Heck, I Already Blew It

I already blew it on my eating today, so I am not going to wallow in that. Breakfast is wicked!

Abby communicated to me her complete irritation with the grammar program that we have been using to kind of 'nail down' her senior year English education. It is from the good folks at Canon Press; don't buy it.

In an effort to find a sequential, builds on review kind of curriculum quickly, I went to the basement and dug up the old records of the Shurley Method. For some reason, I saved the Level 6 Teacher's Manual, so we will review with that for now. I grabbed Aimee's Level 6 student manual, and for your blog entertainment, I will reproduce some of her original sentences for you. You may note that they are all correct; Aimee is a very correct person. We call her the perfect child. The entertaining part is the subject matter. Horses weigh heavily in almost all of her thoughts!

I have a horse. Do you like horses? The wild horse almost ran over John! Bring that horse here. (Declarative, Interrogative, Exclamatory, and Imperative)

The angry horse reared quickly.
The beautiful horse ran quickly by the stands.
The beautiful horse was running at the jump because he loved jumping.
The gentle horse walked quietly.
We know nothing about riding.
Do not ride on the icy path in the woods.
Were the beautiful palomino horses ridden yesterday?
Today the town sheriff met the bandits.
Several angry dogs barked at the boy on the fence.
The little puppy ran around happily.
She is riding today at Bob's stable.
The horses whinnied loudly outside.
(You get the idea.)

Here is an original 3 point paragraph by Aimee.

My Favorite Breeds of Horses

I have three favorite breeds of horses. They are Arabians, Morgans and Pintos. My first favorite breed of horse is the Arabian. I like Arabians because they are very fast. My second favorite breed of horse is the Morgan. I like Morgans because they are strong. My third favorite kind of horse is the Pinto. I like Pintos because they have beautiful spots. I am fond of many kinds of horses, but I like Arabians, Morgans, and Pintos best.

Inserted, almost parenthetically, in her daily sentence log are a few fun facts about the family, like the following:

Hooray! Abby can do a front walkover.
Mom bought a new sofa.
I asked, "Who gave you that candy bar?"
"Woof," said Randy.
Abby walked Randy, and I walked Sassy. (The dog next door, now deceased.)
Abby rode Sundance, and I rode Simon. (Simon and Sundance have passed on as well.)
Abby was sick; however, she went outside. (The need to report is strong in a middle child.)

There were a few horse bloopers:

When the horse stopped, I fell off.
After the horses ran away, we rode cows.

Some complex sentences:
When the music played, the dog howled, and the cat turned green.
The next day:
When the music stopped, the dog turned green and the cat howled.

I could go on for quite a while, but I will finish with another 3 point paragraph.

My Favorite Animals
by Aimee

I have three favorite animals. They are horses, dogs and cats. My first favorite animal is a horse. I like horses because they are fun to ride. My second favorite animal is a dog. I like dogs because they are fun to play with. My third favorite animal is a cat. I like cats because they are graceful. Although I like many animals, horses, dogs and cats are my favorites.

I think she may have changed her mind about cats. This was their lone mention in the entire level 6 workbook.

Enjoy your children today. Now Aimee is old and married and writing another novel this month and presenting a paper next year at a conference in Boston. I doubt she mentions cats in either one, but I would not be surprised if she managed to squeeze in a horse or two.

Today

Well, last night I woke up at about 3 am and could not sleep. I wasted time on the computer, and fell asleep about the time that I should have been getting up. The day continued in that same vein of not doing the right thing first, so although I got things done, I probably wasted a great deal of time. Late in the afternoon, I remembered to check to see if I had a class tonight, and I did. I had just enough time to take a quick shower, and make supper before running out of the door. I came home and ate leftovers and watched a PBS show on seal rescue. Interestingly enough, it mentioned Pier 39 in San Francisco, which we visited last month.

I am certain that I could have done without the seal melodrama, as it turned out to be. Always humans are the bad guys, especially humans who excrete waste. Is there any other kind of human?

