Royal Family Kids Camp and what is means to me

Each year I return from this special camp drained, emotional, and changed by God. This year was no different. I became acquainted with a darling young girl (who shall remain unnamed for safety reasons). She crawled right into my heart and I will carry her there for the rest of my life.

A little description:

1. possible fetal alcohol syndrome

2. developmentally delayed

3. learning and speech disabilities

4. incredibly independent

5. possible detachment issue

6. the best laugh at camp

7. a lover of life, splashing, playing hide and seek

8. a great helper

9. a sister and friend to her family

10. Jesus's special child whom he chose and still chooses.

This week my camper and I learned how to get along and be a team. I learned to help a child who needed a lot of help without making her feel less independent and able. We constantly played games and ran around. We laughed all the time. She laughed for pure joy of being a child. I laughed watching her have fun and at some of her hilarious antics. She did some very silly things!

Another list of silly things:

1. falling asleep on a horse repeatedly for 30 minutes

2. splashing water into her own face and then laughing hysterically

3. rolling around on the floor during chapel

4. always running ahead of me into our cabin and hiding under the bunk so that I can find her

5. running around naked while I try to cover her with a towel

6. stomping around like an elephant with a mischievous grin

7. spitting water at boys who call her cute

8. eating in general

9. calling every pet "ugly" as a name

10. sleeping in a bed filled with toys.

This week has changed my life! If you ever want to experience true life change, then participate in this camp. God will show you how much he loves each of his children.

Name Calling

This is my response to a rude girl on facebook. What I wanted to say was.... "If you are trying to flirt with my brother why don't you just tell him he is handsome and funny. Instead, you use reverse psychology and tell him he is an ugly whore. Do you think this will work on him? I don't instead he will put you in the sort-of-friends category forever. No one wants to date a person who puts them done for fun"

There is a growing trend in our culture to use "name calling" as means to show people a few things.

1. How close we are to them that we can joke the way siblings used to fight when they were wee babies.

2. That we are witty and deserving of laughte

r and praise.

3. The use of these names as term sof endearment to make up memorable.

I am just so sick of it. In fact this is not the first time I have commented on someone's facebook

comment of what a bad idea this is! Maybe it is the teacher in me, but I know that this is damaging to most people. I would never want someone to call me a fugly slut to show me how much they care. In case you were wondering here is another.... she also never dated my brother.

I encourage us all to stand up to rude name calling and make this world a better place!

What Fresno has Taught ME about me

I like lists the most out of every writing technique. If you despise lists, then you might want to read no further. i promise you that my blog will always consist of lists and ramblings. I might also add a few too many exclamation points and run-on sentences. This is how I write and I am not sure if I can "change" it.

Ok so back to my subject....

1. I can ride a bus all by myself. (Or at least with the help of a few

dozen local citizens and bus drivers.)

1.5 I can be away from this man... for an extended period of time

and not die of loneliness, self-esteem issues concerning my worth, or a lack of really hilarious joke telling and dirty language.

1.625 I can stand up for myself and get what I need. The picture below shows my free beer with refill, snacks, book, and music. The most important aspect is the LEG ROOM. I get really sick on air planes. The flight attendant addressed my problem by moving me to the exit row. Ahh pure bliss!

I have a few more, which I will post later. I am just so tired and need to sleep before a long day of school. For those who are biting their nails in anticipation.... It involves an Armenian bartender's love life, a bespectacled schizophrenic man who commented on my reading abilities, a theologian/vet/master chef who tried to buy me a drink and invite me to church, an almost finished movie, a mall, two kids with beer sharing parents, one famous person and tv appearance, and finally a few feral cats.

Love, Steph-a-lone-and-sleepy

Day 1: Flying to Fresno

As I sit waiting for my plane I have a few accomplishments to tell you about!

1. I changed my seat to prevent sickness during flight. As Ben would say, I informed someone of my extreme motion sickness like an adult would.

2. I put away AT LEAST 15 boxes full of stuff we obviously don't need. All in honor of our two month long house guest.

3. I lost 4 pounds in 2 1/2 weeks. All from eating correctly portioned meals and being more

active. Weight Watchers rocks! My goal is to lose 20 pounds. I am not even sure if this will be a healthy weight for me, but I did weigh that and felt very good about myself.

