Category Archives: Reece’s Rainbow

7 Quick Takes: Baseball, British TV Shows, and How Not To Talk To Kitties

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

North Korean propaganda. I don’t know how real this particular video is but it both amuses and scares me.

I’m guessing the footage of the United States was taken after Superstorm Nemo? In any case, I wonder if it’s too close to bedtime for another cup of snow coffee.

— 2 —

Easter. Easter was quiet for us. We had church in the morning and stayed home in the afternoon. I sort of wish that we could have gone to see family or something but after two busy weekends, Holy Week with a lot going on, and Daniel being on Spring Break, it was good to have a quiet Sunday. Jon needed the naptime as did Daniel.

— 3 —

Take me out to the ballgame. Baseball season has officially started. My Giants took the series with Jon’s Dodgers 2-1. In the last game, my boys got their first two home runs of the season. Our Panda hit a 2-run homer in the 3rd and Hunter Pence shot one off in the 6th. They open against the Cardinals in San Francisco on Friday and I’ll be gone so I’ll unfortunately miss it. The World Series ring ceremony is on the 7th and I’ll unfortunately miss that one as well.

— 4 —

The doctor is in. My mom introduced me to the British series “Doc Martin” while I was in San Jose for my anniversary a few weekends ago. It’s addictive — Jon and I watched the rest of the first season the next day. If I hadn’t had a little boy on Spring Break, I probably would have finished the series that week! He’s the British version of “House” and the recurring characters are wonderful. His receptionist is the picture of apathy and the people in Port Wenn (his small town) are lovely. It kind of makes me want to catch up on “Hart of Dixie”.

— 5 —

Talking to kitties. Catfoodbreath, one of my favorite Twitter kitties, has a useful blog post on how not to talk to a kitty. I’m not guilty of #1 on that list… per se. When I talk to my demon spawn cat Freya, I have a tendency to say things like “CAT! CAT CAT CAT CAT CAT CAT CAT!” (She was fostered with Rottweilers so I sometimes have to remind her that she is a cat.)

— 6 —

Forty to Forever. Forty Days to Forever is done and we raised $10,000! Woohooooo!!!! Brett had a little over $100 added to his adoption grant so that’s some success there. He still needs a mama so go click on his picture to find out more about him.

Brett

— 7 —

Querying the Hive Mind. My church is doing a craft fair after Thanksgiving. Could you go to my Pinterest page for crocheted stuff and tell me what you think I should make? Please and thank you!

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

7 Quick Takes: March Madness

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

March Madness. The stupid basketball games have started again (later than usual) so I’m grumping about my CBS shows being pre-empted. Because I couldn’t care less about who wins, I thought I’d share some non-basketball alternatives, of which there seem to be an abundance this year.

Lent Madness
Public Radio Bracket Madness
American Jesus Madness
The Best Christian Book of All Time
TV Couples March Madness Challenge

— 2 —

Brett. This is Brett.

Brett

He needs a mama. Wanna help? Head over to his page and share it on Facebook/Twitter/whatever. His mama is out there and I hope we can find her soon. Want updates on the process? Like him on Facebook.

— 3 —

Kaia. According to the FSP for Kaia’s family, their homestudy is done. Yay!

Miss Kaia

Go show her family some love!

— 4 —

Search term fun. I installed Jetpack for my WordPress a month or so ago which means that I get to see the search terms that come in for my site. There aren’t a lot because I chose to hide it from spiders and search engines for a long time but occasionally some interesting ones come through.

The current interesting one: “serving with a prickly pastors wife”

I am so honored. 🙂

— 5 —

Bible student essays. The professor who runs Bible Students Say… is grading tonight. *rubs hands gleefully*

Some gems:

“God used diff. people to write the Bible b/c diff. author writing abt the same story paid attention the things the other author different.”

“I don??t think not following the bible as is doesn??t mean you’re criticizing the bible & people who are offended need to get with the ages”

“I think, as a believer somebody needs to be bless with an understanding of the bible from the holly spirit to interpret it right.”

