...to us in so many ways. This week, he is apparently speaking to me through blog posts.

I just found Toni's blog through another today and went back to read her earlier posts. This one brought tears to my eyes. This is what it is supposed to be like; this is what God wants from us, even though it is not easy or comfortable. And, really, what in life that is truly good is? A Broad in Athens: The one

Still fighting the fatigue and trying to get caught up...but in better spirits today than I have been lately. I have no commitments this evening after work and I am hoping my body will allow me to get some things done before I need to collapse - there is much to be done! I'm holding out hope that it will.

Some happy thoughts for today:

Beginning Friday at 1 PM, I am off until Thursday. We are closed Monday and Tuesday but I asked if I could have off Wednesday as well. Sarah & Joe are hosting their annual 4th of July extravaganza and Kim, Brian & Emma will be visiting from Connecticut, so I want to be able to relax and catch up without feeling like I have to rush home and get to bed to get ready for work the next day. Plus there is much to be done at home and I have at least one home improvement project I WILL get accomplished this weekend (if I can coerce my dad or David into helping!!)

I'm having the ladies over Friday night to work on a project for the youth to take to Workcamp and give to their residents as gifts. We are decorating terra cotta flower pots and giving them a packet of flower seeds. Any ideas for good verses to put on the seed packets?? Last year, our kids felt like they were not supported by the church so this year, we are endeavoring to change that in quite a few ways.

I'm having dinner and seeing the great Tommy Conwell this weekend. I love Tommy! And my dear friend Kris has never seen him, so we are having an outing. Outings are good...especially to The Blue Comet!

I am really excited about Workcamp. It's coming up fast! I've really been struggling with that being my only "vacation" scheduled this summer and feeling like I needed to do something for myself (selfishly) when I read Bev's blog today. Her post not only convicted me but reminded me that a missions trip can be a vacation - a vacation from the norm, a vacation from not focusing on what's important as you should and reevaluating how you spend your time. I am thankful for the opportunity to go on this trip and minister to the people we'll meet...and as always, God brought me that reminder at just the right time.

This weekend passed by in a haze. Friday was somewhat busy in terms of VBS (which was awesome, by the way - so much fun!) and trying to get laundry done and the house back into some semblance of order after my time away. Saturday there was more of that and running errands in the torrential rain. Then yesterday was the quintessenial way my life is sometimes. My friend Robert came to be our guest speaker since Pastor Glenn is now officially gone and we had planned to go out to lunch afterwards with his family. We ended up with about 30 people - which is fine - except the restaurant we ended up at couldn't accomodate us properly. It was 30 people in several booths, so you had to get up and walk around to talk with anyone. I had scheduled the youth to come over at 2 PM to make tie dye shirts for workcamp (which, as an aside, I had no clue how to do!) but ended up having to move that back until 2:30...but forgot to call one of my kids who was sitting at my house at 2. I felt terrible!

Anyway, the tie dyeing was actually fun. I hope they turn out. They are currently "drying" in my damp & humid basement...we shall see. After that was the race back to church for a prayer, praise & vision night for which I had agreed to coordinate childcare. All that worked out well - many thanks to everyone who helped!

When I got home, I watched part of a movie but then decided to get into bed and work on a new study I am doing, "Small Changes for a Better Life" by Elizabeth George. The title, of course, is intriguing and so far the first chapter has been good. I feel like I need something more structured to get me into the Word these crazy days lately than just my devotional book or online email devotions I get every day. I also bought a commentary this weekend by John MacArthur (at the suggestion of my study - though she suggests a commentary only on Proverbs but I couldn't see spending the money when I could get an entire Bible commentary.) Cindy is apparently planning to offer a study this summer in the evenings and I think I will seriously consider that as well. I have been feeling a hunger for more lately but we haven't had anything available that I could participate in in the evenings so this may be a good option, even if it is only for the summer. I miss doing the Operation Timothy study with Cindy, Kathy & Michelle weekly...maybe I need to find something like that as well. I don't know. I desperately need the accountability of studying with others and I always enjoy the great discussions that come along in the course...studying something on my own just isn't the same.

Anyway, I digress. I was exhausted when I woke up today - to more rain - and ended up getting a late start. I slipped in the shower and very nearly killed myself - which, let me tell you, is NOT the way I want to go! Then I got halfway to work and realized that I forgot my sweater...which led me to realize that, MORE IMPORTANTLY, I forgot my laptop, which I cannot work without, and which was under the sweater so I wouldn't forget it. So I had to go all the way back home.

