Regionals

Went to Regionals with my kids last week for speech club last week.  Man was that fun.  I am always so filled with hope and excitement for the future when I see all these young, fired up Christians who are so well versed in God's word and in what is going on in the world around them.  I am blessed by how much talent is getting ready to go out in the world and impact all areas with their enthusiasm for life and God.  Mine included! 
It was fun to come home, more fun even, and listen to the kidos tell stories of their adventures.  They had so much fun.  The kidos that stayed home know most of the people that my speechers were talking about and laughed til they cried.  We were up to the wee hours sharing.  It really will be nice when we all get to go together to these things. 
Alas, no one in our club made it to Nationals.  The kidos are so gracious though, no tears, no anger, no real disappointment.  In fact, mine were not surprised, having learned how to self judge each round they did, which was correctly reflected in their judge ballots.  I think I was probably more sad than they were.  Oh well, there is always next year.
One of my speechers was asked by another parent if they would do speech club next year if I didn't force them to.  I can't begin to tell you how excited and proud I was when they said after a bit of pondering, yes.  I'm glad they see the value in it as much as I do.
So with that, I am ready to expand our club again.  I feel confident in leading club, seeing as half of our club made it to Regionals this year. (Even if there were only three kids there ^.^)  I have talked to a bunch of other successful club leaders and champion speechers to think I have a handle on what to do next year.  The power of association is so awesome.  Both for me and for my kidos.

The Me Inside of Me

So here I am dieting again.
I'm actually loosing a significant amount of weight here.
But it's not fair.
See, I took a genetic test to find out what type of diet I need to be on.  It is part of system that I purchased.  Did you know your genetics can determine weight loss?  Here is the not fair part.  The test came back and said that my body doesn't process fat well.  Hence, it is stuck all over my body.  It said that for me to actually lose weight I have to cut fat and most meat out of my diet.  It said I need to get protein from plant sources.  And most of all it said that I should eat lots of vegetables.  By the pound I "get" to eat vegetables.  Yup.  Vegetables.  Those things I hate.  A lot.  Always have.  That is the unfair part.  Hmm wonder if that is why I look like I do though.  Wonder if that is why most of the diets I have ever been on never worked, they were mostly protein based. 
One plus is that I am not that limited on carbs.  Now I have yet had potato as part of the meal plan and most "white foods"  are not included, but I like brown rice and with all these gluten free kids around here, there are lots of other choices for pasta.  I miss french fries though. And baked potatoes.  And tator tots.  Yeah, I really miss tator tots.
The other thing the test told me is that my body needs to do high intensity exercises to lose weight.  No gentle walks, no matter how far I go, are going to work for me as well as a high intensity shorter work out.  In fact, with the 12 pounds I've lost, it has come totally from a ten minute work out that gets me really huffing and puffing.   Which is good considering how much trouble my feet are still giving me. 
I have a website that keeps track of my calories, micro nutrients, exercise, and measurements.  It is sure nice to see the graphs with everything going down. 
It was pretty hard at first.  Mainly because I had to eat more calories, which means a lot more food than I was used to.  In the past I didn't eat enough and then it was all the wrong type of things so my body was in starvation mode.  I'm trying to get up to 1500 calories.  I get close most days although I have had a few under 1000. 
As much as I have foods that I miss, and that I really don't care for vegis, I am really happy with the changes I'm seeing.  I feel so much better.  For my birthday my sweetheart and I went to Red Robin for dinner.  I got the same burger I always get but instantly cut it in half and boxed it up.  I had it for 2 meals and the next day I felt yucky.  My stomach was all distended and I had potty issues.  For two days!!  So I haven't done that again and I feel all better.  And I am more alert and awake.  I think that is because I have been more diligent about taking all my vitamins. 
Whatever is working, I am grateful.  I am looking forward to showing everyone the me I see inside of me.

