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The Way I See It...

So Starbucks puts these snippets on their cups about the way others see life. They are usually very odd bits of someones thought and they often try to reach way too deep for such simple musings.
But, if Starbucks were to call me up and ask me how I see things so that they can print it for all of the coffee drinking, caffeine loving world to see, I would reach way down into my creative soul and tell them this...

"Nothing is what it seems.
No one person is able to
display,absorb or comprehend
all that fills their eyes.
It is too big, too grand and too painful
for one's eyes and mind to accept.
I am not yet my future and I refuse to be my past.
I cannot and should not be a recycled version of myself.
I am right now.
I am today.
I am what I see and what I do
and a series of reactions to all that I encounter.

Today, I encountered a grown man
as he picked his nose and ate
that which his body was so desperately
trying to get rid of.

Again I say,
This world contains many things
which I cannot and will not ever comprehend."

Epilogue:
The thing is, we were at Baja Fresh waiting in line to get some very tasty food. AND YET, he couldn't wait. He had to have a snack. But not just any snack would do, he had to take my appetite away while enjoying a morsel of what truly is human waste. It's mind bottling.

If you are what you eat, I would rather be a burrito.

Bible Stories and Prostitutes

This is how you can tell if your child really is absorbing those precious moments of reading the Bible together each night before bed.
Scenario: After school, Grace and pal playing, I'm making lunch

Grace: okay, so you be the one that crushes the baby and takes mine.
Pal: okay Grace (in a southern accent, no idea where she picked it up)
Grace lays down with her baby and pretends to sleep while her pal rolls over her own baby doll and comes to take Graces. She snatches Grace's baby and runs off.
Grace wakes up and cries in a horror that only a mother could understand, "My baby is smashed!! Wait! This is not my baby! I must tell the King..."
She runs off and I hear then in her room going to the King (Solomon for those of you who are not familiar with this story From 1Kings3:16-28) and he (grace) informs them that he will cut the baby in half so that they each get a piece.
Grace feeds each line to her pal.
Pal: it's my baby!
G: no it's mine and she smashed hers!
Grace as King: then I will cut up your baby like a half and you both get it.
Pal via Grace: Yeah
Grace: NO!! please don't hurt my baby. give her away, but don't hurt her!! (sobs)
King: NO! she is the real mother. Guards, take this bad lady away and do not hurt the baby!
Pal: but Grace, now I don't get a baby and you do!
Grace: well then don't smash your baby next time.
Pal: well that's not fair!
Grace: here you can have your smashed baby back and we can pretend she isn't smashed anymore.
Pal:...ok.
And Scene.
I love that my kid knows Bible stories well enough to make them apart of her everyday thought life. It is a little unnerving that she chose one of the most dark and morbid stories she knows though. Obviously she has no idea that they are prostitutes, but I loved calling my friend and telling her that her daughter was pretending to be a baby mashing prostitute. Oh the innocence of childhood!

The Best Part of the Week

I love Wednesday nights at 8:00.
I look forward to it all day Monday, all day Tuesday, and all day Wednesday.
It is a very special part of the week for me.
At 5:30 my sister Michelle comes over and we have dinner.
At 7:00 we put the kids to bed and hang out and chat for about an hour.
Then at 8:00/8:15, it begins.
An entire hour devoted to a very special lady.
I love you Tyra Banks!!
I love America's Next Top Model.
I'm not a big "reality TV" fan, but I love this show.
It's not that I want to be a model or every think I could be but I love the "artsy" stuff with the photography and I love watching one awkward, gangly girl rise to the top of the pack.
At the season opener we each pick our choice for winner (FYI: I am often correct)
and then we spend each week half entranced while the other half of our chitchatting is focused on which parts will be mocked endlessly by Joel McHale on The Soup (another one of my favs).
I usually don't talk about TV stuff around other people because I don't like to debate about why I should or shouldn't like my smut.
However, I feel obligated to inform the rest of you (whomever you are) that this is entertainment on multiple levels.
So I say with the utmost sincerity and in a complete whisper, "Congratulations, you are still in the running to become America's Next Top Model."
Now that is fierce=)

