I’m throwing out a challenge. Find me the smartest person alive, and I will stupefy them with a trip to the grocery store.
The parameters of the game are as follows:
$100 Dollars to Spend
Healthy
Will feed a family of 4 for a week (careful how you estimate kid portions… if you haven’t met mine)
You cannot plan on serving the same meal twice for dinner (lunch left overs are permissible, but not in excess)
You can spend no more than 1hr in the store
Must remember to use at least one coupon (cause you really are trying)
Must ensure receipt is 100% accurate in pricing of items on sale
You have to keep my two children with you, at all times
You need to complete said challenge without injury to self/others.
Some of you read that, and scoffed at my menial abilities, convinced of your mad skills. Others of you, without knowing any better, thought “awwww, bless her heart”… I know what that means… I spent 8 years in the south! Still others, armed with first-hand knowledge of the challenging feat, offer empathy. Thank you.
The kicker. Additional parameters for “Healthy”:
Cannot contain any High Fructose Corn Syrup
All items must have less than 25% daily sodium percentage per serving
All items must also have less than 10% daily sugar percentages per serving
Any Fruit/veggies grown in the ground, or which you eat the skin of, must be organic.
No dyed foods (Red Dye #7, Blue #8…. That stuff will kill you ya’ know ;)
This is not for the faint of heart people. I’m not kidding when I estimate at any given time approximately 3 equations trying to be processed in my head for any single item I put in the cart. Example: “The jar of sauce, says 2 for $5… easy enough $2.50, but its only 16oz, and this other one is 24oz, and costs $3.00… Hmmm 8 oz more, one additional serving, for .$50…… Oh wait, now flip it over for the nutrition facts…. The 16 oz one is lower in overall sodium and sugar, oh wait… there is this 3rd option close in price…. (remember those kids you brought with you… at this point in time, one has walked around the corner, and the other is trying desperately to wiggle out of the cart seat, while whining to you about getting down, and also grabbing things you don’t want to buy off the shelf and throwing them into the cart)…. Where were we at again on those equations?
So who’s gonna give it a whirl??? Any Takers??? The smartest person alive, was given that title for a reason, they are smart enough to know that the challenge set before them is impossible. Prove me wrong. I’ll buy you dinner!
Friday, September 14, 2012
Thursday, September 6, 2012
Back to School, to FINALLY understand the Golden Rule!
At the beginning of the year, my goal, specifically not a resolution, was to find balance. I think maybe my perspective of what balance was started out slightly flawed. I had imagined it as walking a tight rope between right and wrong, and to that imagery I would have fallen to my death long ago, if that tight rope were extended in mid-air. Even with the line safely on the ground, I would have looked like a drunk on the side of the road, trying so hard to avoid a night in the slammer. However, if you added up the leans toward one side and the other…. I might be a little closer to striking a balance. Maybe.
The battle seems to fall between selfish and selfless…. With errors still occurring squarely on the side of selfish. Isn’t it funny how certain you can become that you are the only person in the world who is selfish? That everyone else is walking around in a constant state of service, never once weighing decisions based purely on self-interest.
Or is it true, and I need a massive kick in the pants?
I do love being there for people, helping them when they need it, but only so long as it fits within parameters I’ve defined. Some call that having healthy boundaries, jury is still out for me. To complicate that, you know how good it feels when you do meet a need, give more than you planned, do something for the greater good, and you want to shout it from the roof tops. Which is a strange phenomenon in and of itself, because technically if we were living as we should, we’d be doing those things all the time and our need to toot our own horn at having done them would subside. Back to the point, in all reality the only person that actually wants to hear about it is your mom. It kinda comes with the job I suppose, whenever you’re child comes to you and says look Mom and Dad, look what I did, you give them a pat on the back and say well done. I guess, biblically, that’s how it’s supposed to be done, you know the whole end of our lives “Well done good and faithful servant” speech…. Although I’m still holding out hope for the audible, ‘atta girl’ to fall from heaven sometimes.
Facebook doesn’t help matters. In a matter of seconds I can tell the world that I cleaned my house that day, and get 15 ‘likes’. Then on the days when I’m lacking total motivation and (since I’m lacking total motivation) find myself on Facebook, seeing other people posting about how productive they are, generally only feeds the beast that can be self-loathing. I suppose one thing that has balanced in the last 8 months has been my love of Facebook, its finally found its rightful place at the low end of my to-do/see totem-pole.
