Tonight I pulled out a journaling book that I started in 2007… it has in it, among other gatherings of words… my Bucket List. One hundred things I want to do in my lifetime. It’s been at least a year since I went through the list… that only goes up to 72 at the moment. When I accomplish a listed item I highlight it. There were eight lines highlighted already. Surprisingly, tonight I highlighted three items from 2009 that were accomplished.
I read somewhere long ago that if you write down your goals your brain grasps onto them subconsciously and even if you’re not remembering them… you are drawn to accomplish them. I’m not sure if I believed that until I was married about 14 years and came across my scrapbook from my senior year of high school. There was a page for 1 year, 5 year and 10 year goals. What 18-year-old has any clue what they will be doing when they are 28??? Please. Unbelievably, all the goals that I wrote down had been successfully completed… without me remembering that I jotted them in my scrapbook in 1984.
Back to tonight and my Bucket List. In case you live in a cave, a movie came out a few years back called the Bucket List and the premise was about two old guys determined to live out life’s wishes before they kicked the bucket. I never saw it. Anywho…. I highlighted three lines on my list tonight.
#10. Take the kids on a missions trip. Larisa, Austin and I went to La Mision, Mexico last summer… and it was Austin’s first time seeing an impoverished city. It changed him, as I knew it would. My 11-year-old son still is on the list to go, but I highlighted it anyway. I firmly believe every American kid needs to see poverty, desperate need, and the happiness that is still available in spite of living conditions. We are so spoiled blessed.
#51. Live close to the church. For more than 10 years we have driven 30 minutes to church. When your kids want to get more involved… an hour round-trip is a long way. When gas is over $3 a gallon, every little trip counts. Little did I know that we would be changing churches in 2009 and the new one is 8 minutes away. Glory!
#61. Publish a book for married women. Last September my book Learning to Laugh in the Midst of Marriage came out. Sweet! The book was not even started when I made the list! See…. subconsciously!
Some of my other entries include traveling to far away spots on God’s green earth that I have studied and long to see. Others involve helping others, teaching the kids new tricks, taking an emergency truck ramp…. quit laughing… they are so tempting, learning a few tricks myself and reaching many for God’s kingdom. I believe 2010 will bring at least three more highlighted lines… maybe more!
I finally finished sewing Zaza’s dolly two days ago. I plan to let Zaza name her, but if she asks for suggestions, I might say Amelia or Eliana or Christina. I already used the iron-on face included in the pattern, and besides, it had blue eyes. So I found an embroidered pattern on-line. That took one whole day. They even embroidered the pink cheeks, but I didn’t think that would look too good. I used real make-up.
The body is made from vintage muslin that was in the quilting scraps from my grandmother. I tea-dyed it so as not to have pasty-white skin, like mine. I think Grandma would be happy that I made Zaza’s dolly from her stash. For the hair, I didn’t want to use regular twisted yarn because it can unravel and become a mess. So I searched and searched and found this beautiful black non-twisted yarn made of bamboo. Yes, it surprised me too. It is super soft and combs out perfectly.
I picked up the four purples on a sale day, so the entire outfit including bloomers was $5. Yes, $5. You don’t need much fabric for an 18″ doll. I didn’t follow the pattern for the apron because I wanted the fabric on the bodice to show. So I made up an apron, complete with a pocket for her tissue… or little treasure. I’m starting outfit #2 now out of teeny red and blue floral fabric and I plan to make it short-sleeved (for summer) with the white eyelet pinafore following the pattern. I’ll show you later.
Yes, she needs shoes. There is no pattern for shoes…. except for slippers to match her jammies. That won’t do for her Sunday dress. I had a handmade doll when I was young and she had black felt shoes with a strap and a tiny white button. I’m going to make those…. pray for me… I’m going off 35-year-old memories!
