEACHING. how amazing is it when the one thing you say you want to do your whole life actually turns out to be JUST what you want to do??? it's so amazing.

anyway, crossing the finish line also meant crossing into the realm of SUMMER BREAK!!! ah, a time to finally get settled into our house that got put on the back burner the day we moved in! at least that was the plan. we did that a little (mostly in the past few weeks), but our main hurrah this summer was our amazing 3.5 week road trip out west. good GRIEF! we planned it out, and then played with the idea of not doing it. we literally wrote out the pros and cons of both - going vs. staying home. saving money...time to work on music and plan for next year's school year...work on the house...NAH! the pros of going FAAAAR outweighed staying home. most of the time while we were exploring our beautiful country, it felt like God had us by the hand and was saying, "over here! i want to show you THIS!!!" and we would climb to the top of angel's landing (zion national park) or hike above nevada falls (yosemite) or explore in tide pools along hwy 1 or stare bewilderdly (yes, it IS a word) up at a humongous redwood tree. what a mighty and creative God we serve!

pictures are here on facebook...why upload them twice?
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2077272&id=41802728&l=2efd0f631a
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2077314&id=41802728&l=f6de829bf4
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2077610&id=41802728&l=328e3395c7
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2077920&id=41802728&l=e546f48596

but here are some highlights. :)

well, it won't let me upload them. perhaps THIS is why i've stopped using blogger...

other than the big road trip.....well, that's about it. we did, as i mentioned, finally get a little motivated to get this house in order. jency and i were talking and praying together one night about my level of un-organization, and how it would probably improve if we would actually move IN. we literally prayed for God to provide us an affordable couch. THE. NEXT. DAY. we found a couch in perfect condition for less than our target price. coincidence? i think not. thank you Lord. :) we also got awesome curtains and throw pillows! the curtains were originally $40/panel (we needed 5 panels) but were on sale for $30. so $150 on curtains. no big deal. the lady rang them up and gasped. "oh! these are only $14.99!!!" WAHOO!!! another gift!! now we just need to get all our pictures up on the walls, get some (free) patio furniture from my parents' house, and we'll be good to go! we've been here a year and haven't had one party. *sigh*

banjo is good. thanks for asking. we went to the vet for his little checkup and dr. lena told me that he was 2.5 pounds overweight. oh banjo. you lardo. he's 13.5 pounds and should weigh 11. apparently i can't trust the amount of cat food that the bag tells me to feed him! he is the best cat though. seriously understands english and obeys us...at least when we're around. for example, we don't want him on the new couch (please - just ONE item without fur all over it!) and we've been firm and consistent telling him NO and GET DOWN which he really responds to. the other day, he was sniffing it while we were eating dinner at the dining room table. i leaned around the corner and said quietly "banjo, don't get up there...." he sniffed it again, and went across the room to lay down. but of course, he's probably thinking "whatever. i'll just sleep on it at night and when you're gone all day. who cares..." :)

i'm addicted to SOME NEW TREND. it's a novel written and published chapter by chapter, and it's just so fun and addictive! i hadn't had a chance to listen to it until our road trip (chris would write and play music while he was riding and i was driving, and i would listen to this with my ear buds) and i'm just plain addicted. listen! you'll love it! or you can read it too.

i'm officially stuck online when i should be sleeping, so i'm going to post and go to sleep. school starts soon!!!!!!!!!

Jesus took in that breath

2009-04-12T15:59:00.002-05:00

High noon in the valley of the shadow
When the deep of the valley was bright
When the mouth of the tomb shouted,
"Glory, the groom is alive"
So long, you wages of sin go on,
Don't you come back again
I've been raised and redeemed;
You've lost all your sting
To the victor of the battle at
High noon in the valley
In the valley of the shadow

And the demons, they danced in the darkness
When that last ragged breath left his lungs
And they reveled and howled
At the war that they thought they had won

But then, in the dark of the grave
The stone rolled away
In the still of the dawn on the greatest of days

High noon in the valley of the shadow
When the shadows were shot through with light
When Jesus took in that breath
And shattered all death with his life
Be gone, you wages of sin
Go on, don't you come back again
I've been raised and redeemed
You've lost all your sting
To the victor of the battle
High noon in the valley of the shadow

Let the people rejoice
Let the heavens resound
Let the name of Jesus, who sought us
And freed us forever ring out

All praise to the fighter of the night
Who rides on the light
Whose gun is the grace of the God of the sky

High noon in the valley of the shadow
When the shadows were shot through with light
When the mouth of the tomb shouted,
"Glory, the Groom is alive"
Be gone, you wages of sin
Go on, don't you come back again
I've been raised and redeemed
All praise to the king
The victor of the battle
High noon in the valley
In the valley of the shadow

easter day!!

2009-04-09T13:36:00.002-05:00

easter is my FAVORITE holiday. hello? Jesus rose from the DEAD?? are you kidding me?! that is SO cool. i mean, anyone can die, but to stinking RISE up again? sheesh. i just love it!! and, i mean, i'm all about easter bunnies and eggs and stuff, but i really wanted my kids to hear the REAL easter story. we've been reading it all week and they colored this with crayons (just one of them - don't know how to break it up) on regular printer paper, then they rubbed the back of it with a cotton ball soaked with oil and voila! it made it a stained glass window!! they've been so pretty hanging in our window all week, and today they get to take them home.

we also did the legend of the sand dollar thanks so an AMAZING friend who collects sand dollars and let me have THIRTY of them!! each of my kids got one to break open to see the doves and one to take home whole. it. was. awesome!!!! they LOVED it. i just hope they make them home whole...i painted them with glue, so here's hoping to in-tact sand dollars for easter!!!

today was insane. we had a "wacky weather" field trip from the creative discovery museum that we booked way back in august, so we didn't realize it was our easter party day, but no worries! it worked beautifully! then we had our easter party craft and snack, then we hunted eggs with the 3rd grade!! then a surprise visit from the easter bunny topped it off as the funnest day ever! and the kids were great!!!! exclamation points!!!!!!!!! but don't forget the reason for the celebration:

He is not here; he has risen, just as he said!!!

sand dollars!

2009-04-08T15:28:00.003-05:00

The Legend of the Sand Dollar

There's a pretty little legend

That I would like to tell

Of the birth and death of Jesus

Found in this lowly shell.

If you examine closely,

You'll see that you find here

Four nail holes and a fifth one

Made by a Roman's spear.

On one side the Easter lily,

Its center is the star

That appeared unto the shepherds

And led them from afar.

The Christmas poinsettia,

Etched on the other side

Reminds us of His birthday,

Our happy Christmastide.

Now break the center open,

And here you will release

The five white doves awaiting

To spread Good will and peace.

This simple little symbol,

Christ left for you and me

To help us spread His Gospel

Through all eternity.

cheesy chocolatey goodness

2009-03-29T14:14:00.003-05:00

mmmmmm. chocolate chip cheesecake. the saddest thing that's happened to me in a long time. let me explain. i love cheesecake. it's easy to make and i've done it several times before. chris's favorite dessert is cheesecake. here comes the sad part: this is the first cheesecake i've ever made. bah!! i was going to make it for his birthday back in december, but we had been rolling in decadent everything for about 2 weeks there, and the thought of another rich dessert made us both feel icky. so he asked me to wait to make it. so a couple of days ago while he was at work and i was still spring breakin it, i whipped it up. the next day (b/c we were having dinner with my family that night), i put candles in it and sang happy birthday to him! it was really fun!! and talk about DELICIOUS!!!!!!!

banjo, the one and only, and other ramblings

2009-03-27T11:46:00.007-05:00

chris realized a few months ago that his subconscious named our cat after an existing cartoon cat. and when he showed me the youtube video of banjo the woodpile cat, i almost cried. no! we did NOT copy this by naming our cat banjo!! but it seriously creeped me out that he even LOOKS like our banjo. (markings, ear hair and all) *sigh* compare:

well, it doesn't matter. our banjo is way cuter and much more cuddly. he just jumped into my lap (which is sort of rare - he's not one of those "always in your face" cats) for a little snuggle session. *sigh* he really is the best cat ever.

today is my last day of spring break and i feel almost sick. there was so much more i wanted to get done! so much i wanted to see! so much i wanted to accomplish!! oh well. what's done is done. and i wouldn't trade my trip to houston for ANYTHING. chris got up at 5 (which was really 4:50 since his clock is 10 minutes fast...vomit!) to get school stuff finished up. i offered in my fakest, cheeriest voice i could muster "is there anything i can do to help you? no seriously - i'm offering..." when he said "nah" i can't lie, i wasn't too disappointed. i dozed until about 8:30 at which time banjo big my finger so hard he broke the skin (NOT happy about this biting-in-bed habit), went to the grocery store, and have been in the kitchen ever since. baking is my therapy. i made two batches of granola for two lucky recipients (you'll just have to wait to see who you are...), a big batch of pimiento cheese for sandwiches next week, and am about to make another big surprise. if i'm really motivated and continue to pump life support into my once-dying blog, you might get to see a picture of the big surprise...

speaking of bad banjo habits, he keeps jumping on the counter. AAH! he NEVER did this until the last time he spent time at the slatens with that hooligan cat rascal (the cat previously known as jasper) whom i hold solely responsible for this new detestable habit. i canNOT live in a house with a cat that jumps on the counter. we're never around when he gets up there (and i KNOW he's up there when we're gone) and when he hears us coming, he jumps down immediately, so you KNOW he knows he's not supposed to do it. but. (i hate this but.) today i was finishing up the p. cheese, and up he came. right beside me. meowing cutely the whole time. i screamed and yelled "no. no. no. no." so loud my voice echoed in the house and put him on the ground. oooooooh!!! i HATE it. i looked up some stuff about how to stop him from doing it, and there's several things we can do. before i leave today, i'm going to set up a little booby trap of plastic tupperware containers and cups around the edge. that way, if he DOES jump up there, they will come crashing down and scare him without hurting him. we'll see if it works....

oooooh. yesterday i witnessed a most amazing thing. a kildeer bird has laid her eggs directly on gravel, literally inches away from the ccs track. and every time someone comes near her (think track meet) she flips out. i don't think she dive bombs people, but she circles around making distress calls. kildeers will fake a broken wing to lure predators away from their nest, which i think is just AMAZING. anyway, i called the nature center to see if there was anything we could do to relocate the eggs to a safer spot (anywhere near middle school boys are NOT a good environment to lay your eggs...) but they said to just leave her alone. and apparently, right when the chicks hatch, they're in such a state that they can get up and follow her anywhere. AMAZING AGAIN!!! usually the eggs are incubated for a couple of weeks and then they're unable to leave the nest for another couple of weeks. killdeers. amazing.

i was going to post some pics from houston, but my internet is being stupidly slow...maybe later. off to work on my huge giant surprise!!!

for real deal

2009-03-24T13:14:00.003-05:00

did you know that a 200 foot long, 40 foot deep pool will hold 6.2 million gallons of water and take over a month to fill?

did you know that a rocket that sends people to the moon, when laid down, is longer than a football field? (click on these pictures to see their full size, and then notice the people standing around)

did you know that when astronauts are in space, they have to exercise or their bones will deteriorate and their muscles will shrink because they aren't having to use them as much?

did you know?!

did you know???

did you KNOW????

(this is the crew in space right now - on the STS-119 on the spaceship Discovery.)

oh my word. i just spent a few hours walking around the johnson space center in houston, and good GRIEF it was cool. thank you SO MUCH jeremy. it. was. awesome. he didn't think he would get to take me into the mission control center since there's a shuttle up right now, but he found out last night (he's been working 9pm-6am for 2 weeks) that he COULD! so i got to watch the people at their desks communicating with the people way up there. no wait - there. *points* or maybe it's over there...anyway, it was amazing. very overwhelming. i felt like i was at disney world, which was kinda sad because this was the real deal.

he also found out that he had access to take me into see the HUGE pool (see above stats and pic) where they train with weightlessness, and there were actually people down there training which he said he had never seen. people in huge white space suits floating around working on a mock space station. wow.

and we got to walk around where they train in normal gravity just to learn where everything is at the station.

and i got to see an actual rocket that didn't actually go to the moon, but it could have - it wasn't just a model. (see above stats and pic)

and i got to see an exact replica of the "cock pit" of one of the shuttles. during launch, it's a rocket. in space, it's a space ship. during landing, it's an airplane. so many buttons. so many switches. such a small space. he took a picture of me sitting there...i'll upload pictures later...um...probably to my facebook. all these pics are just from google images.

anyway, it. was. so. cool. i knew nothing (well, very very little) about anything they did before going in, and now i'm a walking information source. well, i've forgotten most of it...but it was unbelievably fun to hear about it first hand today.

i go home tomorrow and i'm very, very sad. that's all.

lovely monday

2009-03-23T16:03:00.002-05:00

today we went to the kemah boardwalk, a charming little amusement park/village by the gulf. it was w-iiiiiiiii-ndy and a bit overcast. we didn't ride any rides because we had little audrey with us, and we didn't go in any stores because they weren't open - much to our cofusion. but we had a great time just walking around and looking at the place. i appreciated the fact that you could just walk around without having to pay an admission fee. i would really like to see the place at night, all lit up and crowded.

i just woke up from an hour-and-a-half nap on the couch. mmmm. spring break.

elizabeth is the kind of person i can just sit with and say i've had the best time EVER. we both think that we might have been twins separated at birth by how similar we are. i can't tell you how many hours we've spent laughing and chatting together in our lifetime. and their little audrey, we both agreed on earlier today, is the cutest thing on earth. she's at that hilarious stage where babble is her main form of talking, but she'll mimic anything - ANYTHING - she hears. look out, tongue!! little ears are listening. elizabeth is the kind of person that, if we lived in the same town, we would be inseparable friends. move back to chattanooga, ebit!!!

tomorrow we get to have an official, real-deal tour of NASA. are you kidding me?? ebit's hubby works there. he's been working the night shift for about 2 weeks now since they have a shuttle up there. see it? up there...anyway, i'm super excited. we don't get to go into mission control though, since they lock everything down to outsiders when they have a shuttle up there. no, there. up there....i'm a little nervous. what if i push a button or something that makes something blow up?? what if i say something stupid like "what's that?" and they'll be like "oh my gosh. you don't know what THAT is?? pppsshhhaw!!" *sigh*

off to finish perelandra. happy monday!

everything for anything

2009-03-22T14:05:00.004-05:00

hello. i'm sitting in the breezy, welcoming living room of my dear friend, elizabeth. i'm officially on spring break, and it's weird! spring break, summer break, christmas break - all for students. AND TEACHERS!! glory. chris and i found out that our spring breaks were different at the beginning of the year and were disappointed, but then realized that we could go places alone and still have fun. plus we have summer break together, so we really can't complain. so i bought a ticket to houston, tx, and here i am.

