The Chronicles of Melinda

So here’s the deal…

My roommate closed on her house last week and has officially moved out.  She’s got a few things left to get…but she and her animals have vacated and moved on up.  Praise God for helping her find the place of her dreams.  Or at least a place that’s great for her.  I have yet to visit.  Our schedules are so off.  She works only weekends, I am off on weekends.  I work all week, she is off all week.  But I’m sure we’ll pull a housewarming soon.  I’m getting used to the newfound space again.  Two people’s stuff takes up a lot of space so it’s already startinig to look more spacious.

Taira has officially moved into and sleeps in her new Tarheel Blue room.  She was hit or miss sleeping up there as long as she could bring a dog with her. But she got a new kitten and for some reason the little purrrrrring box makes her feel safe up there.  All her stuff is in her own space now. Woo hoo!

Cleaning up the yard.  Getting things moved around and bushhogged and considering another Summer Camp.  Hmmmmm….

God is being pretty great right now.  Blessing me in so many ways.

God put the book BOUNDARIES on the $5.00 Perks list for me at the Family Christian Store.  He must be trying to tell me something.  I know I have trouble setting them.  BTW - you need to go check out all the 50% off stuff at FSC.  Good stuff!

Announcing at a benefit horse show this weekend.  Taira wants to take her horse so that will keep her busy.  I love announcing.  It’s gonna be fun.  ‘Bout to get back in the swing of showing a little, too.  Money is tight..gotta pick and choose.

We are working Animal Cruelty cases like crazy at AC.  Got a busy week in court coming up.  Justice for the animals.

The warm weather is finally here.  Lovin’ it!  Everything is so green (and yellow). 

Been doing a bit of bowling with the family lately.  Bowling is fun.  You don’t even have to be good at it for it to be fun.  Have you gone bowling lately?  I think it would be a fun small group activity.  Thinking of coordinating an outing for the teens to go bowling.

Have come to a bit of a crossroads in my life…but it’s a good one.  And it feels like whichever direction I go will be good.  God is good! 

Hey - have you blogged lately?  I bet you Twittered?

On another note - gotta give a food recommendation.  Hit up ANDY’S which just opened up not long ago near the Super Wal-Mart in HIllsborough. (It’s a Statewide chain, but this one is closest to me.)  They are an old fashioned type diner with great burgers, hot dogs, cheesesteaks and frozen custard Sundaes and shakes.  Someone opens the door to let you in, when you walk in they give you a much more energetic “WELCOME TO ANDY’S” from EVERY person that works there.  They have old fashioned diner type seating and the waitresses all wear poodle skirts (complete with the poodle) and pony tails.   The likes of James Dean and Marilyn Monroe don the walls in addition to an old fashioned wall mural of back then diner times.  And the burger—–well mine was off the chain.  I could go for one right now, but I’m on a diet this week. So someone go have one for me.  They also have this Big A. Challenge burger of like - 7 patties with 3 or 4 toppings in between a bun and if you can eat it with fries and a drink it’s FREE and they put your name on the website for all the world to see.  Of course if you don’t….it’s $21.99.  LOL!  I don’t think I’ll be trying that anytime soon since I’m officially trying to eat better.  But hey - let me know if you do!  If you don’t like it….well….I do! LOL!

Alright - 15 minutes and counting and I’m heading to the orthopaedics to get the 411.  Pray for me!

But one thing I am glad about - is that when it comes to GOD there is no chain of command.  He’s the big cheese, the head man in charge, the big dawg….and I like knowing that I can go directly to Him for ANYTHING.  I don’t have to go through a line of people to communicate with Him…and it’s nice to know He’s not afraid to communicate with me in His own ways.

So whether you work in a political field or a private business…just remember that when it comes to God…there’s no chain of command.  Go straight to Him.  He has a true Open Door policy.  And the good thing is…even if you go to Him and question Him or you’re angry with Him…you won’t get fired.  He wants to hear eveyrthing you have to say to Him …the good and the bad.

