8 down 4 to go!

Ok so are you ready for this? If you know me well at all, you might need to sit down before you continue reading this.....ok ready? I did it! I learned how to shoot a gun! Scariest thing of my life to date...I think.... and I did it! Oh yeah, and I didn't even cry :)


How did all of this come about? Well I have an unnatural fear of guns. I know guns don't kill people, people kill people blah blah blah but still. Guns are were completely terrifying to me! They were unknown, loud, and in the wrong hands...deadly. So I decided, as a new years resolution  that I would learn how to shoot a gun, in hopes to calm my fear of them. The more you know the better, right?!


So I had lots of promises from people who said they would teach  me, and cassanderson my dear, I know you would have taught me next month, so don't think I'm mad at you! :) I finally got an offer I couldn't refuse. A friend of mine...let's call him....Shooter, told me that he would take me. So off we went! We went to a place in Circle Pines called Bills Gun Shop. A lovely little place, if I do say so my self. Shooter had  6 guns for me to choose from, and I ended up shooting 5 of them. What were they? Good question! Good thing Shooter text them to me :) They were a Beretta 32 acp, Beretta 40 caliber, Taurus 357, a glock 9mm and a Ruger 22 rifle.


It took me a moment to pull the trigger the first time, and when I did...I screamed :-/ ha! Not my bravest moment!

That's me target shooting! I hit the paper...so I'm happy :) With the 22 I even hit the bulls eye! I found the 9mm easier of the hand guns (which for some reason impressed my father) and there was at least one that I only shot a few times and then gave back to Shooter because it hurt my hand. So I learned how to shoot, and how to load the gun too, all about the safety and how to properly hold it.

The photos are a little fuzzy sorry, we were using a camera phone. Once I got comfortable with it though, we decided that it was time to practice for the upcoming Zombie Apocalypse.

As you can see, they had zombie targets. :) This made me happy. So we got one and decided to practice how we would survive the upcoming epidemic (apparently triggered by bath salts.....)

The results? Not too bad...I'm 100% sure that this Zombie would be dead.

I even got the guy in the back...although Shooter took care of him for good for me :)

So on a scale of 1-10, how did I like it? I'd say it was an 8. The other guns on the range  made me jump when they were fired, although I did fine if I watched them, so I think it's more of the unpreparedness of not being able to see them but just randomly hearing a gun go off that scares me. I'm pretty good with e 22 rifle, I suck with distance shooting (25 feet) and I think it was the 40cal that scared the living daylights out of me when I shot it. BUT, I had fun, I learned something new, and I'm less scared of guns now. So overall it is was a positive experience (I was surprised), I didn't cry and I had a great teacher. Would I go again? Yes. Will I still be jumpy? Most likely. But I figure I can only get better, right?



LETS DO THIS!

6 and 7 down, 5 to go!

Hello July! Apparently summer slows nothing down. School is in full swing, Skidamirink is in ballet! I started a garden, went to New Orleans, got published in a blog at work (twice!) and had a birthday! Whew!

Launching right in, I did something this year I have been wanting to do for quite some time. I started a garden!

I'm doing box gardens, it's interesting, but the yard isn't dug up and then if we ever want to get rid of it, we can. I got the boxes from some friends. Then my lovely gardening friend went to the store with me to help get me started. I got tomato plants, strawberry plants and seed for cucumbers, zucchini, peas, and green beans. I also got some herbs but did not plant them this year (I didn't want to stress myself out with too much to do).

Strawberries! They came with some and I have not gotten any since :(

I have been having fun with it. Skidamirink loves it. She checks on it with me, helps pull the weeds and is so incredibly excited to see the tomatoes start to come in! Unfortunately during one of our hot spouts, I was gone a little often and the sun scorched my thriving peas and green beans. I think some of the green beans might still come in, but I'm fairly sure that the peas or done for. Apparently they don't like heat...I guess we have that in common. But the cucumbers and zucchini are going great and should start producing soon! Tomatoes are green and we're waiting for them to ripen. I will say that weeding the garden right now is so much easier than our old traditional gardens, considering they are in boxes. I'm a fan of that for sure. 