i think the reason i don't update my blog anymore is because it overwhelms me. i feel like i have to update you, the reader, who probably isn't even there because it's been so quiet here you've wandered away for good, on EVERYTHING if i'm going to update you on anything. but i realized the other day that that's just not true. so here i am on a quiet sunday afternoon while audrey and jeremy are asleep and ebit is taking a shower. just rambling...

the whitmires are gone. they moved to spain a few weeks ago, and i probably won't see them until alice is a teenager and tallulah is in kindergarten. ouch! hopefully we'll be over for a visit at some point. and maybe they'll come home before their five years are up. but i'm preparing for the worst, people.

i'm almost done reading "perelandra" by cs lewis, and it's amazing. you should totally read the space trilogy by cs lewis. it's not a typical sci-fi book...of course, i've never read one of those, so i really don't know if that's true or not...hm. anyway, the hero of the book is from earth, and perelandra (which is just venus) is just beginning - only one woman and one man on it. evil is trying to make the woman sin against God, and ransom (that's the name of the hero...hmmm) has been sent to stop it. oosh. it's great.

i'm also reading "the princess and the goblin" by george macdonald, and it's just fabulous. i'm not a fast reader (well, i'm getting faster the more i read) and i was on page 60 before i knew what had happened.

i'm also reading the original mary poppins book. i found it for sale in bi-lo (the local grocery store) for $3 the other day, and snatched it up. it's in a cute classic cover and has all the original illustrations and everything. it goes well with my "mary poppins in the kitchen" that christopher got me for valentines' day in england. (epcot's version of england)

yes, i read a lot since meeting christopher. thank goodness. it's a fabulous world that i avoided for most of my life - much to my mother's dismay.

there are so many pictures i could share with you, but i don't have them with me, obviously, and i've already posted most of the ones that are of interest on my facebook page. so go there if you want exciting pictures.

the owens go to church at night, and i'm a HUGE fan already. it's hard for me to rest on sundays because i feel like i'm up and out the door, and then we have to worry about lunch, and by the time i'm home and "supposed" to relax, i'm wound up and feel like i need to up and at 'em. but today we just slept in, rolled out of bed whenever, had a quiet simple breakfast, and have just hung around the house, playing with little audrey and reading some. we'll leave for church around 4:15 and then go to dinner afterwards. brilliant!

another great idea i've heard recently was from my other dear friend, carrie who has her sabbath rest on saturday. she goes to church on sunday, but her day of actual "rest" is saturday. it makes sense to me because i'm always exhausted on saturday. it's the first day after a long week of work, and i'm not really motivated to do much on that day. and most of the time, i lie around and do nothing anyway, and on sunday, i'm motivated to get work done. hmm...

well, happy spring. finally. friday was a really great laid back day - partly because it was a half day and there were only 7 (out of 15!) kids in my class. but we made bird feeders (stringing cheerios on yarn and tying in a circle, and then spreading peanut butter on bagels and dipping in bird seed) and colored flowers to hang on the door and from the ceiling. yes, welcome spring!! i've been ready for you for a while!!

off to paint my toenails...:)

the fourth picture

2009-01-25T14:21:00.007-05:00

alright alright. i know it's been a shamefully long time since i've posted and that i have become one of those whom i mock shamlessly about letting their blogs die. my explanation? for almost four years, i had a job where i sat at the computer ALL day and sometimes had a lull in things to do, so i could update my blog. (i hope DLH never reads this...) now i'm running around with four year olds all day long, and the time i spend on the computer at home totals about a half hour, if that. if you really want to know what's going on in my life, oh ye blogging fans, go to my facebook page, since that's where all my pictures are now.

the reason for this post is that alexandra tagged me, and i must not ignore a tag. okay fine. normally i think i probably would ignore a tag, but i'm procrastinating going outside and raking leaves since the leaf picker uppers are coming to our neighborhood this week, and what a better way to do it than by playing a blog game! it shows that i'm not even caught up on reading all the blogs i used to visit every day, since she tagged me almost two weeks ago.

here are the rules:

1) Choose the 4th folder where you store your pictures on your computer.
2) Select the 4th picture in the folder.
3) Explain the picture.
4) Tag 4 people to do the same.

No cheating (cropping, editing, etc.)

hahaha!!! so we have this hole in the floor of our extra/sun room, and i was down in the basement one day doing laundry while chris was upstairs in said room moving furntiure around. since he was moving stuff around, the hole - that was usually covered up by banjo's litter box - was now exposed. he starts yelling at me to look up here! look up here!! and i see THIS:

(the better of the two pictures) and die laughing. ever heard of ceiling cat? (that's not the original one...can't find it) so we switched places so he could see our version of ceiling cat and chris brought a camera down. then i had a turn being "ceiling psycho lady".

i officially tag EBIT, JGLASS, DB-AND-JENI, and i fail since those are all i'm tagging.

happy sunday! off to rake! :)

shaving the yard's legs

2008-09-13T12:57:00.003-05:00

mowing the lawn is sort of like shaving your legs. chris has a TON of grading to do, and the lawn is completely out of control, so i decided to mow the lawn myself. after concluding that the mower that was given to us as a most generous gift was NOT going to run for more than 2 minutes, nathan graciously allowed us to borrow his. a mower that actually runs? wow. what a concept. so anyway, as i was going along, very thankful for the invention of the self propeller in a mower, i realized it was much like shaving my legs. i would look back over a row i had just gone over and say "hm, missed a couple of blades there". it made me laugh. and realize that i'm due a mowing myself. sorry. that was tmi.

life the past few weeks has been really busy and amazing. my job is starting to go really well. i'm getting into the groove of planning and taking care of 16 four year olds. they're getting used to me as well. well, sort of. chris' job is going full swing too. tests, quizzes, lectures, dancing. it's all there. our poor house has really taken a back burner, but we did finally hang two things on the walls! hooray!

last friday we got banjo a brother. a gray, white and black tabby named...well, we still don't know his name. bat man. darth vader. smegol. jupiter. ziggo. who knows. it's been hard having two cats - we thought it would be easy, but hemingway is REALLY sick, so he hasn't wanted to play with banjo, and after i took him to the vet, we learned that we should have had the separated since feline upper respiratory infections are REALLY contagious. joy. so now smithsonian lives in the second bedroom and sleeps most of the time. he doesn't eat unless i hold him in my lap and hold the microwaved tunafish (recommended by the vet - if he doesn't smell it, he won't eat it, and hot tuna is most likely the most smelly thing on earth) in front of his face, and even then he only licks it. *sigh* hopefully the meds we're giving him will kick in soon.

it's becca guess's wedding day!! HOORAY!!

tonight we get to hear THE DEEP VIBRATION play in chattanooga!!! GLORY!! we've been wanting to hear them live for YEARS. you heard me. years. i cannot WAIT!!! if you're in town, you should come to midtown music hall tonight at 8:00. it's going to absolutely rock my face off.

we have a chestnut tree. good grief we have a chestnut tree. it has started dropping the most spikey pods on earth, but the chestnuts themselves, look like buckeyes...are they buckeyes?...anyway, one of the branches sort of broke off a few weeks ago and is just hanging there getting browner and browner, but all of the pods have dropped off of just that branch, and it's way more chestnuts than i would ever be able to do anything with. so when all the regular pods start falling off, i'll be swimming in them. if you have a use for chestnuts, let me know if you want some. i have plenty to spare!!

what else...hm. i'm sweaty and covered in grass, so i should probably go take a shower. and mow my legs.

resurrection letters, vol. 1

2008-08-30T09:14:00.003-05:00

october 21 cannot come quick enough. it's the release date of andrew peterson's LONG coming newest record. well, we found out this morning that you can listen to AAAAALLLLLLL of the songs on centricity's website. GO for crying out loud!!! GO!!!!!

http://centricitymusic.com/andrewpeterson/music

finally it happened to me

2008-08-24T20:53:00.003-05:00

greetings strangers. i'm sitting on my couch with banjo the biscuit maker *slash* perfect kitty EVER snuggled up against my leg and my dear husband on the other side of me grading journals. poddy (our ipod) is on "shuffle instrumental", and occasionally chris will break out in a little laugh from his students' entries. that's right friends, we have wireless internet. finally. glory.

i'm not entirely sure that the blogging world knows that i have a new job. i am now a K4 (preschool) and K5 (kindergarten) teacher. *deep sigh* it fell into my lap, gift wrapped, straight from God's hand. it is EXACTLY what i've been wanting, wishing for, praying for, waiting for since college (that's 7 years, people). as chris and i were packing to MOVE INTO OUR HOUSE about 3 weeks ago, i got the call. are you serious? NOW??? now you're offering me this job?? the day before she called me, the other teacher got another amazing job offer that she couldn't turn down because they (where she was going) had fired the current employee. my new boss said that she and jennifer (the old teacher) sat there and cried. they both knew she had to take the job, but jennifer said "but what are you going to do?!" to which my boss replied, "i don't know. but the Lord will provide." and she told me that's when my name came into her mind. really? it was that easy?

see - a few months ago, i got home from another day of sitting behind the computer, feeling like my creativity was dying, and aching from my carpal tunnel-like issues. i said "good grief i want to teach preschool!" and a little voice said "well if you want to do it, you're going to have to do SOMETHING!" so i decided to just print a bunch of resumes and cover letters and shower them across chattanooga - job openings or not. i was aching to find a new job. it was a real, solid desire. i was going to go during my lunch breaks, and my first one i was aiming for four schools. i only wound up leaving my resume at one school - the one where i'm now working - and the next day i woke up with a peace - a true peace - about staying put. we had a new house, chris had a new job, we didn't need another change in our lives. "what about the one resume you left?" ah well. it'll just die on the vine. no big deal.

well, early or mid july rolled around, and the thought just started floating around in my head "wouldn't it be funny if that school called me? hmm..." i didn't have a strong desire to leave by then. it was just a floating thought.

it's late and i need to sleep, so to sum up, it was "catastrophic timing" (in the words of my former boss...thanks man) for me to quit at mccallie, but i had to. i absolutely had to. not only is it the EXACT job i've wanted for 7 years, but she told me that they want me to get my masters in education AND they'll pay for it. WAH??? *whew* dude. wow. WHOA.

classes started this past monday, and i am LOVING it. truly. tomorrow begins the real rotation where i'm teaching K4s and K5s enrichment and PE...HAHAA!! i'm a PE teacher.

i can't believe we're both teachers. what a funny God we serve!! we're probably gonna need another computer.

update

2008-08-04T08:58:00.003-05:00

update on jane:

Praise our Papa God for good news and answer to many prayers! Jane and David got the results early (as in today), and it is the least aggressive form. This kind is treatable and the doc said that even though the average is 5 years, he has (or had) a woman that survived it for 10 years. Don't know if that is current or past. Anyway...it's still good news.
Please keep them in your prayers. This is the beginning of a tough journey.
Thank you for praying.

GLORY! keep praying...

pancreatic cancer

2008-07-30T14:12:00.002-05:00

please pray for my dear friend jane who just found out that she has pancreatic cancer. she and her husband are so active, so young (early 50's, but look and act like they're 30), are brand new grandparents...this is such a shock.

she had been having problems with what they thought was her gall bladder, and when they were looking at that, they found the spots on her pancreas - praise the LORD they found it when they did!! there are apparently two kinds of pancreatic cancer - the "good" kind and the "bad" kind. they're 85% sure that she has the bad kind. the good kind will let you live for 5 years. the bad kind only months. please join me in praying that God wipes it out COMPLETELY!!! He doesn't care how long anything gives anyone to live. He is the author and giver of life. only He makes the call.

in a similar vein, check out these two videos. the first one is a worship song. listen to it. the second one is the story behind this particular performance. believe it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4xsWldmqAo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ_ny8hMgRY&feature=related

monumental day

2008-07-25T14:46:00.002-05:00

today, july 25, 2008, christopher signed his name close to one million times to officially make us HOMEOWNERS. and it was actually FUN. as i was sitting there in the tiny room with all the papers flying, i stepped back (metaphorically) and marvelled at God's blessings. josh (one of the sellers) and chris are friends and play music together, rebecca (the wife of josh) and i work together (for a few more days until they move away), our mortgage guy is chris' cousin, and the title lady (see how i know all the technical terms for all these people?) goes to church with josh and rebecca. (she actually said she had been encouraged to thwart the closing somehow to get j&r to stay in town!) the atmosphere in the room was peaceful and calm. kim the title lady was SOOOOO nice and helpful and informative without making us feel like dummies. it was AMAZING. and THEN j&r, chris and myself went out to lunch together. that's how it should happen, you know? you sign a contract, make a deal, and then break bread together (it was rice this time though - thank you hiroshis!!). when we were parting ways, rebecca actually said "wow, thanks for letting us squat in your house for a few days!!" it made me cry...good tears!! i have pictures, just no way of uploading them right now.

in other, slightly related news, jency franklin is my hero. i asked her off-hand "you guys don't happen to have any boxes lying around, do you?" oh my friend. she LOADED her pathfinder with boxes - not one more would have fit - and brought them to me. some of them were HUMONGOUS which is precisely what we need, and some even had bubble wrap and packing paper stuffed inside!! what a blessing she is!! speaking of blessings, josh and rebecca are AMAZING in that they cleared out the crawl space of the basement and are letting us fill it with as many boxes as we want!! we've already moved two loads over there. speaking of blessings AGAIN, our small group leader, totally voluntarily, said last week "...and i'm taking off work on the 31st to help you guys move..." are you KIDDING ME??? amazing. we are SO loved.

i just got an email saying that IJM is being featured on dateline tonight. here's the email:

Dear Lyndsay,
Dateline NBC this evening will feature a special update on
IJM undercover work in Svay Pak, Cambodia that resulted in the rescue of 37
girls. The Dateline NBC story, entitled “Children for Sale,” originally aired in
January 2004 and has received significant airtime as well as two Emmy awards.

Tonight’s update will include a new interview with Gary Haugen as well as
interviews with several of the young girls rescued by IJM in the original
raids.

9pm EDT/PDTDateline NBC

Please watch and spread the word to friends who may be new to
IJM!

Gratefully– International Justice Mission

P.S. Feel free to visit https://netcommunity.ijm.org/NETCOMMUNITY/page.redir?target=http%3a%2f%2fwww.ijm.org%2fpresscenter&srcid=29592&srctid=1&erid=2957281 for previous Dateline NBC footage along with recent IJM media coverage. For more information surrounding the Svay Pak operation, please read Terrify No More by Gary Haugen.

you should read "terrify no more", but if you don't do that, you should DEFINITELY watch this program tonight, friday, july 25. their organization is stinking amazing.

have you prayed against the abortion clinic being opened in chattanooga today? i've been being led to pray through psalm 139 - we have ALL been fearfully and wonderfully made!! pray that God will intervene and this clinic will NOT be opened!!! (see the post below this one for more details...)

pray against a chattanooga abortion clinic

2008-07-23T15:25:00.001-05:00

i'm going to use my friend's words b/c i'm in a hurry to get home, but she pretty much sums it up. this is hard news - please join us as we pray against this!!

