New Year's Resolutions Again

It is ridiculous that it is New Year's Eve again. Even more ridiculous, I feel the need to review last year's resolutions to see if I accomplished any. I made a giant and ridiculous list. Are you seeing a theme here? Ridiculous.

Here is the recap:

A: Art book for Christian Women...query to Christian publisher Nope.
B: Bead Soup make it/take it table at craft shows....might be good additional income I did think about it and even applied to a craft show, but apparently craft shows are already really jewelry saturated. I did use this as a way to raise money for a mission trip and that was successful.
C: Choreograph a musical...this has been on my mind a lot lately No, but if the opportunity presented, I would do it!

D: Dance more I danced with my dance team more, not sure that really counts
E: Enlarge Girl World by cleaning up the other side of the basement….hahahahaha, just typing it made me laugh, but it will help with some resolutions farther down the list hahahahahahahaha

F: Fondant cake making...this intrigues me rats, no, I still would like to learn this
G: Glucosamine and Chondroitin every day thanks for reminding me, be right back

H: Hair on Broadway, it opens in March Oh, I so wish
I: Increase my Facebook friends to 200, I am pitiful and don't have many friends Yeah baby, I have 264
J: Junk food reduction hahahahaha
K: Kim’s private spiritual retreat...someplace out of the way, just God and me yes I did this twice and both were amazing weeks....Santa Fe in the spring, and New Smyrna Beach in the fall. I highly recommend this and am praying for that again in 2010.
L: Lumberjack book….I have a good idea, who doesn't want to write a book? still in my head
M: Move it...I seriously need a bit of exercise Minus some of the coldest days in December, I have walked at least 2 miles every day since August

N: Normalgirl.etsy.com….to sell some of the beads and jewelry I make hmmm, yes, I did that but now know that an Etsy shop takes ALOT of marketing, so nothing is happening

O: Office redo….this is desperate not so desperate, I guess, since this is still desperate
P: Pray with more focus I use my morning walks for prayer time and for some reason it helps me to focus when I am walking, so I did make some progress
Q: Quality time listening to God, not just talking hard!
R: Roof leak fixed Oh yeah. After that nasty raccoon fell through the ceiling I realized why I had a roof leak, and since there were giant holes both in the roof and the ceiling, I had them fixed
S: Saturday Crafternoons...income or a ministry, or both?? Nope

T: Teach classes in Girl World... will you come? Nope
U: Use some stuff in my stash before collecting more I did use some of my bead stash this year
V: Very interesting semesters in school… all three of them, not sure if I have control of this, but I am saying it anyway Oh my goodness! Two of the three were the worst semesters of the program. WHY?
W: Widen the focus of Divine Design Yes, we went to Atlanta instead of the usual Grace Centers of Hope project

X: Xtreme torch time Nope
Y: Yahoo! Celebrate the list hahahahaha
Z: Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz Learn to sleep less, hahaha! How else will I accomplish all this? Well, I definitely slept less this year, but note, it did not help me to accomplish much on the list.

OK, I am not doing that again this year. This year, I really think that following God's direction will really take care of all of it.

Pray for me?

Normal Girl

Elmer Fudd

Maybe my favorite Christmas present......the Elmer Fudd hat, complete with ear flaps. Warmest hat on earth!

No excuses not to walk in the mornings now,

Normal Girl

The Six Purses Continues

Here she is with her six purses. It continues to crack me up.

"Oh, I wish I had known she was going to be in Oscoda."

"Why? You would have asked her to get you a black purse while there?"

"I am not sure what we are doing for New Year's Eve."

" Choosing a black purse?"

Easily entertained,

Normal Girl

This Year's Christmas Joke

Merry Christmas! Most years, we play a little joke on Mom for Christmas. The stupid thing is that she does not usually get it, but we laugh our heads off over it for days. We have always been able to entertain ourselves.

She is the gestapo of Christmas lists. We are each required to send her a long list. She, however, does not reciprocate, and on top of that, she is very difficult to buy for. This year, she gave us one item when asked. A black purse. A black purse that has compartments, a front pocket, shoulder strap, should zip closed, and not have any large compartments where things get buried down in the bottom. I will tell you now, that is not possible to find. So, all three of us were searching for the elusive black purse....but not knowing that the others were shopping for the same thing.

Two days before Christmas, I discovered that two of us had bought a black purse. So, of course, we got to work and managed to wrap six black purses. As Mom opened them, she did not even grow suspicious, she just said thank you for each one. Some of them were hideous, as we bought them for $1 at the thrift store. She offered a nice thank you for the black glitter purse with the big peace sign on the front. We were laughing like crazy people.

She did loosen up a little when we explained it to her, but in the end, the joke was for our entertainment and we enjoyed it very much. Now we have a few black purses to return.

Worth it!

Normal Girl

We Have Been Doing This a Long Time

I have many pictures of us in front of the tree at different ages. This one is circa 1968 or 1969, I think. We have been doing this a long time together. Wish you were all here this year!

I never got the go-go boots I desperately wanted, but we always had many gifts, Christmas cookies, Jesus, and matching jammies,

Normal Girl

A Windfall of Glitter

I have a job for the next couple months making a pile of glitter projects. The glitter arrived yesterday afternoon. Wahoo, can you just imagine what is in the boxes??

Thats some glitter baby!

Normal Girl

Beware of the Bizarre

We have a fairly new JCPenney in the area. I have been in it twice. Both times, I thought I had stepped into bizarro land, or, I was being punked.

