part 2: august vaca.

. . . also known as part two of the week i realized i need to live by the water someday. huge lake, nice-sized river, or ocean . . . i need to live by the water someday.

it's not simply romanticism.
it's the flipside of the coin of beauty that He made. land: one side. ocean and waters: other side.
[humans are a whole other story; not really a coin. hahah.]
it seems to feed my soul.

saturday or sunday afternoon, we got the speedboat out on the river.

:)

and, for the first time in my life, i went tubing. i can't guarantee i'll ever do so again . . . i don't like the prospect of getting flipped. :P
and now, for charla, here are some pictures that were taken by mum when we went tubing. :)

of course, with my crazy wild imagination issues, i hate seaweed and everything that comes with the dark, unsearchable types of bodies of water . . . especially if i grew up with irrational stories told to me by my two older siblings while we sat in a paddle boat smack dab in the middle of this very river . . . uh. yeah.
as evidence by the slideshow below, this river has a lot of seaweed. :P

august 14, a sunday, we woke up . . . i slept an hour more than i normally do on a sunday [at home: 7am because i have to be there earlier; singing and everything, y'know.] . . . we went to church with gramma shirley. a lovely place where i smiled inside and outside when i saw the greeters and thought of the ones at our church; people i've known since we started going there when i was a baby. people like family.
they even had a sweet library set up outside the sanctuary; a coffee corner with an espresso machine . . . too bad it wasn't open that day. :P hah.

next: monday, the 15th, we left.
and stopped, as tradition [and my camera] calls for, at a lovely place on the rocky shore of lake michigan.

we took pictures, pictures, and more pictures.

i fell in love with the waves.

the wind.

the sunflare i captured.

the frothy edges of waves crashing on my feet.

overall, i'm sure you can see we quite enjoyed our hour or so there. :)
then, back into the van for a few more hours . . .
here are some random ones from rachel's ipod, and nikon camera.

 

by the way: that tall cliff i'm sitting on? a daddy long leg with a dark red body came walking towards me while i was waiting for a sister to hand me the flip-flops i had forgotten on the lower level.

yikes.

:P

p.s. a veryveryvery good post by amber: what is your identity? read it!!

over the past few days . . .

since i read it, many of my thoughts lately have been measured against this post:

horn of africa: on the brink of a humanitarian crisis.
my friend, hanna, linked to it a bit ago.


my thoughts on the matter: truly? i want to sponsor a child someday. someday soon. i have thoughts and plans written down, fresh from tonight.

then there's matthew paul turner's post:
social justice exhaustion: far too many of us are sick and tired . . .

33 Little children, yet a little while I am with you. You will seek me, and just as I said to the Jews, so now I also say to you, 'Where I am going you cannot come.' 

34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 

35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."
[John 13:33-35]

ode to tonight.

before 9pm-9:40pm
just got home from church.
[had about 4 lindt chocolate truffles. there's. nothing. like. lindt. nothing.nothing.nothing! the end:]
cool water infused with a decaf peach-ginger tea bag.
family watching star wars for the first time in years (first time for us kids though)
to be honest, anna, ben and i are not getting into it. it's...just...weird!
and.......people are just finding out they're related. ew.
this is why.
it's just a wee bit too weird for me.
but i still like people who like sw. don't worry. :)
i love this post by danielle. ahhh. i can't wait to see the ocean for the first time someday.
this proposal and story totally had me tearing up. it's beautiful. and by kristen. she's pricey and gorgeous; there's only a 2% chance i'll have her someday, but gosh do i love strolling through her photoshoots!

the study that we've started --heather, steph, anna and i-- lately is by liz curtis higgs. she's quite different from beth moore, let me tell you that. though both writers are very good, i have to say there's something about liz... :) could be that i've read some of her fiction/historical-fiction works. i would definitely recommend her lowlands of scotland books.

so, the current study, by this lovely lady? the bad girls of the bible.
observing, studying, and learning lessons through the stories.
pretty interesting stuff.

