eat your pyromaniacal heart out...

christmas eve. big room full of people. kids message about joy versus happiness. and permission to light fires on stage. (ok, it was flash paper... and i didn't exactly ask permission... but still!)

as ready as i'll ever be...

*just barely putting finishing touches on christmas gifts.
*still scrambling a bit to cross off that handful of very difficult recipients.
*not altogether ready for my part of the christmas eve services at church.
*not sure when i'll find time next week to do my traditional and required baking.
*trying to stave off the holiday treats. only semi-successful. which is suppose isn't success at all.
*feeling like i need a few more stocking stuffers for matt, but have no ideas whatsoever.
*at least the house is decorated... please overlook the single strand of lights along our gutters, which is 4 feet too short, and off-center. and the fall squashes that are still on my doorstep. next year will be a hair more elaborate. promise.

november in review

• went to the zoo with allie. loved the penguins. and the flamingos.
  
• took pictures with marisa and the girls at the edmonds waterfront.
  
• trained a new volunteer in the office, which allows me to focus more on kids ministry. hooray!
  
• worked santa's little sweatshop like crazy. 1/2 of our christmas presents are finished!
  
• broke and fixed our dishwasher. nothing like a week of handwashing to make you truly thankful for that oft'-taken-for-granted appliance.
  
• made homemade yogurt for the first time.
  
• went to the edmonds treelighting.
  
• traveled to my dad's to celebrate thanksgiving.
  
• unearthed the christmas decorations - the last of our "moving boxes", and put up our christmas tree.
  

thankful for...

tonight:

• my dishwasher is broken, so matt helped me wash dishes today. bless his heart.
  
• then he took me out to dinner, so someone else could wash our dinner dishes.
  
• my washing machine works and is humming away on a load of laundry. handwashing clothes would be much more arduous than handwashing dishes.
  
• the house is quiet.
  

this week:

• i managed to stuff four days of work into two days, because wednesday is a holiday for us. so, it's basically friday. (you followed that, right?)
  
• a volunteer at the church who feels called to give a phenomenal amount of time in the office each week, freeing me up to focus on other ministry stuff.
  

overall:

• my boss is pretty awesome. good coach and mentor. wise guy. constantly challenging me. willing to invest the time in building into me much of the skill-set i missed when i skipped traditional schooling.
  
• having our own home. still getting used to the idea that we actually figured out how to buy a house.
  
• matt has steady work. not a lot, but always enough.
  
• making changes in my diet - the kinds of foods we eat. experimenting. feeling the difference little by little. looking forward to more results.
  
• ministry work is thriving, because the church is thriving. loving being a part of seeing so many lives changed.
  
• a good friend growing closer.
  
• a new friend growing closer too.
  
• my dad has chosen total dependance on Christ. this is the thing i am most thankful for this year.
  
• our needs are always covered, even when money should be tight.
  
• God is very, very good.
  

this is worth posting on the internet...

matt is the captain of a whirlyball team.

oh, you don't know what whirlyball is? well, imagine a basketball-like game using a lacrosse-like wicket and a wiffle ball. oh yeah - and you're driving in a go-cart. yeah, you heard me. like this:



the fascination started when we celebrated michael's birthday. then the guys decided they needed to start a couple of teams and join a league. yep, there are leagues.



in case you can't tell, matt's team is "cereal killers" and michael's is "bad donkeys".



i threatened to bedazzle their team shirts, but they wouldn't let me. so i made matt his very own logo. this whole fascination is kinda geeky, but very cute.

sabbath, part 2

still working, slowly and thoughtfully, through dan allender's "sabbath". today, reading about how our sabbath is a very small picture of the life to come when we enter eternity with Jesus, allender writes:

"The Sabbath gives us the opportunity to stand before the endless outpouring of superabundance and fill up our thimble of faith with a drop of the bounty ahead."

and in the same stream of thought, he writes of a friend who had recently passed:

"She is home; I am not. She is glorified; I am far, far from it. I can only cry; she is laughing, dancing, wildly free, and beaming with the roaring wet glory that has enveloped her being. I need music. She is music. She sings to Jesus, and he is dancing with her in his arms. The party has begun.

