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  • 01.18.2010 You Know You Need More Adult Conversation When:
    One Comment

    We had a lot of fun this weekend. Jeremiah was on call (Which I’ve learned to love now that he’s a 5th year resident, because it means we have to stay close to home, but he usually doesn’t get called in too much.) and we had lots of friends and family stop in to visit, or stay the night, or eat, or play music:

    There were also some very unusual dancers spotted:

    While all the craziness was fun, my favorite part of the weekend was Friday night, after the tiny dancers were put to bed. Two of Jeremiah’s best friends (since high school kind of best friends) were in town for a big Christian conference. They had just listened to, and been enthralled by a man who went through Genesis 1 and attempted to reconcile it with science.

    There were six of us grown-ups cozy in our den, with a fire popping in the fireplace, and drinks in our hands, as we talked through the thoughts and feelings we’d held on Genesis as children and as adults. We had the minds of two medicine men and one archaeologist amongst us, who shed new light on all sorts of ideas and concepts that I had either never known or forgotten. Things like macro vs. micro evolution, mutation at the cellular level, moths in England who changed colors, The Flood and what that meant for turtles and people groups :)…But to spend a Friday night in adult, mind stimulating conversation, with people who love the Lord and wanted to spend a weekend night probing His mysteries, was just magnificent…and I told them so as we all filed off to bed.

    The next morning at breakfast, the tiny dancers were back and the adults were trying to have grown-up conversation, but it was frustrating as always. So I, in an attempt to join the two worlds, looked at Pace and Mary Aplin and said, “Show Tommy and Justin the monkey faces we’ve been working on!”

    Then, I proceeded to, very seriously, show them mine, and ask to see theirs.Tommy looked at me and said, “Just last night you were telling us how wonderful it was to have some adult conversation…and look where you’re leading our conversation now!” 🙂 I think this picture may prove that macro-evolution is, indeed, possible! (I am totally kidding, and if you don’t get that little joke, don’t worry, I’m the one who had to ask somebody to explain what the difference in those were on Friday night. Here’s what wicki has to say, if you want to know.)



  • 01.15.2010 The Good and Bad of Anonymity
    18 Comments

    First those recipes some of you asked about:Berry Fruit Salad (from Melissa): 2 bags (4c) frozen mixed berries, 1 1/2 c. vanilla Yogurt, 3 oranges peeled and thinly sliced, 1/3 cup OJ, 2 Tbsp honey, 1 c. chopped toasted walnuts (This is what the recipe calls for, but I always just eyeball it.)

    Combine fruit and nuts. Mix OJ, yogurt and honey and fold into fruit mixture.

    Chicken Salad (not a recipe, but what I do): Pull meat from a Rotisserie Chicken and chop. Cut up a few celery sticks and pulverize in the food processor. Toast some slivered almonds. Combine chicken, celery, and nuts with salt and pepper. Make a hole in middle of chicken mixture and put a dollop of mayo much smaller than you think you need. Squeeze a lemon into the mayo and stir. Finally, stir all that chicken into the mayo, and maybe add a small dollop more if it isn’t sticking together.

    Scones: I blogged the recipe here.

    Now, the blog for today 🙂 Sometime this summer, I learned one of the major negatives of anonymity (Try to say that three times in a row, fast. I can’t even say it once, now that I’ve been trying to figure out how to spell it.). I got a letter in the mail that was addressed to me and had the return address of the house I grew up in. I thought it was from one of my sisters at first and found it strange that they’d typed me a letter and cut it out all funky. It began, “Greetings from Dothan b!*%h.” I thought, “Wow, somebody’s feeling kinda spunky!” As I read on, I quickly realized that it was NOT one of my sisters, but instead some anonymous person who, apparently, hates me.

    It was, quite possibly, the most ridiculous thing I have ever read, and Jeremiah and I have both laughed until we’ve cried about the things this person thinks of me. I can, at least, take comfort in the fact that they know me not at all if they were trying to hurt my feelings by the things they said. I have plenty of insecurities, but this person did not hit on one of them. I am almost tempted to type it here so that you can all laugh with me, but somehow, I’m afraid that might give my quasi-stalker some satisfaction–and that I do not intend to do.

    This past weekend, I learned one of the beautiful sides of anonymity. I drove home for one of Caroline’s wedding showers. It was a very quick trip and as I hopped out of the car (on the way home) to get gas in Montgomery I almost threw away a blank white envelope that I had, apparently, been sitting on for the last hour and a half. I decided to just peek inside before I tossed it, and what I found was FOUR TWENTY DOLLAR BILLS!!!!!! and Jeremiah 29:11 typed on a small sheet of paper:
    “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”

    What in the world?!!! How absolutely, marvelously, sweet was that??!!! I called a bunch of people I thought might be suspects, but none of them were the doers of the good deed. It’s just wondrously anonymous…I don’t do things like that, do you? It’s sad to admit, but I like to see people’s reaction when I do something nice…which, I don’t know that I’ve ever done anything that nice. My Dad said he thought it was God sending me gas money for making the effort to come down for Caroline’s shower. I think it was God sending me the money for that tea-set 🙂 I don’t know, but I certainly am so thankful, and the bursts of happiness it has given me over the past week, have made me want to do the same thing for somebody else.