The grace v. confrontation balance has been a bit of a mind bender for me too. If ‘love covers a multitude of sins’, where on that line… that very fuzzy if not totally transparent, line… do you say enough? I guess if you’re writing a book, that’s designed to cover every human condition, and remain relevant for 2000 years +, you’re bound to have quite a few juxtaposed positions on topics, but it does create quite a complication for someone trying to find their line of balance!
I know I’m not the only one struggling with this one either…. It’s shocking how heated a Christian debate can become. In politics or life, if you hold a different opinion as someone else, they might call you ignorant (if they’re keeping it classy). In Christian debates, people gloss right over ignorance and start praying for your soul…. Meaning they’re quite certain you’re headed to Hell with your current way of thinking and they need to intercede for you. It has me totally baffled. Millions, if not in the billions, of people claim Christianity, and yet the greater church with its many different factions (of which I do claim ignorance for understanding the differences) can’t seem to get us all on the same page? If a house divided falls, I’d say we’re in a bit of trouble peeps.
With all of my questions, I am super excited to start this next semester with church. I’ve signed up to take these seminary style classes from Regent University, it’s part of a pilot program my church is doing with them. Three years, 12 classes I think, and you end with a certificate of practical ministry from the University. This is only my first semester, so whether I stay committed till the end is TBD, but I’m excited for my own ‘Back to School’ adventure! If you weren’t a fan of the faithy posts before, you might want to stop checking in so I don’t annoy you, cause that’s the direction this mama is moving, so I’d expect my musings to follow suit.
The battle seems to fall between selfish and selfless…. With errors still occurring squarely on the side of selfish. Isn’t it funny how certain you can become that you are the only person in the world who is selfish? That everyone else is walking around in a constant state of service, never once weighing decisions based purely on self-interest.
Or is it true, and I need a massive kick in the pants?
I do love being there for people, helping them when they need it, but only so long as it fits within parameters I’ve defined. Some call that having healthy boundaries, jury is still out for me. To complicate that, you know how good it feels when you do meet a need, give more than you planned, do something for the greater good, and you want to shout it from the roof tops. Which is a strange phenomenon in and of itself, because technically if we were living as we should, we’d be doing those things all the time and our need to toot our own horn at having done them would subside. Back to the point, in all reality the only person that actually wants to hear about it is your mom. It kinda comes with the job I suppose, whenever you’re child comes to you and says look Mom and Dad, look what I did, you give them a pat on the back and say well done. I guess, biblically, that’s how it’s supposed to be done, you know the whole end of our lives “Well done good and faithful servant” speech…. Although I’m still holding out hope for the audible, ‘atta girl’ to fall from heaven sometimes.
Facebook doesn’t help matters. In a matter of seconds I can tell the world that I cleaned my house that day, and get 15 ‘likes’. Then on the days when I’m lacking total motivation and (since I’m lacking total motivation) find myself on Facebook, seeing other people posting about how productive they are, generally only feeds the beast that can be self-loathing. I suppose one thing that has balanced in the last 8 months has been my love of Facebook, its finally found its rightful place at the low end of my to-do/see totem-pole.
The grace v. confrontation balance has been a bit of a mind bender for me too. If ‘love covers a multitude of sins’, where on that line… that very fuzzy if not totally transparent, line… do you say enough? I guess if you’re writing a book, that’s designed to cover every human condition, and remain relevant for 2000 years +, you’re bound to have quite a few juxtaposed positions on topics, but it does create quite a complication for someone trying to find their line of balance!
I know I’m not the only one struggling with this one either…. It’s shocking how heated a Christian debate can become. In politics or life, if you hold a different opinion as someone else, they might call you ignorant (if they’re keeping it classy). In Christian debates, people gloss right over ignorance and start praying for your soul…. Meaning they’re quite certain you’re headed to Hell with your current way of thinking and they need to intercede for you. It has me totally baffled. Millions, if not in the billions, of people claim Christianity, and yet the greater church with its many different factions (of which I do claim ignorance for understanding the differences) can’t seem to get us all on the same page? If a house divided falls, I’d say we’re in a bit of trouble peeps.