[lots of green in these pictures..wasn't planned. hehe.]

the chapters of this study are --well, the story part is about 10-15 pages long. then the study part, with questions, scriptures to read, and blanks to write in? that is another 20-30 pages.
a full hour's work, if you're going at it with focus.

but it's good.
my, my, is it good!
so today i sat down in comfortable pajama bottoms and crazy pink socks... [think: dreary day]

and i took on the chapter. with coffee by my side.
did you think i'd go without mentioning it? ;)
my significant other...

do you know what these are?
these are safe in an envelope until i can find an extra roll of double-stick tape somewhere around here.
these are memories.
the only kind i scrapbook in any way on paper.
bookmarks, with starting and finishing dates.
tickets to concerts and movies.
and, once in a blue moon, a random quote written down.

this, i found here, at jessica shae's quote blog: words spoken.

the time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.
[bertrand russell]

well, i guess it's all perspective up to a... a very far point, yes?

rambles: life, deep, flowers, prayer.

this morning, in the shower (best place to pray, evah), i was thinking on some stuff cheryl (at the women's conference this weekend past) spoke on, of the Church, the story of Esther, worship -in spirit and in truth, His presence, and praying . . . oh, and marriage, too. last night my thoughts were slowly spinning about writing a post of what i feel are important things, to write and document, what i know is needed . . .
all of which i'm learning, learning, learning about . . .
her and francis chan have got to be the tip-top of my list of people who speak on christian stuff.
they tell the truth and dive into the living Word of God and how He's changing them, their hearts, how He's brought/bringing them along the journey of this life, not just formulas and rules and religion like some christian leaders tend to do.
it's amazing.
i just feel this deep place inside of me, simmering with a desire that the hearts of the people would be purified.
and that He would raise up in people the desire to act as the church, as His body, and to pray also.

the parallels she showed in the story of Esther opened my eyes to a need that reached deep and around me. to focus on Him with devotion. just as with marriage, a relationship with Jesus isn't just a part of your life; it revolutionizes, it changes it completely. your way of life is different than before you said those vows and moved in to make a life together.
wow.
so here's a song that i'm addicted to as of today, as it's been a while since i've been on a tenth avenue north kick. also, they're awesome live in concert. that concert i've yet to write about, even though it was march 3...and that was a while ago... so sorry.
. . .

