My Fav Quote of the Week

It's possible to build on a foundation that's not laid correctly, but everything built on that foundation will be off.

Odds and Ends in Carolynville This Week!

 Above:  Melinda Brown, great friend, made the above wool scarf for my dad.  She is talented.  Wish I could crochet.  Took lessons when I was a kid from a lady, but I didn't really want to be in the class and didn't pay attention, so it turns out my parents didn't want to continue to "pay for me" if I wasn't going to take it seriously!  :-)  If only I could go back in time!  Good to have Proverbs 31 friends that are talented in that area to pick up the slack!

 Speaking of my parents...above is a pic of my mom and yes, that is me, author of this blog, when I was a baby...ummm I definitely was NOT a cute baby...I think anyway!.  Oh well!  Also, I want to mention that I really appreciate my parents publicly because I may be be grown now, but they are totally in my life and very helpful, and I KNOW they keep up with me by reading this blog...so hi Dad and Mom.  I know you see this.  :-)!!!

 Deepika Azariah cooked dinner for me last Tuesday before David Practice at her house.  It was absolutely yummy, and I tried her homemade Kombucha too!  I've already thanked her for this.  We've decided that every week we will have a girls dinner night.  Sounds like a plan!

 This weekend is the first weekend since August, literally, that I won't have any company....aka friends.... over all weekend....Wow....it is going to be weird....already is...blessing of HQ...we always have family and friends around!......What's planned....LOTS of Bible Study, and getting little projects done such as turning the above fabric into a necktie for my CCoatsOfManyColours! shop by sewing it!  I need to get back into my sewing mode.  Since I've been back I haven't been in the mood, but I need to get there.  One of the best seamstresses here asked a few of us if we would help sew tunics...aka some of the costumes for the David Musical......and of course I got all excited and was like YES!!!  I am sooo happy to have the opportunity to serve in this way!!!!  Dream come true!  Can't wait to get the fabric and start on this project helping out!  Reminds me I need to finish a dress I'm working on for myself!  :-)

 ....and finishing these two paintings started on stretch canvas that I began working on before leaving the country....didn't like it, so I repainted over what I had done with black acrylic paint.  They will be paintings of royal crowns gifted to Jamie Hawkins and Ariel Buckler...two of the sweetest people that I have the honor of knowing.  

Not tomorrow, but next Sunday is the powderpuff football game on the AC campus.  It's no secret that I'm not that athletic.  We had practice maybe a week or two ago, and ladies and gentlemen, I cannot catch to save my life, but I can run.  During our little "scrimmage" I made a touchdown.  Was this a one time thing, or have  I found my athletic calling, we will see.  :-)  This week Mrs. Stacey Short and I are going to practice throwing a football around.  She, Olivia Culpepper, and myself are the only 30 somethings on the teams playing with 18-22 year olds, so we have to represent well.!  Looking forward to it...we even get shirts.  Sweet!

What do I get for procrastination....

Above:  At work, it's not a secret I do NOT like shredding....so I always put my shredding off and off until I end up having to stay at work late after hours shredding bins...literally of things needing shredding....this was me this past week.  THREE bags of shredding.

Below:  People here know I am generally an OBSESSIVELY over the top neat person.  In my home, if someone even moves a chair out of place it bothers me, BUT with my car, for some reason, that is my life exception!  Well, my car has come to the point of NO RETURN...I keep putting off washing my car....I live on a dirt road......and now my car is so dirty it's going to have to go through one of those professional shops.  Yuck!!!  I'll clean it later on this week...no time this weekend.  People won't recognize it once it's cleaned!  Onward I go into a new week!!!!

Being Single 101! Not a Three Credit, but FREE CREDIT Course

It is great that so much attention has been on being single for those of us that truly understand the real point of "why family."  .......reproducing physically actually is to build on to the God Family going beyond just the physical into forever...the point of why we exist....etc etc...
For those of us that are single and actually get it, but are let's say late twenties and beyond, it can honestly get frustrating and annoying dealing with different aspects of singledom.  Today there was a lot of dating conversation due to turnabout weekend coming up which is nothing new to me...grew up at Ambassador in Big Sandy, Texas......so strictly AS A JOKE I came up with the below funny!
DISCLAIMER:  This is only meant to be a dry humor; sophisticated funny!  This is not intended to be educational in any way.  Just real life humor!  :-)

Single Ladies:  If a man asks you out on a date, it's just a date, not a marriage proposal.  (Don't go running to your gal pals saying he likes you and that there may be something there, and that he looked happy to be with you....think practical, it was one date.  Obviously he "liked you" enough to SERVE you in this way, and if he's content in life like the Bible says to be, and living according to "the law" of course he looks happy because he is happy.  Time is precious.  Don't waste your time or your friends time talking about something made up in your head..... oh and like and love are totally different.  A man can like Italian food and be very happy to have it with him on his dinner plate, but he's definitely not going to marry his food.  If a man says he LOVES you, then that's when to go talk to the gal pals....oh you might want to talk to your minister first too!  :-))

Single Men:  If a woman talks to you, it's just that, she's just talking to you; she's not expecting you to marry her.  (Some women may hope something more may develop and may be smiling and even be sometimes annoyingly and abnormally giggly around you, but don't worry about it, that's the way women are, more "fairy-tailish".  Most women really like jewelry a lot, but they know the jewelry is not going to marry them, yet they still like it and wear it often b/c it enhances them.  Oh, and don't worry, single women generally supply their own jewelry, so they are not expecting an engagement ring from you.  In fact, if you actually did propose to a woman, that would shock them way more than if you didn't.  So when a woman talks to you, that is just exactly what she is doing; talking to you.  If she looks happy, then she's doing what the Bible says by being content in life and obeying "the law, so no need for you to avoid talking to women, they are NOT assuming you will marry them.)

