Valentine's Weekend Has Begun

Gary consulting with Russell Cook

Several days ago Gary decided to take this afternoon off work. He blocked it off in his electronic calendar, and no one asked for a meeting. We came home at noon and ate lunch, then drove to First Methodist church in Irving to attend the Winter Festival of Acoustic Music. This festival included hammered dulcimer workshops, which Gary didn't attend, but we poked our heads inside to see what one would be like. You have to bring your own dulcimer--which he has--and your own stand--which he doesn't have. He also doesn't yet have a carrying case.

We paid our $10 each and that allowed us to attend the afternoon concert and the crafts show. The crafts show was really just mom and pop booths for selling acoustic instruments and accessories. There were some cool things there, and Gary looked very carefully at all the books. After talking to him for 10-15 minutes, Gary ended up buying one book from Russell Cook who also autographed it.

We left after 5:30pm so that meant dealing with Friday afternoon traffic, but our journey wasn't long, so it wasn't too bad.

In other news of the week, all reports from Rachel seem pretty good. She had an evaluation on Wednesday and wasn't completely happy with it, but not too unhappy either. She is definitely learning a lot from student teaching, and really thinking hard if this is what she wants to do as a career. We are proud of how she has stepped up to the plate to get up early every morning, be prepared, and stay late many afternoons to finish up. She is learning that life as a Kindergarten teacher is anything but routine--something goes wrong every day that must be dealt with. One day it was snow. Another day it was spilled ranch dressing. Another day it was an absent teacher. Today it was an irate parent and a stranger trying to find a child who didn't exist.

Bottom of the Pecking Order

I've been watching my bird feeder quite a bit on these cold winter days. (I know,I shouldn't complain, I live in Dallas.) Sometimes there is just one bird on the feeder at a time. Then another bird comes along and the first one flies off. But other times I've seen four or more different species on the feeder at the same time. But they don't stay for long with each one eating from his own corner. No, they fight each other off. The male cardinal beats the female cardinal who beats the juncos who beat the sparrows. The sparrows do seem to be at the bottom of the pecking order. Jesus must have known that when he said, "yet not one sparrow falls to the ground without the Father's consent."

This has gotten me thinking about life.

Sculptures

What are you reading? 
We enjoyed having Rachel home this past weekend. We met up with her SNU friends at Border's Bookstore in Hulen Street Mall in Ft. Worth on Sunday afternoon so she could get a ride back to school. These sculptures were outside the bookstore, and they make pretty good advertising. (For the record, Rachel did NOT want to pose for this photo, but I did warn her it might show up in the blog.)

We attended a Superbowl Birthday Party for our friend Bob who teaches history at UTA. His wife, always full of contradictions, served "trailer trash food" (her term, not mine--hot dogs and nachos) along with champagne. The men mostly watched the game and the women mostly talked about upcoming weddings. Our friends John and Shirley were there too, and we heard first hand about John's sculptures on display at the Museum of Biblical Arts until they are taken to NYC for placement at a Catholic church on the edge of the 9/11 site.

The Kiss

The Kiss 
If you look at this photo hard enough you can find it.

We went to a wedding at our church yesterday afternoon. It was fun. Lots of church folks and lots of people from work were there too. Rachel and I served the punch, and out of all those people only one wisecracker came up and said, "Give me a punch."

At the last minute Rachel found a ride home for the weekend so she could attend this wedding. It was fun to hear her tales of her first two weeks of student teaching. She said the second week went better than the first. She starts "real" teaching tomorrow, so I hope the weekend at home hasn't worn her out. If you know Rachel and are reading this, please pray with me that God will give her strength, wisdom, and all that she needs to do a good job.

White Kitty

White Kitty 
I think I figured out why all the birds have disappeared.

Starlings

Starlings 
This is not a very inspiring photo, and startlings are not very inspiring birds. They are considered a nuisance by many. Yesterday I identified a new bird, a Harris sparrow, but I don't have a photo. They are similar to all the other sparrows, but a bit larger and they have a black chin. The bird book says they have a small range, just our part of Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas in the winter and central Canada in the summer.

Today I started the income tax process. There are always a bunch of preparations that have to be done before filling in the forms. I'm hoping for a refund to help make another college payment.

Have I mentioned that I'm ready for the sun to shine again?

What is This Creature?

I don't know 
Should I admit I found it in my kitchen?

I'm just about ready for the sun to shine again. It seems like we've had a solid week of rain or at least of heavy clouds. I'm one of those people who is sensitive to sunshine.

Not much news to report today. My next project is to do the taxes. I will probably start on that this afternoon since it is too rainy to take my afternoon walk.

Happy Birthday, Andrew!

Happy Birthday, Andrew! 

No, today is not Andrew's birthday, but today I got some photos of it. Andrew's girlfriend went to Ethiopia right after Christmas and was there for his birthday. I was quite impressed how she managed to organize a surprise party for him, complete with balloons and roses at the airport and a meal with friends at a restaurant. Today I got a CD of photos from her trip, and thought this one would look nice in my blog. I aso received a wrap/scarf/skirt from Kenya which is cool.

I talked briefly with Rachel this afternoon. She said student teaching went pretty smoothly today--the two troublemakers were absent! She told me the other day she was interviewed and photographed for a blurb in the school annual on student teachers.

Carolina Wren?

Carolina Wren 

Actually, I don't know for sure if this is a Carolina Wren or a Brown Creeper. They both are brown with a white eye streak and they are next to each other in the bird book, so I guess they are similar. I think the coloring is more like the wren, but it was acting like a creeper as it climbed the tree that holds up my clothesline.

It has been a slow day here, I think I'm ready for Gary to come home. I did get some reading done and a project caught up, so I haven't been lazy the entire day. And I talked to two out of three kids, and they seemed like they were doing well. Maybe the third one will call tomorrow.

Cancer

I'm home alone tonight. G. is out of town on a business trip. If you look at the top of this blog, you will see that its point is so I can talk to myself. So that I am doing.

I just got an email from a relative, a little younger than I, saying the tumor they cut out of her leg was indeed cancer. Treatment options are still being explored, but range from radiation to amputation. I just phoned the parents of this relative to tell them to check their email.

And besides that, I just got the results of this. It said there was a "questionable area" and would I please phone for an appointment.

I feel a little sad. Good thing I've got this blog to talk to.

Too Rainy for Birds Today

Uncle Martin and Aunt Helen visit Texas 

After work today I drove to DFW to meet good friends who were having a 4 hour layover on their way to Guatemala. They were our very first supporters and have stuck with us for many years. They had never been to Whataburger, so that is where we went for lunch. The weather was terrible today, lots of heavy rain, so my drive home along IH360 was slow and crowded, but it was worth it to be able to see our friends (and their friends too). During lunch I explained to them what blogs are, so if they don't lose the URL before they get to a computer, they might see themselves here.

Mourning Dove

Mourning Dove 

Today's bird is a mourning dove. I should have saved that one for a day when I'm sad. I'm not sad; in fact, I'm happy. The weather has been lovely, I enjoyed a visit from a friend today, and Rachel's email today said each day is getting a little easier than the day before. I'm thankful to God for helping her get off to a good start with student teaching.

Cardinal

Male Cardinal 

The weather was so beautiful here today, warm and sunny. Soaking up the sunlight on my afternoon walk feels good.

I've just about completed my house rearranging that started before Christmas. Today I added a CD player to "my room" and reengineered the futon to make a lovely reading spot (except the cat seems to have taken it over).

The Robins and My Chickadee

Mr. and Mrs. Robin, with cousin Charlie--no relation to Big Bird 

Today was Rachel's (she's one of my chickadees) first day of being Miss Rachel, the Kindergarten teacher. Well, she's not a real kindergarten teacher, but she's getting close! She started student teaching a private Christian school called School for Children (doesn't that seem like an odd name?) This assignment will go for 6 weeks I think, then she will switch to 2nd grade at a public school for 6 more weeks. She has to be there at 8am and gets off at 4:30 pm, except for Tuesdays when she has to stay until 5:30pm. She called me briefly this afternoon to say she had gotten through the first day OK, and she sounded happy but tired. She said her day might go smoother if she figured out the night before what she was going to wear. She also figured out why teachers wear sensible shoes :-)

We are so proud of her to reach this step, and we continue to pray that God will strengthen and care for her, and guide her regarding decisions for her future.

Carolina Chickadee

Carolina Chickadee 

I'm pretty sure I couldn't tell the difference between a black-capped chickadee and a Carolina chickadee, but my bird books tell me that only the Carolina ones live in Texas.