— 6 —

Little Bear. Please pray for Little Bear. He was born with deformed legs (which honestly made him much cuter) and he won a contest to be on the cover of Modern Cat Magazine earlier this year. He is currently at the vet having one of his legs fixed and will be back home with his mommy on Sunday. Truthfully, he’s stinking cute as is (his feet add to the cuteness) and he doesn’t even know that his feet aren’t normal. He manages to beat up his siblings and get around just fine but his mommy wants him to have full function. He has a Facebook page here.

— 7 —

Lenten blogging. As one of my Lenten disciplines, I’ve been blogging on hymns and praise songs. You can find all my posts on them here.

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

7 Quick Takes: Habemus Papam, Prayer Requests, and Drinking Games.

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Forty Days to Forever. Brett’s special day to be featured as part of the Forty Days to Forever fundraiser was on Wednesday. If you missed this and would like to donate, click here. If you could pray for us to be able to find him a mama, I would muchly appreciate it.

— 2 —

Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. The Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund fundraiser kicked off on March 1st. If you want to participate, you still can. Details are here. I also have a printable sheet for any families with homeschoolers who want to count coins that they donate. Kaia’s adoptive mama just started a blog dedicated to bringing her home. The Saving Kaia blog will remain active however because I can use it to raise awareness for her and hopefully help to raise some of the funds to bring her home.

— 3 —

Habemus Papam. I’m probably the only Protestant who was watching for white smoke on Wednesday when I got up and saw that there had been no black smoke after I went to sleep. (The morning votes in Rome were shown at 2:00 a.m. my time.) I was sitting at $tarbux working on devotions and flipped to Chrome where I saw the smoke. About 5 seconds later, I got a text from the Pope Alarm. After about forty minutes of waiting for them to announce it, I had to run to the bathroom due to the venti Cool Lime Refresher I was sipping on while I worked. Thankfully, I didn’t miss anything. I couldn’t understand the announcement in Latin because the microphone was echoing too much (I was watching the EWTN feed on my laptop) and all I could pick out after “Habemus Papam” was “Franciscum”. I knew that “Franciscum” was Francis so I was looking at the list of all the cardinals with that name until I heard them explain that it was Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio. (I was able to go onto YouTube later and find a clean recording of it that I could understand.)

— 4 —

My thoughts on Pope Francis. Truthfully, I’m happy. He has a commitment to social justice while also being committed to preservation of doctrine and a reputation for living simply. I was displeased when Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI because he had written some rather inflammatory things about non-Catholics in his pre-papal days but I respected him because of his office. Not so much with Pope Francis — I’m a fan. It’s a moot point because I’m Lutheran and he isn’t considered an authority for us but it’s still nice to have a Pope with whom I am enamored. And seriously… he’s a Jesuit — that’s a pretty long shot to become Pope because Jesuits are not supposed to aspire to higher office.

— 5 —

Grumpy Cat. Tard the Grumpy Cat is at SXSW and has landed on our CBS affiliates in Sacramento because the anchors were amused by her. Friskies has done a photo shoot and filmed a commercial with her and I found this online tonight. It’s a parody of the backstage rider for Van Halen that is tailored to Tard herself.

— 6 —

I’ll drink to this. Are you a fan of The Big Bang Theory? There’s a drinking game for you! Consider it’s on for an hour every day in syndication on one of our antenna channels in addition to the new episodes on CBS, I think I could get blotto drunk really fast if I actually drank alcohol.

— 7 —

On a somber note. Ian, a friend of mine from college, is fighting leukemia. His wife posted this today:

I’m writing with tears streaming down. We just heard that they have diagnosed him with a rare liver disease associated with the transplant called “sinusoidal obstructive syndrome” or SOS. Basically, there are clots in the lining of the veins of his liver stopping the flow of fluid, and actually reversing the flow causing fluid to build up in his stomach. The ultrasound this morning confirmed this is the case.