"Sabbath raises a small thimble to glory and says 'Thank you, thank you.' Grattitude is our only response to what pours out on our behalf. We have tasted his love for us amid the heartache of this world, then we can let him sing to us as we sing him as the only song that can fill us."

sabbath, part 1

a recent observation that i don't know how to "sabbath" has brought me to the book by the same name, by dan allender, president and founder of mars hill graduate school. allender's book is not so much a "how-to" but musings on the meaning and act of sabbath. he's poignant, deep and defines sabbath with beautiful words i've never considered before.

"Instead, we must ask, what beauty will you explore and get lost in during this day of celebration? What beauty will open your eyes to the questions God wants you to ponder in order to increase your awe and gratitude?

The Sabbath is the day to experiment with beauty that teases your hunger to know more glory. It is a day of study and silence on one Sabbath, a cutting out of a new kite pattern to fly on a wild breezy Sabbath another... What intrigues, amazes, tickles your fancy, delights your senses, and casts you into an entirely new and unlimited world is the raw material of Sabbath." (pg 46-47)

and then, on the role of time:

"Sabbath demands that we look at time from a different perspective than a linear, sequential, progressive process. The most commonly held view of time in the Western world was developed by Augustine. In his highly subjective view of time, the present doesn't exist - there is only the past and future. The past is entered by memory and is spent, gone and mostly regretted. The future cannot be known or remembered, therefore its uncertainty causes us worry. Time, for Augustine, is not a matter of joy; it is wearisome and hard." (pg 56-57)

awesomeness so far. i'm trying to take a little at a time so i can mull over the ideas. thanks for your insights,

mutant relationships

reflecting today on relationships and the way they change. this year has been about a dynamic-shift for matt andh i in our relationship, but that's not the only relationship changing. a friend i've known for quite a while, who seems to be growing distant. another friend who goes out of her way to show love and concern. a new friend who's growing close quickly. even my relationship with my mom is different. some changes are good. some changes don't seem good right now. and the struggle is in figuring out how to cope with the not-good, while appreciating the good.

and that's where i'm at today.

sunday

it's raining.
i'm all dressed up.
dad and deb are coming to church.
there's soon-to-be strawberry rhubarb jam at home, waiting to be canned.
and i'm preaching, on my own for the first time today.

this should prove to be a very nice day.

i have a twitch, and other tuesday happenings...

it's tuesday. and i'm feeling random.

• i have a twitch in my right eye. actually, i've add this twitch for more than a week now. i'm coming to believe it's stress-induced, given that i've already had 6 canker sores (in a 5 day period?), and a few other common stress-related symptoms we won't discuss here. so, anyway, back to the twitch. at one particularly stressful moment today, the twitch began again in my right eye, then stopped, traveled to my left, stopped and traveled back to my right eye again. cool.
  
• it's raining a bit. nothing real and fall-like, but i feel good knowing it's just around the corner.
  
• and it's september 1st. i love this time of year.
  
• matt starts his whirlyball season tomorrow. yeah, it's a sport. he's in a league and everything. i can't decide if this is "cool" or "dorky", so i'm leaning toward "cute" and just threatening to bedazzle his jersey.
  
• i'm preaching on sunday. could this be the source of my heightened stress level? perhaps a contributor, anyway. awesome. speaking on ruth. really looking forward to it. stressed. but still, really looking forward to it.
  
• i'm typing as fast as i possible can because my battery is on reserve power now and i want to finish this before it dies so i can go to bed for the night.
  
• fugue, my 8 year old, seriously-overweight, tabby ("flabby tabby") has found his inner kitten. earlier, he tried to steal my hair bands from the coffee table. when i rescued them from the floor, he moved on to the pen on the coffee table (now also on the floor). who is this guy??

see, i told you. random.

august in review

maybe one day i'll actually make this month-in-review habit happen.

august - though i feel like i've tuned much of it out:

• went to summer camp. awesomeness. 8 girls. two cabin leaders. exhausting. rewarding. so worth it.
  
• hosted an awesome kids ministry leadership meeting.
  
• celebrated our 5th anniversary.
  
• got my piano - a complete and total surprise from matt - for our 5th anniversary.
  
• matt got a part-time job at city people's.
  
• picked summer blackberries. my favorite.
  
• prepared for launching another service, and an evening program, this fall @ creekside.
  
• caught a game ball at a mariner's game.
  