    Saying all that, I’ve decided that I want to allow people to comment anonymously on this blog again. I know there will be some bad parts to that, but I’ve seen there’s some good in it too. I really miss some of you faithful anonymous commentors from way-back-when. And, if you feel the need to tell me something mean, I’d much rather you go ahead and post it here, than send it to my real mailbox (which is kind of creepy).

    Hooray for sweet anonymous people!!!!!!!!!!



  • 01.11.2010 Oh What a Beautiful Mornin’…and Night
    16 Comments

    Saturday morning was crisp and bright, and I wasn’t sure my south Alabama body was going to be able to handle the shock of 14 degree weather. But Ashley reminded me that I wasn’t an 85-year-old woman who couldn’t leave the house because of the weather, so I bundled myself and the girls and we headed to our first estate sale.

    Ashley grabbed breakfast and coffee for our little group and we were on our way to the big event by 7:45am. Quite a feat for us on a Saturday! Have you ever been to an estate sale? I hadn’t. I thought I was going to walk up to an enormous house, with antique furniture scattered all over the yard, and hordes of people lined up since dawn–trying to be the first to plunder through the mess, looking for the diamond in the rough. What I got (at this particular sale, anyway), was a lot of people crammed in a small house, with a little old woman (who I at first thought was the unfortunate owner of the home being plundered before her eyes) collecting money on the couch. I almost turned around and walked right back out, it was so heart-breaking.

    I’d left the girls in the car eating their breakfast (don’t come arrest me), and I knew I should not stay inside longer than five minutes. I walked past the people pilfering through the poor woman’s CLOSET looking at her clothes (still hanging there like she was just on vacation), and headed straight back to the kitchen where I was met…by this:I have wanted one of my own for ever-so-long. A silver tea service. Every time I give a birthday party or host book-club, I borrow Ashley’s or Lauren’s. I’ve looked at them on-line. Tried e-bay, but they were all $500 or $600…and that was just way too much for such a little extravagance. So, I tucked the dream in the back of my mind for another day, until I was accosted by the site of this old girl.

    There wasn’t a price tag, and I was scared to even ask. I just knew once they told me, I’d walk away disappointed again. I found someone official looking and asked the price. Are you ready for this? $125!!!!!!!! Tray and all!! Still I hesitated. “We don’t have the money. I shouldn’t spend it. My heart’s beating really fast. It’s William Rogers silver. I know it’s the real deal. I know it’s a great deal. All the tea parties we could have….Aggghhh” Finally, I just did it. I stopped thinking and just purchased. I even got up enough courage (through Ashley) to be a haggler and offer $100. The little old lady nodded her agreement to my price, and I felt like I was absolutely robbing her.

    As I walked out to the car, bearing my purchase proudly in my hands, with a smile spread across my face, I heard loud squealing from inside the car. I quickened my step, worried something was wrong with my little breakfast eaters, but when I got the door open (somewhat awkwardly with such a big rattling tray) I saw it was Pace, squealing in sheer delight, “Is it ours?!” she asked. “All ours,” I grinned back. “Can we have a tea party?” “Absolutely!”

    We made Ashley our guest of honor, since she was responsible for getting us all to the estate sale in the first place. Then we spent the drive home planning exactly what we would serve at our tea party. I bore her proudly into our home and set her down on the dining room table, at eye level with two happy little girls, so that they could really inspect the shiny new wonder. “Momma,” Pace said reverently, “can we sing Happy Birthday?” I smiled at my little mini-me. I knew precisely what she meant. It was her birthday, even though she was born many years ago. It was her first birthday in our family.

    All three of us sang and laughed at the silliness of it all. Then we made our grocery list and headed out to procure the vitals. We made chicken saladAnd cut out our sandwich bread, since little ladies never eat crust 🙂We made our favorite fruit saladAnd what would a tea be, without scones?Sadly, our guest of honor was on call, and the hospital was more demanding than we were. So, when night had just dipped her mantle over our little home, we gathered at a tiny white table in a room filled with the baubles of childhood, and we had our tea by candlelight.I delighted in serving my closest friends on our very finest, and we welcomed our new tea service with a maiden voyage that was the best we could dream together.And I determined, it was worth every single one of those hundred dollars we spent.