Weddings

Weddings have been on my mind today. One of the message boards I frequent is talking about weddings. I just had a young couple over for dinner tonight...and since they are getting married in a couple of months, the wedding is high on their list of topics to discuss.

{sigh}

Weddings are a lot of stress...so why does anyone romanticize them?

Who cares! Let's look back at mine.

I remember our wedding day. I remember when my Dad gave me away. I turned to him, kissed him on the cheek and said, "I love you Daddy." As he turned away to sit with my Mom I heard him sniffle.
I remember my cousin (who is one day older than me and was my best friend growing up) had a hard time at my wedding. I was standing in the reception line, being greeted and congratulated by everyone...then my cousin comes by. TO THIS DAY I still wonder what it was she was trying to tell me. She was crying so hard I didn't understand a word of it. Bless her heart. Her emotions triggered MY emotions. Thanks a lot, Cuz.

But all-in-all it was a nice ceremony. Actually, it was probably the shortest ceremony that everyone attending had ever been to! Our minister was **SO** nervous! More than *we* were! He forgot some things...like the scripture that we had agonized over for days to pick out. In the blink of an eye (well, almost) he was announcing us as Mr. and Mrs.

Then my niece...how adorable was she!?! She was two years old and did a great job. The dress she wore was the same one that *I* had worn at her age when I was a flower girl at a wedding. I don't remember my experience as a flower girl and I'm guessing that she doesn't either.
Poor thing was so tired and needed a nap and wasn't afraid to show it.
{sigh} I miss being able to fit into that dress...as well as my skinny jeans. But I wouldn't have missed out on these last 20+ years. I may never be this skinny again...but I will ALWAYS have the love of this wonderful, quirky man.

Something weird happened to my last post.

It didn't show up until today...two days after I *thought* I had posted it.
Weird.
I've got more to say...but I'm too weirded out to write it right now.
ttys

Shopping

Well, my guys have been out of town this weekend with the Boy Scouts...doing the Boy Scout thing. The usual...camping, rock climbing/repelling, cave exploration, fire, food and mud.

So this left my daughter and I with a rare couple of days to enjoy each other's company. And what did we do? SHOP, of course!

We have shopped at lots of stores in the two closest towns...and enjoyed a wonderful visit with my all-grown-up niece at her apartment. It has been a great weekend.

She had to go to work an hour ago...so it's just been me and the dog here at the house.

Hubby just called and said they were on the way home...so it won't be quiet for long.

Just thought you might be interested in what's new here. How has your weekend been going?

Quirks

Here's another one of my earlier writings. Enjoy.

Quirks

Towels. My kids fold the laundry. One of my quirks is that the towels have to be folded in a certain way. They lay in the cabinet better and they look neater when they’re folded this way. It’s not complicated. It’s not like I’m asking for them to fold a napkin swan. Simply fold long ways twice and then over. Tada!

Now, the kids aren’t wonderful at putting away the laundry they fold, but that’s a kid thing and doesn’t annoy me very much. You have to let some things go and pick your fights. Do you know that saying—is this the hill you want to die on? You know what that means, right? If the last memory that my kids had of me was me yelling, “You didn’t put the folded laundry away!” that would be so sad.

So one day while I was putting away the towels I noticed that my little towel-folding rebel had been at it again. That irked me. In order to get them to fit in the cabinet I had to turn them so that the folded edge was to the side instead of facing the front. Later I was irked again when I got ready to take a bath and I pulled out one of those wrongly folded towels and it tumbled on my face instead of coming out of the cabinet neatly (understand, the cabinet is mounted above the bathtub—high above it). WHY can’t they remember—fold twice long ways, then once over? Tada!

God has a sense of humor. I know this because of two things: First, I have a sense of humor and I am made in His image. Second, sometimes He just CRACKS ME UP!
He wants us to “pray without ceasing” and to me that means we can have a conversation with Him all day long—not only while we’re on our knees. So, here I am in the bathtub, and God decides that now is a good time to answer me. The problem wasn’t that my child was a towel folding rebel—the problem was that I was allowing Satan to use this minor (and it IS minor) inconvenience to PUSH MY BUTTON!