1 John 5:14-15
¹⁴This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
1 Peter 3:12
¹²For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer,

James 4:8-10
⁸Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. ¹⁰Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

Philippians 4:6-7
⁶Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. ⁷And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Hey- did you know that Pictochat is apparently the 5th grade version of Twitter and texting?  Give a bunch of 5th graders Nintendo DS and apparently they can communicate in their own little chat rooms.  That kept them busy.  Well that in addition to the DVD’s shown on the bus TVs.  So I joined other parents in grabbing a few extra zzzzzzs on the bus.  One rest stop in between and we arrived in Arapahoe at the Don Lee Center for half a day of educational waterfront fun at a neat christian camp.  The kids explores soils, reptiles and the affects of humans on the water environments.  They even dissected a fish….ewww.  But they sure had fun doing it.  We had lunch there…and man I could go for some right now.  We had fried chicken, lima beans, corn on the cob, mashed potatoes, salad and cake.  Did I mention I could go for some of that right now?

Then we loaded up and got on the ferry and headed to Ft. Macon.  You know I have been to Morehead City twice and didn’t venture to check out Ft. Macon.  Boy did I miss out.  It was fun exploring with some rambunctious 5th graders and we watched a SNOOPY NOSE (as we called them when I was growing up) Coast Guard helicopter land on the base nearby.  Loaded up the bus….then headed to the Sanitary Fish Market.  The food there was pretty good, but I was most impressed with the service.  We packed in a whole lotta kids and hungry adults and the servers were on their game.

After filling them up…we headed to the hotel.  I was assigned 2 kids to my room in addition to Taira.  We settled in then headed to Dunkin Donuts/Baskin Robbins for a snack and back to the hotel we went.  Okay- at one point I had TWENTY ONE kids in my room.  Good thing is - we were next to the electrical storage room and the room next door was empty.  We were making up raps about each kid and just having fun.  Then we ended up heading to another room and hung out there before heading back to our room for some American Idol, showers and downtime.  We got back to our room JUST in time for teacher room check.  HA HA! 

I made some 5th grade fans.  Several of the kids told Taira “your mom is soooo cool!”  It was fun being the cool mom for a couple of days.  Other parents noted how my kid WANTED me sitting with her and her friends cuz theirs didn’t want them anywhere near them! LOL!  Hey- a day in the life of being a “cool” mom.  What can I say?

Well….up and at ‘em early for another fun filled day.  Headed to the hotel rooms continental breakfast and then took the kids for 30 minutes of running on the beach and collecting shells.  One of the boys was stomping on washed up jelly fish and it was cute when one of the girls said “HEEEEY!  THAT’S GOD’S CREATURE NOT YOURS!”  Amen girl!

Headed to the Aquarium at Pine Knoll Shores.  Saw a fun educational program on and met a real live sea turtle.  He was cute!  I want one!  HA HA!  Didn’t have too much time after that before we had to head back to Ft. Macon for a Muskett Firing.  Ever been to one?  Okay ONE muskett is loud as the crowd at Sunday morning worship at NHC….but can you imagine multiplying that by the hundreds?  The ranger that did the presentation was also quite funny!

Now - after the muskett firing we headed to Historic Beaufort and got tours of the old buildings.  We checked out the jail, the apothecary and doctor’s office and the courthouse and I have to say…it was really interesting.  I might even go there again on my own free time!  Then we headed to the Maritime Museum and checked out some cool 411 on boats before loading up the buses and hittin’ the road to home.

Took a nap before one stop to McDonald’s in Kinston for dinner and again…impressed at rapid service to two busloads of 5th graders, parent chaperones and teachers!  One thing I did notice….the kids always got rowdier after they got fed! LOL!  But back on the bus they were back to pictochatting and The Ant Bully on the movie screen and it was rather peaceful.  I didn’t even sleep on the way back.  Arrival time to Pathways…9:00PM and you’d think we went straight home…but nope — - Wal Mart bound! LOL!   Got home around 11:00PM and then finally settled in for some R&R AND had Friday off to recuperate so woo hoo!

