Great Music

Want to have a good day?  Here’s a little suggestion, if you have the time to sit in front of your computer for a while.  Search a song that you enjoy listening to on youtube, then click on suggestions from there.  I have spent most of my afternoon listening to some awesome music.  Most of by Paul McCartney.  Some long  forgotten, by me, music, that is timeless but I have loved since the first time I listened to it.  Here are a few goodies:

http://youtu.be/GEKgYKpEJ3o  

Hey Jude- The Beatles – This is just a great song.  Especially the end.

http://youtu.be/cm2YyVZBL8U

Maybe I’m amazed- Paul McCartney  – Everytime I listen to this song, I think of my husband, and the amazing way he was there for me when I was so depressed after losing our baby.  It captures perfectly the way I fell in love with him all over again during the most painful period of my life.  I am so desperatley in love with my husband.

http://youtu.be/K245iAE8vOw

Michelle- The Beatles – I love this song.  I remember a Jr. high “boyfriend” telling me that this was his song with an ex-girlfriend, and I was so jealous because I loved this song.  However, seeing as her name was Michelle and my name is not, well it makes sense.  LOL

http://youtu.be/B5ZEGAFTA6I

Yesterday- The Beatles  – I must admit that for some weird reason, I LOVE break up songs.  They always end up being my favorite songs.  I’m messed up, I’m sure.  This is one of the most beautiful break up songs ever.

http://youtu.be/swUlDc3v3DE

Blackbird- Paul McCartney  -  I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this song.  It always makes me want to cry.

http://youtu.be/bRok3oy_2H4

instrumental- Junk – Paul McCartney  The first place I ever heard this song was watching Jerry Maguire.  In the scene where Tom Cruise is bringing Renee Zelleweger home from their first date, they play this song as they start to kiss at the front door.  Since then, this song embodies pure romance to me.  I LOVE this song. 

http://youtu.be/w6qfQ5BEQ2s

Junk- same as above with the lyrics about garbage.  Same great tune, but the lyrics take out the romance…  LOL

Then stepping away from The Beatles, and Paul…

Some new music that I am currently obsessed with.  KIMBRA!!  I love her!

http://youtu.be/rBxmidwDy2Y

Kimbra- Settle Down.  The music speaks for itself.  Kimbra is brilliant.

http://youtu.be/1SPzPcZbYEg

Kimbra- Call Me      -I’m obsessed!

http://youtu.be/elyk9MBY72U

Kimbra- Cameo lover   – I often fall asleep with this gem running through my mind.

 

Anyway- take a few minutes for yourself, let the kids destroy the house while you enjoy yourself listening to some awesome music.  It always puts me in a great mood!

 

Untitled

Note to self~ Don’t write a blog while suffering a night with insomnia…

Mother’s Day

To start off this post, I just want to add a disclaimer.  I have an amazing husband who just doesn’t usually care very much about “special” days.  Whether it be for him or for someone else, he thinks they are stupid.  So when mother’s day, or any other holiday comes around, he tries to  make it special for who ever we are celebrating, but I have come to the place where I don’t expect a card or a gift, and take his verbal recognition of the day, and be happy with that.  This doesn’t mean that he doesn’t do anything ever, he just likes to make things special on ordinary days when Hallmark is not telling him to.  Which I love because any woman knows how much an unexpected gesture means.  The cool thing about that is that when he does something on a “special” day, it becomes an unexpected gesture.  Which brings me to yesterday….

Actually it brings me to Saturday really…  We worked on the house as per usual for most of the day, but I had to leave him upstairs to work alone as I needed to go downstairs and get ready for work.  I was on the worship team so I need to get to church 2 hours earlier than my family.  I was expecting that Ryan would work at the house until the last possible minute and probably show up a few minutes late for church.  That’s what happens every weekend, so why would this one be different?  Especially given the fact that he had to get both of our kids ready as well.  So when they walked in a few minutes late to church, I was not surprised in the least. 

I was surprised to find out that he had actually gone to Costco before church.  How did he manage that?!  He must have left the house earlier than I thought.  Then when he wanted me to drive his car home, and he would take the kids in the Outlander that he brought to church… I was even more surprised.  It’s not that we never drive each other’s vehicles, but his car is a standard, and I don’t mesh super well with standards.  They like to stall on me.  (Okay, okay… I admit that I stall them.)  ANYWAY….. so I drove his car home, and he came home after me.  Why?  Because he washed my car.  That in itself was sweet.  Then when he got home, and I was putting the kids to bed he was running around the house in a secretive manner.  At this point I realized that he was doing something for me on mother’s day, and I was touched.  He usually says “Happy Mother’s Day!”  and prepares a bowl of cereal for me. 

