Thoughts from Middle-earth: July 2011

it's nice to know someone cares

baby johan (sorry hobbitsister, he's too big to be called droolasaurus rex now) is 3 1/2. toward the end of our family birthday party today, he came up behind my chair.

baby johan: your guys are here.
me: my guys are here?
baby johan: no. your guys, your guys are at home.
me: my guys are at home?
baby johan [looking at me like since he's now made it so clear to me i should know what he's talking about]: yeah.
me: oh. well it's good for them to be there, right?
baby johan [very concerned]: you're lost!
me: oh! are you talking about erma and scout? did they go home without me?
baby johan: yeah! you're lost!

"It takes courage and godliness to fulfill a ministry that no one ever sees the fruit of." - Charles Price

why it's always good to know prices of things before you shop clearance sales

borders is closing. it's so sad. bookstores should not close.
however, the reason bookstores close is because you can find things cheaper online. before going to borders to check out their clearance deals, i checked amazon and barnes&noble. there are a few things i was looking for, so i wanted to make sure i didn't spend too much. yeah, it's all cheaper online. (and one of the books i'm looking for borders didn't have anyway.) on the minus side, this meant that i didn't find spectacular deals at borders. on the plus side, this means that i can order them and get a package in the mail. that would be exciting. (if i can convince myself that after the shoes i still should get to spend money for fun.)

Go my boyfriend!

My boyfriend had one goal in his career - to get to pitch. I had one goal in my fandom - to get to see Cuddy pitch if he ever got to pitch (well, that and marry Cuddy, but Claudia beat me to that). As I was listening to the blow-out last night, all of a sudden, top of the 8th, they said Cuddyer was throwing in the bullpen. What!?! I called Hobbitsister to make sure I heard what I heard. She confirmed it. I then called Uncle Swedish Chef, and frantically told him I had to come over right now! He hadn't seen what was going on, but he was watching the game, so he very obligingly told me I could come.
And indeed, Cuddyer was warming up in the bullpen. (Gardy later said he didn't dare put in any other position player to pitch. There would've been a fight on the mound, and he was a little scared of what Cuddy might do to him.)

[Swarzak looks a little nervous and Nathan a little intrigued. Perkins looks like he thinks this is fun, and Capps, well, Capps looks like he's spitting out a sunflower seed.]

And then he kicked bottom. He gave up two hits and a walk, but he managed to wiggle out of the jam and not give up a run. (And personally, I believe one of those hits could've been an out if a certain shortstop hadn't stopped running. The other could possibly been an out if the ball hadn't hit the heel of the second baseman's glove.) His ERA is a perfect 0.00.

And he had so much fun. He was grinning from ear to ear (like he does) going in, and grinning from ear to ear coming out. Gardy may have been scowling during the inning because he was scared Cuddy would get injured, but as Cuddy walked back into the dugout beaming, Gardy couldn't help but give him a big grin back.

Good job, Cuddy!

http://minnesota.twins.mlb.com/video/play.jsp?content_id=17290129

Thank you Uncle Swedish Chef for letting me watch my boy!

"The God who created, names, and numbers the stars in the heavens also numbers the hairs of my head...He pays attention to very big things and to very small ones. What matters to me matters to Him, and that changes my life." ~Elisabeth Elliot

great illustration

"Go back to the Old Testament in the flannelboards of your minds..."
- Byron Yawn
He then went on to talk about Jericho "You know that after a few days someone's thinking, 'This is a stupid idea.' Especially if they're church people... 'It's a stupid idea, but I guess we follow those guys because they have the Ark, and you don't want to mess with that thing.'"

And then it was back to talking about the foolish things shaming the wise.

this is my new (this summer) black dress

these are my new red shoes

the combination made me feel that i should go on a date with

drew butera

which kind of surprised me. don't get me wrong - there's absolutely nothing wrong with drew (he's cute and he's my back-up guy-i'm-going-to-marry as far as the twins go), i was just surpised by how off the top of my head and how definite this feeling was.

clearly, he needs to ask me out.