That being underway, I also went to New Orleans! I chaperoned the youth groups Challenge 2012  Everything Is New trip last week. It. was. amazing. Lives were changed, God was moving and I am so thankful that He called me to go. We took vans down (ugh) and while some of the driving was tortuous (24.5 hours down and 22 hours back) it was well worth it for the bonding and relationships that were bettered. The speakers were incredible. The worship, inspiring. The ministry, priceless. We were able to help schools in NOLA and make a difference in our few days down there. God is so good.

Our group- 33 kids 5 adults

I got to do a lot of first on this trip, the trip being one of them. I attended a Challenge conference as a teenager in 2002, Atlanta Ga, but I had never chaperoned a youth trip before. Or driven a 10 passenger van, or pulled an all nighter driving with one other person, or or or! So many things! The best new thing? I got to eat alligator! 

It was DELICIOUS!

Despite what people tell me, it tasted nothing like chicken...sorry folks you must have had bad alligator. This was....alligator. It was meaty and only a hint of something fishy, but it was good. If I had to compare it to something I would say it was closer to pheasant than chicken, but that's just me. I also got to enjoy a Catfish Po'Boy:

as well as the BEST bread pudding I have EVER consumed:

Yes I'll take a 5lb bucket, 2 straws and the recipe please! The trip was worth it if for no other reason than the bread pudding. :)  The hat in the above photo is also new, along with a new necklace I got, and a shirt for Skidamirink. 

All that led up to my birthday, which to be honest wasn't anything much. Work and then a hospital visit to see a friend and then off to youth group where the lovelies surprised me with singing and a cake. Skidamirink also sang to me, and I got it on tape, and she got me roses and a balloon (and a card). She is the cutest thing in the world. So now I'm 27, I got promoted at work!!! and I start that next week, and school is going great. Things are looking up. I'm learning daily to trust God more and more and I know that He has a plan, and it helps me to worry less. Yes, I still have my own dreams and desires, but I have surrendered them to Him, and I know that He will always hold me in the palm of His hand. 

So a bit of lag in posting, my apologies (not like I have a crowd to cater to!) but I got 2 more things done. I still have to learn to shoot a gun...hopefully I will find someone to teach me that before the year is up! I am excited to see what the rest of the summer brings! 

LETS DO THIS!

Opps

Oh hello! So I was going back in time and realized that I had said in my very first post, that I would blog one a week. Apparently, since that was written well past my bedtime, I forgot what I said and I resorted to once a month. Fail. I guess I'll just have to start updating more!

I actually have a lot going on right now, but of course I have no photos right now, as I am not on my own computer. God is still doing amazing things in my life. Bringing in old friends and helping me grow closer to those around me, He is too good to me. I've been on a small break from school, and it was just what was needed to ward off mental exhaustion. We are up and running again though, this time Cross-Cultural Communications and so far I like it. The book "Strange Virtues" by Bernard T Adenet is insightful and lovely. It talks about how really we need God to help us interrelate cross culturally. They truth of the writing is loud. I love it.

The youth group is one step closer to Challenge 2012! I am so excited to go with this amazing group of teens on this adventure. I am excited to see you God sets them on fire for Him and how he uses this experience in their lives. I know that He will teach me as well, and I am working on preparing and opening my heart to what He has to say to me and what He is going to teach me there. This last year with this youth group has been amazing and I am so glad that I have found a place in the church that I can pour myself into. I get the honor of learning from them, but I also get to be humbled. I get to admit my mistakes and hope that God can use me as a tool to help them avoid the mistakes that I have made. I have lots planned for the summer still. And I have lots to catch up in blogging! What's to come? Well I started a garden (I've been waiting for the plants to get a little bigger so I can have some good before and after photos). I have also successfully ran 2 fundraiser events for the youth group. I completely enjoyed every moment of it. Maybe it's something I can look into channeling my energies into. Maybe it's a career path for me. Maybe it's just a fun thing for me to do when the church can use me, who knows! I am becoming more open to His possibilities every day. I'm doing well in taking notes in church and I even found my daily Bible reading schedule! Although it was lost for so long that I am now very far behind. I will get it done though. I am determined.

