The Saturday Six

One.

 Maybe it's the book nerd in me, I don't know, but I found this post fascinating. Behind the scenes look at the design of a book cover. (And also - I wanna be a book cover model!! And also also - yes, I know I'm not a model.)

Two.

Last year, I did Erica Wiggenhorn's Bible Study, "An Unexplainable Life" twice. Once on my own and once leading the small group with Ryan's work friends. It really changed the way I view my relationship with the Lord and with the local church body. Well, Erica has a sequel study coming out NEXT MONTH, and I cannot wait to dig into it! It's called "The Unexplainable Church," and I hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiighly recommend it, based on what I know of the first study!! If your small group is scoping out studies to go over this fall, PICK THESE! 

Three.

 Garage sale season is upon us, and I found this article chronicling some of the best things to hunt for at these sales! Good ideas!

Four.

 Maybe THIS is why my running speeds aren't as fast as some??? I am not using these? (Although I did have a really good mile this week. Second mile was terrible, but mile one was AMAZING!)

Five.

 I have a lot of teacher friends, and I know they are weary at the end of this school year. (And every school year.) I used to want to be a teacher, so I have a tender place in my soul for them and the work they do, especially when feeling so restricted by goals to achieve things that go far outside their intended subject. That's why this post is so perfect. If you're a teacher (or know and love one), read it!
 
Six.

 
Often when I tell you about a book I've read, I am quick to gush about how I flew through it. Couldn't put it down. I guess in my mind, that is one of the great compliments to a book: this one was so good, I just couldn't put it down. And probably for fiction, especially, that is true. But this week I learned the opposite can also be a high compliment to a book. Messy Beautiful Friendship was that book for me this week. It was so good, I had to keep putting it down so I could chew on the words and let them wash over me before I continued.

Christine Hoover is a Texas-loving pasttor's wife who left her beloved Texas roots (and friends) to follow her husband's ministry call to Virginia. This is not her first book, but it was my introduction to her, and my goodness, do I ever appreciate the heart, soul, and deep transparency she put into this book!

It's hard to write about friendship. I think it's harder now than ever, because friendship is so confusing (thanks, social media!) anymore. Facebook has redefined the word "friend" entirely, and we all have to stop and translate in our heads to know for sure where each person in our "friend" life actually fits.

Friendship is hard because we can be catty. Friendship is hard because we compare. Friendship is hard because we're busy. Friendship is hard because we're prideful. But friendship is a gift from the Lord designed (amazingly enough) NOT to fill our social media feed, but to fill our souls and push us closer to Him.

I've heard that about marriage before. I've never thought of it being the same for friendship until I read Christine's book. If we're doing friendship the way the Lord designed, we are friends filled with grace, we aren't afraid of conflict, we dig deep, we walk through the hard stuff just as faithfully as the fun stuff, and in the end, we both know we're nearer to the Lord because this friendship exists.

Christine shares many vulnerable stories from her own life and shows through her own successes and failures how to have honest conversations, move past assumptions (and their lies), walk through valleys, and believe the best from friends.

This book was very convicting to me. I'm not always the friend I want to be, and I read many reminders of why I need to do some things differently, as well as many convicting words about the proper role of friendships in my life.

This book isn't a fast read, and I mean that as a high compliment. If you do blow through it, I think you'll miss so many key points you should pause to digest, savor, and even implement.

If you're frustrated by your friendships, whether the lack or state of them, pick up this book. She has many wise nuggets to share (even a list of them in the back!) and she's safe to learn from, because she's not a perfect friend either. (And what a relief that was to know!)

* Baker Books sent me a copy of this book; all opinions are my own!*

25 Things I Learned from Our Yard Sale

One sale does not an expert make, and I fully know and admit that. But today I wanted to write this post so I can refer to it next time I want to hold a yard sale, and so anyone who has been previously intimidated by such adventurescan learn from our successes and failures. I feel like this past weekend taught me many things about what worked and what didn't in terms of what leads to a successful sale. Here's the list of 25 things I learned. {It's a bit long, but each one was important to me.}

1. Start prepping early. I started cleaning out our house three months before the sale, and although we continued to add items clear up until the week of the sale, the bulk of the finding-items-to-sell work was done weeks in advance. This kept me from stressing out the week of the sale.