A few days ago, I received an email concerning the opening of an abortion
clinic in Chattanooga. To even speak this, makes me sick to my stomach! I have
since verified this information through several means, and found out, that there
is indeed a location, with an address, verified owner of the building and that
the 'company' who seeks to open this also has clinics in Knoxville and Raleigh.

I spoke with AAA Women's Services today and learned of how the abortion
clinic was closed down in 1985 in Chattanooga. There has NOT been one since. The
stories are amazing, miraculous and also heartbreaking. As concern grew in the
area, then, people took action through prayer, counseling, and money was raised
to purchase a particular building that became AAA Women's services. That story
in itself was miraculous. The heartbreaking part was that the two doctors who
performed abortions fell ill, and then died. I pray that they came to the Lord
before they died.

I feel strongly, VERY strongly, that if our brother's and sisters in this
region were aware that this was about to open, the Body of Christ in our region
would stand up against this.

I don't know how you are to be involved. Only the Lord can speak to your
heart concerning this. However, I do believe that our region is set apart for
various reasons of the Lord. I believe that this is an attempt to thwart God's
plans for our region. It is an act of satan!!!

I have contacted Family Action Council, on how we may be involved. I am waiting
to hear back from them. AAA told me that they are aware of this threat, and that
FACTN, can help concerned citizens with information on how to get involved:

http://www.factn.org/

Please, will you pray that this horrible clinic does NOT come to
Chattanooga. That the enemies plans are thwarted! Will you please share with
family and friends around you about what is attempting to come? Will you seek
the Lord to ask Him what you can do?

I personally feel so strongly about this, that if the Body stood up against
this, they would not open their doors!!!!!! We have authority in Jesus, and I
KNOW this is NOT in His heart.

The rumors have been on the news, in the paper and on the internet. Yet,
they aren't taking appointments, yet. (Rumors were August opening). Please pray
for the doctor, that he would repent, and understand that he or she participates
in murder. Right now, this thought just came to mind, that for us to pray that
the Lord would give this individual dreams about the babies and children playing
and that the doctor would see the childrens' destinies in his/her dreams!
Anything is possible with God!

I pray that the pastors of our region would quickly be informed of this
news, and that the Body of Christ would not sleep, but speak and declare truth,
love and hope!!!

Forrest and Alex's Wedding Festivities!

2008-07-17T09:11:00.009-05:00

how blessed am i to have such an amazing brother and new sister in law??! i can't wait to get to hang out with them as a married couple!!

this was a coed shower that was given for them. we didn't get too many pictures, but here's some of them opening a pretty huge gift of outdoor furniture!! alex is saying "shoot girl! are you serious????"

the happy couple!!!

one of their friends had just had a baby (4 or 5 days before!!) and forrest got a chance to hold her (him? shoot. i can't remember.) i LOVE the look he's giving her!!

alex's bachelorette party was an absolute blast!! we laughed a LOT that night!! :)

hot pink sash and feather boa, sparkly tiara and giant fluffy veil?? it's the bride!!! :)

all the ladies!!

the morning after at ihop. MMM!

thursday night before the wedding, forrest and all the guys went to the lookout's game where tw arranged him to throw in the first pitch!! here's a little video of it too!!

july 11-12, 2008 were two perfect days!! the rehearsal was great!

i was giving liza instructions about what to do. lila couldn't be there b/c kendall was in labor with little josephine!! :)

the rehearsal dinner was beautiful and delicious! lots of wonderful things were said about this amazing couple. (that's tallulah june in laurie's arms - NOT a new towns baby!!!)

the day of the wedding! in alex's words, she was "so chill" all morning.

most beautiful bride EVER!!

woo hoo!! look at those red shoes!!! :)

lovely ladies all dressed up and ready to go!! i LOVED getting to spend time with these amazing women.

the only picture chris was able to get during the ceremony b/c of the lighting. liza and lila walked down the aisle together for about 5 rows, then lila turned around and picked up every petal liza had dropped. she slowly made her way down the aisle (so slowly that alex was almost kicking her heels as she and her dad were coming down!) picking up every single one!!! HYSTERICAL!!! i love that girl. :) and i LOVE the look on forrest's face here!!

this is all they did for the entire reception - talk to the more than 600 people attending!! they are truly surrounded with good friends!! (you can see forrest's ring in this one!)

the walkers are off to florida!!!

overwhelmed with good stuff

2008-07-14T08:47:00.005-05:00

as you all know, tallulah june whitmire was born on june 27. i think she's officially my second cousin (my first cousin's baby), but i claim her as my neice.

friday, july 11, josephine pearl crowder was born!! again, technically a second cousin, but she holds the place as my 6th neice. :) :) :)

saturday, july 12, alex liner and forrest walker were welcomed into the wonderful world of being ONE!! (they got married) i will, of course, post more pictures when i have a minute...

wednesday, july 23, chris and i will close on our first HOUSE! and then we move in at the end of this month!!

wednesday, august 6, christopher starts his new job teaching!!!

so much good stuff going on!!!!

new blogs and mysteries

2008-07-09T10:03:00.009-05:00

i stumbled across this blog yesterday and haven't been able to do much else but read it - http://audreycaroline.blogspot.com/. if you read it, you should scroll down and click on january and start from the beginning. it is such an amazing story of a christian family's walk through unimaginable pain. she is so open, so honest, such an encouragement!

i have just been a participant in the biggest mystery ever to take place on earth. we should enter it into unsolved mysteries! on friday, the 4th of july, chris and i were running late going up to be with my family for the july 4th parade - hooray!! i'll post some pictures soon. our "check engine" light came on, which never comes on, so we pulled over. the only thing either of us knows how to do is check the oil. so we did. and it was bone dry. we tried again. still bone dry. shoot! why didn't the "low oil" light come on?? so we called our friend nathan to come rescue us. our motorcycle riding savior came riding up about a half hour and two games of 20-questions later. he checked the oil and it was, of course, bone dry. so we added 4 quarts of oil which filled it up a bit too much, but that's better than bone dry. so we drove off and arrived to catch the last 50 feet of the parade and spent some good time with family.

on our way home, we were driving up a pretty steep piece of road and donovan (our car) started trembling and bright white smoke started pouring out the back, but it was really out of the hood, just streaming behind us. oh crap! we blew up donovan's engine!! long story short, we got him towed, and they finally called yesterday and said "nothing is wrong with your car except that there was 4 quarts too much oil in it....the check engine light came on because your gas cap wasn't screwed on tight enough" "excuse me? did exactly 4 quarts too much?"

weird and a half. and i mean, that's great that there's nothing wrong with him, but it feels weird that he was BONE DRY. i'm telling you. there was NO OIL in him. and i would be doubting myself more if nathan (the man who knows more about cars than any mechanic in chattanooga) hadn't checked it too.

weird. weird. weird.

i have an announcement to make: never take your car to may brothers automotive in chattanooga. they charged us $77 just to change the oil and reset the computer to make the check engine light go away. seventy-seven dollars. GROSS.

we close on our house in about 2 weeks. AMAZING! once we're settled, we're getting internet b/c chris will need it for his work, which means i'll be able to put a bit more thought into my posts. huzzah!

jeni! you tagged me to post the contents of my purse, which i'm trying to do, but blogger won't let me post pictures right now. i know not what is the matter. i will do it soon.... :)

have you gotten ben shive's album yet? we didn't listen to it for about a month, and then put it on a few days ago and it was like having an old friend over for tea. it's just a marvelous piece of work. seriously. http://www.rabbitroom.com/

oh and you'll notice the new blog url. i've been wanting to change it for a while, and chris might be posting some, so now it's OUR blog. so there. :)

sweet tallulah june

2008-07-03T10:30:00.006-05:00

friday, june 27 was amazing. it was monumental!! it was bill gates' last day of work. it was chris' last day of work. it was our small group leader's last day of work at his old job and his first day at a new job. one of our friends' fiance's started his new job. wall-e was released. it was alex's bachelorette party. and (drumroll) TALLULAH JUNE WAS BORN!!

now i'm no country star, but there needs to be a song about sweet tallulah june. she's my newest cousin! well, technically, she's my cousin's newest baby, but i claim all of those amazing girls as my cousins. these are some of my favorite pics. i've been sick (dangit) so i haven't met her yet, but i (hopefully) will tomorrow!! hooray for 4th of july parades!! :) (she's not in it, but we're all invited...)

mae mae giving her a sweet kiss.

liza's a big sister now!!!

alice lovin on her.

the whitmire girls!!

family of SIX!! :)

in other news, today is our 25 month anniversary. amazing!

so i've been sick since last wednesday. then on monday i threw my back out for the first time in over 4 years. today is my first full day back to work and we have tomorrow off. amazingly short week!! we're housesitting the slatens' house, and chris has been sick too (of course he got what i had) which means we've watched A LOT of movies and tv. movies: mean girls, jurassic park, my best friend's wedding, nanny mcphee, ratatoullie, wall-e (that was on saturday in the theater while i was getting sicker), the game, pieces of the others, star wars episodes 3 and 4, be kind rewind, the prestige, probably more that i'm not thinking of. tv: cosby show, gilmore girls, friends, scrubs, price is right, good eats, iron chef, cooking contests, the office, the golden girls, america's funniest videos, definitely more that i'm not thinking of. in other words, chris and i, the two who don't own a tv and hardly ever watch anything, feel GROSS. and i think i'm addicted.

my dear friend jenn hand blog-tagged me a while back, so i had to answer some questions. do i have to tag someone? well i'm gonna. i tag jennifer glass and mandie slaten. TAG! now you have to answer these questions and put them on your blog!! :)

Jenn’s survey:
1) What was I doing ten years ago? i was working as a camp counselor at my home-away-from-home, camp vesper point! it’s where i met my sweet husband, although not that summer.

2) What are five things on my to do list today? 1) make a huge dent in the copying i have to do for work; 2) tell as many people as possible about the new ben shive album; 3) go home early!; 4) rest my aching back; 5) read a giant chunk of exodus.

3) Snacks I enjoy: oh brother. the list could be endless b/c i just LOVE food. just a few: really cold grapes, cinnamon graham crackers with peanut butter, ice cream, cereal, dried apricots and almonds, trail mix, granola, pretzels....see? long list.

4) Places I have lived: signal mountain, tn; birmingham, al; chattanooga, tn

5) Things I would do if I were a billionaire: figure out a way to actually help the poor; donate a giant chunk to compassion international; pay my student loans; buy our house with cash money

6) People I want to know more about: Jesus – sadly, i don’t know nearly as much as i should about him; my family members that are no longer living; i don't know. i always know the answers to these questions before i'm asked...

7) Two things I have in common with Oprah: we both have two eyes, a nose and a mouth. that’s three.

8) You can tell a lot about a person by: what they spend their money on, what they think about, and what they spend time doing; also by what’s in their purse. :)

9) Are you a yeller when you get angry? unfortunately yes. one or two words will pop out in a yell and i’ll usually catch myself. hopefully Jesus will reign this in before i have kids...

10) Have you ever danced in public? of course! ropers baby! and chris and i dance randomly all the time.

11) What did you do to deserve your first detention? i never went...i don’t think.

12) What did you do to deserve your first paddling? i never got paddled. i did, however, throw the blame on my brother OFTEN and he got paddled a LOT. ;)

13) Name 3 things you like about the town you live in: 1) both of our families are here and we get to see them all the time; 2) it’s really beautiful and close to lots of outdoorsy places to go; 3) all of our friends that we’ve made and kept through the years.

14) Name four things you love to do now: 1) spending time with my wonderful husband; 2) hanging out with friends in creative ways; 3) reading; 4) being outside in any capacity

15) Name something unusual you carry with you wherever you go: deodorant. i never leave home without it!

16) What's your favorite website: too many to narrow it down to just one....here’s five. 1) http://www.andrew-peterson.com/ 2) http://www.rabbitroom.com/ 3) icanhascheezburger.com 4) reachsouthasia.blogspot.com 5) http://www.worldnextdoormarket.com/

17) When and where was your first kiss? on my front porch with his family, who was dropping me off after a night out with them, watching. *shudder*

18) What would an enemy have to say about you? i’m really moody. [friends would say that too]

19) Favorite childhood memory: too many to list!! playing easter egg baseball with my entire family; climbing the evergreen tree beside my bedroom with my brother and cousins and shouting at passing cars “fart all you want! we don’t care!”; playing in the woods for hours on end with my brother; going to the pool with my brother; going on family vacations to the beach; going camping with my family at least once a month; field day – i LOVED field day; and the list goes on and on....

20) Any regrets? not living like Christ has created me to live. also smoking cigarettes in high school. every time i walk through a cloud of smoke, i secretly like inhaling...gross.

a cheap shirt from goodwill, or the best record of 2008?

2008-06-20T08:07:00.008-05:00

BEN SHIVE'S DEBUT RECORD IS NOW AVAILABLE. it's an mp3 download, and it's only $10! what?!? only ten bucks?!??? order it by clicking here then click on "ben shive". you choose. a trip to a fast food restaurant with your sweetie, or owning the best record of 2008. if you don't believe me, check out this promo video back when it was available for pre-order:

can't argue with that. ben shive has played on and/or produced more records than i can list. oh okay fine, i'll list them: this is from his website - http://benshive.com/

p = producer
k = keyboards
a = arranger (strings)
w = writer

Label Records
Andrew Peterson
Love and Thunder (kwa) Essential Records 2003
Behold the Lamb of God (pkwa) Fervent Records 2004
The Far Country (pkw) Word Records, Fervent Records 2005
Appendix A (kw) 2006
Slugs, Bugs and Lullabies (k) 2006

Chris Tomlin
whatever the new one’s gonna be called (k) 2006

Ginny Owens
“Wonderful Wonder” single (k) Rocketown Records 2006

Steven Curtis Chapman
All I Really Want for Christmas (k) Sparrow Records 2005
Musical Blessings (China release) (k) Sparrow Records 2006

Amy Grant
Greatest Hits (k) (played on the new track, “The Water”) A&M Records 2004

Kathy Mattea
Joy for Christmas Day (k) Narada Records 2003

Bethany Dillon
Beautiful (k) Sparrow Records 2004

Erin O’Donnell
Christmas Time Is Here (k) Inpop Records 2004

Ten Shekel Shirt
Risk (k) Sony 2003

Sara Kelly
Living Hallelujah Single (ka) Gotee Records 2004

Compilations
City On a Hill
“The Gathering”: (kwa) (Paul Coleman, Andrew Peterson, Ginny Owens) Essential
Records 2003

Sing Over Me: Worship Songs and Lullabies (k) (Bethany Dillon, Nicole Nordeman, Jana Long, Erin O’Donnell, Christie Nockels) EMI 2006

Christmas Angels (k) (Bethany Dillon, Nicole Nordeman) Capital Records 2005

Wow 2005 (k) (Bethany Dillon) Chordant Records

Wow Christmas 2005 (k) (Bethany Dillon) Chordant Records

In The Name of Love: Artists United for Africa (ka) (Nicole Nordeman) Sparrow Records 2004

Indie Records
Dave Barnes
Brother, Bring the Sun (k)
Chasing Mississippi (k)

Matt Wertz
23 Places (k)
Today and Tomorrow (k)
The New One (whatever it’s called) (k)

Randall Goodgame
War and Peace (pk)

Jeremy Cassella
Faith and Heartache (k)

Eric Peters
Miracle of Forgetting (k)
Bookmark (k)
Scarce (k)

Micah Dalton
These Are the Roots (k)
Advancement EP (k)

Ben Shive
The Ill-Tempered Klavier (pkwa)

Keeley Valentino
The Mechanics of Leaving (k)

James Tealy
Echo (pkw)

Sara Beth
Finding the Reason (pka)

Koo Chung
While We Wait (k)
Parallel (k)

Jinny Kim
Finding Ophelia (k)

Chris Slaten
Under Green Canopies (k) [and the fastest accordian lick EVER!]

