Father's Day

Enough said.  

Chauvinism

I have always been fairly lucky in my career to not really have to deal with chauvinist. Usually they have been rather removed from the positions I have worked, but there is this one engineer who is now elligible for retirement that is getting under my skin.

There are a few conservation practices that we do that cross between irrigation (what I do) and livestock (what he does). Practices are divided up among us based on what we specialize in. But those practice that do multi aspects will have one in charge and the others who have a vested interest in will consult on it. Well I am the lead on one such practice and consulted with one of the other specialist about the pratice. The other person was off that day so I typed what changes we agreed upon and laid it on this indivuals desk for his comment.

This morning I hear him at the other specialist's cubical whom I did consult with talking about the changes. Three times the other specialist told him it was my practice and he needed to go see me. He leaves his cubical, of which I expected him to come to mine. He didn't. Instead I received an email 20 minutes later with his opinions. I work 2 cubical away from the other special and in the very cubical this specialist inhabited for umpteen years. Are you kidding me?

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Enjoying Life

I am so blessed.  I have a wonderful life.  I received a new swing for my back porch from Marty and the girls for  Mother's day and I'm sitting out here on the beautiful spring evening wrapped in a blanket enjoying this gorgeous weather.
The wind is causing the leaves to rustle in the trees and the birds are signing.  I can imagine many of evening right here.  Hope your not needing anything from me any time soon.  I can't wait until a bit later though when the Hwy 5 traffic slows down.  It's rather bothersome.
I think I just found my new space to read my Bible and my books.

So where is your favorite spot?  Do you have a retreat spot?  A personal space?

Got to go.  I feel like vegging.

Mt. Magazine with my Family

Here are my pride and joy.  I know most moms say they have great kids and they may but these two girls are amazingly  awesome.  Everyday they bring me new joy and laughter.  They aren't perfect, they are just girls being girls.  They giggle, they cry and they love.  Thank you God for these beautiful creatures that you have entrusted me with.

First Assignment

Well, my first photo is due tonight. I'm so unsure which photo to submit. But i think it is going to be the cat. Who knows. It's the first for all of us. It should be interesting.

The A student in me is having a hard time though because I want to be everyones pick. Now I remember why I wanted ou of college so bad. The pressure is tough on me. Lol. I will let you know Tuesday night what photo won.

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Running Late

Slept right through the alarm this morning. That is not good. Even though I ended up only 10 minutes late for work, it puts me out of alignment all day. I could blame it on the cold medicine I took last night but the fact of the matter is I just need a lot of sleep. One of my sisters sleeps maybe 5 hours every night and I just can't see how she is functioning. Maybe her body is just use to it or maybe I'm just a sloth. Not sure which but I had better find some time to sleep before working the Chrysalis Flight next weekend.

Speaking of that, prayers are requested for that flight and also for me and the walk God has entrusted me with. I am starting to get nerves now because Patti has submitted her team list and she is the last women's walk before mine. There is lots to do and the pressure to really listen to God and do what He is calling me to do is scary. I don't want to fail Him.

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Running

Considering I didn't run all of December, I didn't loose as much ground as I would have thought. I had got to week 5 day 3, though never completed it, but starting back at week 4 hasn't been too difficult. We ran and completed day 2 last night and now for this week I just have to do day 3. I can then move back to week 5. I'm rather proud of myself. I would never have pictured me as a runner and I am only interested in 5Ks but running for my health isn't too bad.

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2011

Well, I feel I'm off to a good start this year. I'm making plans and getting somethings accomplished. The trick will be sticking to it. Tiffany turned me onto droid blogging so maybe I will even be able to blog online what I normally blog in my head. That should scare you.

I don't have any resolutions other then continueing with the couch to 5k program, staying organized and being more Christ like in our finances.

This is a year full of adventures with me being a lay director and Marty declaring his intent to become a Methodist pastor. Good thing God is good and always has a plan. We're leaving it in His hands.
Well this is my first droid post. Need to get back to work.

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Christmas Time

I just spent over an hour typing a Christmas post of which blog saves every so many minutes.  Some how in a matter of seconds, I was able to unintentionally and with know clue how, highlight and delete the post just as the software was doing a save.  Lost the WHOLE thing.  And it wasn't a short thing.  AAAAGGGGHHHH

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all my family, friends and those I have yet to meet.

