• Favorite Newspaper Article:  Gulf Sees Familiar Face in Charge This NY Times article is about my dad’s first cousin, Thad Allen.  We’re very proud of him!
• Favorite Children’s Bible:  The Jesus Storybook Bible:  Every Story Whispers His Name This book is hands-down my favorite Bible to read to my kids.  It was recommended by my friend Mindy and I love, love, love it.  It starts with stories in the Old Testament and works through the New Testament, but each story always ends by pointing the way to our Rescuer, Jesus Christ.  Just incredible.  Heck, I could use it as my own personal devotional book and get so much out of it.  Who says it has to be just for kids?
• Favorite Photo-A-Day Blog: Today.  My friend Jess is doing a photo-a-day project and I’m always looking forward to see what her next photo is going to be.  I’m a self-proclaimed Jess-photo-blog-stalker-fan.  She even has giveaways now and then so subscribe to her blog and stay tuned!  Yes, she is a professional photographer based in Fort Collins, CO.  Incredible talent.  She’s a nurse on the side.  And the dearest, kindest, sweetest person.  Love you, Jess!
• Favorite Dream Concert: The Lord of the Rings at Radio City Music Hall:  Howard Shore’s Complete Score Performed Live to Film. Yup, I want to be there.  Fellowship of the Ring was performed last fall.  The Two Towers is this fall.  And Return of the King is next fall, I assume.  Oh, to be there!!  It’s a dream…if I had to choose, I would choose Return of the King.  (Chris…hint, hint…HINT, HINT)
• Favorite Cleaning Products: Shaklee.  My friend Margie turned me on to these and I had heard about them before through various blogs, but when Margie says she loves something, I take her word for it.  And I love them.  Love them.  My cleaning is much more simplified, organic, environmentally friendly, safe (non-toxic) and smells nice and mild or not at all.  Just what (my) dreams are made of.  Check it out.  I may write more on this later, but I fear sounding like an infomercial.

Going Nowhere, Got Links?

• Two posts in one day yesterday!  Can you even believe it??
• I know you missed me.
• Summer has hit with a vengeance!  May 1st on the calendar coincided with temps in the 90s.  Ahhhhhh, Florida, how we love you.
• I registered G for Youth Soccer for the summer.  Youth Indoor Soccer.  How cool is that?  ”Cool” being the operative word in that sentence.  Air conditioning, baby!
• Yes, I am a wimp in the heat.  It’s no secret.
• We’ll also do swim lessons for both kids at the local university.
• When you have fearless children like we do, swim lessons are a necessity.  Not just an option, a necessity.
• They swim like fish.  Well, they think they can swim like fish.  We get lessons so they can swim like fish.
• And when you live in a part of the country where you are near lots of swimming pools, ponds, creeks and even the ocean…well, we like to make sure our children know how to swim as best we can.
• Fearless children give us gray hair.
• Even the dog is getting in on the lessons action.
• Starting in June – dog training!!  Oh yea!!  Huntley is going to get doggy-manners.
• Or as the dog trainer told me over the phone – dog and adult training.  Ha!
• That cracked me up while making sense at the same time.
• I’ve been teaching a Music Theory 101 class it church and have a lot of fun doing it.
• Until I get a lot of dazed and confused looks at a few tough concepts.
• Those poor souls.  :)
• Our church has Life University on Wednesday nights and they offer a variety of classes including faith classes, money management, exercise, and music.
• But it has been so much fun!  What a great class!
• Now if we could just get a bunch of keyboards and teach class piano…

Going Nowhere

• Whew!  What a spring!  Viruses, allergies, viruses…hopefully we are in the upward swing and will have a healthy summer!
• G has about 4 weeks left of preschool.  Wow!  Can you imagine?
• He has also gotten into watching Charlie Brown on Netflix.  That makes me grin for some reason.
• We have definitely decided to homeschool G next year.
• I’m REALLY excited about it.
• Other times, I’m really nervous.  It deserves it’s own post.  Perhaps this weekend.
• Chris has planted a garden!
• We have tomatoes, corn, cucumbers, and basil.  Some marigolds thrown in for good measure.
• Or something about keeping bugs away?  I don’t remember what he said.
• I stay far away from the garden.
• It’s a lot like work and I tend to kill growing green things.
• I’m allergic to work.
• Speaking of allergies, I think it’s the worst allergy season on record.  Evil oak tree pollen.
• My aunt and uncle are back from serving in Eastern Europe in the Peace Corp!  Yea!!!!!!
• I’m holding two boxes of Girl Scout Thin Mints hostage in order for them to come visit me.
• I’m cruel that way.