2. Price as you go. As I cleaned out every single drawer, closet, cabinet, and cranny of our home, I immediately put price stickers on the items going in the sale. This also saved me incredible amounts of time the week of the sale, because all that work was already done. {Some things did have to be repriced, because not every surface material was created to house a sticker for weeks on end, and we lost a few along the way. But the bulk of the work was done.}

3. Sell some good stuff. Some sales {as you know...you've probably been to them!} are clearly a dumpster labeled with stickers. It's obvious some people sell their worn out junk that they don't want - and probably nobody else does either. I think one of the things that led to the success of our sale was having a significant amount of good stuff. Much of what we sold {and the same went for my mother-in-law} came from simple excess in our homes.

4. Don't underestimate the "junk" that still sells. We had a cracked crock pot that I wanted throw away, but Ryan convinced me to put it in our sale. He said maybe somebody had that same crock pot, but maybe the heating unit wasn't working, and they could combine our good heating unit with their good crock. Or maybe somebody knew how to repair the crock. Amazingly enough, it sold. {We did put a sticker on it explaining it was cracked.} And there were other piddly things that I threw in on a whim...that sold. It shocked me that people would want some of it, but they did.

5. Make little gift packs. Rather than pricing out every single little trinket, I made some gift packs that sold really well. I used different size storage baggies and grouped like items together and sold them as a pack. It saved me time from laying out individual things.

6. Location is everything. I had learned from other people's previous attempts that sales at our home are not successful. We are not in a prominent enough location to draw in traffic, regardless of where we advertise or how many signs we put up. For this sale, we took our stuff to Ryan's mom's rental house in Greentown. The house was just off the highway and had great visibility. ALSO - the house was near a parking lot that made it easy for our shoppers to get in and out safely and easily.

7. Timing is everything. We held our sale as part of the community sale weekend, so there were people in town looking for sales, and we were able to benefit from the sales going on around the community. The official sale day for the community was Saturday only, but we did our sale Friday and Saturday, and Friday was by far a bigger day for us. It was a strange thing to benefit both from the fact that there WERE other sales happening and the fact that we were AHEAD of some of those sales.

8. Weather is everything. You can't control this one, but it really does affect a sale. Our Friday was stunning. It was warm and sunny and people generally wanted to be outside, probably because they know there aren't many days like that left in this year. It wasn't too hot, too windy, too anything. Saturday, we encountered some sprinkles, and during the hours that the rain was most threatening, the crowds were smallest. People don't want to walk around in rain, and you can't blame them.

9. Organize the thing!! I drove past a sale that started even before ours did, and I got hives just looking at it from my car. Tables were tight together, they were obviously packed form side to side, and I had no idea how shoppers would find ANYTHING in there. I spent the entire day prior to our sale sorting through every box we had, dividing every item into categories, and then I made signs for the categories. I figure stores organize their merchandise in categories for a reason, so why shouldn't garage sales? We had SO MANY COMPLIMENTS throughout the weekend from people who appreciated the organization and got a kick out of the fun signs I made. It helped them calm down, find what they needed, and have a fun shopping experience, and they seemed to really like it.

10. Presentation. We borrowed long tables from Ryan's mom's church, and we borrowed clothing racks from a friend of her family. Both were HUGE helps. We were able to spread out the sale throughout the entire yard and give people plenty of room to browse. We had the items displayed by category on the tables, so people could skip sections they weren't interested in. AND we learned that we sold things better when they were up in full view of the people {aka hanging clothes sold better than folded clothes and we sold more shoes when we put them ON a table rather than UNDER a table}.

11. Some people will rummage. Even though I was adamant about having every single item out on display, we had some friends drop off items that were unmarked in boxes. I didn't have time to price their stuff or space to display it all, but I learned some people are undaunted by rummaging through boxes, so it was okay to have the boxes there for those who wanted to do that. {MOST did not want to go to that trouble, but some did.}

12. Multi-family helps. We heard multiple people asking if we knew which other sales in town were BIG sales. It did seem to draw folks in that we had a lot of stuff. We ended up having a three family sale, and we had a WIDE variety of items between the three families. We did not have any kid stuff at ours, and we had some people who were looking for that specifically, but overall, it didn't seem to hurt us that we didn't have kids' stuff. {But if you can find someone selling baby/kid clothing, accessories, toys, etc. that can be a huge selling point!}

13. GET HELP. We had three "full time" employees at our sale, and then my mom was there for a big chunk of the time too. Next time I might make sure we have even more people on hand. You need one person to run the cash box and watch it like a hawk when it's not in use. And sometimes in a rush, it's helpful to have a second person there to sort prices between families {we had to divide the spoils, so that was an extra step for us} and bag the stuff. If you have heavy stuff, it's important to have someone to help lift it - and it's nice to have someone to help customers carry big piles to their cars. And then it's good to have "security detail" since yes, there are people who steal from yard sales. {We had a few.} Unless your sale is small, it's not good to try to run it entirely on your own. {Besides, you need to get food and go to the bathroom sometime!!}

14. Refresh and replenish. On the busiest day, I spent most of my time, walking from front to back, straightening things up, bringing out new things to fill in holes left by things that had sold {yes, we had so much stuff it wasn't all out at once}, and sometimes just scoot things from one side of a table to another. It helped people see things they hadn't seen before. I refolded shirts, pulled new things to the front, and took away entire categories as they sold out. Some people came back to our sale for a second time and commented that they saw things they never saw the first time - because I moved it all around and spruced it up.

15. People come early and show up late. Personally, I do not understand it, because I am a rule follower. If a sale starts or ends at a certain time, I would not DREAM of going outside those boundaries. But on Saturday, we had people show up early {who seemed irritated that we were still setting up} and we also had people come as we were boxing up the leftovers {a half hour after the close of the sale} asking us to unbox and cut deals. These things are not wrong, but it's good to have a plan in place to know how you want to handle them.

16. People will be mean. It's another thing I do not understand. It's a YARD SALE. It's not a life or death thing. But as I told you in my story yesterday, I would have cried over some of my first people on Friday if I'd had time. They were rude and pushy. We finally learned by the end of the weekend, Ryan needed to handle the rude people. So know that they will happen - and be prepared to have someone there to handle that.

17. Know ahead of time when to be firm on price. Part of the reason I had a problem with mean people was that they wanted to negotiate the price of items that did not belong to me. I wasn't comfortable accepting less on someone else's behalf. Finally we had to make a list {for everyone involved in the sale} of the firm items. We wrote them all down and put the list in the cash box, so regardless of who ran the box, they would know if the item could be brought down in price or not.

18. Pricing is a gamble. In all the articles I read ahead of time, some said to price things high because people want to negotiate them down. {Truthfully I don't understand that either. I would never do that. I would pay what the tag says or walk on by if I didn't think it was worth it. But that's just me.} Other articles said if you want to move stuff out, price it to sell. So I priced it to sell - and then people still wanted to argue the prices. That was frustrating to me. I'm not sure yet which is the best way to go, but I know we moved TONS of our stuff, so pricing to sell seemed to work.

19. Set expectations ahead of time. If you're doing a multi-family sale, it's a good idea to know ahead of time what the expectations are of all those involved. Is a representative from each family working the sale at all times? If not, is the hosting family keeping a percentage of the sales? Does everyone pitch in together for the price of any advertising taking place in newspapers or other paid venues? What time does everything need to be at the sale location? All good things to know before the day of the sale.

20. Having the sale at another location brings its own set of challenges. Because the house where we held the sale did not belong to us, we had to work around the schedules of others, and we also had to be sure we brought with us EVERYTHING we would need for the day of the sale. {Food, water, change of clothes in case the weather changed, change of shoes if our feet started to hurt, phone chargers, sunscreen, sunglasses...all that stuff.} I also spent the entire night between the two sale days worrying that the house would get robbed and all our stuff would get stolen. We also had to show up at the house an hour and a half before the sale each day to drag everything out and set it up, since we weren't holding the sale from inside a building that could be set up ahead of time. These weren't bad things, necessarily. Just things that have to be considered ahead of time.

21. Seed Money. Ryan went to the bank before the sale to get seed money for change. Even though he told them it was for a sale, they sent him away with mostly 20's, 10's and 1 dollar bills...and not one lick of change. NO quarters No dimes. No nickles. Fortunately, one of our first customers was a professional sale-goer and had a purse load of change and she kindly sold us some quarters. It was actually enough to get us through, but next time I would make sure we are better set with the money.

