gonna post this now so i can go potty

this is going to be short and sweet because i've had a lot of water and it's going right through me.

i'm tired and grumpy today. i need a good night's sleep. like really good. all snuggly buggly in the world's heaviest blanket and my pajama bottoms don't bunch up around my knees. where i don't have to get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and i don't have to punch my dot in the side for snoring or twitching or both. where i wake up before my alarm clock goes off and feel refreshed and the only thing keeping me from getting up is the warmth of the covers.

ah. now that would be nice.

i ran into an old friend a few weeks ago. it wasn't until after i'd gone on and done my own thing that i finally realized where i knew her from. so today i went back to say hello and introduce myself (again). she remembered me and said she'd had the same feeling after we'd met - that she knew me from somewhere.

i think this is the first time i've run into anyone i went to college with. she said i needed to come back again and visit with her more. i told her i'd try and come someday when i could bring my dot.

cool.

joshua

my friend and i have been looking forward to doing beth moore's joshua study. we've checked with just about everyone for a copy of the dvds. but no one seems to have them. and the leader kit is about $200.

so we've decided to do the online Bible study. it was originally designed to be done online and then they eventually came out with the dvd version. so we're going to be doing it as it was intended. plus she's done it via web before and said it's really good.

so it's official. i'm going to start my very first online Bible study! yippee!! cannot wait!

i've just downloaded and started using desktop google. and [shock of all shockers].. i love it! i am so looking forward to going to work tomorrow to download it there, too. not much about google i haven't been completely nuts about.

i am all things google! heh.

please.. look into giving a gift of life:

TWO.

is the number of sound of music references i've heard watching television tonight.

ONE.

the number of best husbands in the world i have. (i love you, my dot)

bah humbug

that's my laptop wallpaper for the month. i love emily strange! she's so dark and bizarre. something that always attracted me, even as a kid.

my dot and i are going to borrow my mom's christmas tree. it'll be the first time i have ever had a fake tree. and the first time i've had a tree at all at this house. i wonder what the cats will think. heh.

i collect angel ornaments. someday i'll have enough to cover the tree without supplementing with other ornaments. oh, and of course will have an angel topper. heh.

and here is something on my wishlist. actually, what i would really like it to say is"google girl" on it. or maybe, "i am all things google". now that would be cool!

photo rich

posting a few photos from tgiving. this first one is of the two kids i “babysat”. not!! we just got along and played tangoes together. their dad is my dot’s mom’s cousin. (i’m still learning the family tree.)

here’s a pic of my mom-in-law. my dot takes after her a lot in the face. but then.. i’ve never seen his bio-father to make a comparison. she’s very sweet. loves her family. she gets depressed after she has all the family over and then they leave. she doesn’t like the “leave” part.



here’s my dot’s younger brother and his wife, who was my very bestest friend since high school. we were inseparable. i wish we got to see more of each other now.



and here is my dot’s older brother. he was in my brother’s class in high school. in fact, another one of their classmates stopped by the house while we were all there. i need to remember to tell my buh that i ran into jeff zaber!



my lil-bro-in-law was messing with one of the cameras. here i am giving him the stink eye. he deserved it for aiming that thing at me!! my dot's brothers teased him about seeing this look often. er.. maybe they were teasing me!



and then.. finally.. one of my dot and me. i like this one.



we got back from oklahoma late friday afternoon. we were going to go on a date, but my dot wasn’t feeling well. he’d gotten my cold. so we held off and just stayed in watching movies from the couch, had my curry lentil soup and a pasta caesar salad for dinner.. with a little kendall-jackson merlot. yummy.

saturday we got up and went over to rush creek to work on the house we’re trying to sell. we painted, cut and installed baseboards and trim. mom’s been helping us out quite a bit so she was there priming and painting and helping to clean some of the windows and areas where the wall texture accidentally landed. we worked over there for about nine hours then went over to my buh’s. gigi knew we’d be tired after working all day long so she had us over for dinner. salmon patties (ick! not hers.. just salmon in general) and salad. for salmon it was a decent meal, but not one i’d make on my own. unless i used tuna. or something.

we got home and i took a hot bath while my dot was in the shower. then we got in bed and watched a little telly before crashing. my dot couldn’t sleep so he got up and played his computer game until the wee hours of the morning. he had dark circles under his eyes this morning.

i wasn’t feeling so hot this morning, either. i started a new cycle of pills last night and it always makes me nauseous. i felt like i was going to spew all morning long until i could finally force myself to get something in my tummy. i take my pills at night so i will sleep through most of it. doesn’t always work, though.

oh!.. here’s a photo our IT guy took of me working. well.. if you can call being at a creative brainstorming afternoon “working”. we got to play with play-doh while we worked. i made a hippo eating a penguin. *grin* when i look at this picture i'm reminded of a story my grandma used to tell of the very first time she'd ever met me. i was a few months old and my parent handed me over in a pink fuzzy blanket. gma says she unwrapped the blanket to find two of the biggest eyes she'd seen staring right back at her. i don't think i have big eyes until every once in a while someone catches me in a photo like this one.

sudoku and the feast

last night i realized where my dot got his snoring. his dad was sleeping in the room next to us, just outside our door and my dot was on the other side of me in the bed. i was essentially right between the two of them. and they snored.

i could kick my dot. but..

