My So Called May

Start new job.

Plan for and prepare Mother's Day chocolate buffet.

Work.

Confirmation parties.

Work.

Fundraiser BBQ for National Youth Gathering.

Work.

Housewarming party with 72 people in my house.

Work.

Graduation parties.

Work.

Wedding.

Decide to take on a "weekend" (ha!) cosmetic make-over for our kitchen.

Tear down wallpaper.

Work.

TSP.

Tape.

Senior high retreat in the mountains.

Paint.

Work.

More tape.

More paint.

Coordinate all church picnic.

Paint!

Drive to SF to see London musician friend Greg Holden and his gf Katie Costello play at Hotel Utah.

Paint!

Work.

Paint! Paint! Paint!

Tomorrow... college roomie visits from Nebraska and we take a MUCH NEEDED trip to the coast.

Ahhhhhh...

Fresh Expressions in the Church

One of my favorite bloggers, TallSkinnyKiwi, posted this article from the London Times about a new movement in the Church of England. The concept isn't new--it's been happening organically for a couple of decades (at least in England... the U.S. has been a little slow to catch on). But what I find interesting and encouraging is that it's only just now being sanctioned by the upper-powers.

It reminds me of how English developed in Great Britain. It wasn't the wealthy and nobles who established English as the main language, because they were few and far between and therefore, had weak influence. Instead it began as the speech of the peasants and gradually built up momentum because of the large numbers. Then it became the language of the people.

From what I've seen, certain change cannot be commanded; it can only grow from a grassroots movement--especially in the Church. We limit our resources, and therefore mission, if the only ideas come from the uppers. We also limit our mission if we underestimate the power of personal "referrals" and word-of-mouth "advertising". So much depends on the bottom-up stream of change.

Imagi-Paint

While I'm enjoying a few of Trader Joe's potstickers before a meeting I have tonight I thought I'd post a link to a fabulous new website I found. Colorjive is one of those websites that I invented in my head and then thought someone must have already thought of it so I googled it and it turned out someone had (this also happened with Bookswim).

In essence, upload a photo of a room and digi-paint it! Get an idea of how the room will look in any color you choose. I did our living room and kitchen. You can see it's a bit smudgy, but not half bad at all when you're just trying to get an idea of how the room will look. As you'll see in the living room picture, I was even able to try out the red curtains.

Paint away!

Help for the CD COW

This is me, the CD COW (or maybe a cow somewhere in Ireland).

I've never been very good about asking for help. I'd rather risk time, energy and sanity than bother someone with a question or request. Why? It's probably too late to ask "why". What is important is that I get over it because after three years of bumming around in a Masters course and one short-term full-time job and sporadic freelance work, I recently piled a mound of job descriptions on my flimsy plate and I've just now realized it's about to fall through.


This past Monday, I started working full-time as a Creative Director of Communications, Outreach and Worship at my church. Yes. The acronym for my job title is CD COW. That's sort of funny... but not entirely funny when I remember that I over-estimated my superwoman capabilities and underestimated my fatal flaws and miscalculated the number of hours in a week. This new job + freelance copywriting gigs + playing for worship for our band-led and the occasional classic praise service + small group leadership promoting responsibilities + my own small group I'd like to get going + youth group activities + new house projects adds up to an interesting situation if I don't start asking for help.


I'm trying to be realistic at the outset. I know that I'll give 100% to my jobs, and that will leave nothing for my family. That will leave nothing for my friends and community. That also leaves nothing for my writing goals that I've slowly let go over the past few months. I wonder what else I would sacrifice?


What have you sacrificed because you haven't asked for help?

And Another Link (Iceland Volcanic Ash Pictures)

These pictures are unbelievable... and beautiful. I know my scientific mind is infinitely too minute to fathom most physical realities, but I'm in awe that one volcano is responsible for shutting down all of Europe. It just goes to show--

what?

I don't know. It just goes to show, I guess.

20 Catalysts for Creativity

So this is funny. I'm posting a link to a blog post about creativity because I don't have anything creative to say. Eh. We have a world wide web of resources so why not use em?

where's the f** in church?

We've been in an odd season in our church recently. The words "disillusioning", "hopeful", "frustrating" and "confusing" also come to mind. I haven't been able to write about it, which is another oddity because I'm usually able to work through my thoughts better when I write them down.

Every week I feel differently about our future, and today I came to a completely new realization. I'm beginning to wonder if we (speaking generally of Christians) sometimes take church a little too seriously. By church I don't mean faith or God or our relationship with God. I'm talking about our relationships with each other. The first thing Jesus did in ministry was gather a group of friends around him. Would you consider the people in your church to be friends? You may worship with them and pray with them, but...

what else?

Do you hang out with them outside of church "meetings"?

Do you go to them for advice?

Do you eat together? laugh together? have fun together? do life together?

When I look at our church and a few others I've been a part of, I wonder if I struggle because it seems like all the fun has been taken out of it. We've created rules about what we should do when we hang out. We've decided that we need to be governed. We've gotten all beaurocratic about it and completely forgotten about the relationship aspect. It's like if I invited you over to my house one night and handed you a list of house rules and a program for the evening and told you to sit in uncomfortable chairs and we all sat around staring at each other and forgot how to talk.

