Amy J. Bennett

Extraordinary Faith for Everyday Life

Weekend/Monday Recap

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I’ve had a person or two notice that I haven’t posted here as much as normal.  Well, ok.  I’ll admit.  Just my mom misses my daily posts.  So this one’s for her.

Friday night Heather and I went back to KMart. We didn’t get home until 12:30 after visiting two KMarts, one an hour away.  Not sure if it was worth the time and gas except we had fun.

Emma stayed with MIL Friday night but Lexi wanted to go home.  So she was off with me for bible study and helping set up stuff at church for the spaghetti dinner on Sunday.  I don’t think she was feeling well because she stuck by my side.  In fact, she sat in my lap the entire 1.5 hr we were at bible study.  Very unlike her.

I brought Emma home from the church and the girls and I just hung out at home.  They played and I cleaned the house.  Saturday night I cooked dinner which I don’t do a lot on the weekends.  It was really nice to actually be at home.  After getting the kids to bed, I spent the entire night reading Twilight.  I stayed up until 1 when my eyes would not stay open to read anymore.

By the time Lexi went to sleep Saturday she had a fever and was complaining her neck (throat) hurt.  I knew at that point we weren’t going to church.  I woke up Sunday morning to her throwing up in my bed.  That was after I had given her some apple juice.  We were definitely not going to church at that point.  But she was fine all morning, even eating a bowl of cereal.  Her fever had broken through the night and by 12, we were all ready to get out. Well, except me.  I really wanted to stay in and read, read, read!

We went to the choir dinner at church and then came back home.  I let the kids play while I got my CVS stuff ready.  I bravely took them to CVS and they were excited to get candy and a halloween bucket.  Scott got home a little late so I didn’t go to choir.  At that point I think we all just wanted to stay home together instead of going to church.  I had barely seen Scott all weekend because of my Kmart trip and reading marathon.  So we all headed out grocery shopping together and stayed in for the evening.

Today was a normal Monday…Lexi and Emma to school, Scott off working at the church and me at home working and on conference calls most of the day!

This evening we ate at home and then the girls and I played some Wii while Scott was at the church again for a meeting.  My evening was spent watching One Tree Hill.  Scott was home by the end and we started watching Baby Mama but the DVD started skipping.  We’ve had a lot of problems with that lately and the first 10 minutes didn’t really interest either of us so we gave up.

And now, Mom, I hoped you’ve enjoyed because I really feel like this is a boring post!  I have a few more brewing in my head so maybe I’ll get another one out tonight.

Lexi-Speak

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With Lexi’s 4th birthday coming up quickly, I’m realizing how quickly she is getting out of the baby stage.  I find that I’m trying to savor all the baby stuff where Emma I couldn’t wait until she learned that next thing.  One last thing Lexi has left is her speech.   While she is a non-stop talker like her sister, there are a few sounds/words she hasn’t mastered and I’m going to miss them…

  • Sank you (Thank you)
  • Nahkin (Napkin)
  • I luzz you (I love you)
  • Fwee (Three)

New Twilighter Here

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*SPOILERISH*

So I finally, finally got on the Twilight bandwagon.  It was all over blogs, all over Twitter, even a male coworker kept asking me if I had read it since his wife was so obsessed.  I got the book Friday, really started reading Saturday afternoon and finished it this afternoon.  I had heard once you start, you can’t put it down and boy that was an understatement.

Twilight is the age old we-can’t-really-be-together-like-we-want-to-be-I-would-die-for-you-kind-of-Romeo-and-Juliet-love-story.  There wasn’t anything spectacular there I suppose but there was something to this vampire thing.  I have never been a big fan of anything involving Vampires but I actually enjoyed learning as Stephenie spent a good deal of the book explaining the rules through Bella’s questions.  Who this Edward was and why he did what he did.  While Edward couldn’t get into Bella’s head, it seemed just as frustrating that we couldn’t get into HIS head.   I think that first day of school was just as confusing and frustrating for me as Bella.

And gosh, how many of us can relate to that first love?  Wondering what they are thinking, looking for them in every room you went in, having so many questions, feeling that electricity at every touch or even near touch and never wanting to be apart.  It’s that feeling everyone wants and only happens a few times in your life.  And yet somehow, you relive it through Edward and Bella.

But not only that first love but there’s that forbidden love as well.  All those feelings above but with someone you can’t have them with.  Normally a first love is done freely, drinking in all you can.  But not with Edward and Bella.  He has to restrain himself and while feeling all these feelings, he can’t live them out.  It’s really quite intoxicating to read how he wants to touch her so badly and yet reigns himself in..both physically and even in telling her things to protect her.