• celebrated my "license to preach" with mom and bob at teatro zinzanni.
  

the one where we caught a game ball

seizing an opportunity to use mom & bob's really great mariner's tickets, i planned a surprise date for matt. he knew nothing, except that he needed to be home and dressed at a certain time. (granted, he put the details together pretty quickly as we got on the road.)

i knew we were in the 100 level, but i hadn't considered that we were in row 3. *swoon*

this is how close we were.





we reminisced about our favorite dates of the past. i decided my favorite was our third date, when we went to the compline service at St. Marks, and then laid under the stars talking until 2a.m.

and then it happened. our date became our favorite date. a line drive hit into right field, hall dove, making an outstanding catch and bringing the inning to an end, nonchalantly hopped up to run back to the dugout and tossed the ball into the stands. it bounced off the tip of someone or something, and landed squarely behind me, between my back and my chair. and all i could do was giggle.



and take pictures with every camera-like device i had on me. and then text everyone i know.

well, almost everyone. but i also updated my facebook status, so i guess that counts as everyone i know...

and we decided it was officially the best date we've ever had. even if the mariners did lose, and the umps did suck.

our "wooden" anniversary

her story:

my grandmother had been hanging onto the "family piano" for years - waiting for us to get our own house, so she could give it to me... and i had been waiting just as long to have a home in which to put that piano...

so when we bought our house, i was ready. i knew what wall it would go on. i knew how it would look. i even lobbied for red on the walls in our living room, because i knew the piano would look awesome against it.

one day, in may or june, i asked matt about the piano... his answer was "i'm just not ready yet". this made me crazy. what's to be ready for? what does "ready" look like? how can i make you ready!? the conversation escalated into a major problem. finally i had to relent - if he's not ready, he's not ready... but it hurt. i couldn't help feeling a little like "if he loved me, he wouldn't withhold something that would make me so happy".

flash forward to our anniversary. matt has been toying with the idea of going camping the friday/saturday of the weekend, and we planned to celebrate sunday. as we near the date, he's no closer to planning a camping trip, but finally decides on a long day of fishing. we've even decided that though we'll have a nice dinner sunday night, we'll exchange our gifts saturday night.

i've filled up my day with activity... yoga in the morning, breakfast and shopping with the girls, blackberry picking with lani. everything goes as planned. as lani and i head to the blackberries, we pass our street and i happen to glance down, noticing a white car - matt's? - in front of our house. lani manages to persuade me nonchalantly that it was a neighbor's car... after all, matt has just texted me and told me he "caught a big one".

lani and michael are texting back and forth alot. i don't think anything of it. finally, the boys decide they're hungry - when will we come home? we finish up picking blackberries - covered in juice, stains, brush and having been picked and torn at by thorns - and head home.

as i open, i notice right away that michael is off to the side, holding my camera, pointing it at me. i give him a funny look - is he taking pictures of all these awesome blackberries we picked!?

i walk into the house, still thinking it's very weird that he's taking pictures of us - and then i really see it. my piano. i burst into tears, absolutely stunned. i hug matt, i get details about how it all went down - but most of all, i'm struck by the fact that "i'm not ready" really meant "it's not our anniversary yet". he'd been planning this for months.





best gift ever. every time i see it, i feel loved all over again. i love that man.

the value of the blog...

today i was reminded the true value {for me} of a blog. i made a hospital visit to a little girl who is under care for heart problems. mom is using her blog as a method of updating friends and family, but i see that one day, her blog will be a powerful testimony of the journey they walked together, and how God walked them through it. this reminded me of why i began a blog in the first place - to journal.

today i was looking at a picture from my 24th birthday, just 2 1/2 years ago, and unable to remember what i felt or thought or how i celebrated becoming 24. i went to my blog to look for a post, only to realize that in the emotional high of beginning ministry in the same season, my birthday was completely overlooked on my blog. so, i can't remember what turning 24 was like. huh.

so i'm back on the blogging bandwagon. let's see how it sticks. for now, at the very least, my goal is to post month-in-review posts. maybe one day, i'll have the focus to document life more regularly.

at the lakehouse...

it's peaceful this morning, a nice way to wake up. slept in late, despite the fact that we went to bed earlier than has become usual since i began my vacation time. forgot the eggs, but was grateful that matt was willing to run to the "country store" down the road to grab some. for some reason, i can't be at the lakehouse now without making fried egg sandwiches on bagels. so good.

it's raining just a bit, off and on. the baby ducklings who were cute and fuzzy the last time we were here are now much bigger and a little less downy. there are more lily pads on the water, and a ripple on the surface that resembles a current... can't figure out where it's coming from. the lake was so placid the last time we visited. matt's devoted himself to finishing the puzzle that the family started weeks ago. i look forward to a long day of peacefulness.

so while the earlier part of my week was "do nothing" time, (or "do whatever i feel like doing, on a whim" time) now it is study & prep time. nothing too intense, but i'm speaking to the "big people" on Joshua on the 5th and need to finish my message, and i have a few of those "never going to get done unless i put in some extra time" projects i've been wanting to finish. so here's to a morning of productivity.

