Category Archives: Gold Country Life

Mind Blown and The Book of Eli

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During our last Bible study, one of the women brought up the movie The Book of Eli in the context of how much Scripture we could remember. It was decided that we would watch the movie at the next Bible study. I went home and read the wiki on it, deciding to skip the movie. Well, the movie plans got made and I decided to just bring crocheting with me so I could look down if necessary.

I should probably insert here that C and M (our Bible study leaders) are freaking geniuses when it comes to creating interesting environments. We had a haunted hallway for Halloween that was awesome, a Valentine’s Day dinner in the fellowship hall which they decorated to look like a 5-star restaurant (and pulled it off!), and they didn’t disappoint for tonight. They took all the couches from the Fireside Room and the narthex and arranged them in a semi-circle around the projection screen. On the coffee table (also from the Fireside Room, I think), there were individual movie buckets of popcorn, caramel corn, bowls, bottles of green tea, and brownies that someone else had made. (I donated cupcakes from Daniel’s birthday.) C had dared me to wear my penguin pajama bottoms and she came in her jammies too.

(I seriously believe that there has to exist a picture of the two of them holding the Marauder’s Map from Harry Potter that says, “I do solemnly swear that I am up to no good.)

The movie was awesome. It was less bloody than I thought it would be and they did a great job with the plot twist at the end. (I can’t say much more because I don’t want to give away the ending.) I got a few rows crocheted on the baby blanket I’m working on intermittently and I’m glad I went.

Mostly, I’m blown away at how quickly the set-up was able to be taken down. When I came back from taking a couple people home, they had the couches removed and everything looking like it did before. It furthered strengthened my conviction that these are the two people I’d want to be stranded with on a deserted island because the two of them could hatch a plan to get OFF the island while making it into a five-star resort in the meantime.

What I’ve Learned This Lent

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This would have been up sooner but I spent much of yesterday evening in the Pediatric ER at UCD Medical Center with Daniel after he suffered a febrile seizure. (Translation: he spiked a fever really quickly and it triggered a seizure.) I was telling the paramedics that it was ironic that I was in an ambulance because I’d been in one three years earlier when they were having to transfer me to Great Falls to have my emergency c-section.

So… this is what I’ve learned this Lent:

[+] My taste in worship music is not strictly Protestant. It might be that I have more Catholic readers than Protestant these days but a lot of my Catholic friends liked my favorite hymns and worship songs or had some interesting commentary on them. I shouldn’t be surprised because some of those hymns are pretty universal but some of it did surprise me in a good way.

[+] I really need to get a subscription to Sojourners magazine. I could seriously write pages of commentary on every article that appears on my Facebook wall or in my email. It’s wonderful to find like-minded people and a like-minded publication because I seem to defy all labels as to what kind of Christian I am.

[+] I get by with a little help from my friends. It’s been a Lent full of humbling myself and asking people to pray for me when I knew I was going to be dealing with some really hard things. In exchange, I’ve prayed for other friends when they’ve expressed the need for prayer. It’s been a blessing to pray for others and to receive their prayers which isn’t surprising but still an awesome thing.

[+] I am seriously a broken person. I struggle with jealousy, anger, pride, and trust issues when it comes to my relationship with God. Some of this was blogged out and other things were dealt with over Twitter or on Facebook. None of this is surprising — I wouldn’t be utterly dependent on the Cross if I had the capacity to be perfect.

[+] There is more worship music out there on YouTube than I thought. I had no idea that my favorite Communion hymn was out there or that a lot of my other favorite songs had multiple videos. Such an awesome discovery.

[+] I learned a lot about my faith and how far I’ve come. I don’t think I could have dealt with Daniel’s seizure yesterday if I hadn’t dealt with his traumatic birth and the hospital stay last year. Yes, I was sobbing when the paramedics arrived and when they were loading us into the ambulance. However, I persevered and Daniel is OK.

[+] I learned how completely awesome Tim Hawkins is. Christians need to learn how to laugh at each other and how to laugh at ourselves. Tim does a great job with that.

I’ll post something for Easter Sunday tomorrow but I wanted to do kind of a review here on Holy Saturday.