The first time I visited the store, I was walking in the front door and a woman coming in behind me asked if she could ask me a question. Sure, no problem.

"Do you think I should get new glasses?"

"What??? How would I know that?"

The conversation covered the difference between seeing a real eye Doctor vs. seeing a doc in the box, and the reason she did not want new glasses, which was because she loved her old glasses (14 years old) and if she gave them to the doctor, he would yell at her. I eventually learned about her social life (no friends she can trust with such an important question), to the medications she was on (I cannot begin to explain that), to some vitamin that she usually takes that has made her vision better, even though she was having a hard time seeing things, even though she could read that sign over there ( she couldn't). I kept looking for a camera crew. She was whispering so no Penney's employees could hear her. After twenty minutes, yes twenty minutes, I finally apologized and said I had to go or I would be late. Late for retrieving my sanity. She left the store. Apparently, she did not come to shop, just to find a vision consultant.

Today, I went to the store again. Walking down a main aisle, a woman jumped out at me and asked if she could ask me a question. HAHAHAHA Deja Vu! She was holding the world's ugliest dress on a hanger. She wanted to know if I thought the dress was pretty. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Seriously, where is the camera crew? Is there a TV show called Stalking Normal Girl in Penneys? I told her that a dress has to be judged according to who you are buying it for, and I could not judge whether it was right or not.

She said, "So, you don't like it."

I am never going back in that store without my own camera crew,

Normal Girl

One More Class

I had to ask my teacher to re-add my assignment scores yesterday, but I ended up with an A. I got through the 2345879878 hours of homework, my own and Mr. Brady's, and not getting any comments on all the papers I wrote until today. Whew, I have had two really bad semesters in a row.

But! I have only one class left before thesis writing. I am registered, have paid, and am REALLY enjoying the semester break before I start again. And am praying for a good class with a good teacher for my last class.

Onward,

Normal Girl

An offering of Love and Encouragement

Our Worship Arts Pastor has had a rough year. There is a division in the congregation regarding music styles and he has taken the brunt of some anger. Wonder Woman and I thought it might be encouraging for him if we redid his office. You can see the need.

He has a lot of stuff! He works way too many hours, and dealing with the stuff takes a back seat.

These are the before shots. Hope you could tell that......

The wallpaper was falling off the walls in places. It took us about half an hour to remove all the wallpaper. It peeled right off.

And, after a day with the amazing Wonder Woman and her organizational skills, and a handful of other worship arts team members, you see the after shots. The wall color turned out more yellow than I wanted. But, with the lights on in the dark, the color is warm and good. We did kind of a stucco effect on one wall that had a lot of imperfections. If you are ever thinking of doing that on a wall, ask me about it first.

Now there is room for practicing and giving lessons.

The room now feels huge! He is probably going to have to ask us where we put things for awhile.....but he is happy! We have offered him the choice of an additional table for a work station, or, a big wicker chair with a cushion, to go on the window wall. He is thinking about it.

And I only fell off the ladder once,

Normal Girl

That's Crazy

Praise in Motion is dancing Sunday morning. I started rounding up costumes this week to find that I have enough to costume exactly two dancers. I used to have enough for seven dancers. Where everything is, I have no idea. All dancers swear they turned everything in to me at the end of last year. They could have.

I wanted to make some new tunics, so I bought some fabric today. Not bad. Then, I needed ribbon for sashes. Good grief, the ribbon costs more than eight yards of fabric! Does that seem wrong?

Does the wash and wax cost more than the car?

Do the flowers cost more than the house and yard?

Does the brooch cost more than the jacket?

Invest in a ribbon company,

Normal Girl

A Miracle for Normal Girl

The furnace stopped working this afternoon. Of course, because winter arrived today. I figured that a big gust of wind blew out the pilot light. It was ridiculously windy today. I can hear things blowing around and bumping into the house.

So, I put the space heater under the table and kept working, hoping it would stay warm enough in the house for the pipes to make it overnight...until I could get the furnace guy over here tomorrow.

Then I came home from choir practice and the furnace came on!! Don't know why or how, but how great is that? God is good and lets me have heat!!

Thinking about people who have no place to sleep tonight,

Normal Girl

Forestation

I spent the whole day building a forest on the stage. Thank goodness I had help, or I would be there till next Tuesday. Thanks Wonder Woman! The original plan was to have a forest of trees and a snow machine that gently sifted snow on them. Hmmmm, the snow machine did not materialize. We lit the trees from the front and the back, but I could not stand the boredom and added the twinkle light stars. I call it Mother Nature Goes Hollywood. Nobody will be shooting Bambi in that forest.

Putting up one Christmas tree is a pain, we put up 8 or 9 today,

Normal (glad I am not on the take-down crew) Girl

Go Mary!

I have been working on some set decorating stuff. We asked people to send us photos that could visually represent the wonder of Christmas. We got beautiful pictures of children on Christmas morning, snowy cottages, glowing candles....exactly what we need. But, this is my favorite photo. Mary is driving a tractor. Forget the donkey. Mary is motoring to Bethlehem!

Normal Girl

Finals Week

The good news is: it's the final week of class.

The bad news is: it's the final week of class.

Feeling a bit over-scheduled this week. Do you think it is taking multi tasking too far to send emails from my phone while on my morning walk?

It's only a week,

Normal Girl