Look Who's Home

  My sweetheart was once an army man. When we got married, he had been on active duty. Two-ish years later he got out and we started our lives as civilians. It was quite a transition going from one side of the barbed wire to the other. Still, I am thankful that I never had my sweetheart go off to war
.
  Today's military families are almost guaranteed to be deployed. I have a dear friend whose family has experienced this. For almost a year her husband was in a desert, doing whatever the military told him to do. Of course, his time there was intense and life changing. It was the same in a different way for the family he left here as well.

  Finally, her man was coming home. For weeks, the day was changed, sometimes sooner, mostly later. Then the time kept changing, sometimes sooner, sometimes later. She was just a bit crazy at the end. Finally the day was here and she needed someone to take pictures for her. So here is a time line and a few pics of what happened that day.

10:00 am His plane lands at 3:45
11:30 am They just called, his plane lands at 1:45....ahhhhhhhh!
12:00 pm I get to her house and keep the children busy while she puts on the finishing touches. They made some awesome signs.

1:15 pm We left her house. There just happens to be a bus in front of us, could it be him? Nope, it turned.
1:30 pm We get to the gym and find some seats up front. There were coloring books and girl scout cookies provided to snack on while we waited. The big blue gym curtain comes down in the middle of the room.

1:45 pm They announce the plane is running late. My friend is about to pop.
2:15 pm We watch the plane land at the airfield on a screen in the front of the room
2:30 pm We watch as the soldiers file off the plane. Throughout the room we would hear little bursts of cheers as one family after another would catch sight of their soldier.
3:00 pm Continuing bursts of cheers and tears as more and more people see their soldiers as they sign their paperwork and turn in their gear. Still seen on the screen at the front of the room.
3:15 pm The army guy comes out and says time to wait, here watch this movie in a gym full of hyper excited children and adults. My friend is bouncing on her metal folding chair.

3:45 pm The guy comes out again and says this is what is going to happen. We can hear boots on the other side of the curtains. We have to all stay behind the yellow line. My friend squeezes me so hard that I think there is a bruise. I've never seen a yellow line so full of toes. My friends kids toes are on that yellow line.

I only knew the man for a few months before he left and I am still super excited.  I don't know how she can stand it.
3:55 pm The curtain goes up and there they stand.
And in the roar of the crowd I can hear my friend whispering to her family, there he is, third row on the end. The tears start flowing. He can see them too. He is flowing too.
4:00 pm The guy finally stops talking and dismisses the troops. My friend is just standing there.  The time has finally arrived. "Go, go, go!" I yell. They take off.

I am so blessed. The reunion of a family that has become a part of my own. Just so you know, giving a emotional menopausal woman a camera and asking her to take pictures is a bit crazy. I did get a few good ones.

  After the last picture, I said good-bye and slipped away. All around me families were laughing and crying. Soldiers were meeting their new little ones for the first time. Young lovers once again in each other's arms. All the way to the parking lot, families were holding on like they were never letting go.

  My family was one of many that was blessed with being able to support my friend. She came through this with flying colors. Her family weathered the experience with grace and courage. She inspires me in many ways. She allowed me to be a part of one of the most special days of both her and my life.

Movie Review with Spoilers for Les Mis

Movie Review!

I like musicals.  I like musicals with big sets, beautiful costumes and stunning voices.  I like musicals that move me.  I like to go out understanding what the heck just happened in there
. 
I went to see Les Mis.(Can't figure out how to make my keyboard do that fancy s thing) 

The sets were amazing. I would love to have a coat like Inspector Javert's.  The cinamatography was stunning.  The sets complemented the movie and as magnificent as they were, did not distract. The teeth make up was pretty cool.  The rest of the make up was simplistically real. Some of the performances moved me.

And yet....

At the risk of offending all my artsy friends..
.
I didn't get it. 

Like I don't get poetry, except for limericks, I get those.

Some of the things I didn't think I would like, like Russel Crowe, I loved.  I listened to too many reviews.  I really enjoyed his voice and acting.  But what I didn't get was why he committed suicide.
Yeah, really didn't get that. 
And I think I wanted to be sad for him but when he made that crunch sound, all sad feelings went away and all I was left with was ewww!