"vacation" - day 1

i'm out of the office this week, looking to take a little "decompression" time. don't have much of anything planned, though i have a whole stack of books i want to get through, a little to-do list of projects in the studio, and plan to take a few days to go up to the lakehouse at the end of the week.

but i'm still finding it hard to keep myself amused. and it's only day 1. bad sign, eh? suddenly i have all this free time, so i'm doing things like planning the groceries we need for the lakehouse, messing with facebook's mobile update features, and well - updating my blog...

i should probably get out of my pajamas, huh? maybe it's time for a meandering through value village.

house update...

we hosted our housewarming party today, less because our house is "done" {far from it}, and more because we felt like if we waited any longer, we'd lose our window of opportunity. {it's been four months, after all.}

i hate that blogger won't let you upload multiple photos at once. lame.

so, here are a few, and if you want to see the rest, you'll have to go friend me on facebook:

felt the need to compile a list of "everything we've done":

• scrubbed floors, walls, appliances.
  
• ripped up carpet.
  
• pulled staples from the floor. (serious fore-arm workout.)
  
• painted walls, kitchen cabinets & existing trim.
  
• replaced sub-flooring in the bedroom.
  
• tore out utility closet shelves.
  
• installed new stove, washer & dryer - including rewiring and some drywall work.
  
• installed water heater timer & insulation blanket.
  
• shelf-papered over winnie-the-pooh lining on nearly every horizontal surface within the kitchen cabinets (and the bathroom window sill).
  
• put up curtains and rods on every window.
  
• scrubbed and scraped adhesive from hardwoods.
  
• successfully covered up the most severe burn spot i've ever seen, on our living room wood floors.
  
• replaced front door and back door (to garage).
  
• laid carpet in guest room and master bedroom.
  
• tore down wire shelving in guest room.
  
• ripped out baseboards (to be replaced).
  
• dug out dirt/grass around house that was too close to the siding.
  
• ripped out half of the terrible "structure" behind the house.
  
• cut down 5 cedar trees, measuring at least 25-35 feet each, limbing and sawing it for yardwaste disposal and firewood.
  
• mowed, wheedwhacked like crazy.
  
• replaced porch & patio light fixtures.
  
• installed "drawer-pull" style knobs as towel hangers.
  
• cleaned out & replanted {mostly} front flower beds.
  
• installed soaker hoses in front beds.
  
• installed compost bin.

i hate being such an undependable blogger, but rarely do i feel like i have something worth blogging about.

today, it's 90 degrees, and i think my house is at least that. about 5 weeks ago, we cut down the 5 giant cedar trees in our front yard. they were quite the eyesore... but they were also our only source of shade. this is compounded by the fact that all of our windows are, presumably, original construction, and open push-out style. only one set of windows are "new", and despite the double-pane, they radiate heat like crazy. tomorrow, we investigate roll-up solar shades.

so, i'm miserable. matt's miserable. the cats are miserable. here's to a high of only 76 tomorrow...

and, my new favorite kittens...

our friends adopted new kittens saturday - a 10 week old, brother-sister combo - and they were easily the highlight of my weekend. i adore matching sets. no real names yet, but i think they're toying with "dandy" (her) and "lion" (him - because he's fuzzy, and big-boned-ed).

her:

him:

sooooo cute.

sewing madness...

not blogging much, but i've definitely been sewing...

