Amy J. Bennett

Extraordinary Faith for Everyday Life

Day 2

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End of day 2 and we’re surviving.  In fact, my house is extraordinarily clean right now.  And I have no idea why I measure our survivorship by the cleanliness of my house but I do.  I guess when things go haywire, the cleaning is the first to go.  If you walk in and there’s dishes everywhere, toys everywhere, most likely, it’s been a crazy day.  But if I manage to get it all picked up, then the craziness must have ended at some point.

I guess.

But right now, it’s looking pretty good.  I did take the time to finally clean all our hardwoods.  My aunt and her family are coming in tomorrow afternoon and Mom warned me they’d probably make a visit.  Which I’m ecstatic about but I did have to do some cleaning.  Which, hey, I really just got a headstart on this weekend.

Anyway.

It’s not saying things have been perfect since he’s been gone.  Let me give you a little rundown of things that have happened just in the past 48 hours…really just in 22 awake hours that I’ve had them.

  • Lexi spent time in the bathroom today with a sink full of water and half a tube of SpongeBob Toothpaste.  When I found her, it was in her hair, in her Barbie’s hair, smeared all over the entire countertop and on the handtowels.  Lexi had two baths today and really could have used three because…
  • Lexi inhaled bubbles when she was blowing bubbles with this new bubble wand thingy in the garage which must have been pretty bad because it made her vomit in the garage and on her clothes.
  • During her two baths, the floors was completely drenched in water.  It took two full towels to wipe it up which I’m now washing…again.
  • Lexi decided she wanted to pour her own cereal in the sunroom into a bowl.  Apparently I didn’t have the eyes in the back of my head open because the next time I walked by, the feet part of the elliptical machine as well as most of the table and floor in the sunroom was full of SmartStart.  I’m guess she didn’t mistake that for the bowl and was just practicing pouring cereal wherever her little heart felt like.
  • But my favorite is us at the post office…Lexi standing in her cherry silk jammies with American flag Crocs because I didn’t feel like fighting with her and Emma is putting on my lipstick.  Like dark lipstick.  Not the gloss kind. Lexi then gets my phone because she likes to see what’s on the camera.  She then starts taking pictures of the lady’s butt in front of us.  I think the lady behind us in line was chuckling while I literally laughed out loud while telling her to not do that.  Then Emma gets my phone while Lexi puts on lipstick and Emma starts playing Akon’s Smack That in the uber quiet post office where about 12 people are patiently waiting in line.  Yeah, we were the rednecks that day.

So while the house is clean, the last 48 hours haven’t been uneventful.

Did anyone else notice most of those started with Lexi??

Maturing in Faith

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Hebrews 5:11-14

11We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. 12In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God’s word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! 13Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. 14But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil.

On Wednesday at youth he talked about “Hanging out with God”.  Basically the more we spend time with Him the more we become like Him.  And as he said, the best way to become a better skateboarder is to hang out with Tony Hawk.  The best way to be a better Christian is to hang out with God.  Go to the expert.  Nothing newsworthy, although always a great reminder and really did spur me to think of my study time lately but there was something he said that stood out.

You may have heard many preachers speak on the verses in Hebrews 5 above about maturing in our faith.  And when we are new Christians we “drink milk”, or we start out with basic truths and then as we mature, we graduate to solid food, or gain wisdom and then can begin discerning good and evil and digesting more truths of God.

The part that got me was though was when we was talking about maturing and stop waiting for someone to feed you, feed yourself.  Just like a toddler learns to feed himself.

I have never thought of that part of growing from a baby to an adult in real life and applied it to being a Christian..that I can recall. For some reason it was a lightbulb moment.  I go to church, listen to music, read music waiting for someone to feed me.  And yet I don’t take the time to feed myself.  I don’t take the time to “hang out with God”.  I have to make the effort.  I have to spend time with God.  Not godly people.  Not godly books.  Not godly music.    And I have to be mature enough to set aside the time to spend with God.  Listening.  It’s not about going to church on Sunday and Wednesday and waiting to hear something life-changing.  It’s not about reading the “Verse of the Day” and being able to connect with it.  It’s about becoming like God because we spend so much time with Him.