Fast forward to mother’s day morning at 6:50.  I was woken up to the sound of rustling cellophane from the general direction of Jenna’s room.  Usually I would be the one to get up and tell her to get back into bed until at least 8:00.  When I went to get up, Ryan stopped me and he went in.  After which I heard the cellophane moving again, and then silence.  Ryan came back into bed, and we rolled over and went back to sleep.  Thankfully so did Jenna.  Move the clock forward to 8:40am.  Now I am waking up again, (Yes a huge part of my mother’s day bliss was sleeping in!  I know that was completely lucky!) to Jenna barreling into my room carrying 2 dozen red roses that she chose herself to give to me for mother’s day.  This excitement didn’t even match her Christmas morning excitement… it surpassed it.  She was THRILLED to give me her flowers.  That was the best part of it.  her excitement.  The flowers are beautiful, and smell amazing, but Jenna’s excitement was the best part.  I love the fact that she has already tapped into the “better to give than receive” lesson.  Until that afternoon came around, and she gave me a rose that a show home was giving away, and 10 minutes later decided it was actually her flower, not mine.  LOL!  We added it to the roses at home.

To make a long story short, or longer I guess, I had an awesome mother’s day.  Enjoyed a delicious lunch out complete with Lemon Orzo soup… mmmmm!  (One of the greatest things about Saskatoon is the greek restaurants and their lemon soups!)  Then spent the afternoon hanging out with our family.  What a great day.  

I hope all the other moms out there had a happy Mother’s day!

P.S. for Heather…..  I especially hope that you had a great mother’s day.  I hope that you were able to feel Nathan’s love for you, and that Hailey and Ben made the day one worth remembering!  (((HUGS!)))

Are we really friends?

Have you ever wondered how many of the people you hang out with are truly your friends?  How many of these people would stand by you in a time or crisis, or pick you up at the airport at 1:00am or help you move?  I have a great way for you to figure these things out.  However, it would involve completely changing your life.  Move far away. 

I did this 2 years ago, and almost immediately realized what friends would keep in touch, and which wouldn’t really care.  As these last 2 years have gone by I have lost contact with many people who I once considered to be friends.  And at the same time, a friendship that had faded in high school has re-kindled, and is so valuable to me.

So as much as this is sucking, I know that in order to keep a friendship alive, I have to do my part as well.  I fully admit there are many friends that I did let kind of slide, but we weren’t that close in the first place.  It’s the people who I was close to that  have disappeared that hurt.  And those that are doing so now.  The people who I made a large effort to keep the friendship alive, and they didn’t respond at all, or barely.  That lack of response kind of makes me want to just give up.  Who cares?  Who needs you anyway?  Well… that’s the part that sucks…. I need them.  It wouldn’t hurt so much if their friendship didn’t mean anything to me.

This post doesn’t have a lot of point, or any really at all.  I am just whining a little, and admittedly feeling sorry for myself.  Maybe it’s the depression rearing its ugly head?  I don’t know, I hope not!  I have just been feeling like I don’t matter.  Recently finding out that someone close to me made a heinous comment about me didn’t help.  I guess today I am feeling a little betrayed and sad.  I just wish I knew what to do to get myself out of these funks when they come around.

 Anyway, I just felt the need to unload my loneliness, and I didn’t want to bother anyone in particular, so I thought pouring my feelings out into the blog that I am pretty sure no one reads would be the answer.  Holy cow, what a whiner.  I don’t like whining, but I needed to get this out.

The Buried Life

MTV just wrapped up its first season of a show called the Buried Life.  The whole premises of the show is : What do you want to do before you die?  These 4 guys drive around on their bus from city to city crossing off rather large dreams off of their bucket list.  Things such as: Play basketball will Obama, tell a joke on late night TV, go to a party at the Play Boy mansion.  Then for every dream that they meet, and even the few that they don’t meet, they help someone else achieve what they want to do before they die.  The whole point is that we have a whole life to live now, so we might as well live it. 

