By Nicole

Thanks to a great idea from these folks , we have Leap Blog Day! I was lucky enough to get Larissa from Papa is a Preacher to agree to be my guest blogger.  She astounds me with the depth of insight and wisdom she holds for such a young woman.  Keep an eye on her - she has some serious potential and incredible talents.  It'll be good when she is all famous for me to be able to say that she wrote especially for my blog way back when. Go! Do! Act! Now! Every once in a while, I enjoy reading a paragraph or two from an author I usually don't enjoy or agree with. Daddy says it's good, oftentimes necessary, and is part of cultural education. I agree. It has often happened that these very authors have made me think and become inspired. One of them is Jack London. He once said, *"You can't wait for inspiration. You have to go after it with a club." Ironically, this very quote inspired me to do things. Do. I hang my head in shame, but I confess, I'm not muc...

I have been so busy working on my post for tomorrow, that I have negelected today. But here is the cute little Leap Frog to explain what Leap Blog Day is all about!  Click on over and check it out.  And do some blog hopping tomorrow.  That's what I will be doing.

Tonight we had quesadillas and leftover frijoles rancheros. Tuesday is whatever casserole I pull from the freezer. Wednesday is leftovers and a crockpot chicken. Thursday is Italian potluck at the church. Friday is sopes and salad. Saturday is a birthday party for my nephew and pizza. Sunday may or not be the day we start the Daniel Fast, so dinner is undecided. Hopefully tomorrow is the day I get my computer back, and I will be able to post more than just a blurp from my phone...

The boys ran their first 5k at Seward Park today!  Connor rocked it and ran with his Auntie.  I ran with Grady.  It was his fastest 5k ever and my slowest...  And I think it traumatized him.  It might have been better to let my tiny six year old run his first race on a nice warm day instead of making him sludge through puddles in a hailstorm for 3 miles.  Ahhh, hindsight.  I hope he forgives me.

Meeting baby cousin for the first time! 

Thankful that on a day full of driving, I got to see a view like this.

So busy and consumed by running.  To errands and appointments, that is.  I haven't ran for three days.  My computers are still sick, and I have a lot more driving to do in the next few days.  We are just now driving home from our couple's Bible study.  22 couples!  That is huge for our church.  Good food and fellowship.  Worth taking the time out of our day, but blogging has taken a back burner...

Dear World Book Night giver,   We have finished the review of all the applications, and we are pleased to inform you that your application has been accepted! Look for another email in the next week confirming the title of the book you'll have to give out and instructing you to go back online and choose your book pick-up bookstore or library. Thank you for your patience!   All best, WBN Team   Visit the WBN site   Share with a Friend        

This is an easy week.  That makes me happy. Tonight we had Coconut Chicken Curry with rice. Tuesday is Ham and Bean soup. Wednesday is leftovers. Thursday is Mexican-themed potluck at church to kick off our new Bible study. Friday is Jason's pick again, and I have a feeling it will be "crabby patties" (as our kids lovingly call them). Saturday and Sunday nights we probably won't be home and will have to *sigh* eat out.  It's gonna be rough.

We took the kids out along our creek bed today, loaded up with shovels and the metal detector.  We found a whole bunch of junk... But this is my favorite. 

I'm not sick.  All of my computers are...

If I have never before mentioned my passive aggressive love relationship with lists, then I have been keeping a sordid secret from you all. I make lists for just about everything.  Shopping, to do, to pack, to make, menu planning, baby names.  You name it, I have probably listed it.  Sometimes I make lists and check them off as I complete them.  Sometimes I do a whole bunch of stuff and then write up a list of what I actually finished just so that I can cross off everything.  Tonight I am planning on making a list of all the things I want to accomplish this weekend.  One of the things on my list will be to make a shopping list.  It's a sick   helpful thing.  Really.  What feels better than to be able to track all the things you have accomplished?  Or to at least get down on paper all the things you need to accomplish so that they will quit rattling around in your skull and fighting your optic nerve and medulla oblonga...

