November 19, 2009

house update.

buying a house -especially right now after the huge housing and banking crisis – is not for the faint of heart!  banks are next to impossible to deal with right now!  the only thing worse than this would probably be trying to SELL a house especially if you’re upside-down and i know there are lots of people out there in that situation, so by no means am i playing the “more  me” card right now.

but i swear i’ve reached the point that whenever our realtor calls, instead of having one of those HGTV experiences where whenever the realtor calls, it’s usually always good news and she has news within HOURS of their offer (totally misleading btw!), we now expect our realtor to stay “hold tight, we have to wait another ___ days” or “still don’t know anything yet”.  to the point where it’s almost comical.

so we heard good news on october 7th – “full steam ahead!  all is looking good!  BPO has been ordered!”  3 weeks later on october 21st we heard the total opposite – “nothing has been done, BPO NOT ordered, should hear something soon.”  so then we were supposed to hear something on the 11th.  we heard on the 11th that we needed to wait until the 19th.  so today is the 19th and she called to say “don’t know anything, but should know something monday, the 23rd”.  urg!  sure, it’s only 4 days and what’s 4 days when we’ve already waited nearly 3 months?

so keep your fingers and toes crossed that we WILL hear something on monday!  and pray that it’s good news!

November 17, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog. i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things!

today i am thankful for mascara.  my suite-mate in college introduced me to lancome definicils masacara and i haven’t been able to part with it since.  thankfully they haven’t discontinued it.  almost everything else i use is MAC, but i cannot and will not switch my brand of mascara!  i’m pretty sure if i was allowed one beauty item on a desert island i wouldn’t be practical and pick something with SPF in it, no, i would pack my mascara FOR SURE!

November 16, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things!

today i am thankful for my down comforter!  we use it year-round and i love it!  so cozy, comfy and nearly impossible to get out of on cold mornings like today!

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November 15, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things!

this in no way says it all, but i am thankful for my husband.  we have been through a lot together in 7.5 years and i love him more each day we are together.  i am proud of how hard he works for us.  i admire his dedication to the things he loves.  he is a man of integrity, loyalty and passion.  and i am thankful to be married to just an amazing person!

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November 14, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things!

today i am thankful for pomegranate raspberry green tea!  it’s like liquid candy in a warm cup and so perfect for chilly november days by the fire!  thanks to my friend jaclyn for introducing me to this fabulous new find!  i am thankful for her today too :)

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November 13, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things!

today i am thankful for fall.  i love how the cooler / crisper weather has turned the trees around us bright orange and red!  i love how fall makes me want to pull out my cookbooks and hand mixer and bake to make the house warm and smell yummy!  i am thankful for the changing of seasons especially in sacramento – even though our summers are so hot, we get cool winters (nothing like east coast winters which i am VERY thankful for!), but just enough to pull out all your scarves and winter coats!  can you imagine how boring it would be if the weather never changed?  i love fall!

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November 12, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things! 

you know when you reach the point where you don’t think you have enough strength within yourself to wait a little bit longer or love someone when they’re being unlovable?  today i am thankful for patience that only God can give me.  certain circumstances or even people make me lose my patience quickly.  i get so frustrated and it takes everything within me to not fly off the handle.  i am thankful that when i reach the bottom of my bucket of patience that God has the grace to say “here… i knew this was going to be hard for you today and i saved some extra patience for you… please take it”. 

when we were young, one of the restaurants we went to every so often was chili’s.  it was the perfect place to take kids because it was loud enough that if you had whiney children, you didn’t really disturb the other customers, they always had a stack of coasters to play with not to mention crayons and coloring pages to keep kids busy.  my mom always took the opportunity for us to practice our “restaurant manners” - practice being patient when waiting for our food; practice sitting still for an extended period of time and practicing how to behave ourselves in public.  and i remember whenever we would get out of the car before going into chili’s she would “sprinkle” restaurant manners on us – like tinkerbell would sprinkle pixie dust.

and that’s what i feel like God does for me when i’m having a day where i’m losing patience quickly or someone just ticks me off – He reaches into his endless supply and some days He sprinkles patience and some days He just dumps it – cause He knows i need it!  today i am thankful for His patience with me and the patience that He gives me.

