So the other night, when I was with my family, my sister-in-law was taking the baby up to bed when, without thinking, I said, "’Night Ryder!" I laughed and then said it again. Hah! I crack myself up. I think he should name his first car "Kit".
Month: December 2006
The Tastes of Philly
Yesterday afternoon I arrived safely at the Philadelphia airport. I had a couple-hour wait because I was hitchin’ a ride to my parents’ place with my brother and his family, who were flying in from Chicago. Salivating about the Philly cheesesteaks my mom was going to
make for dinner, I was still a bit hungry as I was walking to get my baggage. Then, it was like Heaven opened up…the King of Pizza place was right in front of me, selling fabulous slices of authentic Philly-Italian pizza.
*Side story…if you’ve never heard, I’m not a big fan of pizza where I live in Metro Detroit. We’ve got Buddy’s and Amicci’s, which are both decent. But all the other places-the franchises? Oh man, nothing compares to real, good, authentic pizza made by an Italian family in Philly. I tend to just call it "pizza-shop pizza". The crust, the sauce, the seasonings…I even think the cheese is better MMMMM….(Same effect in New York:)
Anyway, I hadn’t had pizza this good in a year-since the last time I was here! It was so good I had to resist the temptation not to have another slice, but with God’s grace, I made it through. I continued to stand strong, but it was definitely a little tougher with the cheesesteaks later on….:) (Thanks Mom!)
**I’d also like to follow up my enjoyment of Philly food with some inspiration…I jogged 3 times this week! 🙂
Beating my Body
Just walked in from a quick jog. I’m beat.
Last night I worked out at Curves and was ultra-motivated to jog. So I went to my friend Jamie’s house and used her treadmill. My goal was simple-one mile. It was during this time that I realized just how out of it I was. I don’t have the guts to even write about the whole experience. Nonetheless, by the grace of God, I accomplished my simple goal. 🙂
This morning, being my first day off (woo hoo!) I was supposed to get up and work out. My body laughed in my face and said, "Not after what you did to me last night!" All day I’ve been fighting with myself, knowing that I need to be determined to do this thing. I am committed! So, with less time to acutally exercise, I went out for a jog anyway. It was only for 15 minutes and I have no idea how far I went, but I took Paul’s verse about "beating his body" in a physical sense…because my body was certainly not in line with my heart.
My New Look at Bible Study
I just finished my 2 month study on the book of Isaiah, which in its 66 books has an abundance of lessons to learn. I have been intrigued by history (although I’ve never been a great history student, remembering facts) and in reading through this book I have seen God’s presence in the past, in my present and in the future of all of us! 
In my desire to understand more about different events, thoughts, prophesies, et
c. in the Bible, I have asked for a chronological Bible for Christmas. I really, really hope I get it.:)
This past year I woke up on January 1, went to church and asked God to change specific things in my life. Crazy things happen when we ask for change…He does it! Well, I’m still a work-in-progress, but He’s been consistent with these changes, that’s for sure. No longer do New Years resolutions have anything to do with who I’ve been in the past. They have much more to do with who God is creating me to be.
Since I was little I’ve been a Bible-reader. I was challenged to read the Bible through in Missionettes and in JH/high school my youth pastors challenged us to stay strong in the Word. During Bible college I not only read the Bible, but took classes on how to study the Bible. I must be awesome at it now! Not so. The more I read the Bible, the more ignorant I realize I am about this holy Word of God.
So, even before January 1, 2007, I am asking God to help me understand the Bible on a deeper level this year. I’m praying that as I dive into the Word in this chronological order I will be able to see how different things play into each other in Scripture and in history. I want to see those moments in Psalms when David prayed for God’s strength and then received them somewhere in 1 Samuel…you know, the cause and effect.