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We have a new pastor at our church. Today was this third Sunday and he talked about greed, which got me thinking about the opposite: generosity. Generosity is not so easy as just being physically generous. It is harder to be generous with your love, mercy, time, compliments, and interest in others. The point the pastor made was about being generous with one's privacy or private space. In other words, the willingness to let others take up the time one has to themselves.

Dark-eyed Junco

Dark-eyed junco/slate-colored junco 

I'm still experimenting with my new camera, and a tiny camera like mine isn't intended to take closeups of wildlife, but anyway--you can at least tell this is a bird, I hope. I haven't seen many birds today--the homeschoolers' football game that has been going on all afternoon in my backyard might have something to do with it. :-) The weather has been beautiful today--mid 70s.

"You did a good job..."

Just as I was about to leave for work this morning, David phoned. He was at the Presidential Inauguration, calling to brag a little and to tell me he had purchased a new coat yesterday so he could stand to be out in the cold. He had found some Taylor friends with whom to attend, and by the giggles in the background, they must have all been girls. He said someone wanted to tell me something, and then a stranger's voice came on, "Hi, my name is Lisa. I just want to tell you you have a wonderful son. You've done a good job raising him,..." I thought this might be a joke, so I asked her how old she was, as in "Are you old enough to make this judgment?" She assured me she had children older than my children, so yes, she was qualified to say. When David got back on the phone, I asked him if he had paid her to say that and he said, "No, I just saved her place in line."

A week and a half ago another person said something similar. We were attending an open house in the neighborhood, and one of the older gentlemen there looked over at Rachel and said, "Wow, she's come a long ways. I remember when you came to Dallas and she was just a toddler who had some problems. You've done a good job with her, you've been good parents." It was kind of him to say so, in spite of times when I don't feel like I have done a good job.

I do give thanks to God for his work in the lives of our children, and I pray for them every day, that they will "see Him more clearly, follow Him more nearly, love Him more dearly, day by day."

Bird Watching

It is bird watching season again, where are the birds? 

I have rebooted my computer about 15 times today.

I'm playing around with my camera too, trying to figure out if I can take bird photos with it. Stay tuned.

Holiday and Dinner Out

We had a day off work today so we spent it wisely: slept in until 9:30 (of course I was up several times putting the cat out, letting the cat in, feeding the cat, turning the faucet on for the cat, shutting the faucet off--but I digress!) then Gary and I each started separate cleaning projects. He worked on cleaning up his office, as he promised me he would do. Now it is 12 hours later and it hardly looks like anything was done, but he assures me it is all about infrastructure, or something like that.

I moved two bookshelves, two cupboards, and stuff in two closets, continuing the domino effect that started before Christmas when we gave Rachel's bed away. The result is now we have a music room with piano, dulcimer, guitars, African drum, flute, French horn, and lots of music and music books. (There is also a corner cupboard with toys for the two little African boys to play with when them come to visit me.)

And now Rachel's old bedroom has been converted to MY room--my computer (plus two other computers seldom used) a futon for guests, a dresser now being used for sorting stuff that comes for David or Andrew and the closet with off-season clothes. Eventually, I may move my rubber stamping stuff in here too, or even my desk for doing the family finances, but I'll have to think on that for a while. My computer is now situated in such a way that I can see the TV in our bedroom, so I can do two things at once :-)

We worked hard on all this today, then went out for a late dinner at Outback Steakhouse. Why did we go there? Because we had a $20 coupon, of course. Gary had steak and I had shrimp. Nice change from Taco Bueno :-)

Rachel made it safely back to school last night but couldn't get her computer to work. Late this afternoon she phoned the computer services guys, and they came to her dorm to check out the problem. And indeed there was a problem, something about a blade in a server for rooms 1-6 in the dorm. They fixed it, and now she's happy. She had her first day of teacher seminar which lasts this week, and tonight stared her once a week class on The Exceptional Child. (That's what I had--a pile of exceptional children.)

I've still got a couple hours of stuff to do to complete my house rearranging, but tomorrow it is back to work, now that Christmas vacation is finally over.

Modes of Communication

I just got off the phone with Andrew in Ethiopia. It was a terrible connection. I could hear only about every third word he said. We were trying to talk about some Very Important Matters, so it was frustrating not to be able to converse easily. But what do I expect? It is the other side of the world! So I asked him to write to me, by email, the Very Important Details so I will be entirely clear about what is going on with him. "But I want to talk about them," says he.

This exchange was related to the rest of my family and then following conversation occured:

"Yeah, that sounds like me and X."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, given the choice between talking in person and talking on the phone, X would rather talk on the phone."
"Really? Hmm, given the choice between talking on the phone and writing an email, which would X choose?"
"Email."
"Really? Hmm, given the choice between email and not communicating at all, which would X choose?
"I get your point."

Found, parts I and II

That which was lost, has now been found. Do I get a finder's fee? No, I get to go shopping. Old Navy, here we come.

And there was a good conclusion to this lost story, too. The store manager from JCPenney's phoned the next morning saying he had found her keys. The car was still there, and my friend left for China as planned.

Hotel Rwanda

Today was kind of unusual for me, different from my usual routine. It started out the same, went to work and R. went early with me too. (She's been working during her Christmas holiday to make some spending money for next semester when she won't be allowed to have a job.) We decided yesterday to go to a movie today which is in limited release called Hotel Rwanda. The only theater it is showing at is on the north side of Dallas, but it is located just feet away from one of the light rail stations. So we drove 8 miles and parked the car at the nearest mass transit station, then paid $2.50 for an all-day pass, and rode the train to Mockingbird station. After we bought our movie tickets we ate lunch at the Noodle Kitchen. R. is not an adventuresome eater, so she had a chicken sandwich! I had something called Thai Pad Ew, or something like that, which was fried noodles with broccoli, sprouts, and chicken. It was good.

The movie was very intense, very good. Some of the movie was easy to relate to since we have lived in the third world. But we never had to live in a place where there was so much killing and tribal hatred. The most moving point of the movie was when the UN peacekeeper had to tell the story's hero, "We think you are dirt." "Pardon me, who is we?" "The west. We don't care if you kill each other off. Our governments have told us to pull out."

Tonight we carpooled to Bible study in Waxahachie, and on the way there I volunteered to tell about the movie I had just seen. The point of the movie was reinforced: the people in the car with me had never heard of the Hutus or the Tutsis, though it was only 10 years ago and a million of them were killed.

Annual Painful Pancake Test

I had mine today. They bring a mobile unit right to our work, so I was there after a five-minute walk, and it is mostly paid for by our insurance. Except for the misery of the test itself, it couldn't be easier.

That reminds me of once playing Taboo with a couple in their early 70s. Carl was trying his best to discreetly describe the word "mammogram" only to discover that he had misread the Taboo card which said "monogram." Pretty funny.

Don't Know What an Autoharp Is?

I've already had a random twenty-something admit that he didn't know what an autoharp was. Here is a random photograph
of one from the internet. And here is a random website that tells about them.

Really, they are not a beautiful sounding instrument, IMHO, but they are useful for school music teachers who can't carry a piano around with them to class.

Autoharp

Remember those fine instruments? In the midst of my somewhat bad mood and complaining about shoe shopping and losing things, my husband said, "We can be a hillbilly band--I'll play the hammered dulcimer, and you can be the autoharp."

Shoe Shopping

isn't quite as bad as shopping for bras or swimsuits, but it is painful, nonetheless. Especially when the feet that need to be shod are size adult 5.5W or children's 3.5W. Over the space of this Christmas holiday, I honestly think she tried on 50 pairs of shoes in 7-8 stores. Two pairs were actually purchased; one for $90 and one for $10.

Lost, part II

I was watching a Firefly* episode tonight when the phone rang. My friend had lost her keys. Either locked inside her car or lost inside JCPenneys. She doesn't need this hassle right now; she leaves for China day after tomorrow.

*a western set in the future, on TV for awhile, before it was cancelled

Lost

One of the shopping gift cards has gone missing. I think we've already spent $50 worth of our time looking for it.

Shopping

I hate shopping. I know, I'm not the typical woman. But my daughter loves to go shopping. She got money for Christmas gifts so she could buy "professional" clothes in anticipation of her semester of student teaching. Apparently part of her grade is how she is dressed. Anyway, we went shopping today and she got shoes and a suit.


Does she look like a kindergarten teacher?


I think all the little boys will fall in love with her :-)

Christmas Photos

I'm still experimenting with my camera and the new upload photos feature with Blogger. Here are photos of Christmas gifts.