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November 11, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things! 

i can’t help but to be thankful for our veterans today.  i know so many friends or spouses of friends who currently serve in our armed forces and for them i am truly thankful – i don’t know how you do it.  i am thankful to be an american - to live and work in a land of opportunity and someday raise a family in a safe neighborhood, safe schools, go to church and worship freely.  we are blessed more than we know!  thank you to our veterans who have served faithfully for our freedom!  happy veterans day!

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November 10, 2009

being thankful.

every day this month until thanksgiving, i’m thinking of one thing that i’m thankful for and posting it on my blog.   i encourage you to take this challenge too and be reminded how blessed we really are even in the little things! 

TODAY: i am thankful for starbucks double tall non-fat extra foam caramel macchiatos!  if it weren’t for them i’m convinced i wouldn’t get through some mornings!

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November 6, 2009

more deep thoughts.

so i’m reading this book and wrestling with it a little bit in the second section.  the author is in india, living in a temple for a couple of months and pretty much the whole time is spent meditating and praying and chanting – to whom?  i don’t know, but i’m trying to find the pieces in this section that i resonate with.  to me, some of it is a little… well… out there, but i’m trying not to let it hold me back from continuing on with the book. 

so there’s one part that really struck me (page 132):

Like most humanoids, I am burdened with what the Buddhists call the “monkey mind” – the thoughts that swing from limb to limb, stopping only to scratch themselves, spit and howl.  From the distant past to the unknowable future, my mind swings wildly through time, touching on dozens of ideas a minute, unharnessed and undisciplined.  This in itself is not necessarily a problem; the problem is the emotional attachment that goes along with the thinking.  Happy thoughts make me happy, but – whoop! – how quickly I swing again into obsessive worry, blowing the mood; and then it’s the remembrance of an angry moment and I start to get hot and pissed off all over again; and then my mind decides it might be a good time to start feeling sorry for itself, and loneliness follows promptly.  You are, after all, what you think.  Your emotions are the slaves to your thoughts, and you are the slave to your emotions.

The other problem with all this swinging though the vines of thought is that you are never where you are. You are always digging in the past or poking at the future, but rarely do you rest in this moment.  It’s something like the habit of my dear friend Susan, who – whenever she sees a beautiful place – exclaims in near panic, “It’s so beautiful here!  I want to come back here someday!” and it takes all of my persuasive powers to try to convince her that she is already here.  If you’re looking for union with the divine, this kind of forward/backward whirling is a problem.  There’s a reason they call God a presence  – because God is right here, right now.  In the present is the only place to find Him, and now is the only time.

yes, i see about 5 red flags in that based on my “christian filter”, but if you step back, i think there’s something to be said for these points:

“…and then my mind decides it might be a good time to start feeling sorry for itself, and loneliness follows promptly.”  i do this WAY more than i should.  i slip into a junior high mentality of “no one wants to spend time with me… we must not be as good of friends as i thought we were” and put myself into this vicious tailspin of self-pity and loneliness that can eat at me for days!  why do i allow satan to do that?  why do i compare myself (good or bad) to other people and then just end up feeling sorry for myself?  why can’t i constantly be reminded that what other people think or say or even – what i think other people are thinking (oh that’s the worst!) don’t matter? 

“You are always digging in the past or poking at the future, but rarely do you rest in this moment.”  goodness!  that’s convicting.  i am guilty of constantly poking at the future.  hoping that “one day” we will have a house and “one day” we will have a family and “one day” we will live close enough to our church to get more involved and “one day” we will have the money to do such-and-such.  or “i can’t wait until’s…” that i say ALL THE TIME.  “i can’t wait until” christmas!  “i can’t wait until” i lose another 10 pounds!  “i can’t wait until” friday!  why are we so wrapped up in thinking that the future is where it’s at?  why can’t we seize the moment and make the most of every day?  why does it have to wait until tomorrow or next week or next year?  why not today?   james 4:14 “yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.”  live it up TODAY!

okay… i’m off to seize the day :)