Archives for 2007

Good day

August 20, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

Today was a good day. I went into the office and got several things accomplished. Had a nice lunch (and breakfast and afternoon snack). Got my monitor (see previous post). But got some bad news too. ‘Member that little (read big) raise I got? Yeah, well my contracting company is not wanting to play nice. My manager’s manager is getting involved. And I’m guessing I may move contracting companies in the near future. Hopefully nothing will change about my position or work at home/part-time status. ‘Cause we can’t be havin’ that.

Tonight I took the girls to eat at McD’s. I wasn’t hungry yet so I helped them eat by making lots of train/plane/helicopter/car sounds to make them eat. And no, I have no clue how to do any of those sounds. The grandma/grandpa next to me with their 8ish/10ish grandchildren kept looking at me like I had 3 heads. But I firmly did not make eye contact and was just happy my kids were actually eating the kids’ meal I bought them.

We made a stop at Wal-Mart on the way home and got some groceries. Nothing else exciting. We’re home now and the girls are watching HSM2 (again) while I sit staring at my new monitor. Doesn’t seem like work/McD’s/Wal-Mart/computer time would all add up to a good day but it has been.

Yay, look what I got

August 20, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

OK, so they say it’s sometimes as simple as ask and you shall receive and today it was. I went into the office today and mentioned in passing about taking home a flat screen monitor to my manager. Within about 2 minutes I had a brand new one on my desk to take home. And if you notice in the pictures…there it is. And there’s me staring at it. That’s how I spend most of my day every day. And I love it.

It’s just so pretty and modern and big and little all at the same time. I know I’m like 5 years behind everyone else and most people have been staring at flat screen for years and think what’s the big deal. But if you notice in the pictures of the dining room from my House Tour, I had a really big monitor. And now this. It looks so much better. And now I have room for my laptop AND papers.

** Sorry the pictures are so dark. I’m just realizing it and now I don’t want to edit them. You get the idea…

Power Team

August 19, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

Our youth group scheduled a last minute visit to a nearby high school to see John Jac0bs’ Next Generation Power Team tonight. Their main focus is to perform/speak at schools. In fact, I saw a previous Power Team at my high school years ago.

I have to admit I was a little skeptical. I have seen them twice before and although it’s amazing every time, it seemed a little bit corny to go see a third time. But let me tell you, they were amazing. And let me also tell you, it wasn’t simply the water bottle busting, the phone book tearing or the breaking of a baseball bat over one’s leg by shear power but their testimony was simply moving. There were close to 100 people that went forward to accept Christ at the end. I was moved simply by the movement of the Holy Spirit in the others. Their presentation was so clear and direct yet said in a way that an 8 year old could understand. In fact, I would say a good 10-20 of the people were under 12.

There are two stories, one true and one not, that they told that were excellent pictures of what Christ does for us that I hope I remember for a long time.

One is a (imaginary) story of a man that gets a speeding ticket. He knows he’s guilty and admits so to the police officer. The police officer says ok, you pay $2 million or you go to jail for life. The guilty man knows even if he called everyone and every bank he knows, he could not come up with $2 million. So he has resigned himself to spending life in jail. A man pulls up, walks up to the car and says he will pay for the ticket, every ticket he’s every had and also any ticket that he may get in the future. So the guilty man just has to decide whether the guy is crazy or to accept his gift and let the officer put it toward his account.

Now this story is false but in a sense it is quite a realistic picture of us and Christ. We are all sinners, unfit to enter into Heaven and unable to repay any debt of sin we have. Christ died on the cross for us and became our payment for our debt of sin. All we have to do is decide to let him be our payment. It is a choice we make.

Isn’t that a story that makes it so easy for even a child to understand? They learn the idea of doing “bad stuff” and going to jail so early and then to be able to apply it to what Christ did for us is amazing.

The next story is a true story. It is of a man that goes to a barn sale and buys a Harley for $800. It doesn’t run but he wants it for a keepsake. One day he decides to get it running and takes it to a local Harley shop to get an estimate. That afternoon the shop calls the guy and offers $50,000 for the bike. The guy is confused, but realizes something is important about the bike and declines the offer. They call him back that night and offer $75,000, no questions asked. He again, realizing there is something up, declines. The next morning he gets a call from Jay Leno, yes, THE Jay Leno and he offers $200,000 for the bike. He declines again. Leno then offers $250,000. The guy confused says, the bike is not for sale but please tell me what is going on with the bike. Leno explains and says Well, apparently, Harleys have a serial number under the seat and when the Harley shop had pulled the seat up, it said something to the effect of Sold Property of EP. They looked up the serial number and it was previously owned by Elvis Presley. So John Jac0bs at this point asks us what makes the difference between a bike yesterday being worth $800 and then the next the same bike being worth $250 million. Simply, knowing the owner. We find our worth when we decide to accept the payment Christ offers and live our life knowing who owns us. Knowing the God of the universe has our best interest at heart and leads us to the life He has planned for us. We can stand tall and know we are worth something.

That message, as simple as it is, the simple gospel was more powerful than any sermon I’ve heard recently.

Check out their web site, invite them into your schools. They do it all for free on donations given by churches. It could change your schools, your city, maybe even your life.