22. Social Media and other ads. We paid $10 to be included in a town map, and the town dropped off a handful of maps to our sale, which we handed out to others. But as far as we know, the town never advertised it in the local newspaper or the nearby city's paper. So to improve our advertising, I used part of my day-before-the-sale prep taking pictures of some of our bigger ticket items and I made a Facebook album to explain where we would be, our hours, and what we had for sale. And the night after the first day, I updated it with what items remained. We had several people come because they'd seen things on Facebook. So I think using whatever social media you have is a great advertising option.

23. Spring for some bling. I made signs on lime green poster board to put at the end of the road, and I bought some balloons as well - to draw attention. People seemed to respond well to it. I think it shows the sale organizers put time, effort and their own resources into it, so it's likely to be a fun sale.

24. Interact with your people. We had fun at our sale, because it was in our old hometown, and we got to see people we hadn't seen in a long time. We really enjoyed that! But even with the people we didn't know - we tried to strike up conversation, and several said it was the most fun and most friendly sale they'd been to. If people like you, they'll want to buy from you. It can't hurt!

25. Cleanup is as hard as setup. There's a lot of cleanup work to a sale. Our moms stayed and helped us pack up boxes of leftovers, tear down tables, etc. Ryan returned the borrowed tables and clothing racks, we threw away all our signs {go get the ones you put up around town!!!}, pulled flyaway stickers out of the yard, and prepared our leftovers to be donated. We counted and distributed the money, and tried to make sure all our helpers knew how much we appreciated the gift of their time.

So that's what I learned from our first run! For me, this was not just some random thing I did. As a stay-at-home wife, this was my WORK. This was my employment for the weekend. I put the same time and effort into it that I would into a job, and I was proud of the outcome. While my poor feet are enjoying the post-sale break, I'm glad we did it, and I'm glad it was successful! 

I Promised You Stories...

So...we've officially survived our first ever garage sale as a married couple, and really, for me, my first EVER garage sale on my own. I've been part of others, but this was my first time to spearhead the thing, and I'm excited about all the things I learned:  what to do and what not to do next time. It was great to have an extra day with Ryan last week, and we really appreciated our moms, who took time from their own busy schedules to help us out.

I promised you stories...and I'm here to deliver.

I read up on Pinterest before I did this thing. I read allllllll these blog posts of advice and what to expect and they were really helpful. And ALL of them warned about the grumpy customers. The ones who want to haggle over pennies. The ones who try to get you so frazzled you end up cutting them more of a deal than you intended. The ones who show up early and get mad if they can't shop. So I was as prepared as I possibly could be.

And as you might imagine, that was a big fat fail.

Interestingly enough, on day one, there were no earlybird customers, and we were grateful because we were still scrambling to set up. A little after 8, Ryan and his mom took the truck to run just down the road for more tables, and I was left alone in a PANIC, because the one job I said I did not want was running the cash box. And of course, as soon as they left, four people showed up and one had a question about Ryan's shop vac and I called and called and called...only to find out both their phones were AT the sale with me. Sigh.

So when they came back and I got them ushered off to take care of things, two women came up to me wanting to purchase one item each, and both items belonged to Nita. I was in the first hour of my first sale and wasn't ready to make deals for other people yet, so I asked them to wait while I found her. The first lady said to the second, "Well I don't know about you but I think if someone offered me something, I would just take it."

Ruffled.

I stammered, "It's not mine. I need to find the person who put it in the sale."

So lady number one said to me, "Listen. If you're up here, you're in charge. You make the decision." The two of them closed in...like physically closed in...and I was so mad, I said, "Fine." Looks of actual glee came over their faces when they knew they'd won...they got their price and I was ruffled. I would have cried if I'd had the time, but I didn't. But can I just say? There's no reason to be nasty over a shirt. There's just not.

So we rushed around after that, helping people and sorting prices and this and that, and between it all, I was attempting to eat a peanut butter and honey sammich for my breakfast. It took me over an hour. FINALLY, I grabbed about the next to the last bite, and when I bit down, it tasted funny.

I said to Ryan, "This tastes weird."

He told me it may have gone bad sitting out in the sun {can peanut butter and honey even go bad?} - so I popped the rest back in the baggie and put it aside. And then a sensation settled over me in such a way that I cannot even explain, except I knew the crunch in my mouth wasn't the peanut butter. I reached in - and pulled out... the remains of a bee.

An actual, honest to goodness bee was on my sandwich and I didn't see it and I bit right into him. And he stung the side of my tongue.

I told Ryan later, I stood there, holding my face, thinking I am in a driveway with my mother, my mother-in-law {who is a nurse}, my PTA husband, and I'm holding a phone with Google capabilities, and I have a feeling NONE of those can help me right now.What do you do when parents, spouses and Google come up short???

Actually, kudos to Ryan, who managed to extract the stinger from my tongue. With his bare hands. No tweezers, I was really impressed.

It felt like I'd had a shot of Novocaine, but I'm not allergic, so I was completely fine. Grossed out and mad, but fine. Nothing a cookie couldn't fix.

The second day of the sale, a nice gentleman stopped by on his bike to look around for a bit. He was there for quite a while, and when he came up to make his purchase, Ryan breezed by and said brightly, "Did you find something halfway interesting?"

I looked down at the table to see what the man found.

A Bible.

I said, "Well, I hope so! It's the Word of God!!" Then I hurried to explain that I have many more Bibles at home and I'm not a heathen selling my Bible...always awkward. But we got a good laugh out of that little story.

What we didn't really laugh about was the rain we had for a bit on Saturday. But we soldiered on, covering up the books and pulling out the umbrella til it passed.

And it was a fun weekend! A successful sale. Oh. And yes. That is a burn on me. Whoopsie. We both got burned to a crisp on Friday.

 Linking up

The Shafferland Shuffle

I fear the Shaffers have been shuffled! What a week! Thankfully much less happened in the world of things breaking down, but much more happened in the land of busyness!

* Last Sunday  morning, our church handed out little study books to go along with the sermon series, and I was excited because I got to help write them! I was grateful to be included and it was exciting to see the finished product in print! That afternoon I had a massive cookie baking party: dozens of chocolate chip cookies to keep us fueled throughout the week. And that night? We took a walk through campus and got to see from a distance the candlelight service all 16 athletic teams had together to dedicate their seasons to the Lord.

* Monday, since our office was still all torn up, I worked from the floor of the living room: an unusual, but kind of fun vantage point! That night I spiced up our lives by dropping my keys down our garbage disposal, and then after Ryan saved the day by fishing them out, he continued his work on our ceiling - and I think he looks pretty handsome here. Don't you??

* Tuesday morning, I met my friend Kathy for coffee, and we caught up from many months of not being able to talk more than a "hey!" at church. Loved that! Ryan sent me this picture from work. He and his co-worker, Chanteal, won the work cornhole tournament last spring and now there's an official board for the tournament progression! Pretty cool! That night, as some of you may already know, our beautiful new coffee pot just up and died. It was fine on Monday...dead on Tuesday. So...Starbucks to the rescue!!

* Wednesday morning I found this one sitting on my purchases. I guess she likes to shop too! I took a field trip to Fort Wayne that day...stopped by the station to see all my friends {took me an hour and a half to get through to see everyone} and then I had a dentist appointment. Good and bad news there, but we can talk about that another time. Ryan painted our ceiling that night...so close to being done with that project!!

* Thursday, I left home when Ryan did so I could spend the day in Greentown prepping for our sale. I actually had to wait on his step-dad to arrive with a key, so I hung out in my car reading a novel and trying not to creep out the neighbors. :) All day long I sorted and stacked and organized and took pictures and made signs - WHEW! {It was actually almost 10 pm by the time we got home from getting everything ready!!} I also stopped by a friend's house to pick up a catalog...doesn't she have a gorgeous porch view?

* Friday was the first day of our sale, and it was crazy busy. The town sale was technically just Saturday, but we did a Friday and a Saturday, and I'm so glad we did. I have so many tales for you - just wait! Our moms came to help, and they were life-savers. We appreciated them! We had a GREAT first day - sold a BUNCH of stuff and got to see old friends we'd not seen in years. {Benefits of returning to your hometown.} But were we ever pooped and burned to a crisp by the end of the day!

 * We wrapped up our sale on Saturday, and though it was a LONG two days of very hard work, it was also a great result, and we were thankful. Our moms were back for more fun, and we had a few down times when we were able to laugh and tell stories and just enjoy the day. Though the entire weekend had been forecast as great weather, we did have a few sprinkles on Saturday - but nothing a little time under an umbrella couldn't fix!! When the day was done, we cleaned up the leftovers and came home to collapse from our very tired, angry feet!

A Rummaging We Will Go

My sister is the queen of yard sales. She is so good at them. So good, in fact, that shortly after I got my job at the station, she came all the way from Kansas to host a yard sale for me. I was cleaning out the house in preparation for the move that STILL has not happened, four years down the road, and she told me to just put everything in the garage and she would take care of it. No worries. She sorted it. She priced it. She negotiated and haggled and did math and sold stuff.

It's inspiring to watch people like her host sales and do them well. But it's also intimidating, because it makes you wonder...what if you put forth all that effort and no one shows up? No one buys anything?

So I've never had a rummage of my own. Too chicken to try.

Until now.

Earlier this summer, I decided I'd had it up to here with the clutter in our house. We had merged these two households and ended up with duplicates and extras and all kinds of great stuff that we just knew we would use - and then we did not. So right after I stopped working, I ruthlessly went through our house. I weeded out every single closet, drawer, and cabinet. Nothing was safe. I weeded out piles and stacks and priced, priced, priced. I went through HUNDREDS of little stickers, scribbling my initials and prices on all of them, boxing up our extra goods, and making them ready to rummage.

And so it is that this weekend, Ryan and I are joining up with some of his work friends and his mom, and we're having the great rummage of 2015. It has blown out-of-control huge. There's so much stuff!!

And you guys? We are so OCD about this rummage. We made signs and created categories and bagged like-items together. I was working my way through a garage at 8:30 yesterday morning, Clorox wipe in hand, attacking spider webs that had dared to attach themselves to our carefully priced items. Actually, I don't even want to talk about how many spiders I saw yesterday. No.

Wanna see what I mean? {About the signs, not the spiders.}

{That's just a sampling. There are more.}

We hauled tables and mowed grass, took pictures of the funnest stuff, posed with our sale sign, and had a grand time getting ready.

So here goes, y'all. Our first Shafferland yard sale. I can only imagine the adventures that await for me to tell you about next week.

Because you know...you know...there will be stories.

A Year's Worth of Thanks

This week I've been doing a mental review of my year, and I have to say...God has been so good. He was good last year when my life was falling apart and I thought there was absolutely no hope for a future for me. And He has been good this year when He began to restore and redeem what Satan meant to destroy.

On this day of thanks...I'd like to show you some of the blessings of my year.

...Starting the new year with friends who have long loved and accepted me for who I am...
...My buddies the Crandalls, who have walked the darkest roads with me and now celebrate the good roads with me too. (There's a Mr. Crandall for this picture but he wasn't there that night. I'm thankful for him too, though.)...

...Beyond thankful for the opportunity to spend an entire week in Florida for the first time in my life. Loved my beach!!...

...Thankful for and dearly missing my little guy. Ten years of life with Mr. Kaegan...

...The chance to once again see and hear the Marion Easter Pageant...though I still miss getting to be part of it!...

...The chance to spend my birthday with my good friend Cara...touring downtown Indianapolis on a GORGEOUS day...and eating cupcakes!!...

...Road tripping to Jenna's house for her golden birthday...and spending time with her husband and cutie pie daughter, Miss Adelaide...

...a GLORIOUS week of a writing retreat at the cabin in Brown County with Rachel...and while I'm at it...thankful for Rachel and her friendship...

...Eleven years of work in Financial aid...and co-workers who love me enough to give me a wonderful send-off when God opened a new door for me. Miss these people!...

...The chance to be baptized on a GORGEOUS night surrounded by so many of my friends and family...and Brian Holland's heart for my vision for the night and for doing such a great job with it...

...A true dream job as the Mid-Morning producer at WBCL and the treasure of EIGHTEEN DAYS to be trained by Jamie, who made this entire journey wonderful for me...

...The opportunity to stand up with Tom and Olivia at their wedding...a true gift to me...

...my sister Lori making a trip to my house all the way from Kansas...to organize and run a yard sale for me because I had no time to do it myself...

...God's protection over my house when a storm took down the neighbor's tree into my yard. Could have been MUCH worse...

...The LAKE! Even though I didn't get there more than once this year...loved the chance to be on the water again... ...A day at the Cherished Moments Craft Hideaway. Always a treat...

...The chance to work with the lovely Lynne Ford EVERY DAY. She is a rare treasure of a friend and I love her...

Like I said...MUCH to be thankful for. Praise the Lord!!

It's the Weekly Recap!

* Sunday afternoon, I was exhausted - after all the wedding hoopla. I fell asleep and had a dream in which I first drove off the end of a pier and drowned...and then accidentally (?!?) disconnected my toilet and couldn't get it reconnected. Note to self. Don't eat so much garlic bread for lunch before napping! Sunday evening I went to Mr. James' birthday party. It's been two years since I watched him take his very first breaths! Love this guy!
* You would THINK that when my Sunday recap started out "I was exhausted," Monday's recap would include rest. Let me think. No. I pulled an all nighter Sunday night, finally calling it a night TWENTY EIGHT MINUTES before my alarm went off. That was one thing when I worked a block from home. Doing that before an hour commute is NOT SMART. I intended to rest when I came home, but I'd just gotten home when the realtor who listed my house called and said someone wanted to see it Tuesday morning. So I spent all of Monday evening madly rushing about the house, cleaning it up. And because I know you've missed him...it was a new month:
* Tuesday was so much fun at work! It's still very odd to me to be able to do fun, creative stuff...and have that same stuff count as work! Poor Lynne has her work cut out for her, getting that point across to me. I actually had to be retrieved at the end of the work day. I was completely caught up in a brainstorming fest and forgot it was quitting time.

* Wednesday my sister, Lori, arrived!! She came all the way out here from Kansas just to do my moving sale. Can you believe that? Anyway, she arrived right before the end of my work day, so I showed her around the station, and then we went house hunting with my Ft. Wane realtor. We saw four houses (one of which I had seen before, but she wanted to see it in person), and y'all, I found a house I absolutely adore with all my being. I've been very calm about this whole selling/buying thing, but Jesus and I had a discussion about that house. There aren't words to describe that house's precious-ness. After we hunted, I took her out to dinner at Cheddars. I so very VERY rarely get a sister date with either of my sisters, so that was just such a fun night for me. Loved it.

* Thursday, while I was at work all day, Lori transformed my garage into sale-central. What would have taken me weeks to do...took her a day. In a single day, she sorted through all the stuff, organized it, and priced it. She should work for a TV show. She had a plan for everything. And before the sale even started, I'd made over sixty bucks! Here was the "before" (sorted, but cramped up into the garage so the door would close). * Friday was garage sale, day one. So weird to be at work while a party went on at my house! That evening, we all went out to eat at Culvers. The lady who waited on me called me "Sir." Must have been a worse hair day than I thought. Seriously...SIR????? THIS is a sir!!! * Saturday was day two of my yard sale:
Exhausting work, I tell you. Exhausting. I had to get up at 6 in the morning to get ready to help Lori get it all set up. Wore me out. The rest of the day was fun...lunch at Penguin Point...shopping at Cato...dinner at the parentals'...

Books I'm Reading: I read Jesus Calling and Sparkling Gems from the Greek and finished the next to the last chapter in Entrusting Your Dreams to God.

Favorite God Moment of the Whole Week: I think my favorite moment was actually the hardest. Friday afternoon, as I drove home from work, I was in some intense heart-battle. Satan was after me, and I knew it. Scary thing to be flying down the interstate at 70 miles an hour while doing some warfare. But what a great thing to know God was right there with me...and to sense Him saying it would be okay...to fight through it.

Update on Last Week's Goals: I did begin to establish some new routines this week - with exercise, sleep, and journaling. And I have COMPLETELY enjoyed having Lori and Jeff here this weekend.

Goals for the Coming Week: After several weeks of running, running, running, my goals this week are to read...scrapbook...and spend some good time in prayer. I need all those things.