Eegads. I really do need a vacation.

Appetizer

On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how much do you like your job?

I'd have to give it a 5. I enjoy the field I am in and think it's important work. But it doesn't give me the joy I get from the things I do OUTSIDE of work....

Soup

When was the last time you think you were lied to?

I'm not really good at knowing when people lie to me unless it is blatant. Probably yesterday at some point.

Salad

Share some lyrics from own of your favorite songs.

Here I Am by Mercy Me. I love the chorus - taken from the book of Isaiah (6:9).

On the other side of the world
She stands on the ocean shore
Gazing at the heavens
She wonders, is there something more
Never been told the name of Jesus
She turns and walks away
What a shame [oh yeahh]

Just across the street in your hometown
Leaving from his nine-to-five
Gazing down the road
He wonders, is this all there is to life
Never been told the name of Jesus
He continues on his way
What a shame [oh yeahh]

Whom shall I send?
Who will go for me?
To the ends of the earth
Who will rise up for their King
Here am I, send me
Here am I, send me

Whether foreign land or neighbors
Everyone's the same
Searching for the answers
That lie within your name
I wanna proclaim the love of Jesus
In all I do and say, Unashamed

Whom shall I send?
Who will go for me?
To the ends of the earth
Who will rise up for their King
Here am I, send me
Here am I, send me

How beautiful are feet of those who bring good news
Proclaiming peace and your salvation

Whom shall I send
Who will go for me
To the ends of the earth
Who will rise up for their King
Here am I, send me
Here am I, send me
Here am I, send me

Main Course

What do you do/take when you are in pain?

I've got a variety of tactics to combat physical pain...ibuprofen, Thermacare heat wraps, muscle relaxers, sleep aids, etc.

Dessert

Fill in the blanks: My __________ is very __________.

My house is very messy. I had originally written, "My sweet Norman is very loving and happy I am home." But the internet ate my post and now I am redoing it all...and looking around at the laundry & luggage & MESS. Oh my.

Home at last! I can't begin to tell you how glad I am to be home. It was a long week and I am completely exhausted. The furry ones were glad to see me, which was nice, and I was able to go over to the VBS tonight and see what a great job David and some of our lovely and talented youth were doing. I am so proud of them. I am also so upset to have not been able to be a part of this all week long. Tomorrow I have a role in the finale, but it just isn't the same when you missed most of it.

It always amazes me just how much I enjoy working with the kids. It's so easy to slip into that persona of "Miss Trish" and just have fun. I helped out with the preschool class this evening and it truly was the highlight of an otherwise somewhat unthrilling week.

Although, on the bright side, I did have dinner out two nights this week with coworkers and that was nice. I hope that friendliness continues when we get back to the office next week. It would really be great to have some friends there! (Although no one will ever replace my peeps from NCCN! Love you guys!)

Seriously? Pure exhaustion. I am running on empty. Every part of my body is aching.

This week is my company's annual meeting. The sheer size of this thing is like nothing I have ever worked on before and the immensity (is that a word?) of the meeting area is quite astounding. I feel like I have been back and forth across it 87 times today alone. We are actually using pedometers to track how many steps a day we're doing. I just got mine but based on everyone else, it's got to be at least 10,000 - 12,000.

It doesn't help that I am wildly out of shape. This is a lot of physical activity for extended periods of time for one who does exceptionally little physical activity...any time.

I have a funny story to tell but it will have to wait until I have a bit more time.

TTFN

Appetizer
What is a word that you use that would not be considered common?

I actually use a lot of words that are uncommon…it’s part of my charm : )

Tomfoolery
Willy nilly
Indeed (somewhat common but not as commonly used as I use it)
Rammy
Ruchy

Soup
What theme of calendar do you have on your wall this year?

On the wall at home it is animal friends and at work it is the seasons

Salad
Name 3 people you speak with by telephone a regular basis.

Mom
Michelle
Kym (though not lately for some reason)
I’m really more of an email girl…

Main Course
If you could buy a new outfit for someone you know - who would it be and what would you purchase for them?

I would probably buy something for my mom. She doesn’t really like to shop and doesn’t really buy too much in terms of clothing for herself.

Dessert
What is the last beverage you drank?

Seagram’s ginger ale…

NOTHING GOLD CAN STAY — by Robert Frost
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

I’m feeling reflective today. I’m not sure why…maybe it is the loss of Jacob this week combined with all the other stressors I have been dealing with. I was going to simply post another Thursday Thirteen but couldn’t come up with anything even vaguely entertaining and the Frost poem above kept coming into my head.