Okay, one more for today - this time a prayer request

It's a well-known fact that I don't like my job. And it's a well-known fact that I'll never leave my place of employment with this job market. The only way I've been able to see getting out of my job is for the place to close (well, except that one time when I had a dream that I got fired and it was the best feeling in the world until I woke up all the way and realized I had not been), which hopefully won't happen seeing as if it closed not only would I be out of work, but my mother would be, too.
However, there is now a possibility of me at least getting out of the kitchen. There's an opening in the activities department and I filled out an application. I may not have all of the qualifications, but I have most of them, and my experience planning therapy sessions with an elderly stroke patient, as well as my knowledge of the capabilities of the residents we have would, I believe, make up for that.
I don't know that activities is what I want to do for the rest of my life, but it would be a change, and perhaps one that would actually allow me to use my brain once in awhile. Other perks are that they don't start til 9:00am, which would mean that I wouldn't be tired all the time, which would mean I might be able to enjoy life a little. And more importantly, it would mean that I would be able to do a quiet time at 10:30 pm, which would be a far better fit for me. That's when I did it back in college and it worked pretty well, but it just isn't possible right now. And, most importantly, I would have every Sunday off. I would work every other Saturday, but I would be off on Sundays (just the thought of which makes me want to cry).
And so, if you think of it and are up to it, yeah, that's a prayer request of mine right now.

prayer ministry update

It's so hard. Really it is. It's a great struggle for me. When I was with Chelleybutton this weekend, though, we were talking about doing things for GOD, and the importance of it, and how much we want to do it but fail, and she touched on the subject of quiet times. And it hit me - that's probably the biggest reason why I struggle: my complete and utter lack of quiet times. I have my reasons, though when I say them out loud they sound like excuses. The problem is that I'm too tired to read anything when I try. The problem is that I don't know what to read. The problem is that, honestly, I get bored. The problem is that I get tired of praying for my boys, why would I want to add more prayer?
So somehow I have to get myself to do quiet times. I need to spend time with GOD daily. I don't know how to institute that discipline (see reasons/excuses above), but somehow I really need to. My ministry is flailing.

And now for an update on my life that does not revolve around Harry Potter (well, really, Neville Longbottom - I've never really liked Harry)

•A couple weeks ago I went to Chicago to see my brother. Things haven't been going well with his job situation, so my parents and I went to visit, which was nice. We only had the weekend, so we drove down Saturday (my dad and I had front row tickets to the Twins game Friday night, so we couldn't leave then [but of course it then poured down rain so we didn't get to see the game anyway]), had supper with my brother, hung out for a little bit, then drove home on Sunday. We also hit 6 antique stores (my parents hit one more while I was at the hotel on Saturday), which of course was fascinating, but considering that my dad is an addict, I knew that would happen. And I did find a treasure for Hobbitsister, so it wasn't completely wasted.
•The weekend after that, Kimberly came! I hadn't seen her for 8 years and had never met her little people, so it was very exciting (oh yeah, and Josh was here, too). I couldn't get off work, so we only really had Saturday afternoon, but we did get to spend some time together, and we hit Ikea, where she bought me a very cute coffee cup. And not only is it cute, I'll think of her every time I use it. :) It also was nice to see someone from Bible school, seeing as I had been going through withdrawal lately.
•Then, last weekend, I got to go to Chelleybutton's to not just see Harry Potter, but to spend time with her and Autosmiler. I love doing that. My mom saw pictures from that weekend and said it was the most relaxed and happy she had seen me in a long time. I think that was in part because it was just plain fun, but also because for the first time this year I got to actually do something I wanted to do. Tacoma didn't work out when I wanted it to. I didn't get to go to that game in Seattle. I didn't get to go to a game in Kansas City. I didn't get to go on my date with Michael Cuddyer. And there were other things, I believe. I hadn't gotten to go to anything I was hoping to. But here, finally, I got to get out and have fun. (Not that it wasn't fun to have Kimberly here, I loved that!, but it wasn't me going anywhere, and I still had to work, which is not fun.) We three also stopped by another friend's and got to meet her baby, which was nice.
•Last night I babysat at Slip Aunt's, an almost 2-month-old, a two-year-old, and a three-year-old. I still don't like babies, no matter how cute they are, and the other two were very energetic (but good), so once again I have a confirmation that I don't want little people. But that's okay. After Slip Aunt got home, I stuck around to watch the Twins game, 1) because I love the Twins, and 2) because the Handsome Justin Verlander was pitching for the bad guys. I always say that I want Verlander to pitch well until the 8th inning, then for us to kick his bum, but sadly, we didn't do it this time. He sure is pretty, though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYyYKSQljfw

•So basically I've been busy. Busy enough to make this post really long. Sorry about that. Next time I'll try to keep up so you don't get it all at once!

"Be holy for I am holy"

oh yeah. that.

alright, just to get this out of my system

i'll stop after this. i just thought i should take this opportunity to teach y'all some russian.

the pink part says "matthew lewis."

dear whomever invented insulation,

thank you. that was very smart of you. i just wish you had insisted it be installed in the second floor of my house. 87 degrees with the air conditioner running just doesn't cut it. my room is way, way too hot.