Looking forward to another year of life-change-although I’m honestly hoping it’s not quite as hard to walk through as this past year, but, whatever it takes. 🙂
Jingle Bells
Friends are so great! This past Sunday night I got to hang out with
some of my coolest friends-and I even got to make a new friend in the
process. We had our annual CotK Christmas Challenge and our team was
"Jingle Bells". We did a picture scavenger hunt around Southfield and
our team didn’t do too bad-we came in 3rd place. We definitely had a
blast though. Here’s a recap:
Christy, Mark and Chris-sportin’ Michigan State gear (good thing Mark had his State hat with him…even though he goes to UMD)
Here we have Brad, Eddie, me, Andrea and Mark-with 12 reindeer When I first saw this picture I
though, "Wow, I’m really short!" Then I realized that I was crouching down for some reason. Perhaps I thought my head would be cut off if I didn’t.
Jason and Richie are "on Santa’s lap"…I’m not sure if actually got points for this one.
Richie, Andrea, Christy and Katie-all piled in (and ON) a buggy…otherwise known as a "shopping cart", outside of the Metro Detroit area
Mark, Jason, me and Brad-we’re standing in a puddle…really, we are. I’m not sure why I was making
that face-probably telling someone how to use my camera:)
This is everyone on our team except Andrea, who took the picture. If you look closely, Brad’s the baby Jesus, Chris is a sheep, Christy, Mark and I are wisemen, KT is Mary (or is Eddie, Mary?) I think Richie and Jason are shepherds.
Sometimes I wonder if Jesus just sits in Heaven and laughs at us, with the crazy things we do. 🙂 He’s up there sayin’, "Yep, that looks just like what happened! Hehehehehe, those are my silly kids."
Here we are at the after-party-me and my Khalil…those cheeks!
What an incredible and memorable night spent with some of my favorite people! Thanks for a great time!
****My disclaimer-I’m sorry the captions don’t line up with the pictures too well. I have had to reformat this thing over and over again for the past 20 minutes (aka-way too much time to spend on this:) Maybe God’s trying to teach me something about my desire for perfection?
I Lied…
It’s confession time. I lied today. I’m not a liar and I hate that I did it but I couldn’t think quick enough, and to be honest, looking back now I don’t know what else I could’ve said.
We did the Secret Santa thing at work and at the end of last week we revealed ourselves. I won’t dive into the fact that I didn’t get hardly anything on the days leading up to the "reveal" day, mostly because I had a blast giving things to the guy I was a SS to.
So on Friday my SS revealed herself to me by coming into my room and giving me my final "big" present. She handed it to
me and said that she hoped I liked it. I said that I was pretty content with anything and that I’m sure I’d like it. It was busy in my classroom, so I didn’t take the time to open the gift right then. When I finally opened it, to my shock (and horror) I had received a bag full of Jean Nate products. Included was a bottle of perfume, lotion, body spray and a thing of powder (w/ puff). Powder? Do women use that stuff? I remember having some when I was little and I thought it was so grown up to use, but nowadays…yeah, I don’t think so.
And I won’t even mention that the perfume box had doodles all over it. If you look closely to the upper right corner of the transparent box, you’ll see the $9.99 price tag. Classy.
I certainly wasn’t going to wear the stuff, nor was I going to re-gift such a hideous thing. So that night we gave it away as a white elephant gift at our Christmas party. (Christy, I’ll be smelling you to see if you’re wearing it!) Well, this morning the lady asked me if I liked the scent. My reply? Immediately I thought of a great reply…"Oh, thank you so much for the gift!" Then I kind of turned to walk away, when she asked again, "Oh, well did you like it?" I smiled and said, "Yeah!" I am all for honesty, but in that moment I couldn’t think of the right words! Perhaps I could’ve said, "It’s an interesting smell!" But any bright person could see right through that remark.
In conclusion, if you’re looking to get me anything for Christmas, I love giftcards. 🙂
Happy Feet
Nope! I’m not talking ab
out the movie.
