better oxygen circulation to the brain...

i have 2 more holes in my head.
...better circulation, less drag, improved aural faculties...

:)

mostly, they're cute.
this makes 4. (8 total)


little red riding hood: "grandma, how many earrings you have!"
wolf: "the more bling to dazzle you with, my dear..."

more headaches

yup.

not fun.





maybe they'll go away tomorrow.

a wedding and a funeral

i am currently preparing music for a wedding and a funeral.

one of the songs i'm playing for the wedding is called "there's no remedy for love."
i can play whatever i would like for the funeral.

i think i'll play "it is well with my soul" ... a song written by a man who had just lost all of his children to a shipwreck.

i find it interesting to juxtapose the lyrics of the 2 songs.
why is it that weddings tend to bring out the most sentimentally trite in us, while the death of our loved ones (and the inescapable reminder of our own mortality) tends to encourage the most open attempts at profundity, at significance, that many of us ever make?

"there's no remedy for love.
nothing can change the way i feel
i'm hopelessly head over heels
for worse or for better"

when peace like a river
attendeth my way
when sorrows like sea billows roll
whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say
it is well, it is well with my soul

"there's no remedy for love
but i'd have it no other way
the symptoms are clear, i'm yours
for now and forever"

though satan should buffet
though trials should come
let this blessed assurance control
that christ has regarded my helpless estate
and hath shed his own blood for my soul

"there's no remedy for love
caught up in the concept of your kisses
of the mr. and the mrs.
of the steps our love is taking here"

my sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought
my sin, not in part but the whole
is nailed to the cross, and i bear it no more
praise the lord, praise the lord, o my soul!

"i'm lost in the magic and the mystery
in our own small part of history
our hearts have started making here
and i know there'll be no cure for me
but what sweet malady"

and lord, haste the day when my faith shall be sight
the clouds be rolled back as a scroll
the trump shall resound, and the lord shall descend
even so, it is well with my soul


... that i would live and breathe the words of the latter song, that i would live for the day that "my faith shall be sight" ... and not for "our own small part of history."
... that "my sin is nailed to the cross and i bear it no more" ~ i have no "sweet malady"

... that love is not a disease to be contracted! it is a gift from our lord, poured out freely
... that i, because of his great goodness, can love others with his selfless love!
... that it is not about the "concept" of any "kisses", but laying one's life down for another...


i don't want to just dis a nice wedding song .... but i do want to live a life of meaning, so that when i reach the end of this life, i will inspire others to contemplate HIS return! not my earthly journey...

vbs

we have over 300 kids signed up for vacation bible school this year at grace!
that's waayyyy more than we expected ~ yay!

next year, once the building project is done.... we will actually have the space to advertise!

this is such a fun week....
*kids everywhere~
*incredible food (that regular church staff are invited to partake of...)
*awesome decorations! (the church is decorated in a spy/space theme)
*cute skits and songs
*great people!!!

it's so hard to get anything done vbs week!

525,948.766 minutes in a year

after 6 hours of reading
10 minutes in line at midnight
2 years of waiting...

wait.... make that 8 years of waiting......

(i started when i was 12)


i finished harry potter.

the world has finished harry potter.
(except for the reeeaaaaallly slow readers ~ or those weird people who aren't willing to eschew sleep and food for the goal.)


now all we have to look forward to are the lame movies. oh joy.

at least it's harry potter weekend

rain, rain, go away...

it's the middle of july!

busy!

veryveryvery busy with work right now!!!

so..... i rearranged my desktop. (actually i did that before it got busy)

my inspiration was bella espresso in cannon beach.

i love that place.

burnside st & powell blvd

yeah, i know it's a bit of a stretch, but that's what i was reminded of when i was creating this pic.
(the actual title is sweet dreams.)

i'm horrible with navigation. completely abysmal. i can be driven somewhere 10 times, have directions, and still get lost.

& i don't like burnside.

i think that in heaven, we're only going to have one golden street...
actually, i would probably still get lost. (did gabriel say to take a right or a left at the road...)

®åη∂øΜΝ∈ςς

in my lala-world, there are 2 seasons: summer and christmas.
summer is the first 85 degree day through the beginning of fall (september twenty-something).
christmas is the beginning of fall through new year's day.

the rest of the year we don't talk about. we suffer from severe seasonal affective disorder induced meltdowns, and cry frequently after dark (which happens at, like, 2pm).


i ♥ summer!

i ♥ walking outside and breathing in short little gasps because it's so hot.
i ♥ not being able to actually touch my steering wheel.
i ♥ staying up til midnight reading because it's too hot to sleep, then complaining about it the next day.
i ♥ seeing the freckles (my mom calls them angel kisses) come out on my face and laughing at our flip-flop tans.


the only teenie-weenie itty-bitty thing that i didn't like so much...

a peeling sunburn on the top of my head in my part. yuck.
but 20 minutes of hard brushing and 3 or 4 washings took care of things nicely.


end of randomness. happy sunshine!

my summer freckles have come out to play!

okok, you can barely see them, but they're there!

ay ay, captain...

my brother is spending this week as a camp counselor, and tim thomas and i got to be in on the discussion of his camp name!

tim suggested john travolta - an allusion to chip's white tuxedoed performance at the youth group prom. chip wasn't amused, so tim returned with the rhyming "dance pants."

yup, that's right.


dance pants was vetoed on the grounds that it would be shortened to simply pants... and we can't have that in a camp for jr. highers.

chip opted for the authoritative sounding "captain." he's going to paint little stripes on his shirt sleeves and all his campers sleeves, and it's going to be very cute and nautical and ... yeah.

here's a 4th of july picture of captain pants at the helm.

pictures :)

still haven't uploaded the pics.
here's other pics, though, from the last month or so.

happy july!

will post pics from last weekend's college/career group bbq and this weekend's beach trip as soon as i can upload and sift through all 650 of them.

which won't be tonight because we're hanging out at church with a bunch of grade school kids from taiwan. really.


... i won't post all 650.