With all of my questions, I am super excited to start this next semester with church. I’ve signed up to take these seminary style classes from Regent University, it’s part of a pilot program my church is doing with them. Three years, 12 classes I think, and you end with a certificate of practical ministry from the University. This is only my first semester, so whether I stay committed till the end is TBD, but I’m excited for my own ‘Back to School’ adventure! If you weren’t a fan of the faithy posts before, you might want to stop checking in so I don’t annoy you, cause that’s the direction this mama is moving, so I’d expect my musings to follow suit.
Sunday, September 2, 2012
The Unexpected
I've landed myself squarely in a conundrum.... Before I actually BELIEVED any of this faith stuff, I was totally fine telling anyone 'yeah I believe, I'm just not one of those crazies', and then went ahead on my jolly way living my own life doing my own thing, right/wrong/whatevs. Now I do BELIEVE it, and I don't talk about it because I don't want to scare people.... Cause let's face it... church people can really be WIERD sometimes! So eitherway you sliced it, I didn't seem to end up on the right side.... Live a life not really making any attempt to follow Jesus, and tell people I was.... confusing.... or live a life trying to, and not talk about Him at all.... confusing.
I do want to set the record straight on a couple things though, me 'Believing' does not translate to: won't touch alcohol, wouldn't think of shaking their groove thing to a song that doesn't play on a christian station, is on their knees with their nose in a bible for 25 hours a day, is suddenly a doting wife/mother/best friend ever/amazing coorespondant/will drop everything to help whenever/whoever/whatever at a moments notice perfect person. I'm sure there are a couple more I'm missing, that I'll likely get the chance to point out when I make a bone head move, and someone says "I thought you CHAAAAANGED" (cause that's how I see this going down in my head), and I can say.... "Oh yeah change didn't necessarily translate to that either... at least not yet".
This faith stuff is crazy ya'll, like seriously mind-boggling WTFudge ;) crazy! Most liberating thing I've found to-date.... God know's when I was typing that, that fudge was not the word that came to mind, and while He might not be "cool" with it, He's got a really REALLY big long list of other things He's working on with me first, and that one will eventually come up, but He would be more annoyed with me trying to 'change' how I talk so I can sound like I think I'm supposed, cause then I'd be fake.... and He's got a bigger issue with the F word when that word is Fake :) So we're just gonna be real, whatever that looks like.
O.K... so you've made it this far.... on to the real reason for the Blog....
You guys, August was INSANE... My head is quite litterally spinning which is why I had to write it all down cause trying to make sense of it in my head was NOT working out well for me.
Let's start with the first week. Aug 1st, our tenants in Texas give notice they are moving out and we have 30 days to figure out how to re-let the house from 1100 miles away. A few days later, one of my very closest friends from out here, and the boys care provider, drops the bomb that she's moving to Colorado.... in a WEEK. Eight hours after that, we learned that our second pregnancy since Logan was also going to end in a mis-carriage. Not a stellar week in the Alspaugh household.
So to end the month in abject wonder and thankfulness from that start is nothing short of a miracle :)!
God provided a new care provider for the boys, before I even realized I needed one (A girl from my church approached me actually ASKING me if she could watch my boys 3 days before Steph gave her notice, I'd told her I had everything covered at the time.... You know who got the first call when Steph did give her notice!). Caaaa-RAY-zeeee, but so cool too!
The week after the miscarriage we were overwhelmed with an outpouring of love from my girlfriends out here and family/friends from home, they stocked my fridge for two weeks with meals, came and watched chick flix with me, and Kev and the boys were angels as well... may be par for the course for Kev, but the boys... yeah the can run the spectrum from angel... to possessed... so angels for a whole week was a treat! The icing on that cake, was I got to find purpose in what was going to be an empty nursery. A week after learning the room would be empty we actually ended up filling it with a new addition to our family... I GOT MY GIRL ;) (wait... breath... no baby, no adoption... ok. are we composed again?) Melanie, an intern for our church for the school year was litterally arriving that Saturday and the church didn't have a home for her... and well we now had room, so in she moved :)
All that only brought us to the middle of the month when Kevin's parents came for a visit, and I had my Bear encounter. Please tell me you saw my picture on Facebook. IT WAS A REAL, LIVE, HONEST TO GOD BLACK BEAR 30 ft. from me you guys... Seriously... INSANE MONTH! Who has bear encounters?