Married People:  If you see two singles of the opposite gender speaking to one another, or on a date with each other, it does not mean that they are getting married, and it also does not mean that they like each other romantically.  Obviously, they "like each other" to spend time together, but people also "like" their pets like their dog or their cat.  :-)!  When you see singles talking, or on a date, that is exactly what they are doing....talking and on a date serving each other.  You can help iron out the awkwardness by not giving singles that you see together "goo-goo eyes" and telling them that they look cute together hoping they will grow in love...we have already established that their is no such thing as fall in love.  Oh, and on another note...don't ask your single friends "Why are you single?"  That translates as "What is wrong with you?"  Not a very popular question among singles; but to answer your question, it's called not having many people to choose from and waiting on a right match to come along which translates pretty much into a miracle with the slim pickings.  We appreciate the kind thoughts in this way, but if you really want to see a wedding happen, this way of acting will "insure" <on purpose sp> that a wedding will NOT happen....You'll have to download the song "Here Comes the Bride" if you want to hear it, but then again, who really ever uses that song in their weddings nowadays anyway!  :-)

Single 101 Summary.....

Q:  Why don't marriages happen often?

A:  Marriages come from friendship, but if no one gets past the awkwardness, then no one will become friends for fear of marriage proposals.....no friendship....no weddings.

This crash course on being single has been given free of charge as a courtesy from the school of real life.  If my parents had named me Charity, I could say donations could be made "to charity" but they didn't.  :-)!

Conner Brown Doing Home Repairs to My Place

 Friends like Conner and Melinda Brown are rare jewels!  They gave up their Sunday to come over to my house to fix a busted pipe and ended up fixing some other things for me!  THANK YOU ALL...you classically rock!

Long story short...I came home from work one day last week and one of my rooms was flooded and I heard water gushing out from somewhere inside my wall, ...aka a pipe was busted inside a wall.....so I called my brother who came over and showed me how to turn all of my water off.  Great having family so close by!  Melinda Brown, a friend of mine since 2nd grade emailed me about something, and I emailed her back about my flooding prob....didn't ask for help, was planning on figuring out how to fix on my own....next day she emailed and said she told her husband Conner, another loooong life childhood friend of mine, (we all grew up in Texas together) and that he wanted to fix it for me.  WOW!!!!  I owe them BIG TIME!

ABOVE and BELOW:  Conner Brown starting to "put a hole" in my wall connected to my shower.

 Conner and Melinda's son, Alec, watches his daddy work.

 Melinda watches her two favorite men work on cutting a hole in my wall.

 Ta da!....and we have a "hol-e" wall!  :-)

 They are raising their son to grow up to be a real man.  I love that!....Alec shows me that he can be strong and handy like his daddy in these pics!

...and just like that, Conner fixes my busted pipe,  buys a pop out panel, so now I can open my shower wall anytime I need to, and installs it.  Sweet! ....talk about Conner being a great handy man around a house!!!

 ...and then, thanks to little Alec, Conner discovered my master bath shower door was off the track, so he fixed it too along along with some other things around my house that needed fixing.  Fantastic friend!

 Melinda watches her husband proudly, and rightfully so, as he finishes fixing my shower door!  I am so blessed to have wonderful friends in life that I have known almost my entire life!  Not a fun day, but yet it was fun spending it w/friends though it was a house work day!  Highlight of my day is when I started singing "London Bridge" and little Alec told me it is a "stupid song....talking about a bridge"  His words...ha,ha....he really liked Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star though.  Duly noted!  :-)

...and here's a short video of Conner starting to cut into the shower wall.

Gal Pal Time

 Fun gal pal weekend...

 T'was so much fun cooking Sat. night dinner and Sunday morning breakfast for the friends.

Fun David Musical Blocking Practice Candid Shots!--11 weeks until showtime!!

 Yeah!  We had our first David Musical practice with blocking.  Was total fun!  Such an honor to be a part of this BIG project!  Showtime dates at Armstrong Auditorium in Edmond, Oklahoma...Dec 26, Dec 28, Dec 29!

 Oops their pic came out blurry, but if you come to the show in December you can see them in focus!  :-)

Had no idea I got a pic of my leg and foot, but it's a keeper....was totally relaxed...umm maybe too much!

Fresh Chives, Soup, & Dvlping Proverbs 31:16

 Been sick this week, so craving lighter foods like soup!

Mrs. Melissa Burks gave me fresh chives from their garden, they taste so delicious even on their own, so I added them into my soup.  Yummy!  It's a blessing to have friends with green thumbs when you don't have the greenest thumb yourself.  :-)  That's a  Proverbs 31:16 area I need work on...you know..."she plants her own vineyard etc part!"  I have the field, just no vineyard.  :-)  Mrs. Burks has it down!

Ingredients I used in this (basically for myself to remember since I liked it.  No shame in having a "public blog memory")  :-)

Veggie Stock

Tomatoes

Green Beans

Lentils

Sweet Peas

Carrots

Fresh Chives

Freshly Minced Garlic

Corn

Grass Fed Ground Beef

Turkey Bacon (not the healthiest, but made the stock extra yummy)

Black Beans

A tiny bit of pasta

Pinto Beans

Potatoes

Sea Salt