At home this morning

August 19, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

Instead of embarrassing Lexi and myself by letting her scratch her herself all morning in Sunday School, I opted to stay home with her. Her rash does seem to be improving in the slightest way as I didn’t have to wake up through the night with her even though she slept with us. I’ve also learned to change her as soon as she wets and wipe her with water and then dry her before putting a diaper back on. The dr said it should be improved by tonight so I’m hoping. I’m supposed to go into work tomorrow and I hope I don’t end up having to stay home to run interference. Something about sick kids always wanting their mommy.

So today is the first Sunday service without St leading choir/worship. I’m wondering how many people will sing in the choir and how the praise and worship will go. Scott is not the best at giving scoop and J is not going to be there this morning either so we’ll see how much info I get.

Crap – just a call that C is leaking fluid and she is in Wisconsin visiting family and was supposed to fly home today. She’s only 23 weeks pregnant and had E at 28 weeks. Please pray hard!

Hair cuts and refrigerators

August 18, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

Even though the waterpark adventure got cancelled for me yesterday, I still took the afternoon off. Mom took the kids and Scott and I went to the mall and I got a hair cut. I paid major bucks because my new stylist I had found in town here was on vacation so I went back to my long-time stylist at Toni & Guy. More money I think was spent on “products” than the actual hair cut. I’m such a sucker for those sweet smelling Bed Head products. And the do make a difference when I’m trying to duplicate the style at home. Or maybe it’s all in my head. Who knows. There’s just something about walking through the mall with a new haircut and a bag full of hair products that makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

While we were at the mall, we finally broke down and bought a Kenmore refrigerator at Sears. We paid a little extra to have it delivered today and so far I really like it. The old fridge was owned by the last owner and it’s kind of nice to have a new one of our own. Plus, this has the water and ice dispensers on the front. It’s a faux stainless steel on the front and black on the side. It’s not a fake painted gray color, but something I think they call satin stainless that looks exactly like stainless steel but doesn’t leave fingerprints and is also magnetic. So yay, one thing off our to-buy list.

Lexi “sick”

August 17, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

*warning girl/children medical talk ahead*

Lexi is not technically “sick” but she is MISERABLE. The poor thing has a yeast infection. But it’s not like an adult yeast infection, it seems to be all on the outside. And no, there’s not white yucky stuff. It looks like a diaper rash but it itches her until she literally falls to her knees crying in such pain. She has a few minutes when she finally stops itching and gets down to play but she is on the verge of insanity and gets mad/upset at the drop of a hat. I feel so bad for her.

It showed up on Wednesday, got bad yesterday and today I finally took her to the dr hoping they could do something and while they did put her on prescription strength cream, it doesn’t stop the immediate itching. The dr. said it would probably be bad until Monday. Ugh.

And you can’t take the girl anywhere. She’s not shy about scratching. She spreads her legs like a boy and starts scratching like a baseball player with jock-itch. It’s VERY unladylike and extremely embarrassing. I had to run out of Walgreens when we were getting her prescription as she started scratching and crying which made everyone in sight look at her. I tried to cover and say things like “I know it hurts, honey” or “I know it itches, mommy’s getting some medicine for you”. But for some reason it didn’t stop the stares. So methinks we’ll be staying in most of the weekend.

Wow, that was not good

August 17, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

I’m sorry folks if I’m the only one, but I did NOT enjoy High School Musical 2. Too many rip offs from Grease and Dirty Dancing and not enough action. It wasn’t until about an hour and half into it that anything actually good happened. I do have to say I think Kenny Ortega did decent on the group dancing but what was with the producing of the songs? They sounded like all electronic or something. I’m not music expert so I don’t know how to describe it. And the only song I actually would listen to is the one Troy and Gabriella sang right before she left. I don’t know, maybe I’m finally too old to enjoy movies like that but I’m glad I didn’t pay $9 for it. Although, I do have to say Mr. Troy was lookin’ awfully cute. Made it easier to sit through all two hours. And Troy and Gabriella were cute together through the first part of the movie. They should have broken up earlier and created more drama!

SYTYCD Finale

August 17, 2007 by Amy Leave a Comment

So I’ve been keeping up with this show but haven’ t mentioned it too much. It seems the ones going each week were pretty predictable and if not predictable, ok by me. The top 4 though was a little questionable about who would go first and who would win. To me, Lacey had seemed to be a crowd favorite from the get-go. But as my sister and I agreed, she was consistently good, but Sabra and Danny really showed some improvement through the season. Danny had a very, very strong night Wednesday night and I thought–and hoped–for sure he would win, especially when I saw Lacey dropped out first. I am very happy with the results. Sabra is an AMAZING dancer. She makes everything look so natural and yet so professional. She has so much attitude and yet is humble. Danny is simply amazing. His lines and techniques are far beyond anyone else I think. I’m no expert but I don’t think anyone can argue with that. So I have to admit to chanting Danny’s name as Cat rambled on and fidgeted with envelopes (I love Cat, but the suspense seemed to last forever). I was disappointed that Danny didn’t win, but it was good to see a female win and Sabra definitely deserves it as well. I definitely think this was the best season so far and am looking forward to next year!