Finding My Calling

I've had a lot on my mind lately.
Sometimes I feel so content but often I am thinking about what the future will look like.
I know I am meant to be a teacher. I love my job and I love my school.
But there are so many roads one can take just in teaching.
I love being in the classroom and the order and the routine matched with unpredictable moments. It truly is the best job in the world to me.
My passion for the kids is what drives me. I love listening to them and talking with them and showing them how important they are. I love being an encouragement and a challenge. I love when they come to me and I get to be a part of their journey in life and learning. It is fun. I know that sounds like a weak way to describe it. But I really do have fun doing that.
I love that even though I have days that I want to quit, or I get mad at one kid or another or allof them, I love knowing that tomorrow is fresh and new and we get to start over. I love working with them on how to have healthy relationships with their friends and relating everything we talk about to God. I love when I am teaching a lesson and God permeates every inch of it and they get so pleasantly surprised that God found his way into our discussion about...character types or The Great Gatsby. I love this job almost but not nearly as much as my family.
I hate grading and always will, but that really is the only consistent downfall to this job.
I have such a great desire to make an impact which is hard because most of the time even if you do make an impact, you never get to know or see the fruits. But I don't care about that. I really love my students and really love watching the individual change and grow and struggle.
So what's my dilemma?
I have a masters in education, which aside from a slight financial increase, hasn't done much for my classroom experience.
I know that my education is not complete.
I want to go back to school, but I have no idea for what degree.
I have so many things yet to do.
Here are the things I am considering:
1. A masters in English (I love the subject and could teach this for a long time)
2. A masters so I can do school counseling (but, can I handle the emotional rollercoaster of dealing with so many problems?)
3. A PhD in something educational which would allow me to teach teachers how to be teachers.
I definitely see myself at the college level someday but even that is such a broad spectrum of possibilities that I don't know where to start.
This is a plea to all who have gone before me and figured this out. How do you know what to choose now to plan for later?
I have to make wise choices because there are two more college students in the making that I have to plan for as well.
I need wisdom and inspiration.

Carnivores 101

I like meat.
I'm not ashamed to admit it or enjoy a good steak or some yummy seafood.
Grace is a very...inconsistent eater. She likes most everything, it's just getting her to stop moving her mouth long enough to actually get food from the plate to her belly that is very difficult.
So we went to Ruby's.
Grace
Ella
Me
and my sister, Michelle
We are eating our food and chatting happily.
Grace eat your chicken (which is a plain chicken breast chopped up and some apples)
She continues to chat
Grace eat your chicken please.
More chatting.
GG (that's our nickname from "Gracie Girl"), honey, I need you to eat your lunch please.
More chatting.
Grace. Please eat some chicken now.
Okay mom. (she picks up a piece and begins to inspect it)
She then holds up the piece of chicken breast and says,
"Why did they kill this chicken for me to eat?"
I stare frozen in a carnivorous moment of space and time.
Michelle has to turn away.
I say, "that chicken or any chicken?"
(the reason I asked, was to A. allow myself more time to formulate an answer and B. to make sure I am answering the right question. Kind of like when your kid asks where babies come from and all they really want you to say is from a mommy's tummy and not info on the birds and the bees)
she says any chicken.
I say, "well, God made all of the animals for us to take care of but also to eat. Chicken is good for you."
She says, Oh, vegetables are good for you too.
Yes, they are.
Yeah, but you don't have to kill vegetables.
Nope...
I breath a sigh of relief hoping that I have answered the question "properly" in her terms.
A couple nights later we are having more chicken. She picks up a piece of chicken breast that is pointy and asks, "is this the beak?"
I have never felt so guilty for eating meat!
She has completely changed the way I eat because every time I eat meat of any kind now, I think about what it looked like whole and picture her voice asking why we killed these animals to eat them.
But the sound of a steak right now sounds amazing, so I guess I'm not completely ruined.

When Bad Choices Slap You in the Face

Okay so Sundays are my worst day. I have all of this extra time to get ready and Eric is gone but somehow we (the girls and I) are late almost every week.
SO this last Sunday I was knew I needed a shower and Ella was asleep.
Grace and I were watching a kid show. I decided this was my moment to run and shower.
I never let Grace watch TV alone because I want to monitor everything she sees.
But I really needed a shower so I told her I was going to run and shower.
I forgot to tell her to turn the TV off when the show was done so she didn't.
Well, I run and shower and then I run back out to make sure the show is either off or needing to be turned off.
I get out to the living room to find my child riveted by something on the TV.
Its the news.
I turn the TV off and she looks up at me to say and I quote.
"Mom, you only need three cleaners (holds up three fingers). One for the stove, (one finger up), one for the kitchen, (two fingers up), and one for the bathroom (third finger goes up). BAM! (that's the name of the product). It's so easy."
I recover from what I have just heard and ask her where she heard this.
"Oh on a commercial. I love commercials. You should try this cleaning stuff."
This is why I monitor what she watches and why I never let her watch commercials.
Can you imagine what will happen to our lives when she sees a Barbie commercial?!
Whoever marketed that cleaning product was genius because they got a 4 year old to want it.

Okay, bad mom moment number two.
My kid says "Like" constantly.
I can blame this on no one but myself. I say it way too much.
She and I have made a deal that we have to call each other out on it whenever we say it. I know I will go nuts with her nagging me about this, but I have to stop for the sake of my child.
She already thinks she is 40 so if she is going to be sooo mature, I am going to have to get her to stop sounding like a 13 year old Bop in her speech.
And I guess I should sound more grown up too.