Things with my heart are going better as well. I still know and believe that God has great plans for me. I appreciate my support system, and know that, as you're reading this, I am doing well. I am not masking anything; I am truly growing and learning from it. I harbor to resentment or bitterness and I am getting over the fact that I’m not going to have true closure on it. God is still God and God is still GOOD.

LETS DO THIS!

5 Down 7 To Go!

What a whirl wind month May is turning out to be! I think I say something like that every month, but it is just so true. Each month I think, well things can't get much crazier than this! and then low and behold, they do!

So my 5th new thing to do this year I sadly do not have any photos of. :( What is it? Well I joined I softball league! Our first game was a few weeks ago (I missed the 2nd) and we just played our 3rd game which led to our first win! Hooray! An old high school friend of mine asked me to join the league. They have been playing for a while, but this year they needed another girl, so after a little thinking, I agreed. I have not played softball in over 5 years (and that was once) and before that I only played in elementary school! I told them I would play, but that I'm not very good :-/  Good thing for me, they play to have fun. And fun it has been! Although it's pointing out to me just how out of shape I am, I'm having fun. I can still hit the ball, although not very far and for some reason I seem to like to hit the ball right up the first base line.....not a very good way to get on base! I also have taken on the role of playing in right field...because less balls come over that way! haha Over all I'm having fun. The league only goes through July but it's a fun break and something to do once a week. I'm finding myself looking forward to Friday night games.


So what else has been going on? Skidamirink got signed up for dance classes! I'm so excited to see her dance! Her classes do not start until next month, but she is getting excited. I have fully recovered from her haircut. It is just hair after all and as she informed me, "a princess can have short hair." She has been enjoying her time with Grammy, even more so now that Grammy has a fun new Ipad to play with. I do have to say, that watching Athia play with the Ipad is facinating. She is learning her way around the Ipad faster than my Mother! I have instituted a new rule though, she is not allowed to play on the Ipad and watch TV at the same time. I know that the younger generations are supposed to be excellent multi-taskers and I do believe that the day and age they are living in is attributing to that, however I do want skidamirink to be able to actually focus on something! If she constantly has a million things coming at her, how will she learn to do that? So...one social media tool at a time, at least for now.

I'm not sure if I have mentioned this yet, I do not think I have...BUT another new thing for my 2012 year is that I joined Toastmasters! It's pretty amazing and I am becoming more confident in my speaking already. I joined about a month and a half a go and have already given 3 speeches. I love the confidence that it is giving me. It's true as well, now that I am forced to pay close attention to peoples "ah's and um's" while they give their speeches, I can't help but notice it in every day life as well! I find myself getting frustrated with people what use them excessively. I also notice that I self monitor a lot more to try to keep myself from saying them.

12:2 youth group has ended for the "season." I am so thankful for the kids I got to work with and all that they have taught me. I love to see them love Jesus, to wrestle with the trials and big questions of God and beliefs. They are growing every day and it is amazing to be a part of that. To help them where God enables me, to learn from them in the wisdom they have already acquired. I pray that they will always remember to "not let the world look down on you because you are young." They too have a voice, and they too can help teach and draw other closer to God. Along those lines, the Bible reading every day and been....almost non-existant. Not that I'm not not reading, but I lost the paper that had my schedule on it and do you think I can replicate the google search I initially had to find that same schedule?! No. So...I'm working on it. Right now I really want to find a good devotional to get into. . . So any suggestions on that front would be most appreciated.


Last update here as I'm getting long winded and I realize that this post has no photos....