God has blessed me with a wonderful loving husband; beautiful intelligent caring daughters; extended family and friends too numerous to count.  The love that fills my heart with these blessings overflows.  I wish each and every person this love.  If you have lost someone one this year, I am praying for you this holiday season.  God is always with us.

God loves you.  I love you. And nothing you can do can change that.

Love to you all!!!

Couch to 5K

Back in June Marty and I started doing the Couch to 5K running plan.  Not really to get ready for a 5K but to get us off the couch and back to being active and healthy.  This is a 9 week program where you run 3 days of each week, so you would think we would be done by now.  LOL.  Well we're not.  Marty is way farther then me but he is going at my pace so I will keep doing it.  We are on Week 5 Day 3.  Day 3 is 5 minutes of warm up, 20 minutes of running and 5 minutes of cool down.  When we started, I could barely run for 1 minute and I could hardly imagine that I would run for 30 minutes straight.  We did Day 3 Week 5 on Sunday and I was able to run 14 minutes of the 20 minutes and travel 5 laps around the football field.  This is just amazing to me.  I have NEVER in my life ran 14 minutes for any reason.

I will let you know if I actually make it to 20 minutes.

Pumpkin Carving

We finally found a Saturday where we could make it to the pumpkin patch and get our pumpkins.  Every since we started carving pumpkins in girl scouts my girls have to carve a pumpkin each year.  It's really cool that they love it so much.  Pumpkin carving isn't something we did very much when I was young.  I only remember doing it once or twice, but it is becoming a family tradition for us.  The girls do a very good job of carving too.

Emily did a witches hat.  Erin did a laughing pumpkin and Marty did a traditional pumpkin.

Life as of Late

There has been so many things helping lately.  I have thought many times about blogging and just haven't done it. Too bad my thoughts have to go through my fingers to the keyboard to blog.  LOL.

In the last month, I have become the mom of a teenager.  Emily has grown up so fast.  It is so hard to believe that it has been 13 years since we brought her home

Back to School and back to routine

School starts in just 10 more days.  Emily is going into 7th grade and Erin into 5th.  Man, is this going fast. 

Last week we picked up Emily's schedule.  Lots of hype over getting a piece a paper.  She spent all afternoon finding out she had no classes with any of her friends.  Which I understand not having any of the electives with none of her friends because one is an athlete, one is a wanting band, one is a drama queen and Emily is into choir but her basics?  She is taking PreAP English, PreAP Math, and PreAP Science and her three best friends are too.  How many PreAP classes are there?  This is the same 350 kids she went to school with last year, come on.  Anyway, being the laid back kid she is, she wasn't upset in the least.  Just OK and prepared me a supply list to go shopping for.  Got to love that kid.  She makes my life so easy.

Now if she would just plan her 13th birthday party for me I would be all set.

Erin doesn't find out about her team until the 10th.  So we don't know if she will be with any of her friends or not.  She is patiently anticipating though.  She feels like she knows that school already from going up there for her sister's parent/teacher conferences and art night.  We shall see.  There is one friend from day care she is really wanting on her team because when they opened a new school 3 years ago and did the rezoning she was moved to another school and they no longer got to see each other.  She so wants to get to spend time with her again.

Negative vs. Positive

Wow!!!!  I was just typing a post (which I deleted before I posted it) about my job and while thinking about it and my last post I realize. "Dang I'm sure negative."  That isn't like me.  I'm always the up beat one, the Polly Anna of the group.

Never Stops, Does it?

We never out grow it do we? We never stop having those stupid high school dramas. Why is that? Why can't we grow up and just get a long? Why must we all be so self absorbed that we don't realize that others have issues too?

Christ tells us to love one another as we love ourselves. If we were to all do this I don't think this would be a problem. There wouldn't stupid issues of: "you don't ever call me." "You visit him more then you do me." "OH, you didn't invite us to the party." Why do we get our feelings hurt over, most of the time, unintentional exclusions? In high school it was because we didn't get invited to "THE" party or "THE" movie or "THE" whatever. But at what age do we stop feeling we are deliberately being cut off when most of the time it is just the lack of time people have in their busy lives.

I'm having an issue right now and I don't feel I can talk to anyone about it which is just silly because I have a ton of wonderful friends who would listen if I would just call. I know that their life is full of issues they are dealing with and so I don't want to call. What this does though, is it makes me feel like no one cares and like I'm the one always being there for them but not getting the same back. Which in turns makes me want to be there less for them because their not being there for me. Yet, I'm not giving them the chance to be either, but shouldn't they know me well enough to know what all is going on with me. Shouldn't they be calling and just checking in on me? Why must I be the one that always makes the calls? Thus a vicious cycle continues to go round.