..so i endured it. i was very tired when i got up this morning. i heard some voices and thought i'd better get in the bathroom before it starts filling with people wanting to shower.

after i got out of the bathroom i saw that the only ones up were my dot's parents. they chatted with me a bit, offered me some coffee, and that was that. i was out of bed for good. i had some pumpkin bread with my coffee and pretty soon my dot joined us.

it wasn't really long after that when his mom got to work on cooking for lunch. all that preparation!!! and she says it's worth it. she says she usually cries after everyone leaves each year, because she enjoys having everyone over just that much. and enjoys all the work it takes to put together the feast. hmh. hard to wrap my brain around.

i helped out where i could and tried to keep out of the way when i couldn't help.

finally kriss declared it ready, uncle vann prayed over the meal, and the feasting began. not counting the meat (because i hardly looked at what there was) we had:

broccoli & cheese casserole
green beans
corn
brussel sprouts
peanut butter filled or cheese filled celery
cranberry sauce
shrimp (made special for me)
rolls
dressing
deviled eggs
pickles
olives
sweet potatoes
mashed potatoes
gravy

lunch was very very good. i stuffed myself. just like a turkey. heh.

shortly thereafter a few naps commenced, some of which lasted until well into early evening. but about 6 of us sat down and played a game of phase 10, which also lasted until well into early evening.

then we brought out the tangoes again and played with that for a little while. now a bunch of us are on our laptops and all of the kids are around the pc. i've been playing sudoku.

and i plan on turning in soon. i'm yawning a lot.

all in all - a very enjoyable thanksgiving holiday with my new family, and my dot's and my first thanksgiving together as husband and wife!!

he is at the top of my list of things i am thankful for. i surprisingly don't make "thankful" lists at thanksgiving. as much as i love lists, you'd think it would be natural for me, but i just don't do it. so this year, in light of all the new things in my life, i will for the first time, put together my top ten things i am thankful for:

i am thankful for orange
i am thankful for the world's heaviest blanket and sleeping at my warmest
i am thankful for sweaters with hoods
i am thankful for cheese - all kinds, shapes, colors, consistencies and reasons to eat it
i am thankful for music - the well-put-together kind where the lyrics and energy and crescendos and mix all lend itself to the feel and sound
i am thankful for laughter. the kind that takes you over, seduces others into it, the kind that makes you feel like you've just had a massage and gone on a roller-coaster all at the same time
i am thankful for being able to do what i am passionate about. and get paid for it
i am thankful for the many many people in my life whom i love, my family and friends, my co-workers, my church family
i am thankful for my dot
i am thankful that i am a citizen of heaven

tangoes

at the in-laws for tgiving. we drove up here this evening, stopped at burger king and used our 2 $5 gift cards to pickup a little dinner (yay-veggie burger!), and met the family at my dot's parent's house. we'll be staying here for two nights.

there are two kids here, i think they are my dot's cousins once removed, and i brought out my tangoes for us to play together. my mom-in-law said i make a good babysitter, but the truth is i just make a good peer.

i met some of my dot's family that either i hadn't met before or just didn't remember. and niecy is here (my best friend.. since high school. she's now my sister-in-law. we did, after all, want to be sisters!) and she spent most of the evening in the kitchen making stuff for tomorrow. me? i just brought some broccoli/cheese casserole and a couple of bags of chips. the chips were requested, the casserole was a bonus bring.

i figured since it's been a tradition in my family, i could bring it to my dot's. plus it will give me an entree to eat in the midst of all the animal protein.

it's quiet now.. most everyone has either left or gone to bed. it's been a good day, a good time getting to know everyone and get to be part of the family.

miss me?

guess what i'm going to say. go on, guess. it's the oldest (and lamest?) excuse in the book - try and guess.

yup. you got it. "i've been busy".

geez, how overused and trite can i get?

so i've been trying to get all settled into ministry work and seem to have a million projects all brand new just begging for me to tackle them all at once, teams to build up, job descriptions to create, websites to design and populate, and maybe the hardest one of all of them: get my paperwork in order to transfer my retirement account. i swear, i've never received so many emails w/instructions or documentation to fill out or approve or signatures to get notarized in all my life!

i just finally finished the task of going through all of the many files and binders and clippings that i inherited from about 6 different people when i first started here. apparently they were all so happy to find that i would be doing what i am doing and they could finally get this stuff off of their desks.. and right onto mine. but i have gone through the last bit today and have it all filed (most of it in the round file).

one final task will be to get all of the job descriptions written so i can distribute and get covenants and agreements turned back in to me. once that is done, it is maintenance from here on out, my friend!

well, i mean, there are going to be new projects all the time, i am sure, but at least the regular part of my job will be organized and in place. when i first started here i had no one in the position before me to train me. no processes existed, no training was being held, no communications were being made. so i've had to build all of that up. now i just have to keep it that way.

outside of work, my dot and i have spent a good deal of time working on the other house trying to get it in selling shape. we're on the last stretch, i believe, with only trim/moulding, paint touch ups, a good cleaning and a little landscaping left to do. it would be so wonderful - financially and emotionally - to get that thing sold. it has been the bane of my existence for a good long while and i will celebrate it's departure.

my dot and i are constantly adding to a list of things we will do/buy when the house sells. we feel like we've put off so much of our lives to post-sale. we don't go out to eat, we don't buy clothes, we don't buy gifts, we try and wear things more than once to save on laundry-related water and electricity expenses, we make our meals and take lunches to work. i don't mind being thrifty, i think it's a great habit to be in, but i am so tired of saying no to lunch invitations and worrying about being invited to someone's house for dinner because it is only polite to ask if you can bring anything and i fear what i will be asked to bring. is it expensive? is it budgeted? ergh!!!

life after house will be much lighter.