Take time to...

Ever since I started working from home, I tend to have the local news on in the background. And there is one thing I've started noticing as a common theme. Time. Take time to exercise. Take time to eat healthy, etc etc. Today I found myself becoming frustrated with this. Here is a list of the items that in a typical week that I need to "take time to"

1. Exercise (2.5 hours a week)
2. Cook dinner (4 hours a week)
3. Read/engage in a daily devotional (5 chapters a day! 7 hours a week)
4. Work (40 hours a week)
5. Quality time with Andrew (5 hours a week)
6. Clean the house (2-3 hours a week)
7. Pay bills (1 hour a week)
8. Maintain the monthly budget (1 hour a week)
9. Iron clothes (1 hour a week)
10. Sleep (56 hours a week)
11. Grocery shop (1 hour a week)
12. Church (2 hours a week)
13. Band rehearsal (3 hours a week)
14. Practice (3 hours a week)
15. Bible Study (2 hours a week)
16. Accountability groups (0.5 hours a week)
17. House maintenance (1 hour a week)
18. Drive time to get to all the various places (3 hours a week)
19. Personal Hygiene (14 hours a week)
20. Eating (10.5 hours a week)
Total hours occupied: 160.5
Total hours in a week: 168
Total free hours: 7.5

Well this exercise was good for one thing. It helped me realize I have a few hours to goof off! Certainly doesn't feel that way as I'm going through the week. Now what will I do with that time?!?

Thankful

So I found a reason to be thankful. I heard of a friend of a friend, who just gave birth to a baby girl on Sunday. To have the same baby girl die, on Sunday. I can't imagine going through all that one goes through in a pregnancy, just to lose that baby on it's birthday. It was hard enough to lose my babies when I did. But right now I thank God that I did loose them at 6 weeks, rather than 40. If I had to chose between losing the baby early and losing it that far along, please let me lose it early.

I'm heartbroken for the ones who lost their baby. I really can't imagine that. Just goes to show, that nothing is ever really as it seems.

Is there ever a too much?

Sometimes I wonder, really, how much one person can take. What it is that finally pushes them over the edge and crosses that invisible line.

Once again I find myself full of inexpressible anger and sadness for my friends. Just over a year ago I had to watch my family deal with the anger and pain of a suicide. And again, I am standing on the sidelines, watching friends deal with the same thing. Again I'm between anger and tears. Feels like it just brings back all the emotions that I never dealt with when Amanda died.

Why are we so selfish? What is it about us that truly believes that we are the only one who matters. Do we truly love others? I'm beginning to think we are incapable of love. How can one profess to love another, but then put them through this kind of pain? When one harms themselves like this, they are, in effect, rejecting the ones left behind. Telling them they weren't worth living for. If you are struggling with this sort of thing, please please get help. Don't let it come to this. You may be in all sorts of pain, but it causes all sorts of pain to those left behind.

Ghost Trees

So I thought this was rather comical looking. We are heading for another freeze tonight and as my poor lilac bushes have been rather abused, I didn't want them being harmed by a hard freeze. So I covered them with sheets, held down by rocks. My neighbors think I'm nuts I'm sure.

New Car!

Yeah, so I have no life that I'm blogging about the new car Andrew and I just came home with today. If you've been reading, then you know that our 96 Explorer kicked the bucket a few weeks ago, and we've been surviving with one car, our trusty 99 Accord with 163,000 miles. Thankfully I'm working from home now so it hasn't been too much of an issue, except for those days I did need to run some errands. We wanted to take our time, so we looked around at a few places and stumbled upon a 2005 Nissan Altima. We drove it, all looked good and drove nice, but the salesman wouldn't come down to a price we were willing to pay, so we left. He called back the next day with an even lower price. We kept looking, but ended up back again yesterday and took it home today. It is the newest and lowest mileage car I have ever owned, so I'm very excited.
















Although my little Honda is still my favorite car. :) The best part is that we paid cash. The not so cool part is our savings taking a hit.

F.ound O.n R.oad D.ead

So, after my commenting about not having much to report? Well, I may have spoken too early. It has been an interesting weekend to say the least. What was supposed to be spring break for Andrew turned into a spiraling of events that the end result has meant we need a new car! It wasn't really events, but event. We had company in town for the weekend, and spent most of it dealing with a now dead Ford Explorer. Or as I call it - Exploder. And my experiences with Fords has definitely been, well, poor.

First one I had any experience with, a 1987 Ford Mustang caught on fire while I was in it. Driving. 2nd experience was with our first Explorer, a 98, that I hated. And it knew it to. As it would never break down on Andrew, but consistently failed on me. Never would repeat the failure once Andrew was around either. So the hatred was mutual apparently. That one finally bit the dust last June when the transmission failed suddenly. And seeing as how the truck was beat up (3 wrecks, 1 of which totaled it and resulted in a salvaged title, 160+ K miles) we decided to dump it for something more reliable, cheap and quick. So we bought this 96 Explorer with 125K quick and cheap. And well, it's gasped it's last breath. Failed to start on us Saturday, it's not the starter as we replaced that and still won't start. Transmission was failing and really began acting up before it failed to start. We had to have it towed home. Managed to get it running for enough time to get it in the garage, where it is now parked until we push it out.

So we are on the hunt for a new vehicle. Any one selling a decent car for a decent price? Lol. Or if you are searching for a fixer-upper F.ix O.r R.epair D.aily, let us know, we have one for cheap! You just have to haul it away.

March

Wow so it's been a while. Really not a lot going on with us right now. We are just getting through the days and moving forward with life! Right now I am looking up trees and shrubs to find something to plant on the front of the house. I have a garden area next to the garage which needs something done with it but it gets little sun so not much grows. Ahh well. If anyone has any suggestions, I'd love to know them! Hopefully this summer we'll be able to do some work in the back yard. Well I call it a yard. It's really a mass of dirt and weeds with some grass mixed in. I got my deck built last year (yay go Andrew and Dad!) but have yet to be able to enjoy it.

Anyway, I am going to go back to Googling plants. Bye!