I liked Ann Hathaway.  Didn't expect the graphicness of the awful things she suffered.  But truly felt bad for her character.  Her voice matched the rawness of Fantine's experience.

My favorite characters had to be Carter and Cohen as the Thenardiers.  Consistently funny and foul throughout. 

The young actors and singers were really good.  I look forward to seeing many of them in other things. 

Notice who I didn't mention.
Mmmhmm.
Yup.
Didn't like him.
Not much anyway.
He had moments.
His acting was amazing.  I will give him that.  I think he really captured the complexity of Valjean.  I think I  listened to too many reviews again.  Maybe if my expectations hadn't been so high, I would not have been so...underwhelmed. 

I'm assuming that there were a lot of metaphors that I just didn't get.  The candlesticks were pretty easy.  The barricade, not so much.

So there I was at the end, weeping quietly, the only time I wept, and was feeling all emotional about him going to heaven and all, and then there was this barricade.

What?

And all the dead people are singing the revolution song.
They lost and all died for not.
Why are they so happy now?
I don't get it.

I read this review, an honest opinion of the movie.  I guess I should have listened.  I too wondered why all the cockney accents in France.

Oh, and don't take kids.  Not appropriate.  We don't celebrate Christmas, but how they treated Santa was just wrong.  Way too much raunch and graphic raunch for kids.  I found myself trying to cover my twenty year old's eyes, and she is twenty. 

Back in the Saddle Again

It is time to start blogging again.  To be honest, I got into sort of a rut, doing the same thing day after day and not really finding anything to be excited or joyful about.  It wasn't bad, or sad, or depressing, just sort of blah.  In all honesty, I think I forgot to see the blessing in the mundane.  We had no major trauma, no deaths, to big changes.

But we did get to go to Vegas and visit my mom for Thanksgiving.  We had a beautiful trip, visiting friends along the way.  We got to see a few of the amazing hotels and the fantastic fountains at the Bilagio.  We went out to the Red Rock National Park and spent a day climbing rocks and looking at God's incredible creation.  We were able to visit one day with my sweetheart's family. The kids took turns between staying with us in the hotel and staying at Grandma's house.  We even got to go to a chocolate factory.  We traveled by car the whole trip and had no vehicle challenges what so ever. We drove into good weather where ever we went, with rain or snow behind us or in front of us.   We had plenty of money to do the things we wanted to do.  What a blessing.  We even did laundry the whole time we were there so I didn't have a boat load to do after being gone so long. 

We did start our speech club.  I must say I was a bit nervous going into this.  I was not able to find my materials or contact list for a long time.  I was not able to procure a building.  I was not confident at all that I was going to pull it off.  But it all came together.  We have a small club with three families and some gifted young people that meet at my house.  (Which means my house gets mostly clean once a week ^.^) We went to our first competition and Josh moved on to Regionals with one of his speeches.  The rest of the kids did much better than they thought they would and had a fun time.  Enough so that they are already prepping for the next tournament with excitement and joy. 

Our schul moms got together and started a Yeshiva.  This is definitely something I was praying for.  I so struggle with foreign languages and Hebrew is so different from English. With one who had never really attended Yeshiva getting ready for her Bat Mitzvah, this was such a relief and blessing.  Now they are all learning Hebrew or brushing up on everything they forgot they knew.  The Yeshiva also includes a Bible study. We have studied the fruit of the Spirit and are now working on the armor of God. I have been teaching the 4 to 8 year olds their aleph bet.  Easy and slow for my mind ^.^.  I have been working with the 13+ year olds in the Bible study.  Again, this has been scary and amazing at the same time.  Teens have never been my favorite, until mine became them things.  It has become such a joy.  Watching how they are growing into mighty women and men of God has been so rewarding.  To see them open their Bibles and read and try to make sense of God's word, applying it to their lives and seeing the consequences of their behavior in God's eyes is so fulfilling.  Wow.  They are wonderful.  They made a totally fun video for Hanukah, creating and performing a song. I am so proud of them.

