Random Musings

I've been excited the last few months in that I've been able to increase the intensity level in aerobics class.  This past week I've had to drop down a notch or two (when I'm really tired my body doesn't always cooperate well) and have had the old pain in my feet and knees in the morning.  Disappointing, but I felt like I needed to keep pressing with exercise and weight loss in hopes of postponing Arthir the moocher. So today, instead of using the exercise equipment upstairs (my usual Tues/Thurs routine), I went to a 20/20 class.  The description says by the time class is over you will have spent 20 minutes on each of the following: cardio, flexibility training, and weight bearing exercises. That sounds like something I need, so I head to the gym with a little fear, nervousness and excitement.  The first ten minutes in (while marching in place, the simplest of exercises) I felt a searing pain in my calf.  It's not uncommon for me to have short bouts of pain fla...

I'm not a big fruit person.  But there are days, like today, when I feel a little fruity.  You know, when it seems as if your life is divided into segments that seldom, if ever, overlap. Similar to the subdivisions in a grapefruit, you have to cut the parts to make them want to move.  Except I hate grapefruits, so then it made me think of oranges and lemons which are also like a wheel and segmented, but I'm not overly crazy about those, either.  I will drink orange juice and somewhat enjoy the taste of an orange (when I can convince myself it's worth the sticky juice), but lemons have never really been my friend.  My sisters will eat lemons in the same manner I eat chocolate, but the mere taste will conjure my mouth into the weirdest of expressions. It's strange how the fruit I enjoy (watermelon, cantaloupe, apples), is never the fruit that comes to mind when I think of my life.

When I was in middle school it was deemed improper to pad your bra.  Everyone had heard the stories of the girls who tried it and the horror of the tissue or newspaper wads falling totally or partially out and the embarrassment (or lopsidedness) that ensued.  Now they just sell padded bras so young girls don't have to worry about it.  Forget all the discussions about modesty and honesty.  Want to look like you have more than "swollen mosquito bites" (as one friend used to complain about)?  Just buy a padded bra. Imagine my shock when in college as we learned about adapting to other cultures, I found that not everyone values breast size the westerners do.  In Africa, you want to catch a man's eyes... pad your hips.  Not joking. In China, you really want a man to lust after you?  Have small feet, wear sandals without socks, and paint your toenails.  Of course, you'll also be dubbed a scarlet letter woman, but every Asian knows that beauty i...

4 MORE MONTHS 'TIL CHRISTMAS!!!

It is raining here in the Triangle area of NC, and boy do I mean RAINING! The pier is flooded. The duck house is flooded. The goose's nesting pen is flooded. Our yard has multiple "ponds" in it. And I am nice and dry at home. It sounds like a good day to finish canning some grape jelly, do some ironing, and tackle those two bedrooms a little more. And I had a little motivation in the room renovations from an unusual place: a magazine. I don't usually buy magazines, but this one caught my eye in the bookstore the other day.  It's titled cloth paper scissors studios and the entire edition highlights different studios and their artists.  Almost all of them do something with fabric, and at least four of them mainly quilt. It's taken me almost a week to look and read through it, and I have absolutely enjoyed it!  It's only put out four times a year, but there is an ad on their website where you can buy all four issues from 2 years ago on a CD (for the ...

Last Wednesday night our Bible Study was on Haggai.  Yeah, that's right.  One of those little books at the end of the Old Testament that you have to thumb through the pages several times to find.  And the passage read could easily have been an autobiographical description of my feelings. Here's the Monica paraphrase: You work hard, but it's not enough. You get new clothes, but they're either not warm enough or too hot (or don't fit right). You eat (and cook and clean up afterward) but it doesn't really satisfy (or else is unhealthy). You finally earn money, only to find it's already spent. Your big expectations?  They turned out nothing like you had hoped. Think about what you're doing.  What are you doing to build up God's kingdom? Only after you've quit worrying about yourself, your own house,  your own needs and focus on God's temple and kingdom will there be peace. Do you hear me uttering OUCH! ?  Did you hear me almost gasp S...

It is finished. The quilt for the contest that is.  It is 2:10pm on Thursday afternoon.  The post office closes at 4:30pm, so I made it with 2 hours and 20 minutes to spare.  I come to the computer to upload some pics, and find:  two swatches of fabric that were supposed to be submitted with my quilt.  Hmph.  They will just have to go into an envelope and be mailed by their own selves.  Who knows?  They might even get there by Monday so my whole quilt package can be reunited. It's not perfect, but it's the first sewing contest I've ever entered and I'm excited.  I know I won't win.  There's too many imperfections, but I'm proud of what I've accomplished.  So here it is: The finished project This little chicken needs some help. For such a tiny object, it's an okay job of applique. The Chicken Pen...does it look like they've scratched up sand? Where the wall, the house, and the chimney do NOT properly align.   ...

