Audio Update

Thank you, all of you who gave me suggestions for my daughter's audio thingy.  She figured it out all by herself, and you can go to her blog to see what she did with it.  This little project involved recording the music, doing her own mix job on audio software that she dowloaded and deciphered (I have no clue -- I don't even know how SHE knew what to download), and getting some sort of embedded player to post it with. That last part was what had us stumped.  Anyway, the recording was done on a cheapo mic, and the remix makes it sound like the girls played their piece in the bathroom :o)  I think it's a great job even if I am bit biased.

Yay! I PASSED!!

I woke up this morning to the barely audible breathing sounds of someone being v-e-r-y quiet outside my bedroom door.  As I slowly drifted back to reality from where ever I was while I was sleeping, I lay there, one with the mattress, with my eyes still shut, concentrating on feigning sleep. The carpeted floor gives a tell-tale groan whenever anyone walks over one particular, seemingly unavoidable spot there, so I didn't have to strain my ears long to be sure that other sound really was someone breathing. Very shortly, the floor groaned again, and I knew the "someone" had left.  A few delicious minutes went by and then I heard it again. I was pretty sure it was Emily, 3, checking on me to see if she could crawl into bed for a morning snuggle.  Sometimes she is too irresistible to ignore, and I was about to open my eyes to see her hopeful little face. Wait, just another minute of sleep..."Someone" was still there. I opened one eye. It wasn't her. It was my oldest daughter, Alizona.  When she saw that I was awake, she walked to my side of the bed and sighed a huge sigh. "What, Alison. What are you sighing about already?" She said, "Mom, I know you don't want to hear this, but our toilet is clogged.  I tried to unclog it but I didn't get it, and it overflowed all over the bathroom floor. Gross, icky toilet water." 

Are you with me here?  I am thinking, "Lord, is this how I have to start this day?  Because if it is, I do not want to get out of bed."  Well, I am pretty good about being calm over the big things.  It is the little things that I have a hard time with.  To me, brown stinky sewer water all over the bathroom floor is a big thing, a thing of gargantuan proportions when it is the first thing to greet me in the morning.  I tried my meek and quiet spirit on for size, and followed my daughter to the bathroom. In that short distance I had visions. Brown slimy water, mixed with goopy slimy toilet paper remains, cover the floor and stop at the hall carpet. The just-washed bath mat is soaked with it.  The trash can and toilet brush holder are floating in it.  I am wondering what I should use to clean it up, and whether I can catch some sort of E. coli disease doing it.

And guess what?!  The Lord rewarded me royally for giving the meek and quiet spirit a try! It was just a test!  And I PASSED!!! He is so good to me.  My quick-thinking Alison had had the presence of mind to turn the water off at the valve! So the yucky water was just in a little puddle at the base of the toilet!  The bath mat wasn't even close to wet, and there was not a thing floating in slime!  It took me one small towel to clean up the mess, while four pair of eyes carefully watched how to do it. (That's so that they could take care of it themselves the next time a clogged toilet threatened to wake me up, right?)  Wow. I got that little mess cleaned up in no time, wearing a smile the whole way.   I have never been so happy to have something NOT turn out the way I imagined...

I can explain the original description of this disaster by saying my daughter is twelve, almost thirteen years old.  "Gross, icky toilet water all over the bathroom floor" was a pretty age-appropriate exaggeration on her part, don't you think?  I am proud of her for attempting to use the plunger.  Waking me up wasn't in her original plans, at least!

Hollywood Blasphemy

Here is a video I saw at HeartnSoul. What do you think? Are you ready to dump your TV yet?

 

Tagged in the NO TAG Zone!!!

I was tagged by my very own daughter, Alizona. I can't believe it -- she knows better!  Daughter!  Wouldn't you rather have me taking care of my girls than lose your mother to hours of mental vacation in blogland?!

This is the 8 Things Tag. I don't think I can come up with eight things.  Hold on, I'm thinking.... (Do you detect the faint odor of smoke?)  Here are the rules:

1).The player starts with 8 random facts about herself or himself.

2).The person who is tagged must post on his/her own blog his/her answers and post the rules first.

3).Then the player must pick 8 people and tag them. Also leave them either a comment or a message that lets them know that you tagged them.

 

Okay, here we go. Are you ready for a thrill (not)?

