Top 5 Things I Could Do For A Really Long Time

1. Read at the beach (especially if someone else was watching the kids).

2. Talk to someone sitting next to me at the beach. I'm pretty chatty when I'm happy.

3. Watch Pride and Prejudice. The BBC version. All six hours of it, and then go out to eat with all of my girl friends and talk about how awesome it was. And then maybe go back home and watch Sense and Sensibility. I love me some Jane Austen English-countryside-walking heroines. And Mr. Darcy!! Reminds me of my angel baby, except I can't talk Justin into wearing cravats. Or riding breeches. Or a top hat. Shame.

4. Hike in the mountains. If it is somewhere beautiful but not too strenuous. If it is too strenuous, then it will have to go in my top 5 list of things I could do for 25 minutes or so.

5. Jigsaw puzzle. This Christmas I bought a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle and sorted it all out on a table downstairs. I thought everyone would love it! Turns out the kiddies were mildly interested in it, but I became completely addicted to it. Even now I can hear it calling me, trying to lure me away from the task at hand. The puzzle is pretty close to done, and I will be sad to see it go. I have been using it as a reward for getting things done, as in: if I put away all of this laundry, then I will give myself 15 minutes of puzzle time. OK 30 minutes, but then it's back to work! Seriously. I mean it. Just one more piece.

I Can't Make New Year's Resolutions

Why can't I make resolutions?

Well, I can, I guess.  Last year I resolved to read the Bible through in a year, which led me to spend my "quiet time" in December plowing through Revelations, skimming II Chronicles, and jogging past the book of John frantically so that I could say (to myself, of course, because one does not boast about one's Bible reading), "I did it!"

I decided around December 28th that this was not Bible reading as God intended it, even though He is gracious to give us illumination and encouragement even from a cursory reading of His truth.  But after my decison, instead of finding a passage and just sitting in it, meditating on it, I chunked the whole thing and just stopped reading.  That is not Bible reading as God intended it either; so what do I do? I realized that I need a plan.  I love lists and charts and plans.  Which is why January 1 found me back in Genesis 1, Psalm 1, Matthew 1.  I need a plan.

If I made New Year's resolutions, I couldn't just stop at one.  There are too many things about myself that I would like to fix.  Which to pick to work on?  The truth is, I make New Year's resolutions every night around 10:30, every week on Sunday evening...

tomorrow I will/this week I will:

exercise, 
use my time wisely, 
get up and read my Bible, 
finish all of the laundry, 
change the light fixtures downstairs, 
repaint the boys' room, 
install new hooks in the kids' bathroom, 
clean the bathroom, 
plant my tulip bulbs, 
make a quilt, 
finish the scrapbook from 2008...

Let's just say hypothetically, that this time, I do it.  All of my tasks get done, I am a model of efficiency and cleanliness, I drop 4 dress sizes, and my friends beg me for advice and insight because of my obvious skill in all things domestic and womanly.  

Who would not be impressed?  I would dare to say that Jesus might not.

The problem with new year's resolutions for me (and for most people) is that they are all about me.  Me fixing me.  Me focusing, unrelentingly, wholeheartedly, on me.

I do that enough already.

This year, I would like to resolve to love God and love my neighbor better.  And even this  resolution is made in vain if I do not bring it to my Father, who is the source of any and all good to be found in me.

He has told you, O man, what is good;
and what does the Lord require of you
but to do justice, and to love kindness,
and to walk humbly with your God?

  - Micah 6:8

That is my every day resolution.

I have 12 minutes to blog

You may wonder where I have been.  Boy did that party two weeks ago really take it out of me!  I am just now back to blogging.

11 minutes to go.

I only have 11 minutes because I have to pick Emma up from school in 11 minutes.  She is in the school production of The Jungle Book - she's Bagheera, cool and intellectual, completely her role - and she has been rehearsing ever since 2:45 this afternoon.  After I pick her up, we eat a quick supper and begin our two hours of basketball at the YMCA with Will and Jack enjoying back-to-back games.

8 minutes to go.

I have to "coach" Will's team because Justin can't be there because he has to be at church for a meeting.  I was a cheerleader in high school.  I can't dribble anything.

7 minutes to go.

My sweet baby sister is coming to visit with her family.  She's the one with the gently used minivan that I envied a few weeks ago.  I would go find that blog entry and link to it but I only have

6 minutes to go.