Greg Adkins
Lower Than The Angels (k)

JJ Heller
Only Love Remains (k)

with such a long list of people soliciting his musical genius, his own solo stuff has GOT to be amazing. it's just a guarantee. and oh, what's that? that's right! he played on chris' album!! it's a long and wonderful story how that came about. ask me about it sometime. anyway, you NEED this album. chris and i have been listening to it for three days straight, and i keep finding more and more things i love about it, more and more things that move me, more and more things that speak to the deep places. for example:

from Rise Up
Every stone that makes you stumble
And cuts you when you fall
Every serpent here that strikes your heel
To curse you when you crawl
The King of Love one day will crush them all

And every sad seduction
And every clever lie
Every word that woos and wounds
The pilgrim children of the sky
The King of Love will break them by and by

Nothing For The Ache
The world’s a friendly salesman
Blowing down the door
To have is to be happy
What you need is something more

And they charm you with the package
And they bleed you with the price
He can empty out your pockets
Can he fill you up inside?
It’s all a lie

There’s nothing for the ache
The groaning of a heart about to break
You’ll notice when you lie in bed awake
Feeling like you’re falling

And the world’s a pretty harlot
When you’re traveling alone
And a fool can see she’s looking
And a fool would take her home

Cause her love is so expensive
And her flattery is cheap
When you’ve gotten what you wanted
And you’re back out on the street
Then you’ll see

There’s nothing for the ache
The groaning of a heart about to break
You’ll notice when you lie in bed awake
Feeling like you’re falling

And there’s nothing for you here
Your life is like a mist that disappears
Fading like a ringing in the ears
You strain to hear the sound and then it’s gone

How my heart is bleeding
I cry with every beating
Tell me why are we born with these souls inside
That burst and break us open?
Why

If there’s nothing for the ache
No healing for a heart that’s bound to break
And no lover when you lie in bed awake
And not a hand to hold you

With a word that won’t deceive
To bring you in and meet this burning need
In the haven of a love that never leaves
In all your dreams
You were only falling in the arms of God

add some of the most amazing melodies and insrumentation with full strings and harmonies,
and you get some of the best music i've heard in my young 29 years. you can hear one of them on his myspace page - http://www.myspace.com/benshive. so go to the rabbit room and
order it! you will NOT regret it.

good stuff

2008-06-12T08:52:00.006-05:00

more cat pictures

haven't watched this in a while. so nice.

ad-ad-ad-additions!

2008-06-11T13:47:00.009-05:00

chris got a phone call yesterday from his new boss. he said "you still have a job..." (when he was retelling me this story, i thought 'oh great! a paycut!') "...you'll still be doing exactly what we discussed, but you'll also be teaching a section of general music...." he was surprised at first, but now he's gotten really excited. teaching english and music? are you kidding me? God said "hm. how could we make this job more tailor made to fit you exactly....hey, i know!!! english AND music!!!"

in other news, it's hot. really hot. and it's barely june. what will july and august be like?!?! chris and i get to spend a long weekend at the nc cabin together in celebration of our 2 year anniversary...oh boy. i just realized i didn't post anything on our anniversary....i'm a bad blogger....it was june 3rd....i was so distracted by jency and nathan's wedding that i couldn't think of anything else!! anyway, we're super excited!! but jency and nathan shirai said that their week up there was super hot - the cabin was really stuffy the whole time. what?! that doesn't happen until august!! not too hot already!!!

here's to 760 days of being married!!!

ch-ch-ch-changes!

2008-06-10T08:21:00.003-05:00

it's official. i can announce it from the rooftops! everyone needs to know!!! (i am not pregnant...)

CHRIS GOT A JOB AT CHATTANOOGA CHRISTIAN AS A 7TH GRADE ENGLISH TEACHER!!!!

*whew* i've been holding that one in for a few weeks now. i was about to bust! he didn't want to announce it until his current job knew, and his current job couldn't know until a proper "notice" time was up, which was yesterday. three weeks and he's done with unum. he'll have the month of july to prepare his lesson plans and classroom. (and rest a bit!) he'll be a co-worker with my brother and another good friend of ours! i could type and type all day and never express to you how excited and proud i am!! i really think he's going to be in his element with these 12 year olds! it's so exciting too that, since it's a christian school, he can openly share his faith when the opportunitites arise! so if you think about it during your day, say a prayer for him that God would give him the creativity and ability to lead these kids into a deeper understanding of english as well as HIS spirit. (also say a prayer for us for the end of july/beginning of august - we close on our house and move into it on july 31, and then he starts this new job august 1!!! CRAZY!!)

in other news, forrest and alex get married in 32 days. it's unbelieveable!! i got my final fitting for the bridesmaids dress and it's GORGEOUS. i can't wait to wear it on their amazingly blessed day.

jency and nathan's wedding, part 2

2008-06-05T12:41:00.008-05:00

borrowed from others! (mostly) a lot of these have weird colorations - we played with settings where the camera only picks up one color. i think they're REALLY cool. especially the purple ones!! :)

beautiful location!

the night before, we made her a true princess!!

jency and her girls (minus sarah) at the rehearsal!

rehearsal dinner flirting!

more rehearsal dinner lovin'!!! LOOK AT THEM! i love this one. good grief......

manly men shoot guns the day before they get married.

and pose beside motorcycles with their groomsmen...:)

jency getting her mama's help - she's gorgeous!!

see?! she's a ringing bell!!!

we needed a lot of help that afternoon....mostly mentally....:)

so we loaded up on the good stuff - ice cream!!!!

i LOVE the look on her face!!!!!

everyone!

here it comes!!!

that's right people - he got the garter with his TEETH!

i don't think they could be happier!!!

gettin' it in front of the cousins!!!

laura and i whispered sweet nothings into each others' ears all weekend. :)

bridesmaids!!

the shirais!!!

JENCY AND NATHAN'S WEDDING!

2008-06-02T09:46:00.014-05:00

for anyone who doesn't know, jency is my best friend, nathan is chris' best friend, and they got married on saturday!! (as we say - how convenient for us!!:) the day could not have been more perfect. the only time i've ever been happier was on my own wedding day!!! PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW!!! i'm sure more pics will make their way here soon!!!

a very handsome and beaming nathan walking his proud mama down the aisle.

proudest matron of honor EVER!!!

the flower girls!! little catie needed her daddy's help...:)

pretty maids all in a row!

i've never seen a prouder papa!!!

have you ever seen anyone more BEAUTIFUL than this girl???

the vows.

we had the honor of praying over them. laura ruth's (aka, my crying buddy) tears kept landing on my arm as i was praying. it might have been my favorite part of the ceremony... :,)

the kiss...the very, very, very looooong kiss!!!!!

the hug!!

the pronouncement!! (it looks like i'm dancing, but i'm probably just itching a biting fly away....aw nevermind. i AM dancing!!! :) :) :)

mr. and mrs. nathan and jency shirai!!! (notice me leaning on laura for support!!)

SOOOO happy!!!! (i was absolutely bawling....)

laura ruth is GORGEOUS!

sister sarah and brother ted!!

new obsessions

2008-05-28T14:27:00.003-05:00

http://garfieldminusgarfield.net/ - are you kidding me? this stuff is hilarious!!

"Who would have guessed that when you remove Garfield from the Garfield comic strips, the result is an even better comic about schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and the empty desperation of modern life? Friends, meet Jon Arbuckle. Let’s laugh and learn with him on a journey deep into the tortured mind of an isolated young everyman as he fights a losing battle against loneliness in a quiet American suburb."

my favorite (and most applicable) one:

my latest favorites from my other obsession:

#1-PRAY; #2-the iron giant and lessons

2008-05-22T08:25:00.006-05:00

please pray for steven curtis chapman and his family. i find myself thinking initially, for some reason, and since he's famous, he wouldn't need as much prayer as someone down the street from me. how painful it must be to have lost their youngest child in such a horribly, seemingly preventable accident. please pray for the brother who ran over her with the car. please pray that God - who, as his manager said on the website, was not surprised by this, and who will use this for His glory and good (He says so: "...in all things, God works for the good of those who love him..." romans 8:28) - will use this use this tragedy to touch lives and show Himself to people. please pray for steven as he steps on stage as his job, that he will be able to show the love and grace of a loving and grace-filled God, that he will be able to continue performing and speaking the truth to thousands of people. pray that God would take the chapman family into a deeper relationship with Him and that this death would bring them closer together instead of farther apart.

in other news, have a i mentioned the iron giant here before? i can't remember. if you've never seen it, watch it immediately. you would love it!! it was one of brad bird's first movies (he wrote and directed 'the incredibles' and 'ratatouille') every time we would look up anything about him (chris does research on pixar movies and people a lot...) it would say "the creator of the under-appreciated masterpiece 'the iron giant'...." and things like that. one of our friends mentioned it once as being his favorite movie. we found out that tim keller preached a sermon on it. we said "we must see this movie!!" so we went to mckays and bought it. it. was. amazing. i cry easily in movies. that's an understatement, since i cry easily all the time. so it might not mean much that i bawled during this movie, or that now when i watch it, knowing the story, i bawl through the entire thing. hah! anyway, you would like it. i promise. not to mention the fact that harry connick jr is one of the voices. he's so dreamy!!! and jennifer anniston and vin diesel are main voices too. haha!! so anyway, we wanted to give it to hudson for his SEVENTH birthday (i can't believe he's that old...i started keeping him when he was 4 months old....) so we ordered it from amazon.com. the next day after i ordered it, we saw it for sale at the bilo. SERIOUSLY? we were amazed.

in other news, coming soon - new pictures from my first trip to the cabin since october! we had a BLAST with old friends and new friends alike!! even though chris was kinda sick, and even though we didn't see precious the bear, we had a great time. have you gotten quelf yet? you must get it and play it. we had the MOST fun with it. hannah had to roll the dice from 5 feet away from the board and if it didn't land on the board she had to move back a space, i had to play the entire game with my clothes inside out, drew had to wear lipstick, we had to put one of the cards in the middle of the board game and call it "chewy" and pull a hair from anywhere on our bodies and put it on "chewy" before rolling our turn...yeah. it's a weird game. but it's SO FUN!!!! :)

our small group served dinner at the methodist church in our neighborhood last night, and the devotional was about knowing who Jesus really is. the pastor said that if we truly love Jesus, we'll do what He asks us to. one of the guys there mentioned how a lot of times people are afraid of God, and therefore His commands are a burden. fearing God and being afraid of Him are very different. i'm learning this lately - to not do things God is urging me to do just to avoid hell or just to check off the list that i did it, ie, to avoid His wrath and anger - but to do it out of love, just like i would do anything chris asks me to do, not just to appease him, but because i love him.

But the eyes of the LORD are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love, to deliver them from death and keep them alive in famine. We wait in hope for the LORD; he is our help and our shield. In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name. May your unfailing love rest upon us, O LORD, even as we put our hope in you. Psalm 33:18-22

OH OH MANDIE

2008-05-15T07:41:00.025-05:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

BEAUTIFUL GIRL!!!

someday, i promise you someday!! we WILL make it to the aquarium. we will stop saying that we're going to take you, and actually take you. :)

fear not, for He has made you; He has called you by name - you are HIS! when you pass through the waters, He will be with you. when you walk through the fire, you will not be burned. for He is the Lord your God, the Holy One of Israel, your Savior! you are precious and honored in His sight and He loves you. (isaiah 43)

speaking of birthdays, chris gave me an everybodyfields cd (YAY!) and a card with fake tickets to a show in them. they were fake b/c the tickets weren't on sale yet. well, we bought them yesterday! we have great seats! guess where we're going???? here. i'll give you a hint......:) :) :)

thank you guys so much...for the...HOUSE!

2008-05-06T07:47:00.025-05:00

first of all, i must say this. HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO CAROLINE!!!! what a beautiful day for a beautiful sister to turn 28!!! i hope it's overflowing with beautiful blessings!

now on to business. what you hear is true. chris and lyndsay bought a house. the signatures are official. alls that needs to happen now is to get approved for that loan, get the inspection done and wait a couple months, and we'll CLOSE. it's not really all that weird either. it feels really natural. like it's the perfect next step. PRAISE THE LORD!!!! what a provider He is. we were thinking about maybe looking for another apartment or MAYBE a house in the next few months. a friend from work sent an email around last thursday saying they were selling their house. we had been to this house before and LOVED it. and actually, when we were househunting last year, we compared the ones we liked to this house even though it wasn't for sale. "man! if we could just find one like that house!!!" buddy did we snatch it up quick. the timing works perfectly for when they have to move out and when our lease is up. it's just awesome - AWESOME - how God provided for both couples involved!!!

THE FRONT. beautiful, glorious front porch!!! WITH a swing!! :) and the little tiny tree that you see is "little stick". one of the stipulations of buying the house is that we take very good care of him. not, like, officially. but these are our friends so we talked about silly things like that. i love it! and i actually had a dream night before last that i broke little stick. i think it's anxiety that they'll come back and visit a few years from now and little stick will be dead...let it not happen!!!

THE BACK. notice the GIANT back deck! :)

BACK YARD!!!! are you kidding?! it's HUGE!! sitting out on the back porch feels like you're out in the suburbs - it's quiet, secluded b/c of all the trees and bushes, and apparently when it's that time of year the lightening bugs are EVERYWHERE. other than those types of bugs, the back yard isn't buggy (ie, mosquitos) and there are bunnies and butterflies!!! oh boy!! and i must say that a fence and puppy dog very well might be in the slatens' near future thanks to this back yard...:)

**EDIT** our dear friend jeremiah, in chris' words "was very quick to point out all the possible locations for a slip and slide in the back yard." oh. my. word.

KITCHEN! i love the kitchen. counter space! cabinets! WINDOWS!! glory!!!

DINING ROOM. RED! enough said. and AWESOME windows.