If you do not have enough bad news, my bil, Joel, relayed the thoughts of a Russian thinker who believes China and Russia will eventually run the international banking system. When Gog and Magog take over, I am hoping to be leaving shortly...

I did get some Christmas shopping done today, cleaned the first floor of the office, picked up the mail, and bought my Lies Women Believe book. Also, the Rostrons are coming for Thanksgiving. Hooray!!! Of course, the house is filled with leaves that the dog has dragged in, and if I vacuum them up, he will drag in more just before I answer the door on Thursday. I love my messy dog.

On the good side, I am not all upset about everything. I have decided just to stop being so intense about things that I cannot fix. However, I have no one to blame but myself for my weight, so I am going to work on that---Tomorrow, of course!

In between beatings...

In between times of telling myself that I am going to lose 40 pounds and do it RIGHT NOW, and other times of telling myself to get off my butt and get out there and run, and other times of telling myself to get out of bed right now because IT IT TIME TO PRAY...then I think to myself that I need to get re-motivated or start rethinking my approach to life. What I am doing is not working for me.

Today, a great thing happened. I got together with a faithful-prayer-partner-friend- mentor-person, and we are going to meet once a week for a few months to go over the Nancy De Moss book, Lies Women Believe.

There is something about accountability that really helps me to get motivated and get things off of the ground.

It is probably a great deal like telling your kids to make their beds vs. telling them that you will be in shortly to check on their made beds.


We had a great weekend in Reno watching the Broncos beat the Wolfpack. That was a stressful, exhilarating game with loads of really fun fans, even the one behind me who accidentally poured beer down my back and later bonked me on the head unintentionally. I kept telling her, "This is not a problem. We are packed in here like sardines." :)

I have to say that it was a thrill to feel the cold beer on a brisk day outdoors when we were in the nosebleed section of the stadium. All of us survived, and a long hot bath did wonders for body and soul that night.

A Rhetorical Question

Is it possible to see yourself in the process of decomposing while you are still alive?

The last couple of days have made me want to just pull my own plug, and turn in my Believer Card to my Maker.

"Here I am. I am done. I believe in You. Please take me into Heaven because a. You are merciful b. You love me more than life itself c. It looks like the country is taking a turn for the worse very shortly, and I did not vote for it, pray for this to happen, donate to the wrong people or even watch Oprah, who evidently is the new Antichrist. d. Relationships with church people are driving me to the brink of (Insert something desperate, but non-violent in here, thank you.) e. All of the above

Running away never solves anything, even running to Heaven, although I hear the shadow is a great place to be. (Psalm 91) The truth is that as we stay and face up to our own insecurities and the blatant insensitivity and ungratefulness of the body of Christ is when we are being most Christ-like, and most God-like. In the sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us that his Father is kind to the ungrateful et al.

Being like Jesus, means that I am going to die to some/all, depending on the day, of my personal goals and ambitions because how I treat people is more important than how they treat me.

When people in the body of Christ engage in activities and speech than is offensive to us, and we take the time and care to approach them to deal with the offenses because we care about maintaining relationships, a value that is high on God's list as well, (Keep your offering until you make things right with your brother.) and we are scorned, disbelieved, rejected, lectured, and dissed, there is some dying in that. We get to die to our ideas of what great fellowship looks like because sometimes there is blood on the floor, and we find out it is ours. We get to die to our illusions that our spiritual leaders are really sensitive and compassionate, because we find out that they not only have feet of clay, but that the reason they have so many problems getting along with people is that they do not have the people skills of a Kmart cashier, despite their great spiritual gifting or calling.

Oh well. I am staying on earth. And I am dying to a few things this week, and probably decomposing a little more next week. Somewhere in all of this will turn up life. It's on the back of my Believer Card. He who loses his life will find it. Doesn't say where or when, but will. Maybe in Reno...maybe in Boise...but it will happen, just like the sun coming up.