4. I finished my first full year of school with a 4.0 GPA. I am so proud of myself.

5. I have worked on developing positive relationships, being more confident in myself, and letting God work in me.

6. I am not wearing makeup for month. I need to feel beautiful without adding to myself. Notice no makeup AND naturally curly hair. I did put fake

tanner on, but only so I won't be tempted to tan in California and get SKIN CANCER!!!!! See my legs definitely look...tan? At least Ben didn't pull out the Lindsey Lohan nickname from when I decided to mystic tan myself to Amazon brown. By the way I took this picture in the airport and all these older fellows just looked at me with a lot of wonder and amusement.

That is all I can think of for now. It sure feels good to work hard to better the environment around you as well as yourself. Now, I am off to Fresno! I will be all by myself for two weeks working on learning science to become a better science teacher. The class is called: The solar neighborhood. I will keep you posted!

Steph

My Life and Some Things I have discovered

I love lists more than I love talking. Considering I love to talk this is a big deal so here is my list of life.

1. I don't trust people to care for me as much as I care for them. I am damaged by relationships gone sour. Now that I have had this epiphany (also the name of my dad's new sail boat) I can let God work on my heart.

2. People in roles of authority are not always right. In fact, I need to be confident in who I am without affirmation from others. This is so backward from everything I feel like I need. What a lesson!

3. I deleted this one.

4. I am self-effacing. I tend to follow a brilliant comment I make with an insult to myself. Some one noticed this about me at school and told me to stop. SO I need to stop.

5. Absolutely no one in the world can empathize with the exact place in my life I am at. I just have to deal with it myself! There is no way to describe to anyone how much I have to get done for school, work on my house, go to work, be with family, and every other chore!

6. Long hair is not all that it is cracked up to be.

I think that is all the listing I have for today. Maybe I will feel empowered later this week.

My obsession with Scifi

Many of you may not know this, but you probably could have guessed that I am a SCIFI FANATIC! I love books, movies, miniseries, discussions, full series, and dreams all set in space or the supernatural. In order to commemorate my obsession I deemed today as official:

SCIFI LOVERS UNIT DAY FEBRUARY 23, 2010

This means you must choose your favorite scifi book, movie, or other category.

Books:

1. Gone

Kids all alone in a town with super powers. Animals morph too!

2. Twilight Series

Please don't tell me you haven't already read this!!!

3. The Dark Angel Trilogy (my absolute favorite)

A world is dying and one girl is chosen to save it inadvertently.

4. East

A fairytale with a Nordic girl and her bear.

Movies:

1. Firefly

Thats all for now Ben is shutting my computer as we speak...

Cats like Citrus

Today I baked a cake of lemon. I put copious amounts of lemon in every part. I put 1/2 cup of lemon juice in the cake and 1/2 cup lemon juice in the frosting. Somehow it was still not enough... First I thought to add grapefruit juice to the cake, but instead I made the frosting pure sour! I added more lemon juice to the frosting, and behold perfection! Once it was baked I put the frosting on top. It melted into a perfect layer. I ate a tiny little slice that made my face scrunch up. (just to test)

It was just perfect.

My kitten took a few bites. (without permission)

She thought it was just delicious. (purrrrrr)

If you would like a piece come on over!

Bring some tums...

And maybe some chocolate milk...

Sincerely,

An avid cake maker eater devotee and dictator

Recipe:

Betty Crocker yellow cake mix

Follow directions, BUT substitute 1/2 cup water with lemon juice

Frosting: a mountain of powdered sugar, some butter, lemon juice, and 1-2 drops yellow food coloring. Mix, add powdered sugar to thicken. Put on cake while still hot from oven. The white is the frosting without yellow food coloring.

Facebook and the types of people who post.

Everyday I look at my facebook account and I wonder what people are thinking. They treat facebook as though it is the most important thing to. Below I have listed several groups or categories of facebookers. If you disagree tell me why? If you want to add a category please do!

1. Mommies

These are the people who have just recently had a child. They are so enamored with their babies and post 1-2 pictures per day. Posts include quotes such as," Judy just picked up a cup and walked around smiling," or, "Jordan was angry during bath time." While this is somewhat endearing, you want to filter about half their posts in order to see more peoples statuses.

2. lovey couples

This is genre of facebooker that constantly post loving things about their significant other. Not only will they post these things daily, but also that significant other will say something equally as smoopey back. It will look something like this:

Javier is " loving the women who chose to marry him."