Up until recently, there has been no cure for this and it’s an end game situation. There is a medication called Defibrotide they are very hopeful about via clinical trial that they are working on getting for him. It is only made in Italy and there are hoops to jump through but they assure us he will get it. It takes a week or two for response from the medication, and he will be on it for at least three weeks. In the mean time, things are expected to get worse and they may need to drain his belly multiple times to allow room for his kidneys to function. His stomach looks twice as big as it did last night and he hasn’t been able to eat or drink. He is in such pain and discomfort already, I can’t imagine two more weeks of this progressing… I’m still in shock.

Please pray they can get Ian in the clinical trial and receive the Defribrotide quickly.
Please pray he responds as fast as possible and it is completely effective in treating his liver. Sometimes people never fully recover even with the medication and need to have their stomach drained regularly for the rest of their lives. Please pray this is not the case with Ian.

So it seems the heat has been turned up a few notches. Please pray that when we walk out of this furnace we’d be like the young men in Daniel- glowing brighter with a testimony and not even smelling like smoke.

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

7 Quick Takes: Fundraising, Sergio Romo, and the Lions of Rome

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

GoFundMe. I’ve seen a couple GoFundMe sites among my blog reads this week. In the interest of helping everyone out, here are the ones for people I know or follow.

[=] Help the CDC team go to NYC! (OK… this is actually IndieGoGo but I’ll lump them into this category for the moment.)
[=] Help Little Bear have surgery to fix his paws. Little Bear is an adorable little house panther who was born with deformed legs. He won a contest to be on the cover of Modern Cat magazine and his mommy is trying to raise the money to get his paws fixed.
[=] Help to pay for Anna’s transplant meds. Anna got a new liver last fall and the co-pay on her anti-rejection meds jumped up to $300. She doesn’t get a choice on whether she takes the meds and her mom started the GoFundMe to raise some funds so that they can pay for them.
[=] Save Aquinas and More. Aquinas and More is an online store where you can get a number of Catholic things. Two things that make them special (and extra cool in my eyes) are the registries for seminarians and the fact that they will not sell anything made in China. If everyone who liked them on Facebook contributed maybe $10-20, they could re-open and do so better than before.

— 2 —

Forty Days to Forever. Brett will be the guest of honor on the blog at Forty Days to Forever on March 13th. Please share this if you have a blog. Thanks!

— 3 —

Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. I’m doing a fundraiser for Kaia over on her blog called Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. It’s super easy — all you have to do is save your spare change in a jar or bottle and when it’s full, take it to the bank to count it. I have all the information you’ll likely need over at Saving Kaia.

My collection bottle

— 4 —

He only looks illegal. Sergio Romo, one of my favorite players on the Giants, is playing for Team Mexico in the World Baseball Classic which is taking place in Arizona. What else goes on in Arizona? SB 1070 which lets police pull people over to check their citizenship. This is happening to Team Mexico during this tournament. Guys: read his shirt. He only looks illegal. 🙂

— 5 —

You mean allergies aren’t made up? I have a weird egg allergy that Daniel also shares — shots don’t do anything bad to us but we break out in a rash if we eat scrambled eggs. As a result, I can’t eat most breakfast items and I’ve managed to piss off at least one person because I can’t eat whatever they brought to church. (I barely resisted asking them if they’d like to pay for my Epi-Pens when they complained.) For that reason, this cracks me up. True, I don’t like eggs — they give me rashes that require Benadryl.

— 6 —

The Big Bang Theory. How completely awkward was the part of tonight’s episode where Sheldon, Leonard, and Howard were speaking to the middle school girls about science? I think I probably would have run screaming from the classroom and refused to do anything but be an English major. Then again, I did end up in the humanities…

— 7 —

Lent Madness. We’ve reached the Saintly Sixteen. Today was Janani Luwum vs. Jonathan Daniels. I’m kind of looking forward to the day that Ignatius of Antioch faces Hilda of Whitby so that the Lions of Rome will appear again in my Twitter.