David got a stethoscope from Rachel:



Rachel got a cell phone from Mom:



Linda got a funny book about editing from Grandpa:



Gary got a hammered dulcimer from everybody:

My New Camera

I got a new digital camera for Christmas from my little boy. He has a real job for the first time in his life, and is using his megabucks to be generous to me. Good boy. :-)

I also just discovered a new way to post photos on Blogger, without having to first post them on my own website, so this job just got a lot easier. Anyway, I'm still trying to figure my new camera out. Here are some of my current efforts: (click on the photos to enlarge them.)



"I don't need my little brother to find me a Prince Charming!"



"My, what big feet you have."




"Mom, this CD is too big."



Kenny and friends

Trading Spaces

Rachel has cable TV at college and when she isn't studying diligently for a test, she has been known to sneak a look at those home remodeling shows. She came home with lots of ideas of how to redo one of our bedrooms in view to her moving back home after graduation in May. (That idea itself may be a topic for another blog, but not today.) Anyway, we pared her pile of ideas down to something a little more doable for a couple of amateurs without a professional designer and carpenter standing by: move the furniture out, clean, repaint (in two colors, neither of which was white!), move different furniture back in.

We started the project Thursday--a trip to buy paint and masking tape during lunch hour, then in the evening we cleared out the room (thanks go to a friend who helped move stuff--I hope your back is OK).

Friday and Saturday we worked long hours to repair, tape, retexture, paint, and repaint the walls, then tape and paint the trim. It all went reasonably well until we locked ourselves in the room and couldn't get out. I had taken the door knob off both sides of the door, but failed to take out the part that actually goes into the door frame (there must be a name for that piece, but I don't know what it is). When the door got pushed shut, we discovered we couldn't get it open again. "Not to worry," thought I, "I'll just use the screwdriver to open it." But when I started poking at it with the screw driver, I couldn't get it to turn. So I kept poking and whoops! a stray piece of the mechanism fell down into the inside of the hollow door. At that point Rachel said, "I'll crawl through the window and go get dad." So we pushed the screen out of the window (Lucky for us it is a low window) and she went and got dad (who was still asleep and leaving his girls to do all this man-work). Well, he came and grumbled at us, then we tried more screw drivers, and when that didn't work he crawled back in the window and took the hinges out--that didn't help either. Then he tore apart another door knob and latch from another door to see if that would help us figure it out, but they weren't identical. This all went on for an hour and finally I managed to jimmy the latch from the inside with a flexible putty knife--and since the hinges had been removed, the door came crashing down on my head when I finally got it open.

Anyway, our project is almost complete, and now we need to put the blinds back up and move furniture back in.

After

Room remodel nearing completion

Before

It has been a lot of work, but the end is in sight. We hope to have everything back in place sometime tomorrow.

Back to Work

We got home from south Texas in less than 10 hours Sunday night. The neighbors were kind to host a party, more or less in David's honor, a couple hours after we arrived. Gary and I attended for a few minutes, but I was too fried from driving, so we didn't stay long. Besides, all those young kids make me feel old. :-)

On Monday, Rachel and Gary and I went back to work. Rachel is resuming the scanning work that she did last summer. There is probably enough work to keep her busy for her holiday break. The office is very quiet because most people aren't working this week.

David had two days to just do nothing and hang out with his friends. He played some frisbee and last night went to a Mavericks' game with a friend. We got up at 5:30 this morning to take him to DFW and he phoned to say he got back to DC safely.

Tomorrow Laura flies to Ethiopia. We will be in prayer for her and Andrew.

Unfortunately, I've caught a cold, the first one I've had in a long time. I hope it doesn't make me feel too miserable for the project we have planned for the weekend: repainting the bedroom that Rachel wants to move into after she comes home from college. This will be an experience: I keep saying it will be a lot of work and she keeps telling me about a real cool episode of Trading Spaces or While You Were Out. We've been doing some research on homedepot.com and if we make it through the buying-the-paint process, we should be able to do the rest.

Merry Christmas and Happy Anniversary

...to me! Gary gave me just what I wanted for my anniversary/Christmas: a coupon for "twenty hours of true love." Rachel read that and immediately started raising her eyebrows with innuendo, as only an embarrassed daughter can do. I quickly kicked her and said, "No, not that. He's promising to clean up his office! Yay!"

We looked out the window at midnight and what to our wondering eyes should appear? Snow and ice! It was so pretty when we woke up this morning. We had to go take photos before it melted. This is the first time in 100 years they've had a white Christmas, so they say.

Married with Children

I'm on vacation now, so my mind is not thinking about work. I'm at my mom's house, in a setting that is reminding me that sometimes I'm not the mom--sometimes I'm the child. At the same time, I have 2 out of 3 of my almost-grown children here with me. Further, my heart is sad because this is the first Christmas without my grandmother. And on top of all of that, tomorrow I will have been married for 29 years. So I'm thinking about family today.

I am so lucky (though I know believers really shouldn't use that word) to have a happy marriage. So many people of my age have married and divorced, some more than once. And if we are to believe the statistics, the chances of my three children all having happy marriages are not good.

I was 22 years old when I got married. Two of my children are already older than that.

One of my kids does have a significant other and I think is heading toward marriage in the not-too-distant future. Odd thing about that is that, although this child is the most social and socially well-adjusted of all my kids, this is his first ever real girlfriend. He did like a certain girl as a teenager, but she never really reciprocated, though they were always close friends and remain so today. She broke his heart, but he hid it well until years later he finally told me how much he had liked her and how badly he hurt when she rejected him. Sigh. There are some obstacles to overcome with his current relationship, but he is madly in love, and has a can-do attitude about life, so he will actively pursue her without doubt and without hesitation until she says either "yes" or "no."

Another one of my kids has "always" had a significant other, though at this present moment he doesn't. He has the kind of personality that girls find attractive--extremely self-confident, quiet, and capable of doing just about anything. He has had at least three different girlfriends in his short life and I liked all three of them. I know he wants to get married some day, but he is choosing a life of lots of education, so maybe it is good that he isn't dating anyone now so he can pursue his education singlemindedly for a little while.

The last of my children really wants to get married and is now at the point in her life where she could be free to marry. She has had two boyfriends and a number of other "crushes" during her life, but no current prospects. She is at that stage in life where she is nearly finished with her education and her nesting instincts are kicking in. I feel kind of sorry for her, because in our society it seems like it really isn't OK for a young woman to feel that way. Society is telling her to be strong, get a job, make money, be independent, etc. But she wants a husband and a home and kids to take care of. I myself am at a loss as to how to advise her. I certainly acknowledge her feelings as legitimate, and indeed I felt exactly the same needs at an even younger age. I try to tell her to trust God to bring the right man to her at the right time, someone who will love her without doubt and without hesitation. It isn't easy to wait, but I don't see how she has any choice. [She did ask me what I thought about going to one of those Christian match-maker sites on the internet. I told her I'm not against the idea entirely, but I think it is too early for that.]

OK, these are the thoughts that are running in my idle mind today. I think I am going to click the "No comments allowed" button on this post, because I don't want anyone telling me how stupid this post is. I guess if anyone wants to say anything to me on this topic, they will need to find my email address.

Lord, I love you. I thank you for a good husband and a long, happy marriage. I thank you for three wonderful kids. I am a blessed woman. Lord, you've heard me ask this before, but I will ask it again: please bring each of my children into happy marriages. Bring them the right person at the right time, someone they will love and someone who will love them without doubt and without hesitation.

Christamas Vacation has Begun

We arrived safely at mom's house at 5pm yesterday. We had terrible weather for the first two hours of driving down from Dallas--heavy, cold rain and, since it was still dark, it was quite miserable to drive. We stopped in Austin for a 30 minute break when David phoned one of his HS friends who goes to school in Austin and she joined us for hot chocolate at at place that called itself "Not Starbucks."

We went out to Mexican food for dinner (they know how to do Mexican here :-) and mom had a cherry pie at home for dessert. We aren't going to starve while here. .

We started the annual 1000 piece puzzle. It is of a painting, not a photograph, so it is on the easier side. Rachel seems taken with it this year.

Today we are basically doing nothing. We are reading old magazines, studying the user manuals for my camera and Rachel's phone, watching TV, listening to Elvis Christmas followed by Handel's Messiah*, eating, being lazy. Oh, and Gary is doing rocket science on his laptop when he isn't trying to put puzzle pieces in with his magnifying glass.

We are happy to be here, but sad for those who are missing this year: greatgrandma and Andrew.

*Overheard during the overture of the Messiah: "This is better than Elvis."

A Good Day

I've had a good day today. At staff meeting this morning we prayed for God's help in solving a problem. I won't bother with all the details here, but God ended up solving the problem in a way completely different than I had planned, using people I hadn't even imagined.

