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The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. -Proverbs 1:7

Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost you all you have, get understanding.-Proverbs 4:7


Sunday, September 30, 2012

Playing "Catch Up"

My grandma told me I'm behind on my blog. :-)

To be honest, I haven't felt very well for the past couple of weeks and I run a busy life.  Keeping up with all my stuff is as much as I could do.  Besides, who wants to hear me talk about the same boring stuff all the time? 

Maybe I should start a series or something.  I've noticed that's what other people do.  Hmm...

How much could I write today to fill space without actually saying anything?

The grand synopsis of my day (which is not finished yet and I expect will end on a really awesome note):

Woke up not feeling too well.  Thought about laying around all day in the name of "rest", but then decided I'm not giving in to all of that and dragged off to church...which was awesome.  FCA training.  Cooked dinner.  Going back to church...which will be awesome again.

Pretty much a perfect day.  :-)

Was trying to think of something uber-nutritious that wouldn't take forever.  This is a 15 minute meal.  Basically, corn pasta (because it's gluten-free) with an avocado/basil "cream" sauce.  Cucumbers, grape tomatoes and red onion in a raspberry vinegarette.  Liberal sprinkling of raw pepitas, walnuts and sunflower seeds.

Saturday, September 22, 2012

17

 
 
When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares. -Henri Nouwen
 
 
9-22-95 0747 AKDT...


Last year, I posted this.  This year, I wasn't going to say anything. 

There is everything to say and yet nothing to say.

Some things must be learned the hard way and through a process one would never wish for; but yet a process one can look back upon and be afraid of who one would have become had it not occurred. 

How else would I have learned about humanity?  And community? 

And powerlessness?

One moment will always be the marker of time for me.  The moment which determined the rest of my life. 

Is it selfish to possibly be grateful I have such a moment in time?  This is not to say I would choose it again if I was able to rewind time, but only to say through one horrible event I have received much. 

Stuff I grasp dearly and do not know how I would possess otherwise.  And, at the same time, still grasping to keep hold of what was lost.

17 years...healing is a mystery to me.









Thursday, September 20, 2012

Community


This is what my Thursday nights look like (from the view of someone's phone).  :-)

Something my pastor says: "There are two kinds of people; givers and takers.  Givers always have more than they need and takers never have enough."

He doesn't lie.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Bits and Pieces

 
Just building furniture in the living room on a Saturday night...carry on...
 

 
 Sometimes I come home to the unexpected.  Was not expecting this.  I didn't even know we still had the trains.


Aren't these tomatoes cute?  Some kind of heirloom from Seed Savers. (Too lazy to look them up right now...) I have tons of them out in the garden.  I would have picked more, but my phone was trying to blow-up with tornado warnings and the like and I finally decided I should come inside.  I only went out for the rosemary anyway.


Crafting while making dinner.  This is part of a fairly large project (for me, anyway).  At some point, you will get to see all of that. 


Dinner=Spinach salad with artichoke hearts, a few different olives/marinated mushrooms and garlic, white bean/basil hummus and those tiny tomatoes.  I thought we had pine nuts.  I was wrong.  Beans and crash potatoes.  Search "crash potatoes" for a recipe.  There's a million posts on the net about them.

Alicia made a chocolate lava cake.


Bad Weather = Bad Light

Saturday, September 15, 2012

My First Game





1.  Let us not talk about the score.  The only thing I'm going to say about that is the words to most of our cheers seem wildly inappropriate in some situations.  We did them anyway.  I assume that's what cheerleaders are supposed to do?  Hmm...I told them when I took this I didn't know anything about cheerleading.

2.  I realized one of my primary duties is to keep them continually informed whether we are offense or defense.  While I don't know a thing about cheerleading, I do know about football.  Spent most of the game trying to explain how the game is played.  Now, I must say, that while the defense/offense thing seems like it should be an obvious thing, it isn't.  Because I'm down on the track, I'm short, all the benchwarmers create a line that blocks the view and JV football is absolutely frustrating to me in that they seem to just stay most of the game at mid-field which makes it difficult for me to keep track of what's happening as a result of everyone always being in the same place. 