So that brings me to the trials/tribulations of re-letting a home 1100 miles away. We got an early bite on the ad. I was thrilled. That was until in my first conversation with the prospect alerted me to the felony record that would accompany them into the house, should I extend a contract to them. Yeah... That will pull you up short in a phone conversation. "A felony, huh, well I guess the next logical question would be what for?", "Well my husband robbed two banks 5 years ago, he wasn't armed, but our credit is now shot, and no one will give us a chance, I totally understand if you won't either". OUCH... she HAD to play the compassion card, I'm such a sucker for those. I told her I'd pray about it and let her know (this was not one of those, I'll pray about its, so I can get you off the phone trying to be nice). I told God I'd move forward with this, and asked Him to make the prospects withdrawl themselves from the process if they were gonna screw me. Long story short, after probably about 50 e-mails, phone calls to the parole officer, their pastor, and about 20 other back ground checks, I sent them a contract... and wouldn't ya' know... they back out.
So now a week before the month runs out, I had no prospects, an empty house and a looming double mortgage/rent payment coming due? What does God do... He invites me (via my girlfriend) to spend a 5 days in Key West with Him and one of my nearest/dearest.... He's a pretty cool guy ;) (A smidge of a lie, I bought the plane ticket, the day before our prospects backed out... so in my defense, I did think I had tenants when I spent the money).
So we FINALLY brought August to an end, and did so with no tenant.... until today! :) I'm not gonna lie, I am SO not a fan of the sweating it out method that God seems to enjoy employing from time to time... Really not... gonna have a chat with Him about the logic behind that when I get to Heaven, and how many heart attacks may have resulted from such methods, and who's fault those were, but I digress.... He did it, He found us the perfect tenants, who signed a TWO YEAR lease!!!
Christine Caine came and spoke at our church half-way through this month... I found it rather appropriate timing, as one of her points in her message is that our job is mearly to prepare, to just do what we can, when we can do it. She said God doesn't start working until we've reached our impossible, if its possible and within our means we are expected to do it.... Well my impossible was Sept. 1st with no tenants... and wouldn't ya' know... He came through!
So yeah... crazy month, but with as stressful and unexpected as everything was, I wouldn't have traded it. Sure, I might have choosen some things to work out differently, but this faith that I've been working on for the last two years was put to the test, and it held. I rather enjoy not going to pieces when it appears as though my life is doing just that. Waiting... Watching... Believing for something to come through, to work, and allowing a VERY broad range for what that will look like. The answers aren't alwasy what I want, but there is reason to them, and when there doesn't even seem to be reason, there is at least the adventure of the unexpected. If I had to pick between a life of expected, and the adventure of the unexpected, I want the latter..... Although should I end up dying of a stress induced heart attack, me and God are gonna have some words on the why behind that one! ;)
I do want to set the record straight on a couple things though, me 'Believing' does not translate to: won't touch alcohol, wouldn't think of shaking their groove thing to a song that doesn't play on a christian station, is on their knees with their nose in a bible for 25 hours a day, is suddenly a doting wife/mother/best friend ever/amazing coorespondant/will drop everything to help whenever/whoever/whatever at a moments notice perfect person. I'm sure there are a couple more I'm missing, that I'll likely get the chance to point out when I make a bone head move, and someone says "I thought you CHAAAAANGED" (cause that's how I see this going down in my head), and I can say.... "Oh yeah change didn't necessarily translate to that either... at least not yet".
This faith stuff is crazy ya'll, like seriously mind-boggling WTFudge ;) crazy! Most liberating thing I've found to-date.... God know's when I was typing that, that fudge was not the word that came to mind, and while He might not be "cool" with it, He's got a really REALLY big long list of other things He's working on with me first, and that one will eventually come up, but He would be more annoyed with me trying to 'change' how I talk so I can sound like I think I'm supposed, cause then I'd be fake.... and He's got a bigger issue with the F word when that word is Fake :) So we're just gonna be real, whatever that looks like.
O.K... so you've made it this far.... on to the real reason for the Blog....
You guys, August was INSANE... My head is quite litterally spinning which is why I had to write it all down cause trying to make sense of it in my head was NOT working out well for me.
Let's start with the first week. Aug 1st, our tenants in Texas give notice they are moving out and we have 30 days to figure out how to re-let the house from 1100 miles away. A few days later, one of my very closest friends from out here, and the boys care provider, drops the bomb that she's moving to Colorado.... in a WEEK. Eight hours after that, we learned that our second pregnancy since Logan was also going to end in a mis-carriage. Not a stellar week in the Alspaugh household.
