The current struggle in my life.

I want to let you all know first that this is a very honest confession, one that is hard to put out there but by doing so I think it will help me thing through everything. I like "seeing things in print" and I value your opinions.

Image: Simon Howden / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Church....I love my Church I love what it represents that it is reaching out to others and inviting them in. I love the people in it, they are my local family. But because of the outreach mission of my Church 70% of the time the sermons are very well... basic. Again there is nothing wrong with this but I'm finally in a place where I want to learn, I want to know the history and the background not just the stories. I've got the basics down. Don't get me wrong I have no plans to leave my Church that would honestly hurt to much. These people were with me during the hardest parts of my life and are now celebrating the good times with me. I have no desire to leave I just have a desire to learn. We do have small groups and the point of those are to feed the 'non-beginners' so to speak. However the series we are doing isn't what I thought it would be. It is more a discussion about common "rules" of Christianity and challenging their merit. There isn't a lot of study to it like I thought there would be. I've been doing some studying on my own and Ry and I are going to start soon (he has a much more in depth background than I do.) so that is exciting to me.

I wish there could be a happy medium. but those Churches just don't make it in this world. You have to the either or.

So here is the contemplative part. The question I guess. My Church does a good job of clearly stating that Church is for the seekers and Bible study is where we get the meat. Why don't other seeker Churches do this??? Have we become so complacent that these basic sermons are enough? Do we just go to Church because we are supposed to and really aren't paying attention? I'm glad that there are Churches out there for the new Christians but if we the 'long time' Christians are going to them without any other supplement (devotions, Bible study, etc.) how are we learning anything?

Thoughts on Thursdays

"Recognize each others priorities"

Pictures are of great importance to me, the hubby recognizes that and even encourages it! Not only my shutterbug habits but also my scrapbooking. He likes paintball and hockey and since he has a desk job if the opportunity comes up for him to play either (and we have the time) I encourage him to go. Those two things are easy and obvious but what about the less obvious things?

Hubby hates dirty dishes in the sink, I don't like them either but after cooking I'm not really in the mood to do them right away. This drives him crazy. Really what would it hurt for me to spend an extra 5-20 min doing them no instead of later? Then when he gets home he wouldn't have to see that mess first thing as he walks into the house. This would make his nights so much more relaxing.

Hubby knows I cherish time with him especially when I'm sick, yesterday I was SICK. He was so good about sticking with me, checking in on me when I was sleeping. I don't think he has any idea how much that meant to me he just knew it was the right thing to do.

Just making sure that we are aware of each others priorities and then making them a priority ourselves I think we could eliminate a lot of the 'everyday' frustration in marriage.

New Main Room!

So Out living room was WHITE I mean ALL WHITE with old brown carpet. A month or so ago we painted the 3 living room walls red, 4.5 coats of paint later I was sick of painting and decided to put off the other walls for a while.

After 5 hours of taping Friday night Ryan and I had the main room ready for my friend Sarah and I to paint the next day. The room looked crazy with its white walls and blue tape. One of our friends even commented saying " I think I liked it better the old way" then his wife informed him that it was tape, lol.

*Hint for a crisp line wile painting use a putty knife to push down the tape.*

Then Saturday my friend Sarah came over and we painted for 3 1/2 hours and pretty much got the main room done. Then we had fun at a friends house making some meals for our freezer, and finally we went to a bar and played bingo (Don't knock it till you try it it was great!)

Sunday I spend from 12-6 taping and painting the hallway and entry as well as touching up the rest of the living/dinning room !

We almost have all the tape down and by this weekend the room should be back together with all of our pictures hung!

Going off grid for the weekends.

So I just realized that it might seem a little weird that I post for 2 or 3 days in a row and then disappear for a while....well that is exactly what I do.

During the weekends I try very hard not to become addicted to my computer or I would get nothing done. I barley even check my e-mail. It gets delivered to my phone but if its not an emergency I wait and deal with it during the work week. I'm one of those people that once I connect to the Internet I find every reason to stay connected.

Recently I've learned that I can post date my blog entries to be published on later days as well as just trying to spread out the ideas I have. I hope to have more consistent postings in the future.

Meanwhile I will continue to go 'off grid' for the weekends for my and my houses sanity.

The risk of self-worth.

I've finished the book, The Search for Significance, and now I'm going through the workbook section. Its been an interesting ride, I've learned a lot I just wish I could implement some of the strategies faster. Of course it takes a long time to overide 26 years of doing the opposite.

Anyway that is not my point, through this journey I've been doing a lot of observing of other people trying to figure out how they tick, and this morning as I was driving to work I had an interesting thought.

"If we focus to much on what we think of ourselves and not what others think, that we get stuck. We don't realize the parts of us that still need improvement or the parts of us that are still hurting." (I hope that makes sense this is hard to explain)

This is why its so vital to keep God in the mix as well as solid Christian friends. We need people around us to encourage us and point out things that we are doing wrong. I know the word conviction isn't a popular one but just think of where the world would be without Godly conviction let alone legal conviction....yikes.

I guess I was under the impression that if I could just stop living life for other peoples opinions I would be good. I never thought about that fact that since I'm an all or nothing type of girl this could fall drastically the other way. Instead of worrying about what others think there are some that don't care at all what others think, they are always right and are living for themselves. There needs to be a balance between depending on others opinions to make you happy and not caring at all.