Chicken owning has left the honey moon phase.  We still love the chickens and get much joy from them.  We watched them go through a molt.  That was weird.  Raw meat running around the backyard o.O.  We expanded the pen and they no longer roam around free in the backyard.  I got tired of stepping out the back door into giant puddles of chicken poo.  How do such small animals make so much poo? Any way, they now have a nice big pen and are full of feathers again.  We are still getting eggs even if they are smaller.  We have also determined that they are not nearly as smart as we gave them credit for.  Even with it being so cold and wet outside, they have been "forgetting" to get into their house at night. The kids have to go check every evening to make sure they get in.  The one night we didn't get home til midnight, Em and my sweetheart went out to check on them and found four of the five still outside.  One of them was so cold that when the others went in their house, she didn't move and he was able to just pick her up.  They brought her in, we wrapped her in a towel and fed her some meal worms and she perked up.  Stupid chicken.

So you see, I have had lots to be thankful for.  Living life day to day, I forgot to look at the big picture and see the blessing instead of the day to day drudge that makes it all happen.  In honor of the season of New Year resolutions that I seldom make, I am going to work hard at looking up from the drudge of every day and see the blessing that is the big picture.

Rant about Politcal Thugs

Rant time.

So yesterday, the kidos and I went to Fort Nisqually Historical Park with some friends and had a blast. Of course, I have no camera and the phone pics just didn't come out, so no pics. The kids had a great time and I hope learned a little something there too.

On the way there, we were struck by the number of political signs in the median. Most were for Democrats. Hmmm. I know that my husband had put a bunch of the signs of the Republican candidate he is working with up in those same areas. So had the other Republican candidates. But for the most part, they were gone. Curious don't you think.

Then on the way home, the kidos notice piles, and more than one, of pulled up signs on the side of the road. I dropped them off at the corner and had them run back and pick up any of the signs that belong to our candidate. I know how much those things cost. And how much time and energy it takes to get them up. All the way home we picked them up. There were a bunch of signs, not just ours, broken, torn or thrown in the streets. Most of them had R's on them.

My kids were flabbergasted. How do I explain this to them? How do I explain that the other side is so afraid that their message isn't strong enough to stand on its own that they need to remove all signs of opposition. How do I explain that the other side is so tolerant of multiple ideas, unless they disagree with them of course. How do I explain that the other side wants people to have choices, as long as it is one that they choose. Aargggghhh.

But on the other hand, I am so happy that my kidos have taken ownership of their government. They are more aware of what is going on and what is at stake. As they picked up the signs, they were waving them as they walked down the sidewalk to get back to the car. As we continued on the drive, whenever they saw the signs of our candidate, they would shout, in the car mind you, "There is one of our signs!"

So there you go, rant.

Vote for David "Ike" Eichner!

Fourth of July

Of all the non-biblical holidays, the Fourth of July has always been my favorite.

I guess that makes my oldest daughter's birthday appropriate. Yup, a firecracker baby.

I grew up in a military family and on many different posts. I grew up listening to the Army band march around the neighborhoods playing John Philip Sousa music. I remember decorating my bike with streamers and wearing my colonial clothes riding or marching behind them. I also remember the local parades around the nation, from the small town of Hope, KS to the town of Morgan Hill, Ca and many others, where locals gather to celebrate. And I love, love, love fireworks! (Kinda my personality, big and loud ^.^)

I love the Fourth because it is a reminder that we live in such a great nation. (One of the best parts is that we can have dissenting opinions and still be free express them, so I won't argue that point with anyone.) It is a time that we can stand together as neighbors and just enjoy being Americans. A great big birthday party.

I think another reason I like it is that it is a time to be with family and friends. This year we partied with some great friends and were able to be on post with the great men and women who defend and fight for our country. We had so much fun. My favorite part was watching the kids on the climbing rock.

Look how high this little one got! It was amazing!

It was free ^.^ More courage than I have, that is for sure!

They got to pet lizards, bang on music makers, and run and play together before watching the Army put on a very patriotic show and fireworks. The weather was perfect, not something you say in the PNW very often, and the food was yummmmmmy. Em got her birthday pie.

It is everything I wanted my children to remember it being.