{a new lunch bag for kate...}


{a set of placemats and napkins for my stepsister who will be married next saturday...}


{and some cute little kitty toys for my new favorite kittens (another post in itself)...}

a big day...

nevermind my delinquency - it's a busy, busy season. today marks the last day our church will meet at our rented building in northgate. after church, we will walk to the new campus about 7 miles north and have our first real celebration service (which is more like a practice service for our launch next Sunday). all week - last Sunday through last night, i've been thinking "this is the last time i'll do that" with each task that is specific to our old campus. locking our old kids church room door, delivering the box of sunday "stuff" to the rented campus, setting up for kids church there. in fact, last night i made matt promise he'd never ask me to help with chair crew again. and truly, that is what i'm most relieved about - matt will never have to do chair crew again.

what a day.

giving thanks in ALL things

i left my Bible at church this week, so i've been depending on an old devotional bible for my morning quiet time. this morning, as i read, i came to 1 Thessalonians 5:16, and noticed a side-bar devotion about giving thanks in all things. the author discussed the feelings of the single who desires to be married, or the jobless who desperately wants to work - how are they supposed to be thankful? she lead her reader to the understanding that truly believing scripture - which shows us that God cares deeply about our circumstances - means being able to simply trust that whatever you're going through now is worth being thankful for now.

i pondered this briefly, but went about my day. flash forward - a friend approached me after kids church and said "did you hear what happened?" ... "uh, no?" he continued to tell me that a kid - let's call him "johnny" - snuck into the upper hallway during church, grabbed a roll of toilet paper, and sent it sailing down the balcony (while holding the loose end, of course).

my immediate reaction, besides restraining myself from repeatedly slamming my head into the cinder-block wall, was "wait a minute, one of MY kids did this!?" of course, knowing this kid's background, it wasn't impossible - i just was surprised that he'd go to such lengths.

humiliated, i swiftly dealt with the problem, but as i put the pieces together - including, his very late arrival to kids church (which i'd assumed had something to do with the DST time-change last night) - i realized that he hadn't even been in our care when this happened... which means he probably got to church on time, but was fooling around for 45 minutes before coming in.

so on the way home, i was reminded: give thanks in ALL circumstances. ok, Lord - how am i supposed to give thanks in THIS circumstance? ... well, i suppose i can be thankful that i'm not the kind of pastor that would expell a kid from my program, so he will get another chance to come to kids church - because i believe that's what Jesus would do. and i can be thankful that i have a good rapport with his guardians, so i know i can talk to them about this. and i can be thankful that ultimately, i have a chance to make this seemingly unlovable kid feel loved, and maybe - just maybe - i can make an impact on his life.

even more house stuff

so much has happened in the last three weeks, and i haven't really taken time to document it. we worked hard the week between closing and move-in - cleaning, scrubbing, painting, etc - not to mention, removing the sub-floor in our bedroom, replacing it, pulling carpet and staples, scraping adhesive from the wood floors... in fact, we worked so hard we didn't have much time for packing, which left packing day especially hectic... not that we hadn't packed at all, just that we hadn't packed as much as i had wanted.

and so our move help arrived saturday morning, 10am, and i had already had two mini-breakdowns. but we got it all, and in one trip... nevermind the boxes of smorgasbord varieties of possessions.

but we made it. happy valentine's day honey.

monday after was a holiday, spent together, with my sister-in-law and mother-in-law, cleaning the old place. man, am i glad that's behind me, and that's all i have to say.

so for the last two weeks, we've been living in the "office" (read: craft room) while we waited to find the best price on carpeting for the tv/guest room and the master bedroom. finally, carpet was installed mid-last week, and though it took us a few days to get our "stuff" together, we've now moved into our rightful bedroom, and the guestroom is together as well.

but we're far from done. faaar from done. there's still trim to be painted - not to mention my red walls which did not paint as easily as all the other colors (wish the home depot guy had warned me - i would've picked a different color). the office is still in boxes, with furniture strewn haphazardly around. i've purchased most of our curtains, but need to hem them as well, so bedsheets suffice in the rooms where exhibitionism would not be tolerated among neighbors.

and of course, there are lots of little things to accomplish. sometimes it feels like we'll be living in boxes forever. who am i kidding... it always feels that way. we know we got ourselves into a "project" house, and there are plenty of things involved in making this house what we want it to be, so i really need to lower my expectations... but i sure wish we could get these boxes outta here.

christmas comes early to the kids ministry...

the next six weeks or so will bring a pretty steady delivery schedule of all the miscellaneous fun things we're buying for the kids ministry wing at the new campus. amused by the variety and randomness of it all, i think i'll keep track here.

yesterday brought the delivery of:
*one VBS "paul and the underground church" starter kit, a free gift because of our membership to a new background screening service.
*five wall-mounted hand sanitizer dispensers
*an eight-pack of refills for the above dispensers
*five first-aid kits

today, we received:
*four handheld 2-way radios, complete with charging bases, etc for our security team.