I have not been feeling well for over a week now… stiffly nose, sore throat, annoying cough, weariness and general lethargy. If that isn’t bad news on its own, I don’t have a quality piece of literature to take me away from the here and now! Of course, I’m still reading, but nothing that grabs my interest and sucks me in while hours dissipate. Oh, for an orphan story of rags to royalty and lost parents to found love…. on the docks in a new country…. ….. ….
As you may or may not know, I’ll be teaching History of Arizona next school year and I’m searching for biographies for the high schoolers to report on. I proof them all first, so as not to assign steamy wagon stories of lust gone bad on the lonely, dusty trail in the desert. I’m currently speed reading These Is My Words, a collection of diary entries from a pioneer woman. Thez onlee sew much badd gramer n spellin’ I ken tak in won sittin’. Good grief. The stories are thought provoking, but as a English-loving teacher, I don’t think I can assign this book in its entirty to anyone who may mention my name in association with the book. Maybe I’ll read excerpts to the class for brainstorming journal writing ideas.
Bulletproof George Washington is the other book I’m making my way through. It’s a short read and if I was not incapacitated it would sincerely be an hour-long at most. But I’m on day three. I have to put the book down to blow my nose…. I may have above average manual dexterity, but I cannot blow my nose singlehandedly. History books of REAL history that has been systematically removed from government text books and encyclopedias makes me want to shout for joy… and proclaim the truth from the roof top. (I’m not sure I could get up on our roof, however….) This book is written from five or six different sources with genuine stories of God’s hand of guidance and protection on our country’s first President. And God, himself, is even mentioned in the pages for all to see! The book discusses daily happenings in young George’s life that are not common knowledge thanks to our liberal school systems. My kids will be reading this when we study American History… next school year… 2011-2012.
My name is at the top of the Reserved list at the library for two new books that are on order…. one from one of my favorite authors, Allison Pittman titled The Bridegrooms. I’ve read everything Ms. Pittman has published and have not been disappointed yet. Her books make me giggle out loud…. GOL. The other is Her Mother’s Hope by Francine Rivers. Francine has caught and held my interest in the past, but has also let me down a few times…. I’m hoping with all hope for Her Mother’s Hope to be a keeper. I pray at least one of these comes in before we head away on a two-week road trip!
And can I just make a plug for Cepocal? It is by far the best cough drop on the market! Really!
Yesterday I blogged about the glorious side of our camping experience in Northern Arizona…. well, I purposely left out the Chuck information because I knew his story would require an entire blog entry. I’m kicking myself that we did not think to gather photo evidence of Chuck’s shenanigans for this unbiased report.
How many campers can you count??
Chuck’s Info: Married; in the vicinity of 70 years old; Army-shaved-regulation hair cut; blue eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses; no smile; stern; fit; slight build; wears various National Camping Association issued tan shirts, shorts and hats which he changes intermittently throughout the day; Camp Host at Wet Beaver Creek; lives in a motor home; watches Who Wants to Be a Millionaire every day; drives a white golf cart counter-clockwise around the campground with various cleaning supplies standing neatly in the back; keeps an impeccably clean campground; is DILIGENT at enforcing the rules of the National Camping Association….. Extremely Diligent!
We were not in the 13-site campground more than three minutes when we encountered Chuck and already had one infraction against us. We talked to another camper. That is not acceptable, as we found out. (???) We did arrive under unusual circumstances…. one wife, one husband, both married to other people who would be arriving later, two boys and a 35-year-old male friend….. with a truck and trailer full of enough camping paraphernalia to survive at least 27 days without human contact. We were in the midst of choosing two campsites when Chuck descended on us… seems we inadvertently drove past his site without stopping to introduce ourselves. We mentioned, mistakenly, that the kind camper lady across the road had informed us that she was leaving by 4:00 and we could have her adjacent campsite. Heaven forbid! That was a BIG no-no. No talking to other campers! Might cause a revolt????
