The Good and the Bad

Today brought with it some surprises. One good and one bad. I'll start with the bad one. My grandpa has been in the hospital for a few days. Grandpa was scheduled to have gallbladder surgery on Tuesday. Well, on Sunday afternoon, he was looking very yellow (jaundiced) which is obviously not a good sign! I had mono a few years ago, and when I started getting jaundiced, that was the red flag to rush into the dr.'s office and make sure I didn't need to make a trip to the hospital. Luckily after lots of rest I got better with no hospital trip. But it was crazy...my skin and especially the whites of my eyes turned YELLOW. Gross, but a little bit fascinating at the same time.

ANYWAY, I'm off on a tangent. Since he was jaundiced, they took him to the ER on Sunday night. They promised him that they would move his surgery to Monday morning. Fast forward to Monday morning, and they decided that it was okay to push his surgery back to Tuesday. Bummer #1.

Tuesday his surgery went very well. He was feeling great afterward, and all ready to go home. Unfortunately, they still had a procedure to preform to remove a gallstone. They scheduled it for Wednesday morning. Bummer #2. And he's only been able to live on a liquid diet since Sunday...Bummer #3. He is just dying to have a cheeseburger, and I think I would be too in his position!!

Well today they TRIED to remove the gallstone. I say tried because it was lodged in too well for them to remove it with the procedure. They tried for two hours, and failed. Alas, they will have to schedule another surgery for tomorrow morning to remove the stone. Bummer #4.

I went to visit Grandpa as soon as I heard about what happened today. My sister, who is on spring break this week, went with me. My mom, aunt, and grandma were already at the hospital. We got there about 10 minutes after grandpa heard the bad news that he would have to have another surgery, and at the exact moment that he was being brought back to his room. When we walked in, my grandma was holding his hand, and he was crying. My heart broke for him. He just wants to go home! It would be a bummer to go through all that and then find out you have to have surgery again. Please keep him in your prayers if you think of it!

Well the good news happened while I was at the hospital. I was talking with my mom and Aunt Beth while we were there, and the subject somehow turned to the church library. I started spilling out all of these ideas that I had for it. We are adding on to our church in the next few years, and we are excited about having a new church library. Well, I told my aunt (who is in charge of Christian Ed. at our church - which includes the library) that I would be willing to help with anything. I'm very passionate about it for some reason. And she said "Well Carol [our current church librarian] is getting older, and spending more time taking care of her parents. I think she's going to be interested in stepping down from her position in a year or two, and maybe you could take over!" It's no secret that I love to read, and there is nothing I would love more than to be the church librarian! I'm always looking for a place to serve at church. It sounds horrible, but sometimes it's hard to help with the kids since I spend 36 hours a week with k-6 graders. And I think the library would be the perfect place to help! I'm so excited, and have so many ideas running through my head. I can't wait to get started! I guess I may be helping the new librarian for now until she is ready to quit.

Well I have to go! Luke and I have to teach our preschool class at KBC tonight. I was going to make a springy picnic dinner, but I don't have time since I made my trip to the hospital. This post is being composed for the sole purpose of killing time while I wait for our frozen pizza to bake :-P

Have a great night, and say a little prayer for Grandpa if you remember, please. He's just really bummed out, and wants to be out of the hospital already!

Shades of Green

I saw many shades of green today...there were only a few unfortunate students who forgot to wear green. I made sure I wore green - I'm Irish, I can't not wear green today!

Today made me remember what beautiful sunshine can look like. It was absolutely perfect today. I finally opened the blinds beside my desk at work. I kept them closed for most of the winter because I couldn't bear to look at the schools courtyard covered in snowy grayness. Today it looked beautiful, and I was basking in the sunlight at my desk all day. It was even warm enough for a fire drill...it was great to be released from my classroom for 10 minutes to stand in the sun. Praise God for all His little everyday blessings!

When I got home at 3, of course I spent some time outside! I layed out a blanket, and kept myself busy with this for 2 hours:
I plan on doing this a lot in the next few months! There's nothing like soaking up the sun while listening to music or reading a good book!

Luke's so excited about his little fire pit. He is chomping at the bit to use it. He came across some free wood at work yesterday (he works for the parks department at a nearby city. He gets lots of random free stuff). Do you think we'll have enough?

Yeah, me too. But just in case, he brought home another load in his truck today!
He can't pass up anything if it's free. The other day he brought home 2 fire hoses that he found in a dumpster at work. Why, you ask? Because they looked perfectly new and he thought he could sell them on ebay or craigslist! At least he's not wasteful, I guess.