other God/christianity/and/or/church posts going around lately...
consider the lilies
my barefoot journey one and two
emerging mummy
scribbles n' things

~~~

so, now for a bit of life stuff.

like this beautiful cherry pie that anna made after we had vegetarian tacos for lunch:)

like the 6# of dark roast coffee that we got today. the quota had to be made, and not many people put in a good $$$ order... and it went down from the no-sale $25 per 2lb of last month's pricelist. yay!

like flowers.

rach and lyd have been busy-busy fascinated by making these clips/barrettes. the snapping kind. whatever that means.

but i may or may not be a model for them; they keep coming over and changing the flower in my hair as they make them. then i snap a picture with my webcam --crappy, i know;)-- and they grin. :)

so there we go. i love all the ones they've had me try, but have a thing for the yellow one with the turquoise button... hmmm. :)

kind of like this one, but different button:)

this is the one. yet to be glue-gunned to a barrett.

the stuff i wrote this morning after getting gram ready for the day and having a chat with her--rarity!--i'll post tomorrow. or something. it's life, real and raw, and it's been seemingly forever since i've posted about gram. it's just, who posts about the stuff so integrated in their day? so normal, such a part, just . . . .something you're used to? also, something that breaks some people's hearts. or could. if they knew all some people live through.
i think it's going to rain again.
this is the beginning of spring, isn't it? through the gloominess, the rain, the green coming from the ground will break through.
it's the valleys that change us. not the mountain tops.

create in me 
a clean heart, oh God . . .
[psalm 51:10]

sanctus real, the big wide world, etc...

Hmm. The warm weather is coming back. :) It’s a wonderful thing; yesterday was all 30ish and snow thin on the ground. Ew. We’ve had enough of that –and more, this winter. Spring, come my way! I saw you last week, but I’d like you to stay!
I didn’t mean to rhyme. It just came naturally. (heheh)

Last night was the Sanctus Real concert, and it was really good.

Heather (hi!:)) met us there, and it was her first “ccm” (Christian contemporary music) concert. The whole night was a bit more on the mellow side; Me In Motion was good: loved the guitars, and watching the drummer is always fun –well, when you’re in a mosh pit. Sheesh. They didn’t have one at this place, this time. (sigh) I was quite disappointed, since I like to be right there, between the moshing peoples and the stage. :)

Then there was Above The Golden State. They were good; more soft than MIM (the above) and a bit more jivey. I told Heather it was kinda like café music; you sway and want to maybe snap your fingers, bob your head sideways. (haha) And drink coffee. Or tea. Whichever you prefer or are able to tolerate. ;)

Then…there was ^Addison Road. Man, they were good. I had gotten their CD from the library, and wasn’t too impressed because not a minute into each song I was tired of it, it sounded the same. They were way better live. I loved them. And it always helps when someone in the band likes to talk, and talks good. Well, interesting and different. That’s how Jenny was. She was the sweetest thing, introduced the band and her husband on a guitar to the right of the stage, and talked about their 11-month-old little girl who looks like a squirrel, crazy hair and oh so cute. They had some slower songs, but then they really got into a few that were almost dancy, a bit of attitude. I would look over in the middle of one of these songs, and see Heather moving more to the music than I was. I laughed, and she would just look at me, like I'd asked her if the music was loud or her hair was brown, and tell me “I like this song!” (okay, heather, i will refrain from writing about your antics...no need to worry for your reputation.;)) And the sad thing is, we were some of the most liveliest people in the crowd. And that's not saying a whole lot. All those privileged little stink-pots up in the first several rows were still as a bunch of frozen peony stems. Sheesh. :) (alright, i cannot deny it: i kinda like the sentence i just wrote...pshaw...it's kinda spunky/clever. haha!)

Then Sanctus Real came up, after a video of Sammy Adebiyi (add-ah-bee). I guess this is the second time he’s toured with them, speaking for 10 minutes or so, and it was good. The underlying subject was poor African people and making clean water available to them, but it was much different from your normal take-pity-and-give-money commercial. When the video first started, all you saw was a shockingly young black guy with a mop of dreads. I have to confess, I leaned over to Heather (you’re noticing a pattern here because she sat inbetween Anna and I) and said something like, “How old is he? Like 19?” I would’ve said 16, but I’m guessing you can’t adopt a child with your wife at that age. Har har. So the video turned out to be long, but he was fascinating and amusing, his imagination taking us for a loop. His accent came out in the really passionate sentences, which was especially near the end. He gave the example of 100 people in the room, all representing people from across the world. Half have clean water and food. The rest have malnutrition. Ten of the better-off half have access to internet and have a computer at home. And one –once again, of the better half-- (if I remember this right) has the choice to go to college.

It was fascinating. Heartbreaking. Like, how many of us actually think of the people outside of our busy schedule? Our busy little world.

So he spoke to us, all in the room. We were obviously part of the proven better-off half. We were in the front of the line. And we were doing nothing for the people in the back of the line, starving and thirsting and dying off as we sat there. We think we can’t do anything to influence change in this big wide world because we’re so small, we’re only one person; what can I possibly do that will make a difference? . . . but he spoke of how he’d always thought that way, but then Matthew 25 came completely alive to him—in that, at the end of time, if we got it the least bit right, when we stand before God, He’ll say “_____, thank you. Thank you for clothing me when I was naked, thank you for giving me that drink of water, thank you for feeding me. Because when you did it for those ‘least of these’, I care so much that it was like you were doing it for/to Me.”