We were then told that we could not occupy two sites without two vehicles…. what? Then the story changed…. was he trying to intimidate us??? Chuck informed us that we needed to indeed have all of our camping gear for both sites in our possession in order to claim and pay for two sites. We explained that we did… minus the second vehicle. (See the HUGE trailer FULL of camping gear?) We were then read rule number 353.7 from the Nat’l Camping Association handbook page 27 that there were only to be eight people maximum at each campsite and there were no exceptions. We kindly explained that we would have five unique individuals at campsite #11 and seven unique individuals at campsite #10. He assumed we were trying to pull one over on him. We look so devious! Good grief! How did he treat hippy looking, pot-smoking, tattooed, keg toting, loud music blaring reprobates?
Throughout our three days under Chuck’s care, we observed that we could set our clocks by his daily habits… 5 am bathroom hose-down…7 am routine walking tour inspection…9 am routine riding in the golf cart inspection and refilling of toilet paper… (all of this leading up to the all important….) 1 pm MANDATORY check-out time for overnighters. This was quickly followed by a walking inspection of each vacated site and the necessary raking and emptying of ash from the fire pit. It was all so predictable, yet comical. He routinely stopped and counted people in each site, reported high winds and no-fire warnings, and was fastidiously aware of every move made in Wet Beaver Creek… especially if non-paying day users accidentally wandered through the campground to access the creek. Oh boy! That was a no-no. (page 35 in the NCA handbook)
Each of us adults made it a point to make contact with Chuck for the purpose of gathering information for this report. We conspired to have him divulge nazi involvement or at least a military career. Nope, seems he owned gas stations, has a pace maker, wife had a heart attack two years ago but is OK now, lives in Mesa, has been camp hosting for seven years all over the nation, was retired for ten years before camp hosting and is at Wet Beaver Creek for three more months. If you go, you can’t miss him…. or more like it, he won’t miss seeing you!
We decided that wherever Chuck is hosting we will stay. It will be a clean and orderly campground, albeit the feeling of Big Brother did permeate the camp.
Yes, we camped in the great outdoors again. That’s twice in 30 days and we have another adventure on the calendar for July. It’s almost time to start filming a reality wilderness show. Two days before our departure time my throat started getting hot and scratchy. Not good. Echinacea became my new best friend. I figured I could be sick at home with no one to take care of me or sick in the woods with my family and friends. Last time we camped at Lake Pleasant I was by myself with the kids for three full days before Rick showed up. I would not have done that with a hot and scratchy throat. But alas, Rickey was coming on the SAME day as me, albeit, nine hours later than the boys and I.
It’s the first time EVER that I went to bed in my tent wearing my wool socks and flannel jammies before the mandatory campground quiet time commenced. Sadly for my non-camping times, but happily for camping moments, my air mattress is more comfortable than my bed at home. Earplugs were inserted and a blissful night was had in the fresh creek-side air. Mornings come early outside and breakfast was consumed by 7:00 am. By 7:30 am I was headed back to the tent for nap #1. Nap #2 was after lunch. Despite my throat, continual sneezing and nose blowing, we did have a relaxing time.
Wet Beaver Creek was recently stocked with 9-12 inch rainbow trout… that were delicious! The boys fished and fished… caught trout and crawdads… rode their bikes… hiked….. gathered fire wood…. swam…laughed and laughed…. and ate. Then they did it all over again for two more days after that!
Austin invented an ingenious way to keep the soles of his water shoes from bunching up at his toes. Duct tape is the BEST!
One of my favorite moments of the trip was when all the kids climbed into the back of a truck for a quick trip up the creek for a better swimming hole.
But Keeve was asked if he wanted to ride in the trailer behind the truck all by himself….. not knowing that the trailer had been unhooked from the truck. The look on his face was priceless when the truck pulled away and there he sat with all of us cracking up. He took it like a sport and laughed with us. Good times.
More tomorrow with my report for the National Camping Association on Chuck, the Nazi camp host.
What a refreshing movie to see in today’s world of over-sexed, potty-mouth, shoot-em-up flicks. I’m a self-professed clean movie die-hard that so appreciates the film industry making movies that are endearing, romantic, humorous, inoffensive and beautiful. Of course I know not all movie goers appreciate this type of entertainment…. one review I read said Letters to Juliet was a ”witless ninny of a movie.” So I assumed that reviewer would consider me a witless ninny, but that’s OK. I thoroughly enjoyed two hours of witless entertainment.
