Extraordinary Faith for Everyday Life
Ok, failed to finish out the updates through the weekend, but we’re back. Leg is fine. I’ll post pictures tomorrow.
We ended up going to Alligator Adventure, to dinner at a GREAT local seafood place and then to putt-putt Saturday night.
This morning we went back to the beach, ate in, went shopping and then headed home. Girls are gone to Mom’s to stay the night. We’re headed to be to catch up on sleep!
So I’m out tomorrow. We’re leaving around 2 I think and will be back either Saturday night or Sunday afternoon depending on how the girls do. If it’s a nightmare and they hate the beach (Lexi wouldn’t step on the sand last year), we’ll go ahead and come back, otherwise we’ll stay. In fact, we may just stay just ’cause we can and we’re not going with family and finally get some time just the four of us. Well, technically we’re going with J&J and his parents. There are two condos and we’ll be staying in one with J&J and his parents in the other. J&J are very easy going and fun to be around and Emma and Lexi LOVE them so I suspect it will be a great weekend.
We had a nice day today. FIL came and got the kids and I headed to get my aunt. We went clothes shopping for about 5 hours in 3 different stores. She got a lot of really good deals for my cousin’s girlfriend and I had a great time picking out stuff and not spending money on it! I couldn’t leave empty handed of course and ended up with stuff for the house. I got new bath rugs, shower curtain, vase for the dining room, picture for Emma’s room, a pillow…oh, and a new purse. I actually had a really, really good time with her.
I never thought her and I had much in common but I found out we both like shopping yet are quite indecisive, hence the long shopping trip, we both are weight-conscious and don’t find it extremely hard to moderate what we eat (unlike my mom, sister and grandmother), and we both love peanut butter. Small, random facts, but I think they count.
We got done shopping about the same time Scott woke up from working last night so I drove my aunt to meet up with my mom and I went home. Scott and I headed to get the girls. Scott had slept so long though, he was back off to work about an hour later. Mom, Dad, Heather and my aunt all came over this evening and cooked steaks on the grill, went swimming and then we all went out for ice cream.
Speaking of moderating my food, the past two days with my aunt her has sacrificed any idea of a diet. I had been down 1/2 lb below goal at one point this week so let myself have more than I have been lately but I think today put me over the edge. All ending with a peanut butter and hot fudge sundae at the ice cream place. Ice cream is definitely my Achilles’ heel. So hopefully I’ll get back on track on Monday.
I don’t think I have much to report on besides that. After preparing for Sunday School tomorrow morning, I’ve been trying to pick some more “Vintage Amy” posts this evening and I literally have been laughing out loud to myself. At 14 it was simply boys, boys, boys. Geesh.
Last night we ended up going out to eat with my Mom, aunt and sister. It was sort of girls night out thing. The local restaurant was extremely busy and we ended up ordering while we were still waiting for a table. Our food came out right before we sat down so it actually worked out pretty nicely. Sit down and there’s your food. Lexi fell asleep after she ate though. Which was nice for the restaurant but then she woke up at home right after 9 and didn’t want to go back to sleep until 11:30 or so. I had planned to touch up my hair and finish cleaning the house but I had to lay down with her in my bed to convince her to go back to sleep and I didn’t wake up until 3:30 this morning. So now I’m sitting here doing my hair, trying to get ready before FIL picks up the girls for the day.
Then my orders are to take my aunt shopping for my cousin’s girlfriend who apparently doesn’t have much support from her family so my aunt tries to fill in the gaps. Me, go shopping? Why, yes, I can help! So today should be fun. The only bad part is my aunt is extremely meticulous. She’s one of those that looks at every. single. thing. She was in Garden Ridge yesterday for like 5 hours. No lie.
Alrighty, Emma is calling me to play and since she’ll be gone for the day, I’m going to go sit and play Polly Pocket for a moment….by the way, I did this last night with her and wrote down some things she said. I’ll have to post that later…
It’s not normal as of late but I don’t have much to report for tonight.
My aunt is in town and we all went out for lunch and then she came over here with Mom and Heather this evening. In between, I’ve been working on the youth group’s podcast. It’s a long and irritating story but someone uninstalled our video capture software off of our computer at the church so it’s taking me twice as long to do it this week.
The girls are spending the night with my mom so I’m hoping to get some good sleep tonight.
Ya’ll, other than that, I don’t have much to say, so good night!
When the package said Soft Black, for some reason in my head, I wasn’t thinking it would actually be BLACK. It sounded so noncommittal to the color black. Like brown with a little bit of spice. My hair is as dark as that black shirt I have on and THAT was what my face looked like when I finished rinsing it. If you look a few posts back, you’ll see my hair was definitely brown and not BLACK. Oh my. I hope this wears off a little.
Picture comments below are below/beside the picture (depending on site or RSS), not above. This stupid theme will not work with pictures!! I AM a programmer you would think I could handle a little formatting. Sorry, it’s the best I could do!
Can you see the patch of brown on the side that didn’t get done??
Do you know how hard it is to get a decent picture of yourself at 11:30 at night??
OK, I’m getting the hang of this, I think this picture is really cute..it’s headed to myspace after this. Seriously. Check it.
Oh, and look what a mess I made! I had an old t-shirt of Scott’s on and it got on the shirt which I wiped off with a towel and apparently the dye soaked through and I am a mess. You can see on my arm where I swiped the spot on my shirt. Part of my hairline on my skin is dyed too. Ay caramba! This is why the professionals should handle this.
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.
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.