JD and I are no more. He decided that we were not meant to be and decided to end things. I'm leaning on God through it all, as I just watched what I thought was my future dissolve before my watery eyes. I know that God must have something amazing in store for me, because the future I was envisioning up until a few days a go, was pretty stellar. And I know that nothing I can come up with can even come close to what God has in store for me. The worst part about the whole thing, is the feeling....the inability to fall apart. JD was not my "world" and that's a good thing, but I love him and when I got home that night all I wanted to do was cry my eyes out. This was totally a possibility when I was 18 and in fact I did do it when I was 18. I was allowed to bawl and crawl into bed stay there for as long as I wanted and no one cared because I was hurting. This is not the case anymore. As I have learned, having a child does not allow one to simply fall apart. I can't wallow and crawl into bed and morn the loss of the previously dreamed future because life goes on. And for a three year old, life goes on right now!  She doesn't understand that Mommy's heart is broken and she wants to stay in bed. I have to get up. I have to put her to bed, read her a story, make sure her teeth are brushed; and in the morning I have to feed her and clothe her and clean the house and her and make sure she is getting everything she needs from me. That's all that matters. Maybe it's a good thing. What good is accomplished by lying in bed crying for a day or two or three? Other than an "emotional release" I don't know what else. So perhaps the fact that she gets me up early in the morning coupled with the fact that I try my hardest not to let her see me cry (good or bad, I don't know yet...) I just have to keep moving. I double over, grasp for God, find Him, steady myself, take a breath and stand up again. I don't see another option.

So what are we doing the rainy Memorial Day weekend? I am blogging (obviously) Skidamirink is playing Angry Birds and apologizing to eh birds as she launches them into the air (haha). The laundry is in the washer, and when I'm done here the house needs to be cleaned, lunch needs to be made and naps need to be taken. Would I rather sit around and wallow? Part of me says yes. I find I randomly let me guard down and my eyes fill with tears, but Skidamirink is hungry and there's no time for tears. So...I trust. I trust that God is there, I trust that He is in control and and He is handling this situation. Thanks to a good friend, the Psalms are getting me through. God is my rock and my salvation. Nothing can shake me in Him and by extension me. My God is greater...and nothing is impossible for Him.

4 down 8 to go!


Oh my oh my goodness where did April go!? To start with, I would like to wish my parents a very happy 30th wedding anniversary! They are celebrating in Aruba (without me) and I am so proud to say that they have stuck it out for 30 years. Through everything they have been through, they are in inspiration to me. They never gave up and they always fought through the ups and downs.

So April is almost over and I've done a few new things this month. I attended a marriage conference (even though I'm not married) and we learned some tips and tricks to hopefully help have a great marriage if that ever happens for me! I led the Sr. Highers on a Reverse Photo Captioned Scavenger Hunt, which was epically awesome. My favorite photo? This one:

Yep that's right. One of my kids doing a back flip off of my car, over another kid,while the girls looked on holding their breath. Fear not, he practiced before hand so we knew exactly where the kid on the ground would have to be in order to not get hurt. The Caption they had to adhere to in this one was : "All the onlookers could tell how this one was going to end"   The kids had a blast and when we were done, we went back to church for a pizza party. Great night.

JD and I also took Skidamirink hiking! She's been asking for a while now to go camping (something she has never done) but the weather has not been in our favor on that one. Although we did pick her up a PINK (gross) Princess sleeping bag this week so we are ready to go. We are hoping to go in May sometime. Instead of freezing our dupa's odd camping, we decided to take a day trip and go hiking with her. She was so excited, and we were not even 5 feet into the trail when she started saying "oh my gosh! Mom! This is so cool!" :) She did great. We stopped at Subway on the way up and had a picnic on a rock overlooking the river. Beautiful.

That's where we ate. She loved looking at the river. The whole time we were walking I kept repeating to her, "watch you feet. Always look where you are going to step" she insisted on taking the hard way on every path and up every rock. Totally Fearless and adorable. After a while as she climbed I could hear her saying "I watch my feet, always watch my feet." It was priceless. 

I watch my feet

We had a great time all day. We stayed and hiked for a couple of hours, and ended up leaving just in time as it started raining. We packed the day pack with lunch, snacks and water, a fist aid kit (just in case) and of course the camera. The first aid kit ended up being very helpful, as Athia for some odd and inexplicable reason, touched dog poop, so we were able to sanitize her hands right away (ew). After we got done, she looked and me and said "Mom! Why would I touch that poop?!" I answered "I have no idea...why did you?" Her response? "I don't know..that just gross" ahahahaha Hopefully that will be the last god poop touching incident we have to deal with.

What about anyone else? Any good hiking or camping tricks you want to share when it comes to bringing toddlers along? I'm nervous about taking her camping, mainly because I haven't been in over 10 years. So tips and tricks are welcomed!

Easter is a Lovely Time!