The summary of the movie is hopelessly romantic… a chick flick to the nth degree. A wall in Verona, Italy, is known for Juliet’s stone balcony. Yes, Juliet of Montague and Capulet and Romeo fame. Lost souls leave letters in the wall of love gone wrong, and love missing in action, and lovers needing advice, and love stories lacking love. A group of Juliet’s secretaries answer the letters. Yes, it’s true… in real life, not witless ninny life, in Verona. Club Juliet is actually functioning as the movie tells it, answering letters left at the wall. A modern-day Dear Abbey in motion. Ah, hopelessly romantic!
Sophie helps collect the letters one evening and knocks a block out of the wall only to discover a 50-year-old letter written by an English woman. Sophie answers the letter encouraging the woman to follow her lost love, whom she jilted and returned to England. A few days later, the “Gran” shows up in Verona accompanied by her grandson (the cold fish), determined to search for her Lorenzo from 50 years previous…. and the journey begins.
One of the eye-pleasing additions to the film is the unequalled views of the lush countryside in Italy. Not many films can inspire vacations to Europe like this one. If you happen to be a male reading this, let me give a few hints: you will score major points if you take your sweetheart to see Letters to Juliet, but be forewarned that she will also add to her bucket list “Trip to Italy”.
I realize that this blog, my every day life blog, is the one listed with our adoption agency, Gladney, as our adoption blog. It is not, but I do occassionaly put adoption news and tidbits on here. For those who have never looked to the right —–> there is a counter that is unbelievably at 3 years and almost 6 months that we have been waiting for our little girl, Zaza. Our adoption blog doesn’t get as many entries as this one, but it can be found at: www.ZazasMama.wordpress.com. Our timeline is there as well as the worse-than- snail-slow process and progress.
Yes, I think about our little girl every day. Yes, I miss her and I haven’t even met her yet. We do not know her age, her name, her location (other than Colombia), her background…. nothing. But she is our little girl… who is not home yet. Our 11-year-old son prays faithfully for Zaza each night that she has a home and a bed and food and people who love her. I pray they same prayer each night and that she will know God’s love at an early age.
Yes, we call her Zaza. My sister-in-law came up with that nickname because we kept saying “our little girl from Colombia”… which is a bit long. No, we will not change her name to Zaza. We won’t change her first name at all because she will be 5 or 6-years-old and her name will be one of the only things she brings home with her from her mother country.
Yes, waiting is hard. I hate waiting. I’m SOOO a right now girl! This has taught me patience beyond what I thought was humanly possible. We know some day she will be here and our family will be complete, but we don’t know when…… like I said, it’s hard.
This week I’ve been sewing a dolly, her clothes and a sleeping bag for the dolly…. all for Zaza to play with. It keeps my mind on her and prayers sent heavenward on her behalf. It also makes me feel like I’m doing SOMETHING!
After last night’s fiasco at the grocery store, my 16-year-old daughter was flabbergasted at the thought of not having a cell phone… like in the “olden days” when I was a teen.
She asked incredulously, “What would you have done in this situation when you were 16???”
Wise Old Mom (me) replied, “I would have used the store’s phone at customer service.” (no big deal!)
16yo: “What would you have done if you ran out of gas??????” (wide eyes at the thought of the stranded situation)
WOM: “Walked to a gas station and used the pay phone.”
16yo: “What if there wasn’t a pay phone?”
WOM: “When I was a teen EVERY gas station had a pay phone, as well as all shopping malls and even some street corners.”
16yo: “What if you didn’t have any money to use the pay phone?”
WOM: “I would call home collect.”
16yo: “What is collect?” (Oh, the generation gap was widening in my mind….)
WOM: “It’s when you call the operator and ask for a collect call to be placed. They ask for your name and then call the number you gave. When someone answered they would say, “Do you accept a collect call from Linda?” And when they said yes, we would talk.”