9/11 You recognize it; you know what it means; the very numbers leave you with sundry thoughts and emotions. Should a mosque be built there? I wrestle with this question on so many levels.  As an American, "Ground Zero" as we call it, is hallowed ground. It's one of my two lifetime historical events that I can tell you exactly where I was when it happened. So my gut instinct to even think of the religion behind the catastrophic attack on my country building one of its "holy sites" there seems to be a condescending bowing before the very ones who abhor the very freedoms our country hold dear. Freedom of religion - government can't prohibit it.  Neither can they censor free speech. But Christian churches and colleges are routinely denied building permits due to zoning, fire codes, traffic issues, and other practical matters. Bars are not allowed to build or operate within so many feet of churches or schools. Hospitals are required to get government a...

It's official. I'm old. Saturday I weeded two small sections of the yard and did a small amount of housework. The next morning my joints ached so bad I actually took some pain medicine. Things weren't much better yesterday.Yesterday I spent several hours trying to finish up this quilt for the contest (it needs to go in the mail tomorrow), and woke up about 3am with every joint throughout my upper limbs throbbing. I pulled out Mom's blue emu cream, took a tylenol, and climbed back in the bed. Things are a little better now, but it is a little scary when our body starts to rebel against us just for doing routine activities. On a different note, I made an interesting discovery yesterday. (Or should I say re-discovery?) You get what you pay for. Old info, yeah, I know. But lately I've had a major problem with this: So yesterday after my SECOND quilting needle bent to the point it was next to impossible to use (I've actually had a few break this year.) I did...

This morning as I read the pain a friend is facing from the death of a friend, and think of my cousin's wife Charlotte and Lydia's Dad who are in various stages of crossing over the Jordan River, I'm reminded of the words to one of my many favorite heaven songs: There Will Be A Day Songwriters: Camp, Jeremy Thomas; I try to hold on to this world with everything I have But I feel the weight of what it brings, and the hurt that tries to grab The many trials that seem to never end, His word declares this truth That we will enter in this rest with wonders anew But I hold on to this hope and the promise that He brings That there will be a place with no more suffering There will be a day with no more tears No more pain, and no more fears There will be a day when the burdens of this place Will be no more, we'll see Jesus face to face But until that day, we'll hold on to you always I know the journey seems so long You feel you're walking on your own But there has never...

As always, I'm a little behind in my "required reading" (no, I'm not in school, that's just how I tend to view anything I'm not reading for strict pleasure). This week I finished reading chapter two of How People Change by Tripp and Lane, and was struck by a sentence in the last paragraph. This is modified, but it basically says our identity is bound up by who we are in Christ. That strikes me on so many levels. I was eight when my father became a pastor. One of the few negatives of being a PK was always hearing the phrase "Her Dad's a preacher." with all its connotations and implications. (And just for the record, those subtle nuances ran the gamut "Don't ask her out" to "she's going to be a trouble maker" to "she has no mind of her own".) It seemed people always tried to wrap my identity around my father's job. She makes straight A's? Well, you know, her Dad's a preacher. She has to do...

In the midst of changing out rooms and realizing just how many projects I have lined up to work on "one day", I told Bobby that I seriously needed to keep slaving away until I finished some things so I could start something else. And then the package arrived. There's this company called Keepsake Quilting that sends out a quarterly catalog. I call it my drool book. I love it when the small booklet arrives in the mailbox, and am thrilled even more if I have 30 minutes to drop everything (or ignore everything) and browse through it. Twice a year, they have a "challenge" where you can order a small package of material, make a small quilt from it, and mail it back to enter a contest. You know the theme of the material and the contest, but not what the material is. This quarter's theme was landscaping. I've ordered some landscaping material in the past, and figured that even if I didn't enter the contest, I would have some material that I liked. I placed t...

Step One: Take the 30"square quilting project and needle it until it resembles a somewhat flat piece of material. Call the company to answer your questions about the dimensions, then layer it until it's ready for quilting. Step Two: Crunch all the numbers in hopes of making them balance in the appropriate checkbook columns. Step Three: Combine straw bristles to the floor, then add the dust pan. Using cloth strings, lightly sprinkle with lysol water until all the tire tracks are gone. Step Four: Add the dogs to the pen, separate the birds from their pen, and move the biddies from one "bowl" to the next. Step Five: Combine a hundred other minute but important things, and hope the heat of the day cooks it adequately into a good mess.