Later, Luke and I are planning on making homemade shamrock shakes, because we're festive like that. I bought some Oreos to go along with them, because that just sounded good to me. Oreos and mint...mmmm, just sounds delicious!

Today has been great so far, and filled with so many blessings. The best part? It's supposed to be even warmer tomorrow! I decided to make cheeseburgers, fries, and pasta salad for dinner tomorrow to celebrate the warm weather :-)

Yay for more good news! Luke just now surprised me by buying tickets to an Indians game! It's on the Friday of Memorial Day weekend, and they play the Yankees (yuck! :-P) We're going with our friend JC and whoever he decides to bring with him. And it's fireworks night!! After the game, there's a fireworks show with the city of Cleveland in the background. I hate watching football, and basketball - I could take it or leave it. But I would never pass up a chance to go to Jacob's Field! (oops...I mean Progressive Field. it's still Jacob's Field to me!) I love watching the Indians play on a warm summer night. I love paying a fortune for a jumbo, all beef hot dog with ketchup and stadium mustard. I love being entertained by drunk people at the game. I love the jumbotron, and Slider. I love it when someone proposes and it's shown on the jumbotron, and Slider comes out and brings them flowers. I love drooling over the center-fielder (Grady Sizemore ;-)) I love cheering during the ups and downs of the game. Mostly, I think I love baseball because I associate it with summer. For our second date, Luke and I went to an Indians game. That might also have something to do with the reason I like it so much. Anyway, can you tell I'm excited about the first trip to Jacob's Field of the year? Because I am. I will leave you with a few pictures from 2 years ago when Luke and I went to the season home opener. They
called it "Snow-pening Day." Yeah, the game was snowed out. On April 5. This is the coldest I've ever been in my life, but it was fun!

Can you see the field? The funny thing was, if I recall correctly, this was during my spring break. The beginning of the week, we had temperatures nearing 75 degrees. At the end of the week we had this...welcome to Ohio weather.

Here is our frozen group...I'm the short one and Luke's the tall one :-P
And just in case you didn't know who Slider was...:

Fun Finds and a Weekly Splurge

Tomorrow it is supposed to be 62 degrees without a cloud in the sky. I decided I better run all my errands today! I want to spend the afternoon tomorrow lying out on a blanket in the sun, getting lost in the pages of "The Other Boleyn Girl." That's what I did all afternoon yesterday too. I've been stuck inside for way too long, and I'm going to go outside every chance I can get!

Anyway, I went grocery shopping after work today. I have found that grocery shopping is one of these areas where it's very hard to serve! Ha! I used to hate it so much. But a few months ago, I decided I need to make it more fun. First of all, I switched grocery stores. I had been going to Wal Mart. It was always so crowded I'd just try to get in and out as fast as I could. But then I started going to Giant Eagle. Now we use their fuel perks, and Luke almost never has to pay full price for gas. And their meat and produce sections are much better quality than Wal Mart. A little more expensive, but we figure with the money we save on gas, it probably evens out. Plus I have an advantage card. Today alone I saved $11 just for having one!

Okay, I'm done with my commercial for Giant Eagle. Another way to make grocery shopping more fun is to look for fun things on sale. Here are some fun finds from my trip today:
The butter sesame and pumpernickel & onion pretzels were on sale. They are delicious! You can kind of tell the Pumpernickel & Onion bag is opened...I needed something to much on on the way home:-) And if you ever need something quick and easy to make, pick up one of these Macaroni Grill dinners. It is basically like Hamburger Helper, but a little classier. lol...they are very delicious, and very easy to make. My favorite part? It's almost impossible to mess it up :-) And finally, I bought the yellow squash. It wasn't on sale, but I had about $30 extra that we had budgeted for groceries this week, so I decided to splurge and buy them. One of my favorite comfort foods is slices of yellow squash and onions fried in butter. Not the most nutritional snack, but oh, so delicious!! Luke thinks I'm disgusting, but I promise it tastes amazing. I'm kind of strange though, because I love vegetables. I would pick squash or asparagus over oranges or a banana any day.

I also found my weekly splurge pick for this week at Giant Eagle. They have a small seasonal section that I like to look at. They had lots of spring and Easter things there today, and I bought this:

I thought it was very cute, and brought a little touch of spring into our hallway/dining room :-P This reminds me that I still have a few winter decorations that need boxed up. I don't want to see them again until next Christmas!

