Friday, December 5, 2008

So Much To Say...Where I Am - 05

So much to say...I feel as though I have not really blogged in the last two weeks about all the goings on in my life, so here I am to catch this blog up! I'm going to revert to my stand-by method of updating by going to my "Where I Am" format...so here goes!

Where I am: Sitting in my bed! Yes, it is 9am on a Friday, but it's my day off and...well this is as far as I've gotten today...Love it!

What I'm Listening To: Nat King Cole singing Away in a Manger off of iTunes radio - Thanks Marla...I read about this on your blog and I decided to check it out! I love the classic Christmas songs...

Fabulous Moments from the past two weeks: I seriously have had some great weeks here so it is hard for me to decide. So, I'll give a quick run down of my top three:

1. Thanksgiving with Josh's family - We just had a wonderful time with his family and I especially enjoyed Josh & I's gift giving time. If any of you read my previous blog I mentioned that we were changing up most of our gift giving this year - trying to do more meaningful gifts...giving of our time rather than just purchasing expensive gifts. So, after much thought I had the idea to ask our two nephews & niece to join us in raising money for a water well in India. So, we sat them down and told them a little about our trip to India. We told them about the boys and girls that we met and how sweet that they were...we also told them that not only do these kids not have many toys, but they also sometimes get really sick because they don't have clean water. We printed off a different picture of kids for each of them and asked if they would do two things. Could they start praying for these kids and could they start saving their change so we as a family could drill a water well for them this upcoming year. We then pulled out their gifts - piggy banks! Surprisingly, the two older kids were really excited and already started putting change in their banks! It was a really special time.

Luke shows off his piggy bank

Saba & Safta (Hebrew for Grandmother & Grandfather) give some change to Zoe & Levi to start off their banks!

Levi looks at the picture we gave him of James

Here are three piggy banks we got the kids - aren't they cute?

Then, as part of their gift we said that we just wanted to have fun with them! So, on
Saturday morning we took them to "Pirate Town" (aka McDonalds with a Pirate Ship) and we played together for a while. You know, I think that we all enjoyed this change in gift
giving. I felt more connected with the kids and was much more intentional about spending
quality time with each of them while we were there.


Josh, Zoe, Luke & Levi show off their best pirate faces!

2. I mentioned in an earlier post that my mom's birthday was on Monday, and we had our immediate family over for dinner & a little celebration. I guess what made this moment fabulous is just that I realized once again just how blessed I am to have my family. They are just fun to be with and I love them all.


3. My third fabulous moment was watching my students preach on Wednesday night. I just finished teaching a class called "Preaching & Teaching the Bible" and three of my students had the opportunity to preach to our church. They were each nervous, but it hardly showed! They stood up there with a combination of humility and confidence and preached their hearts out! I was so proud! So, if you see or know Angela Smith, Hal Brandenburg, or Kyla Osborne please take a minute and encourage them. I believe that this is just the beginning of opportunities like this for all three of them.

I've always heard parents say that it is more fun for their kids to succeed than themselves and although these three are most definitely not my kids, I felt like I got a taste of that truth. I just sat there cheering them on inside, and it was so fun to see people bragging on them after the service...and even more amazing to see that many in the congregation were either crying or praying after these sermons - they weren't performances, but God used these three to speak His truth.

Funniest Moments of the Weeks: Again, there is a toss up here between two...so I'll tell both.
1. While we were in Dallas we were driving with Josh's sister Joy & her three kids. We were listening to the radio, and she and Josh changed the station because the song that came on had some questionable lyrics. My niece, zoe started complaining that she couldn't listen to that song while Josh and Joy were explaining that there are some songs we just don't listen to because they say bad things. At that moment my little nephew Levi says, "Apple Bottom Jeans has bad words..." You probably had to be there, but I laughed out loud! Josh asked Joy how he even knew that song? But then we all just started laughing!

2. So, in case you don't know, I have three ladies who work for me at the church & they are AMAZING!!!! Kyla works full-time overseeing our communications, Missy works part-time helping me with MTS & Hannah works part-time with zoe. So, on Wednesday I took the three of them out on "an thank you adventure" just to say thanks for making my life so much easier! We laughed A LOT that day, but probably the best was after we finished eating at Manna, Hannah got hit on. Some guys boss actually came over and said that he was just mesmerized by Hannah and ultimately the boss was trying to get Hannah's number for this guy. Again, I'm sure you had to be there, but it was fun!

Pictures I enjoyed taking this week:


With my beautiful niece!

Levi - seriously, he is one of the funniest kids you will ever meet!


Madison shows me that she learned to clap!

Things I'm looking forward to:
  • I'm taking pictures of Molly Kate today! I'm not the best photographer, but if I can capture an ounce of Molly Kate's cuteness then it should be a success.
  • Secret Sister Party - zoe does Secret Sisters every year and we have our unveiling party tomorrow morning at my house.
  • Sending out Christmas cards. Again, I'm to be wise with the money, so my cards are a little different this year, but hopefully they will come together nicely!

1 comments:

Jennifer said...

Fab update!

The song lyric thing cracked me up! I never paid much attention to the lyrics until I had exchange students riding in my car. They listen to everything because they're trying to learn English. I've had a Japanese girl proudly singing "My milkshake brings all the boys to the yard..." -thinking only about those amazing drinks she had discovered from Sonic.
I also had one ask- "What means hump?" Which confused me for a minute until I asked- "Where did you hear that" and she replied- "From that song. And what are lumps?"

mmmmhmmmmmm- we stuck with Country after that.

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