Many folks who have "seen many birthdays" are known to flee to Florida or Arizona come colder weather. My parents flew off to Colorado for the first week of November, go figure. My parents went to join my Aunt and Uncle in their time share at Estes Park CO. In spite of my initial misgivings it seemed to be a great trip for the folks. The weather was better there than here, they were entertained by drives around the mountains looking for Elk and a sweatshirt for Peter and it appears a good time was had by all. They were in good spirits upon arrival yesterday and looking for another adventure. Know anyone with an extra room in Florida?
Tuesday night Restorative Yoga is great. After some coaching from my "therapist," I learned how to move my mind from spin class speed to yoga speed. Mentally I have started taking a VW bus on a trip to some peaceful place. I visualize all the aspects and hear the sounds while I follow the slow movements of our Yoga poses. Thus far I have taken a red VW bus to the SC beach and the NC mountains. And last week I took a pale yellow one to the beaches of Tanzania. It is amazing how this has helped me relax. As the class ends I am usually in the place of praying about a specific thing or making a plan for the evening. I am looking forward to seeing where the bus and I go this week!
Once again God intervened in the perils of my Friday Night with a teenager. The trend is Peter goes to the football game and tells me he is headed for a party afterwards. A couple of times his team has lost thus meaning no party and after going to Taco Bell with a friend, he comes home. This week his team made a triumphant win against a main rival. But in God's grace to me, he sent a down pour that kept Peter from attending the victory party and had him home well before curfew.
Peter needs a job. I tell him that regularly. Every time he ask for something I respond with "get a job." I know it is not an easy task to find a job, especially when you come home and sleep after school every day and spend the weekend at the grandparents watching football games. He has filled out a couple of on line applications but has not shown very much gumption in convincing someone to hire him.
I am a bit of a Netflix junkie. However so that I could get some sleep a couple of months ago I switched from Netflix streaming to Netflix disc. Thus I have a new movie or three or four TV episodes about every four to five days. (For further understanding we have no TV hook up of any kind at our house.) I have watched a variety of shows and movies via Netflix. I like to find a good series to follow. For awhile I was watching the new Hawaii Five 0 via streaming. When I was at an outdoor craft festival this fall and I kept wanting to duck every time I heard the helicopters overhead, I decided maybe I was watching just a little too much. That is about the time I switched from streaming to disk and decided to try a new show. I have become a fan of stuff produced by BBC and other foreign shores. Currently I am watching a series out of Australia called Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries. If you enjoy period pieces and mysteries, this one is fun. I watch three or four episodes at a time (usually over a couple of days) as they come on the disc. This is much better then three or four a night via streaming. If you like mystery series I also highly recommend BBC's Death in Paradise. That one was lots of fun. And if you want some great characters that make you laugh out loud and some crazy action adventure, I also highly recommend Chuck.
As for book reading I have really mixed feelings about Nicholas Spark's novels (and movies based on them.) Basically someone usually always dies at the end. And if I keep that in mind I am okay. Problem is I forget and then I am sucker punched in the end when a main character dies. I have listened to several of his books on audio - ones that have not been made famous by movie makers. I was so angst by one just knowing the wife was going to die that when she didn't I was almost just as upset. With that said, Ol Nick redeemed himself as I recently listened to The Wedding on audio. Now first of all it was read by Tom Wopat (you know Luke Duke of Dukes of Hazard) and listening to him is NOT hard. Second, no one died and the story was delightful. It actually is a sequel of sorts to The Notebook. So if you want to think a little more positively of Mr. Sparks or simply want a sweet story, I do recommend The Wedding. And you can double the fun by getting it on audio. My new delight is a narrative style cookbook called An Everlasting Meal by Tamar Adler. A delightful read plus cooking advice all in one. This one just might change the way I think about cooking.
While I am giving unsolicited reviews on favorites let me give a quick plug for The Rend Collective. A friend recently steered me in their direction. I think it was the VW bus in the picture on their home page that led her to do so. However after looking at their bio video and hearing the song
Lighthouse, I have become a fan. It is great worship music out of Ireland. And the videos are fun. If you are looking for some new worship music I highly recommend checking out
The Rend Collective .
It's raining here again. The good news is I think with all this rain, I may just get the moss garden to grow. Just need to mix up some moss/buttermilk smoothies to pour out in that spot.
So as I bring the rambling to a close let me share one of my recent favorite preschooler quotes. This blond hair, blue eyed little three year old girl approaches me with great light in her eyes and says with extreme enthusiasm, "For my birthday I am going to get a camera and a Unicorn!"
May your days be filled with the excitement and anticipation of a new camera and a Unicorn.
