Good Days

Ah, what a wonderful morning I’ve had. I got up at 6. I made Vanilla Biscotti Coffee. And I sat down and engaged an old friend. I have a book I really love. I was looking for it before we moved. I couldn’t find it anywhere. I thought perhaps I had loaned it out and it hadn’t been returned. I was sad because for as much as I love it, I never can remember the title to tell someone about it—or to order a new one if I need it. (In fact I’m going to go get it so I can tell you the name.)

It’s called “Knowing Me Knowing God: Exploring Your Spirituality with Myers-Briggs.” In the prologue he identifies his thinking with Thomas Merton and sates: “I believe that the desire to please God does indeed please God, whether that desire is fulfilled or not.”

I liked that. And as I meditated on that thought I caught a ride on the tangential train. I was thinking about the way some of my books are like tools. I thought about how when Nelson was in construction. He wouldn’t start a job without his tools close at hand. Then I was stopped by a random thought: if I was only allowed five of my books, what five would I chose. This sent me, cup of coffee in hand, to the office where most of my books are randomly shelved.

It was so nice to check in with old friends! I scanned the shelves and considered which ones would be better suited for the active shelves at work. I pulled out a little stack. It will be fun to get reacquainted.

Work yesterday went well. One of the things that became a battle was my eating over the last few days. I had to really do battle with stress eating. There aren’t enough carbs on the face of the planet to quell that nervous feeling—but it seemed I was on a mission to try. Ugh! Having things go relatively smoothly yesterday and having several of the women who were working out tell me that I was doing well helped—a lot!

I went in about forty-five minutes early to make sure that I could get the music and “change stations now” CD to work. I figured that way if I couldn’t, I would still have time to call for help. When the day was done I left a running list of things I had questions about—there were 10 things on my list. All in all: a good day!

Today we have snow. And they’re calling for more of the same. Thankfully, the only day they aren’t calling for snow is Wednesday: the day I have to drive to my northern office. This is good news for the weather weenie!

Asher Day

My ankle is better. Only wore a brace one day. Never even bruised! Even more surprising to me was that I wasn't achy sore the next day. I'm going to attribute that to working out!

Classes went well last week. I do love teaching. This week at work I've spent a lot of time on the phone and typing different things on the computer.

I have my last training session at Curves tonight. Saturday I'll be flying solo. I don't worry about being out in the circuit with the ladies--it's the thought of answering the phone and not knowing the correct answer and doing the deposit. Guess I'll just do what I can and beg forgiveness and ignorance for what I mess up.

Today is Asher's first birthday! It should be a fun time of ripping paper, squeals of joy, and messy cake at my house tonight. Wish you all could join us. Annie is making a Nemo cake. Beth got him a zebra bouncy ride 'em thing, Annie got him a noisy toy that you shoot these balls through, I got him a zebra in a train car to go with a zoo train thing that he got for Christmas, Nemo PJ's, two sippy cups that have pop up straws (NO more spilling), and little slippers he probably won't keep on his feet, but since they were only $2 I thought I'd try.

Other Asher news: he's walking. It's so adorable. The new configuration of living room truly facilitated this. It's so hard to believe a year has gone by--they really do grow up too fast!

Go Boom

So I’m sitting here reading and thinking. I’m sitting here with my foot up. I fell last night. I was coming down the stairs holding Caden—he’s okay. I made sure of that. I, however, have an extremely sore ankle. I have full range of motion—I even went and worked out at Curves this morning (not going to use any excuses to not go), so I’m thinking it’s just nicely strained or sprained. Ouch. I have an ankle support on it and that is helping. I was going to take some Alieve…but it’s buried in a box…somewhere.

But I digress…

Tomorrow I’m teaching two classes. The first is on personality. I love teaching this. We use the Trent/Smalley inventory that results in each participant identifying whether their personality is that of a lion, a beaver, a golden retriever, or an otter. I then link that with other inventory information and discuss personality and the workplace, relationships, and communication. It’s a fun look at the topic that really provides some personal information and insight enabling the participants the opportunity to look at themselves in a non-threatening but enlightening sort of way.

The second class I’ll be teaching is on genius. We all are geniuses, you know. We’re the experts on us. It leads to a discussion of motivation and dreaming. It’s good stuff and quite a bit of fun for me.

On Wednesday I’ll teach about creating SMART goals and on Thursday I’ll be teaching about improving our communication skills.

It’s now time to get ready to go home to prepare for training at Curves. I wish I was enjoying this, but my trainer is trying to train and run the business. I have learned how to clean the place. I also understand the machines and the process. Wish I felt more like I was ready to do the job. So far it’s been a lot about selling the place. I have three more days of 4 till 8 (Mon., Tues., Wed.). I’m just planning to work very part time: every other Saturday and an evening each week. Not much work for a lot of benefits—it’s all good!

Well, I need to run…er, hobble. Actually, the ankle is feeling better. Spending time at the computer today has really helped. TTFN.