No, I can’t spend my entire day in prayer.  But come on, I can’t even come up with 15 minutes of prayer a day.  It’s a sad state of affairs really.  I thought after twenty years of being a Christian a may have matured a little and yet I can’t get the basics down.

They say out of the mouths of babes but…

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out of the mouths of teenagers can be funny too.  Wednesday night at church the worksheet had this question: What would happen if you intentionally spent time with God every day foe one month?

Everyone joked “What’s a foe??”

This conversation happened between a youth and J, another youth worker

Youth: It’s a deer!!

J: That’s a doe.

Youth: Oh Really?? I didn’t know that.

Nice.

That’s a South Carolina education for ya.

And on the subject of mistakes on brochures/worksheets, J said she’d never forget a brochure for a ministry which was trying to state “pork and beans” but instead said “porn and beans”.

Nice.

The dentist owns me

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Geesh, I just took Lexi for a cleaning two weeks ago and Emma went today.  Then we have FOUR more appointments in the next few weeks for fillings.  Yes, unfortunately Emma has two cavities and since they’re on opposite sides of her mouth they have to do it in two sittings.  The exciting news from today though?  Emma’s two front teeth are loose!!  I was really shocked as Emma hasn’t mentioned and I had NO CLUE it started this early…apparently I need a “What to Expect” book for school age children because I feel so unprepared for all this new stuff!  Anyway, she said it could take anywhere from 2 weeks to a few months for them to fall out based on how much she tries to wiggle them.  I’m scheduling portraits pronto so I get some good pictures…wahhhh…my baby is growing up.

The David Finale

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Syesha leaving was no surprise but wow, it really hit me, we have an all male finale.  AND two finalist whom I think will BOTH do well in the real world.  I’m proud of voters for the final two–I only voted a handful of times a few week ago.

It’s hard to pick between the two though because they are SO different.  I really fell in love with David Archuleta in tonight’s montage of his homecoming.  He’s just so humble and sweet.  I’m just afraid the kid might melt into the floor if he actually wins.  He doesn’t handle all the hype well yet!  I still think I want Cook to win though.  It’d be a nice change to see a male winner do really, really well.

Filed Under: tv

AI Top 3

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I’m a little late as the Top 2 will be announced within about an hour but a few notes from AI last night:

  • Overall disappointed with song choices.  Usually this week is a great week.
  • Syesha’s Fever is the song that will cost her her place in Top 2.  She sang it well but it was out of place.
  • Her last song was actually really good
  • Archie saying “Boo” was just weird.  I could not believe he sang a Chris Brown song.  Kudos to him for doing something modern though.  Just not sure if THAT’S the song he should have picked.
  • David was great on all his songs

I predict Syesha leaving tonight leaving a David war for the finale.

Better GReader

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OK, how ’bout an actual useful post that’s not sponsored??

If you’re like me, you’re subscribed to more than just a few blogs in Google Reader.  I find it annoying (sorry, I do understand the reasons and do the same with my OTH blog) when authors don’t post the entire post in their feeds and I have to click on to their site to read their full post.  I also find it time consuming sometimes to post a comment on people’s blogs when you have to click out of reader.

Well, I found a Firefox Add-on that has made both issues non-issues…Better GReader.  It has several features but the one I’m loving is the preview in-line.  Just click the title to the post and it brings up that post…in the same window.  No more opening a new tab or new window and trying to find that.  Reading and commenting all can happen right there within Reader!

Check out the site for more details on the features and if you have any other recommendations for Firefox add-ons, I’d love to hear your favorites.

Scott made it and so far we are making it

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Scott actually called today to say he made it. Their luggage, however, did not. They’re hoping it shows up tonight or in the morning. I’m just hoping he packed some essentials in his carry on bag.

The girls and I are doing fine so far. It really just feels like Scott is on nights right now since we usually don’t see him much. Emma did say she missed Daddy this morning.

I’ve managed to keep everything relatively clean so far..I know it hasn’t been even 24 hours yet but it certainly doesn’t take that long sometimes. I guess when he’s gone I take the extra effort to clean up after us since I know he’s not here to do it. But, shhh, don’t tell him I found where the trash can is…lol