My calves hurt. That’s all I can think about. Between Jillian and my two 15 oz. can of queso “weights” on Monday night and running up and down the village in my Vibrams at lunch yesterday, it’s a wonder I can even walk. Yes, I am being dramatic and somewhat of a wuss. The great thing about this pain though, is that I was looking back through all my draft posts that I needed to finish, and way back in November, I posted about needing to run again . Well I actually started not long after that post and have stuck with it!! I needed that little bit of reinforcement – to see that I am making an improvement. I also had a draft post about a running plan going (which has been retrained into this post). So far this year, I have run one 5k , with my darling sister-in-law. As a coping mechanism for her while my brother is deployed and a way to fit back in my jeans (and stay there) for me, we have decided that we are running at least one race per month. We are starting with 5k’s because they are ...

Cleaning a mess.

This is a re-post.  Everyone else is doing it (you know who you are).  And I love you all so much, I am going to recycle an oldie.  Add a little sparkle, a couple of links, and this is a decent Valentine's gift.  I am off to snuggle with my hubby and drink tea. The Foolishness of Grace "And a certain sign of grace is this.... through broken earth, flowers come up, pushing through the dirt." What a foolish notion, grace. Who deserves it? Many feel they don't need it. Only fools understand and accept it. The educated scoff at the idea that men, the most "evolved" species with the highest intelligence would have need of God's love and forgiveness. After all, we are capable of doing good. Those of us who are positive forces in the community, who believe in the inner good of man and the power of being in balance and in tune with nature and ourselves have no need of grace. We are good enough on our own. We don't hurt anyone. We pay taxes. We put a...

Tonight - Venison, chili beans, and Brussels sprouts roasted with garlic and bacon.  We might hurt tomorrow, but it was so worth it.  We also wrote out Valentines, and I had two bags of Skittles.  I am such a cheater. Tuesday - Leftover vegetable barley soup from our Sunday potluck.  Maybe served with bread and butter. Wednesday - Crockpot chicken and salad. Thursday - Pesto chicken pizza Friday - Jason's choice... And he hasn't decided yet. This weekend, I am making banana muffins and some casseroles to freeze ahead.  We are running out, and that makes me nervous.

I've decided I am a hoarder of comments, keeping them all to myself.  Where's the fun in that?  Tonight, my time online is going to be spent sharing love... not trying to write something that will garner comments from others. 

Plaid, plaid everywhere... I expected way more camo .

My husband and I decided early on that we wanted our kids to be the kids who have friends over to our house... more often than our kids stay with others.  Then we decided that for the plan to really work, we needed to start the pattern early on, when the kids are young enough to not be embarrassed of us or our house and haven't started to think that town is cooler than the sticks.  Tonight is one of those nights.  Friends and homemade chicken strips, playing outside, Playstation, movies and popcorn.  And that is where we are now.  Movies... We have so many good movies.  And what do they want?  A Netflix new release.  The True Story of Puss in Boots .  Truly awful.  Painful.  Low budget, kind of sleazy feeling.  Looooooooowwwwww budget.  I am cringing.  Oh, thank you Lord!  The kids just realized how bad it is.  They were hoping for the Shrek version .  It's not even ...

I just finished reading The Hunger Games trilogy.  What a great group of books!  I am not going to do an in-depth review, other than to say the books are totally worth acquiescing to all the hype and just reading.  Quietly.  If you are like me and hate going with the flow, especially in fads and pop hysteria, then no one needs to know.  Except your family when you begin to ignore all their basic needs and complete existence just to finish reading every chapter.... anyway, I am digressing.  At the end of the final book, there was a special section where Collins thanks those who helped her finish the books, beginning with her triumvirate group of editors.  Since I wasn't mentally savvy enough at the time to deduce the whole tri- part of the word and count how many editors she named, I got all confused and befuddled by a word I had never recalled hearing before.  So I looked it up .  And I just started saying it to hear i...