Beyond that, there is the whole bad boy persona Edward has.  The guy that makes it ok to skip class and stretch the truth in order to go out of town on a date.

And not only bad boy, OLDER bad boy.  There was something about him being experienced, technically old and yet so new to this love thing.

And let’s not forget he’s the stalker guy.  The guy that was so obsessed with her that he stared her down at lunch and eventually watched her sleep with her knowing.  Yes, stalking is in some weird way flattering.

And all while being bad and older and stalkerish, he loves her through and through, protects her every single chance he gets and says the sweetest things out of the blue.

Yes, I’m beginning to think Edward Cullen is one of the best leading men I’ve ever read.

However, I wasn’t completely taken away with every part of the book.  The first person was hard to get into at first but ended up working.  And it was a little slow to start.  Stephenie definitely likes including lots of mundane details.  Honestly, the book went a little uninteresting after the baseball game and the tracker appeared.  It meant less time for Edward and Bella together but I understood the need for the drama and it was good to see her interact with his family.  I’m a little concerned because the movie seems to hover over the whole tracker mess for dramatic effect but I hope that’s not the main drama of the movie.  I want to see Edward and Bella live this book (and mostly the first 3/4 of it.  The book was  at its best about 1/4 to 3/4.  I guess that’s the way it’s supposed to be though) out on screen.

With my blog-cap on, I actually left tab marks on favorite moments.  It’s kind of funny that the moments I loved, are also well-loved by others.  And in chronological order, here they are (Source):

I wasn’t interesting. And he was. Interesting… and brilliant… and mysterious… and perfect… and beautiful… and possibly able to lift full-sized vans with one hand.
Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 4, p.79

The wasting of finite resources is everyone’s business.
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 4, p.83

It would be more… prudent for you not to be my friend. But I’m tired of trying to stay away from you, Bella.
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 4, p.84

I decided as long as I was going to hell, I might as well do it thoroughly.
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 5, p.87

About three things I was absolutely positive. First, Edward was a vampire. Second, there was part of him — and I didn’t know how potent that part might be — that thirsted for my blood. And third, I was unconditionally and irrevocably in love with him.
Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 9, p.195

His face startled me — his expression was torn, almost pained, and so fiercely beautiful that the ache to touch him flared as strong as before. My goodbye stuck in my throat. He raised his hand, hesitant, conflict raging in his eyes, and then swiftly brushed the length of my cheekbone with his fingertips. His skin was as icy as ever, but the trail his fingers left on my skin was alarmingly warm — like I’d been burned, but didn’t feel the pain of it yet.
Bella Swan, Twilight, Chapter 11, p.220

Bella, I couldn’t live with myself if I ever hurt you. You don’t know how it’s tortured me. The thought of you, still, white, cold… to never see you blush scarlet again, to never see that flash of intuition in your eyes when you see through my pretenses… it would be unendurable. You are the most important thing to me now. The most important thing to me ever.
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 13, p.274

And so the lion fell in love with the lamb…
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 13, p.274

If I could dream at all, it would be about you. And I’m not ashamed of it.
Edward Cullen, Twilight, Chapter 14, p.294

“You smell so good in the rain, ” he explained.
“In a good way, or in a bad way?” I asked cautiously.
“Both, always both”
Edward Cullen/Bella, Twilight, Chapter 17, p.361

So are you on the bandwagon yet?  What are your favorite parts/quotes?

Blue Light Special

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Ok, coupon queens, get ready!  I’ve been couponing heavily at CVS for a year now and I was blown away by this one.  K-Mart has a deal for a few days where you can double coupons up to $2! Glade also has a deal where you buy two plug-ins for $4.19 each, there is a B1G1 coupon and you get TWO $4 coupons back!!  And I had 4 B1G1 coupons!

Everything in that picture is worth $135.  I did 5 transactions rolling over my money to buy more of the Glade until the 5th I did everything else and paid with the money I earned.  For each of the Glade transactions, I paid .78 and for the last transaction ith everything else, my total was $99 and I paid SIXTY THREE CENTS!!!!!  AND had EIGHT DOLLARS LEFT!  K-Mart PAID ME money to take all that home!

Wednesday List

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I want a thought-provoking post to come out of me right now but it’s not happening.

