Flu: 1, Lisa: 0

Ok. Talk about cabin fever. How about room fever. I have not left my bedroom for more than a total of 30 minutes since TUESDAY. And I'm including the master bathroom in that. I have eaten nothing but dry cereal and soup and I am just dying for something interesting to eat. I don't know what, but something more than chicken noodle soup. Is that a sign of getting better? If I could get my darn fever to break, then I'd know that things were going much better, but I can't. 101 and 102 for the last two days, and thought I was good today when it was only 99 all morning, but then spiked at 100 this afternoon. That and my darn throat which feels like a tiny thousand knives have been raking up and down the back of it and swallowing, talking, anything is absolute torture!

Ok I'll stop with my moaning. It's really been an uneventful month for us. Andrew has been working away at student teaching and is finding it rather enjoyable. I get to go to both Huntsville and Orlando in the next three weeks, providing I can kick this darned flu to the curb. At this rate it feels like it will never get over! Wow I'm whining again.

So that's all around the King household. I think I'll go nap again.

Dave Ramsey, you should be proud of me

Ok Dave. Now this may be taking your beans and rice policy a little bit too far, but my lunch today is...a can of tuna and mayo. And why is it only a can of tuna and mayo? Because silly me, forgot to grab the loaf of bread when I ran out the door for work today. I remembered the tuna and the mayo to make a tuna sandwich, but forgot the bread. So...instead of running to the store to buy bread, and who knows what else because I'm shopping for food while HUNGRY, I simply mixed up my tuna and my mayo and I'm eating that alone!

Go me, it's my birthday and I will be debt free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! INCLUDING my house.

:-D

Back to work

Well, It is back to another week for Student teaching(wk 6) a class of Kindergarten's, after being off 3 days last week sick. I feel much better, I caught some sort of bug going around kids at school. I almost have my health back, I still have a persistent cough though. I was exhausted from the illness most of last week, made it rather difficult to get my student teaching stuff done, my school work done, and my vending done, so I reluctantly had to work Saturday to get caught up on my vending. I hire someone to run the vending route throughout the week, but it still requires my help occasionally now.
Oh almost forgot, Lisa took off for work and then left me home alone sick for the week while she was gone to Boston.

The past does not define me

So this is the perfect title. I had a whole speil worked out last night as I was lying in bed trying, unsuccessfully, to fall asleep. And it was beautifully written. In my head! And now, 10 or so hours later, all I remember is the darned title. Other than that, I just remember a general thought process, which was just along the lines of, I'm tired of being depressed and bitter and reliving all the crap that I've seen, done (and am sorry for or regret), or had happen to me. It's not done me any good to constantly remember it. And then I ended by determining that I would no longer live in the past, but in the here and now. And look forward to what tomorrow has to offer. Not because tomorrow is going to be better than today, but because tomorrow has endless MORE possibilities than I am already experiencing today!

So that being said, today is the first day of a new life. However, as I have been remiss in my posting duties, I do need to catch you up. So forgive me for my delve into the past here!

So let's see. After returning from my impromptu trip to Michigan, we've been very busy. Andrew has started his 5th (FIVE?!?!) week of student teaching. This week he is in charge of teaching around 25 kindergartner's math. He's been having a very good experience, over all. At least I think so, he may disagree. He has seen students with varying levels of intelligence and handicaps and has had to work with them in order to get them to pay attention, stay on task and help them learn the skills needed to get them to the next grade. I am very proud of him. Even though it is very tiring, between student teaching, school classes still for his masters, and trying to do the odd job with the vending, I've seen him "bloom." I truly feel this is God's calling for him.

Me, now let's see. I have still been busily ensconced with work, band, church, bells, and just trying to keep house. January saw me in Miami for a trade show. Now, I had absolutely gorgeous views and even stuck my feet in the ocean, for the first time in, oh, 14 years? Yeah, so the beach doesn't agree with me.





OH and while I was wasting away in Miami, poor Andrew was stuck at home, working on remodeling our Master bath. It's not done, and will be a bit more before it is, but it is already much much improved over what it had been!

Now after I returned from Miami, I was in charge of organizing a meal for church. Now this is like nothing compared to the events I've had to organize for work, but I still had my panic moments. Thankfully, all went off without a hitch. Now I am waiting to travel to Boston tomorrow for another business trip. Then, I'm home! Well, until March anyway!

So anyway. Hopefully the next post won't be as long as I won't have to update you on 2 months worth of activities. Whoops. What happened to those New Year resolutions? :-D

Amanda

Death of the body comes to all of us at some time in our lives. After all, the price of sin is death. Unfortunately, death has come to a loved one all too quickly.