DEN pic 1. that fireplace works, dude!!

DEN pic 2. beautiful, glorious windows!!

BEDROOM 1. bigger than what we have now! one thing we must get creative on is closet space. the house was built in the 1930s and apparently back then you were taxed according to how many rooms you had, and a closet counted as a room b/c it had a door. so they built no closets. the renovators built in two small closets (one in each bedroom) so we'll need to get a wardrobe or something. and the bedroom's big enough to take one! hurrah!! :)

BEDROOM 2. this is a terrible picture of it, but whatever. there's the other fireplace! and it's really small, but we won't really be using it for anything other than really small people...someday. and until then, it'll just be a computer/music room.

SUN ROOM! i LOVE this room! it's practically ALL windows and leads out to the back deck.

we didn't get any pictures of the basement, but it's (what i call) HUGE and perfect for storage. there's a fan down there that kicks in when the moisture gets to a certain level and it works so well that the people living in it now have their bulk paper towels and toilet paper sitting out on a shelf. the washer and dryer are down there too...which, btw are STAYING with the house. what a gift!!! :)

the handsome smile of a home owner. i hope we did everything right....:)

FREE ICE CREAM!

2008-04-29T08:36:00.001-05:00

GET IT WHILE IT'S FREE!!!

Sarcasma

2008-04-23T14:35:00.004-05:00

QUELF

2008-04-21T10:49:00.004-05:00

"i have never had this much fun playing a board game". hyped up marketing on the quelf website? ABSOLUTELY NOT! it is the only way i can describe my experience with QUELF. we played last night for about 3 hours and i did NOT want it to end. i cannot wait to post pictures and i HOPE i can get the videos to work...if we can find our camera cord. an example card:

"Put your forefingers in your ears, your thumbs in your mouth and your
pinky fingers in your nostrils. Once everything is in place, you must say the
following at the top of your voice: Feels good, don't it!?' If you successfully
complete this card, pick one opponent to repeat the stunt. If they fail, they
must pay the penalty [move back 2 spaces]."

last night (when brian turned into frankenstein and had to answer his ringing phone [not part of the game - just good fortune!]) was the hardest i have laughed since high school. you simply must buy the game. you will LOVE it.

april 17!!

2008-04-17T13:15:00.005-05:00

guess what today is?!?!? HIGH FIVE MAN!!

it's also this for me:

Psalm 139: O LORD, you have searched me and you know me. You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar. You discern my going out and my lying down; you are familiar with all my ways. Before a word is on my tongue you know it completely, O LORD. You hem me in—behind and before; you have laid your hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too lofty for me to attain. Where can I go from your Spirit? Where can I flee from your presence? If I go up to the heavens, you are there; if I make my bed in the depths, you are there. If I rise on the wings of the dawn, if I settle on the far side of the sea, even there your hand will guide me, your right hand will hold me fast. If I say, "Surely the darkness will hide me and the light become night around me," even the darkness will not be dark to you; the night will shine like the day, for darkness is as light to you.
For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! Were I to count them, they would outnumber the grains of sand. When I awake, I am still with you...

sunny days sweeping the clouds away

2008-04-16T10:19:00.004-05:00

today is the sunniest day!! it's still chilly, but man it's gorgeous. not a cloud up there. and - IT'S DUCK DAY! wahoo! it happened on this day last year too. it's fun to watch the guys go crazy as it's announced in chapel! i cannot BELIEVE these boys are actually going to go swimming - it's been below freezing at night the past three nights! SHEESH! what happens during duck day? eating contests (krytals, cottage cheese, raw whole jalepenos, to name a few), various races (usually grown men (faculty) on the tiniest bicycles with training wheels you've ever seen), and belly flop contests. then they get to go home around noon or so. lucky ducks.

eye update: the drops work! the first day was rough, but a) i've gotten used to putting them in which is HUGE, and b) they're actually working. my eyes don't get strained anymore. it's amazing - a doctor who knows what's wrong AND knows how to fix it! wonder of wonders!!

what else was i going to blog about? the words came out of my mouth this morning "i'm going to blog about that!!" hmm....

oh and btw: i had to change my security to not allow annonymous posts b/c i've been having some sketchy issues. please don't take it personally! (unless you're the sketchy one...in which case, it's all because of YOU.)

"The Old and the New"

2008-04-14T08:03:00.002-05:00

read this. it's excellent. it's from "the rabbit room", which you should definitely visit regularly. this particular entry was written by (of course) andrew peterson on april 11.

enjoy.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of speaking to the students at Lipscomb University, here in Nashville, for a convocation series called “Stories of Lived Discipleship”. You’ll notice right off the bat that the introduction was inspired in part by a discussion here in the Room from last week. Here’s the manuscript, for your reading pleasure (or displeasure).
——————————————————-
The Old and the New
I got in trouble for using a dirty word when I was in the third grade.

I remember being in homeroom, sitting at my desk but still managing to be in a huddle of boys talking about the things that are of utmost importance to third-graders. We talked about things that we boys had in common, things that were assumed to be true, so our conversation was not as much an exchange of ideas as it was a passionate, pretentious blab session of stating (what was to us) the obvious.

It was plain to such a discerning group of young men that girls, for example, were an abomination. Girls were to be avoided at all costs, partly because they failed to see the sublime glory, the near unbelievable and existential beauty of a big-rig Mack truck. I filled my notebook with pictures of these trucks, these sleek works of diesel craftsmanship. If evidence were needed to convict third-grade girls of being uncultured and deeply, deeply broken, one must only point to Optimus Prime, leader of the Autobots, and note the dull, unresponsive reaction on a girl’s face. To a third-grade boy, however, it was almost unbearably awesome that a big-rig semi (a red one, no less) was conceived that actually transformed into a robot (a cool looking robot, no less) with laser cannons. I might need to take a brief intermission.

I know you’d like me to go on and on about Optimus Prime, but I won’t. The thing we were talking about in the huddle that day, the dirty word that got me into trouble, was Hell. I said Hell in the third grade. The other kids gasped. I’m not exaggerating. And this wasn’t some private Christian school where the moms all wore denim dresses and bonnets. This was a run-of-the-mill Florida public school, where the rebellious kids bandied about all manner of bad words.

A kid leapt from his desk, broke away from our huddle, and ran to tell Mrs. Something-or-other about my transgression. There may have been a parent-teacher conference, and there may have been a public flogging; I can’t remember. I can’t remember anything after that last four-letter-word popped from between my lips and whizzed around the room like an unstoppered balloon.

So after that elaborate setup, here was the subject of the conversation in which my potty mouth flushed, so to speak: Theology.

We were talking about church. After the chorus of praises for Optimus Prime’s awesomeness died down, somehow we segued to talking about church, and sin, and…Hell. I remember as clearly as if it were yesterday. I told them this: If you’re good, you go to Heaven. If you’re bad, you go to (GASP!) Heeeeeelllll. And the word echoed off the walls of Mrs. Something-or-other’s yarny, cray papery, primary colory, alphabetty classroom. That was the Gospel as I understood it, as it was implicitly taught to me by my church, my family, my Sunday School teachers. That is the Gospel as most people today understand it. Bad boys go to Hell, good boys go to Heaven.

Fast forward about two years. I was nine years old. One Sunday morning at church, on the index card in the back of the pew, I checked the box next to the sentence, “I’m not a visitor but I would like to be baptized.” I knew that baptism was Something I was Supposed to Do. I knew that I had sinned, was a sinner, and that that I needed what to my young mind was a free pass out of Hell. I didn’t cry. I didn’t even pray about it. At that age I only really prayed that I wouldn’t get caught when I was up to no good. I just checked the box and dropped the card in the offering plate when it went by. My dad noticed it (my dad was the preacher, and still preaches today), called me into his office later that week to talk to me about it. He asked me, “When you do something wrong, what do you feel inside?” I thought about it for a minute, trying to think of the Right Answer. I thought back to how I felt earlier that day when I had done something rotten to my little sisters and said, “Guilty.”

This was partly true. I usually felt a thrill when I did something wrong, usually a twisted sort of glee, but I had to admit that somewhere in the mix, there it was: Guilt. My dad nodded and said, “Okay. You’re ready.” So that next Sunday during church I sat on my knuckles, tried to keep my back straight, bounced my knees with the toes of my feet firmly attached to the floor so as to keep my fidgeting silent. Then it came. The Invitation. Right on cue, when my dad said, “If anyone here would like to accept Jesus as their Lord and Savior…,” the organist glided to her place and played a somber hymn. When everyone stood to sing, I walked down the center aisle and stood next to my dad. I remember the way his belly brushed up against my shoulder, his hand on my neck, as we sang the fourth verse of the hymn just in case someone else, moved by my penitence, had checked the box and would be joining me.

While I cried for some reason I couldn’t figure, my dad had me repeat the Good Confession: “I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God, my Lord and My Savior.” Then I went upstairs and changed into a white robe, descended the steps into the lukewarm baptistery water, and partook of the ancient sacrament of baptism. When I came up out of the water, I remember trying to sense, to really sense the Gift of the Holy Spirit, but nothing really felt any different. I did feel happy. Though my short life so far had been one of vast disobedience, yet I had obeyed in at least this thing. Later I stood at the church doors beside my dad, wearing my normal clothes again, my hair still wet, and shook hands with everyone who walked by. I was a Christian. A follower of Christ. A disciple.

Fast forward two days. Word got around that a kid at school had torn a page out of his dad’s Playboy magazine and was passing it around between classes. I relished the thought of seeing it. And later, when I finally had my turn to look, I relished the image on the wrinkled, glossy magazine paper. I carried that image around in my third-grade heart, right next to where the Holy Spirit, I assumed, resided. Christ hated me, I figured. He had cleaned up the neighborhood and moved in, just me and Jesus and the manicured lawns of my temple-of-the-Holy-Spirit heart, and for two whole days things were great. With one good, long, wide-eyed look at that piece of paper, some trashy people moved in to my heart and the whole place went south. At night, in my bed, wrapped up in my Empire Strikes Back sheets, I laid there coming to terms with the fact that I was going to go to Hell after all. I was doomed. The Holy Spirit, in my young boy’s imagination, was nothing more than a weak old man in his pajamas, standing in his tiny front lawn waving a rolled-up newspaper around and cursing the hoodlums that were populating and multiplying in the temple area at an alarming rate.

For the next ten years of my life my sense of obedience to God, my belief in God, and my desire for God fought a losing battle with my hormones, my rebellion, my spiteful tongue, my greed. I would’ve told you that I was a Christian. I would’ve told you that I was a disciple of Christ. But ten minutes later I would be lustful or angry or deceitful, and I would’ve seen no problem with that. It was fun, and besides, Christ hated me anyway. And I figured that if he didn’t hate me, he probably should. Either way, he wasn’t someone I wanted to think about, or to be near, or to obey.

I wanted to taste of the forbidden fruit in a way that would have shocked Eve herself. (I’m not saying that I did, but that I wanted to. This isn’t a bragging session but a confession.) My sin was not a slip of the tongue, or a lapse in judgment. Mine was a calculated, passionate, boisterous rebellion of the heart. My hypocrisy drove my sense of righteousness in one direction and my sense of wild, unadulterated selfishness in another so that they diverged in a wood like two roads. Instead of turning right or left, I chose the barren rot of the wasteland between. I went to church and smiled at the sweet old people. I told funny stories at family dinner. I was like a caricature of Eddie Haskell from Leave it to Beaver, all smiles for Mrs. Cleaver but up to no good whatsoever. It occurs to me that I was less than a caricature. I was a phantom, or was becoming more like one every time I said “Hallelujah!” with my mouth but in my heart growled “Give me something or someone I can use.” A phantom floating through the halls of my high school without a care in the world but for myself and my vile devices.

I don’t picture the Holy Spirit in my life at this time as that angry old man. I see him now as Aslan, bound to the Stone Table of my heart. Anything to keep him quiet and out of my way. The carousing, wicked, mocking beasts I put there are gathered around him, shaving his mane, heckling and spitting. But if you look into his sad eyes you can see the fountain of strength that waits for its moment to burst forth and cleanse the temple. I see the Holy Spirit as a formidable, shining Being laid low not because anyone bent his back but because he is stooping to level the gray city that spread in my heart like mould. He is descending into the fray to rescue what is left of his lost servant, his missing sheep, his prodigal son. For the joy set before him, he endured the cross.

And suddenly, the light breaks through.

I was sitting at a piano in an empty church building. I had sensed for a while the spring returning, the rivers thawing. The snow that covered the wide fields of my heart began to melt and water the seeds so long frozen. A change was coming. I sensed the change coming, and I ached for it as if my life depended on it. And it did.

It was a Rich Mullins song. “If I Stand.” Then a few months later, “Sometimes By Step.”

Sometimes I think of Abraham,
How one star he saw had been lit for me
He was a stranger in this land
And I am that, no less than he

And on this road to righteousness
Sometimes the climb can be so steep
I may falter in my steps
But never beyond your reach

Oh God, you are my God
And I will ever praise you
I will seek you in the morning
And I will learn to walk in your ways
And step by step you lead me
And I will follow you all of my days

That song became my most earnest prayer. I remember playing the piano for a band that sang it at a youth conference fifteen years ago, and that night I walked another aisle, even though I was supposedly a sponsor with the youth group. It seems a little hokey to me now, but that night in East Tennessee I committed my life to service to God and his Kingdom. I had finally come to the end of my strength and could run from him no more. I laid my life down, and said, like the horse to Aslan in the C.S. Lewis story, “I’d rather be eaten by you than be fed by anyone else.” He stooped into the fray and lifted my weary body out. He was Hosea, and I was Gomer. He was David, and I was Mephibosheth. He was Aslan and I was Edmund. Like Peter, I confessed his name, then like Peter I denied him again and again and again. Like Peter, I wept bitter tears. And like Peter, I am forgiven.

Fast-forward fifteen years, and here I stand.

I look at that summer as the time I finally learned to love the person of Jesus, not the idea of him. I think of that as the beginning of my discipleship. Everything up to then was the Old Testament, when things seemed darker, savage and archaic. I was so many of those characters—Eve gobbling up the forbidden fruit, Noah drunk in his birthday suit, Abraham lying to save his own skin, David letting his lust have its way, and the people of Israel and Judah over and over again, loving God then chasing after their idols, then repenting of everything but those mysterious, persistent high places. In my Old Testament days I was plagued by God’s holy Law, in constant fear of him even though he said over and over again that his faithfulness was great, his loving-kindness everlasting.I really thought that I had to learn to be a good little boy or I would be cast into the outer darkness where I would forever wail and grind my teeth together from the unbearable pain, fear, and rage. I feel chills describing that even now.

But then, he comes. Jesus appears when all seems lost. He suffers, dies, and rises again, then he sets into motion his Church, his Kingdom. A New Testament. Suddenly my baptism makes perfect sense. Suddenly my church camp dedications and re-dedications become a part of this greater story. Christ in his mercy reaches back that far and redeems it, claims it for his own.