I have tried to turn this over to Christ so many times but I am a weak, weak human and I let this chain of gloom drag me down. I love my friends, my sisters and would do anything and everything to move heaven and earth for them. I always try to put my sisters needs before my own and be Christ servant of love to all. Yet when the guilt monster comes out because one has needed more attention and thus left another feeling slighted, I can not deal. How do I get past my feeling of despair when someone feels that I'm not their "true friend" because I have not been there for them as they expect me to based solely on their view of the situation.

Sometimes I think facebook, instant messaging, twitter, text messages and voicemail have truly destroyed good friendships because us humans feel slighted when someone responds to another post but not ours, or comments on their photo but not ours, or they don't get right back to us when we sent them a text or twitter. REALLY - When will we ever stop putting so much pressure on each other to make us happy. Isn't that what we're looking for? You call me and show me I'm important to you and thus I'm happy. I call you and show you your important tome and thus your happy.

When will I fully let go and let God handle this? How many times do I have to take it to the cross? I guess Satan knows me too well and thus continues to undermine me growing in God.

Dear Heavenly Father,

Gracious father, please take these evil feelings of loneliness and despair and inadequacy away. Please help me learn to discern the issues that I should concern myself with and to let go of those that are really of no merit. Guide me each day to love and accept each person as children of yours and remind me that we each fall short of perfection. Help me to forgive those that may not understand me or who may think ill of me and learn that being liked by all is far less of importance then being loved by you. Let me find my happiness in you and the wonderful blessing you have granted me. I just want to be your daughter, to walk in your way.

With all my love,

Walk to Emmaus

The Walk to Emmaus is a very important part of mine and Marty's life and I have been asked to be a Lay Director in 2011. Basically a lay director is the person that puts the walk together for the weekend. They are responsible for getting the people to work, and organizing all the speakers and making sure all the supplies are there. It's a huge responsibility.

I'm a very organized person and have organized vacation bible school for 5 years, plus a children's ministry for 4 years, plus a girl scout troop of 10-20 girls and even a gs camp for over 150 girls. So I know I can do this BUT I'm so scared. I'm worried that no one will want to work this walk, which Marty swears is ridiculous. I'm scared that there won't be any one that is available because it is in Aug and everyone will be getting ready for back to school. I concerned about the ton of reading that a lay director must read through out the weekend. I'm concerned that I will not be a good servant and listen to what God is telling me to do.

See my walk was a pivoting point on my journey with Christ and it was because of the servants that Christ put there on the walk to help me discern the path that God had for to travel on. What if I don't LISTEN and do something more out of obligation? Stupid by most opinions I'm sure but I feel so very unworthy of this task. Christ is counting and me and I am counting on Him to see me through. I just have some doubts about my ability.

Hearing the Calling

Every since Marty went on his Walk to Emmaus walk April 2006, he has been trying to discern the feelings God has been stirring within him. Marty is a cradle Methodist, which means he was born to a family that attended church regularly all his life because they had attended church all their life and that denomination has always been Methodist.

Marty was raised in two very different Methodist churches though. His home church and the one he was baptist and confirmed in was Pulaski Height UMC in Little Rock and it is very high church. They are televised and have 4 or 5 associate pastors as well as the senior pastor. Then there was his Grandmother Bowie's church in rural McCool, Mississippi. That church had an a circuit pastor, which they shared with two other churches. The pastor would preach at one church, travel to the next and preach and then travel to the last church and preach. The congregation was small, maybe 10 or 20 when Marty was growing up with those hard pews with no padding and there was a little elderly woman who always played the piano. It was a very broad church experience to say the least.

Pastors are also common in his family. His Uncle John (Dad's older brother) is a retired United Methodist pastor and John's son Scott is a United Methodist pastor.

Well he has been wrestling with: is he or isn't he being called by God to preach. He's currently a lay speaker by taking lay speaker 1 and 2 classes offered by the United Methodist Church, but the path before him has a few options. He can try to go to seminary and become an ordained minister, he can do some seminary but only become a local pastor or he can just continue to be a lay speaker. He doesn't know which is the path that God has planned for him but today was the first of a feel many times to come.