The year I was in sixth grade, The Outsiders came out in the movies and the book by SE Hinton was THE book. All of my friends were obsessed with it. We all read it and cried our eyes out. I know for me, I felt a deep connection with the characters in the book – I could completely understand them. If you’ve never read it, I highly recommend you do. On the surface, it is about conflict between the haves and the have nots. But really it’s about relationships and about the hard realities we face in life. In the angst and the drama, the main character, Ponyboy, shares the poem with his friend Johnny and they talk about how nothing gold can stay, life is always changing and things can’t stay the same, even when we want them to desperately. In a particularly poignant scene not long after, Johnny says to Ponyboy, “Stay gold”.

Today, this keeps coming in to my mind. I used to be able to recite this poem from memory and probably still could today. I remember my friends and I signing notes to each other, “Stay gold”. If there is any memorabilia in my mom’s house from that year, I’m certain I’ll find it written somewhere.

Back then, I think we truly thought we could “stay gold”. That things would stay as they were, we would always be friends, and life would be as it was then forever. But Frost was right. People pass away, friends move on, children get sick, jobs change...life changes.

And nothing gold can stay.

I am exhausted, I am stressed, I am sad. I really don't know what to post or where to begin, so I am going to take the easy way out and do a meme. I found this one at www.musicalmemoirs.blogdrive.com.

Musical Firsts (How many can you remember)

First CD/Album Purchased: I think it was a 45 of "Beth" by KISS

First Concert: Def Leppard (I was 12; Stacy Queen's dad took us at the Fairgrounds)

First Over 21 Show: Age of Exposure at the Ambler Cabaret

First Musical Obsession: Very first was Shawn Cassidy. Somewhere in the mix was a long obsession with Prince...

First Musical Crush: Shawn Cassidy

First Musical/Musical Movie: The first musical movie I saw was Mary Poppins when I was 5 (at the drive in)

First Stereo: Don't think it even had a brand name

First Portable Device/Player: Cassette deck of some kind

First Musical Format Owned (i.e. LP, Cassette, 8 Track, CD) LP (45)

First 45/CD Single Purchased: Again, I think it was "Beth" by KISS but am not sure...

Tagging anyone interested in doing this one!

You may remember me mentioning Amazing Jacob, a little boy with cancer whom I list in my links. Jacob became an angel last night and is now finally healed and in the arms of our Father in heaven.

My heart breaks for his family. I have constantly been astounded by their faith and their full reliance on God throughout this - even though I too believe that God can do all things. I know that I and so many others around the world prayed in earnest for Jacob to be healed here on earth, knowing that it was God's will - not ours - that would be the final say. As recently as Saturday, during a pray vigil time that was set for Jacob, I was praying for his healing on earth but also acknowledging God's will in the situation - even if it would not be what we would want.

I know that God hears all of our prayers. It saddens me and breaks my heart that Jacob has left this world but I know that many people's faith was strengthen through him and that some people came to faith through this amazing family. God's timing is not our timing and his ways are not our ways. We may not understand it now but there is a reason for everything - even this.

Please pray for the Duckworth family - for Heather, Donnie, Devin, Brandon & Kyle, as well as their friends and extended family during this time.

I had big plans for today.

To do nothing.

And in a way, I suppose I succeeded, but not as I had hoped.

After yesterday's whirlwind, I decided that no matter how long the to do list was (and it just seems to keep growing!), I was going to come home from church and relax. If I felt like doing anything around the house, it would be because I chose to, not because I felt like I had to.

Today was our first Sunday doing full-service children's ministry. We've been working up to this for years and decided it was finally time to leap. Basically, when the kids arrive with their parents, they now can come into Adventure Theater where we have games & crafts set up and music playing. We have a somewhat unstructured time together, hanging out, and then break into our groups for a connection question before worship time. Before, we would have the kids stay with the parents until after adult worship time was over and then come in and worship. Needless to say, they weren't digging it. Plus, there wasn't anything for them to do except run amok through the church before service started...and run amok is exactly what many of them did.

So, we put out the crafts and activities, turned on the music and waited for the kids to arrive. We didn't have as many as we had hoped in the beginning but we did have a good time. And I got to actually spend time talking with the kids instead of being so focused on teaching them...and that was really nice. I think it is going to make a huge difference in our lives - ours and the kids - and in our church.