I was able to schedule a doctor's appointment--"How about in an hour?" instead of, "Sorry, no openings until..."

Three boxes of Christmas gifts arrived for us.

The tickets I ordered for David's Christmas arrived.

A check for nearly $4000 arrived for Andrew--his loan repayment application was approved (this covers 6 months of payments).

I put a printer in the trash. I spent too much time trying to make an old printer work with a new computer, and the software just wasn't cooperating. Somehow it was freeing to just chuck it.

The only bad thing that happened today was at dinner. My normally concilitory husband, who generally isn't a picky eater, rebelled against the idea of eating baked potatoes with broccoli and cheese sauce. He doesn't like baked potatoes to start with, and he hates "liquid cheese," as he calls it. So he decided to eat fruitcake for dinner instead. I say "Yuck!" to that. What does one do with a single lonely baked potato?

Yay for Rachel!

Yesterday was a good day for Rachel. She found out that she passed the third of three teacher certification tests for Oklahoma and is now eligible to apply for a teaching license, though she won't actually do that until she has done some student teaching next semester. We are so proud of her. Thanks to everyone who prayed for her, it has made a big difference.

She decided that she needed to have a new hairdo that would suit a teacher. No more hair falling down in her face and getting in her way. So last yesterday she got it cut. Here are the before and after photos.



And I think she finished her Christmas shopping, thanks to a friend who was willing to take her shopping.

Another thing we did today affects Rachel too--we gave away her bed. A friend of mine wanted a loft for her son, so we decided he needed it more than Rachel did. With our boys out of the house (except for the stuff they have packed up in boxes), we've got empty bedrooms galore, so Rachel will probably move to a different room with a different bed. In fact, she wants us to paint one of the empty bedrooms sometime during her Christmas break. We'll see if that happens.

I Hate Driving

But I love Rachel, and she couldn't find a ride home so I ended up driving up here today to get her. Well, she did find a freshman who lived near Longview and offered her a possible ride, but the girl couldn't even say for sure whether she drove through Dallas on her way home, nor did she know the names of any of the roads. That made me nervous enough to drive up here myself :-(

Rachel's last exam got over at 6pm and I've been helping her do laundry and clean and pack since then. I'm so proud of her finishing another semester--Way to go, girl!

My Boy, the Chef

Our older son, Andrew, worked in a genetics lab at Texas A&M, sequencing DNA the summer after his junior year of college. He called me one day that summer to ask what "simmer" meant.

Yesterday I got a call from the younger son, David, who works at the National Cancer Institute programming electron microscopes. He called last night to ask what "broil" meant.

Somehow, I have failed these boys! (But they both know how to scrub a toilet :-)

Wicked Sense of Humor

There were two funny things at church yesterday. I hope I can tell the story so it is funny, but it might turn out to be one of those cases where "you had to be there."

First, my husband went to get some coffee before Sunday School. The guy in line ahead of him was a cheerful black man who was stirring creamer into his coffee. He made the remark to Gary, "How do you take your coffee?" and Gary replied, "Don't you know Black is Beautiful?" At which point I was about to clobber him, but our friend just laughed and said, "Yes, but not for coffee."

Then in SS class we had another laugh. Bob, our leader, has a daughter who is soon to marry the son of Alan, a class member. Bob got up and said, "We thank the Lord that we are soon to become grandparents. Our son, David and his wife..." at which point Alan blurts out, "Whew!" After a few seconds we all got the joke and had a good laugh.

And on a different topic, if anyone wants to see a few photos of the visit last weekend of our older son's girlfriend, you can see them on my personal website. The son in the photos is our younger son who was home for the day (the older one being in Africa).

Christmas Gifts

It is that time of year to think about Christmas gifts. There are two primary schools of thought when it comes to gift giving. There is the "hand me your list" way of thinking and there is the "don't ask, don't tell" school of thought.

I grew up in a family that was very open about Christmas gifts. When asked the famous question: "What do you want for Christmas?" these are some typical answers you would hear:

• "I don't know. I don't really need anything."


• "About time you asked. Here's my list, written in my best handwriting."


• "Why don't you just give me money, then I can buy what I want."


• "Go in with your sister and brother and just buy me a vacuum."


• "I really need plastic shoe rack."


• "The same thing you got me last year--new underwear."

My husband's family, on the other hand, does not discuss gift giving. One should be able to think of a good gift. This doesn't always happen, but over the years there have been some nice surprises.

As for me, whenever I'm asked what I want for Christmas, these are the kinds of answers I give:

• "I don't know. I don't really need anything."


• "You can't afford what I want."


• "A gift of your time--clean your office. You can do it all at once, but I'm also willing to accept two hours per month on the installment plan."


• "The same thing you got me last year--new underwear."


• "All I want is good kids."

Trust

If someone lies to you, then admits they lied and apologizes, you should forgive them. No hard feelings. I understand that. But should you trust them to not lie to you again? Is that what it means to really forgive someone--to assume they won't lie again?

When we sin against God, then admit it and apologize, God forgives us. No hard feelings. But does he then assume we will not sin again?

Lying

I've only been up for 30 minutes and I'm already having a bad day.

First, I nearly stepped on a hairball that the cat coughed up and deposited right outside my bedroom door.

Then I got an email from a friend, someone who had asked me for help with a personal problem, telling me he* has been lying to me. I'm sad because he felt the need to lie to me and I'm sad because he apparently has not been helped by my prayers and efforts on his behalf. (Am I just plain stupid to assume people are telling the truth? I'm so trusting and naive that I just assume people speak the truth when they talk to me. It doesn't even occur to me to question them.)

I know I cannot assume responsibility for the sins of others, but it still makes me sad.

*please remember that in English, the male pronoun can at times refer to persons of either gender.

Nice to See Rachel

Well, we survived our busy weekend, but just barely. All went well during the drive home from Oklahoma last night until we were 4-5 miles from home. Some guy decided he wanted the part of the freeway that we were occupying more than we did. I had to swerve over into another lane (at 65 mph) to avoid hitting him. Gary said, "Nice save," as my adreneline surged.

It ws nice to see Rachel. We arrived late Saturday night and dropped Laura at Rachel's room and then spent the night at a minus five star motel. Next morning we bought cinnamon rolls and ate them in the dorm lounge before going to her BIG church for the morning service. After that it was Taco Bueno (Laura's choice) then we hung out a little before taking Laura to the airport. Gary decided to pass the time by getting sick. So we snuck him into Rachel's room ("Man on the floor!") and he slept for a couple hours. I spent the time reading and commenting on Rachel's big paper that is due on Tuesday. It will be over 20 pages. At 6pm was Rachel's last college concert. There were 4-5 anthems followed by Mozarts's Coronation Mass which we enjoyed very much. Then the long drive home in the dark.

All went well with Laura here. She and David picked out and put up the Christmas tree on Saturday afternoon with help from the two little African boys from next door. It looks great and it was nice to have some help with it. Laura and Rachel stayed up late Saturday night with girl talk, which they seemed to enjoy. I got some good photos which I will have to organize one of these days, but I'm too busy at the moment.

Andrew is expecting a full written report about Laura's visit, but I told him I need a day or two for reflection first. But we did have a good time with her :-)

Nice to See David

Our younger son is here visiting for less than 24 hours. He got off the plane at 10pm last night in a suit that he had bought all by himself! He had five separate interviews at Baylor Medical Center, three for the PhD program and two for the medical school program. He says he thought the PhD ones went better than the medical ones; I guess now we just wait and see if they liked him.

We also have another visitor here, but I'll talk about that later. Right now she and David have gone to buy a Christmas tree.

Pray for David's Interviews Tomorrow

David called me at work this morning from the DC airport, just to say he was on his way to Houston for his medical school interviews tomorrow. It turns out that someone from his lab knows someone who is on the admissions committee for the PhD program, so David was given phone numbers, etc. and told to go meet him. That sounds like a helpful coincidence :-) He is being hosted at Rice U. tonight by a girl he knew in HS who has a friend with a couch he can sleep on.

Then Andrew called about 30 seconds later to ask me what the difference was between earrings that had a post and ones that were shaped like a hook. (He was buying Christmas presents.) Only Andrew would call from the other side of the world to ask a question like that.* He also told me to enjoy my visit with his g/f tomorrow. He's is flying to Kenya tomorrow for a few days of meetings.

*That reminds me of when he was working at a genetics lab at A&M University one summer, sequencing DNA. He called me to ask what "simmer" meant.