Today I got the humbling pleasure to hear him preach for the first time. Rev. Aubrietta Jones is on maternity leave from Old Austin UMC and she had asked Marty to fill in on one of the days she was off. Today was that day. It seemed very fitting that it was Father's Day to be his first sermon. His Dad and Mother came along with me and the girls, but also Emily Bredfield brought her girls. Which was very fitting because the first person I heard express their option to Marty that he should pursue preaching was Chip. I am truly sorry that Chip wasn't here to hear him though, but Emily and the girls were there for him. I don't know who was more nervous, me or Marty but it would be close. Then during offering they played Mercy Me's song "Here with Me" and the video. I lost it. The tears started and there was just no stopping them. The pride I felt being there in the Lord's presence knowing Marty was doing something he was called to do. I can't describe it any more then I could turn the tears off. It was so awesome and he did such a great job. I couldn't be more proud.

I love you Marty. What ever path God calls you down, I will be right behind you with my love and support.

Day 2

This is only day two of trying to get my size 12 body heading to a 14 turned around into a size 12 heading to 10 or 8. I am not "depressed" but I so hate how my clothes look on me and I can't stand going shopping because of the sizes. This is really just a selfish because my wonderful husband and beautiful daughters tell me all the time that I shouldn't say I'm fat because I'm not. Well, I may not be fat but I'm not happy with my muffin top or my double chin.

So thus begins my determination to get fit. I have a friend who is fit and I want to look like that. It will not happen over night and it may not even happen in a year but it is one day at a time from here on out. I'm not dieting because diets do not work. Diets never work and please don't be offended if you think they do. Being fit is a way of life that when I was in junior high and high school I could maintain while surviving on cokes and snickers for lunch every day. But this 40 year old body is not going to be fit if I continue to have a sedimentary life. (Don't you love the fact that we grow up to get jobs to pay the bills and they turn out to be killing us slow as we sit in our cubicles?) Ooops! Sorry, don't chase that rabbit.

We are not doing much at the moment but walking the track and trying to not snack. I love to snack and my cubicle is the perfect place to snack, but again I digress. We walked 8 laps last night and sweated. Though I need to do way more of that as my fingers resemble little sausage links but which really is water retention. Too much salt in my diet. I love salt and salt loves to keep water in me.

We are talking about doing walking and bike alternatively which I love but I don't know if I get as good of an exercise with biking. I don't feel as tired when we bike. Maybe we need to do more then 18 miles but time in the evening isn't on our side.

Well, I will try to post more though I know I'm only talking to myself here. But, maybe I can hold myself accountable if I assume someone is out there reading this. Ha Ha. Let's see if this motivates me.

Time for a shower. I smell.

PS. There will be no before bikini photos for a while of this body. Like you wanted to see this in a bikini. LOL

Easter with my girls and hubby

Getting to spend the last four days going through the Passion of Christ with my girls and my hubby has been such a wonderful time.

Thursday evening we went to Old Austin UMC and celebrated Maunday Thursday together. For those that may not know what Maunday Thursday is, simple it is a communion service that focuses on the last supper the disciples shared with Christ. It just amazes me the similarities we have with the disciples on that night. The Bible doesn't tell us what each of the disciples thought that night but the general consensus is that no one actually understood what Jesus was telling them but many of them knew something special was about to take place.

Friday night we went to our church property in Greystone and celebrated Good Friday together. Readings were done by Jeff, Aubrietta, Marty and Mitch of each point of the betrayal through when Christ took His last breath. We were each given a 20 penny nail to pray over and to ponder OUR personal sins that Christ died to wash away. After the readings, we each took our nail and hammered into a cross that had been erected.

Saturday afternoon we all gathered at Magness Creek Elementary school to hunt Easter Eggs and spend some time with our church family. The girls did a great job hunting eggs and won many prizes. I was the event photographer and photographed the kids that were will with the Easter Bunny. I know, I've been asking the question and trying to find the answer too. What does a bunny and eggs have to do with Easter. When I finally find it, I will let you know.

Sunday morning we all got up and were at Cypress Creek Country Club in time for SonRise Service. It was a beautiful sunrise and a balmy 58 - 60 degrees. So much improved over the 30s and 40s of the last couple of years. It was a beautiful morning with 200+ of God's children gathered together.

Emily and Erin got wear their new Easter dresses this year and I must say, they take my breath away. God blessed me and Marty with two beautiful young women that bring nothing but smiles and pride to us. Thank you God for all the blessing you have given me, but thank you most for the blessing of your Son and the fact that I know that He died and then rose from the grave just for me.

Happy Easter everyone.