• 
  
  Since I really hate being the center of attention, I wanted to elope.  My dad kindly suggested that since I am the only daughter in the family, that might not be a good idea.  Mom and Dad had done so much for me, I did not want to disappoint them.  So we had a real wedding. But I am pretty sure there were friends and relatives in attendance who thought an elopement would have been a better idea for us, lol! It wasn't the happiest day of everyone's life, including mine. (Let me qualify that by saying that I do NOT regret marrying my dear husband!) I still think an elopement would have great, but wait... I don't want my own girls to elope!  Hear that, girls?
  
  


• 
  
  For a couple of years I attended grade school/junior high school in western NY state.  I was on the gymnastics team, sort of -- I went to the practices, but I never competed.  No way.  Too scary.  Every time the coach came by, I would fall off the balance beam on purpose.
  
  


• 
  
  While in my sophomore year in college I worked at Target snack bar. (Ick.  Awful job!) It was there that I met the subject of my final human interest story for my journalism class, an old lady who had kept and loved 87 physically and/or mentally handicapped foster children. She had come in with about seven of them, to treat them to popcorn.  I interviewed her at her home.  Too bad I never got around to sending my story to Reader's Digest!    (Oh, and I got an "A" on my paper!)
  
  


• 
  
  When my husband and I bought a two-acre place on the edge of town, we were really excited to grow our own veggies.  Nevermind the fact that we had never done this before.  It was an educational summer.  We learned the literal meaning of Isaiah 1:8, "And the daughter of Zion is left as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a besieged city."  Someone had the bright idea to plant five hills of zucchini and three hills of cucumbers.  (It wasn't him -- he doesn't even like cukes.) Yep, the garden got besieged!  In short time there were cucumber vines EVERYWHERE.  We couldn't walk in our garden without getting our feet caught in vines. Nothing was spared! But the little cukes were oh, so good!!  Also, I had heard that if you plant basil next to your green beans, it keeps the mosquitoes down.  Well, I beg to differ.  We not only had tons of bird-sized mosquitoes, but enough basil to last us forever, as well. Thankfully our property was lined with woods, where all but one of the basil plants was sent to biodegrade, along with several dozen canteloupe melons that were chock full of little black beetles, and the zucchini over-stock.
  
  


• 
  
  I was diagnosed with juvenlie diabetes and spent the first week of my senior year of high school in the hospital.  The same week, my dad had back surgery.  Since there was nothing wrong with me to keep me in bed, I spent a lot of time in his room visiting with him . The nurse thought it was pretty inappropriate for this teen girl to be visiting that middle-aged man so much, and she told me so.  (She could have looked at our charts and figured out we were related -- we shared an uncommon last name!)
  
  


• 
  
  One of my favorite places on earth was a fire ring near lifeguard station #7 at Huntington City Beach. I have great memories of the ocean. I LOVE the ocean.  Too bad so many other people, do, too!
  
  


• 
  
  I actually did a cannonball into the lake the other day -- the first time in more than two decades, I think. It's tricky in a WholesomeWear swimsuit! (What? Did you think I would wear one of those microscopic pieces of lycra? You're crazy.  What if the Lord Jesus came back right then?!)
  
  


• 
  
  Okay, here we go, this is the last one.  I knew this would take forever.  It takes even longer when you lose your entry...  Umm, I never wanted to learn to cook while I was living at home. My mom offered many times to teach me, but I HATED cooking and I just figured I would learn when I got on my own. I made the worst ever batter-fried chicken for my soon-to-be-husband and his brother.  The brave man married me anyway, and we have had nearly twenty years of culinary adventures!
  
  

Okay, whew, glad that's done.  Since this is a tag-free zone, I don't have to follow the rules, right?  Who is going to pick up this tag and do it?  Let me know, so I can go and see your eight things. Good night, all!

Typical Desert Dweller

Happy Birthday to Me!

Sincere thanks to all of you bloggers who wished me a happy birthday today!

Daddy and 3 yo. sang Happy Birthday to me at about 8:00 this morning.   He took me out for authentic Mexican food for lunch, and then to Dollar Tree, where he treats each of his girls on their birthdays. He picked a birthday card off the rack had me read it, then put it back.  That was my card from my husband.  The thing is, it said, "Happy 45th Birthday!"  I am 44.  I pointed this out to him, and he said, "Well, good!  We can come back here next year and I will hand you the same card.  And the next year after that I can hand you that same card again, and you will be impressed that I still think you look 45!" What a goof!

