Home Sweet Home

It has been a very long day today as we finally journeyed home from our 11-day Thanksgiving trip to Tennessee. The girls are now in bed, Matt's watching National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation, and I'm catching up on the happenings in the world wide web. I have a dozen or so blogs that I follow regularly and one of them literally made me cry tonight. Since bringing me to tears isn't a regular event for a blog post, I thought I'd share: "Being" by Ellen.

... the will...

Today, I got a little freaked out about our not having a will. Since I wanted to do something about it THIS SECOND, I got online and did an easy, free, simple, not legally binding one. I'll try to actually get some signatures on a paper document soon, but this helped put me at ease a little for tonight!

Such a "cute face:

Trying to take a nice photo of my children can sometimes be difficult. Instead of a sweet smile, they almost always prefer to make a "cute face." If you aren't sure what I mean by "cute face" then here are a couple of examples.

Having seen MANY photos of Julia and Audrey making a "cute face," the granddads decided this week to join in the fun.

Ahhh, the faces Poppa and Pop will make when Julia is the photographer.

just some pictures

Hmmm. I think the girls were allowed to play in makeup.

Perhaps it's hard to tell in these pictures but they actually wound up looking ridiculously awful; it was definitely fun though!


OK - and here are some pictures I wanted to post last night but didn't. The girls enjoyed spending time with aunts/uncles this week!

w/ Uncle Jacob

w/ Aunt Amy

w/ Aunt Kelsey

w/ Uncle Andy

A Night Away

After spending a nice, relaxing day at Matt's Granddaddy's, we headed outside to say good-bye to Matt's sister Amy, her husband Jacob, and stepson Brodye. Brodye is just a month younger than Julia, and they had had a fabulous time (for the most part) playing together all afternoon. As I was stepping outside to say "good-bye," Brodye came in and asked me an interesting question. "Can Julia stay at my house?"
Hmmm. Spend the night? Away from me? MY BABY?!?!?!?

In all of Julia's 3 years, 8 months, and some odd days she has spent a grand total of 6 nights away from me: 2 nights while I was in the hospital having Audrey, and 4 nights while I went to chaperone youth camp this past summer. All 6 of these nights, she was able to stay at our house with Meme and Pop and sleep in her own bed. Now, I realize that many who read this will say that this is pitiful and that I'm too overprotective of a mother, and the many who say that would be correct. However, Julia's lack of experience being away from me/home isn't completely my fault; when you live 7+ hours away from the grandparents, you can't exactly just drop the child off for a one night visit.

Back to Brodye asking if Julia could spend the night...

What else could I say? I said "yes." I had an extra backpack in which I stuffed a change of clothes, and I loaded up my firstborn into Aunt Amy's car. As they were pulling out of the driveway, Julia was ALL smiles, I was already missing her, and Audrey... well, Audrey was pitifully hollering "Juuuu-Juuuu" over and over and over again. It was one of the saddest sounds I've ever heard, and tears started building up in my eyes. It was all I could do to keep them from falling. Matt's Aunt Vickie had to turn away to wipe her eyes too. It was then that I realized that while I had spent 6 nights away from my dear Julia, Audrey had NEVER been without "Ju-Ju." I think the child was traumatized.

4 hours later, I received a phone call from Amy, you guessed it, Julia had a TON of fun.... UNTIL bedtime!!!! Matt went to meet Amy and Julia, and Julia's little exercise of independance was over. I'm glad she tried to stay overnight somewhere. Julia got take a (very) small step out from under my cover, and Audrey was able to experience a few hours of having all of Mommy AND Daddy's attention.

Thanksgiving 2009... so far!

Top 5 memories (thus far) from Thanksgiving 2009

5. My Grandmother standing in the woods, taking her clothes off in order to give Julia an anatomy lesson. (spine only people)

4. Julia wrestling my Meemaw to the kitchen floor, and trying to wrestle her Uncle Jacob.

3. Julia bonding with her Great Aunt Donna (flashlights ward off the tickle monster) and Great Uncle David (Superbaby!)

2. Amy's tiramisu. (I heart Amy K!)

1. Audrey eating one of Meemaw's glucose tablets! (scared me to death... I had no idea what was in her mouth!!!)

No hug for you!

Oh Holidays! I think that Matt and I have a fabulous extended family, and I love visiting with all of them.

However...

...it can become kind of stressful to cart these children all around Jackson-Madison County with little or no naptime. It can also be frustrating to us and to our family when these same 2 children decide that they just DO NOT want to socialize with some members of our wonderful family. I'm sorry. They're children. Be patient.

Ellen's Wedding Weekend

Wow. We have had a fun, wonderful, BUSY weekend! We headed out of town early Friday morning to travel to Knoxville/Maryville for my cousin Ellen's wedding. This trip to Knoxville was extra fun because when we stopped for lunch in Chattanooga we were joined by a very special friend of mine. Jennifer (Fisher) Tachenko was my best friend in high school, but before this lunch date I hadn't seen her since her October 2004 wedding. I was thrilled to be able to introduce her to Julia and Audrey and also just to spend a few minutes talking to her face-to-face.




Instead of typing nonstop, I think I'll just hit a few of the highlights of the wedding weekend!
* The rehearsal dinner was held at Calhouns. Matt and I were able to enjoy a child-free meal of TN barbecue! LOVED IT!
* It's football time in Tennessee...... Vanderbilt players, coaches, and fans were EVERYWHERE in our hotel, and the VOLS were actually eating at Calhouns when we were there.
* Since I was a bridesmaid and needed to attend the rehearsal Friday and get to the church early Saturday, Matt got alot of Daddy/Daughters time this weekend. Good Times I'm sure!
* Being behind the scenes with any bride is a wonderful, exciting experience. When that bride is someone that you've loved and been friends with for 2.5 decades - well, it's beyond words. One memory that I will always have of her last few hours pre-wedding will be her suggesting we all gather around the piano and sing some hymns. It really did help the last hour pass quickly. Some hymns, however, had to be stopped midway through. My Aunt Martha (our pianist and MOTHER of the BRIDE) came close to letting the waterworks go a few times. OH! and have I mentioned that Ellen looked absolutely stunning in her dress? Well, she did.
* I cried, just a little, as Ellen was coming down the aisle.
* The reception included dancing, and let me tell you Audrey Bowman is one dancing machine!!!!!!! She literally danced for hours. Most of that time was spent dancing with Matt, but she certainly spent a decent amount of time CHASING after one of the groom's nephews and forcing him to dance with her. Julia had a cute young (4 year old) gentleman dance with her as well. Adorable.


Here comes a string of pictures of just some of the wonderful people I got to spend time with at the wedding.
My brother, Andy (Matt was trying to dodge the shot, but didn't quite make it)


My gorgeous cousin ELLEN!


My Dad


Family Photo Op!

Here's a picture of the Bride and Groom at their Rehearsal Dinner

Congratulations Ellen and Geoff!!!

End of story.

Right?

Well, some of you already know that I'm leaving out a little bit...

... a little embarrassing bit.

... or perhaps the word would be humiliating.

All right, confession time. I'll tell the story the best I can, but I'll be honest - some of it is a little fuzzy.

During the minister's 'reflections' I started to feel bad. I thought it was likely due to the high heels I was wearing so I began to shift them around a little bit. When the minister finished his time of reflections, I was relieved! I know I was feeling pretty good at that time, because I remember being in awe of the love, joy, excitement, devotion, etc radiating off the groom's face as the vows began. I remember Ellen's voice being so clear. There were no whispered vows for either of them.

The exchange of rings is a little less clear. At some point, I began to feel light-headed and queasy. I remember thinking, "It will look tacky, but I am going to have to lean against this banister." Then, I remember grabbing for the arm of the groomsmen beside me. Yes. I became THAT bridesmaid. I passed out during the ceremony. The next thing I remember is opening my eyes and Matt and Lisa (my Dad's wife) were right in front me. Matt, however, says that my eyes were never closed.... so perhaps, they just became clear again. Either way, as soon as I could 'see' again - I was fine physically. I did, however, want to crawl under a pew and hide. Most of this happened during a long prayer time that 4 different people were leading. The first 2 people I don't remember at all, but I did resume my standing position before Prayer#4 was finished. I was fine for the rest of the service and have felt fine ever since.

To Matt Flanigan (groomsman from Illinois whom I just met Friday and will likely never see again) - Thank you for not letting me fall flat on the floor... I truly appreciate you keeping me from causing myself further embarrassment.

To Ellen and Geoff - I'm Sorry!!! I'm glad you were able to laugh and joke about it afterwards with me. I certainly wish I could go back and change the timing of this! Congratulations on your new marriage, I hope you're having a fabulous honeymoon.

It's 1:00 AM.
I'm getting up at 6:00 AM.
I have a long day ahead of me.
I'm tired, but I can't sleep.
I keep thinking of things we might need as we travel.
:(

But that's ok.
I get to see an old friend tomorrow.
Perhaps I should say 'friend from high school' instead of 'old.'

Then, after hours of driving, we'll get to celebrate with Ellen and Geoff!
They're getting married Saturday.

Apparently, I can't even put a paragraph together.
I shouldn't try to blog when I can't even think straight.

Last night I had a new friend request on facebook. It was from fellow Unionite/Jacksonian Meg (Wright) Moore, and I was rather surprised by it. I certainly know her, but I never really KNEW her. You know the difference. I was even more surprised when she later instant messaged me via facebook. Again, we were acquaintances, but I wouldn't have considered her a friend. No negative reason for that, we were just never around each other much. However, in our facebook messaging conversation, I realized that right now we have some major stuff in common. She's a stay at home mom who's husband is currently job searching for a ministerial position. It was rather nice to talk to someone who is in a halfway similar situation as I am. And even though it didn't solve anything, it was reassuring to know that Matt and I aren't the only people currently dealing with the frustrations that can come along with the job search. Anyways, just thought I'd share.

As far as today goes... the girls and I have been working on Christmas decorations. I wanted stuff up before we left for our super long Thanksgiving trip. I got the tree up, and then asked the girls to be in charge of the icicles. Very good work girls!!


Allright, Julia is up from her 'rest' and it's now time for ornaments.
Happy decorating to us!

Pictures!

After not having a successful photo shoot last week, we headed out once more to Portrait Innovations in Columbus to try again. **Hoping for a sweet shot of the 2 of them together** The photographer laughed at me when I said, "I'm just hoping for 1 shot where both girls look pleasant." "I think we can do better than that," was her reply. At first, Julia was more than willing to smile, but Audrey didn't want to do anything that couldn't be done sitting in my lap. And OF COURSE, by the time Audrey had warmed up to the photographer, Julia was done. She didn't want to smile, much less even sit up. She just kind of sprawled herself on the floor and looked towards the back of the room. WHAT?? Great, photo shoot number 2 wasn't going well either. After lots of attempts at improving the situation and after a clothing change (Christmas dresses this time) that resulted in tears :) we just decided enough was enough.

The photographer showed me the few pictures she had taken and SHOCKINGLY there was actually one that looked pretty darn cute. Not perfect, but seeing as how I had been expecting NADA I was very pleasantly surprised. I was even more surprised when the photographer said she was going to comp me the 40 picture special offer. Really? Even though it was ALL OUR FAULT that the shoot didn't go well? AWESOME! Free pictures!

Later today, I got in the mood to put up our Christmas tree. However, we have too much JUNK around our house right now that some of it has to go before I can put Christmas stuff out. So... I decided to get a carload of BABY STUFF ready to go. Here are the girls playing with these outgrown items one last time.

All this actually just came from the outside closet and shed. Tomorrow, I'll get rid of some stuff from INSIDE the house. So sad :(

O.C.C.

Here we are shopping. "What for?" you ask?

The girls and I spent some time this past week doing a little ministry project. We decided to participate in the Operation Christmas Child "Shoebox" ministry. I explained to Julia (and technically Audrey was also in the room at the time) that we were going to take these shoeboxes, put lots of fun toys in them, and send them to 2 little girls who wouldn't get lots of toys for Christmas. Julia thought this was great. She couldn't wait to get toys and give them to 'the little girls.'

Julia had alot of fun picking out stuff. We got crayons, notebooks, jump ropes, pencils, pens, hairclips, bracelets, etc. to go in our boxes. While we were shopping, though, instead of 2 of each item going in my buggy, Julia kept putting in 3. Hmmm...

"Julia, why are there 3 sets of Tinkerbell pens, jump ropes, etc.?" I would ask.

These are for the little girls, and this one is for me - was Julia's response.
HA! Good try darling, but no.

We packed our shoeboxes.

We decorated cards to put in our boxes.

No photo shoot is finished without a "cute face."

Finally, we headed to Lakewood Baptist to drop off our completed shoeboxes. Unfortunately, I didn't realize my camera battery was so low and this is the only shot I got:

Yay for their first ministry project together!

A family in need

Please pray for the family of Jim Indykiewicz. He committed suicide sometime last night or early this morning. Although, we didn't know him well, his wife and 2 of his 4 children were very active members of Summerville. His wife is Cathy and the 2 children we know are Kyle (early teens) and Camryn (age 10/11). He also has 2 older teens named Meagan and Brandon.

I jumped the gun today

This afternoon, the girls and I headed out to the mailbox, and I was very disappointed by what was inside. A letter to Matt from the church who's "1st cut" he just made last week... the only church that geographically doesn't make me close my eyes and sigh with frustration. The letter was formal looking and obviously only 1 sheet. I knew exactly what it said. I didn't even have to open it. "Thanks, but no thanks."

I then stayed outside with the girls for another hour listening to music and helping them catch ladybugs. (YES, they were both willing to HOLD LADYBUGS... major step!) All the while we were playing, I was thinking long and hard. I was so very disappointed that Matt working at this church wasn't going to happen. Mostly, though, I was mad at myself for getting my hopes up. (And before I get anyone else's hopes up too - this church IS NOT located in west TN.) I know better than to get my hopes up, to imagine what life would/could be like in that location before things have progressed further than they had with this unnamed church. Still, excitement was rightthere and I could't help myself but to daydream.

Then the pitbull mix next door growled at Audrey. Yes, MAGGIE growled! She and I had a stare down/yell down b/c I thought I should try to show dominance. Anyways, we went inside! I cooked dinner and we ate in the living room (Florida played the 3:30 game... it was close... Matt wasn't going to be coming in the kitchen.) While we were eating, conversation came to that stupid letter Matt had received in the mail today. And - yep- I had assumed wrong. The letter wasn't actually "Thanks, but no thanks." It was "Thanks for applying - we're narrowing it down - any questions call." I'm stupid. I moped outside for a good hour for nothing. The church of MY choice is still a possibility. I don't know if it would be a good fit for Matt as a minister or for us as a family, but it's still my fave.

Some complaining, but a good number of pictures!

*I took the girls to have their picture taken, and walked out with NOTHING b/c Audrey wouldn't smile.
*On the way home, Audrey started doing this...


*I still, however, needed to tan today so I prolonged our trip home to do so.
*When we got back in the car - Audrey started up the screaming again.
*Julia yelled back to Audrey "You're hurting my ears!!!!"
*2 hours later I realized I had tanned too much today.
*Audrey woke up from her nap and still cried at the drop of a hat.
*Something must be done.
*Today was NO FUN.
*How could we change that?
*Ahhh - I remember a recent blog post by Ellen (Penny) Grant.
*Good idea - A movie and cookies.... but since my burned stomach is being irritated by jeans - we'll make this a Pajama Party too.

I asked Matt to visit a Redbox and get this new release


We decided to make balloon cookies to go with the movie. (Already in our pajamas)

We frosted our balloon cookies. (the only one to get a ton of frosting on her PJ's would be ME! Julia and Audrey came out clean.)

We ate dinner, and then we settled in for the movie. (Sorry to cut your head off Matt!)

After 30 minutes or so, we decided it was time for balloon cookies!!!

and apparently popcorn too!

Much better ending to today!

Is it bad that I want to "hide" all of my Summerville Facebook Friends? (Summerville being the church where Matt no longer serves) Is it wrong of me not to want to read about what they're doing and thinking? Most of the Facebook posts that they update are nice to read. For example: I'm thrilled to know that Becca got her first college acceptance letter, and that Abbie made the volleyball team. I don't even mind reading that loud Danny and exceptionally loud Stephanie are now "dating." What I don't want to see is negativity that just brings my hurt and anger back to the surface. I don't want to read people's (ahem..... adult's) rude reactions to Sara's decision to attend a different church. And this week, I really didn't want to read about the prospective youth minister coming to town.
Do I want Matt to have that job back? no
Do I want the stress and dread of those Sundays and Wednesdays? no
Do I regret Matt quitting? well. I do believe him falling on his sword was the "right" thing for him to do, but yeah... sometimes I regret it.

I'm likely caught in the pit of jealousy that Summerville is "moving on" with a new youth minister before we have been able to "move on." And I mean that figuratively and literally!

I'm not kidding when I tell you that I stand over Matt's phone WILLING it to ring. When his phone does ring, my left ear works diligently to keep the girls quiet and the right ear is desperately studying the sound of Matt's voice to know whether the call is personal or professional. When he sits down at the computer I sometimes steal a glance over to see if there are any BOLD new messages in his inbox. (Matt - I promise I don't do it often, but yes - it has happened... you likely already realized that.)

I know we're very fortunate. We have an amazing extended family. We have health. We have savings! We have a God that is somehow, someway spending this time preparing Matt - all 4 of us - to serve Him in an exciting way. We have a God that is preparing a church where Matt can effectively minister... a church all 4 of us can call home.

I just hope the preparation doesn't take too much longer.

Tae-bo

Now, I'm not an exercise guru by any stretch of the imagination. I do, however, like to "move around" every once in awhile just to keep from feeling too "blah." Today, I decided that it was time to put in the Billy Blanks Tae Bo DVD. One of the reasons why I particularly like this DVD is because Julia and Audrey will often exercise with me. It is ADORABLE to watch them stretch, do leg lifts, arm circles, etc. I also recommend doing jumping jacks with the girls.... big smiles!!

Today, I wasn't quite so lucky with their participation. Audrey stretched a tiny bit with me, but then she sat on her Pooh riding car and proceeded to run me down time and time again. Moving around to get out of her way just turned into a game. After Audrey lost interest in that, Julia came in to give me a kiss.... and then another.... and then another.... and then Audrey was back following suit. Air kicks and punches are harder to do when you're dodging a 3 year old and 1 year old, but I always feel very GUILTY refusing their kisses. After the kisses ended, I had a good few minutes on my own before they came back. Did they come back to exercise with me? NO. They came back to play Candyland in the middle of the floor.

Matt's Blog

http://www.epiccalling.blogspot.com
This is a link to Matt's blog. He mostly writes about 'churchy' stuff, but I did want to share his post from yesterday. (Nov. 10)

Mr. Fix-it

A few pictures of Audrey.
Here she is literally running away while I tried to snap a pic of her in Julia's Tebow jersey. Matt says Audrey's in a Heisman pose. The 2nd pic is of her enjoying some banana pudding.






Now on to the "Mr. Fix-it" story...

Our kitchen faucet broke a few days ago. Sunday night to be exact. While Matt's never been nicknamed "Mr. Fix-it" he did head out to "The Depot" Monday to look for replacement parts. When he got back Monday, the part didn't work and during our conversation I realized that he didn't ask for help from the employees there when looking for what to get. His reason was that the numerous employees nearby should have noticed his hesitation in selecting a product and thus have come over and OFFERED their help. Now, believe me, I agree that the Home Depot employees should definitely have offered help. HOWEVER, I also feel that when no help was offered, Matt should have REQUESTED IT! I mean - hello - I'm rinsing out dishes in the bathtub!!

He went back to the Depot this morning... I think it was Home Depot. He mentioned driving the extra 20 minutes to Lowe's during the "employee" conversation of the night before... but I think he decided to stay on our side of the river. Anyways, he wound up bringing home a brand new faucet and was going to stay home with the girls and install it while I headed to the tanning bed. (yeah, yeah, yeah - tanning is bad for you - I KNOW. In fact I swore them off years ago, but I can't help it! There's a really pretty STRAPLESS bridesmaids dress I have to wear Nov. 21 and I still have tan lines!)

ok

where was I??

Oh yeah, so Matt was supposed to install this thing, but of course all his tools are in the back of his car which I so wonderfully had just driven off in.

After I got home, he finally got under the sink to get started. And, I promise (fingers crossed), Matt didn't complain AT ALL about the undersink area being way to small for a grown man. However, after some deep sighs and hmphs - Matt realized/decided that he needed some other kind of tool in order to finish the job. OK - so right before dinner he heads out to "THE DEPOT" for a 3rd time.

I could go on and on and on about his frustrations over the tight workspace, his annoyance at me for not wanting to listen to his frustrations, or his tendency to second guess written instructions. But I won't go into all of this, b/c it doesn't really matter now because....

MY KITCHEN FAUCET WORKS!!! YAY

The faucet picture from above is very similar to the one Matt installed. However, Matt got our faucet on CLEARANCE :) so I couldn't find a pic online.

THANKS MATTHEW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Today, the girls and I headed to the local Dollar store. The cashier seemed like a very nice lady and chatted sweetly to the girls about Hannah Montana (both girls were wearing HM t-shirts.) However, Julia soon noticed and LOUDLY pointed out to me that the nice cashier was missing something. Hmm, what could it have been???

I tried to just "oh" and "mmm" my way through this comment, but dear Julia wouldn't let it go. I don't remember exactly all that I said other than a quick, "yes, people lose teeth sometimes." I couldn't get out of that store quick enough!

Audrey showed off a new word to Matt tonight. Her favorite book of the week is pictured below.

It's a sweet, easy read that features animals, shepherds, and at the end Mary, Joseph, and Jesus. She's been able to 'bah" at the ram and 'moo' at the ox for some time now. She also can certainly say "baby" when she sees this page of the book:

Tonight, though, she took Matt very much by surprise when she looked at the following page and said "Dada" (actually no, but she associates the male as 'dada') "Mama" and "JESUS." Matt's mouth fell open, and he said, "Did she just say?" So, we got her to say them again. That's right, Audrey can say "Jesus" ('Z-sus' actually)

My Afternoon SUCKED...Literally

** by Matt Bowman**

I learned today that Valerie is no longer allowed to answer the door at our house. We'll see if I can still trust her to answer the phone!

We had just got back home from another amazing shopping trip for Valerie (that's another story) when she saw a woman walking up our driveway. I pretty much ignored it, thinking that it was probably a neighbor. No, I couldn't have been more wrong

She told Valerie that they were opening a business in the area & in order to build some relationship with people in the community they were going to come in & clean one room in our home for free. She mentioned some other stuff like shampooing & scotch-guarding the carpets. What she failed to mention & what Valerie didn't foresee was that this was just the hook or the proverbial "shoe in the door". The next thing I know, this lady is vacuuming our living room & going to get other people.

Within 15 minutes this lady was replaced by 2 guys dressed in slacks, shirts & ties & carrying boxes. Ah yes the old bait & switch; we were now the unknowing victims of a product demonstration, not a free cleaning service to promote a new business. In fact, we never laid eyes on the lady, whom we only know as "Michelle", again.

So.... 3 hours later (yes 3 hours later, you're not imagining that, I wrote 3 hours) we finally convinced the salesman we would not be buying this amazing advancement in sucking technology. He couldn't believe that we didn't want to spend $2,600 on a new vacuum. Now the vacuum was pretty cool. It could be used to unclog sinks, spray paint, blow leaves, & I think you could even rig it to travel through time, but $2,600? Even when we made it perfectly clear that we wouldn't even pay $1,000 for it, his bosses were still pressuring him to pressure us. Don't get me wrong, he was a pretty nice guy, but the whole thing was weird, especially when I could see his cohorts continually driving past our house. Valerie of course thought this was all a setup for a later burglary of our home, so I may have to skip church tomorrow to stand guard.

The moral of the story: when people come to your door promising you something that's too good to be true (free stuff, new cool weird religion) remember that it probably is too good to be true. Don't let them get their foot in the door because once they're in, it's over. So do what we used to do when I was a kid: we would run through the house, turn off the lights & hide, even if we knew that they knew we were inside!

Guest Blog Post

After an interesting afternoon, I decided that it would be pretty entertaining to allow Matt to publish a guest post. I could tell you the story of what happened today, but I'm actually rather interested in reading exactly what he has to say. He should have this written before the night is over so look for it! It's kind of odd to think of Matt as being a guest poster on a site that is titled "Bowman Family." Perhaps I should instead call this Matt's First Post.

Another Haircut

Last month, I posted about a new experience at the Bowman household. Well, today we relived that experience. YES - I cut Matt's hair again! Since I have only done this once before, I pulled out the directions to scan. However, within seconds Matt says, "Let's get this show on the road." Hmm. Really? He trusts me that much? Matt?

This time around I was much more confident concerning my haircutting abilities. I breezed through the 3 different attachments until all I had left to do were trimming around the ears and cleaning up the back. All Right!!! Good Job, VAL! So, at some point during this haircut, Matt asks if I am going to use the attachment for around the ears. Hmmm. Did I use those the last time I cut his hair? I don't think I did. However, the directions for using the Left and Right Ear Tapers are clearly typed up in the directions. I scanned these instructions, attached the Left Ear Taper and....

well...

umm...

OK. So in my defense I'm still not sure exactly what I did wrong. I still think I followed the instructions. However, whatever I did certainly didn't produce the desired results. There was a small section of Matt's hair that within seconds became significantly shorter than the hair surrounding it. As soon as this happened, I froze. My confidence had been zapped out of me. I inwardly cringed at the thought of Matt seeing the error. I guess I began stammering incoherently (I really can't remember what I said) because Matt immediately got up to look in the mirror himself. *Breathe, Val... Breathe*

We spent a few more minutes shortening the rest of Matt's hair a tiny bit in the hopes of blending in the mishap, and then just said "ok, enough." His hair will fortunately grow out quickly. In fact, by the time we leave for my cousin Ellen's wedding in 2 weeks it probably will not even be noticeable - especially if I trim up the rest again. Whew!

Supposedly, all of our life experiences should also be learning experiences and I wanted to share the things I learned because of today's haircut.

1. Do NOT assume that Matt will freak out! During our ordeal, he calmly instructed me on how he wanted to lessen the damage done. Since I was still ordering myself to just *breathe* - I needed his level head.

2. Do NOT continually fret over things beyond your control. We 'fixed' the error I made as best we could and then Matt let it go. In fact, just minutes later when he came into the kitchen to make chili - he was humming. People do not hum when they are worrying/freaking out. Believe me on this, I should know.

3. Do NOT ever, Ever, EVER use the Taper Ear attachment. No more explanation is needed.

You might be a Southern Baptist if...

I ran into this facebook group page and thought some of the comments were pretty funny. Here are a few of my favorites.

You might be a Southern Baptist if...
* You think someone who says "Amen" while the preacher is preaching might qualify as being 'charismatic.'
* You've memorized Robert's Rules of Order just b/c of business meetings.
* You consider dancing one of the seven deadly sins.
* You need a committee to approve a potluck dinner.
* Your definition of fellowship has something to do with food.
* Your last pastor got fired b/c he moved the pulpit 1/100th of an inch to the left.
* Your entire summer calendar revolves around VBS and 'CAMP.'
* You're afraid to try a new recipe b/c it has wine in it.
* Sitting in a different seat during Worship is considered "leaving your comfort zone."
* Hearing "How many Southern Baptist preachers does it take to change a lightbulb?" makes you respond, "Change?! What do you mean CHANGE??!! My dear Grandmother donated that lightbulb, and my father worked by the sweat of his brow to install it 15 years ago."

It's November now. Thanksgiving is just around the corner, and there are Christmas trees up in all the department stores. So, what have I been doing today? Sitting outside working on my tan. Weird huh?

About my husband...

I saw this on a friend's blog and decided to do it myself!

1. He's sitting in front of the TV; what is on the screen? Football, House, Roseanne, Bear (don't know the show... just the guy on it.)

2. You're out-to-eat; what kind of dressing does he get on his salad? HAHAHA. Matt would most certainly bypass the salad.

3. What's one food he doesn't like? anything with mayo

4. You go out to eat and have a drink; what does he order? coke

5. Where did he go to high school? Jackson Christian

6. What size shoe does he wear? 13 (12 sometimes)

7. What is something he likes to do but never gets to do it? Play his guitar/mandolin ALONE

8. What is his favorite type of sandwich? chicken sandwich (no pickle please) from Chick-fil-a

9. What would he eat every day if he could? again... chick-fil-a!

10. What is his favorite cereal? umm.... he eats Honey Bunches of Oats with Almonds, but that's just because I buy that for myself. I think I've seen him eat Fruit Loops at camp.

11. What would he never wear? a brown belt with black pants

12. What is his favorite sports team? Florida Gators!

13. Who did he vote for? I assume we're talking in the presidential election last Nov. - that would be McCain.

14. Who is his best friend? surely ME

15. What is something you do that he wishes you wouldn't do? he wishes that I wouldn't take any and every opportunity to worry. he also wishes i wouldn't burst out in spontaneous song.

16. What is his heritage? I guess "from the bluff" isn't sufficient here... English for the most part (i think)

17. You bake him a cake for his birthday; what kind? he'd prefer a cheesecake

18. Did he play sports in high school? baseball

19. What could he spend hours doing? watching football or playing his guitar

20. What is one unique talent/gift that he has? Matt has a remarkable ability to remember useless trivia. On a more serious note... Matt's a minister. Therefore, he preaches. He's able to come up with original sermon ideas and then write/deliver them in a way that will definitely be remembered. However, I think a greater gift is his yearning to learn from other pastors/leaders whom he greatly respects.