Emily: "Oh baby you are the best."

Javier: "No you are the best."

Sandra is "so thankful for a husband who does the dishes without her asking."

Bob: "Darling you are worth every scrub."

Sandra: "Let scrub together when I get home...:)"

You can see how this is like watching a terribly rated romance movie. Lets keep the love private and consider others without a significant other.

3. singles

This group includes partiers, just out of romances, and all other categories. These people post everything about how a party went, how drunk they were, and tend to group invite as a status update. Don't get me wrong, they are very entertaining, but how many drunk escapades do they post before everyone thinks they are an alcoholic? This group tends to flirt way to much as well. Their picture is very seductive and may include bare chests and cleavage. I say, " go to match.com!"

4. oversharers

Jaimie is, "I just pooped and it looked like a turtle."

George is, "Loving the new maytag washer that he and his wife bought ten minutes ago. It has a duel speed system. I even went to target and found this amazing green liquid soap that will be good for our environment. There is nothing like new $546.99 appliances that I was able to pay for from my savings account. Now I am poor. Want to buy my car? (503-456-****)

Violetta is, "Really excited that she moved up a bra size!"

enough said...

5. People who think facebook is twitter

This group updates every 30 minutes or so. This group can include any other category or group and most likely is a single or a mommy, or in some cases unemployed or sick.

6. songsmiths

I already demonstrated my pet peeve of random song lyrics as a post. If you are going to post please reference your quote. Otherwise, technically you are infringing on copyright laws.

7. gamers

This last group is by far the most annoying and yet so entertaining. Daily they remind you why it is important to have friends, pets, a job, and other things to do. Those people who spend hours a day playing games and posting their success are doing themselves a disservice. Rather read a book and tell my how it changed you!

Disclaimer: I am in no way judging other people. Instead I am reflecting on what I see and trying to make sense of it! I am sure I sometimes an part of these categories.

Oh, I forgot a category.....

8. People who join ridiculous groups...like my brother

A list of personal pet peeves for all to know.

1. teachers who talk with no purpose

2. t.v. shows that leave you with a cliff hanger

3. encountering more than two bad drivers during one trip

4. needing sugar but not the calories

5. late fees at the library

6. all my radio stations on commercial break

7. painful ponytails

8. not having sour cream when you need it!

9. judging one another

10. doing bad things to prove that you are interesting, so ridiculous...

ex. swearing, vandalizing, mocking, drinking, any drug, and just the choice to degrade your body and/or mind to prove to someone else your worth!

11. people who quit dreaming and working hard to accomplish that dream

12. being cold for too long

13. people who quote songs that I don't know as their facebook status

14. impatient people

15. the term love used foolishly

And that is all for now...

A day of love

To all my fellow lovers of men in the world,

With a cat in my lap and coffee brewing I contemplate what really happened yesterday. It was not that it didn't meet expectations, or fulfill the gift quota, or commemorate love. In fact Ben exceeded those categories. I just always feel like it wasn't the "perfect day." This tends to frustrate me every Valentine's day. I set myself up for failure. As a romantic I believe that everything about the day will be as spectacular as it should be. Countless hours could have been spent in preparation. Each reaction to a word or present is given with enthusiastic feeling. Instead I am met with the ordinariness of each day of my life.

I began to consider this phrase ordinary. Could not my ordinary be someone else's extraordinary? Ben has never taken me for granted. He buys me presents often, and he loves affection. Why would an ordinary day not be extraordinary? It seems to me that I need to change the way I think about what my husband provides naturally. He is a gift giver. He is very thoughtful. He gives me the affection I need and want. But most of all, he loves me deeply and fully. What more does a woman want? Forget about Valentine's day and hello Monday... :)

The beginning

I have decided to keep a journal of sorts to help me sort my life into coherent thoughts. I realize that more often than not my blog will be a place to vent or stew.

For example: Sometimes I feel like I waste too much time doing things that will never benefit anyone or anything. I watch to many BBC victorian romances. Tears roll down my face, my cat purrs into the blanket, and Ben comes home to ask," What's for dinner?" I take my melancholy mood and swing it into him. Before I have realized it the ridiculousness has slopped all over my real life. I need to quit taking time to watch depressing movies.