I came home and opened presents from my girls.  Emily gave me a pile of popsicle sticks, a shell, a sand dollar, and a special scribble.  I later learned she also wanted to give me some of my own Tupperware lids, but a big sister talked her out of it, lol! (I would have to say, that is better than the pile of carefully hoarded used drinking straws one of my other girls gave their Dad when she was about the same age! LOL!!!) Amy gave me a cute Sculpey creation, two teeny dolls sitting at a huge table, with a cake on it. Plus, something that is my favorite color, another bag of Hershey Nuggets , yay! Alison crocheted a beautiful cotton dishcloth (she really does do a beautiful job) and also gave me an interesting bowl (I say interesting, because it foreshadowed my next gift), which had M&M's all over it.  And yes, my next gift was a big bag of M&M's from Elisabeth.   Amy baked my birthday cake, and Alison and Mr. Thrifty cleaned up the kitchen and my sweet eldest even scrubbed my kitchen sink!  All gifts were made and given with lots of love and affection -- what a dear, special, sweet family I have!

Trusting God's Answers

“But they understood not this saying, and it was hid from them, that they perceived it not: and they feared to ask him of that saying.”  Luke 9: 45

Have you ever been afraid to ask God about a particular passage of the scripture? I have. Soon after I was saved I began to hear preaching and to come across Bible literature about a lady’s wardrobe.  It wasn’t just about modesty, for if it had been, I would not have been bothered.  I thought I was modest. (It’s amazing how the Bible opens blinded eyes!) This stuff I was hearing and seeing had to do with women wearing pants, and how God designed women and men, and what the Bible has to say on the subject of a woman’s wardrobe.  For some weeks I pondered and wondered.  I searched the scriptures, looking for a verse that said my outward appearance didn’t matter. (It wasn’t there.) Then I began to argue with God.  While I didn’t want to be a rebel against the Lord, I also didn’t want to submit to his will if it meant giving up my pants.  What would my family and friends think? Wouldn’t people look at me strange if I only wore skirts?? How could I afford a new wardrobe?!

The whole question could have been solved much sooner for me, if I had just asked God the clear meaning of the passages I had read. But I was afraid to ask him! I think I already KNEW what God wanted me to do. So why was I afraid? Did I think submitting to his will was going to make me miserable?  Did I think God wanted me to feel conspicuous? Was he going to destroy my comfortable LIFE?  Did I think God just did not know what he was doing?  After all, in our culture, women wear pants. If I gave in to this, what else was he going to demand from me?  (Pants on ladies is not the subject of this post, so keep reading, and don't send me any hate mail.)

Since that time, other similar issues have come up for me, issues that I was afraid to ask the Lord about -- how he wants me to act towards or react to the unloveables in my life, what he wants from me now that he owns me, what kind of missions offering does he want me to give? The Bible has the answers to all of those questions. Certainly I have not gotten the victory over every fear concerning what God might ask of me, but I do thank the Lord for this promise:

“For the Son of man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.” Luke 9:56

There is nothing that God could ask of me, that, if I obey him, will make my life miserable.  Oh, I might be afraid to give up this security blanket or to be put into that uncomfortable situation or to humble myself, but I know now that on the other side of obedience there is joy and a peaceful conviction that I am in the will of God.

My husband knows a man who thinks maybe the Lord is calling him to be a preacher.  This man is afraid to ask the Lord about it, because he is afraid of the answer. A call to preach would mean EVERYTHING that his family is comfortable with would change.  They would have to move away, take a very serious pay-cut, and move into the spotlight as a preacher’s family. He would have to learn to speak in front of people on a very regular basis (oooh!), and come up with messages that he is convinced are from the Lord, to feed his church. The burden to pray would be great.  The burdens of his church family would add to the burdens of his own family. His wife would be a preacher’s wife, and his children would become PK’s.  His dreams and aspirations for this life would go up in a puff of smoke! Now that’s scary! Is God set out to destroy this man’s life and that of his family?  No.  God wants to save his life.  God may be giving this man an opportunity to serve him right in the center of His perfect will. What an opportunity!  What peace can be found when God’s answer is known AND acted upon. 

What does God want for your future or your career (or lack thereof)? What does he want you to look like, and how does he wish for you to spend your free time?  Are you afraid to ask him? If you are God's child, he has a wonderful plan for you. His plan for you is better than any of your own plans. Go his way.  It may take a leap of faith to ask him what it is, but you won’t regret following him in it.

There. I Did It.

I have come out of hiding, and posted a picture of me.  I'm not sure I like it.  I prefer to be incognito.  Who cares what I look like, or who I am?  Ehh, I don't know... The original photo was mural-sized, you know, like it is when your camera is set on simple mode. I had to play with it a while.  Wait!  I know what I can do....I'll disguise us. There! New avatar! That's better.