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.