Thoughts on Thursday

"Don't get stuck in a rut"

Its so easy to do, you come home clean the pick up the house cook dinner clean the kitchen and then sit down and watch TV with your honey. Then then next night you do the same thing, Its so easy to get stuck in the same ol' same ol' every night. In my experience this leads to complacency. Complacency is a marriage killer. We need to always be striving to improve our marriage even if we think its perfect.

Recycling Rules

I just got our city magazine and saw a great list of things we can recycle in our curbside pick up. These are pretty standard items but check with your town to make sure what they accept and what they do not.

Accepted

PAPER- Magazines, Mail, Newspaper, Newspaper inserts, Office papers, Phone Books, School papers, Shredded paper In a closed paper bag.

PAPER BOXES- Cake Mix Boxes, Cardboard boxes, Cereal Boxes, Electronics boxes, Gift Boxes, Medication boxes, Toiletry Boxes, Shoe boxes, Toothpaste boxes. (General rule if the product is in the cupboard then its recyclable if its in the fridge, freezer or microwave you can not.)

GLASS- good and beverage bottles and jars

METAL- Aluminum food and beverage cans, Steel food and beverage cans

PLASTIC- Dish washing bottles and detergent jugs, Ketchup and salad dressing bottles, Milk and juice jugs, Shampoo, soap and lotion bottles, water, soda and juice bottles.

*Hints* Remove all caps lids and pumps, give it a quick rinse, leave the labels on, do not place in plastic bags.

Don't Recycle

PAPER- Boxes soiled with food, Boxes from the refrigerated or frozen foods, Cups, Egg cartons, Gift wrap, Juice boxes, Milk cartons, Napkins, Paper towels, Pizza boxes, Plates

GLASS- Containers that held hazardous products, Drinking glasses, Window and mirror glass.

METAL- Aerosol cans, Containers that held hazardous products such as paint thinner, Paint cans.

PLASTIC- Lawn edging and hoses, Tubs and cups (ie cottage cheese and yogurt) produce containers, plastic wrap.

Fun photography blogs and such

These are all recent disoveries that I thought I would share with you.

Photo Challanges, Tutorials and Tips

Open Scrapbook

More Tutorials Tips/Tricks a blog and a forum

Thoughts on Thursday

"Speak Clearly"

No one would every call me a quite person I'm a talker there is no doubt about it but do people understand what I'm saying. There seems to be some un-written rule between the hubby and I that we can read each others minds...ummm no. Why is it that we assume that our spouse will automatically understand what we are saying and then get mad/frustrated when they don't.

I don't know when you need me to move left unless you tell me to and you don't know that I'm talking about Iowa not MN unless I clarify that. It seems simple enough, why don't we just communicate more clearly?? Humm that is something I need to work on.

10 ways to be a little more green.

1. When taking a drive together try to take the car that gets better mileage (unless you really need the truck)

2. Make a plan and try to do all of your errands on one day in one trip.

3. Cook at home and from scratch as much as possible.

4. Go paperless, bills, IRA statements, coupons even (only print the ones you will use)

5. Use cloth napkins even at work.

6. Drink loose tea and use a mug to make it not a paper bag.

7. Don't blow dry your hair wash it the night before towel dry and then sleep on it.

8. Turn off the lights when you leave a room and use the new light bulbs.

9. Use your digital camera (rechargeable batteries,) review your pictures edit and only print the pics you need.

10. If you don't need it don't print it if you may need it someday back it up on an external hard drive.

Plans for the house (and the green things I hope to do)

So here are some of the upcoming plans for the house:



We want a rug for the TV room so the couch doesn't slide around anymore. I'm hoping to craigslist it and would love to find a sports themed one (without being too corny) since that is the theme we are going for (Wild, Twins, Vikes and Gophers.)





I'm going to redo the bar, instead of starting from scratch we are going to rip off the carpet and recover it and then we are going to cover the top of the bar with sports memorabilia. Speaking of which if you have any you would like to give me let me know!




The pink bathroom is going away!!! We are hoping to redo the cabinets instead of replace but all the tile will have to go. We are hoping to get the 'new' tile from the Re Store. Those are the immediate plans more to come.

Thoughts on Thursday

"Say Thank You"

Its so easy to take for granted the things your spouse does for you, they are supposed to, right? Ok in theory yes we are supposed to serve each other but that doesn't mean its easy, or that we don't want to be appreciated. Almost every night my husband makes sure I have a lunch ready to go for work the next day (if I forgot) gets the dog food ready for Cooper and makes a smoothie for both of us and puts it in the fridge. These things together easily save me 20-30 min each and every morning. But I can't remember the last time I said thank you. So don't forget to say thank you once in a while.

Happy Things

So apparently both Ryan and I believe in keeping the boxes that things come in "just inc case" this leads to a lot of empty boxes. Infact we moved an empty Kitchen Aid mixer box from the hubby's house to here...lol. So I forgot to get the true before pics but this will give you an idea.That is after I crushed about half of them
This is where the boxes were, look at all that new storage!

Here is something else that makes me happy, a groceries run where the only thing that I get from the evil "middle asile" are unbleached flour and sugar. I will point out that the 4 "pops" you see are sugar free and organic basically they are carbonated juice and they will last 2 weeks. Also I keep one pre-packaged salad in the fridge for a quick dinner so that going to McDonalds isn't an option.


Fun with Family: