Thursday Thanks Tanks #27 (Thanksgiving day style)

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

I wanted to post quickly before it's not thanksgiving anymore :) I had a GREAT day with my parents, brother and husband. I love spending time with my family, and it's even more fun with my brother home from California!!

So today...I'm doing this a bit different. Thanksgiving, I feel, is a day to remember what the Lord has done for us. So today I'm thankful for:

1. Salvation. It's amazing to know I don't have to work for it. God has given it to us for free and we just have to take it!

2. Love. I never feel so loved as when I'm spending time with my Heavenly father.

3. Jesus. This is the time of year when we start remembering Jesus coming down as a baby to save us. I'm so grateful for that sacrifice and am honored by His choice to do that for me.

4. Grace. I mess up so much. I'm thankful that God loves me anyway, and doesn't give me what I deserve!

5. The opportunity to be used. I don't feel very skilled at most things I do, but God uses me anyway. It's amazing to know that I have a place on His team, as long as I'm willing to be used!

Music....Thursday?

Recall
Brave Saint Saturn

It was all about acceleration
All for notoriety
All about the destination
Driven by my own abilities
Rockets shuttered screamed and then fell away
Lift this juggernaut into the sky
Radio waves in the frozen night
Spelling "I miss you"

Like a flicker of light
In the back of my mind
And it all comes back to me
Like an overdue sunrise
It all comes back to me

There's nothing like complete exhaustion
The atrophy of complete defeat
The feeling of the world upon my shoulders
And realizing I am incomplete
Well there's a lot of freedom in failure
Of recklessness of weightless abandonment
I remember light coming through stained glass

And it reminds me

I remember Your love
Being better than life
When it all comes back to me
I will sing in the shadows
When it all comes back
When it all comes back
When it all comes back
To me

Sorry I don't have a link to listen to this song...if you search google I believe a clip of the song comes up though! Or you can listen on rhapsody if you haven't used up all your songs yet :)

This is one of those songs I just sit back and close my eyes to. There are two parts that always jump out at me...almost to the point of smacking me across the face. "Well there's a lot of freedom in failure, of reckless, of weightless abandonment."

So true, realizing that I can't make my life what it should be, giving up and letting God take over...that's where I really become free. I become obsessed with what God thinks of me, what others think of me, but God thinks exactly what He thinks of me (ha figure that one out). I'm not going to earn His love. I look at myself as see all my failures, all my mistakes, all that is wrong with me, but if I try to look at myself through God's eyes, I see the woman he's still creating me to be. I just have to let Him do His work!!!

God, give me Your eyes so I can see myself the way You do.

"I remember Your love being better than life when it all comes back to me." I hear that line and it almost brings me to tears every time. How do I keep that from just being a "flicker of light in the back of my mind" and realize that God's love IS better than life.


If you're really confused by the rocket/space imagery in this song...Wikipedia explains the concept of the album pretty well.

Thursday Thanks Tank #27

Only 2 weeks until Thanksgiving! I'm so happy that I've been practicing thankfulness with this blog for the past several months. This will be my first Thanksgiving Thanks Tank! I'll have to think of something BIG for that one :)

My first thought of thankfulness was for my job, so here it goes...what I'm thankful for about my job:

1. I have one. That's a lot more than some people can say.

2. I can set my own hours. If I need to take a day off, or work from home to catch up on a few hours here and there, I can! No problem :) As long as I get the work done, it doesn't matter WHEN I do it!

3. I get to work with family. Not biological family, but I LOVE working with my church family. I know that if something happens and I need some support, I will have it without a question. My co-workers are more concerned with how I'm doing than what I'm doing. How cool is that?

4. I get to be around people almost all day. Now that can be a bad thing too, but I'm such a social person that I love having people pop in at any given moment. Of course when I'm up to my ears in projects...sometimes I'd rather you not stop by, but normally, come on in!!!!

5. I do what I love. I spend my days working in ministry, doing graphic design, and helping people come to know Jesus! How much better could a job be??

6. It's close. Not as close as when I lived with grandma and worked at the school (walking distance...woohoo!), but it's definitely closer than when I was working at Borders (20 - 30 minute drive) or after Ian and I moved to Lebanon and I worked at the school (hour and a half drive each way...YUCK!). I can handle 10 minutes!

7. I can listen to my music. Ok I have ear buds in now, but when I get my new office...I'm hooking up speakers and blasting my music as loud as I want. Hehehe.

Thursday Thanks Tank #26

Wow, I have been slacking!!! Life is getting away from me, but I'm THANKFUL. Everything seems to be going well, and now that VBS and the Fall Carnival are done I don't see any more major projects on my horizon!! There are projects on my horizon, I just don't see them! :)

1. The Fall Carnival was GREAT! We had about 68 kids and LOTS of adults! AND That night my friend Charise (dressed as Snow White) had her Prince Charming ask her to marry him (yes he was really dressed up as Prince Charming)!!! WOOHOO! Congrats Charise and Kelly!