Getting By With Help

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One of the jobs that is tough with having a special needs child is dealing with the Social Security Administration regarding your child’s SSI. My local one is incompetent at best and in March, they messed up Daniel’s SSI amount because the person reviewing the file decided to skip a page of what makes him eligible. When I called them and told them to FIX IT, they told me to return the check and they’d send out a corrected one. I complied and got a letter from them yesterday saying that Daniel’s SSI was suspended until I called my local office because his March check had been returned to the US Treasury… by the local office. Ready to punch a wall yet? Making things “better”, I got the letter 15 minutes after the office closed which means that I get to deal with it today. Oh flipping joy.

Knowing the incredible temptation to use four-lettered words and the creative curses that could spring out of my mouth, I tweeted and Facebook-messaged a few friends to pray for my mouth tomorrow that in my anger I wouldn’t sin. I’m not saying that I won’t have had angry thoughts about the SSA but I’ll be less likely to use language that will rub off on Daniel in bad ways.

It was a lesson in the fact that I’m not alone on my “journey home” and that we aren’t meant to try and get through the world ourselves. We have the Holy Spirit and we also have each other. Without the help of Rich and Kate, I’d probably be in VERY deep trouble right now in terms of the state of my soul… or at least more trouble than I normally am as a broken person.

11 Things

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Ann of House of Estrogen tagged me in this meme going around the Internet. Whee!

Rules
1.) The first rule is to post these rules.
2.) Post a photo of yourself then write 11 things about you/your life.
3.) Answer the questions for you set in the original post.
4.) Create 11 new questions and tag people to answer them.
5.) Go to their blog/twitter to tell them you have tagged them.

OK… so let me find a picture I like.

Me after a haircut

OK… 11 things about me.

01.) I’m a night owl. I get most of my blogging done after 9 p.m.
02.) I’m 5’1 on a bad hair day. People tell me that I seem taller online.
03.) I’m incredibly shy and very introverted. I’d prefer to people-watch rather than socialize.
04.) I have a weird accent that makes me sound like a valley girl Canadian. It makes it really hilarious when I switch into academic mode and I’m using polysyllabic words while sounding like I should be on a beach in southern California tanning myself.
05.) I graduated from college in 3 years. I’m not smart — just strategic. The fact that I was sick of being in a long-distance relationship also didn’t hurt.
06.) I read murder mysteries for fun. I’m currently reading Buried in Buttercream by G.A. McKevitt.
07.) I have part of a Masters in Theological Studies. I’m incredibly good at it but theology in general bores me. I’m more of a historian and linguist.
08.) I’ve been singing Handel’s Messiah since I was 15. It was a holiday tradition for my mom and I throughout high school and college to do the You-Sing-It-Messiah with the San Jose Symphonic Choir.
09.) I love t-shirts with interesting messages. I love my We Will Not Be Silent shirt and am heartbroken that I’m having to replace it.
10.) My promise not to blog on the Republican candidates is grating on me. There’s SOOOOOOOO much snark I want to post!!!!!!
11.) I’m a princess darnit!

OK… my questions to answer!

1.) What is your favorite movie? It varies. I like the classic Disney cartoons like “The Aristocats” and “The Sword and the Stone” as well as “Forrest Gump”, “The Birdcage”, “The Spitfire Grill”, “Whale Rider”, and “Saved”.

2.) If you could go back and give your 16 year old self one piece of advice, what would it be? Stop worrying about what people will think and join a church. (I’m a convert to Christianity.)

3.) Why do you blog? So many reasons. Generally, I do it because it’s cheaper than therapy and I’ve made so many friends doing it. It also was my way of accessing the outside world when I lived in remote areas of the US.

4.) What did you want to be when you grew up? Are you doing that? I wanted to be a lawyer until I was 15 when I started wanting to be a doctor. I’m not doing either though I’m discerning doing training as a respiratory therapist because they’ve been the coolest health professionals that I’ve encountered in my own adventures and with Daniel.

5.) M&M’s – plain or peanut? Coconut.

6.) What was your first car? 1984 Volvo 240 GL.

7.) What is your favorite Halloween costume you’ve ever worn? The cat costume my mom made us when we were 3.

8.) What are your favorite blogs to read? I have at least 30-40 in my feed reader. They range from Canadian pastors to young Catholic women to Mormon housewives. Most blogs these day happen to be mommy blogs because all my bloggy friends have kids.

9.) If you were to have a boy and a girl tomorrow, what would you name them? Aidan Michael and Hannah Grace.

10.) What was your favorite class in college? Women’s Chorale, my advisor’s history classes, Religion and Social Change, Science and Human Values, the Making of the Modern Middle East, my Organic Chemistry labs, and my college’s Core course.