But toward the end, I started to get a terrible headache. This has been happening for some time on Sunday mornings. I actually had one week where I had to sit down afterwards and Kym & Kim were bringing me water & taking care of me because I felt so sick and totally wiped out by a headache like this. I went to the dr and he felt it was low blood sugar, caused by my breakfast of Starbucks. So I cut out my weekly Starbucks treat : ( . This morning, knowing I had a full morning, I actually ate some cereal - which is unusual for me. But again, the same deal. I chalked it up again to blood sugar and ran through a drive thru on the way to a baptism of two of my youths but still felt increasingly crummy. I convinced myself it was allergies and tried to lie down and rest but it turned into a full blown migraine. Joy!! So my day of rest was indeed one of rest - but not a comfortable, relaxing rest as I had hoped.

I just can't figure it out. I understand the low blood sugar theory and all that. Maybe I just waited too long to get something to eat when it came on? I don't know but I can't keep ending up like this every Sunday. I end up in bed most Sunday afternoons...which in theory should be a good thing. But I'd rather be watching a movie or reading a book or watching the race.

I think my diet needs a massive overhaul. I was doing well with smaller meals and such during the week and felt a lot better but the weekends I fall back into my patterns of no breakfast, quick lunch and dinner...nothing really in between because I am constantly running. Any suggestions?

I couldn't find anything witty to post about that began with "F" yesterday. (I kept coming up with "frantic", "frenetic", and "frenzied"...which would have been accurate but hard to put down in words). So today we have Scrappin' Saturday. I spent several hours last night working on the scrapbook for The One Who is Leaving. I'm almost finished. I want to write something nice on the last page and I have to do a personal page from me as well but that shouldn't be a big deal. I'm pretty pleased with it and hope that everyone remembers to bring me their pages tomorrow. I really don't want to have to scramble next Sunday to put it together before the picnic.

ANYWAY, today was also a big scrapbooking day. My aunt is up from Florida and had asked if I could help her with a Red Hat scrapbook. I said sure and she & my mom came up. Neither of them scrapbook but after an hour or so they were cropping and putting on embellishments and having themselves a good old time. I've never done a whole scrapbook in a day - until today! She still has some things to add and needs to journal in about what everything is but for the most part, it's together. Whoo! And we also had lunch out and went shopping. What a day! I'm pooped. But now I have to prepare the Adventure Theater lesson for tomorrow and make dinner. After that, though, it's all about lying on the couch watching tv. Ah, how I dream of not having anything to do!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Since I've been busy and the creative juices are definitely not flowing (posting my to do list??? - please!) I'm going to try lifting some ideas from other renowned blogophiles. And today, I take "Thankful Thursday" from Nic.

1. My youth...no, I don't mean my age...I mean my youth in my youth group. We had a really awesome night last night and I was reminded, as I often am, of why God has me working with them. My heart was overflowing last night when I left and I was just singing my praise to God for him putting me where I am and allowing me the blessing of working with these young people! I love you guys!

2. My health. I am struggling this week with fatigue again and am about to cut my head off so my allergy symptoms will abate, but overall, my health has been much better that last few weeks. I'm thankful that I do have good days and sometimes even good weeks like right now.

3. That I am seriously able to consider buying a house. I really feel like it will be a stretch - a big one - and things may be so tight they squeak for a while. But I feel like the time is right and I need to invest in something. And investing in a home, ultimately will be investing in myself and my financial health. I am going to look at two condos tonight. I just looked at them online and am very interested in one. I keep saying this is going to be a long, drawn out process but it may not be if I find the right place. I am just not willing to compromise.

4. Ramona, Nellie & Norm. Some people might think it is silly to put them on this list but they are my furry children and I love them so dearly. I've had some trouble sleeping this week and each night, they all climb in with me and snuggle in until I am able to fall back asleep.

5. That my aunt Delores is visiting from Florida and wants to spend the day with me & my mom on Saturday. I've always struggled with feeling somewhat extended family-less because we never really did things together since I was a small child. With the loss of my grammy and then my uncle last year, I feel like there has been a strengthening on my mom's side of the family - more effort being made to keep in touch and be in one another's lives and that makes me so very happy.

6. For all the men & women serving our country. We may not always agree with the President or whathaveyou, but these folks choose to risk their lives each day so that we can be free! How amazing is that? Sometimes it leaves me completely awestruck to think of it. Please keep Ron Dangler in your prayers, too, the friend I met at Tom & Keri's at Christmas, who has been serving in Iraq. I think he's due home this month sometime. Please just pray for his continued safety and that of his friends & unit.
I'm sure I've got a lot more to be thankful for but I'll save some for next week's edition!