Friday, April 25, 2008

Online Calendar and Address Book

I just wanted to send out my recommendation for an online calendar and address book, if anyone is searching for one. I really enjoy Plaxo (pulse.plaxo.com). It's pretty and colorful and lets me put in contact information and calendar appointments the way I like to put them and not in the forced layout that so many calendars and address books use.

So...check it out if you're interested. :)

Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Dirty Kitchens


Dirty kitchens GROSS ME OUT.

Seriously...have you ever thought about it? That's the place where you lay your food out and expose it to everything floating in the air. You drop food on the counter and oftentimes think nothing of picking it up and throwing it back on your plate. You turn on the faucet, turn off the faucet, move the faucet head, open the oven, shut the oven, open the microwave, shut the microwave, open the fridge, shut the fridge, open the dishwasher, shut the dishwasher, open the cupboards, shut the cupboards, open the pantry, shut the pantry...

And how often do you sanitize those things? For most people, I think the answer would be very rarely. And how often do you touch those things without washing your hands? For most people, I think the answer would be all the time.

GROSS.

I spent a good 15-20 minutes cleaning and sanitizing my work kitchen this morning. I don't know if anyone else has ever done it by the looks of it. I have to do it in stages...a little one day, a little the next, because it's such a mess. My germs are bad enough, I really don't want to know what's coming off the hands of the other 100+ people working here.

Yuck yuck yuck.

Monday, April 21, 2008

Life Update 4.21.08

Today is two months from our wedding!! I can't wait.

All the plans are slowly coming together. I'd say at this point we have everything planned, we just don't have everything done. Doing is often much more time consuming than planning.

I head north on May 2nd for an Indiana bridal shower on May 3rd, hosted by my wonderful friend and maid of honor, Audrey. It's going to be a lot of fun!

I then have another shower in Charlotte on June 8th, hosted by Dave's Aunt Linda. So many showers...I'm feeling spoiled.

Work is going well...I truly enjoy my job and rarely mind coming to work. (Although, like most people I would assume, I can always think of something else I'd rather be doing.) My only complaint is that my office (and yes I have my own office so I probably shouldn't be complaining about anything, but anyways...) doesn't have a window. So I start feeling slightly lethargic and trapped by the end of the day. I think it'd be okay (I prefer "okay" to o.k. and OK so I apologize if the word bothers you) if no one had windows, but just about everyone else does. So I walk by all of their light and airy offices and then sit down in my slightly gloomy and yellow-lighted personal space. Still, it's much better than a cubical (which I had at my previous job) and I've spiced it up with some plants and lamps from home. I also have lots of pictures in frames on the walls to give it a homey feel. So it's really not that bad. I was also blessed with a laptop when I started, which non-statisticians don't earn until they've worked here for about three years (or so I've heard). So I really did land a good deal.

Maggie is doing wonderfully...she's finally starting to understand how to "sit pretty", which I'm very happy about. It's definitely a trick I'd like to add to her collection. (For those of you who don't know, she can already sit, lay down, stay, roll over, play dead, give kisses, give five, speak, stand up on her hind legs, dance, and crawl. Sitting pretty, however, has never been something she's wanted to learn or even attempt to do.) Her wounds all appear to have healed well, although she does have a lot of scars. (For people out of the loop, she was hit by a car the end of January.) She also seems to be more chipper and have a new appreciation for life since the accident. :)

Everything else seems to be going well. I'm growing out my nails and working out regularly to get ready for the wedding, and I'm slowly working on Dave's place to get it ready for my big move the end of June. I can't WAIT to live with him. :)

That's all for now!
God bless!

Monday, April 14, 2008

Birthdays, Bibles, and 4th Brothers

First off, I'd like to say that today is my Mom's birthday, so Happy Birthday Mom!!!! :)

Second, I discovered the number-one cure for my days of depression.
Read the Bible.
I know it sounds cliche, but yesterday I was in the WORST mood ever, then I read the Bible for a while (the Old Testament, believe it or not...and not Psalms or Proverbs either) and it totally lifted my mood. It made me remember that people in the olden (is that a word?) days had it WAY worse than me, and they still kept their heads high and their eyes on God...so I should be able to do the same!! If they could keep uplifted spirits in their times, I should definitely be able to keep an uplifted spirit in mine.
It's just that sometimes you get caught up in all the motions of life...work, dinner, clean, work, dinner, clean...and you start to wonder, what IS the point of all this?
Why do we live to just go through all these motions and then die?
Open up the Bible and it gives you the answer...we do it for God. We do everything for Him. So that one day we can be with Him for eternity, and there will be no more of this monotonous life.
This world isn't our true home. That's why we feel so out of place and like something is always missing. It's because our hearts long to be with God in paradise, where we will feel love and contentment always.

Third, I wanted to share that my family has identified my half-brother, and I'm SOOOO excited. Most of you don't know, but I have a half-brother that I've never met, and I never knew his name or even if he was alive until yesterday. It's been something that's been heavy on my heart for 5 years. Although I don't know if he even wants to meet me and my other brothers or have anything to do with us, just knowing he's alive and well and seeing an online picture of him was enough to ease the pain I've tried to ignore for years. I'm incredibly happy.

Alright back to work. God bless you all!

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Dancing


Dave and I are taking dance lessons for our first dance at our wedding, and I'm so excited!! We had our first lesson last night, and we blew the dance teacher away with how quickly we picked it up. I was so proud. :)


We're going to do a waltz to the song he proposed with. So any of you coming to the wedding will get to see the result of our hard work. :)


Tuesday, April 1, 2008

Healthy Sunshine


So I just read another great article...this one stating that it's actually GOOD for your skin to get a little sun. This is music to my ears, as sitting in the sun is one of the best mood-boosters for me. (Mind you, though, it doesn't encourage sun burns or frying yourself in the tanning bed, and it doesn't dispute the point that sun damage leads to skin cancer. It does, however, say that we don't need to smother ourselves in sunscreen if we're just walking outside for a few minutes.)

Check it out if you're interested:



Words of a Survivalist

I just read these words in an online article (bold added by me), and I wanted to share:

"I believed in God and had been brought up in church. I knew the Bible said that Jesus Christ died for the sins of the world, that He was buried, and rose on the third day. If someone had asked me if I were a Christian, I would have said, "Yes." Yet there was a storm raging within me.

"In my search for solutions, I went back to the Bible. Upon reading a verse (Matthew 6:33a) that said, "Seek first the kingdom of God," the reality hit me that I had sought God's help all my life, but I had never sought God Himself. I realized that being born into a Christian home, going to church, or just believing was not enough. I not only had to believe but I had to personally—by faith— seek God. I prayed that night as I had never prayed before, asking for God's forgiveness and for Him to take control of my life...

"...How reassuring! And it is reassuring to know that I can draw my confidence in performing my daily roles from knowing God loves me and has a purpose for me, no matter what the outcome may be. It motivates me to accept challenges. It prevents fear from paralyzing me when others doubt me, associates discourage me, and friends or family don't understand me. It comes from a continual choice to believe that when I feel unsure and frightened about who I am and what I can do, God is there."
These words really touched me, because they explained a part of my Christian journey that I've never been able to put into words. Up until about a year and a half ago, I'd always sought God's help, but never God Himself. It's the difference between believing in God and having a relationship with God. And now that I have a relationship with Him, I know that I am doing my best to follow His will and that whatever may come, whether I succeed or fail in any circumstance, it is in line with what God wants for my life. It takes a load off your shoulders.

If you'd like to read the full article, you can find it here: http://christianwomentoday.com/growth/sheilawest.html.

God bless!!