Some of you may have met her at my wedding. She was a bridesmaid, walked down 3rd. She was Amanda. Amanda was 24. Amanda had potential. She had so much to live for, a family who loved her deeply, including an extended family who felt she was more of a sister than a cousin. A boyfriend who also loved her. She would have married and had many children. Now I know that you always see these things mentioned with the death of one so young, but it is so true. Amanda committed suicide after a 4 year struggle with addiction to prescription medication.

I remember the good times with her. I remember the trip to Manistee, where I swear my Uncle must have hated us! :) If the truth be told though, I think he enjoyed the torture we put him through. “Are we there yet? What time is it? I have to go to the bathroom!” There were 6 phrases that we repeated ad nauseum for probably an hour. One for each kid. Yes, my uncle took 6 children, all under the age of 10, I believe, on a road trip by himself. Boy was he brave.

I remember the Christmas trips, where we stuck together almost like glue. We were the only two girls after all, out of what was at the time, 7 grandchildren. We were seriously outnumbered! Lauren joined us later and it was a few years before she was able to enter into the games with the girls.

I remember the playing Barbies! Neither one of us could give up our childhood toys until we were well into the teenage years!

Then things changed. I first noticed it when I was 21, she would have been almost 18, or maybe she was 18. It may have been the addiction, it may have simply been a personality conflict, I don't know. I just remember the sudden change in personality towards me. Lauren was 12 by then, and it was suddenly Amanda and Lauren, with me as a third wheel. Which, if I think about it, was only natural. I was about to enter into the adult world, I was no longer a child, I was about to enter an entirely different part of my life.

It saddens me that we drifted apart, for whatever reason. We may have had our differences, but she was family, and no matter what, I would have fought for her. The Amanda I knew in the early years is not the same Amanda who showed during our last few encounters.

I find anger to be a comfort. The anger masks the pain. The anger keeps my shoulders back and my chin up. The anger gives me the blind determination to never put myself in a situation where I will ever cause my family this much pain. If you are considering suicide as a way out, wake up. Be real. Do you really believe that the people in your life think they would be better off without you? Do you know what suicide says to those who are left behind? That you didn't care enough about them to fight for your life, to stick around, to love and to be loved by them. Life is not all about you. And death is not all about you.

Be wary of drugs, all of them. They all have their evil. Watch your children, watch your friends. I can only pray as Andrew and I look at starting our family that God will watch over our children and keep them from the evils of this world. I pray that our children will be born with a strong sense of self, a strong will (yes mom, I want them to be stubborn and willful, after all it served me well, even if I will have to fight them tooth and nail).

I'll leave you with these parting words, taken from the cover of her funeral bulletin, which I can only find myself wishing that Amanda had taken them to heart:

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow. Because He lives all fear is gone. Because I know He holds the future. And life is worth the living, just because He lives.

Christmas in Iowa - 2007

Well the holidays are almost over. Just one more "holiday" to go, and Andrew's birthday (29.....he's almost old!) We went to Andrew's family for Christmas and spent the day with Grandma Shirley and all the cousins. Thought I would post some pictures for you.



Here's Grandma Shirley and Andrew!



And Nathan. If any of you remember him, he was the ring bearer in our wedding. My, what a difference 4 years makes!



Well I hope you all have had a wonderful holiday! Merry belated Christmas, may you know the reason for the season and have a wonderful New Year!

Oh my gosh, we are finally finished! :)

Ok so after two years, and a few soap operaish moments (ie Andrew trying to chop his arm off with the chop saw, instead of the piece of wood he was attempting to cut), our basement is finally finished! Unfortunately, I don't have any before pictures (bad me! I have an excuse. I didn't have a camera until July of this year!!!) So you'll just have to use your imagination as I describe how it USED to be.

When we moved in back in November of 2005, you would walk into the room and half of the room was just the cement wall and the other half was covered in the 70's most popular style of wood paneling! The stairs were completely closed in so you had about a doorway's amount of room to get into them and it was just one big huge dark, dirty room. The furnace and hot water heater were just sitting one side of the room, completely open.

So we decided to take the one big room and give us 4 smaller rooms. One room became a storage area. We moved the washer and dryer hook ups to a different corner and made the 2nd room a laundry room/utility area. The third room enclosed another small storage space while closing in the hot water heater and furnace. The largest room is now our third "living room." We already have a family room and formal living room upstairs. Our already large 1700 square foot house just became an even larger 2000 square foot house. Yikes. I don't know what to do with all the space! We already got lost in all the space we had before. We also knocked out half the wall along the stairway in order to make a nice bannister area.

Adding all of this space also allowed us to move the office from our third bedroom to the basement. So we now have two guest bedrooms! :) I am so thrilled. It looks wonderful. Andrew did the bulk of the work with help from my father, his father, our friends Mike, Paul and John, my mother and I. So... Here are some pics!