Well, maybe that's an exaggeration. But I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that at one time or another, most people have viewed church as a chore.

So what can we do to put the fun back into church?

An interesting post on the Guardian blog

Where did all the Christian writers go?

Blog Makeover at 3:00 am

It's 3:00 am and I can't sleep. I wasn't tired when I turned out the light at 11:45 and I was wide awake during an hour long spontaneous pillow talk with my bed friend. I guess I drifted off for a half hour but then woke up with a dead arm. So now I've been sitting at the computer for an hour wondering if I should attempt sleep again or if I should continue redesigning my blog (an entertaining way to spend the wee hours, I must say). In any case, I felt the need to inform you that I might be making some aesthetic changes around here. We'll see what strikes my fancy the next time I'm up at 3:00 am.

I spent my spring break at IKEA

I guess you should call it a spring weekend. I don't like to use the phrase because it reminds me of the madness that was our university's annual Olympics which consisted of boys and girls teams competing in opening ceremonies, sync swims, cowpie throwing (it was Nebraska) body-contorting games, obstacle courses, art races, and of course, the dreaded and hailed lip sync that required months of practice...but it was a weekend, and it did occur in the spring.

My parents and younger brother came to visit our new house! And us, I suppose. We walked to the lake, enjoyed happy hour in a local wine bar, rode bikes in San Francisco, (fell off our bikes in San Francisco), went flea market and IKEA shopping (female-bonding time), golfing (male-bonding time), cat-hunting (don't worry, we found him), champagne-toasted the house, and as is always the case, ate WAY too much food.

Not only did we make lot's of good memories but I learned a few things:

--Goat cheese log topped with Trader Joe's pineapple mango salsa. Yuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmyyyyyyyy

--I haven't ridden a bike in a long time for a very good reason.

--The next time I ride a bike, I'll make sure it has an excessively large padded seat.

--You should visit us just to try my husband's stuffed burgers. They're aMAZing.

--Baker Beach is not biker friendly.

--Flea markets. Love them. Will visit more of them. (Except the guy in the wiry-things stall. He was not happy to barter.)

--Shopping is so much better with my mom.

--Two people are required to manhandle IKEA shopping carts. And if you aren't as obsessed as I am with ingeniously-designed Swedish odds and ends, you can entertain yourself by watching other people try to maneuver them and have just as much fun.

--Consider spending your spring break at IKEA, but plan on a day in each department. Monday in living rooms, Tuesday in bedrooms, Wednesday in kitchens and so on. You might want to plan an extra day just for lighting and home organization.

--One brother is nice, but three is even better. Next time I'm home I'm looking forward to seeing all three of them!

So yes. Good weekend. House is broken in. Easter coming. Hope is here!

So much depends on the heart--

"If Jesus were in this room, what would he say?"

A common question from parents and Sunday school teachers to kids when they're misbehaving. Whenever it was asked of me, I had it in my head that Jesus sat in the corner, quietly observing, not saying anything unless asked and then he spoke short proverbial phrases.

Now that I'm a bit older than eight and I've had more time to understand the Jesus in the Bible, I realize that the question is fairly open ended, as it should be. Especially when it comes to matters that aren't specifically addressed in Scripture. When we need guidance, our natural tendency as humans is to want a straight answer. I've often wished I could hear Jesus' audible responses to my questions. How much TV is too much? Should we or shouldn't we use birth control? How much do we need to give to be considered generous givers?

I'm not a parent, but as I've watched friends and family parent their children over the years, I've realized how different kids are from each other, and how differently they respond to love and discipline. A parent knows what each child needs--the content and the delivery of it.

It occurred to me last night that Jesus appears to be the same way. You see this in the way he relates to disciples, to the sick, to the poor, to anyone he comes in contact with. His actions vary widely depending on each of their situations because all of us are different people. He communicates to each of us differently. When it comes to matters that are not commandments (because I do believe there is a right and a wrong and the important commandments are addressed in Scripture) what's right for me may not be right for you. It all depends on our personalities and our relationship with God.

So for example, if Jesus came to visit you, would he enter your living room and suggest you turn off the TV? Maybe. Maybe not. I think he might ask if you're distracted from him because of it. Or if you're distracted from people because of it.

As Paul says, we have freedom in Christ. Freedom to eat or not to eat. Freedom to watch TV or not to watch TV. Freedom to give what we've been convicted by the Spirit to give.

--So much depends on the heart.

If you give a woman a house...

...she'll want to take the ugly drapes down and put up her curtains.

When she takes her curtains out of storage, she'll realize that they're in desperate need of washing.

After she washes the curtains, she'll realize that they need to be dried.

After she dries the curtains, she'll see that they need to be ironed.

After she's ironed the curtains and waited patiently until her handy husband arrives home to install them, she'll realize the curtains have shrunk and are too small for the window and she has to go buy new ones.

...But if the house you give the woman is the first house the woman has ever owned in her entire life, she'll hum her way happily to the store and start the whole process over again...