First Christmas Party of the Season

Last evening our boss invited us and the rest of the office staff, with spouses, to his house for an early Christmas party. Lots of nice desserts, of course, but lots of good stories too. The question asked was, "What was your most memorable Christmas?" Whenever longtime missionaries get together and get asked a question like this, the answers are very entertaining. The stories ranged from

"We spent 36 miserable hours cramped up in a 2nd class berth on a sooty train to go pick up our kids from boarding school. When the train slowed down, we looked outside and we were just yards away from the Taj Mahal."

to

"It was our first term in Indonesia. We had just arrived with four kids and had only our suitcases. We decided to make do the best we could. We got a tree but there were no decorations on it. Then our first of 23 barrels arrived from Wewak. It was the one with the Christmas stuff in it."

to

"Our most interesting Christmas is just about to happen. In two weeks we will fly for 36 hours, then immediately get on a train for 8 hours, then be picked up by a taxi for 5 hour ride to the foothills of the Himalayas."

My Christmas story: we got married on Christmas.

Checking People Out

A young lady is coming to our house this weekend for the express purpose of meeting me and my husband. When I said to a friend, "She sure is brave, to come here by herself and be put under the microscope," my friend replied, "Maybe it's you who's going to be under the microscope."

More Credit Card Theft

Ugh! Those nice guys in Italy are at it again. Over the weekend there was a $400 charge on our debit card from a gas station in Italy. This time in was using a different debit card number than the last time, and this is a card I've only used for a couple months. Three additional charges, totaling over $10,000 from a travel agency in Italy, did not go through. So the credit card company contacted me right away, and then cancelled the card, but it is a nuisance to set up automatic payments again, etc. At least the credit card company is doing a good job noticing these things.

Homework, Housework, Shopping

I didn't sleep so well last night, and I woke up too early. That gave me time to start the housework before Rachel woke up and wanted me to help her with the homework. So I made turkey soup, cleaned up the kitchen, cleaned my bathroom. Then my neighbor phoned and asked me to go walking with her. Rachel got up and had soup for breakfast (I need to buy some milk!) then we started working on an assignment for her Early Childhood Curriculum class. She had to make up six age-appropriate self-directed educational activities around an insect theme, and they had to be such that they could all be attached to a folding board that could be set up in a classroom.

She came up with six pretty good ideas for the activities, but she needed some help implementing them. So I helped cut and glue and apply contact paper. Due to her birth defect, she is very slow with those kinds of skills, which is unfortunate for a kindergarten teacher. She has thought about this handicap though, and has a brilliant plan for coping: "I'll just get the parents to help me!" And knowing her, she will do just that. Rachel is never lacking in optimism, she's always willing to try, and always willing to ask for help.


So by one o'clock that project was finished. We had some lunch and cleaned up the mess we had made and at 3pm went shoe shopping. At the third store we finally found her a pair of short black boots to replace her old ones with holes in them. I hate shopping and I was getting grouchy, but then I realized that there was really nothing to be grouchy about. Poor Rachel, she loves to shop, but not me.

And then we came home, had some more soup, cleaned up the kitchen, cleaned the other bathroom, vacuumed the floors.

The only other exciting thing that happened today was lending our van to some resourceful MKs who went street shopping and found a couch. No, that is not the same thing as dumpster diving.

50 Things I'm Thankful For

As the day goes by, I'm going to make a list of 50 things I'm thankful for. I just woke up, so I'll get started:

1. that I got to sleep in this morning
2. that I woke up beside my favorite person
3. that I had some nice emails in my inbox this morning
4. that my friend is putting a turkey in the oven about now and I get to eat some of it later
5. that my other friend's son stayed up late to bake pumpkin and apple pies, and since I lent him some pie pans, I bet I'll get them back full instead of empty
6. I just ate my first meal of the day--I'm thankful I can have green salad for breakfast.
7. that a friend just called me to say Happy Thanksgiving and to ask: should I give the turkey giblets to the cat raw or should I cook them first?
8. that my daughter woke up in a good mood
9. that my husband is practicing Christmas music on the piano
10. that he is also practicing Beethoven
11. for my first cup of tea of the day
12. for a washing machine. And bleach.
13. that I can read pretty well (according the the paper I'm editing, 44 million Americans cannot).
14. that there are books on tape for people who either cannot see well enough to read or who have reading disabilities.
15. OK, it is almost time to leave for our friends' house, but I'm thankful the neighbor boy showed up with pumpkin pie. Don't tell--I snuck a little piece already--mmmmm!
16. that the sun has come out so we have cool but sunny weather.
17. I'm thankful for global telecommunications. We just called Andrew in Ethiopia. It is cool to get the globe out during the conversation and observe how far away he is, but it sounds like he is just next door.
18. I'm thankful for Andrew's job in Ethiopia.
19. I'm thankful that Andrew likes his job.
20. I'm thankful that he seems to be doing a good job--his main job is to schmooze (in the nicest sense of the word). He is a networker, a global thinker, and he knows how to apologize when appropriate.
21. I'm thankful that Rachel knows how to make green bean casserole.
22. I'm thankful that my attempt to make a child's puzzle using a color printer and a photocopier worked on the first try.
23. OK, we're back from Thanksgiving dinner. I'm thankful for good food.
24. I'm thankful I didn't have to cook it all.
25. I'm thankful for good friends. We live far away from family, but friends are a good substitute.
26. I'm thankful for some new online friends I've made this past year too, even if I've never met them.
27. I'm thankful for A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.
28. I'm thankful for a digital camera to borrow.
29. some new photos for my website.
30. the chance to talk to David today. He declined all invitations to Tgiving dinner and ate Campbell's vegetable soup instead. :-/
31. a good job
32. a meaningful job
33. a job with lots of flexibility
34. a good boss
35. great coworkers
36. another cup of tea
37. a safe neighborhood to live in
38. a house that is paid for
39. friends to walk with
40. friends to talk with
41. I'm down to the last 10, three more hours of Thanksgiving left. I'm thankful for yet another cup of tea. This one prepared and served by my best friend.
42. I'm thankful for God's love.
43. for God's love shown to me by family
44. for God's love shown to me by friends
45. for God's love declared to me in the Bible which I can read in my mother tongue
46. for a great group of financial supporters who have kept food on our table for over 25 years
47. for a great group of prayer supporters who have kept us going for over 25 years
48. for an old Bible study group where I am helped
49. for a new Bible study group where I can help
50. Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift.

More pre-Thanksgiving

I worked today, made BLTs for lunch, then spent an hour talking over one of Rachel's school projects with her. Then we went to the library and found 12 children's books illustrated (not written) by Janet Stevens. Then to the bank and the school teacher store. Rachel is really getting into the teaching thing--she wanted to buy something from every aisle. But since she had to use her own money she restricted her purchases to just a few insect-themed items. The checkout lady gave her the teacher discount without asking. Rachel felt obliged to confess that she wasn't actually a teacher yet, but she hoped to be in one more semester. The lady smiled and said, "Too late."

We have an easy day tomorrow--all I have to provide for Thanksgiving dinner is olives, pickles, and pepperoncinis. Rachel is going to make the one and possibly only thing she knows how to make, green bean casserole. I'm thankful for long-time friends who make us feel like family.

And my husband is thankful too--he won his first Ebay bid.

pre-Thanksgiving

I'm thankful for lots of things. I'm thankful at least one of my kids gets to be home with us for the Thanksgiving holiday. I am awaiting her imminent arrival. She found a ride home with a girl who lives nearby. We were expecting them at about 6pm. At 6:15 the phone rang--they were stuck in bad traffic in north Dallas. There had been a storm early this afternoon that closed part of the route they were coming on. Every 30 minutes the phone rang again. They were getting closer, but not here yet. Then it rang again, "We missed the exit and now we're at the corner of Wheatland and Cockerell Hill. Which way do we go?" "Go west on Wheatland." "Which was is west? Hey, quit laughing at me!" And this girl wonders why we haven't given her a car to drive to school...

Anyway, it is 8pm and she just got here. It is a joy to have her home for a few days. She had hoped to not have homework, but there will probably be some. She has worked very hard the past two weeks with projects and a big exam, and she deserves a break.

Lord, thank you for bringing her safely home.

Ebay

My husband is funny. Tonight he is bidding in his first Ebay auction, and he's so excited. He didn't have an Ebay name or password, so I gave him mine. Well, I've never used it either--I got my name when David was underage and begged me to let him bid on something. (I think he bought something really nice, like a pair of leopard print boxer shorts, or something like that...)

Anyway, he is trying really hard to get a certain song book. He first tried to buy it on Amazon.com, but it is out of print. So he looked on Ebay and found one copy. So he is bidding on it and he's acting like a kid at Christmas. (Wait, I told him if he gets it I'm wrapping it up and giving it to him for Christmas.)

No, I'm not going to tell you the name of the song book. I don't want you going and bidding the price up! But I will tell you he is practing piano songs for the upcoming holiday, trying to copy the style of George Winston and David Huntsinger.

Homemade bread

Mmmm, I love that smell. No better comfort food.

The Boutique

Today was the big Boutique Christmas give-away. The Boutique is one of my favorite stores--it's free. Of course, you can't get in without a nametag, even if the stuff is free. And they have more security at the Boutique, where everything is given away for free, than at any other office with thousands and thousands of dollars' worth of computer equipment--but I digress.

Anyway, I went shopping. I found a nice stash of children's books that will go to my favorite aspiring teacher. Also found a photo album, a blank journal, some size 5.5 shoes, and a Dallas Maverick's cap. All brand new. Then I picked up some Christmas ribbon and these little gizzies that you put on drinking glasses to make them look fancy. I don't know what they are called.

I went to my favorite restaurant today for lunch--Ton's. When my husband is away I like to get together with my lady friends: Martha for Tuesday lunch, Kaye for Tuesday dinner, Sharla for Thursday lunch. Gary comes back tomorrow. When he gets here we go to Taco Bueno. Another friend, Shari, asked me to walk with her in the afternoons. That is probably a good thing after going out all these times.

Philosophical question

Following a sober discussion with my daughter, I have the following question:

Is a caterpillar an insect?

Well--is it?

Do angels read blogs?

I wouldn't have thought so, and if they did, I wouldn't expect them to leave comments. And if they did leave comments, I wouldn't expect them to later erase their comments.

It is weird. Back in September I posted a blog entry about my chickadee in Ethiopia. Someone I didn't know, named Mark, left a comment on that entry with information about where to use a credit card in Addis Ababa, and other information specific to life in Addis that turned out to be helpful to my chickadee (who thought I was being stalked :-). The next day I added a blog comment, thanking Mark, whoever he was. Well, yesterday I went back to find those two comments and they are GONE. All other comments seem to be there. What's up with that?

Another comment I left disappeared too, on someone else's blog. But I guess the answer to that is that the blogger just deleted it (as well as his post that prompted my comment). I guess he didn't like what I said.

There's nothing wrong

...but I feel lonely and a little down. Today feels like an empty nest day, one of those days for which I started this blog. The gray weather doesn't help. Actually, I am alone today--the kids are all in their respective places, and G. is also gone on a 9-day trip. My house guest left a few hours ago, so it is just me and the cat. Lots of times I actually like being alone because then I have no responsibilities to keep anyone else happy, and I can use my time as I like. But sometimes if no one is around I lose my focus: I can't decide what to do, I know I should do certain things but I don't feel like it, etc. For instance, I should go shopping, but the thought of doing that repels me, so I decide I can wait another day. I am doing the laundry and getting winter clothes out of storage.

Maybe it is because I just talked to my mom and she can't come for Christmas, Andrew can't come for Christmas, David says he might not come for Christmas. I'm thinking we might just skip Christmas this year. I read a book by that title a couple years ago, and it was actually a good book. I hear then made it into a movie, I wonder if it is any good?

Yeah, it is one of those days where I can't even find any topics on my favorite online forum that I feel like commenting on. It might be one of those days where I eat popcorn and drink diet coke all day long. Why cook if there's no one here to eat it?

No, there's nothing wrong, I just feel a little down. A friend did give me a science fiction book a couple days ago called Ender's Game. I've started it and it is good, so maybe I'll go read. Unfortunately, reading lightweight books in the middle of the day makes me feel guilty for wasting my time--that's pretty stupid, huh? Earlier today I started teaching myself about Powerpoint, but had to stop because I knew I would end up doing Rachel's homework for her if I kept it up, and that's not good.

No, there's nothing wrong...and that's good.

Update

I can't think of a clever title, nor do I have anything earth shattering to post.

We are proud of D. who has gotten his first invitation to interview for medical school, at Baylor in Houston. And he also got a second invitation to interview for the accompanying Ph.D. program. He's bought his ticket to fly to Houston and will stop by Dallas for less than one day to visit us on his way back home. Speaking of D., he had a little cyst or something surgically removed from near his eye socket last Monday. He had to drive himself to the hospital and back, mommy wasn't there to take him. :-( He was grouchy and groggy after the surgery (done with local anesthetic), but next day he was back to his cheerful self. :-)

R. is in the midst of probably the hardest part of the semester, with a huge project due tomorrow, a draft of a 20-page paper due next Tuesday, and her big standardized test the Saturday after that. But, this time she seems to be handling the stress pretty well, and we are proud of her persistence to keep going. I continue to ask God to help her, and seek my friends to pray for her also.

News from Ethiopia seems good too. A. got his official Ethiopia drivers license, and now he just has to get something to drive. He is off on a trip south tomorrow to Awassa where he hopes to secure the permissions needed to start one of his projects. He got some official papers in the mail recently, one signed by Colin Powell, that he needs for some reason or another. He's learning about paperwork in the third world.

G. is off tomorrow for nine days. We leave for DFW at 4:30am--ugh. First he goes to Fresno, then to Phoenix. This is a business trip, but we have a supporter in Fresno whom he will also see, and his parents live in Sun City, near Phoenix, so he'll see them too.

A stack of Bibles

No, I didn't swear on them. (I did wonder if one could swear on a stack of Bibles written in foreign languages.) Today there was a stack of four Bibles on my boss's desk. These were Bibles published sometime during the past six months.

• A medium-sized one with a hardback green cover. It was a diglot New Testament translation in Limos Kalinga and Ilokano from the Philippines. Population = 20,000


• A big black one with a plastic cover and red edges. This one was a full Bible in a language of Mexico called Nahuatl de la Huasteca Occidental. Population = 400,000


• A black one in an exotic script, non-roman. This one is a whole Bible in the Northern Khmer language of Thailand. Population = 1,000,000


• A small black compact book with gilt edges and thumbcuts to mark the different books. I recognized the word "Allah" on the cover. This is a diglot New Testament in the Abun and Bahasa Indonesia languages of Indonesia. Population = 3,000

1,423,000 more people have scriptures in their mother tongue.

If God so leads you, please

Our daughter, Rachel, is in her last year of college. If you read this blog and are a believer, please lift Rachel up to our Lord. She has two big school projects due before Thanksgiving and will be taking the third of three standardized tests on November 20 to secure her elementary teacher certification. School and tests are not easy for her, so pray

• that she will be able to concentrate and finish her work,
• that she will not get discouraged,
• that she will indeed pass the standardized test on Nov. 20

Identity Theft

Apparently my husband has been off to Italy buying things on our credit card. Over $700 of charges were made, but thankfully the credit card company observed that the charges didn't look right and contacted us. A new card is being issued.

Scottie, the 11-year old politician

This is Scott's third day with us. Last night I could hardly get him to go to bed because he was engrossed in a political show on PBS. He wouldn't go to bed until I agreed to set the VCR going.

Today on the way home from picking him up from school he told me he wants to become a politician when he grows up. Then he proceeded to grill me about for whom I voted, but I told him it wasn't polite to ask that question.

Then during dinner he told us he wanted to be the governor of Washington state. We suggested maybe he start with the school board or local mayor first. And I suppose moving to Washington might help too.

I'm recording this in my blog in case he becomes president someday. I'll let him stay up a little late tonight so he can watch the election returns.

Not empty

This week my nest is not empty. We are babysitting 11-year old Scott while his parents are away raising money.* I now remember how I don't like driving kids to school and back, but I do like having someone around to cook for. I noticing that Scott gets his homework done by "Asking Jeeves." Scott also informed us of his political views, a la Shawn Hannity. (Isn't he too young for that?)

*Other names for this process:

- raising support
- doing deputation
- partnership development
- pious pillaging of prosperous patrons
- begging

Halloween

Halloween doesn't amount to much in our neighborhood. We used to have a few children come by for candy, but now all the local churches have big parties for the kids. So I buy candy (chocolate) just in case anyone comes, then eat the leftovers myself :-)

I decided to post some photos of Halloweens past to remind myself of my cute little kids who aren't little anymore. (I'll be lucky if I see more than one of them for Christmas, let alone Thanksgiving or Halloween.)

First we have scary Halloween (well, maybe not that scary):


Next, we have Bible Halloween (Pharoah, church mouse, and Moses):


Last, we have Pacific Islands Halloween (I carried R. in that laplap as a newborn):

I always feel happy

...when someone says thank you.

The other two recipients also said thank you in emails. Maybe I should go bake some more cookies.