  • Career Day went well.  The last of 3 teachers that rotated to us said we were the most interesting so I guess that’s good.  My flower girl who also was a girl I used babysit in my neighborhood was in the first class.  It made me feel old.
  • I got home at 10:30 from the school and didn’t quit working until 7:30 tonight.  I’m only supposed to work 6 hours a day.
  • Even after all that I’m going into the office tomorrow and will be in meetings all day.  Right at this moment, I’m not excited about it.
  • I started chatting with a girl I went to high school with who works in marketing at a local modeling agency today on Facebook.  She’s willing to forward my comp card to their agency folks.  I’m going to dig up my comp card and seriously consider doing local stuff again.  #HBC was just too much fun.  Melissa is supposed to help update the card and hopefully have something soon to hand out.
  • An established TV blog that is for sale has been offered to me.  I seriously want to take but I seriously don’t want to spend the money or have the time to do it.
  • I seriously want to quit work to blog and model.  Doesn’t it sound lovely?
  • If you haven’t seen Iron Man, please do so immediately.
  • Nights in Rodanthe was ok.  Wait for DVD.
  • No idea why those last two made it to the list.
  • My eyes hurt and I want to go to bed.

Career Day

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Career Day.  That one day in school where your teacher didn’t teach and someone from the community came in and talked about how important college was.  Except tomorrow?  I’m going to be one of those people from the community.  Yeah, I got invited to speak at our high school’s Career Day and it has me feeling every single year of my age.  It also has me feeling a little nervous.  I’m just not a huge fan of public speaking.  As I said in this post, my neck and chest are going to turn all red and it’ll get worse if someone points it out and wow, I just hope I can think of something to say.  So to help prepare me, I’m going to make a few notes here.  My career history (I had other jobs but these I think were actually somewhat related to my actual career):

  1. I started my career in an internship at a local real estate.  I really ended up being a realtor’s personal assistant but I learned about business and developed a few Access Databases that helped them perform their job. I was able to solidify my desire to become a programmer.
  2. I was offered an official internship as a programmer at a local manufacturing company at the end of my freshman year of college.  I did everything from help start the company’s Intranet to working on manufacturing programs drawing diagrams in a very cold computer room.
  3. When I graduated college, I left there after being accepted as a contractor at a contracting company…same one I’m with now and the same one my dad used to work for and was able to give me a good recommendation.

What I learned from above:

  • Internships are good
  • College degrees are better
  • Connections are the best

What I do

  • Program computers LOL.  My dad never really explained it well what he did with work growing up and now I see why.  It’s hard to explain to someone who isn’t familiar with programming at all!  Thankfully today’s teens are really familiar with computers.
  • Go to meetings and talk about what I’m going to program.  A lot.
  • Document what I program.  A lot.

I’m specifically going to talk about working from home.  The advantages (obvious):

  • Don’t have to get ready
  • No commute time
  • Home with my kids
  • Don’t eat out a lot
  • Don’t get distracted by people pulling you into many conversations

Disadvantages

  • Hard to build vital relationships with coworkers
  • Difficult to participate during meetings
  • File transfers/jobs are slower
  • Not in the office when you have computer trouble
  • Can be easily distracted

Ok, and that concludes Career Day with Amy Bennett.  You can wake up now.

Productive Day

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Wow.  Today has been a busy day!  But the good kind…got a TON of stuff done around the house.  The kids were up pretty early but I finally slid out of bed at 9 and quickly got the kids breakfast and all of us ready.  I promised them a trip to the park and MIL was supposed to get them for the day so I wanted to fit it in first thing.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day today and I enjoyed our time there. MIL came and took over about 11 and I came home and got busy!

Nothing exciting..just dishes, laundry, bills and a trip to the grocery store.  But it feels great!  When Emma was first born and Scott was off in police academy during the weeks, I took Mondays off and worked longer hours Tuesday through Friday just to recuperate from the weekends.  I’m thinking that more Mondays like this would be FANTASTIC!

Meeting of two Bloggy Friends

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Lately there seems to be onslaught of meeting people I’ve met online first.  Yesterday was yet another occasion.  For regular readers and especially commentators, you may recognize Carolyn.  She is a fellow One Tree Hill fan and has been a great supporter of this site (and me) for a few months even though she doesn’t blog herself.  She lives in Canada and is currently on vacation at a local beach.  Her, husband and her two children drove four hours yesterday to come visit us!

We showed them around here and visited for a time before heading out to the mall for a bit to find some Converse shoes for her daugher (you know I had to help another female looking for a pair of shoes!).  After coming home, the kids played and the men chatted while I cooked dinner.  We had a late, but good dinner together and then played some Wii and had a cup of coffee before they headed back to the beach.

I have to say it’s amazing meeting someone you meet online first.  It’s this weird mix of being awkward at first and yet knowing that you know so much about one another.  We quickly settled in and were like old friends.  The girls took so well to her daugher and even Carolyn.  By the end of the night, they were curled up beside her and she read books to them.

It was a lovely visit and I hope to take up their offer to visit them in Canda soon!