This has me inspired.  As a wife and a mom of 2 young kids, I doubt that I would be able to reach any major dreams off of my list, but the least I can do is make a list, and let it grow as my family and I grow.  I have already crossed off a few things off of my dream list that I had made mentally when I was younger, and I imagine that I would be able to cross more off in the future.  Things on my list have included:

1. Fall in love – check!

2. Marry the man of my dreams – check!

3. Find a job that I love and do it well – check!

4. Make some babies with the man of my dreams – check!  (and we did that very well if you ask me!)

5. Stay at home to raise my kids to be a lady and a gentleman with hearts that yearn for Christ – I am working on that, and with a lot of prayer and guidance I have faith that this will be checked off eventually!

6. Record a song and be paid for it – check!  (And Justin thought I was doing him a favor!)

7. Lead worship – check, and I hope to continue to check this one off for years to come.  Whether I be on stage with a mic, or in a congregation, I pray that through my worship, others would feel compelled to also worship the One who created the stars, sun, moon, and yet still took the time to create my beautiful children and husband for me.

There are more things that I want to achieve than just these though, even though I believe these were worth while goals.  I would like to add:

8. Be a really good friend. - this isn’t something that I have the power to really cross off of my list, but it depends on what my friends think.

9. Inspire my children to be all that they can be

10. Graduate high school. - I am 3 credits shy of any type of course I choose to take.  I really just need to go take some class to finish. 

11. Travel Europe for at least 4 weeks with my family when our kids are a little older.  I would love to back pack or even just rent a car and see everything with my kids and husband.  I think that would be such a fantastic experience for each of us. 

12.  If I never get the chance to spend 4 weeks in Europe with my kids, I would love to at least take them to Austria to show them where their Dad and I started really falling in love.

13. Visit an orphanage and make a difference in the kid’s lives.  We already have supported a few different orphanages, but I would love to visit one some day.  It wouldn’t even necessarily have to be an orphanage that we have supported.

14. Surprise my husband with a trip for just the two of us.  I would love to take him on a romantic trip where he would be shocked, and thrilled.  (Keeping in mind that if I want to make it romantic for him, I would have to go somewhere with a car show… maybe Geneva…)

15. Take a trip with my entire family – meaning my parents, John, Tonya and their girls, Shauna and Dwayne, Steph and Graham and their kids.  It wouldn’t have to be something crazy and elaborate, just time where we all had the chance to hang out together.

16. Take a trip with my mom, sisters and a couple of friends.

17. Do my best to ensure that Meg gets the wedding of her dreams!  We just need Tyler to hurry up and complete step one…

Wow apparently I want to travel.  Most things on my list are pretty self-centered.  I just really want to experience life, and to do so with friends and family.  There are many other things that I would love to do, but dreams like buying every one in my family a house, or paying off their mortgages would be a little too large of a dream than I expect to be able to fulfill.  If I ever come into huge amounts of cash, then those would be added for sure.  Until then, this is my list.  I expect to add more as my kids get older and begin to develope dreams based more in reality than being a princess when Jenna grows up.

Debates?

I as much as the next person who enjoys a good debate now and then, enjoy debating.  It’s interesting, and I enjoy the outlet it gives me as a stay at home mom.  Most my conversations are about Dora the Explorer or Princesses, and those conversations are not only with my daughter.  Most conversations with friends and family revolve around my kids, so Dora sneaks her little self into those conversations also.  So it’s nice once and a while to have a conversation where I don’t have to use Dora’s last adventure as a reference to make my point.

Recently I have been frequenting a the Circle Of Moms website, and have joined a group labeled, “Parenting Debates & Hot Topics”.  I have enjoyed hanging around there and let my opinions fly on many topics.  However, in the past week a lot of the topics have been centered around religion.  Which I find annoys me to no end.  We usually find these groups involved:

1.  In one group we have illiterate Christians spouting off their belief of what MAY or may not be Biblical as the God spoken truth.  This annoys me, because if you don’t know what you are talking about on ANY topic, then don’t discuss it.  Your foot will end up in your mouth and you will look stupid.  Take it from me, I have done this often in my debates.  LOL

2. We have every sort of unbeliever who are honestly just enjoying a good debate, and pointing out with Biblical verses where the illiterate Christian is wrong.

3.  We have the unbeliever hell-bent on being rude and intent on making any one who does believe in God feel like an idiot for doing so.  Which usually gets the illiterate Christians in a rage and they start feeding the trolls.  In this groups defence they are often being baited by the inital posts of the holier than thou illiterate Christians.