11.) What celebrity do you think it would be fun to be friends with? Definitely Pauley Perette (Abby on NCIS). She’s very much in person like she is on TV and she’s also incredibly socially conscious. I also love anyone who can pull off the goth look over the age of 30. (She’s in her 40’s.)

OK… now my questions!

01.) What food would you never eat even if you were paid to eat it?
02.) What is your favorite Bible verse or quote?
03.) Should jello at church be in the proper liturgical color?
04.) What was your high school or college mascot?
05.) What do you wish you could do?
06.) What book should everyone read?
07.) What is the weirdest thing you’ve eaten?
08.) Pretend I magically arrived on your doorstep. How would we spend your ideal day?
09.) Manicure or pedicure?
10.) What is the best type of ethnic food (i.e. Italian, Japanese, Indonesian)?
11.) Grey or orange tabby cats?

Now for the tagging!

Beth @ The Catholic Couponer

Nikkiana @ Authentic Experience

Kate @ ImperfectKate

Kathleen @ So Much to Say…

The Preoteasa @ Fear Not Little Flock

Dawn @ ladydusk

I know all of you have lives and such. Please find a way to mold this meme to your blog. If you can’t post a picture of yourself, post one of your kids or something that represents you.

7 Quick Takes — IEP’s, School Lunch Quandries, and Rain

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Daniel’s IEP went well on Monday. I’m incredibly thankful that we’ve got a great staff at the local school (where they have all the preschool classes) and that they have an ABA preschool class where Daniel will go. I’ve heard horror stories about the school district in the town to the north and how hard it is to get services for your kids there. Daniel will start preschool on April 11th (his 3rd birthday is on Holy Saturday) and he’ll be in school Monday to Friday for 5 hours every day. The IEP team will meet again on May 11th and firm up goals and plans for things like physical and occupational therapy.

— 2 —

With Daniel starting preschool, I now have a new quandry: school lunches. I need to provide enough food for two snacks and Daniel isn’t feeding himself with a spoon yet. The complicating factor in this is that he also doesn’t know how to take bites out of something so it would need to be finger food. Got any suggestions? I’d welcome any and all input including how to teach him to take bites out of his food.

— 3 —

March seems to be going out like a lion here. After a wet week two weeks ago, we’ve had nice weather, rain on the weekend, and then rain the last couple days. It was pleasant enough to walk to my WIC appointment with Daniel this morning but it’s cloudy again and I think we’ll be getting more rain tonight. We do need the moisture but I sort of wish I could pick the days it would come.

— 4 —

Daniel has been using his “more” sign more and more. Considering that it took almost two years to get him to do it on his own, I’m pretty happy. He signed it to my mom last weekend when she was giving him lunch and he has done it at all his therapy sessions that happened this week. (Physical therapy got rescheduled to next week because it was a park date but was pouring by the time we got to Elk Grove.) I’m hoping to be able to teach him some more signs and have that be a help with communication. He already makes his needs known in non-verbal ways but he has to learn to communicate verbally somehow and signing can do that.

— 5 —

Daniel turns 3 in a little over a week. His birthday falls on Holy Saturday this year and it’s also the day of our church’s Easter Egg Hunt. I can’t believe that it’s been almost three years now since he was born. I don’t know if we have any Easter plans as of yet so I’m not sure how we’ll celebrate. All I do know is that next week’s Quick Takes will probably be solely Daniel-focused. We’ve already gotten some books for his birthday from my in-laws and my mom has done some clothes shopping for him.

— 6 —

“The Big Bang Theory” returns tonight. I’ve definitely missed it the past two weeks. Granted, we have Netflix and I can watch “He-Man and the Masters of the Universe” or actually find out what all the “Downton Abbey” hype is all about, but my life is just not complete without seeing Sheldon being his asocial self.

— 7 —

Ahem… sponsor me.

I'm a survivor!
Symptoms of preeclampsia

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

7 Quick Takes — Writing About Music, Blegging for Promise Walk Donations, and a Synopsis of My Life

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

We didn’t get to have dinner with friends on Friday. Between Daniel and I and the weather, it was not a good idea to venture northward into the Sierra foothills. Daniel was better than Wednesday but had thrown up that morning and I hadn’t slept well meaning that I was not going to be great dinner company. (Sleep deprivation does not do good things to me.) The weather was foul and I actually did well by only going to Elk Grove to get a new router and then for some basic groceries. The upside of the rain was that I just had to leave Daniel’s crib mattress out in the morning and it got washed off.