Here’s something I noticed.  You put a bunch of 5th graders together you get to notice the social order.  The “popular” kids and the “loners”.    The groups that stuck together and the one kid who tried to be part of the group only to be subtly and sometimes obviously rejected.  I paid attention to the loners because I kind of related them to those people right outside the doors of the church waiting for someone to offer them a gesture of acceptance.  I harp on the whole “clique” thing in the christian sense.  I remember specifically deliverring a message to the Spiked teens about being sure they were not missing an opportunity to make someone feel welcome in the christian “circle” by failing to notice those standing right outside their cliques.  Like my favorite Christian video - Does Anybody Hear Her. I just wonderred…if it’s that obvious in a group of 5th graders why is it sometimes not so obvious to a group of adults that there’s someone RIGHT THERE that might fall through the cracks….Just something to chew on!

Oh yeah- and another cool thing.  I got to connect with a few other parents and engage in some christian conversation.  When we passed NHC I mentioned “there goes our church” and this triggered a conversation and an invitation to NHC by a fellow parent who mentioned they were consdiering checking it out.  Seems they like our kind of church…so hopefully we’ll see them there soon!  Why do I get so excited when I get to talk about NHC and all of our cool environments, a cool Senior Pastor delivering life relevant messages and of course….what God is doing through the whole church and my involvement in Student Ministries?  Well…needless to say….I like it!

We fed Dave LIVE to the teens upstairs in Spiked on Sunday morning, which was something totally new and awesome.   We greeted them at the door with FREE Monster drinks and got them all hyped up!  Then Dave gave them a shout out and they got to watch his message live on the big screen without ever leaving the Spiked Space.  How about then we gave out Easter Eggs and one lucky teen got the golden…okay…silver egg that got them paid $100.00 cash.  How about it was a first time teen that got it AND right before we gave out the eggs…he got saved!  It doesn’t get much more awesome than that.

Sunday afternoon after leaving the church I loaded up to leave and snagged a Spiked teen for the day to come with us and we decided to be nosey and check the progress on the previously one soon to be two lane bridge construction.  Well God must have sent me there because we got out of the car and I just happened to look to my left at a box in the ditch and out popped a little orange kitten head.  Somebody taped up the box and dumped it there.  I’d like to HOPE they meant for someone to find them, like the construction team, but it was at a spot where there’s no traffic right now due to the construction.  Well there wasn’t one…but THREE kittens in the box when we broke it open.  Needless to say they rode home with us.  Kitten anyone?

Got the kittens bedded down and fed and started playing with the horses.  The kids rode three horses and I rode the four wheeler loaded with worms and fishing rods and we headed to the pond out back.  The fish were biting much better yesterday than they were Saturday when we headed back there.  (It was cooler Saturday).  They weren’t very big, but I have to say it was nice and peaceful back there listening to the quite sounds of nature and the peaceful setting of a still pond.  Only to be interrupted by a very excited Taira who was so discouraged that momma was catching all the fish to suddenly get a bite on her line to reel in a fish of her own. Then…a few minutes later she caught another.  Granted - they weren’t very big - size of your hand maybe…but it was still fun!

After packing up we headed back to the house, put the horses up and headed back to HIllsborough to drop off my Spiked teen.  Then it was home for R&R and I have to say….I was beat.  Cuz the kids were playing video games and I was playing the back of my eyelids!!!!

We will be hurt by someone in our family, our friends, our “so-called” friends, co-workers and even strangers.  And I think we tend to remember our hurts a whole lot more than we remember those good things people have done for us. 

The same person who hurt us may do something good for us….but somehow we let the hurt be stronger than the memory of good.  Why is that so?

We have to choose to work on that on our own accord.  But I’m not saying it’s not hard.  But someone sent me this very cool e-mail today so I thought I would share.

Two friends were walking through the desert. During some point of the journey, they had an argument; and one friend slapped the other one in the face.

Learn to write your hurts in the sand and to carve your benefits in stone.

Yeah - it’s someone that when I met them they weren’t even attending a church.  So yeah - I think it’s a big deal that they’re going all in with this.

Hopefully you have agreed to join Dave on the 10 day prayer journey.  Here’s the memo for day 1:

Today the prayer focus is for your family. With the hussle and bustle of each day sometmes we forget to cherish the time we have with them. Take today to focus on the blessings God has given to your family and ask Him how you can serve each family member better.

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• @Dougbug24 You know you missed it! 09:26:36 PM November 23, 2009 from web in reply to Dougbug24