Blew It

I did something today that I have not done for a long time. I blew it. I was mad that no one did the dishes while I was gone last night, even though I made all the food and set the table for them. I was mad that they used my best cookie sheet to stick some BBQ'd chicken in the oven and have apparently ruined my cookie sheet. I have guarded my two best cookie sheets for years from pizza and assorted things that would ruin the finish, and now this. I was mad that Abby got up 2 hours later than I did and then said that she was ditzing on the computer instead of doing school because she had to wait for me. I was mad because some other people, not related to me, seem to have presumed to direct and control my plans. Those who know me, know how much I just love that. Other things, which I am not mentioning, have been pretty stressful as well. So, I blew it. I yelled. I stormed. I said I was taking today off of school. I pushed a stool with a brisk squeaky action with enough strength to make it crash a little, although it didn't do any damage. I told Abby she was doing all of her work by herself today. So there.

I went to the basement to do someone else's laundry, and talk it all out with the Lord. He is the only Person in the universe who is not threatened by angry women who have absolutely had it. The Red Cross had the misfortune to call and want my blood at that moment. The Nerve. I politely let them know that I would not be giving them any more blood. I am off the list.

When I started praying, and unloading everything with the Lord, it occurred to me that I am really weary in my soul. I thought about the marathon and how wearying that it turned out to be, how I felt completely overwhelmed when I was on the last fifth of the race. That's when my friend, Lynn B., came and parked her car and ran the last five miles with me. There was no glory in it for her at all. It wasn't even a good work out for her because I was going so darn slowly. When I thought about how weary that I was, and how much I appreciated her sacrifice for me, it made me cry. Suddenly it dawned on me that it was so touching because she was acting like God does. He does that for us. Doctrinally, I know that He is always with us, but sometimes when we are just weary in our souls and want to quit, we just need a good dose of His presence to make us good to go again. Patient endurance can come just from being encouraged at the right time by a Friend who wants to see you succeed by not quitting. A very gracious Friend.

Ryan's Tender Heart

Yesterday Ryan started telling me about a elementary aged boy in northern Idaho who was being beaten by his parents and was removed from his home and put with a foster family. Eventually, the boy went before a judge, who wanted to place him with different extended family members, his grandparents. The boy said that they would beat him as well. The judge suggested an aunt and uncle. The boy protested that they would beat him as well.

At this point I explained to Ryan that when a family is so dysfunctional as to beat a child in the way that this boy had been beaten, that often the violence is rooted in the extended family. As I waited to hear the conclusion of the story, I felt kind of a sad anticipation, and wondered if the reason Ryan was bringing this up was that one of our friends was taking in this young boy.

Ryan added that the judge asked the boy where he wanted to be placed, if he could choose any place. The boy answered, "I want to live with the Idaho Vandals, because they never beat anybody."

Well, People Are Coming

I am not sure why, but we are having a terrible time trying to make friends at church.

We usually make friends by spending time with people at church, a.k.a. Sunday school or small groups, but this church does not have those things. I tried to make friends by serving, but I only became acquainted with the secretary because the building was empty, no big surprise here, when you are cleaning it. I worked in the nursery for the Saturday night services this summer, and also came up empty. There was never more than one child at a time in there. Well, once I had two children, and talked to one of the moms who hung around a while, but they did not stay at the church. They were just visiting and trying to decide whether or not to leave their old church. Total strikeout.

Another way we have of making friends at churches is by having people over for dinner. Everyone whom we have gotten to know in this way has left the state. One left the country; she moved to Australia. She sends me fascinating emails replete with photos of all that they are doing and experiencing, and sweet personal notes and encouragements that she is praying for me. Alas, she is an email friend. We need some flesh and blood friends.

Our final way of making friends is by having parties. We are supposed to have one tonight, and I think that it may have bombed before it even started.

Hey!!! The phone rang. Aimee and Brent are coming...It may be a fun time after all.

I will let you know.