Uncategorized

  • Two quilts by yours truly!

    Some of you might know that I’m occasionally crafty ;)  
    If you are looking for something like this for Christmas, this is your lucky day!  Let me know if you have any questions.  Buy local! {Xanga}.  Help a girl out!

    Baby Boy Squares Quilt!

    See it here on Etsy!

    Sweet Sugar Quilt!

    See it here on Etsy!

    Thanks guys :)

  • Pimpin’ ain’t easy – daddy edition

    I watched this guy walk through the mall trying to keep his pants up with one hand and carry a 3 year old with the other.  Ah, priorities. 

    The three year old seemed to be wearing the correct size.

  • I am now going into hunker down mode. I am contenting myself with online games, Paul Washer sermons, Scottish Highland Dancing, podcasts, and virtual interactions for a while. So, pretty much like normal. But don’t be upset please if I don’t respond like normal if you message me.  I am severely in shock. 

    My life goals have pretty much been: 1.) Be smart, read good books, have intelligent conversations with like-minded people.  2.) Make pretty music, act in shows, dance, be creative  3.)  Serve and honor the God who made me.  4.) Be married to a wonderful man who loves this stuff too, and me.  Have kids with said man and educate them in said things.

    Things aren’t lookin’ so hot for me right now.  Everything is up in the air.  Obama winning another term jeopardizes this more than I can say.  Our economy is in severe trouble, and people just simply don’t care.  This is a cultural problem.   It’s serious.

    This is a real test of faith (as if nothing else were).  But it feels so much more dramatic right now.  I love Jesus.  I trust Him. 
    If you need to get in touch with me, I’ll be right behind Him.

  • They cannot conquer forever

    “Suddenly, caught by the level beams, Frodo saw the old king’s (stone) head: it was lying rolled away by the roadside. ‘Look, Sam!’ he cried, startled into speech. ‘Look! The king has got a crown again.’

    The eyes were hollow and the carven beard was broken, but about the high stern forehead there was a coronal of silver and gold. A trailing plant with flowers like small white stars had bound itself across the brows as if in reverence for the fallen king, and in the crevices of his stony hair yellow stonecrop gleamed.

    ‘They cannot conquer forever!’ said Frodo.

  • I dance on swords!

    This is my first sword dance performance!  I was so nervous today…this was at a church gathering (Presbyterian, of course) at a Scottish society meeting.  So I did Fling and Swords.  This is swords (the video cut off on Fling).   About halfway through I got really tired and felt like I was gonna throw up but I kept going!  I love how my foot slips a bit toward the end.  Dancing on tile floor is not ideal.  But I was so happy that I got to dance today, as my first competition is one week from today!  Yay!

    Woot for not falling down or messing up (much)

  • Red tape rant **update**

    If you didn’t know, I was “let go” from my job of 6 years because my boss thought I might get married and not come back.  So, instead of waiting for me to tell her if I was coming back or not (she said I had till the end of school)…at 3 weeks before the end of school she informed me she’d hired someone else to replace me.  “But maybe we’ll have overflow kids and you can teach them”.  Ahem…yeah.

    So…since then I’ve been poor.  I still have my wonderful private school job and my church job, but it’s not enough.  Not being able to afford groceries or to get my oil changed is no fun.  So, I started looking for another teaching job.  I found two…one at another school in the same district and one in a new district.  The one in the same district is a job I had a few years ago…teaching in a small, dark, closet-like room off the stage with the band practicing onstage constantly.  Not ideal, but it’s money.

    The new district has been like trying to join the FBI.  First I had to submit a bunch of paperwork, which is fine.  I had to go to a training meeting that they said wouldn’t happen again till November (this was back in Sept!).  And I had to get fingerprinted, even though they did a background check on me.  I guess I could be a rapist or something, but it seems a bit excessive.  But apparently all school districts make you get fingerprinted now.  Okay, whatever.  So I don’t schedule my appointment because I don’t feel like paying 42 dollars to give the government my fingerprints, which they probably already have anyway.  I’m not a huge fan of my private info going to the government (you know how I feel about the TSA).  So I didn’t schedule my appointment until the meeting happened, so I’d be sure I was actually going to have a job teaching there before I did it.  So…the meeting happened.  It was on the only day I teach, during my lessons, so I had to cancel and reschedule my lessons to drive out there for a meeting which lasted 15 minutes.  That was fine.  We were told we had to get our picture taken, but the person who takes them had already gone home so we had to come back another day.  OK. 

    So I schedule my fingerprint appointment.  The first available time is a week and a half out.  Whatever…I schedule it.  *Sit on butt and not work for a week and a half more*.  Okay…then the night before my appointment they call and leave a message that they have a “family emergency” and I need to call and reschedule because they’ll be closed.  Brilliant.  So I don’t call the next day because they are closed.  I call today and am on hold for 10 minutes then get another call, so have to hang up.  Call again…same thing.  Hang up and call the number the lady actually called from instead of public number… same thing.  On hold. I go to the website and try to schedule another appt. on there.  But since I had an appointment already they won’t let me…and say they sent an email to me to change it.  No such email in my inbox. 

    Pull.
    My.
    Hair.
    Out.

