monday=funday

the excitement today was Dominic getting sent home from school with 102 fever!

he says he feels fine just tired and says his legs hurt.

also fun, tonight and tomorrow it is predicted that we will get an inch of ice. im thinking i should have bought that coffee press i saw last week at the coffee shop so when our power goes out im not left with no coffee (hello Circle K).

not too much going on yesterday at our house, we stopped down at All Ways Pottery to pick up our pieces, Dominic made this coffee mug for me, the other 2 sides have a picture on them as well, one has a cross, one has a picture of Yoda (?).

the afternoon was spent relaxing at home, i reading on my new Kindle (yay) and eating my chocolate covered caramels with sea salt (we stopped at Cocoa Safari while we were downtown) Ken watching The Karate Kid and nerf fighting with D.

today holds all the excitement i could ever hope for...a birthday party at the bowling alley, and lots of praying that dominic does not pick up the strep that had 8 of his classmates out of school last week.

i considered taking him to the movies instead of allowing him to go to the party....but i worry that not many will be able to come and the birthday boy will be disappointed. we will not however be eating birthday cake.

stepping up to the challenge?

3 of my favorite blogs to read belong to Tricia and her daughters Jessica and Megan.

Tricia and Jessica have been posting everyday for the last month (i think its suppose to be for the year)

i started reading Tricias blog shortly after i started blogging she is funny, optimistic and crafty, not to mention loves fashion and coffee.

we hit it off in blogland fairly quickly and i learned that her MIL lives right across the river from me in carrollton KY!

i immediately (hopefully not creepy weirdo-y) invited her over the next time she was in town.

when she did visit her MIL we got together for coffee and shopping, the main hurdle in hanging with Tricia is you have to be chemical free-FREE..which doesnt sound too hard until you start freeing yourself from scented body wash, scented lotion, hair sprays, cosmetics, deodorant, even laundry soap and fabric softener so i had alot to learn about chemical sensitivities on that first meeting. over the last 2 years seeing Tricia when she visited and also meeting Megan and Jessica when i went to visit her last year for a real vacation, all 4 of us agree that its like we are all related and im the cousin that they rarely see but love and think about often, and they are my cousins that live in florida and extend an open invitation to me.

any way, i aspire to blog every day this month, just like them.

im over it.

is it really that bad?

i dont know but what i do know is im seeing and hearing alot of complaining.

i see alot to FB statuses that lament the despair of having to deal with snow.

how would we be able to relate to the line "Sin had left a crimson stain, he washed me white as snow" if we NEVER saw snow that blanketed everything in sight?

im hearing alot of complaints about the kids having to be in school until june? is this even worth your breath? really?

so they will go to school until june, its not going to hurt them.

complaints of school basketball games cancelled, complaints of messy roads, of home bound children driving you crazy, of snow getting tracked in....the list goes on

first i do want to admit that i have been guilty of a complaint or two in my day, then i want to say

im so thankful that my house is warm and dry, im so thankful that my tires are not bald, that my healthy intellegent son is bugging me to play with him, that i get to spend an extra 2 days of my time on the earth hanging out with this kid. im super thankful for Netflix instant viewing option.

its nothing to get your knickers in a twist over, my friends.

just stop complaining and enjoy these days for what they are.

smarty pants?

sometimes i wonder...am i a smarty pants? am i a know it all?

it seems like i just cant help offering solutions, if you have a problem, then i want a solution, especially if its something similar to an experience i have had.

in the past week i have offered solutions, mostly kid related to a handful of friends who seem to be seeking a tap in the direction of a solution.

i have advised on food specifically healthy food.

i have advised on sick babies.

i have advised on school related issues (im still learning here, folks)

i have advised on difficult relatives.

some of my suggestions seem to be taken well, others seem to be rejected before they are out of my mouth.

my question...how do i decide whether the person wants my opinion, or just wants to vent.

i want to help when i can, but i dont want pepole to avoid me because im a miss know it all smarty pants.

yesterday we visited First Baptist Church downtown and found it to be promising, the teaching was solid bible teaching, the kind that has you flipping all over the new testament.

the people (the ones we didnt know) welcomed us, but not in a weird accosting you with too much enthusiasm kind of way. Dominic liked kids church ( ken and i already knew the teacher) and as luck would have it, we got invited to the adult sunday school class' pot luck lunch where we were able to talk to the interum pastor and his wife, both of whom have a background in urban and innercity ministry.

also we later learned that Dominic felt lead to give his heart to Jesus.

ken asked him if he did that in Kids Church, dominic told him "no, it was while you and mommy were eating chicken with our new church family"

all in all it was a good experience and we will definitely be visiting again next week.

is back :)

had a couple of semi dark days there...whew.

im so glad for friendly encouragement.

Ken and i discussed which direction we need to be headed in and the pros and cons of a) continuing to go to Sojourn in Louisville for a few weeks or b) visiting some local churches so we can start connecting to some people in our area who are living on mission.

we decided that although Sojuorn is a comfortable place for us, and we know what to expect ,thats where our dear friends the kelleys and their grown kids go, and it would be a great place to rest for a while we would accomplish nothing by continuing to attend every week.

Sojuorn will be a place where we can go if we are in between visiting local churches, but not where we go regularly.

so the goal is to find a local church where the teaching is solid, the leadership is biblical and the people are serving...tall order, i know.

but now i feel better.

i feel like i should

i feel like i should blog today, why? because its been a week since i blogged and im not really doing much today.

has my blog run its course?

in the last 6 monts or so i just am not into it.

i no longer think "ooh, im going to blog this!!"

i just slap something down when i feel like i should.

but there are things happening.

after 2 years of pouring our life, energy and finances into our mission of taking the love of Christ downtown to the walnut street neighborhood by planting a church and serving the poor and broken we disbanded. it became apparent that we were spinning our wheels fruitlessly in the attempt to plant a church. we are now looking for an existing church with a heart to reach the lost that we can become a part of. we have been enjoying attending Sojourn in Louisville, but we need somewhere in town, where we can invite people without expecting them to make an hour drive to get there.

so this is a strange time here on the hilltop, we dont even know what a normal week is suppose to look like at this point.

ginger lemonade

Dominic was sick this week so i went to walmart and bought all the things you buy when someone is sick ...excpept ginger ale.

the kid hates soda, he says its too spicy.

so instead i bough a box of english breakfast tea, a lemon and a ginger root.

a relatively small ginger root.

but it doesnt take much ginger root to make an acceptable ginger tea, so now i have a chunk of ginger root.

this being the very first time i have ever worked with a real ginger root, i decided to start experimenting.

i consulted google.

then mixed up a batch of minced ginger, the juice of one lemon and a big squirt of honey in my empty *tear* kombucha bottle.

let it sit overnight in the fridge then mixed it wit as much seltzer water as the bottle would hold, about 14 oz.

i strained this through a coffee filter and chilled it.

the results...YUM.