I'm guessing it's probably really hard to be a cheerleader if you don't understand the game or how the cheers line up to what is going on in the game.  At one point I said "Don't we have a sack that quarterback cheer?" They said "We can do that one right now?"  "Umm...yeah."  So cute.  What has happened to me?  I promise there was a "me" at some point that would not have found anything but disgust with that question.

3.  I had fun. :-)

Friday, September 14, 2012

The Big Announcement...

This is huge in my world.  If you don't know me, then I guess you are probably all "So what's the big deal?".  Trust me...it's a big deal.  In July I would have told you I could more easily see myself knocking off the 7-11 than this.  Anything other than this.

Fortunately, photographic technology exists, because nobody believes it when I tell them.  And then when it registers...hahaha...kind of funny to watch play out.

I've had a couple of weeks to come up with some sort of explanation.  Easier said than done.  Get this book and read the whole thing (because it's good).  The applicable part starts on page 175 and goes to the end.  What else can I say?

Tomorrow is the first game for me.  I was going to wait until then to let y'all know about this.  Pictures, you know.  But I just realized they posted this beauty on the school website.  So I stole it.  Real-time pictures tomorrow.  :-)

I'll save the rest of this story for some other time.  There's more...trust me...there's more.

Now...study this picture.  Doesn't it look like I have a freakishly long arm with a giant hand?  Like they photoshopped someone else's arm/hand on there?  Maybe they did.  Because nothing on my body is freakishly long.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Some other world I live in...



There will be a post on Saturday telling you exactly what I've gotten myself into.  For now, let's just say I'm hooked up with a bunch of girls who like to do activities in the name of "bonding" and if it's someone's birthday...all the better.


 
 

Birthday party/Tie Dye Bonding party.  In my room.  After school.  Today.  Because when the last bell rang, I still had 7 hours left until I could come home.  In the name of "Back to School Night".  Yay?  They wanted to come Friday.  I told them it had to be today.  ;-)


 This is what they do in the name of bonding.  No doubt, texting each other or someone else within eye's reach.


They invited boys who tried to eat all the snacks.


Someone made "Tye Dye Cake".

I'm tired.  No question about that.

Monday, September 10, 2012

Fall, maybe?


Suddenly, the mornings got chilly.  Which is kind of awesome considering my room at school does not have AC and last week it was about 122 degrees in there every day and the kids were like wet dogs.  Blah.  Today was much better.

Fall=winter squash season.  I LOVE squash soup.  A lot.  Was just planning on having soup, but when I went to the garden to get rosemary I noticed there were ripe tomatoes.  Who knew?  I spaced that garden awhile ago and haven't really been out there since.  The kids had talked me into this nutrition-free bread and I decided to make open face sandwiches.  I got hooked on these sandwiches (with better bread) at the beach; bread/hummus/sprouts.  So good.  On better bread, that is.  So, soup (that I added spinach and white beans to) and mediocre sandwiches.

Will perhaps be MIA until the end of the week.  I have three back-to-school nights in a row.  I wasn't planning on going to some of them (because listening to 7 people read syllabi to me each night is BORING), but the kids at school told me that all white people go to that stuff.  So...huh.  I guess I have to go?


Sunday, September 9, 2012

Marigold and MollyAnne


I gave my chickens away today.  Because we don't eat eggs and why would we need chickens if we aren't going to eat the eggs?  Is it weird to be sad about that?  I raised these girls from chicks.  What kind of person gets attached to chickens anyway?  Even if said chickens were all endearing with their little habit of knocking on the glass when they wanted a treat? 

Sigh...we are down to 2 pets.  So close to being "normal".... 


Saturday, September 8, 2012

To confirm I'm still alive...

I realize it's been a long while.  10 days or so.  I've been busy.  Since the last post, I spent 3 days at the beach and had to weather through the whole second week of school.  The second week is hard.  Because that's when the kids decide to come out of their shells and I don't know them yet.  Trying to remember if the third week is easier than the second.  I hope.



Sometimes I'm all in the mood to be a short order cook.  Like today.  Because I was productive with cleaning and that always puts me in a good mood.  Tofu for Ryan and pork for the kids.  It only goes so far, though.  Brown rice for all even though the kids would have preferred basmati.

Vegan pear cake just because.  Just because I bought a ton of pears for juicing and the thing about pears is they get really ripe, really quick.