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

7 Quick Takes: Fundraising, English Folk Songs, and Political Grumping

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. We have a fundraiser starting today over at Saving Kaia called Kaia’s Kindergarten Fund. Click on the link for more details.

— 2 —

English folk music. Daniel was banging his snack container in a certain rhythm today and the English folk song “Dashing Away With the Smoothing Iron” came to mind so I looked up the words and sang it to him.

He managed to keep banging in almost perfect rhythm.

— 3 —

Dancers. For those of you who know Elizabeth Esther, her daughter Jewel and her ballet team made it to the finals for the Grand Prix in New York City. The team has to raise $15000 for the housing, fees, and transportation. They’ve currently (as I’m typing this) raised $2640 and they have 22 more days to do this. Can you spare a few bucks?

— 4 —

Lent Madness. I have to say that Lent Madness is amusing me greatly. It’s been enjoyable to see who wins each day. Granted, my bracket is screwed up because Ignatius of Antioch beat Ignatius of Loyola; but the parody account that it spawned is amusing. The post answering criticisms of the SEC (Super Executive Committee) is even well-done. Episcopal Church for the win!

— 5 —

The end of a era. I watched Pope (now Pope Emeritus) Benedict XVI leaving the Vatican today, getting on his helicopter, and saying “good night” to the people at Castel Gadolfo. While I wasn’t amused when he was chosen as Pope (he has a history of calling people like me “heretics” in his pre-papal life), I respected him because of his office and I will admit that I was watching all of this happen this morning completely stunned.

Thank you to Good Day Sacramento for showing all of it without making any snarky remarks and getting a *real* Monsignor to do commentary. Next time, however, please refrain from stalking the bishop while he’s celebrating Mass. 🙂 (They did refrain from actually bringing cameras in and interrupting.)

— 6 —

Fantasy Conclave. I did enter in a guess for Fantasy Conclave though I’ll be *incredibly* surprised if I’m right. There’s also an opportunity for people to adopt a cardinal and pray for them throughout the conclave. For my Protestant readers, it would be a nice thing to do, especially as the choosing of the new Pope affects us ecumenically. I got Cardinal Angelo Scola. Truth be told, I’d rather be praying for Jason Motte (closing pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals) but Cardinal Scola looks interesting.

— 7 —

Politics. If anyone needs suggestions for lay-offs for the sequester, I can think of 535 people to lay off first…

Seriously y’all in DC, I don’t give a rat’s behind who comes up with the best plan — pretend you actually meant all those promises you made about being bipartisan when you ran for election and COME UP WITH SOMETHING THAT DOESN’T SCREW OVER THE COUNTRY!!!!!!

*steps off the soapbox*

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

7 Quick Takes: Great Big Sea, Ashes, and Baseball

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Another former WBC member. I have so much hope for my generation now that another former Westboro Baptist person is speaking out. Lauren Drain posed for the NOH8 campaign, had an AMA on Reddit, and has a book out next month on her experiences. I’m hoping it will be available for NOOK.

— 2 —

Great Big Sea. I can’t remember if I saw this on Facebook or on someone’s blog or what. It’s a version of “Children, Go Where I Send Thee” called “Come and I Will Sing You”. My husband Jon remembers singing it at Boy Scout camp. I love this YouTube video because it’s the guys of Great Big Sea doing it acoustically with just a bodhran and shakers for instruments… outside in the middle of a snow storm. You can tell they’re having fun and getting into the jamming session.

— 3 —

Ash Wednesday worship. I had to deal with the Social Security Administration down in Lodi so I snuck into a noon Eucharist for ashes because I didn’t know how much of the evening service at Metanoia that I’d get to attend. It turns out I got to attend all of it. Boo yah! We celebrated with a couple other ministries and churches in town and had a blast. I think our Pentecostal lector needs to give the Lutheran lectors some tips because he was quite… passionate about his reading. My ash cross from Metanoia was also pretty decent even after bathing Daniel and taking care of basic stuff before Jon got home.

ashtag

— 4 —

An update on Yong. Do you remember the Chinese orphan I mentioned last week for whom we were hoping to raise $100,000 so he could get to the States and have his massive facial tumor removed. ALL THE MONEY GOT RAISED. I think it only took a week too. God is awesome!

