Five Di's plus one

Because six di's (dianthus) doesn't really have the same ring to it.

Their friends the Purple Ladies are gone (fungus). Trying to water and will my girls through the brutal next two months.

A little bit smarter?

I have been willing my lovely purple cell phone to remain alive, which I have had at least three years (because I had it on my trip to Kyiv in 2011 to see this sweet family). I knew I had to replace it because it wasn't holding a charge very long but was thinking about taking the plunge to smart phone land (yes, I'm one of the last two people one earth that didn't have one)...but I didn't want to deal with that while studying. So, Saturday, this is what happened...

While I honestly would have been perfectly fine with a free "smart" phone I could have received (after paying the upgrade fee), since I have a brother that works for Apple, purchasing any other brand would be considered treason. :)  And, it is really easy this way because every person in my family, including spouses has one of this "i" devices, so we can do Facetime (Apple's version of Skype) and my pictures and videos and songs are SUPPOSED to share themselves between the phone and iPad.

Insert skepticism. 

I have only just now gotten the ability to receive voicemails after having this "phone" in my possession for 3 days.  It seems the "smart" phone was not intelligent enough to record a voice message, which my old lovely purple non "smart" phone was perfectly capable of doing.  So after 2 trips to the AT&T store and 2 calls to them, I can finally receive and retrieve voicemail messages.

And, I don't know why I didn't get the white one.  Why did I think it would get dirty when it would always have a cover on it?  This bright lime green is horrid.  Too late.  (The black/silver ones were $100 more and I certainly wasn't going to do that.  Blue is what my Mom has.  Pink and yellow were too flashy as I might have this out in a meeting at work...) The picture above does not quite capture the brightness of the green...*sigh*...oh well!!! At least the girl found me a cover that basically makes the phone look purple...

I know I will come to love this handy gadget in my pocket, but right now it's caused me more time and angst than it's helped me.  I do not intend to use much data because I don't want to pay for it, so it will basically be when I'm traveling and don't have access to wifi that I use it like a smartphone.  You should have seen the look on the little boy's face at the store when I told him this.  Like I said the world was ending.  Really.  I can live hours - and days!  without reading Facebook or even the news.  As long as I can get in touch by text or email or phone with those I love...that's really all that matters.

Whether I'm smarter or not as a result of this new device remains to be seen...though my SS teacher did tell me about the "gas buddy" app that will pull up the prices of gas stations around you and show you the cheapest one.  That is something I can use.  And am willing to pay for. :)

Fair-Feathered Shoppers

Last night after work, I went by my CVS to pick up a couple RX's when outside the door, I saw these guys (or girls, I didn't check!). They got even closer to the door but never went in. They are not at all skittish of people - the first picture is not zoomed!

After a rather "downer" day at work, it was just a funny sight and several other customers and I had a good laugh at these feathered-fellows' expense. I swear (except I don't) that one of them was wagging its tail feathers while we were talking to it!!

Simple Pleasures

On of my fave blogs to read, Kelly's Korner, today, there was a great post about the simple pleasures in life. Here, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER, are some of my simple pleasures:

1) Going to bed Friday night and knowing I can sleep until I want to Saturday morning (benefit of being single and childless!)
2) Cross-stitching while watching college football
3) Having it be in the 60's in my apartment without either A/C or heat (i.e., VERY low electric bill!) ;)
4) Hearing my friend's little girl call me Aunt Sarah...and her getting excited for me to come and giving me hugs
5) Hearing my niece (by blood) who's 2 say "love you" on the phone after I told her the same thing (this was the first time she uttered those words ever)
6) Enjoying the every other weekend I don't need to brave the apartment laundry room
7) A good sale at Gymboree
8) Having the opportunity to play my oboe
9) Going to my doctor's office and getting a hug from her and being thanked for coming!
10) Being "kissed" by a dog and having him be excited to see me, even when he only sees me once every month or so
11) Getting the weekly cards I get from my Mom, that usually also contain a little 'mad $$'
12) Freshly fallen snow (mostly memories as it doesn't happen much now in TX, but I used to live where it snowed a lot!)
13) A baby's laugh
14) Special K Chocolatey Delight with Kashi Go Lean Crunch and milk (typically for dinner!)
15) A Karen Kingsbury novel
16) Being able to snuggle with my babies in the baby room (nursery) at church and having them all be content/quiet even for a few seconds
17) An e-mail from a friend I haven't heard from in a while
18) God's hand clearly evident in an area of concern in my life
19) (newly acquired) DVR
20) Jelly Belly jelly beans (esp. the Cold Stone Cream flavors)

Again, those were in no particular order; clearly some of those are far more precious and priceless than others.