i'm just waiting for the eight ladies dancing and the partridge in the pear tree.

more house stuff

stuff is happening so often and so fast, i feel like i can't blog it fast enough to stay on top.

friday, we got our keys and began cleaning right away. matt began a few little odd jobs to get us ready for painting and some other misc tasks that needed to be done. late in the evening, we made a home depot trip to beat all home depot trips - $377 on "small stuff" (and a crapload of paint).

saturday, a ton of our very-good-sport friends and family showed to help with various painting tasks. accomplished much, but not all, as i'd expected. yeah, i was ambitious. and nobody told me you had to prime with grey or pink before painting with red. i will never paint with red again. went home feeling exhausted and overwhelmed, and quite teary.

sunday, knowing how much needed to done, michael, lani, allie and sam took our house key and left church right after service to get started. what amazing friends we have. they started with pulling carpet, having removed carpet and pad from the living room by the time we got home - and they were well on their way to removing all the staples and tack strips. we also figured out why the previous owners had laid the carpet: a big patch of water or burn damage on the living room floor that had been sloppily covered with the same paint they'd used on the walls. matt needed some stress relief, so he pulled the rest of the carpet and pad from the hall and other rooms. mike & lani ended up staying late into the evening, as did matt's mom - bless their hearts. we finished painting the kitchen, and made progress on other various tasks. part of pulling up the carpet was the revealing of the suspicious corner of our bedroom, which had a bubble under the wood flooring, and a big square patch where there was no wood flooring - just an extra layer of plywood. lameness. note to selves: bring home carpenter buddy to have a look.

monday, clarice came over and focused on painting the edges in the kitchen. so glad i didn't have to do it. added knobs and outlet covers/switchplates in the kitchen. feeling like it's looking sharp.

tuesday, today, matt brought our friend don home after church for a look at the floors. suspecting rot, they begin pulling up the floor to reveal the subfloor having rotted through. don uses the words "the worst i've ever seen". he tests the edges of the house and finds rot in the other bedrooms as well, though to a much lesser degree. we're upset, but i'm taking it surprisingly well. matt's beside himself and in serious buyer's remorse. contacted our inspector, who is coming to have a look tomorrow, and feeling terrible about the situation, because he wasn't able to navigate our crawlspace due to snow run-off that had caused standing water in the crawlspace at the time of the inspection. i keep telling myself "it is what it is", and as i pray nearly the whole way home in the car, i find myself just wanting matt's heart to be soothed, because when he is confident, i can be confident too.

the key handoff

the key hand-off was messy. a call right around 5pm on thursday told us that our file had been flagged by the county clerk, because the sale looked suspicious - like someone was trying to get out of paying excise tax. apparently, we were getting too good of a deal. the county expected that the house should sell at $76,000 higher than we paid for it... which left me asking - are they even watching the market??

so, after some tears, matt and i decided to go ahead with the dedication, which we'd planned to do right after we got our keys. i messaged everyone and told them to dress warm and bring an umbrella. as we stood in the driveway, chatting before we began the dedication, i noticed that bob disappeared... and then the garage opened. he always was a rule-breaker. he'd found entry via the door that had been kicked in the week prior.

after some back and forth, we decided that the house was as good as ours, so we walked the perimeter, then gathered undercover (a cover which i'm now blowing) in the living room to pray.

our friend mel led the prayer, and did a beautiful job. we were very thankful for his spiritual maturity and the beauty of his words. most of all, there was an air of excitement. maybe it was from (almost) getting our new house... maybe it was from the rule-breaking.

friday, after a little waiting, megan called us and told us we had the keys. we met up with her at the church, collected our key and i headed off to start cleaning... and the rest of the story comes later.

almost there...

signed papers yesterday. heard from agent today - sellers have signed too. now we wait for the lender to give it all a once-over and release funds, then the whole thing goes to the courthouse and we get our keys. tomorrow, in theory.

hooray!

cozy saturday morning

i'm curled up on the couch, enjoying my extra-strong (how'd that happen?) coffee, listening to the call of a rather persistent bird in the weeping cherry of my front yard. each call consists of five short, concise whistles, descending in pitch quickly. he knows what he wants to say, and so he speaks with confidence.