4. We have the diffuser.  These are the people trying to apologize for groups 1 and 3.  Trying to bring the thread back on topic, and make the whole conversation peaceful without the mud-slinging that had just been happening.

5. We have the Christians who are literate trying to bring in an intelligent Christian view-point.  To no avail, as everyone is too busy slinging mud back and forth by the times groups 4 and 5 step in.

You may be wondering which group I fall into.  Well, I usually post at the beginning of the thread before this time of debate breaks out.  Then once a debate about religion is raised over “How old were your children the first time they tried peanut butter?”, I step out.  I like to debate, but I highly doubt that anyone online is going to take my or anyone elses opinion seriously enough to actually change their beliefs.  I know I don’t.

If as a Christian, I want to impact other people’s life or belief, the last resort I will ever take is internet preaching.  I don’t think it works. I love my friends and family.  I want to see them all in Heaven one day, but I don’t think beating someone over the head with my interpretation of scripture is going to do it.  I would rather love others, and be their friend.  Then allow them the same free will that God gave us, without trying to force them into my beliefs.

Goodbye Blogspot…. maybe.

I recently started blogging on Blog spot.  The only reason I had chosen that site, was because that was the site I was reading when I decided to start blogging myself.  Seeing that we have a spell check option at the top of this page already confirms that I will probably leave blogspot to rust.  I love me some spell check.   I am not about to start ranting about blog spot to bore everyone to tears.  You can read below to do that.  So on to the real post.

I am going to get VERY honest here and disclose a few things that very few people have been privy to, and to be honest I am not sure if I will even post this.  We’ll see.  In a recent blog I asked people to pray for me.  I didn’t give specifics but I asked for prayer anyway.  Seeing as I have never had a comment, I am not sure anyone reads it anyway, which is probably why I am feeling a little more comfortable about sharing this with whoever might not be reading.  Here it goes!  Gulp!

In recent months I have been going through a very hard time.  I have recognized a pattern in my moods that scared me, and I was finally able to figure out what was going on.  I was dealing with depression.  Thankfully after a few months, I believe that we have kicked this crap to the past, and I have overcome it.  The nitty-gritty details are boring, because nothing exciting happened, I was just really sad.  So I won’t go into too much depth.  However, now as I have friends going through some things that scare the living crap out of me, I feel guilty that I even got depressed at all.

I have one friend who recently gave birth to her stillborn son.  How scary!  How terrible, and I just feel so much for her and her family, that I can’t even begin to explain it.  I have gone through the terrors of the possibility of losing my son soon after his birth, and the terror of the realization that had we gone with a home birth, like I had considered, he wouldn’t be here today.  I haven’t however, had to live on the other side of that nightmare.  Actually losing the baby.  So how dare I feel so sad for no reason what so ever in the midst of such abundant blessings in my life, when my dear friend has to go through such heart ache?  I just wish there were more that I could do.  I have been praying like crazy for her, but besides that, there isn’t much I can do, as we don’t even live in the same city.  My heart just breaks for her.

I have another friend who found out that she has cancer in December, on the wake of losing her precious baby.  She lost her baby early in her pregnancy, but regardless of how long that baby was in her tummy, the baby was loved, and was her child.  It’s impossible not to mourn that.  The issue here is my friend’s health.  She hasn’t even had time to think about her loss as a result of trying to get better and fight this rare form of cancer that continues to baffle her doctors.  She was going through all this at the same time as I was going through my depression, and her battle still continues.  I can help but feel for her mom, whose heart must be breaking in half.  I can’t imagine watching one of my kids go through this constant battle.  I think of her husband.  How terrified he must be.  What would I do if anything ever happened to Ryan?  And her precious little girl.  She must be so confused.  It wouldn’t be possible to maintain the peaceful household they enjoyed before this all started.  I am praying for a full recovery for Jill, and I pray that it happens sooner than later, and that she would still be able to have children in the future.  She is too much of an awesome mom to not bless more than one child as a mother.

 All I can do is pray for these women and their families, and ask you to do the same.  I think that guilt in the midst of my blessings while my friends struggle is probably pretty normal.  I want to help them bear their load, but I have no other options besides letting my life continue.   Which I know is a painful thing to witness as you are the one going through the hard times.  I guess the best thing I can do in addition to praying for them, is letting them know that although my life has to continue as normal, I definitely take out moments to pray for them, and feel for them.  My support is the only thing I can offer.