    I’ve already cried over this because I’m so frustrated.  Why such bureaucracy?  This as ceased to be about me teaching kids how to sing.  This is about paperwork, red tape, who has what badge and name tag and how much money the fingerprinting people can make.  And ultimately about how much power the government can wield.  I love kids, and I love singing.  I will teach them.  But I remember even more so how I detest public school when things like this happen. 

    I lost my job to bureaucracy, and now I’m having a heck of a time getting  new one for the same reason.  I fear the entire semester might be over by the time I’m done with all this . 

    ***UPDATE***

    Just sat on hold for 15 minutes.  At exactly 15 minutes the lady came on and gave me a “first available appointment” …on Thursday of NEXT week.  Soooooo another week not working!  I would hope they’d have some time/space for people whose appointments they canceled, but alas, no.

  • Your First Time

    You might have seen Lena Dunham’s Obama campaign video called “Your First Time”, in which talks about voting as if it were having sex with Obama.  Um…that’s pretty gross and creepy.  

    This parody is great, though.

  • I hate the meme world

    I admit it:  I hate memes. 

    Now, some of them are funny.  I’ll grant them that.  A few…a very select few are funny.  But most of them nowadays pollute the internet for me.  Nothing against you if you love them.  I’m probably making myself look old by saying this.  But just a very few years ago, if something newsworthy happened, I’d hear about it.  If I was interested in learning more, I’d do an internet search and read about it.  Then maybe I’d jump into some Facebook discussions, or Xanga, or internet forums. 

    Now if something interesting happens, I don’t have time to look it up.  Heck, no…I am run over by a steamroller of memes.  Facebook, Xanga, Twitter…everywhere you turn.  Memes.  Memes about life.  Memes about people.  Memes about memes.  Everywhere.  It’s like a joke gone too far.  You have memes coming out about events before the event even ends!

    I think it’s too easy for people.  Instead of having to have a discussion, or read an article, they just read a meme and then argue about it.  (I’m guilty of this, as well, by the way.)  It’s a truncation of information that cuts off thinking/feeling and reduces it to the lowest common denominator and presents it in a sarcastic or kitschy way.  I get a generally achy feeling from seeing them so much.

    They are extremely sarcastic and negative.  I know both these things describe me.  But I also get sick of it sometimes. 

    It’s like the constant stream of passive-aggressive sarcasm that plagues my generation.  “Dear person in front of me in line:  I hear you talking about religion and you just make yourself look stupid with your ignorance.  Love, me.”       <<<<<  Seriously?  Posting all this passive-aggressive stuff just makes your brain more stunted, is NOT a good way to get out aggression, and doesn’t help ANYONE.  Put down your phone and have a conversation if you really care about something. 

    Yes, I’m crabby.  But the constant barrage of sarcastic negativity and saying things we don’t mean gets to me sometimes. 

    Here’s what I’m challenging myself to do this week:

    - Instead of reposting a meme, write out what I care to say and post a blog about it. 
    - Instead of posting a passive-aggressive “dear _____” post, write what I care to say on social media.  Or better yet, have a conversation with a real person about how things affect me and how we both see the world.  Find some commonality. 
    -Say what I MEAN.  Not the opposite. 
    -Do the hard work of writing something well thought out. 
    -Say something nice.
    -If I can’t say something nice, write something mean in my personal physical diary.  No one gets hurt.

    That’s all I have for now.  Thanks for reading. 

  • It’s too early for Christmas music!

    …but I don’t care!  It’s finally cold outside and I’m rockin’ out to this while cleaning!!

    This guy (Jim Reeves) is my great uncle.  Err…was.  He died in 1963.  I grew up on this Christmas album!

    Bing Crosby!  Irish music!  What could be grander?  I do a jig when I hear this!!

    There goes Mr. Humbug!  There goes Mr. Grim!!!
    <3 Muppets Christmas Carol!!

    Carry on, serfs :)

    (I will NOT be decorating early, however.  Just music!  Church musicians have to endure Christmas music starting in Sept/Oct. for rehearsals). 

  • Happy Birthday to me! (Lost keys avoids shooting)

    It’s my birthday today.

    It’s been pretty good so far.  I had planned on going to Kohl’s this afternoon for some birthday shopping.  I had my bag in my hands and headed to my car, only to not be able to find my keys.  I called my mom and she said I’d left them in her car, and that to wait till she got home and we could go together.  Traffic was particularly bad, so it took a bit longer for her to get home, but we still had time.
    We headed to Kohl’s.  I heard a weird noise and posed the question “Does it sound like there’s a helicopter directly above our car?”  We saw there was indeed.  As we neared Kohl’s it became apparent that something was wrong.  The helicopter landed in the parking lot.  There were cops everywhere, fire trucks, ambulances, and yellow police line tape.  
    We asked a few people in the parking lot, and learned there had been a shooting in the store.  I saw on the news just now it was a struggle/face off between a shop lifting suspect and a cop.  So in other words…me being a forgetful bum with my keys made me not be present at the scene of a shooting.  
    Yeah…pretty incredible.  
    Birthday has been pretty good so far.  No one has asked me to go out or anything tonight.  My mom is always amazing to me on my birthday.  All my “real life friends” are happily married and far too busy with family life to bother with me, I guess.  Ah, well.