and i'm daydreaming about my garden, which i hope i will be able to plant this spring in my new ginormous backyard. i'm thinking raspberries and blueberries, plus tomatoes and zucchini for my first year. i know i could use all of them, especially in abundance. though, i'm not sure how we'll go about tilling and preparing the soil. and i'd want a little picket fence around the garden plot, with a little gate. oh well, details, details. that's why it's called "daydreaming".

on the reality side of things, i figured out yesterday that i was the bottleneck in the closing process, waiting on W-2s and the like. so we scrambled to get it all together, minus a couple of paystubs we're waiting on from matt's employer. if all the paperwork is in monday, it should be tight, but we'll stand a chance at closing on thursday. i'm just praying that we're the end of the bottleneck (and that his employer doesn't add to the trouble).

yesterday, i finished addressing our "new address" cards for friends and family. i started these the day before we made our first offer (though, i didn't print the address until just this last week). i knew that if i waited, it might never get done, what with all the boxes.

and today, i believe i will be making a big batch of thank you cards, so that as people help us clean, paint, move, etc, we can thank them in good time. later today, matt and i have to organize the music room, which has been used for storage since we were married, and i need to get our piano on craigslist, to make room for a family heirloom i'm receiving when we move in... want a piano?

january, in review

i began the month-in-review post a few years back, but fell out of the habit when blogging got put on the back burner. i'm starting again, to record bits and pieces of life that might not always become the center of a blog post in itself, or may otherwise be forgotten.

so here we go, january in review, in no particular order:

• started the month with some house shopping.
  
• found our dream home, made two offers, the second of which was accepted.
  
• discussed paint colors. rediscussed paint colors. re-rediscussed paint colors. finally decided on most of the paint colors.
  
• discovered that snowflakes sometimes actually look like the stereotypical snowflake! i'm so amazed by God's attention to detail and creativity.
  
• celebrated my 26th birthday. dinner with friends at CPK, and a belated Christmas dinner with my grandparents at mom's.
  
• taught in big church for the first time - a part of our "purpose leaders" team teaching on the vision of the church (vision day 2009).
  
• did some awesome (if i may say so) design work in preparation for vision day 2009. man, i love design.
  
• helped plan a smokin' super bowl tailgate party at church, as a part of my "outreach" role.
  
• started planning furniture for kids' wing at new campus.
  
• started and scratched at least 4 different design schemes for kids' wing paint/decor. am working on draft... 5 now?
  
• had tea in port gamble with mom, grama, allie and lani to celebrate my birthday.
  
• house inspection - went smoothly and less traumatic than expected.
  
• house appraisal - also smoothly, and less traumatic than expected.
  
• did some awesome offering/mission stuff with the kids, pooling together $100 in just 4 weeks for a water buffalo for a philipino farmer.
  

hmm, i feel like something's been forgotten, but who knows. what a busy month!! next month, even busier.

the art of self-leadership

in the past few days, i've been ruminating on the art of self-leadership. "before we lead others, we must lead ourselves." a part of self-leadership is developing the disciplines that are lacking in my life, and the first two i'm tackling together: rising early, and exercise.

i used to be great at rising early. even on weekends, i'd set an alarm, even if it was technically "sleeping in" and when my alarm went off, no matter the day, i'd get up, and do my routine: brush teeth, make coffee and breakfast, eat/drink/read my bible. lately, i've let this slip - not every day, but now i snooze more, start later, and then get less than edifying time in the Word. i want to have the self-discipline to rise early every day, to greet the day with a right heart after a relaxed routine. so, i'm beginning by rising at the same time every day, even on weekends and days off. currently this means 6:45am - but that's just to get into the habit. as i grow in this discipline, i'll be bumping the time back in 5 minute increments until i'm rising around 6am, in theory.

i wish i was ever as "great" at exercise as i was at rising early, but it's never been something i could get into consistently. this is part of why i'm tackling it with rising early. i know that if i don't exercise in the morning, it won't happen at all. so for now, i'll get up at 6:45, and add a little exercise into my routine. this will throw off my work day by a half hour for a few weeks, but once i get used to that pattern, and begin bumping my rising time backward, i should be able to stick to the pattern quite nicely.

that's what's on my mind today. that, and furniture placement in my new house. how is it that we're paring down, moving into a bigger home, and i *still* don't have enough room for my furniture??