And really, do we want to go through life and not have done anything? For His Truth, for Love? To me, that's one of the most important things.

There’s this thing called Mocha Club that he talked about. You can research it if you want to. It’s a 7-dollars-a-month dealy-o that seems quite doable for even me. Like, heck, I can do that.

Needless to say, it's got me thinking. A lot.

Life is nothing if we do not Love.

Life is nothing if we do not Give.

Life is nothing if we do not just be, and rest in Him as His children, His people, His beloved ones.

Because no matter what, He Loves us.

Sanctus Real started, then. They were really good. They played practically their whole newest album, which was kind of weird because no other band I know has done that . . . at least, none that I’ve seen.
But they were good. :) A few, like I Want To Get Lost, and Keep My Heart Alive, made you just stand there and feel the music. Others, like Forgiven, These Things Take Time, Take Over Me, and Dear Heart, made you move and sing –--thank goodness they had all the lyrics, because some lazy people like me needed them. I didn’t purposefully put the CD in to play, though Anna did, and a few songs sounded familiar.

Hmmm.
I'm tired. And going for a walk in the dark with Anna--one needs a walk when one has just finished a dinner of leftover seafood lasagna and fresh homemade apple-pie-in-a-pan. :]
So...goodnight.

life, quotes and suffering.

Sometimes you can help it if you're touched and changed and blessed by someone suffering more than you by far.
I was, just this afternoon. And on the way home, I held Lyd close and sang songs with her.
Because sometimes that's all you can do.
That's how you can react, especially when your "outlook on life" (sorry to be using such an over-used phrase) has just been changed, impacted, and pointed upward, outward and lastly inward. But not to admire oneself and plan the next thing to do and be noticed; rather, to examine and choose to Love more. So I chose to Love Lyddie.
Because she was within reach, and sometimes one forgets what's right in front of oneself, and misses the chance to impact a life with love before it has already grown.
I want to be remembered as that loving sister.
And I can only try my best, and I'm just starting to work on it, and asking God's help a ton.
And now I have to stop ranting on this, otherwise I'll feel even worse next time I fail . . . and get back up. And reach out. Or is it the other way around?

But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
[C.S. Lewis]

And forgive me, but I googled "C.S. Lewis suffering quotes", and I got this along with it:

A newborn child has to cry, for only in this way will his lungs expand. A doctor once told me of a child who could not breathe when it was born. In order to make it breathe the doctor gave it a slight blow. The mother must have thought the doctor cruel. But he was really doing the kindest thing possible. As with newborn children the lungs are contracted, so are our spiritual lungs. But through suffering God strikes us in love. Then our lungs expand and we can breathe and pray.
[Sadhu Sundar Singh]

Hmmmm. Talk about thought-provoking. And true.

This is the lovely source: http://www.tentmaker.org/Quotes/sufferingquotes.htm

michael tyrell . . . and . . . lounge/pj pants. who likes 'em? i do. :)

Nothing new to say today, sorry.
Life like normal.
Prepped for turkey meatball soup. 
Watched 2-yr-old Danny for a while.
Oh, wait! But I have to blog about this beloved subject, because Anna told me to; plus, we even took pictures. Well, Anna did. And Sarah will, perhaps, be reading this. ;) (hi, sarah! give eliyah a kiss on her sweet cheeks for me! :))
Orange-and-pink plaid pj/lounge pants. :) She gave them to me for my birthday, but Sunday Anna did a wee little photoshoot Sunday afternoon, just when I happened to be all matchy-matchy. :) She said I looked 'fruity', 'peachy,' and sweet. Oh, and Heather called me 'colorful'. Guess I'm not normally so colorful. :) No, I really like wearing black, peoples. You just don't see me enough below the neck to know it. ;)

So there they are. And there we are: me and Bubby. :) 
Otherwise known as Ben. My brother. He did his hair Sunday morning, and we talked him into wearing it to church like so. ;) Everyone loved it.  
(didn't you, sarah? you cute little instructive-criticismer! just kidding.)
So it's been lovingly tolerable weather of late. Tomorrow and Thursday is supposed to be mid-50's! Yay! Praise be to God, Spring is coming. I think God loves Spring. But He loves winter, also, because we come to appreciate life's different facets in those harder, colder, unlovelier times. He does a lot of work in the winter that we can't see. Because we all know, those perennials are going to pop up when it gets warm enough, and He was good enough to make so much beauty. In flowers, in the sky, in His people.

Okay. There were several more pictures, but Ben was reacting to the camera's attentions and tried to push me off the deck with utmost brotherly affection. Grr. There was mud and snow down there, off the left side of the deck/ramp for Grammy's wheelchair, and so I put up a wonderful fight, keeping myself stable and on dry ground. Er, wood.
No matter that I was addicted to that song, Kiss the Flag by Evans Blue for probably an hour earlier, while I was drinking my first strong mug of coffee since mid last week . . . combatting symptoms completely takes away any craving for coffee.
Another thing--I finished the hour-long CD of Michael Tyrell that dear friends sent to me for my birthday (smiles--thanks rayray! and the rest of you!) . . . . goodness, my goodness. That was so good. I stood there for a little bit, just typing away a ton of quotes while listening. Here's a little part:

Stand at the crossroads and look… and ask for the ancient path and where the good way is. Sometimes you get lost, sometimes you just lose your bearings. In the church we think the lost are people who haven’t found Jesus, in the world we think lost just means I don’t know where I am. There’s a good way. And it’s Yahweh. I don’t want to go any other way.

Oh, and this one:

You won’t get popular telling the Truth, but you might get beheaded. But what are our options, we just become great at deceitfulness and act like it’s church? We just be real nice and forget how to be kind? We just become political, instead of holy? What are our options? Play church, or be church?