— 5 —

Speaking of orphans… We now know who is adopting Kaia: the Heaton Family! Her adoption will not be cheap so if you can, please go to their site and throw a few bucks their direction.

And then there’s Brett.

Brett

He really needs a mama. Go show him some love.

— 6 —

Baseball. Spring Training is beginning!!! I’m looking forward to the season this year. Obviously, I’m rooting for the Giants (I grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area) but I’m also following Jason Motte on the Cardinals. (He’s a great pitcher and a great sport.) Apparently, there was a fan that got all hot and bothered because he (Motte) didn’t stop to sign an autograph for him. Motte’s reply (via Twitter):

Dear fan at gate that boo’ed me for not stopping to sign, My wife has a 103 temp & a screaming 5 wk old n the car. Thanks for understanding.

(I’m sitting here at $tarbux on Thursday morning trying to get these done early because I have a crazy night for the third day in a row and I happened to see the tweet.) Because, you know, all athletes exist to do is sign autographs, right?

— 7 —

Forty to Forever. The Forty Days to Forever fundraiser is underway and they still need people to be sponsoring blogs. The amazing and awesome Elizabeth of Tales from Astoria signed up and I’d like to encourage any/all of you to do the same. You can also follow on Twitter — we’re @fortytoforever.

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

7 Quick Takes: Lent Madness, Hope for Westboro Baptist Church, and Orphan Needs

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7 Quick Takes

— 1 —

Kaia has a family. I found out on Tuesday that Kaia has a family committed to her. This is awesome news!!!

Her adoption grant, however, only has $278 in it and her adoption will be probably around $20,000. Could we up that a bit and help her adoptive family? Go show them some love.

— 2 —

Brett. Our boy here still needs a mama.

His profile is here. Share his profile with anyone you know who might want to adopt.

He is also part of the Forty Days to Forever fundraiser. Go to the site and check out what is going on with the fundraiser right now.

— 3 —

Lent Madness! Why am I not surprised that the Episcopal Church has found a way to combine March Madness and Lent? I am sooooo participating in Lent Madness this year! No idea who will be receiving the Golden Halo this year (Mary Magdalene won last year) but it looks interesting.

For those who want to accuse me of heresy because most people on this link-up are Catholic, Busted Halo has a lovely Lenten calendar with interesting challenges. (I wanted to say “Lenten Advent calendar” but that would sound silly.)

— 4 —

Really? I was gobsmacked when I saw that this app existed. I mean, “Bang with Friends”? Really? This isn’t just being marketed to college kids — this is going to 13 year olds!!! And 260,000 users in the first nine days? This is evil.

The makers have referred to the critics as “prudes”. Count me incredibly proud to be a prude.

— 5 —

Hope for Westboro Baptist Church. Remember the link about Libby Phelps Alvarez who left Westboro Baptist Church? Two more granddaughters of Fred Phelps have left the church including Megan who was their social media person and heir to the legacy. (Their statement about it is here.) This gives me hope that that the church will either cease to exist within a generation or somehow God will reach them and convince them of their error.

— 6 —

Help this boy with his tumor. We have a matter of weeks to raise $100,000 for visas and surgery for this little boy to get his tumor removed. If you can’t give, please share this story around. If you know some organization/trust/corporation who can help, let them know.

— 7 —

Update on Katya. I won the giveaway on Welcome Home Katya! which is trying to fundraise to pay for the dental work she needs to help with her speech acquisition. For those who don’t know, Katya was adopted from the Ukraine by the Duecks. Currently, her hair is falling out from a hematoma which I’m not sure if they can fix medically. (Katie???) Keep her in prayer and if you feel led, toss some funds their way for her dental work.

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