Greetings and salutations!

  Life has been a whirl-wind! Between work, school, skidamirink, JD, and the rest of life I hardly know what day it is at this point! This past weekend, however was Easter weekend. It was a blast. Despite the ever looming deadline of my prospectus presentation that was due yesterday (Monday) I managed to take the weekend and have some needs time with my family. We decided to have a family Easter dinner on Saturday with my family and then we went to Easter lunch at JD's grandparents (who are so adorable I can only hope to be in love like they are when I am their age!)
 
   I found myself wondering on Thursday what exactly I could do to decorate for Easter on Saturday. I had purchased an adorable EASTER wood carving thing on sale at Walgreens:

So that was cute and all, but I felt it needed something more. Being the Pinterest addict that I am I decided to do some looking and found the perfect craft! Neglecting my homework in the name of arts-and-crafts-bonding with skidamirink we went to Michaels and bought lots of colors of embroidery floss and a few packages of balloons. We made our own Easter egg decorations! How you ask? The inspiration came from Crafty Endeavor and immediately caught my eye. It was a titch more messy than I thought it would be (skidamirink actually wouldn't touch it because she didn't like the way the liquid starch felt) but it was initially easy and fun! 

So obviously balloons were the first place to start. The original blog said to use water balloons because of the smaller size and I should have listened. I used regular balloons and blew them up smaller but they were still a little big in the end to work with. I made the liquid starch with corn starch an water which proved a little more difficult to do than I thought. In fact I am still not sure that I did it quite right but it all worked out in the end. I wish I could give you the recipe for it, but I pretty much improvised so I'm not sure what I did! I let it cool and filled pie pans with the liquid starch.

I picked the pie pans because you have to wrap the floss in a circle around and I figured that the pie pan would work bestt as it is not too deep or too large. It worked great. 

From here we (JD did a whole 2 for me...thanks dear) wrapped the floss around the balloons however we wanted! The idea is that you then leave them to dry, pop the balloons and have beautiful eggs to make an Easter garland or however else you chose to display them. 

Once they were wrapped we let them dry.

Now I don't have pictures of the next part because I was alone and a little frustrated. After I popped the balloons the next night, I was surprised to find that the balloons did not deflate. The blog I was following said nothing about this, so I am wondering if this is because I may not have done the liquid starch exactly right, but I do not know. So...I popped the balloon and nothing happened. I laughed a lot while attempting to pry the balloons away from the hardened floss mainly so that I wouldn't cry do to stress and lack of sleep (it took over 1.5 hours to get all the balloons out of the hardened eggs, which as far as I can tell is not typical).  I worked and worked and finally......

Success!!! Now they were a little misshapen due to all the prying to get the balloons out, but they were incredible easy to re-shape so that was a blessing. I then took a thin metal stick we use to test if cakes and what not are done and I used that to scrape off the dried liquid starch that was left on the eggs. Then we hung them up! 

I then took the bags of starburst jelly beans I bought, and the Gerber Daisies and made a centerpiece: 

Easter dinner consisted of bacon wrapped pork loin, bacon wrapped sweet potatoes, a green bean feta salad, cheddar filled corn meal biscuits (all thanks to Kraft.com) and my sister made her cheesy hashbrown potato thingy that I don't eat. Over all it was a very successful Easter and I am so glad I got to spend it with family. 

On a side note, literally while I was typing this and skidamirink was playing with magnets in the kitchen (or so I thought) I noticed she got too quite (parents you know what I mean). So I asked her what she was doing and when her response was "I don't know" I knew I was in trouble. That being said, my beautiful girl with long (almost to her waist) curly hair....

This was Sunday

She is now my beautiful girl with incredible short hair....

I have cried for over an hour now....and I know it's just hair...but I can't help it. She keeps telling me that "it's ok mom, I'm still a princess" but it is so different! I know it'll grow back, but she looks like a new person and I can't get past it yet. I'm sure by tomorrow I'll be better but I'm pretty traumatized at this point. I was bawling in Great Clips trying to ask them to fix it,  fortunately for me I'm not the first mom to have this experience, and so when I asked "can you fi..." and started sobbing, they knew what I needed. The stylist was great and helped calm skidamirink too who kept telling me "I don't want to be a boy!" and now she keeps telling me how pretty she is. So I'm sad this is how her first true haircut had to come about, but I guess it could always be worse. 