Farewell, blue car

As soon as D. left home, we decided to get rid of the blue car. We had a family from church that was in need so we gave it to them. They, unlike us, are a family that knows how to fix cars, so when the blue car would hiccup, they knew what to do. Just last Sunday we were walking across the church parking lot and R. said, "Oh look, there's our car!" To which we said, "Yes, that actually is our car. Or was our car. Yay, it is still working well enough that they drove it to church." Sadly, when their teenage daughter was driving home from church Sunday night (in the rain), she hit another car and wrecked it. Only minor human injuries, but it is doubtful if the blue car will be drivable again.

When R. gets her own car, we'd like to find one that has as good of visibility as this blue car (a 1989 Plymouth Reliant K). We had to put a block on the accelerator so her short legs could reach, but it was an easy car to look out of and get a good view.

Moon gazing

At the moment, a total lunar eclipse has just begun. It was raining earlier today, but when the eclipse began at 8:14pm, the clouds had pretty much cleared, and stayed away for the most part until now, 9:23pm. I tried to get someone to watch with me, but without success. G. is legally blind, so he can't see much of the moon so far away. I talked with R. on the phone and sent her outside to look, but it was cloudy in OKC. So the cat and I watched it. I used G.'s binoculars and monocular, and got a pretty good look. I tried several live webcasts on the internet, but they were all clogged up with traffic and I couldn't get through. G. told me that they showed a TV shot of it at from St. Louis where the Red Sox are trying to sweep the Cards in the 4th game of the World Series.

Believe it or not, there was a time in my young life when I wanted to be an astronomer. I think I was in 3rd or 4th grade. I remember one Christmas my parents bought me some kind of kit to build a cardboard telescope, but one crucial piece was missing. 40+ years later I still remember the disappointment of that. (Time to get over it, huh?)

Two more jobs?

I talked to child #3 yesterday and he said he was going to try to get a paid tutoring job since he was bored and didn't have anything to do in the evenings. That and he might join a community band, and he's tutoring an 8th grader up on Capitol Hill, and Bible study on Wednesdays, ...

Then today he said he got the 2nd job and might take a 3rd. Seasonal help at Best Buy would give him something to do on the weekends. And some more cash. And maybe an employee discount? I wonder.

So I said, "You need some friends to hang out with. What about the guys you live with?" He replied, "Well, they are cool and all, but they're so old--like 24 or 25." Do you see my eyes rolling??

I hope he likes the cookies I sent. I hope R. likes the cookies I sent. I hope one of the M.O.C.K.ees likes the cookies I sent.

Crisis averted

When child #3 called last night and asked me to send cookies, what could I say? So today I went to find my favorite cookie recipe and IT WAS MISSING! I nearly panicked until my neighbor invited me over for a cup of tea and dug the recipe out of her box--which she had gotten from me some years ago. So now cookies are baking and starving child #3 will soon get his package.

And while I'm on a kitchen theme, here are some little known facts about kitchen colors:

• Split green peas will fade to yellow if left in the sunlight.
  
• Cut green apples turn brown slower than cut red apples.
  
• The bleach stain on my apron is not a color nor a stain.
  
• White meat starts brown and ends up white.
  
• Red meat starts red and ends up brown.
  
• No food should be gray.
  

Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow...

Last night we went to the local theater's production of Annie, and now I've got that song stuck in my head. It was lots of fun. They did a professional job, the little girl who played Annie was great, and it was especially fun because a number of folks in the cast are from our church. G. took us out to eat at a great Mexican restaurant just before the performance, so that was nice too.

We had a good weekend with R. home. She got a bunch of homework done and some other things too: haircut, trip to the bank, unsuccessful shoe-shopping trip, and she voted. We had a laugh before voting because she said she was tempted to write in a friend's name* for president. She planned to do this until she learned that you could only put in declared write-in candidates.

We and R. have begun a discussion of where she might live next year. Of course, that is likely to depend on where she ends up getting a job. But one plan is that she would move back in with us, and take over the apartment end of our house (for a price, of course :-) A friend of mine, who has been a teacher herself, reminded me that the first year of teaching is very hard, and it is good to have some friendly ear at home to "dump" on when you get home from teaching each day. If R. got an apartment by herself, that would be difficult. If she had a roommate, it might work, but my friend thought for her first year, living at home might be the least stress to add to the first year of teaching. Of course, that all assumes that she would come back to Texas instead of staying in Oklahoma, which isn't a given. We will just have to see what doors the Lord opens as we carry on a discussion on the topic.

In the meantime, the song says, "Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow, you're always a day away."

*I'm not sure he's presidential material. He's more the dictator type.

Full nest for a few days

We've had visitors this week, a couple the age of our parents, who have loved and supported us for many years. Every time they come they fix something in my house (which is nice since my husband, capable in so many ways, isn't much for fixing things). This time they did some caulking in one of the bathrooms and fixed a wobbling towel rack. It is always nice to have them come, and it would be nice to have them come even if they didn't fix things for us.

And last night our daughter came home from college for her short fall break. We had to drive 20 miles to pick her up from a town south of Dallas, but at least we didn't have to drive 200 miles to pick her up from a town north of Dallas. Unfortunately, it won't be much of a break for her since she has school projects to work on. Sigh. The girl works so hard, but gets discouraged at times because school is not particularly easy for her. We keep reminding each other that she has only one and a half semesters left (out of ten) to graduate. (And my husband and I keep reminding ourselves that we only have one and a half more semesters to pay for!) Anyway, I may take the day off work so I can be with her, take her to get a haircut, maybe we'll go to the HS football game tonight, etc.

"I have a word from the Lord for you"

Someone told that to me a week ago. I get nervous when people say they've received a direct revelation from the Lord, but I listened anyway. His word to me turned out to be simple enough, and biblical enough too: "You need to calm down and trust the Lord."

Indeed. The situation that prompted my latest round of worry has come and gone, and surely the Lord is taking care of all those involved. We thank God for his gracious love to us, his work in our lives and the lives of our children, and his patience with me when I would rather worry about things than trust him.

Lord, thank you for hearing our prayers. Continue to work in all our lives.

Fortune cookies

We have visitors staying with us this week, always nice to see them. And a special treat is they always take us out to eat. Tonight we went to my favorite restaurant, Ton's Mongonlian BBQ. This kind of food is not at all related to the meat and potatoes that I grew up on in rural Michign, but I love it. First, there is the bowl of Hot and Sour soup that always gives me a temporary case of the hiccups because it is so spicy. Then, you can't go wrong when you can choose your own ingredients in any amount from a spread of raw meats and vegetables. Ladle on a scoop of hot oil, sesame oil, sugar water, cooking cherry [sic], garlic, salt water, lemon juice and oyster sauce. Then watch your meal be cooked right in front of your very eyes in about two minutes, along with six others on this giant grill heated to a thousand degrees (or however many). Top it off with sesame seeds and enjoy with rice on the side.

On the way out there are forture cookies after you pay your bill. Here are the two best from tonight:

"The dictionary is the only place where success comes from work." Whoops, did we loose something in the translation here?

And speaking of translation, the other fortune was bilingual: "Antes de que puedes anotar, tu tienes que tener un gol." (Before you can score yo must first have a goal.) This is Texas, after all.

Computer conversations

I got home after dark last night from a two-day visit to R.'s dorm room. We had a good visit, but I won't post about our conversations. Instead, I'll mention the talks I've had recently with my computers.

Computer: Your computer is running dangerously low on resources.
Me: Ok, then live dangerously. I do it all the time.

Computer: Low on memory.
Me: I can't remember when that last happened.

Computer: SP2 did not install properly. Your system is unstable.
Me: Unstable? Who's unstable?

Computer: Runtime error. Would you like to debug?
Me: Of course. I debug all the time.

Computer: There is a problem. Would you like to send a report to Microsoft?
Me: Sure, why not? I bet I'm the only person they've heard from this week.

Do I have a great husband, or what?

If anyone reading this blog actually knows me IRL, you probably have recently heard me asking for prayer for our older son. He lives in Ethiopia and works for a Christian relief agency. He is the most social of anyone in our family, and has been kind of lonely since starting this new job. He has always had tons of friends who were girls, has never been the least bit shy around girls, but also has never had a serious gf. Well, now he has become interested in a young lady and has been seeking our advice about his relationship with her. Today I read this email which my husband sent to him. I'm lucky to be married to someone so insightful.