16yo: “Are there still operators?”
WOM: “I think there are.”
Following that unimaginable conversation, I told her about my college dorm that had one pay phone for 36 girls to share. She couldn’t believe it! She asked who would answer it, what we did when we had to use it and it was busy, how our parents left messages, how much it cost to call from Canada to California, and was basically in a state of shock that I lived such an archaic life.
I didn’t feel like she was quite ready to handle stories of her dad’s teen years with party lines…. I’m saving that for another day.
If you haven’t heard, Larisa, my 16-year-old daughter and I decided to “go” organic. It’s been two weeks now and I must say, either I’m forgetting what chemically engineered food tastes like, OR organic food really does taste better! We’ve had pizza, quesadillas, Southwestern Black Bean Soup, Beef & brocoli with Coconut Basmati rice, Newman-Os (Oreos), plus mint chocolate bars. We have not been suffering. We keep looking at each other and saying, “This is the best ___________ I’ve ever had!” And we’re still amazed every time it happens. It happened tonight with white cheddar and green onion quesadillas. Totally delicious.
After an exhausting day, Rick and I were home alone at dinner and I decided to go easy and make homemade apple/cinnamon/flax seed oatmeal with blue agave syrup. Again, fabulous. However, while I was cooking, Rick asked for my driver’s license number whilst I was stirring the pot on the stove. No, I do not have it memorized. Being a homeschool mom, I do know my library card number by heart 1110003116554… but not my driver’s license number. So, being the kind wife that I am, I retrieved my wallet from the front room and delivered it to him in the back room… while the oatmeal simmered. “Please put it back in my purse when you are done,” was my single request.
Not long after the totally delicious oatmeal was consumed, some of our children returned home. Larisa asked if we could go to the grocery store because we were out of quite a few organic mainstays… like bread and cheese and butter. So we made a list, checked it twice and were out the door. Can you already see it coming????
We shopped for about 40 minutes, taking our time reading labels and comparing prices. Finally we arrived at the check out stand and as the kind checker was flinging our food hither and yon, I realized (out loud, of course) that I didn’t have my wallet. Then I realized (out loud, again) that I didn’t even have my cell phone. So the kind flinger handed me his personal cell phone and I called my dear husband at home. “Remember when I asked you to put my wallet back in my purse?” Yes, he did indeed remember.
They have these two black leather livingroom sitting chairs across from the check-out lanes at Safeway with a cozy table between them and a vase full of live roses on it… for sale, of course. I’ve always thought it was odd that the chairs were there. Well, I didn’t think it odd tonight as we sat in them for a half hour. Even though I did not have pertinent purse particulars (wallet and phone) I DID have my electronic Sudoku game! Yes!
I did figure out that this was the third time in my life that this has happened. Once in Blumenort, Alberta… the owner let me take home $126 of groceries and return the next day with the money!!!! Once in Safeway in Phoenix… they rolled my whole cart into their freezer and I returned later that day with the money. And tonight, while I sat in the leather chair playing Sudoku until Rick showed up. Three times isn’t that bad…. in 23 years of marriage… and he’s only had to save me once!
My knight in shining armor did arrive and save the day and we all lived happily ever after.
This episode brought on a meaningful mother/daughter (generation gap) conversation that I will save for another blog. Too much excitement for one night could be hazardous to your health. (I was tired BEFORE we went to the store!!!)
Welcome to My Sister's Jar. The story behind the blog lies in the original post on Feb. 2, 2008. Type "giddy moments" into the search box to find it.
I'm a homeschool mom who loves to speak and write, encouraging moms to press-on in motherhood. Two of my books are available NOW! Laughing in the Midst of Mothering and Laughing in the Midst of Marriage. See them at www.LindaCrosby.com or www.cbd.com.
I have four children, one of whom is adopted from Colombia, so there are LOTS of adoption tidbits here.
~~~~~~ Linda Ann Crosby