Leilee saw this picture tonight and said, "Mom!  I was a baby!" Yes, dear, you were... and now you are almost three... Tonight is a night following a day that was relatively benign except for one conversation that left me feeling like screaming and crying and crawling in bed defeated.  Over something really stupid.  Something that I should have a tough enough skin by now to not let bother me.  So I will stop this rant now to retire to my pillow and pray. And you all can look at a picture of my darling baby almost two years ago. 

A few months ago, I posted a review of Stuck by Jennie Allen . Part of the amazing revelation and great conversation that I had this weekend was about how sticky it can be trying to get unstuck.  On the outside, I do a pretty good job of making people think I have it all together (unless they know about and are reading some of my blog posts).  Even my husband doesn't know all of the battles that rage on inside of me.  For the most part, I shove my frustrations and fears and worries and shortcomings down deep inside.  I don't have a whole bunch of bosom friends, so I rarely confide in anyone.  That has also caused me anxiety in the past. And heaven forbid that I actually voice my unhappiness with myself to myself, let alone to someone else.  They might tell!  Word travels fast in a small town.  Even the well-meaning are well-known gossips.  Is there anyone I can trust?  I'm a Christian, no one can know I'm not perfect!...

Tonight we had leftover quinoa cakes and green beans.  Those cakes are much better after they have been frozen and cooked later.  The flavors run together a little bit more. There were no leftovers! Tuesday we will be eating at the church.  Probably potato soup, also reheated from frozen. Wednesday is another church dinner.  Quesadillas and leftover soup. Thursday will be deer steak, a vegetable of some kind and sweet potatoes. Friday will be halibut and brussels sprouts. Saturday me and the hubby are heading out of town to a concert!  Who knows what Grandma will feed the kids.  Probably cheese and rice cakes...  just kidding.  She does cook when they are there! Sunday is leftover venison vegetable soup from our Soup for Sashes (Missionettes fundraiser) on Sunday after church.  I always make a huge pot of soup so that we have leftovers for dinner that night.  So far, I have been entering calories and exercise into myfi...

Yes, we did watch the last part of the Superbowl game today.  And yes, I know what it is.  I even understand some of the rules, and I know the names of a lot of the teams.  But, we are not a sports watching family in general.  I dislike spending my time watching any kind of sports (I like to waste my time on other equally frivolous pastimes, as you all know).  It makes me very happy that my husband is not a sports watcher.  I think I might even love him more because of it.  Previous boyfriends of mine have been the kind that would watch ANY sport on television and had at least three or five different teams, sports, etc. that they HAD to follow religiously.  Seriously.  So today, on the way home from church, we were explaining the rest of the day's schedule to the kids.  We planned to go over and watch the Superbowl at Grandpa's house after we finished some other chores.  The boys started asking what it was, and after Jason had exp...

The title sounds a bit somber, and I am entering into this post not entirely meaning to be that way.   I would like to say funny things and make everyone laugh, but it might not turn out that way. Just to ease your worries, there are no bodies or wounds or illicit substances.  In fact, it might seem a little silly to some that I would even feel the need to confess this, because in relation to one of the above activities it's kind of a wimpy confession.  But I want to start off with something that I meant to explore in January, and that I feel I really need to get out in the open so that I will deal with it.  And if I am going to make this any kind of blog where I grow and share my faith with the few other people in the world that read my ramblings, I had better be honest.  Right?  Here goes... but wait. First of all, the women's conference I attended last night and most of today was amazing.  The message God gave to our speaker...

This weekend is our church's annual women's retreat.  I look forward to the shopping, fellowship, and move of God every year!  Praying for a fresh outlook and renewed peace.

Running.  Reading the Hunger Games. Counting calories.  Reading the Hunger Games.  Sleeping and dreaming about The Hunger Games.  Can't break free.  Must. Finish. All. Three.

I am so excited for this.  Check out www.worldbooknight.org !  Deadline has been extended to February 6 to sign up as a giver.  I am swamped and will have to add more later.