What about you? Any awesome kid-cutting-hair stories to share? 

Lacking Motivation

Disclaimer: There will be a lack of photos in this post!

We are experiencing an early spring/summer here. The weather had been in the 80's over the weekend! 80's in March! According to the news we are shattering records! hooray! :) Not about the record...I could care less about that. But the weather! The beautiful wonderful, lets-spend-loads-of-time-outside weather! I can't get enough of it! Skid can't either! She is loving it. The park, the walks, the trampoline (until it broke on Saturday!) So what, you may ask, am I lacking motivation in? Homework....housework....yard work....and work work! (notice the trend?) All I want to do it enjoy the weather. To sit outside and soak it all up with toy cars and chalk and bubbles! Skidamirink makes me feel 5 again :)

I have a ton of homework to do. That's a main starting point. I'm staying mostly on top of house work, but I know there is some more spring cleaning that could be getting done. On the plus side, I'm only about 3 days behind on my Bible reading! Hooray progress! Of for those of you who don't know; I joined Toastmasters International. Toastmasters? What the heck is that?! Well I'll tell you. It's basically a club that helps you develop and work on your public speaking and leadership skills. I'm actually pretty excited about this. I didn't count it as a "new" thing for blogging purposes, as I can't really document it via photos, but nevertheless, I've joined the club and I'm going to be giving my first speech in a few weeks! ahh! The first one is just an ice breaker speech, basically letting the people in the club get to know you a bit. We'll see how it goes. It's only 4-6 minutes long, but we all know that can seem like an eternity when up in front of people!

This past weekend was amazing. St. Patricks Day was a success! I had a Sr. High Youth Group party complete with clothing exchange and the breaking of my trampoline. Good thing Skid is so cute, because by the next day she had already convinced Grandpa to buy her a new one! Yay Grandpa! (softy! haha) The girls had fun and so did I. It's nice to be able to get to know them outside of the church.

I made them a dessert off of Pinterest :) It was delicious. It's called Pattys Pudding and you can get the recipe by clicking on the link. It's fast and simple and very yummy. I did use the mint green Oreos instead of the regular ones though, just for fun and added taste.

Later that night JD's brother and family came over for a BBQ. We made Hawaiian Chicken sandwiches which were great. Add a spinach and strawberry salad with raisins and a Very Berry Vinaigrette, a Suddenly Salad, some chocolate mint dip-n-dots and we had a great time! We even had a bonfire  and stayed up "late" playing tag and flashlight hide-and-go-seek with the kiddos! Skid loved it! She doesn't get to play games like that a lot considering she's an only child of a single mom!  Overall the weekend was a huge success! Which brings me back to the point that I am seriously lacking motivation in getting "work" done!

That being said JD and I have signed up to do a Warrior Dash! We are headed to out of state for it, as the one here conflicted for us. We are attempting to become St. Jude Warriors too, so if you want to help by donating, follow the link! Your support is much appreciated, that children and I thank you. :) Anything you can donate will help, and it all goes to St. Jude Children Research Hospital. Basically (check out the link above) we are going to be running a 5k from hell. Running through fire, over cargo net walls, crawling through the mud under barbed wire....good stuff. BUT for a good cause. And as we've learned, I'm a sucker for a good cause ;) So we are getting ready for that. I've upped my daily walking to start, started doing yoga and plan to re-integrate pilates into my routine for strength training as well. I know that eventually I will have to start actually dying RUNNING, and any advice would be much appreciated. I HATE  (we don't say hate, Mom!) DISTAIN running! I tried the couch potato to 5k and didn't care for it, so any other suggestions would be most welcomed! How did you start running? What works, what doesn't? How do you deal with shin splints (cuz I always get them then I decide to start running, it's a major contributing factor in me stopping every time I start)? I have 4ish months to get ready for this thing. My goal, to be honest, is to finish and finish strong (and not in last place). I don't want to win I just want to rock it! So I know I need to start something. . . Thanks for your input!

LETS DO THIS!