That was good and fun and a great way to start the day! What are some of YOUR simple pleasures???

Snow, Stuffed Ballerinas and Reflection

So it's snowed a few times in "The Big D" this past month. Somehow I seem to miss it most of the time because I'm out of town (be it OH or south TX)...but yesterday, I did observe some huge, beautiful snowflakes falling in this southern city. These native Texans (no offense if you are one) are HYSTERICAL with "winter weather advisorys"/warnings/"artic blast" (if it's below 50*!) and the de-icing of the planes at DFW. CRACKS ME UP. We are at war in a number of 'theaters', we had an underwear bomber try to do us in on Jesus' birthday and this is college football Bowl week--and the top story on all the news is that it will "plummet" to 48*!!! I LOVE IT!

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A completely un-related but almost more funny incident occurred when I reviewed my receipt from Tom Thumb (a.k.a. Randall's or Safeway in other parts of the country) on Monday...I confess I don't usually check it, but there was a particular sale that I wanted to be sure rang up correctly. Much to my confusion, I saw "STUFFED BALLERINAS" for $3.99 as one of the items. Hmmm...I did not buy, nor do I know what, a stuffed ballerina is. It's certainly not what was in my (they're worthless for re-using because they're so thin) Tom Thumb bag. By process of elimination it was one of these:

Apparently, somewhere in the giant, invisible world of UPC codes, someone entered "stuffed ballerinas" as what should come up when the UPC code for a candle-lighter was scanned. I'm sorry to admit I've thought long and hard about this and I can't for the life of me think of a correlation...so it just makes me smile and I hope you get a chuckle out of it as well!

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Today is New Year's Eve. Another year has come to a close. Everyone says it in their Christmas cards/letters, but I promise it's more and more true every year--time does FLY! It seems not very long ago that my niece was born (she's 2 now). It seems like last night when my good friend B had baby E...and it's been nearly 2 weeks. If time passes more quickly the older you get, then pretty soon I'll be ancient (never mind the fact I feel ancient sometimes...that's another post for another day...)

As I'm sure lots of us do, I try to be reflective at either the end of the year or the very beginning of the next...renumerating all the myriads of blessings from my gracious Heavenly Father...the prayers answered in ways I liked and asking for peace and patience for the prayers that were answered by "no, not right now" and/or "no, never." I'm guilty of this too, but why do we say "praise the Lord for answered prayer"???? God answers ALL our prayers--some with "yes", some with "no" and some with "wait"...but we seem to only give Him glory when the answer is "yes"...I know I'm very bad about this.

The Bible says in Psalm 116 (these verses are from The Message translation):

^{1 -6} I love God because he listened to me, listened as I begged for mercy.
He listened so intently
as I laid out my case before him.

Death stared me in the face,
hell was hard on my heels.
Up against it, I didn't know which way to turn;
then I called out to God for help:
"Please, God!" I cried out.
"Save my life!"

God is gracious—it is he who makes things right,
our most compassionate God.
God takes the side of the helpless;
when I was at the end of my rope, he saved me.

^{7 -8} I said to myself, "Relax and rest.
God has showered you with blessings.
Soul, you've been rescued from death;
Eye, you've been rescued from tears;
And you, Foot, were kept from stumbling."

So whether it's today, tomorrow, this weekend or in the next couple weeks, let's spend at least a few minutes remembering God's faithfulness to us this past year. Though things like jobs and friends and any number of situations may change, He never does. He is the same today, tomorrow and throughout the rest of our lives, all praise to Him!

I may not know what a "stuffed ballerina" is, but I know the one and only God, and after it's all said and done, I think that's really all that matters.

Happy 2010, everyone...may it be a year filled with God's best blessings on us and our families, and may we be ever watchful for those blessings ready to give Him the glory!