While I'm here let me share some thoughts that about your relationship with *****. Actually, what I'm doing here is repeating what I said to Mom the first time she told me about your interest in *****. She was expressing concern about the fact that she was Catholic, and my response to her was something like, "Well, being Catholic per se doesn't worry me so much--more to the point is whether she is a Mother Teresa or an Imelda Marcos." You obviously know all about Mother Teresa as an example of a Catholic woman who really loved the Lord and obeyed his command to minister to the poorest of the poor. At the other extreme is Imelda Marcos, a Catholic woman who was notorious for her glamorous extravagance. Do you know about her? She was big news during your Acton days. She was Miss Manila in the 1950s and married Ferdinand Marcos who became the dictator of the Philippines for a couple decades. She is most famous for her shoes. When Marcos was run out of the country by a popular uprising in 1986 (after siphoning off billions of dollars into his own bank accounts), they found 1200 pairs of shoes abandoned in her closet. The total collection was thought to be upwards of 3,000 pairs--almost all of them expensive imports. So today "Imelda's shoes" has entered the language as an idiom for wanton extravagance.

I don't mean to imply that ***** is like that since I clearly don't know her yet. But there is a reason Imelda's shoes popped into my mind when Mom was telling me the story. If I have the facts right, ***** has grown up in a well-to-do family and is currently living in a much higher economic bracket than your family has ever occupied. People say that how to spend money is what couples fight about the most, and it is also said (though I haven't tried to verify it) that there is more teaching in the Gospels about money and materialism than about any other topic. Thus I think you'd be wise to pay special attention to where her heart is--not only spiritually, but also materially.

Especially in light of the call you have felt on your life to minister to the world's poor, I trust that you'll be able to find a life partner who can share that with you. When I was in my courting days, I was looking not just for someone who would share my faith, but also someone who would share in my call to ministry. I had a few serious girl friends along the way who met the faith criterion, but weren't ready to go with me to the ends of the earth. One was P. (in Missouri who we have stayed with on the way to Taylor); her passion was to be a dental hygienist, and she wasn't ready to give that up. And there was V. who couldn't imagine leaving the comforts of home, so she stuck with her plan to become a music teacher. But then there was L. who did share my passion for Bible translation. In the final analysis, it shouldn't be about how someone rates on the proverbial ten-point scale, but on how well they share your vision of how you should live your life. And that's why my answer for Mom about your situation was that I wouldn't be worried if she was like Mother Teresa, but would be if she was more like Imelda Marcos.

I hope you don't feel like I'm preaching at you--I'm just trying to share from the heart. We know that you have a good head on your shoulders and won't do anything foolish.

Lord, give them your guidance.

Way to go, D.!

D. got his MCAT scores today and did very well, 97th percentile. Now he waits to see if he gets asked to any interviews for the MD/Ph.D programs he is applying to. He also got his first paycheck today (from NIH). So he is having a doubly good day. Now he should celebrate--luckily he's still underage! (Not that he would celebrate that way, anyway... :-)

Regrets

I'm reasonably happy with my life, so perhaps regret is too strong a word to describe things I would change if I could live life over again. Here they are:

• not getting more education - I guess I really didn't have much choice here. I'm from a generation that didn't assume one would go to college and from a family that was uneducated. It was enough, it seemed at the time, to attend Bible institute followed by specialized missionary training. But in HS I was a good student, the top math and science student in my class, but I never studied math or hard science after that. I regret that.
• aggravating my children - I have a good relationship with my three kids, I love each of them more than life itself. I would do anything for them (and sometimes I do). And my kids all love me too, for which I thank the Lord. But now that my nest is empty and I have time to reflect on my child rearing, I think there were too many times when I disobeyed Colossians 3:21 and irritated or provoked my children when I didn't need to. I regret that.
• not learning to dance - I grew up in a strict Christian environment that said, "Don't smoke, don't chew, don't go with girls that do." It also said don't drink, don't go to movies, don't dance, and don't listen to rock music. I don't regret not smoking, I don't regret not drinking, I don't even regret not going to movies (I was already married before I attended my first movie in a theater), and I suppose I heard enough rock music along the way to become inoculated to it. But I do wish I had learned how to dance--square, ballroom, line, salsa--whatever. I regret that.

The YellowJacket

Woo hoo! I got a package in the mail today. You thought the M.O.C.K.ing mothers (that means Mothers of College Kids, for those not in the know) only sent packages, not received them, huh? What was in my package? The last two issues of the LeTourneau University's student newspaper, The YellowJacket. Why am I so privledged to get this in the mail? No, I did not write the guest editorial--I just have an inside track with the editor.

It looks like a nice little newspaper. I don't know that much about LU, having never actually been there. I hear quite a bit about it, however, since a lot of my colleagues send their kids there. I got to know the editor, Charley, a couple years ago when he lived with our family for a summer. (p.s. to Charley--I think you are wise to skip the barcode tatoo. If you wait until you start to go bald, you can have comb-over that looks like a barcode:-)

I hear complaints about LU sometimes, usually about meals. I don't know whether to consider them seriously or just assume they come from typical college kids who miss mom's cooking. I mean, I sent my three kids to other Christian colleges, and they complained the same way.

Sometimes I've heard complaints from LU students about chapel. I assume chapel attendance is required, otherwise they wouldn't be complaining about it. Maybe LU should consider making these changes to chapel, and see if things improve:

• Chapel is voluntary, not required.
  
• Chapel speakers and musicians are of high quality.
  
• Chapel is when campus announcements are made.
  
• The library, post office, and snack bar are all closed during chapel hour so staff can attend chapel.

These policies were in practice at the Christian college my boys attended, and there was never enough seating for everyone to get into the auditorium for chapel.

Hmm, maybe I should ask the YellowJacket editor if I can write a guest editorial for the next issue.

"The Politics of God"

I don't really know that much about politics, but it is the political season and I did watch the VP debate last night. Today I read an article entitled "The Politics of God." It was kind of interesting, a little summary of how religion affects how Americans vote. (This article came from the Kennedy School of Government Bulletin, but when I last checked that URL, it was not the latest issue. This magazine arrived in my mailbox because our older son is a recent graduate of the KSG and Ethiopia is too far away to mail it. And even though they, no doubt, expect me to cower in respect, I did find a copyediting error in the article, a missing closing double quote. "So there!" I say smugly.)

The article talks mostly about voting patterns since the Kennedy election in 1960. According to the author, 82% of American Catholics voted for JFK.

Twenty years later, the once-burning "Catholic issue" was forgotten, replaced by the "Christian Right" question. After voting for Jimmy Carter in 1976, the nation's white evangelicals overwhelmingly opted for Ronald Reagan in 1980.... Urged on by fundamentalist preachers like Jerry Falwell and his Moral Majority and then by Pat Robertson and his Christian Coalition, those voters dropped the Democratic Party by the millions for wholehearted embrace of the GOP.

The article goes on to point out how Americans are much more religious than Europeans, and they vote according to their religious values. But it is too simplistic to say religious Americans vote Republican and secular ones vote Democrat. Rather, the author says Americans divide up along these religious percentages:

25% Catholic
25% white evangelical or fundamentalist
25% mainline Protestant
10% black Protestant
2% Jewish
2% Mormon
1% Muslim
10% secular

and then vote thus: white evangelicals and Mormons will vote Republican, black protestants and Jews will vote Democrat. Therefore, the election is in the hands of Catholics and mainline protestants.

Hmm, maybe I should have posted this entry on my favorite
online forum, but then all those twenty-somethings would think I'm interested in politics.

Risk taking

Once a month my boss sends out a newsletter to all the people who work in our section. I found this paragraph from his newsletter kind of interesting:

We are in a better position to take risks than non-believers. For one thing,our identity isn't tied up in our accomplishments. Our identity comes from who we are in Christ. And we know that the Lord is sovereign and will accomplish His purposes both through our successes AND failures.

I don't really see myself as a big risk taker (although I have stuck my neck out in a few cases that involved relationships with people). I think it is his second sentence that caught my attention: our identity is not tied up in our accomplishments. You know, if that is true, it is a very freeing concept. Who I am is not a sum of all the things I've done (or not), or all the money I've earned (or not), or all the pats on the back I've gotten (or not). If my identity comes from who I am in Christ, and if yours does too, then you and I are petty much equals, just different parts of the same Body.

Top ten ways you know your nest is empty

10. You rediscover the color of the carpet in your kids' bedrooms, and find silverware that has been missing for months.

9. You make a car-sized space in the garage and when you come home from work, the space is still there.

8. Your telephone is free, but silent, since your friends gave up months ago trying to get through.

6. You run the dishwasher once every two days instead of twice in one day.

5. You go to the grocery store once a week instead of once a day.

4. You go out to eat at Chili's instead of McDonalds.

3. You clean the house and it stays clean.

2. Your husband says he wants to have more kids so you will at least cook dinner

And the number one reason you know your nest is empty,

**has been censored** ;-)