Here I am at Caribou (as always, working hard on a Saturday night:). This guy comes in and sits in
the comfy chair diagonally from me, in front of the fire. He didn’t buy anything (and he’s clearly not with anyone), so I thought for a second that that was rude. But other than that, no big deal…until he decided to take his shoes off and put them up on the public newspaper basket (feet in the basket)! Good night! Where does this guy think he is?
Just since I started writing this post, he put down his book and literally curled up on the chair…as if he’s in front of a real fire, in his own home.
Hey, Buddy, I feel for ya if you don’t have a fireplace of your own. I’m there with ya, but let’s just get for real here…you’re in a public coffee shop! No one wants to see your lovely, stained socks. We’re just not that close.
His Royal Throne
Last night I had a conversation with someone about guarding our hearts. I was sharing some of my own failures in that area and about how I was realizing that the purpose of us guarding our hearts had to do with others, and not just ourselves. It’s an area that I’ve never really been good at and when I’ve failed I have usually only seen the fatalities in my own life. Yes, folks, everything revolves around me...in case you didn’t already know that. I have tended to neglect how my unguarded heart could possibly hurt another person, directly or indirectly.
This morning I saw this on a deeper level, as I was worshipping and getting ready for work. Listening to the song, "Take my Life and Let it Be", I was captured by these lines:
Take my will and make it Thine,
It shall be no longer mine;
Take my heart, it is Thine own,
It shall be Thy royal throne.
Once again, I simply stopped and listened to words that God was using to penetrate my heart. My heart isJesus’ throne. Why does it take me so long to put these things together? It’s like, I need to not only guard my heart because, well, I’m a girl :), or even for the sake of other people. My King lives on the throne of my heart. He’s royalty! He deserves for me to protect that special place that holds us together…my heart.
Let Go
Ladies and Gentlemen, I have recently stumbled upon an amazing gospel singer named DeWayne Woods. You’ve gotta check this guy out! I referenced him a couple weeks ago when I talked about a song that kept coming across my path, "Let Go." After searching for awhile, I ended up finding him on myspace. The song that led me to this guy was that one song though, "Let Go." It goes something like this:
…as soon as I stop worryin’, worryin’ how the story ends, when I let go and I let God, let God have His way…that’s when things start happenin’…when I stop lookin’ at back when…when I let go and I let God have His way…
Awesome stuff. I am constantly looking at my story and wondering how this next chapter is going to look. After all, I’m the type of person who regularly enjoys reading the beginning of a story and then the end of a story, only to go back and read the middle later. I’m well aware of my final end, once I reach eternity. I’m as aware as the Bible helps me to be anyway. But there are always going to be several subplots to the stories of our lives. The current story…not so sure how it’s going to end and I wonder about it a lot. This song speaks to my heart about letting go, very well. I have played it often these last couple of weeks, and it has served as a reminder to pray 🙂
Be encouraged to do the same. Let go and let God…it’s a common phrase, but fitting words for any life.
The Sullivan Kids
It’s late and I’m tired, but I really wanted to publicly announce just how much I love hangin’ out with Sullivan kids! Tonight I had the pleasure of watching them (this is no sarcastic pleasure…it’s pure pleasure). Jonathon had us cracking up at the dinner table, doing his funny imitations (gee, Tal, wonder where he gets that from!). He had Allison laughing so hard that I thought she was going to choke on her salad! Seriously, I was going over the heimlich in my head, just in case. She almost fell out of her chair. Then we watched their favorite music videos (Rudolph and Frosty songs). We sang and danced around together with the claymation characters. Allison’s facial expressions almost topped the ones she had when we watched a few clips from Cars a few weeks ago.
I helped Annaliese brush out her wig for her Lucy character, which she’ll debut this Sunday at church. Jonathon showed me what he described as like the coolest thing ever…a book light. It thrilled him, so I was pumped about it. 😉 We read a Flinstones ABC book (Ally’s choice) and they went to bed.
Good times…I love those kids!
Memoirs of a Redhead 