:) Yes, I typed it out word-for-word. Kinda raw. He was intense. I loved it.
And then there's this one:

...Until it’s a virus, until it multiplies, until we just tell the truth, and tell the truth, and tell the Truth so no lies can live…

Wow.
I'm off. Goodnight. :)
One last one:

I’m empty, You’re full, save me.

hey unlovely, I will love you...

9:14pm

Hello everyone. :)
Unlike some less-privileged people, I didn't get out of bed until 3pm. I feel I need to inform you that I have never slept in that late, much less without taking a shower since the day before. (ew) But if you're a girl, you'll understand I had a legitimate reason. I happen to be one of those who stays in bed most of that first day.
But I did get out of bed, and last night I did start on one of those 3 library books I have, so I'm making slow progress and everything. :) Church was good, I went last minute with Dad when he came home from the farm and got ready. Gosh, but I love this t-shirt. (sorry, randomness coming here) It was given to me lately, just (haha) randomly, and it's dark army grey-green, and it has a rocket, a smiley-face moon, and some stars on the front, all of which look colored on with a type of marker, although it's normal paint stuff that you normally find on t-shirt fronts. :)
I thought I'd share that with you. It's kind of whimsy, as Anna put it, and it pairs so well with these blue-green plaid pj pants I got from Wally-World (Wal-Mart) for only $8 freaking dollars. Nice, huh? Oh yeah. I love that price. It doesn't hurt too much. ;) $12 hurts more.

I love this song. Sorry I'm so random tonight, must be all the hormones. ;]
This is an excerpt from the song Some Will Seek Forgiveness, Others Escape; by Underoath. I love this song, and one of our distant cousins had this playing during their supposedly-aboslutely-sweet unique personally written vows last summer, and darn it, their voices were not miked, so therefore we heard this lovely song and not them at all...Anna and I were so bummed.
But while we strained our ears in hopes of hearing at least an echo in the big, airy, beautiful pale-ice-blue-architecturey church, we heard this song, and I recognized the voice of Aaron Gillespie (The Almost, and also the drummer for Underoath) singing. Of course, the sound guy faded it out beautifully in the quiet space before Spencer Chamberlain (the screamer of the band, yes, it's more than a slightly screamo band...hahah) started screaming the next lyrics before the end of the song, so when we went home, (I already had basically all of Underoath's CDs) I listened to it with another reason to like it; it reminded me of the wedding, and how it was unlike any others we've went to... in different ways I shall not discuss right now, because I need to go! Maybe fry an egg, because I'm hungry and have basically starved until 3pm, ate a yummy rice dish Anna cooked up in my absence, and then drank an Oregon vanilla chai that I mixed up before leaving for church.
So here are a few lyrics, and have a good night.

Hey unlovely, I will love you
Hey unfaithful I will teach you
To be stronger
Hey ungraceful I will teach you
To forgive one another
Hey unfaithful I will teach you
To be stronger
Hey unloving
I will love you
And will love you
For those of you not accustomed to my sometimes really-random-randomness, I thought I would just randomly blog, because I would. And I did. Just see it as a sign that I like comments. And I love ya'll. :) Sleep good!

And know that God loves you, no matter how unlovely you are.
(repeats to self: God loves me no matter how unlovely I am...)
We all need to know that. It's whether we care or not, that depends on how we live our lives... that's one of my thoughts on it, anyways.
G'night!!! for the last time... ;)

sunday, emma, no coffee yet.

Good Sunday afternoon to you.

Gosh, I haven't seen it rain since . . . well, since before winter started. It's a strange thing.
Church was good today, though --after the service-- Dad took over the espresso machine in the cafe and I took care of the starter and finishing processes. Whip cream, caramel and chocolate drizzle. Yes, our church is one of those that has a cafe. Goodness, I like that espresso machine. :) Sometimes I'm stuck with steaming/frothing the milk, but I'm pretty decent at that. Just not my favorite job.

Anyways, like it matters if I didn't get to make espresso today--I don't have my smelling ability back yet, or the last 70% of my tastebuds. Grr. I wasn't able to taste the chicken noodle soup and Italian combo sandwich Friday night at Panera Bread. How sad is that? I didn't get coffee that night either because this darn cold that started on Monday has yet to be completely kicked.

You know what? When I'm getting over something --which is why I'm kicking this so hard (haha)-- I have no taste for coffee. Ironically, this time I can't even taste coffee even if I wanted to. Kinda sucks, especially if you know how much I like coffee.
Ah. Someday . . . :)


It's a good day, anyways.
I have to read more of that book Tea with Hezbollah, because Ben was asking after it. (Ha, as if he has time yet, but still...he could hock it.)
It's taking me a bit to get used to Ted Dekker's style of writing again, especially after reading 3 books in a row written by ladies, and chick-flicky books at that.

Wow, this new David Crowder Band album {church music} is pretty funky. Dancy. Interesting.

Well, one thing making this day pretty sweet is that . . . Emma, the newest version, is airing tonight on PBS. Yay! It's one of those things that our whole family -pretty much- cozies up in the living room for. Last week, the last of 3 weeks of The Return of Cranford aired, and we loved that, though it was a bit unexpectedly sad with deaths we weren't expecting. But then there was a bit of love and happiness. (As if those things all can't be intertwined, but hey...)
Yes. I predict that even the boys will stay in the room for this next family-watching-addiction. (Just kidding on the addiction part!)
But really, Romala Garai is an excellent Emma. :) I love her. Quite a bit more expressive of the full range of emotions than the old Emma.

Look up the song Shadows by the DCB. It's awesome.


The feeling remains that God is on the journey, too.
-St. Teresa of Avila