People ask me when I became a Christian. I never know quite how to answer that question, which I realize would make my Bible college professors a little annoyed. I was born into a Christian family, was surrounded by and assaulted by the Word of God at every turn. One day I checked a box because I knew I was supposed to, then the next thing I knew I was sopping wet and shaking hands in a receiving line. I sinned, repented, sinned, repented, sinned, repented and sinned some more for ten long years.

Then one day, out of the blue, the Lion roared. I didn’t hear it as that at the time. At the time it was a thousand small graces strewn across my path: a surprising urge to read my Bible one morning; a sudden appreciation of my parents’ steady faith; the catch of my breath at the way light rests on the hill; then one night at the piano I heard coming out of the boom box speakers the broken voice of a broken poet, singing about the unwavering love of God.

I could go on and on about my life with Jesus over the past fifteen years, which is when my discipleship really began, starting with that summer when in my heart Jesus turned over the tables and drove out the moneylenders. The cleansing of the temple. I have found that I still sin, though I know you must find that hard to believe. I still sometimes clench my jaw and drive my fist into the steering wheel, angry at the persistence of certain sins in my life. “Who will save me from this body of death? But thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

The Great Comforter reminds me in a deep, gentle voice that the law has been fulfilled. The temple is clean. He reminds me that I’m not carrying around just the Law and the Prophets, but a New Testament, a promise that hope is not futile, forgiveness is real, that the grace of God banishes my shame and makes the geography of my heart spacious and pristine and inhabited by the very Spirit of God himself.

Discipleship is a long walk with the Light of the World blazing inside you. He may lead you to periods of deep rest, he may lead you into frightening places, but he will always lead you to what is best for you, all so that he may bring you closer to himself. He invites you deeper into his heart, just far enough so that you aren’t burned to a crisp by the holy fire, then he helps you grow that much more into who you’re meant to be. Again, he pulls you deeper in, and again you feel like you might just die. And you realize that you have become that much more like him, and you are grateful, astounded by his mercy. You find that what you once thought was killing you is giving you life.

It is transforming you.

And that word, “transform”, in the weirdest, cheesiest way, brings me back to Optimus Prime. I didn’t mean for that to happen.

But Optimus Prime brings me back to that conversation I was having with my third-grade buddies about how scary Hell must be. And that makes me think of how downright ornery I was in high school, which makes me think with great relief about the way the Great Story of the death and resurrection of Christ sank into my very bones. And that makes me think of how dear a friend Jesus is to me now, how tender and steadfast, how gently he abides and assures me that I am his, how he takes away my many fears. And that makes me think of this verse:

“…those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children.”

Amen.

happy birthday forrest!!!

2008-04-11T08:23:00.007-05:00

i swear i remember when you used to crawl in my crib with me. usually you were "searching for dirt!" between my toes!! eew! i remember that crib, doll and wallpaper too...weird.

remember those sippy cups with the sipper in the middle?! i totally do! and i remember drinking out of those bottles...i really miss footie pjs. mom and dad still have that blanket. we did EVERYTHING on that thing!

i remember this like it was yesterday. i feel like we went camping and paddle-boating every weekend! aren't those our own life vests? i remember thinking it was great that we owned orange life vests that matched our orange tent. i still remember the way it smelled.

ah, the clc skating. I MISS IT! and those costumes....hehehe....i hope you don't get blackmailed for this one....kermit :)

best. family. ever. nice glasses dad. ;)

probably ponte vedra. i can't BELIEVE you get to go back there in july. i'm so jealous!!!

"what, mom??? i have no idea why she's crying!"

uncle howard!!! why did we ALL have to pile up on him? i miss that man. and that chair.

the bomb. the old garage. snow. what more could a person want?!

cutest kids! beautiful mommy!

dadGUM renee' for breaking our swing!!!! i LOVED swinging with you in that thing. the ropes are still there, you know....we should totally make a new one!

i remember specifically that we HAD to do this, and we HAD to pile up in order of oldest to youngest. i don't know how kendall got out of it...where is that anyway? e's?

"a nurse's work is never done". that's grandmother's pink lady apron and real scrubs and stethoscope thanks to mom. remember doing operation on my dolls on the ironing board? i remember taking it VERY seriously....

i love you brother. i miss our cvp days!

i couldn't ask for a better brother! happy birthday forrest!!!! :)

EYES

2008-04-07T07:50:00.003-05:00

have you ever really, really thought about your eyes? the fact that you can SEE is just astonishing!!!!!!!!!! it's a beautiful thing. someone asked me once (in a "would you rather" type way) which sense i would rather lose if i had to lose one. whatever i lost, i would have to keep my vision. i love being able to see things! my favorite quote ever is "there's so much beauty around us for just two eyes to see, but everywhere i go, i'm looking". (rich mullins, "here in america")

my question: if a doctor tells me i don't need glasses, does it make it true? i've worn reading glasses for...wow....ten years.....oh. my. gosh. (lyndsay gathers herself together after the shock of being so old...) i've been at the computer for barely an hour now, and my head already aches, my eyes are already heavy and hard to keep open. when i wear my glasses (which i didn't bring today, btw) these feelings disappear. the doctor tested my vision, but i must have been asleep when she tested me for reading...all i remember was looking at letters on the far wall with her going "which one do you like better? number one? or number two?" (anyone seen brian reagan's sketch on this? i was LITERALLY biting my lip HARD to keep from being hysterical with laughter.....*sigh*) maybe that does test for close-up vision....anyway, she said these feelings i get are symptoms of dry eye, gave me some drops to use, and told me to stop wearing my reading glasses. if i'm wearing them while i'm this young (yes, i know this contradicts my above statement of being old), i'll be unnecessarily dependent on them as i age.

but i need them! eye drops aren't doing squat for me this morning!

in other news, i've been sick for going on three weeks. do i break down and take the antibiotic? i mean, i'm not SICK, but i've got a runny nose and a definite hackhackhack in my chest. but i don't WANT to take the medicine! why doesn't it just go away on its own!?!?!?

happy monday. don't forget that God will supply your every need. :)

EYES!

2008-04-04T10:55:00.003-05:00

i truly believe that i am fearfully and wonderfully made. and i trust that God has given humans the ability to learn about the body and treat it accurately and effectively. but who in the WORLD came up with dilating eyes?!?! all i want to do is crawl under a rock and sleep for a week. this is not me, but a random picture from the internet, but it's definitely what my eyes look like right now. my eye appointment was almost like being in hell. (not that i've been there...) i hate hate hate hate hate hate hate eye drops. i hate putting anything in my eye for any reason, and i had to have FOUR eye drops! (that's eight total) one to numb me for the glaucoma test, two to dilate me, and one more to reverse the dilation. suddenly i can't read anything. everything is cloudy white and i'm struggling to keep my eyes open. not b/c i'm tired, but b/c they feel so weird....BLEH! i hate this!!!! it's also weird b/c she told me that i shouldn't be wearing reading glasses. but i need them! but you don't. but i do! but you shouldn't. she said eye fatigue is a sign of dry-eye, so guess what she gave me to see if i can stop using the readers? eye drops. JOY! sigh. grumble. pout. AGONY!!!!!!

in other news, it's friday, and that is good.

all praise to HIM

2008-04-01T15:00:00.005-05:00

ANDREW IS FINE. good grief. he went from dead, to brain dead, to in a coma with questionable brain damage, to completely fine. what a roller coaster with the BEST ending possible!! thank you - seriously - for praying.

in other news, april is script frenzy month! amy is making me do it with her which infuriates me. *sigh* who else is in???? it's SO FUN!!

in other, much less serious news, this is my absolute, all time, hands down favorite pic from this website YET!!!

PRAY

2008-03-27T10:38:00.005-05:00

caroline is my new sister in law - she married chris' brother two weekends ago!! (pictures to come - i promise!) last night, caroline's sister found her 3 year old son at the bottom of their pool. his heart had stopped, but the paramedics were able to get a heartbeat back. as of this morning, he's stable in the icu. THANK YOU GOD FOR ANSWERING OUR PRAYERS WITH A BIG YES!!! (i tossed and turned and had horrible dreams last night because until this morning, we thought he had died...)

he's in an induced coma, and they're going to do an mri today to assess the damage done from lack of oxygen. please pray. pray for our papa God to supply little andrew all he needs to recover from this scary situation. as one of my friends said, "our God could have provided oxygen to that little boy's brain no matter how long he was under. He IS faithful!" please pray for elena (caro's sister) to have peace unspeakable, for her to turn to the giver of life and all good things, for her and the whole family to have increased faith. God works in mysterious (sometimes scary and infuriating) ways, but He is sovereign. i know He is. He has GOOD plans for all of us. i know He does!! please pray that their family will know He is too!! even during earthly tragedy!

***UPDATE***
as of 3/28, andrew is stable and his mri and eeg have returned positive results! ALL PRAISE TO GOD WHO REIGNS ON HIGH. He has answered our prayers! may He get all the glory and thanks!!

from andrew's mom:

For those of you who have heard my youngest son, Andrew, had a tragic
accident on Wednesday. He nearly drowned in our pool. I pulled him
out and with the help of our neighbor, a neonatal nurse, performed CPR. He
was lifelited to a children’s hospital here in Atlanta. It has been the
longest 32 hours of my life ever. This is the most horrific, tragic and
sad event that I or my family have ever been through. Right now I pray for
my little boy, his Daddy and my other two children. I will continue to
pray for them and the other families out there that have gone through this as
well as for the other families out there that I hope never go through
this.

Thank you to all of you who have prayed with us, THE LORD IS SO
GREAT! We knew that whatever road we were faced with, it would be the one
that God had chosen for us. He has a divine plan that we all play into and
I am eager to know what I can do next to serve him. I pray and look
forward to watching my son get better and also serve our Lord in whatever way he
is asked.

We don’t know a a whole lot right now, but this is what we do know.
He heart rate is stable. His breathing is controlled by a ventilator until
he can begin to breathe on his own. He had an MRI done that revealed no
damage to his brain! Praise GOD! Again, thank you for your prayers-
He hears us! We are waiting for him to regain consciousness from the drug
induced coma. If that does not occur tonight, he will be re-sedated and we
will try again tomorrow. It is vital at this time that I give all of my
attention and strength to my little one. I appreciate all of your thoughts
and concerns but please bear with us and give our family some space to get
through this difficult time. It is so encouraging to hear kind thoughts
and prayers, but we just don’t have the time to respond to everyone.
Please know that we thank you and appreciate your efforts and when the time is
right we will communicate to everyone. At this time my Best friend Bre
Anne is aware of everything that is going on and is updated almost immediatly
after I am. Please do not hesitate to email her (no. 1 on my friends list)
or call her for those of you that have her number. She will make sure that
everyone is kept informed.
Please leave me emails or comments as it helps to boost my spirits. I love to hear from everyone sharing their love and support for my little man Andrew!

Thank you again from the depths of my heart. He has benefited from
your strength, faith and prayers.

On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness BLOG REVIEW

2008-03-21T15:10:00.007-05:00

andrew peterson recruited some people with blogs to read and review his new book, and i was picked as one of them! if you know me and my almost obsession with AP's music, forget all about that, and read this with new eyes. and then go order and read the book! you're gonna love it!

Have you ever anticipated that something you were about to experience was going to be excellent, just to have it turn around and exceed those expectations? It happened to me when I visited Disney World for the first time a little over a year and a half ago (i.e., the exhaustive technical expertise, superior customer service, and almost overwhelming attention to detail). When I first sat down to read Andrew Peterson’s latest creation, Book One of "The Wingfeather Saga", On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness, I knew I would like it. I suspected I might even love it. But I’m ashamed to say that I was not expecting it to be as excellent as it was. It definitely exceeded my expectations.

It’s hard to find words to explain Andrew’s novel. The subtitle says it’s an adventure filled with peril. Other reviewers have labeled it as "fun to read" and "wildly imaginative". These are all accurate depictions of what you will experience, and I would add that it is an absolutely brilliant story. It has so much engrossing creativity that I kept having to remind myself that the lands of Skree and Aerwiar were just storybook lands; that Fangs of Dang weren’t waiting in the center of town to arrest me; that Gnag the Nameless didn’t have a desire to hunt me down and finish me off. Through the pages of this excellent work, I found myself laughing out loud, wiping tears off of my cheeks, and actually throwing the book across the room when I reached the climax in the plot! Andrew’s writing style creates within you an emotional bond with the characters and makes you totally lose yourself in their world.

I was gripped from the very beginning. And not just from the clever and delightful introductions on the lands of Aerwiar and Skree and the Igiby cottage, where you learn of a Nameless Evil (named Gnag) that rules the Fangs of Dang, who suppress the Skreeans, including the Igiby family, who live a free life, "as long as they were in their homes by midnight."

In the very first chapter, I trembled right alongside Janner Igiby as he "lay trembling in his bed with his eyes shut tight" at the sound of the passing Black Carriage sent by Gnag the Nameless. His fears were heightened knowing that his brother and sister, Tink and Leeli, were asleep, leaving him alone in the dark. The thoughts that went through his mind, his imagination running utterly away from him, was very reminiscent of my thoughts as a young girl laying wide-eyed in my bed, wondering and shivering at every sound I heard. And as soon as my parents’ light, visible from the crack under my door, went out, my fears multiplied knowing I was the only one left awake in the house. But I never faced anything as perilous as the thought of being carried away by the Black Carriage and its shadowy driver, never to be seen again. But as the carriage passed by his window and continued down the street, Janner found comfort in the wagging tail of his little sister’s dog, Nugget, knowing that even just the dog was awake with him – a simple comfort that sent him quickly to sleep.

Andrew Peterson has long been my favorite songwriter. In fact, some have labeled him as one of the greatest songwriters of our time. His lyrics are captivating, encouraging, and sometimes even life-changing. (I first noticed Andrew’s music when a line from The Chasing Song caught my ear: "Well I realize that falling down ain’t graceful, but I thank the Lord that falling’s full of grace." I still cling to that prayer, even eight years later.) While On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness might not change your life, there are definitely lessons to take away from it. I won’t spoil things by telling you what you’ll walk away with. You’ll just have to read the book and add it to your favorites list. I certainly have.

You can order the book here for only $11.19!

latest toy

2008-03-12T13:05:00.010-05:00

from this (times 4 or 5):

to this:

every time chris and i get in the car to go anywhere more than 20 minutes away, we drag with us one giant cd case, 3 regular sized cd cases, 1 small cd case and at least 2 giant rolls (the kind that blank cds come on) of cds. LITERALLY. chris has a small-capacity (6GB?) zen micro that he took to england that officially died (literally blew up) the other day. and it never helped us cut down on the amount of cds we carried around anyway.

today, we did it. we bought an 80GB ipod. *sigh* i'm so torn about it. while it's convenient to not have to lug around ALL those cds, we just dropped a lot of dough in the hands of a local electronic store. enough money to feed, support and care for a compassion international child for well over a year. all for what? convenience and entertainment. as a coworker who is also a fellow believer just said "they make good idols!"

*sigh* he's right. and yet this machine still sits and charges beside me on my desk. what do we do? be in the world but not of the world! does that mean supporting the economy and spending the money that we earn? does it mean giving away every single extra penny to charity and the poor? does it mean living in the tension somewhere in between?

although i will say that it will be nice to ride approximately 16 hours in the car NOT sharing my feet-space with a million cds, and NOT using my precious and limited finger and arm strength sifting through said million cds (it's amazing how quickly that wears me out...).

yep.

spring break baby

2008-03-11T14:21:00.001-05:00

enough said.

all sorts of stuffs

2008-03-06T16:32:00.004-05:00

i know you're just dying to know - the results of my mri were clear. there was something about a slight somethingerother being visible, but that it shouldn't have any effect on anything. so i went to the doctor and he said i could stop taking meds. and he said "call us if you need us". so now all that's entering my body other than food and water is a multivitamin, and it feels GREAT!! i mean, i wasn't really all that drugged up, but i still hated taking medicine. of course, today everything hurts - including my teeth. so maybe i DO need some lyrica afterall....hmm......

in other news, it was confirmed to us last night that our apartment-mate did, indeed, commit suicide. dangit! and coincidentally, the friend who encouraged us in small group emailed us today with some words from her dad when she talked to him about our story. he said i could post them, and instead of picking and choosing what to post, i'm just going to post the whole thing. i hope it encourages you like it did us:

This scenario is always used by Baptists to strike fear and guilt into people so
that they use every opportunity possible to present the Gospel and get people
into the life-boat . I'm sure it is very difficult to process when
it is more than just a discussion. Do you remember this speech?

1. It is not your fault.
2. It is your fault.
You have to keep both of these truths if you are going to get through this Biblically.
It is not your fault.
Every person has a journey. This is easy to prove Biblically. Take any character of scripture and see how their life was woven together by God. A person does not die before his time nor can days be added to his life. These are easy texts to find. Therefore, once one accepts the sovereignty of God over life and death, it is possible to put a death, and untimely as it might seem to us, in his providence. Nor does one know what happened in that person's heart and mind even seconds before his death. To assume that a person was not saved because of our inaction is the pathway to self-sabotage. We will never be able to bear the burden that only God can bear. Share in his sorrow over the lost, perhaps, but we do not save nor can we prevent him from saving – yes, even without us. And a person is condemned not because of the hesitation of Christ's ambassadors, but because of his own sin. Therefore, one may rest in the loving-kindness of God, and trust that He is able to do even when we are not willing. It is not your fault. In fact, living in a world-view that says, "It is my fault." is to rob oneself of any hope of being an ambassador of the true gospel for it undermines the only truth that saves which is, "Only God can save."
It is your fault.
The above argument is only the first step toward a healthy world view. If one is not moved to compassion for the lost, if one cannot stop for the helpless, nor care for the unloved, then he/she has not understood the gospel. I would never stand in the way of someone feeling remorse for sins of omission. By sins of omission we mean all those things which by the positive understanding of the moral law we ought to do but do not. It is in fact these sins that turn our volumes of sin into the library of congress
of sin. When we fail to love, we fail the gospel because love is the final apologetic. It should hurt. It should make us repent. But most importantly it should drive us, in all our inadequacy, back to the adequacy of Christ. I think that it is fair to say that if a remorse over a sin of omission causes us to retreat into self absorption and regret, that it is not a repentance unto life. I believe it is of the devil. The devil would have us believe that because we failed, we are failures and not loved by God. In this way we embrace a sorrow that leads to death. The truth is that we are sin-sick AND that we are loved by God. In this way we can embrace a repentance unto life.
In conclusion,
We rest in the fact that this person's death was sovereignly determined before the beginning of time by God. He died EXACTLY when he was supposed to die. We repent with a view towards loving people more, loving Christ more, and embracing the Gospel more.
So that, as we are conformed more and more unto the likeness of Christ, the next time a neighbor grabs hold of our leg, we won't shake him off. Even so, we will fail again, and we will run back to Him again. Repent, Believe, Fight, Repent, Believe, Fight, … such is the rhythm of our walk with Christ.

praise the Lord for wise words!!!

in other news, we're going over their apartment (the friend whose dad said the above) tonight to watch LOST. holy smokes! neither of us have ever watched an episode, we have both always wanted to because of everything everyone has been saying about it, and we've been wanting to hang out with these people more! joy! we don't own a tv. it's going to be weird to watch 2 hours (we're going over early to watch last week's episode!) of television when we're not at either of our parents' houses!! they suggested that we watch the 8 minute and 15 second recap of all seasons - it's quite impressive, and pretty hilarious.

this is my favorite picture today:

On The Edge Of The Dark Sea Of Darkness

2008-03-05T09:01:00.009-05:00

Adventure. Peril. Lost Jewels. and the Fearsome Toothy Cows of Skree.

andrew peterson has finally come out with his latest project - a novel!! i think i've mentioned it before, but now it's here, and i could not be more excited.

pre-order the book!

from BooksChristian.com:

Once, in a cottage above the cliffs on the Dark Sea of Darkness, there lived three children and their trusty dog Nugget. Janner Igiby, his brother Tink, their crippled sister Leeli are gifted children as all children are, loved well by a noble mother and ex-pirate grandfather. But they will need all their gifts and all that love to survive the evil pursuit of the venomous Fangs of Dang who have crossed the dark sea to rule the land with malice and pursue
the Igibys who hold the secret to the lost legend and jewels of good King
Wingfeather of the Shining Isle of Anniera. Andrew Peterson spins a quirky and
riveting tale of the Igibys’ extraordinary journey from Glipwood’s Dragon Day Festival and a secret hidden in the Books and Crannies Bookstore, past the terrifying Black Carriage, clutches of the horned hounds and loathsome toothy cows surrounding AnkleJelly Manor, through the Glipwood Forest and mysterious treehouse of Peet the Sock Man (known for a little softshoe and wearing tattered socks on his hands and arms), to the very edge of the Ice Prairies. Full of characters rich in heart, smarts, and courage, On the Edge of the Dark Sea of Darkness presents a world of wonder and a tale children of all ages will
cherish, families can read aloud, and readers’ groups are sure to discuss for its layers of meaning about life’s true treasure and tangle of the beautiful and horrible, temporal and eternal, and good and bad.

check back soon for a full review!

being watched

2008-02-28T15:47:00.004-05:00

have you ever felt like you were being watched? i suppose i brought it on myself by creating this thing called a blog, but it's still weird to have people watching you. so many more people read this blog than i would ever imagine. hi everyone!

i don't really have anything intellectual to say. but i guess i could ramble...

i got an mri last monday (11 days ago!) and the doctor still hasn't called me about the results. i have left three - THREE - messages with them asking for the results. should i give up? or keep calling? one of the problems with that is that i don't like to bug people. i know they're busy and they'll call me when they have time. (maybe.) but another problem is that my doctor is my best friend's dad....so i really don't want to bug him. although i will say that i've been very tempted to call him at his house the past few nights....grrr!!!! i'm dying to know if something showed up that's causing this CRAZY PAIN!!!!! going on 4 years...good grief.......

in other news, i'm officially a member of the verizon squad. *sigh* i was with sprint for...oh gosh. seven years. WEIRD! chris and i finally got a family plan and verizon made so much more sense. all of our friends have verizon, they are the only ones that get service in the remote places we go (the nc cabin and nana's...) so we went with them. we got new phones (i have a camera phone now!!!) and i finally have a headset that i LIKE! halleluia! no more switching from ear to ear from the pain holding a phone to my ear causes!!!! and less chance of a brain tumor...right? hmm....

in more other news, this is my favorite picture lately:

i've been saved by my pinchers of power!

2008-02-27T16:11:00.004-05:00

the goonies. i feel confident in saying that it is one of the BEST movies ever made. the dialog, acting (well, most of the time), sets and scenery, story line, everything is outstanding!!! we were going to rent it and watch it the other night because nathan has never seen it...pity. on the way to rent it, we decided that was foolishness. so we just bought it. (hooray!) we watched it, and it was bliss.

the princess bride. i feel confident in saying that it is one of the BEST movies ever made. (again? YES!) EVERYTHING is outstanding. one of the local theaters here showed it monday and tuesday night, and i went to see it with some friends. brilliant! people in the audience were snickering and quoting under their breath even before the actual quotes would happen. it was SO much fun.

i got to watch two fantastic movies in the same week! watching movies as an adult that you watched regularly as a child is really interesting. you pick up on new things, understand the plot better, and now i always think "what great writing!" or "what great acting!" the movie that made me realize how good it is to watch childhood movies later in life was mary poppins. i never understood the underlying theme of being a good parent...i just liked the magic of the movie as a child! but it's a really, really well-written movie with an amazing moral.

in other news, please pray for a nameless family. (i don't know their last name!) one of the two just-out-of-college guys that lived upstairs in our building, who had been best friends for years from what we understand, (which is really just a house turned into a few apartments, so we know everyone) died. it's been so much more emotional than i ever thought it would be. we just haven't wanted to be in the apartment, so we've actually been staying with our parents the past couple of nights. sheesh. police were at our place when we got home (like, 7 cars!) and we thought it was a drug bust b/c one of them was sitting in the back of a police car with his face in his hands. but when the cops came and asked us questions at around 11:30, they told us that someone passed away upstairs. when we asked if it was one of the two guys, one of them said "if you look around, you can figure it out..." the one guy is right there, and the other guy's truck it parked on the street...yeah. it was him. when they left, we both fell on our faces and bawled - i mean bawled - for about a half hour. (i still have little blood blisters on the skin around my eyes from crying so hard with my head down....that's never happened before...hello makeup!!!) anyway, i'm really worn out emotionally...why didn't we reach out to him more like we said we were going to? why didn't we invite him to church like we said we were going to at least once a month? what if? why? what if? why??!! oh holy and sovereign God, reach down and pour grace and mercy on his family and friends, and on his roommate (who probably found him dead....)

take this away - when you feel a little urge to do something for someone that seems to be good, but you feel like resisting it because it either takes you out of your comfort zone, or it takes away from time that seems so precious, just suck it up and do it. you really never know how much time anyone has on this earth. it's real. and when it hits, it's really weird. we pull in our driveway and see his truck still parked there, and it's like "weird..." regret...guilt....hope.....peace.

this is the day that the Lord has made. go and rejoice and be glad in it!!!

that your love may abound more and more

2008-02-11T19:37:00.000-05:00

you know? life is really good. even though i'm the busiest i've ever been, it is really, really good. i don't really have the finger power to tell you all about it with words, so i'm just going to post a whole bunch of pictures....i think that will be okay with all of you.... :) :) :)

i'm at rembrandts and the connection is pretty slow, which won't mean anything to you as you read this. just know that this post took forever to create!!

i'll start with the most important... and what everyone wants to see....

there it is!! the beginning of alex liner becoming alex walker. WHOA! i'm so PROUD of my dear brother!! the ring is gorgeous and, as alex says, "exactly what i've always wanted!!!"

the story: i got a phone call from my dear and fabulous brother (who NEVER calls me...so i knew something was up) who told me, as you all know, HE'S ENGAGED!!!! he took her up to camp vesper point (of course! where else could it happen!) and he asked her to be his bride on the rocks of the point at sunset. AWESOME!! alex is just the PERFECT fit for him. all these years that we've prayed and prayed for a wife, turns out she was just too young at the time! the timing is perfect. what a great, great couple. i can't wait to see them together as husband and wife!!! and tonight the two of us went to taco night (thank you 79 cent tacos!!) and she (i'm crying in public again...) asked me to be her matron of honor. are you KIDDING ME?!?!?!?! absolutely rock my world. amazing.

and now back to the new year. brian got us a chocolate fountain for christmas! here it is in all its glory for our new years party. MMMMMMMM.........

we all played the most amazing game (it's called "the hat game", which is the WORST name ever. i call it EXTREME CHARADES!!!!) here is chris acting out "fatigue" to lee!

this is chris with his newest toy - a remote control helicopter!! his dad always gets him and his brother a fun toy as a little bonus to regular christmas presents. it's REALLY fun to play with....even if it does look like a creepy giant bug!!!

for christopher's birthday (which is actually before the new year, but who cares?) the two of us went hiking which was AMAZING. we drove to the ocoee - just about 45 minutes away which is not bad at all - which i've never hiked before. this is a LIVING tree. seriously. i marvelled.

and marvelled. and marvelled. it had real live growing branches and leaves at the top. and this is what it looked like when you looked straight up into it. literally a 360 degree turn!!! it looks like a dragon!! BIZARRE!!!

jency turned 24!!! we had a fun party and had a little too much fun with balloons...we seriously must have played with them for an hour like this. don't let them touch the ground!! keep them in the air!! pound each other with them!! keep going! all at the same time!!!!

then we had a bit too much fun with static....(yes, that is "once" on in the background!!!)

everyone had to try....

yes. we are adults.....

no more cookie cake for you, husband!!!

we had an epiphany party (when the wisemen came to see Jesus) at nathan's mom's house! we made gnocchi (a pasta made with literally only potatoes and flour - the steam from the potato acts as the water! here is brian presenting the gnocchi as it is drying.) and then we rolled them into giant worms, cut them into inch long little pieces, and rolled them on the gnocchi boards to make grooves. when you boil them, they float to the top when they're ready! and they are SO GOOD!!! anne's genuine italian sauces help make them the best food EVER!!!

here are the lovebirds....i mean, jency and nathan presenting the gnocchi as it comes out of the water. MMMMM!!!!

RACHEL AND LEE GOT MARRIED!!!! the ceremony was PERFECT! i have so loved getting to know these two, and it was just so great to be a part of watching them begin their new life together!!! i could ramble and ramble and ramble!!!

this is my favorite picture. she is SO BEAUTIFUL!!! (this is her dad...)

colin and caroline are getting married TOOOOO!!! we went to a SUPER fun party for them last month down in atlanta and got to meet all their friends and just hang out. it was so, so good!!

AND we got to hang out and play with caroline's cats, lulu and jackmo. OH MAN. chris and i were in heaven. we both adore cats, and when they have a sea of wrapping paper and tissue to play in, it's a great adventure.

this is my favorite shot of jackmo. he is nothing but mischief!!!

*sigh* i told you life was good. it gets better.

last night we celebrated shoo's birthday, and EVERYONE was there. EVERYONE!!! we had a blast dancing to brad's (emily's new fella!) amazing banjo playing and just sitting around enjoying family.

katie and chase are living in town preparing for going overseas with young life. i can't believe they're leaving!! but i'm so excited for them! the best part about it all is that katie and kendall are BOTH pregnant!!! WAHOO!!! more babies!!!!!!!!!

look at liza's eyes...i think she's trying to hypnotize me.....

and here is queen alice with her rick-rack crown and robe that matches her american girl doll. :) precious alice gets older and more awesome every time i see her!!! i hope my kids are as cool as the whitmire and crowder clan....i wish we got to spend more time around all of them.

the girls already adore alex. she's going to be the best mom someday!!! and she already fits into the walker family SO well!!

another SUPER exciting thing about life lately is that kim shomaker gave me some of her TWENTY YEAR OLD sourdough starter to make bread. HOLY SMOKES! we're talking, chris grew up eating bread off of this starter. i've made bread twice - once the regular way and once with whole wheat flour. BOTH ARE AMAZING!!!! i can't believe i make bread - actual bread, not the cake-y kind. chris and i usually eat a whole loaf in less than 2 days. i like being able to give it away. if you want a loaf, let me know and i'll bring you one some sunday! (i bake on sundays...)

now i'm off to play with the video function...can i really post videos????

::::edit::::yes...apparently the video thing DOES work, but it takes truly forever...and i keep getting errors...so you'll just have to wait to see shoo and gege dancing with the girls, and chris, nathan and sami playing and singing the PERFECT processional in rachel's wedding. oh well. :)

FINALLY!

2008-02-11T08:49:00.001-05:00

FORREST

IS

ENGAGED!!!!!!

the ways of the weary

2008-02-07T08:58:00.000-05:00

well my m&m addiction is over. for now. which basically means that the m&ms are gone and i haven't bought more...and i don't think i will because i'm not really supposed to eat chocolate.....but that's not the point.

last night (and this morning, too!) was hilarious in a sad, sad way. chris and i are both so busy, we're growing wearier and wearier...i shall prove it.

last night, i made soup!!! i was planning on making a quick stir fry with veggies and chicken and rice since chris has to go to his internship. but when he told me that he wasn't going to go anymore (the first move in trying to streamline our time during the week...) i said "ooh! i'll make soup!" those of you out there who know my husband will know that this made him a very, very happy man. and it was a really, REALLY good pot of soup. no recipe. just stuff in a pot. broth, a can of crushed tomatoes, chicken, squash, peppers, green beans, corn, chopped cocktail weiners, seasonings.......YUUUUUMMMMMMMMM!!!! chris was SO excited and was talking about how he was going to take soup to work for lunch the rest of the week! he gets soup EVERY day at work, but now he can have free soup that's BETTER than the work cafeteria!!! but that's not the hilarious, sad part.

then jency came over, and then she stayed and stayed and we talked and talked and it was so very good! around 8:30, i realized i had better get to to making the cinnamon bread b/c it was the day to make it (i'm stuck in a seeming endless cycle of amish friendship bread...) so i started making it. then i realized i was out of sugar. but that's not the hilarious, sad part either.

jency left and chris i went to the store. before leaving i turned the preheating oven off like every good american. we got back from getting sugar and i finished making the bread. i'm breaking my boredom of making the same thing every 10 days by spicing it up a little. this time i used 1/2 cup of regular flour and 1-1/2 cups of wheat flour. and i added pecans this time. YUM!! it's a totally different creature. but, of course, that is not the hilarious, sad part either.

i put the loaves in to bake around 9:15 and was relieved that i wasn't going to but up too terribly late. after 40 minutes of baking, the timer finally went off which meant i could finally forget about it and go to sleep. i looked at them to see if they were done and i said "wow. they didn't rise very much...oh no....you are KIDDING ME!!!!" you may have figured it out already....i forgot to turn the oven BACK on when we got back from the store. BAH! see, it was still hot enough from before leaving for the store to make me think it was on when i put them in. oh you're kidding me.....so i turned the oven on, went back to bed and read for almost an hour. (1 samuel - weird stuff happens in there man..."make a gold modle of the tumors afflicting us...".....WHA???) after 50 minutes of baking, they weren't even close to done. i guess adding the whole wheat flour makes a difference? i don't know. so it took about an hour and a half to bake and about a half hour to cool enough for me to cover them. *sigh*

so that is the hilarious, sad part of my day yesterday and the proof that i am, indeed, growing weary. hilarious because it's hilarious that the loaves sat there for an hour going "um...hello? aren't we supposed to be HOT???" and sad because i went to bed after 11:00 when we normally go to bed around 10. *sigh* i'm sleepy.

the hilarious and sad part about TODAY that proves how weary chris is: he forgot to take soup to work today. ACK!

in other news, iron and wine's new album RULES!!!! (even though the picture scares me a little....)

2008-02-05T15:29:00.000-05:00

HELP!!! I CAN'T STOP EATING THESE!!!!

i'm afraid without professional help, i will become a dark chocolate peanut m&m....someone! please help me!

or at least join me in my delicious addiction.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......

blessings all mine with ten thousand beside

2008-02-04T11:06:00.000-05:00

driving in to work today i saw a wreck. i wish i could make a cartoon of how it happened, but i don't have time. i was driving on a two-way road and traffic is relatively heavy but moving quickly in both directions. there are several cross-roads along the way, and they either have stop signs or red lights, and they can all turn left, right or go straight across. i don't know what the actual directions are, but i'll make it up to make it easier. i was traveling north, and a car wanting to cross comes to the stop sign FAST going west. he slows down just barely and then guns it to cross about 50 yards in front of me. there isn't even a tiny break in traffic!! there were two cars beside each other going south and the west-bound car barely missed the closest car but the farthest car basically t-boned him. by this time, they're just barely past being right beside me, so when i turned me head a little to the left, i could see it happen in my periphery. the south-bound car - some sort of small suv - hit the west-bound car and spun around and around, and i think he might have hit one of the post office's blue mailboxes, but i'm not sure. i didn't see what the west-bound car did. i wanted to slam on the breaks to stop and see if everyone was okay, but i knew i would cause another accident. i called 911 and told them about it.

it truly amazed me how i reacted to it. i had a pretty bad wreck back in 2002 in colorado, and suffered from post-traumatic stress for about a year, and now whenever it snows and i'm on the road i suddenly and surprisingly have a panic attack remembering that wreck. and today when i just heard the crunch of metal that is so unique to car wrecks, it all came back again. i trembled and had adrenalyn running through my body with a racing heart for at least two hours after it happened. WEIRD!

AND! my friends who are in ecuador making connections with people for their awesome fair trade business had a wreck! a really bad wreck! no one was hurt by the grace of God, but it really makes you stop and think about what you're thankful for.

i know that Your mercies are new every morning...i know and trust that You know the plans you have for me, and they're GOOD!...i really believe that You are with me always....calm down little lyndsay. *whew* post-traumatic stress syndrome, meet my God of peace! booyah!!!

in other news, i've been staring at the computer for exactly 4-1/2 hours, and i'm CROSS EYED!!! i have GOT to go to the eye doctor...these glasses are not only broken (i'm ashamed to say i'm using scotch tape to hold them together) but they just aren't cutting it anymore....

for your reading enjoyment, i hope that the following lyrics encourage you in some way. really think about the words, and don't let the "thees" and "thy's" get in the way!!

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father;
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, Thy compassions, they fail not;
As Thou hast been, Thou forever will be.

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

Pardon for sin and a peace that endureth
Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide;
Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow,
Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!

Great is Thy faithfulness!
Great is Thy faithfulness!
Morning by morning new mercies I see.
All I have needed Thy hand hath provided;
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me!

**EDIT** I COMPLETELY FORGOT THE BEST THING ABOUT MY RECENT LIFE!!! one of chris' parents' friends gave me some of her famous sourdough bread starter!!!! and i made sourdough bread this weekend!!!!!!!!! IT WAS SO GOOD!!!!!! i fed the starter on friday night and let it sit all night at room temperature. then saturday morning, i mixed together the bread with one cup of the starter (and put the starter back to bed in the fridge). it was a small little blob - about the size of a really big grapfruit - and it rose in the oven all day (just with the light on to create a warm envinronment). saturday night it was HUGE!!! bigger than a basketball!!! i punched it down, kneeded it a few times and divided it between three loaf pans. the little blobs were only about 2 inches high and didn't even cover the bottom of the pans. they rose all night in the oven, and sunday morning i drug myself to the oven, took the towel off to a beautiful sight of three totally full loaf pans!! they had risen and were even pushing the towel up a little bit! ah, the glory of yeast. i turned the oven and timer on, and crawled back in bed. about 20 minutes later, chris got up to get ready for church and left the door open. he yelled "IT SMELLS SO GOOD!!!" and i thought "yeah, it can't smell THAT good..." but when the smell drifted into the bedroom, i couldn't believe it!!!!!!!!!!!! i want to make it every week JUST to get the smell!!!! then we proceded to eat all but about 2 slices of one of the loaves for breakfast. mmmmmmmmmmmm.

i took pictures, but i don't have the camera cord with me....until later.

day of hilarity

2008-01-31T18:55:00.000-05:00

chris is at guitar lessons, and i'm at mom and dad's just hanging out. i absolutely HAVE to tell you about my day yesterday. i work in the boarding side of an admissions office for an all-boys school here in town. we've been getting our first round of notification letters ready, and at around 12, my boss gave me a list of students who needed to get letters. and they needed to go out that day.

RIGHT. (sorry david...) but he still made me feel like i should be able to do it. *sigh*

[insert explanation of how long it takes to send acceptance letters: they went out today, and i worked on them from 8 am until 5 pm. literally. the information in the computer (due dates, deposit amounts, etc...) had to be entered into the computer and double checked; they had to be printed; the letters then had to be double and triple checked - the worst thing on EARTH would be to send a kid the wrong letter. then they had to be stuffed with all the correct pamphlets and information sheets and memos and lists; the labels had to be printed and be matched with each letter; THEN he wanted them overnighted so we had to fill out 22 overnight DHL forms...we divided it among us because i can't write right now...that's another story. so the written labels had to be matched with the proper letters, the pickup had to be scheduled, they had to be carried downstairs to the pickup site. i ran up and down the 2 flights of stairs AT LEAST 10 times this afternoon.]

now, this all might seem like it wouldn't take a long time to you, but it really, really does. i always think it won't take as long as it does. but it always takes forever.

back to yesterday. so i already have the heaviness of knowing my boss is disappointed in me. i mean, not REALLY, but the feeling is still there.

another task was to get these certificates and official announcement letters out to another group of boys, and they HAD to go out before the end of the day. period. i technically probably might have been able to get all the other letters out if i hadn't had to do that. so i worked on the certificate itself to make it pretty, which took FOREVER. then i had to go buy the paper. then i had to print them and the letters. at about 330, i took them up to the headmaster because he had to sign them. i asked his secretary to call me when they were done.

then i went into mercy's office (one of the girls i work with) to work on the plans for a big event coming up in mid-february that takes weeks and weeks of planning, and this is mercy's first year, so i'm kind of helping her out. which means that i wasn't in my office when his secretary called me, and when i remembered to go get the certificates, it was 430. so i asked one of the guys i work with to please go get them, and he did! thank you! and he came back and said "guess they don't work until 5 up there...it's dark and locked." WHAT?!?!?!?

at this time, i realized that i wasn't going to be able to pick up my husband from work. he gets off at 445 and i pick him up at 515 - he stays at work 30 minutes longer than he needs to every day - EVERY DAY - because we just have one car. (it's our choice though - we like it!) but this day work prevented me from leaving at 5. it happens sometimes, which is fine, but it's really, really hard to call your precious hubby and say "i can't pick you up today. can nathan take you to the internship too?" [his music internship at church at 645.] *sigh*

so then i called security. and they let me in the office. and i got the certificates. *whew*

i got all the certificates and letters signed by all the proper people, stuffed them into envelopes and ready to be stamped. it's about 515 now. so i took them and went downstairs to stamp them. and the DOOR WAS LOCKED!!!! it's happened to me before but it was friday. (this was wednesday)

so i called security. he did NOT sound happy to hear from me again. they let me in, and i stamped them. *whew*

but then i only had 20 minutes to make it to the post office that stays open until 6. eek! and it's 20 minutes away. no leeway. (is that how that's spelled?) so i shut down my office quickly, hoping everything that i was leaving could be left, and ran out of there. i didn't speed, but i hurried. traffic was not bad, some red lights got me, but no big deal. as i'm driving along with about 10 minutes to go before the last run of mail. sheesh! but i was okay. i was handling it. i was together. not stressed...well, not too badly.

then what happened, you ask? this:

actually it said "maintenance required". are you KIDDING ME???? *sigh* it freaked me out at first, but then i remembered that it happens in this car...it's just an automatic thing that happens every so often. no big deal. i was still together. there were 7 or 8 minutes left, and i was about 7 or 8 minutes away. *whew*

then what happened you ask? this:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

*DEEP BREATHS* *DEEP BREATHS* i am together. i am not going to get fired. i am not going to bust through the barrier....hopefully.

the worst part about it was that we COULD have gone through. it was power-line workers, and they were only taking up one lane. but they had the whole road blocked. *sigh* most of the people in front of me were turning around. i was doomed. the people right in front of me turned right on a road i didn't see immediately before the barrier, and i followed, hoping that they knew where they were going. THEY DID!!! we made it around on little back roads for about a minute and then *poof*, were back on shallowford road!! HOORAY! i might make it afterall. when i pulled back onto the road, what turned in front of me from another road? the mail truck!!! AAAH! wait! don't unload the box without me!!! i pulled into the post office behind the mail truck [that didn't go the boxes out front...] at exactly 601. i dropped the little packages into the box and saw:

last pickup: 7:00PM

*sigh* fine. whatever. i don't care.

during most of these events that just kept piling up, i couldn't do anything but laugh. but i will admit that when i saw the road closed sign, there were sad tears mixed with laughing ones. but it was just one of those days.

today, as i mentioned, i worked on the other letters ALL DAY, and i mentioned to someone that yesterday and today were like running a marathon, and yesterday was mile 19. forrest always says that mile 19 is where he's praying that his second wind comes along. [and where he sees the ghost of braxton bragg when he runs at the battlefield. hah!]

that's all. i just wanted to share the amazingness of the craziest day i've had yet.

in other news, this is my new favorite picture:

very much alive

2008-01-30T13:19:00.000-05:00

so...hi. apparently people actually read this, so i don't want you to think i'm dead or don't want to update the blog. i DO want to update! i have so much to post about and so many pictures and so many stories and so much to say!!!! but i, like jesse spanno, have no time. i used to, quite frankly (sorry boss...), have some time to kill, but now - not a chance. PLUS we don't have internet at home, and we never take the computer anywhere that has wifi unless we're doing something specific and i don't have time to blog.

anyway, while you're impatiently waiting for me to post, play on this website - http://icanhascheezburger.com/. oh my gosh, i am so addicted to this website!!!!! it's mostly cats, but sometimes other animals. i think this is my new favorite one:

woo! anyway, have fun, and if you can think of a good, hilarious and worthy caption for my demon kitty hobbes (last picture in the post), please let me know! i'm blank and i want to submit it to the website!! :)