So to end the month in abject wonder and thankfulness from that start is nothing short of a miracle :)!
God provided a new care provider for the boys, before I even realized I needed one (A girl from my church approached me actually ASKING me if she could watch my boys 3 days before Steph gave her notice, I'd told her I had everything covered at the time.... You know who got the first call when Steph did give her notice!). Caaaa-RAY-zeeee, but so cool too!
The week after the miscarriage we were overwhelmed with an outpouring of love from my girlfriends out here and family/friends from home, they stocked my fridge for two weeks with meals, came and watched chick flix with me, and Kev and the boys were angels as well... may be par for the course for Kev, but the boys... yeah the can run the spectrum from angel... to possessed... so angels for a whole week was a treat! The icing on that cake, was I got to find purpose in what was going to be an empty nursery. A week after learning the room would be empty we actually ended up filling it with a new addition to our family... I GOT MY GIRL ;) (wait... breath... no baby, no adoption... ok. are we composed again?) Melanie, an intern for our church for the school year was litterally arriving that Saturday and the church didn't have a home for her... and well we now had room, so in she moved :)
All that only brought us to the middle of the month when Kevin's parents came for a visit, and I had my Bear encounter. Please tell me you saw my picture on Facebook. IT WAS A REAL, LIVE, HONEST TO GOD BLACK BEAR 30 ft. from me you guys... Seriously... INSANE MONTH! Who has bear encounters?
So that brings me to the trials/tribulations of re-letting a home 1100 miles away. We got an early bite on the ad. I was thrilled. That was until in my first conversation with the prospect alerted me to the felony record that would accompany them into the house, should I extend a contract to them. Yeah... That will pull you up short in a phone conversation. "A felony, huh, well I guess the next logical question would be what for?", "Well my husband robbed two banks 5 years ago, he wasn't armed, but our credit is now shot, and no one will give us a chance, I totally understand if you won't either". OUCH... she HAD to play the compassion card, I'm such a sucker for those. I told her I'd pray about it and let her know (this was not one of those, I'll pray about its, so I can get you off the phone trying to be nice). I told God I'd move forward with this, and asked Him to make the prospects withdrawl themselves from the process if they were gonna screw me. Long story short, after probably about 50 e-mails, phone calls to the parole officer, their pastor, and about 20 other back ground checks, I sent them a contract... and wouldn't ya' know... they back out.
So now a week before the month runs out, I had no prospects, an empty house and a looming double mortgage/rent payment coming due? What does God do... He invites me (via my girlfriend) to spend a 5 days in Key West with Him and one of my nearest/dearest.... He's a pretty cool guy ;) (A smidge of a lie, I bought the plane ticket, the day before our prospects backed out... so in my defense, I did think I had tenants when I spent the money).
So we FINALLY brought August to an end, and did so with no tenant.... until today! :) I'm not gonna lie, I am SO not a fan of the sweating it out method that God seems to enjoy employing from time to time... Really not... gonna have a chat with Him about the logic behind that when I get to Heaven, and how many heart attacks may have resulted from such methods, and who's fault those were, but I digress.... He did it, He found us the perfect tenants, who signed a TWO YEAR lease!!!
Christine Caine came and spoke at our church half-way through this month... I found it rather appropriate timing, as one of her points in her message is that our job is mearly to prepare, to just do what we can, when we can do it. She said God doesn't start working until we've reached our impossible, if its possible and within our means we are expected to do it.... Well my impossible was Sept. 1st with no tenants... and wouldn't ya' know... He came through!
So yeah... crazy month, but with as stressful and unexpected as everything was, I wouldn't have traded it. Sure, I might have choosen some things to work out differently, but this faith that I've been working on for the last two years was put to the test, and it held. I rather enjoy not going to pieces when it appears as though my life is doing just that. Waiting... Watching... Believing for something to come through, to work, and allowing a VERY broad range for what that will look like. The answers aren't alwasy what I want, but there is reason to them, and when there doesn't even seem to be reason, there is at least the adventure of the unexpected. If I had to pick between a life of expected, and the adventure of the unexpected, I want the latter..... Although should I end up dying of a stress induced heart attack, me and God are gonna have some words on the why behind that one! ;)
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