2. Wetter, colder weather. I know! I'm weird, but I like the wet, cold weather until about May. I like sweaters and thick fuzzy socks and having our fireplace going (even though we lose our cat to the fireplace every time we turn it on!).

3. HOME Group. I'm glad it's started up again. We have a lot of fun, and I think we're actually getting the group to start being interested in...you know studying the Bible! Kelly and Charise have been a great addition to our group and having Charlotte and Kevin & Jen back has been great!

4. Fall colors. I know, I know. Ian says "you haven't seen fall colors until you've seen Fall in Maine" but I still smile when I wake up, look out the window and see all the red, orange and yellow of fall!

5. Ian is doing well in school! Financially it's a little difficult, but we're doing ok, and Ian is feeling successful, and keeps talking about when he's done with school and earns the big money! HA! We'll see, but I'm very proud of him for working so hard!

Catching Up!

I don't like going more than a week without posting, but I've missed 2 Thursday Thanks Tanks now...so I figured I should post SOMETHING!

Work was insane, but it's calmed down quite a bit now. The stress of it all was making my eye twitch, causing me migraines and leaving me quite cranky. Then when it started getting better I went to a Mariners game which I believe is where I picked up a nasty bug and I was sick for almost a whole week! 3 of the 11 people who went on the trip got sick from it (all girls...hmmm) and so at least I wasn't alone in my misery! Cheryl said that there was a guy hacking and coughing the whole time right behind her...so we blame him.

So at the game it was Kid's Appreciation Day...so they had all sorts of silly things going on, and like 25+ mascots running around for all sorts of different things. Now I want this to be a family friendly blog...so I won't go into details....but whoever thought a Geoduck was a good mascot really needs to reconsider this. And yes, I know this is going to show up on the preview as the photo for all of you who have blogger accounts...sorry for that!

So then I spent a week off work sick. That was fun (yes I'm being sarcastic). Well I did work last Friday, and part of Tuesday, and some at home on Wednesday, so I really only took 2 full days off work, and considering I worked 4 days worth of extra hours the weeks before that...I don't feel a bit guilty about not being at work!

Oh did I mention I went to my parent's house to borrow my dad's sander, and when I got home from their house I realized I completely forgot to bring home said sander....so it will be a little longer before I get to start working on my end table/night stand thing. Stress...I blame it on stress.

I had a doctor's appointment this week...you know the annual appointment that all us women just LOVE. It was only my second time getting one of these and last time was REALLY horrible (I'd give you details, but once again...family friendly!), but this time was better (still not good, I mean is it POSSIBLE for it to be good?!? I don't think so.). So then my doctor asked me "When was your last tetanus shot?" Of course I couldn't lie about it. Well I COULD but that would be bad, so I said "I don't remember ever having one." That doesn't mean I haven't ever had one, I just don't remember it if I did. So she told me it was my lucky day and gave me a shot right then and there...ok well she didn't the nurse did, but I didn't have time to get away!

So now my arm itches and there's a bump where the injection was. Oh and it finally got sore like 2 days later, so it itches and when I scratch it, it hurts. If it didn't itch I wouldn't scratch it and I wouldn't notice the hurt. Grrrr.

Oh and since I haven't said it here yet....CONGRATS to my friend Susan who had her baby boy 2 weeks ago! We're all excited that her little boy is happy and healthy and as cute as a button! She brought him to MOPS this morning and all the moms were going crazy over him (he's still only like 6 or 7 lbs, so he's itty bitty!). She's a lucky lady with a great family!

Lunch

I'm hungry for lunch. So I was thinking of what to make for myself and BAM it hit me: Lobster Roll.

Where does one get a lobster roll in Oregon?

I bet they're more expensive here than in Maine too...shucks!

Edit: Do you remember that song "Tootsie Roll?" It was a hit when I was in school and even though I didn't listen to secular music it was a hard one to miss. I don't really remember much of it, but every time I think "Lobster Roll" I start singing "Let me see that lobster roll! To the left, to the left, to the right, to the right, now slide baby slide..." and so on.

Yeah.

Thursday Thanks Tank #25

I'm 1/4 way to 100! w00t!

I'm feeling MUCH more thankful this week!

I want to thank God this week for the little things:

1. Getting to wear my favorite sweater because the weather is cooler
2. Having the energy to cook dinner again (no more hamburger helper a la Ian!)
3. Rainstorms
4. A pretty clean house.
5. Helpful people
6. A warm shower every morning
7. Sleeping in
8. My husband getting ready with me every morning
9. Letting my hair down (literally)
10. Flip-flops and jeans (with the favorite sweater mentioned above)
11. A pen that works
12. Painted toe-nails
13. My wedding ring (I still look at it and think "awwwwwww!" quite often)
14. Snuggling in a blanket
15. Iced tea
16. Warm banana bread
17. Knowing where my cell phone AND keys are at the same time!
18. Free produce and iris bulbs from elderly ladies in the church
19. A job well done...or at least done.
20. Post-it notes
21. Pretty sunrises
22. A clean desk (uh, I don't have that one right now)
23. Our winter comforter
24. Listening to music in my car
25. Home