We are officially only 5 days away from the first official day of spring. Usually we still have some snow and cold temperatures through the middle of April, but I think this year might be different. The 10-day forecast looks pretty good! I'm going to go as far as to say that I think we're done with snow for this year...KNOCK ON WOOD! We had a much colder and more bitter and snowy winter than we usually do here, and I think God may be blessing us with an early spring! And even if it does snow some more, I'll know it's almost done. Things are looking up!

Happy St. Patrick's Day tomorrow!

Sunday

Raymond's in his Sunday best,
He's usually up to his chest in oil and grease.
There's the Martin's walkin in,
With that mean little freckle-faced kid,
Who broke a window last week.
Sweet Miss Betty likes to sing off key in the pew behind me.

That's what I love about Sunday:
Sing along as the choir sways;
Every verse of Amazin' Grace,
And then we shake the Preacher's hand.
Go home, into your blue jeans;
Have some chicken and some baked beans.
Pick a back yard football team,
Not do much of anything:
That's what I love about Sunday.

I stroll to the end of the drive,
Pick up the Sunday Times, grab my coffee cup.
It looks like Sally an' Ron, finally tied the knot,
Well, it's about time.
It's 35 cents off a ground round,
Baby, cut that coupon out!

That's what I love about Sunday:
Cat-napping on the porch swing;
You curled up next to me,
The smell of jasmine wakes us up.
Take a walk down a back road,
Tackle box and a cane pole;
Carve our names in that white oak,
An' steal a kiss as the sun fades,
That's what I love about Sunday,
Oh, yeah.

Ooh, new believers gettin' baptized,
Momma's hands raised up high,
Havin' a Hallelujah good time
A smile on everybody's face.
That's what I love about Sunday,
Oh, yeah.

That's what I love about Sunday

Projects Galore

Today was a busy day for us. As I've mentioned before, our house is a tri-plex. We live in one section and rent out the other two. Sometime this spring my grandma is moving in to one of our apartments! We've been busy renovating the apartment for her. Today she, my parents, and my aunts and uncles came to help. We got a lot done! We painted the bedroom and the bathroom, and the men hung cabinets. Tomorrow we're finishing up painting in the living room and kitchen.

The finished product...and one very tired dad of mine!
It was a little crowded inside, so Luke decided to work on the yard. He really got excited about it, and worked nonstop all day!

Goodbye, ugly cracked sidewalk!

Luke is using the cracked concrete to make a fire pit...The anticipation for our first spring bonfire is killing me!

This will be my grandma's porch, but we are putting a little platform right in front of it there for our grill. We promised her we'd bring her a piece of steak whenever we use it since she will be able to smell it in her apartment!

And he cleaned out this messy little flower bed so we can put a ramp in for Grandma. I hope we can find room somewhere to plant some beautiful flowers!

I did notice that we will have some daffodils. I can't wait until I see some buds and blooms on these! Then spring will have sprung for sure!

Speaking of daffodils, please check out the new element on my page: my "Spring Firsts" list. My aunt always had a poster in her house in early March titled "Spring Firsts." She wrote down spring things on the poster, and if you were the first to see one of these things first, you got to write down your name and the date that you saw it. I decided I'd play this little game by myself, and put it on my page! Be looking for dates on the list of when I see each of these things. I will post pictures too if I can get them! Can you tell I'm a little excited about spring?? :-)

Bookworm

I'm a bookworm. There is nothing I love more than to curl up with a good book after a long day. I made a big decision today and decided to switch libraries. This is a big deal for me, I've been going to the same library since I was barely tall enough to see over the sign-out counter. But there is a beautiful library closer to our house that I decided to try out. I got some good stuff!

I always seem to overdo it at the library. I see way too many books that look good, and end up bringing 8 books home. Obviously I can't read 8 books by their due date (2 weeks) so I MADE myself only check out 2:




















I started reading "The Other Boleyn Girl" as soon as I got home, and I'm hooked already! I have a long to-do list this weekend, and I hope I can pull myself away from the pages of this book for long enough to get it all done!

I decided to read "The Atonement Child" because I've heard so many good things about Francine Rivers, but I've never read any of her books. I'm excited to try her out!

In school I was always the one in my class who had her nose in a book all the time. In early elementary school, I would always have a "Sweet Valley Girls" book with me. I read just about all of them!

