Saturday, April 30, 2011

Breathing In Beauty

Last night after dinner, I stepped out on our front porch and breathed in beauty--cool, calm, twilighted beauty. The violent storms were gone, the pollen had been swept from the air and the sky was full of glory.

I called to Sarah to come downstairs and she and I grabbed our bikes and pedaled into the evening.

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Nature. A daughter. Two bikes. A smile. It was such a lovely evening to breathe in beauty.

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Thursday, April 28, 2011

Lights, Camera, Action, Easter!

The last few weeks before Easter were extra busy ones for us. For a variety of reasons, we got a late start on our Easter production and so Steve and I, along with our music/drama team, basically ended up writing (and endlessly editing) a script, working out music and video elements, building a set, putting into place fairly complicated lighting, getting fog machines geared up, training the dance team for their number—all in the space of about four weeks.

Steve went up and down this ladder . . .

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. . . at least forty times as he was getting the lights into place. And for a man who doesn’t care much for heights, that was quite an accomplishment!

There were meetings with different teams . . .

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. . . and the pondering of various gizmos and gadgets.

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Steve also worked with “Jesus” in planning out some of his movements.

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The lighting for the tomb had to be looked into . . .

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. . . and the resurrection itself planned.

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After the resurrection scene was done, one of our team members performed a sign language number to the Nicole C. Mullens song, “Redeemer.” It was absolutely gorgeous (And it was made even more special by the fact that it was taught to her by Meagan, our fabulous future daughter-in-law.)

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Sarah was a part of the dance team which she loved.

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After one of the rehearsals where we were experimenting with the fog machine, I took some random pictures of the floating fog and later saw what looked like a bird floating through the air.

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A few final photos . . .

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The production turned out very well which we were glad about; however, more importantly, we have heard many reports since Sunday of how it touched people’s hearts.

We have such a wonderful story to tell and we are honored to have the chance to tell it in a fresh, creative way.

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Comments

Ericka said, As a follow up to the question somebody asked about photo storage, I have 2 more questions:


How do you deal with the impermanence of electronic media? Do you print photos/blog entries so that your grandkids and great grandkids will still be able to see them even after CDs or thumb drives are no longer used?


I often worry about this. If we never print photos and online writings, there will never be boxes in the attic for our great grandkids to look through and I hate that. The electronic media will be lost as the ability to access each type of storage device dies, which tends to happen rapidly.

Ericka, wow—that’s a great question.

I agree with you that we have lost something in life when there are no longer boxes in the attic of precious things for grandkids to rummage through. Looking at pictures on a digital device just sort of loses a little something when compared to taking actual pictures out of a box and passing them around to siblings or parents and sharing all those wonderful memories encompassed in every shot.

I don’t know if you’re familiar with online companies that will scan your extra special photos for you and print them out. I’ve yet to use this company called Scan My Photos but when I get some extra money gathered up, I already have some pictures set aside that I’m going to send in to have them turned into prints. I realize that it is possible to scan photos at home but if you have 500 or 1000 that you want to make into prints, it gets a bit time consuming.

As for printing out blog entries—that’s something I’ve not thought about a whole lot. Considering the fact that I’ve written over 700 posts with an average of 600-1000 words per post, that would be a whole lot of printing and too big of a job for my home printer. And yet I sure do hate the thought of ever losing all that.

If any readers have any ideas you’d like to share on answering this question, Ericka and I would both love to hear from you!

Waning Wobbliness

I did call my doctor yesterday about my strange symptoms and he said two things:

1) Discontinue the medication immediately

2) Go get blood work done immediately to check for liver issues.

He told me that this particular medication has a long half life so it might be a couple days all the way up to a week before I start noticing marked improvement in how I feel.

I wouldn’t be overly concerned with treating this fungus if were just a cosmetic issue but unfortunately the podiatrist said that it’s also changing the shape of my toe nails which are causing them to become ingrown and then they have to be cut out about once a year. Which is not so much fun. (Trust me on that.)

I did get my blood work results back earlier this morning and thankfully my liver function is fine, which is what my doctor was most worried about.

At any rate, that’s the scoop on that particular exciting aspect of my life! I’m sure you were hardly able to sleep last night, just thinking so much about me and the state of my toes. (Or not.)

I have a long, picture-filled update about 95% ready to go and will get it up sometime before bed time tonight.

Thanks for checking in and thanks too for your patience as I've had to slow down a bit while waiting for this wobbliness to wane.


Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Wobbly.

Well, I was planning to write a lively, lovely and lengthy post today but I'm afraid my body and brain have other plans for me.

I'm still just feeling "weird" and I don't know why. I slogged my way to the gym earlier this morning and my legs and arms felt so weak I just knew they were about to give out on me at any moment. I feel like I could lie down and sleep for a week and I'm sorta just slogging along trying to muster up one little shred of energy for the day.

I know what depression feels like and I don't feel depressed. I just feel, well . . wobbly. I feel like I've just run a 26-mile marathon. (Which is sort of funny since I can't even run one-quarter of a mile without being threatened by complete collapse.)

So . . . the quintessential quandary facing me is that I have several thousand things on my To Do List at home and several thousand more things on my To Do List at the church. And my body and brain are both saying, "Lie down! Don't think! Don't do! Don't even think about doing!"

But the logical side of my self is saying, 'Girlfriend, you need to get up and you need to git 'er done."

Sigh.

Is it possibly to git 'er done in a wobbly sort of way? I guess I'm about to find out.

(Picture a few minutes passing here. . . . )

Okay, I'm back. Just as I was typing the above words it occurred to me that I've been on an antifungal medicine for about a month now. I thought, "I wonder if that could be affecting me." I did a search for the medicine's side effects and under "severe side effects" were the words, "Unusual weakness and tiredness."

Hmmmm.

Looks like a call to my doctor might be in order. (And also a nap.)

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Fun Link

(Edited to add:) A couple of you left comments saying you couldn't find the link mentioned below.

However, when I clicked on the words "this link" I was taken right to it. So it might possibly be that you were taken to a link but you didn't think it was correct because it's kind of a funny looking page with cartoon horses on it.

When you get there, turn up your sound, and try clicking on each of the horses, one at at a time. That is what made me smile. (And if you're still having trouble, let me know!)


(Original Post)

In the midst of all of the malaise-y mushiness of today, this link made me smile.

Malaise-y Mushiness

Thanks to those of you who have been checking in here for a current update. Things are fine and dandy here, with the exception of some random bonus busyness and stressy-ness.


And for some reason, I've been having a really horrible time with insomnia and have lain awake night after night for no good reason whatsoever.


And so lately, during the day, my brain has been feeling extra, unappealingly mushy and I really want to spare my dear readers the horror of a blog post written by a mushy- brained woman. It wouldn't be purty, believe me.



Anyway, I just wanted to check in here and let you know that I do have tons of blog post ideas floating around in the aforementioned malaise-y maze of my mental mushiness and I will be writing them soon.



And that's all. For now.