So I let it go.

No longer was I going to allow Satan the enjoyment of watching me to get my Irish up whenever I saw a towel folded once long ways then short ways then again long ways. What a relief! That burden was no longer mine to carry! I instantly felt better instead of bitter.

Then I got tickled. Being a visual person, my mind tends to make up a mental picture if there isn’t a visual image. I imagined Satan, lying back in an easy chair with some cute demons at his side fanning him with palm leaves and feeding him grapes. He decides he’s bored and needs entertainment, so he reaches over beside him and pushes a little button and sits back to watch the action. Nothing happens. He sits up and pushes it again. And again. PushPushPushPushPushPushPushPush Nothing happens. I have disconnected that button! Then I picture him frantically grabbing the wires and trying to reconnect it. Is it red to blue? Black to green? He’s twisting the wires together, but still the button doesn’t work. It won’t work because I let it go.

This is fun! I have POWER over Satan! What else can we let go, Lord? You know what, He’s showing me!

Symmetry Art

Four years ago we did some symmetry math which lead to symmetry art. I know it was four years ago because I found this picture in with the pictures of my 16-year-old son's 12th birthday party. I'm so good at sorting out and labeling my photos. Not.

Anyway, check out what we did:

Basically you find a picture that shows symmetry (or draw your own),

get two pieces of contrasting construction paper,

cut one in half and draw half your design on it,

cut it out and paste the positive and negative halves on the full sheet of construction paper.

Pretty cool, huh?

Bring on the outlaws...

My knight in cardboard armor is ready for 'em.

Timothy spent the afternoon playing with a cardboard box, a Boy Scout knife and a wild imagination.

Gotta love that boy.

Exercise.

That might be a four-letter-word. I have a love/hate thing going on with exercise. I love how I feel when I get exercise...and I hate doing it. I especially hate walking. I don't know why. Maybe it's because my fingers always swell up when I walk. But that seems to be the preferred exercise of some of my friends.

"Pam, why don't we go for a walk tonight after work?"

No thanks.

So explain to me why, when I got up this morning, I dug out some summer clothes and hopped on our new treadmill?

My husband has been using the exercise equipment at work. He *was* lifting weights (and had some AWESOME muscles, I might add) when he switched to all cardio...AKA...the treadmill. I miss him. He works out for an hour each night after work. (Shh...I miss his muscles, too.) That hour didn't seem like much at first, but it has really cut our family time because we have Scout and Church activities nearly every night during the week.

So...we went shopping last night and brought home a treadmill. We've been researching them for weeks and last week we decided which one to buy. Last night we had time to go to the store and get it. (Remember? I live *miles* from any mall or big chain store--so it's a big deal to "go to town.") By the time it was assembled, it was too late to work out. So *I* am the first one to work out on the thing because dh (dear hubby) couldn't get woke up enough this morning. (I had the "luxury" of taking half an hour to wake up.)

So here I sit...all sweaty...typing out my morning's adventures while I cool down. I need to get a bath and go to work. I hope you'll make some time in your day to get some exercise. Your body with thank you for it.


P.S. In January I mentioned that I had joined a friend in a health challenge at her work. Our final weigh-in was last Friday. For the nine-week challenge, I had lost......drum roll please....eighteen pounds. Yeah for me! I'm hoping the treadmill will help me stay on the downhill-slide (so to speak).

Things are back to normal around here...

Everyone is mostly over the cold. Boy Scouts is keeping us busy every weekend again (it must be Spring), and the kids are all looking forward to school lessons to be over with for the year.
Today the Scouts held a Pancake Breakfast fund raiser. It sounds like they made out pretty well. I'm so proud of all the boys...they really pitched in and were friendly and helpful. We have a great group of guys.
Last night my husband and I got to enjoy a Date Night out. Our church organized a dinner-and-a-movie night. We ate at a local pizza shop (actually, it's the one where our daughter works--and she "got" to be our waitress for the evening), then went to the church to watch a video. Around 30 people participated. Everyone agreed that they had a good time. It was fun!
Oh, you want to know what the above picture is about? It's just my husband and daughter having a "moment." My husband volunteered to drive a van load of teens to a Christian concert a couple of years ago. He grabbed one of our puppet wigs and wore it--the entire day. The teens loved it. He said he had his picture taken DOZENS of times that day. He loves to tell about the drivers on the interstate. The teens would wave at them as they passed the van, so they'd be smiling by the time they reached the driver--then they'd sort of freeze when they saw him...a big man in a bright pink wig.
That's my wild and crazy family. I love 'em all and wouldn't change a thing.
TTFN

Words of wisdom for the teens....

First off...I'm not going to get into the whole dating/no dating debate.

I just want to say that I've seen so many of my children's friends who are dating (both ps and hs) and, quite frankly, I'm upset with them. The trend these days seems to be to start at the top--in everything you do. Does anyone see a problem with that?

Excuse me?
{tap, tap, tap} Is this thing on?
Good. Listen up! 'cause here are my words of wisdom to you:

When you start with "I love you", there's no place to go from there but down.

Thank you.
This has been a public service announcement from a concerned mother. Now go clean your rooms.

Update on us.

Hi guys. Long time to blog.
The cold/flu has been making the rounds in my house. I was the first to catch it (as previously mentioned)...then the boys...and now my daughter has it. Poor thing.
She and I seem to get the flu worse than the males in this house. The good news is that it only lasts about 4 days and you feel better. Alive, even. Meanwhile, life goes on. I didn't miss any work. I work in an office alone. Most of the time, I'm the only person in the building--besides my kids if they follow me to work. So I didn't think anything of going to work with a cold. Little did I know that the cold chills weren't from the cold temps outside, but from the fever within. Our thermometer is broke. WHY is it that you never know these things until it's too late? It's not like I could run right out and buy another one.
But you know what? I never really know that we have the flu until the SECOND person gets hit by it. You know how that is, right? Tell me I'm not alone. Please.
Anyway, by the time I got home from work, I was exhausted. After resting for a bit, I had to haul laundry downstairs and toss it in the washing machine. A mundane task, mind you...but it wore me out. At what point do you think it dawned on me that I needed to be in bed? Never. I couldn't think clearly. I just took frequent breaks. Even climbing the stairs--something that I do a hundred times a week--left me huffing and puffing. I reasoned that my lungs were worn out from fighting the green gunk that I was coughing out of them. {Insert clanging bells and giant red flags here. Nevermind, I couldn't see 'em.} So when the clothes were done in the washer, I hauled them outside to hang on the clothesline. WHY was I hanging clothes outside in 30-something degree weather you ask? Because my dryer decided it was tired of providing hot air. {Side note--after 65 dollars of parts, dh finally found the right one and VIOLA!, it works.} The laundry is all caught up just in time for the next round.
So anyway, I'm feeling MUCH better. Just a cough remains. The boys are coming out of it. Dd is going to milk this for all its worth.
I don't blame her.
A girls' gotta do what a girl's gotta do. :)
Hope all you guys stay far, far away from the flu.
And to anyone who may have seen me this week: I'm REALLY sorry if I exposed you to the flu. I didn't know that it wasn't a simple cold.

Blahs.

I finally went to the Doctor yesterday. I haven't been feeling well. I know...I didn't tell you. I don't like to complain (okay, I *do* like to complain, but only to those who love me)
The good news is that my Cholesterol, Tri-g's and Sugar levels are all normal/acceptable.
The bad news is I have an infection.
Wanna know what's worse? A couple of hours after leaving the Dr's office I felt a cold attacking me. Now I'm coughing and have chest congestion.
I'm a mess.
But have no fear...I'll be feeling better soon.