Going Nowhere

• I really want to redo my blog header up there, but I dread the thought of re-learning how I actually did it.  Maybe if I did a header every few months, the steps wouldn’t leave my head so quickly.
• I have a secret desire to a fabulous photographer.  I LOVE photo blogs and am hopelessly addicted to them.  I’m a photo-blog-stalker.   Maybe some day I’ll be able to get a fancy-shmancy camera and try it for myself.
• S loves to dance and sing for us.
• And she’s really loud, too.
• Huntley is still my shadow.  He never leaves my side and in fact often steps on my feet as he follows me around the house.  That’s pretty annoying when you wear flip-flops.  Crazy-lovable-huggable dog.
• After the kids are in bed, Huntley jumps on the couch and owns it.  Completely and totally.  Last night, he even stretched himself out with his head on a pillow.
• This past weekend, Chris took the kiddos and went up north a bit to visit his parents.  I love the quiet weekends of relaxation.  Sometimes a mom just needs a few days of quiet.
• And the kids got to see snow for the first time!!!  I hate that missed it but we’ve got some great videos of them playing in it.  So fun.
• A G funny story for you:  He got some Spiderman stickers from the treasure box at school and they were the kind that if you moved them back and forth, you would see a different picture.  I opened the package and moved it back and forth to show him and he loved it.  He took the stickers and stuck them all over his short and wore them like that all day.  When Chris got him, G ran up to him and said, “Look, Daddy!  My stickers!  And they move!”  With that, he moved his upper-body back and forth to make the stickers change pictures for his daddy the same way I moved the stickers themselves back and forth earlier in the day.  But since the stickers were stuck to his chest, his solution was to move his chest, too.  I laughed so hard.

Giggles, Going Nowhere, Growing Up, Uncategorized

Heather tagged me for this.  It looked entertaining, but know that I have a looooooooong list of quirks.  It’ll be hard to narrow down.

The Rules:

1. Post these rules on your blog.
2. Tell about your six quirks.
3. Tag six bloggers to do the same.  (Yea, I’m not into tagging anyone.  If you want to participate, please do!  Pop back in and leave me a comment to let me know! I’d love to see your list!)
4.  Leave them a comment to let them know you’ve tagged them so they can participate.

My list of quirkiness:

1.  I have a nightly routine.  If I swerve from that routine in any way at all, then I will not be able to sleep until said routine is completed.  OCD, much?  I take my medicine, brush my teeth, check on the kids, check all the doors, make sure the garage door is closed, my bed blankets have to be juuuuuust right, I read for a bit, then finally turn out my light.  The only time I deviate from this routine is when I have a migraine.

2.  I cannot eat blue food.  Blueberries or anything resembling that is just off-limits.  Blue = bad.  I don’t like or am allergic to nearly all fruit.  Bananas are the exception.  The fruit I actually like, I am allergic to.  No fair.  I hope that quirkiness goes away in Heaven.  I’m so dessert-limited because of this fruit handicap.  I would really love to love fruit.  Thank goodness chocolate is not a fruit.

3.  I freeze when it comes to home-decorating purchases.  Even frames.  Especially furniture or lamps or art or knick-knacks.  I wish I had the money to pay an interior decorator to do it for me.  Not sure why the prospect of decorating my own home freaks me out.  I don’t know where to start, I guess.

4.  Pickles are evil.  Truly.  I don’t even like to smell them.  The crunch when other people eat them even makes me cringe.  And no, I did not eat them when I was pregnant.

5.  I sometimes avoid fiction books because I love them so much.  Makes no sense, I know.  But when I start a fiction book, I HAVE to finish it right away.  As a result, life around the house tends to shut down until I’m finished.  I sometimes prefer non-fiction to fiction because I actually have to read slowly to learn and process it all.  Fiction books – I can easily read one or two in a day.  An expensive habit to avoid, as well.

6.  If something is popular, I tend to avoid it for a very, very long time and at all costs.  Doesn’t matter what it is…books, movies, tv shows, clothes, food, etc..  It takes me awhile to warm up to something that is popular and is truly good.  I hate falling for fads.  Unless it’s Starbucks.

7.  As a performer, I actually do not care for performing solo on stage.  I much prefer being a part of an ensemble whether it be a praise band at church, or a piano duet, or some other arrangement.  I don’t mind standing in front of hundreds of people playing keys, as long as I’m not by myself.

8.  If I get nervous, my hands shake.  Very uncool if you are a pianist which requires, you know, using your hands.

9.  Did you really think I would keep this list to six?  Another quirk…

Look forward to reading yours!

Going Nowhere