Moving Day

Well, we’re moved.
We had several come and help this morning. All but three were from our Sunday School class. One had serious heart attacks a couple years back. One had double cataract surgery last month. One had a double mastectomy last summer. One was close to 70. The others weren’t spring chickens—but golly how they all worked. A wonderful lady in our class brought us an amazing lunch—on the way over to feed and care for her bedfast daughter who has MS.

Bottom line: I got my socks blessed off today and so did Nelson. Nelson was very careful to abide by the lifting limitation that has been imposed upon him since his injury: nothing more than 25 pounds. I was hard for him to ask for help. Hard to accept it. But hardest of all was watching everyone else work and only really being able to direct traffic.

Another person that just impressed my socks off and blessed my little heart was Beth’s boyfriend, Ron. Wow. This guy worked tirelessly moving boxes and then today was the strongest young back we had. He moved all the appliances. We sent Ron and Beth to Ruby Tuesday’s for dinner as a small way of saying thanks for all their hard work.

I have so many boxes to unpack. I had to come into the office to get something and snuck in a couple moments here on the computer. We’ll be without computer or cable until Monday. Hopefully by then I’ll resurrect the office…wish me luck on that one.

Well, Ann just called and wants a treat from Dairy Queen. She had baby duty all day—no easy task! Guess she deserves a treat too. A Moolatte sounds kind of indulgent to me too!

Sleep well…I know I will!

Part of the Plot

It's been a wild week. Lots of packing. We thought Asher might have chicken pox, but it only turned out to be a viral rash after a couple days of high fever. Thank you, God!

I've worn some of my skinny clothes and it feels so good. I am finally feeling okay about looking attractive. There was such a mental stigma attached to that for me. What typically would happen is that I would get right at the edge of feeling good and I would balloon back up.

Ballooning shouldn't be much of an issue for me. I got a part time job with Curves!!! I'm so excited. My membership will be paid as a part of my compensation--so I've done a good thing to reduce our monthly expenditures. And then my paycheck will serve as my mad money...so I won't need to ask for money--which I'm totally no good at. I start training today.

Ann and I were talking on the way home from our workout at Curves. Nelson has been a packing machine. After packing too much of the bathroom--leaving us no neosporon to use in the meantime, he's been more careful to leave the essentials unpacked until the move on Saturday. Ann decided he went to far again. He packed all the hot chocolate!
We had a good chuckle. Daddy just didn't see cocoa as an essential. Now isn't that just like a man for you? We (I) decided that the recent medical revelation that chocolate has benefits for one's cardiovascular system is really just a ruse by an underground feminist group to get men to quit dogging us about our absolute need for chocolate. As long as they believe that there's value then perhaps we won't have to indulge our cravings in secret any longer.

Now, if we could just find a medical substantiation for cookie dough!

Hershey Kisses for everyone!

Beautiful Day

Yesterday was a Cinderella sort of day! I took my gift cards and headed south to the fancy-schmancy mall.

First, I went to Talbots. I have loved their clothes but never been able to shop there. Card in hand, I began to pick out a few things. I was tickled when I was able to purchase a pair of really nice black dress slacks, a plum colored jacket and a deep turquoise blouse—all in a size 12!!!!

I realized in the morning, before I went shopping, that last January 1 I wore a size 24 pants and a man’s size 2X shirt—and they were tight. So when the little clerk tapped on my dressing room door and asked if the sizes I picked were working for me, I just giggled and squeaked out a weak “yes.” I explained my absolute delight as I was checking out.

After Talbots, I went to Ann Taylor Loft. This was a new store for me, a little more “trendy” than I’m used to. They were having a clearance sale, so I was able to get three skirts and three sweaters there for my gift card. The skirts are so different from my normal wear—these actually show some of my calf! (blushes with the audacity!)

Next I went to Linen N Things. Oh my! I was like a kid in a growed up candy store. I called Nelson and told him that I couldn’t do this on my own, so we decided to visit after we moved in and had a better idea of what we needed in the new house. Spending there is going to be SO much fun!

After leaving that shop empty handed, I went to Barnes and Noble. Hi, I’m Daisy and I’m addicted to books. I shopped and browsed, and shopped some more, but as all good Cinderella’s know, I needed to make my purchases and beat feet so I wouldn’t turn into a country bumpkin. Good thing I left when I did, too, as it was spitting snow and windy all the way home.

It was just a glorious, therapeutic kind of day. I felt pretty. I felt loved. I enjoyed my company.

Then I went back to work today. I spent the day in the factory. My goal was to check out what was going wrong and where we needed to tighten things up. There were several very costly errors, though caught prior to shipping, that just need to not happen. I found so much stuff today, that my boss determined I need to spend the rest of the week (at least) there at the factory getting things back on track. So, one of my co-workers is going to go to meet with my clients in the satellite counties. This is a disappointment for me, but I’m doing better with it now. It’s just hard to not take it as a demotion.

We’re coming along well on packing for the move. Everything is out of the basement and attic and many boxes have been packed from rooms around the house. All the utilities will be in our name this weekend and we’ll start moving some things. The truck has been reserved for the 13^th. Hopefully there won’t be a blizzard then…