Also, who didn't read the "American Girl" books when they were in elementary school?! Samantha was my favorite. And yes, I had the doll. My sister had Molly, and the 4 of us enjoyed many tea parties together ;-)

I can't forget about "The Baby-sitters Club." Probably my favorite series of all. Every girl in my class seemed to love these books, and we would trade them with each other and pass them around until we had read most of them. This was about the time that I started reading the "Sweet Vally Twins" books instead of "Sweet Valley Kids." I was growing up!

In fifth and sixth grade I became obsessed with the "Little House" books. These books are a rite of passage, I think everyone should read them! Also, I read Harriet the Spy for a book project in sixth grade and fell in love with it. I probably read it 5 times that year.

In junior high, I always had my nose in a book by Janette Oke or Lori Wick. Yay for discovering Christian women's fiction! I'll also never forget the first time I read "The Giver" and "The Outsiders" those years, either.

In high school, I was the nerd in study hall who was always reading a Lori Wick book during study hall while everyone else was busy passing notes. I couldn't get enough of her books back then! Of course I was busy reading the classics for my English classes as well.

In college I never had time to read until my student teaching semester my senior year. This is the year my mom got me the book "Even Now" by Karen Kingsbury. I liked the book, and decided to read more by her. After I read "Redemption," there was no turning back. I was hooked! I read Karen Kingsbury books like it was my job for the next few months.

After college I discovered authors like Frank Peretti and Ted Dekker. So different from what I normally read, but I love them! I also admit that this past fall I became completely, undeniably obsessed with the Twilight series. I've currenly read the first 2 books, and am waiting to borrow the third one. Also, who can't resist a good romance story? I love Nicholas Sparks books because they don't get more romantic than that. If you haven't read "The Wedding" by him, you should drive to the nearest library RIGHT NOW and go check it out! It's that good!

Well I'm off to get lost in "The Other Boleyn Girl" some more. Have a great Friday night!

My Little Diva

Of course "My Little Diva" is my cat, Gabby. I thought she deserved her own post. She is the most rotten, fiesty, ornery, misheveous cat I've ever seen. Unfortunately, she is also one of the cutest creatures I've ever seen, so I can't help but to love her! I really am a dog person, but decided to try a cat out. It's going pretty well so far :-)

Please enjoy this picture post devoted my adorable little devil! Ha! Sorry for the insane amount of pictures, but I just couldn't resist :-)

Gabby lived with my sister, Julie and her roomate for a few weeks, because they got her for me, and we were living in our no-pets-allowed-apartment at the time. So here are some pictures of the first time I "met" her at Julie's apartment in Akron:

It was love at first sight!

Here are some with her brother, Gus. We want to reunite Gabby and Gus one of these days. I wonder if they remember each other.

Here they are with Julie's roomate, Anissa
With my lovely sister, Julie:
Have you ever seen 2 cuter kittens?!

And here are some of the little princess by herself, looking adorable!

Part of the reason we named her Gabby was because she never shut up when she was little. Here she is in Julie's bathtub (don't you love the ducks??) crying. This is my favorite picture of her. I really think she's the cutest kitten ever (I might be a little biased, though :-P)

Cutie-pa-tootie!

She had the biggest, bluest eyes when she was younger.
She also liked to hang out in weird places:

In tight, compact spaces:
On shoulders
On laps
And on bookcases

Gabby was born in August, so she's still pretty young. But she's gotten a lot bigger! I still think she's pretty cute, though!

Here she is today. Still cute!

Still likes to hang out in weird places!

Still ornery...Christmas decorations + Gabby = DISASTER. Not sure how many ornaments she broke this year, but it was a lot.

Not to mention, she is a pretty awesome basketball player. This picture is compliments of our friend, Michael:

Well, somehow gabby has wrapped me around her little finger, err, claw :-P My blog name is "Called to Serve" and sometimes I think Gabby thinks that I'm only hear to serve her. How do cats do that?! They make us treat them like royalty and like they deserve nothing less. That's why I personally like "man's best friend" better. But I have fallen in love with my little Gabs (one of her many nicknames. Some others are Gabbers, Gabster, and "You Little Butthead!!" She gets called the last one a lot :-P)

I really do think she needs a little puppy playmate though! I'm definitely leaning toward "yes" on the puppy issue. We may have a new, furry member of our family this June!!

Thank you for putting up with my many pictures of Gabby! I'm sure she loves the attention ;-)