Thanks to the am service yesterday morning, Bobby and I briefly rehashed a conversation we've had on multiple occasions. We've had it so many times, it's now condensed to bullet points and new thoughts/situations. Here's a condensed version: At what point does a person stop being a child? According to our parents, never. So do we ever get to stop obeying/honoring them? Is there a difference between obeying and honoring? Can we lovingly disagree with them, follow our own path, and still honor them? According to Pastor Mike, parents will and should always guide or offer advice to their children, especially when they become parents. How does this fit with the "leaving and cleaving" philosophy of marriage we're taught? What do you do when a godly Christian couple with two sets of godly Christian parents give conflicting advice? (For example, a couple is financially strapped to the point of needing food stamps. One set of in-laws say the mother needs t...

In honor of school starting next week (in Walker County Alabama, at least), here's your vocabulary list: Yard Saling - a verb, meaning to go shopping at yard sales Deflated - when all your energy is gone and you feel overwhelmed by too many projects staring you in the face Over-inflated - that can do attitude adopted by people who think "little by little" I can conquer this mountain. This emotion is usually followed by deflation in a day or two. Biddie - a baby chicken, NOT an old woman who talks too much Boggled - the feeling when half the thoughts in your brain start rotating at the same time Unbiased - when you cut your material the wrong way and it's too stretchy and the seams aren't lining up correctly Loopy - the way the thread looks on your material if you don't have the sewing machine tension aligned correctly Delusional - a matter of opinion on a person's expectations, thoughts, and goals Boxed In - when your calendar is so full you can...

You have a theme, whether it be a piece of furniture, artwork, or accessory, and you want to show it off. So you look around the room, decide where the main focal point is, place the item there, and work outward. (Or if it's an item in your home you measure to see where it would fit!). I've been thinking about exhibits quite a bit since last week. For our anniversary, one of the things we did was visit a furniture exhibit at the History Museum I've been wanting to see. Called Behind the Veneer, it is samples of work from Master Cabinetmaker Thomas Day, a freed slave in the early 1800's. The first half of the exhibit was a little disappointing/bit of a surprise. I guess I expected the entire exhibit to be his furniture. Instead, the first half was items related to the time period he lived (but not his stuff), as well as tools and displays of the woodworking trade itself. All of that in and of itself was interesting, and certainly set the stage. After all, when y...

There's some things in life I'm a little strange about. Books is one of them. If I find an author I like, I tend to read everything that person writes. There's nothing I hate more than to start a book, get a few chapters in, and be exceptionally bored with it. I have this weird thing that I'm supposed to finish every book I start. I don't know why. There's certainly no law about it, but I feel guilty if I don't finish. I think there's only been two books that I started and never finished. One was a John Steinbeck novel. I was in high school, and after page two and I had already hit the 20 th curse word I put it down. I don't remember what the other novel was, except that it was more modern fiction. I did read to the second chapter of that one, though. There's nothing more interesting to me than seeing a movie that is based off a book, and wonderfully done at that. Sometimes, like Harry Potter movie 3, my imagination of the book is muc...

A little over a week ago I began a massive overhaul of the last three rooms in the house. Below is the Before pic: This room was originally going to be our nursery, then I "claimed" it for my work room, but with the hospital bed there wasn't a whole lot of room to maneuver. NOW: Evidently the Belarussian visitors we had for several summers confiscated the bolts from the screws holding up the mirror. When I went to move the dresser it was propped against the wall. I was shocked to find mere screws in the slots. So until I make it to Lowes or the hardware store, this is the scene. And I bought a bedspread for my old bed (after 11 years, I guess it's time!), but didn't have extra pillows for the shams. That's a non-essential that'll come later. I did go ahead and get curtains, though as you can see the white polka dot sheer on the bed it's not totally up yet. (I've got to get a rod for it!) I was worried the furniture would overwhelm the room, bu...

One of the things I hated the most when I worked in food-related jobs was that the health department inspector always showed up to inspect during the busiest time of the day. Anyone who has ever worked in the food industry knows that anything between the hours of 11am and 1pm is NOT the time for an inspection. The inspector and his stupid little clipboard does not care that you have an irate customer who is mad because they stopped at Target on their lunchbreak and had to wait in line to check out and is now in danger of being late for work and is starting to yell at you because they've had to wait for their food for more than three minutes. (Like they could make a fresh burrito and taco or cook biscuits or eggs at home that fast, but that's another story.) Instead the inspector seems to think that you should be ever grateful that he's walking around the small aisle while you're trying to carry a hot pan quickly to its place without getting burned or spilling anything...