and i almost forgot! {a house update}

our agent called this morning to tell me that the appraiser - who had received our original order for an appraisal, but couldn't find any record for it, and therefore had not done it yet - apologized deeply for the delay, put us on rush-priority, didn't find any work he'd require to be done before closing (amazing!), and appraised our house higher than what we're paying for it (don't know how high yet, but any kind of "higher" is better!)

the only bad news, when he arrived, the exterior door to the garage had been kicked in, and someone (punk teens, we think) had gained access to the house. the heat had been cranked, and the house was about 70 degrees (impressive, since the wallboard heaters are among the least efficient of heat sources...) so, our agent rushed over to make the place look lived in. apparently a new door is at the top of our list.

living colossians 3:23

for the last several weeks, our memory verse at kids church has been colossians 3:23-

"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men..."

(though translated differently for their understanding). i have relied on this verse for my own regular attitude adjustments in the past (particularly in my previous career), but only now am i beginning to wonder what might happen if i applied this verse to each detail and task in my life.

would my husband feel more loved and served, because i see Jesus in him each time he asks a favor?
would my house be neater, because i would be expecting the Lord's company, and thus unexpected visitors might feel more welcomed?
would i excel more-so in ministry, because i would be willing to do just about anything it takes? (let's be honest - i'm not quite there. there are always a few things that take some self-coercing.)
would even the most menial tasks take on new meaning, because the Lord is my (good) Overseer?

i guess you could call this my resolution this year. this is my verse for the year. i will cling to it, repeat it to myself as often as possible, and when i would rather lounge around than sweep the floor, or when i begin to grumble that no one appreciates "all the work i put into this place", i will remember that i am not working for man, but for the Lord.

non-update house update

not a lot happening in the house world right now. this terrible holding pattern while we wait for closing has me growing more impatient every day. and people keep asking if i'm excited? um, that doesn't help!

so, i'm tired of looking at stacks of cardboard boxes. and that is exactly the only thing happening over here.

purging

the initial phases of packing have a lot less packing and a lot more purging going on in the thaete household. we've made at least 2 donation trips to Value Village since the new year, and we made 2 in december, as we began feeling the urge to purge. this is, of course, the first time we've kept donation receipts for tax purposes. yay deductions.

this morning's trip included 10 grocery bags of clothes - both his and mine, but mostly mine. how good it felt to get rid of all that stuff. and now, we tackle the craft room. {we? who am i kidding. i. now i tackle the craft room.}

i should be purging/packing...

but i really just want to sit and watch HGTV and think of things to do to our new house.

(does anybody have some HGTV i can watch? we don't have cable.)

a house for my birthday,,,

today i discovered that the best version of "happy birthday" ends with the words "they accepted your offer, happy birthday to you!"

at 5pm, i had given up hope of hearing anything... but kris called at 5:03pm to sing me happy birthday - and ended with those words. i burst into tears (and may have shrieked), and then it took me quite a while to get a hold of myself.

it had been an emotional week. we discovered the house last week, on a house-hunting outing with kris and megan. it was better than the house we'd picked out previously, which we were simply waiting for to come back on the market after foreclosure. but this house... oh, this house. all of the problems the other house posed, which we decided we'd make work or fix - only 720 sq. ft., only 2 bedrooms, no garage, purple carpet, overpowering dog "scent", and purple-painted kitchen cabinets - were answered in this new house. 1025 sq. ft. 3 bedrooms. a perfectly-sized garage. and no purple. not to mention, the nicely-sized bath and ginormous back yard. we knew we were in for a ride, though - the house is bank-owned.

so, we made the offer monday - after seeing it three times, doing a preliminary (and partial) inspection with my dad, and falling deeply in love, only to hear tuesday morning that our offer had been rejected because of our FHA financing and FHA's supposedly stringent appraisal requirements (never mind that we said we'd do any required work).

we thought we'd lost out. my heart was broken, i cried a lot, and generally didn't accomplish much that day. but then our mortgage consultant posed plan B: what if we resubmitted as a conventional loan with a slightly higher interest rate. this program came with other perks as well, so we went for it. wednesday morning, the new offer was in, and we were told to expect a two day wait.

we were optimistic, of course. after all, how cool would it be to "get" a house on my birthday? but by 5pm, we'd given up hope... and now you know the rest of the story.

the best part - we see God's hand in the fact that there was a second offer on the house, comparable to ours, by a co-op of developers who buy good deals and, i assume, rent them out (or flip). and yet, the selling bank picked us.