— 2 —

Dinner with my parents, evil twin, and his fiancée was excellent. The only downside was Daniel being grumpy because he couldn’t go outside and play in the rain as well as not having a full nap. Dinner was lovely and it was good to see Sean (the evil twin) and Jeanette again. We also got to see Daniel sign “more” spontaneously as we bounced him on Jeanette’s exercise ball. When he signed it, he got LOTS more bouncing. We’ve been trying to get him to do this for almost 2 years so this was some pretty sweet success.

— 3 —

Sunday, I slept until 4 p.m. with a few wakings to change Daniel’s diaper and take care of his basic needs. I think my body was kind of tired of me beating it into submission through all the sleep deprivation. Thankfully, our living room and hallway are Daniel-proof and Jon got home at noon so Daniel wasn’t without supervision for too long. (I fell asleep in the recliner in the living room so I would have heard if he was screaming or if something happened.) I also think there was some leftover Sudafed in my system or something?

— 4 —

My 10th wedding anniversary is Friday so we headed to San Jose today. The purpose of going to San Jose is obtaining cheap babysitting via my parents and also having an Olive Garden close enough for dinner. Yes, I’m aware that Olive Garden is the McDonalds of Italian food. However, I’m trying to be faithful about not eating meat on Fridays and I know that their calamari and minestrone soup are not going to irritate my stomach.

— 5 —

It’s been nice weather for the past two days. Fortunately (or unfortunately if you have outside plans this weekend), we are supposed to be having rain in the forecast for the next few days. From here, it looks like it will just be north of us and hopefully not in the south bay — I want to have park time with Daniel this weekend. The fresh air is good for him and all the climbing and chasing is good for me.

— 6 —

I’ve been really blessed by all the music posting I’ve been doing lately. I wrote last week about all the writer’s block I’ve been having. I decided that I’d focus some more of my Lenten writing on hymns and songs that are reaching me. I had been wanting to talk about “Brethren We Have Met to Worship” for a long time as well as the song “If I Stand” by Rich Mullins. The coolest thing about doing the Rich Mullins post is that I found a YouTube video of him performing it. He died in a car accident (for the love of God people, PLEASEPLEASEPLEASEPLEASE wear your seatbelts!!!!) just as I was learning about him and his music so I’ve felt cheated in a way because I never got to see him perform. Finding the YouTube video was an answer to a prayer and desire that I don’t think I’ve ever vocalized.

— 7 —

At this time 3 years ago, I had swollen hands and some pretty spectacular cankles. My body was starting to feel the effects of the HELLP Syndrome and we didn’t connect the pieces until I went into full-on preeclampsia on the night of April 6th. Being part of the Promise Walk last year was one of the most healing things I think I’ve ever done because I got to know others who had dealt with some of the same things I did. Please sponsor me and help fund studies so that we can know more about this condition and help to prevent it from occurring in others.

For more Quick Takes, visit Jen at ConversionDiary.Com.

The Simple Woman’s Daybook: March 19, 2012

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Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY March 19, 2012

Outside my window… mildly sunny and in the 50’s.

I am thinking… that I hate allergy season.

I am thankful… for Daniel signing “more” on his own while I was bouncing him on my sister-in-law’s exercise ball. After he spontaneously signed it, he got LOTS more bouncing.

In the kitchen… making pasta salad at some point this week.

I am wearing… black zip-up hoodie, light blue v-neck shirt, and Left Behind shorts.

I am creating… clean dishes.

I am going… to do laundry at a parishioner’s house tomorrow. (Our dryer is demon-possessed.)

I am reading… Fearless by Max Lucado and Girl Meets God by Lauren Winner.

I am hoping… Daniel goes down for his nap soon.

I am looking forward to… my anniversary dinner on Friday. (10 years!)

Around the house… doing dishes. Whee.

One of my favorite things… Bertolli’s frozen soups for two.

A few plans for the rest of the week: PT tomorrow, speech and mid-week Lenten dinner on Wednesday, OT and leaving for San Jose on Thursday, haircuts for Daniel/me and dinner out for our anniversary on Friday, and coming home on Saturday.

Hosted by The Simple Woman’s Daybook