We are having Jack's b'day party tomorrow.  His birthday always falls during Thanksgiving holidays so it's hard to know when to have a party.  I didn't want to have it on Saturday because Sam my sister is going to Asheville and I want to come too.

5 minutes to go.

So we (probably just me, Justin has more sense) are taking Jack and three friends to Monkey Joe's (AKA a little taste of hell on earth for adults) on Friday after school.  I will be pre- and post-medicating myself.

4 minutes to go.

Monkey Joe's consists of a bunch of inflatables, crying kids, screaming kids, laughing kids, loud kid-influenced music on overhead speakers, and a high schooler dressed up in a monkey suit who shows up every half hour and scares just as many children as he/she enchants.

2 minutes to go.

You have to wear socks, eat their food, drink their drinks, and the fact that they have wi-fi available doesn't cancel out any of their badness.  It is one of Jack's very favorite places to go, but I am unwilling to pay $10 for him to jump up and down in loudness very often, so that's why it takes a special birthday request from Jack to make me willing to endure the agony.  I will smuggle in a Diet Coke and dare one of those 17 year olds to give me junk about it.

41 seconds to go.

Will wants me to watch a rap about a platypus on Phineas and Ferb, so I have to go now.

Another Saturday Night

For all of you praying for me to not come apart at the seams Saturday night, I would like to say Thank You!  Our Fall Party was a great success.  I couldn't tell you how many people were here, but the house was full and there were plenty of kids on the bouncy.  The band was a lot of fun!  I was not sure whether booking a band was a great idea, but they ended up being a huge hit.  Something about having to yell a conversation over the noise of guitars and a drum set creates a special bond between former strangers.   I also had forgotten how much fun it is to dance to a band!  I am not sure if it is appropriate for pastor's wives to dance to bands, but I can only hope that it is.  I find it ironic that talking to people scares me to death, but I cannot restrain myself from jumping around like a crazy woman when I hear a Michael Jackson cover, regardless of who might be watching.  Go figure.

What was especially gratifying to me personally was how many of our neighbors came.  Four or five families show up out of the many we invited, and several called to give their regrets.  One of our church plant families commented that they were inspired to try to organize a block party with their neighbors after the party Saturday night.  That was encouraging. Talking to your neighbors isn't so scary after all.

After the party was over, I felt like I had just passed a final exam and was about to embark on summer break.  Justin and I were talking as we were cleaning up, and I was saying how great the party had been and he was saying how great our house is for entertaining and then he said, "You know, we should do this again at Christmas."

Worrying about Saturday

We are having a party at our house on Saturday.  We're calling it a Fall Party and inviting everyone from the church plant and encouraging them to invite their friends.  We are going around our neighborhood, handing out invitations and introducing ourselves.  Justin remarked as we went from house to house today how much people's expressions change when they realize we are not trying to sell them something.  They open the door guardedly, and then when we explain that we are neighbors and we would like for them to come to our house, their faces soften and some even begin to smile.

I don't know if many of them will come.  If some random neighbor came to my house and invited me over on Saturday, I don't know that I would go.  But my husband would probably make me, since he loves people like Jesus does and I only love books and friends and family who are already friends and family.  I'm just being honest.  Actually, I like new people in small doses, but an onslaught of new people combined with me trying to host an event for said new people at my house gives me the shakes.

This is our second day of assaulting the neighbors, and I think we're going to do it again tomorrow.  The weather on Saturday is supposed to be brisk, so we're renting outside heaters.  Justin has a band and a bouncy house lined up.  The whole thing frightens me.

I struggle with being scared.  What if the church plant doesn't grow?  What if no one shows up on Saturday?  What if it is too cold and the three people who actually show up don't go outside to listen to the band?  What if the band only plays covers from hair bands of the 80s?  What if the bouncy house explodes and people sue us?  What if we don't have enough food?  What if? What if? What if?

What I have to remember is that God is in the what ifs.  He doesn't freak out, he never leaves me, he is for me and he is big enough to take care of me and everyone I care about.  And anything I enter into, He is already there.  I am the scaredy-kid on the diving board, and he's the dad in the water, telling me to jump!  That I can trust him, he won't let me sink.  It is hard sometimes to trust.  But as my dad would say, it sure beats the alternative.

BatDog

I hate my life.

I can't believe you dressed me as a BatDog.

Just shoot me.

I wonder if I can really fly.

Is there anyone in this family who will help me?

Please. Stop. Laughing.

My Day

Hope it gets better.