Five Years--a glimpse of what's been happening!

It's been such a long time since I've blogged anything! I don't know yet if I'm coming back to this, but I do feel like I should update it a bit. I have no idea if people even keep up with this or wonder about what's happened in the last 5 years. What's the best way to update what feels like a lifetime? Here's my attempt...

2009

September

My parents celebrate 25 years of marriage and take a trip to where they honeymooned. While they are gone my siblings and I plot a surprise party for them with family and church. They were duly surprised. :-)

December

My Aunt Donna went home to be with the Lord.

2010

I take on a full time management position at work.

March

We have a baby kitten born on our porch, she gets named Puzzle and we keep her. 

May

Youngest brother Andrew graduates from high school, ending our years as a home schooling family.

June

We go on probably our last family vacation/graduation trip. Head to Massachusetts. Had a great trip. We got to see John Q. Adams house, explore Lexington, see the house of Louisa May Alcott (book loving me loved it!), see Plymouth, visit Cape Cod, and stop in Pennsylvania for a trip to Sight and Sounds. Was a great trip!

September

My sister Sarah heads to Spain for an eight month adventure as a teacher assistant. See her blog for the full scope of that adventure! (http://fromthevalleytothebasin.blogspot.com/)

Fall-Winter

Stressful time for me dealing with the stress of full time retail.

2011

March

I step down out of full time management and go back to part time. Life becomes much better!

I head to Spain to visit Sarah. First visit overseas for me! Spend a couple days in Spain and then head to Paris with Sarah. Great trip, but very crazy! Think lost luggage times 10 in weirdness. I have a post on her blog about that trip. You can read two long posts about it here:

http://fromthevalleytothebasin.blogspot.com/2011/04/semana-blancaaka-semana-amanda.html

 http://fromthevalleytothebasin.blogspot.com/2011/05/well-always-have-paris-amandas.html

April

Life at our local church undergoes some major changes.

June

I head back overseas and meet up with Sarah in London. We spend almost three weeks touring the UK. Get to see a lot of England and a few days in Scotland. BEST TRIP EVER!!!!!!!

Highlights--Attending Charles Spurgeon's former church for a service, seeing amazing historical museums etc. Stonehenge. Bath--I loved Bath. Jane Austen fans must go there! Was my favorite part of England. We get to see a Hamlet production, loved that too! Sleepy town called Woodstock, such a great place after the hectic London world. Chatsworth house--where they filmed the most recent version of Pride and Prejudice. Such a great place! We get to see the Bronte house, and get an unplanned walking tour group. Great time! Funny story involving an older gentleman taking us right up to the house because we were so concerned about missing it. Yorkshire--sorry, very lame and touristy, we should have skipped that! A couple of days in Edinburgh. Cool castle, fun Highlands tour and get to see the Loch Ness. Adventures of Sarah leaving her purse, but no worries, no one took it! That is a really surface view of our time in England. It was such a great time!

Sarah returns home with me, life goes back to normal in our household. :-)

Fall

Mom's sister Susan, has a return of cancer.

Parents take a trip with Mom's sisters and their spouses to Gatlinburg, Tennessee.

Dad retires from the fire house!

Sarah and I take a trip down to see our friend in South Carolina.

2012

June

My siblings and I take a trip to Salt Lake City, Utah to visit our Aunt and Uncle. Fun trip with our first real exposure to the western part of the US!

August

I am diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis--a two year journey which involves a blog or several posts of its own!

2013

April

 Parents, Sarah, and I take a trip down to South Carolina to celebrate our friend's 30th birthday!

June

Mom's sister Susan passes away.

Most of the year

Life gets hard for me, I'm trying a diet called SCD to help with the UC. Losing a lot of weight and getting very sick. I stay with some friends in Nov/Dec to try to help. A stomach virus on Thanksgiving day puts me down to 92 pounds! Scary times. 

December

Doctor is urging me to go to surgery

2014

January

Cold times in Ohio!

I finally get in to see another doctor, who is in to functional medicine.

He suggests just doing gluten and dairy free diet. Within 4 weeks I gain 14 pounds! Praise the Lord!! Since then, I have only continued to progress and am still amazed at the Lord's provision and care for me! A short snippet doesn't do justice to what has happened in the last year of my life!

March

I start getting into gardening

June

We get a new kitten and name her Ellie.
July
Our church gets to host a joint service for the first time with several local small churches joining us for an evening service. Great time of fellowship!

August

Sarah and I take a day trip with a friend to Lexington, Kentucky. Fun times exploring the Horse Park, seeing Mary Todd Lincoln's house, and eating at a place called Shakespeare & Company.

Sarah and I take a trip down to South Carolina to visit friends.

I know I'm probably missing some things, but that's a pretty good summary of the last 5 years. Dad is preaching more at our local church. I am still at our local craft store, 6 years coming up soon! I still hope for an Administrative job someday. We currently have three cats and one dog. 2014 has brought a lot of new friendships into my life and I'm looking forward to seeing what's in store for 2015!

Life is busy, but good, and God is GREAT!

Thanks for reading!

2009 Summer Quotes of the Week

Hello all! This summer I really slacked off on quotes, so here are the two I did. I hope to have an update later today. :-)

Have a great day!

I often derive a peculiar satisfaction in conversing with the ancient and modern dead, - who yet live and speak excellently in their works. My neighbors think me often alone, - and yet at such times I am in company with more than five hundred mutes - each of whom, at my pleasure, communicates his ideas to me by dumb signs - quite as intelligently as any person living can do by uttering of words.
~Laurence Sterne

There is a temperate zone in the mind, between luxurious indolence and exacting work; and it is to this region, just between laziness and labor, that summer reading belongs.

~Henry Ward Beecher

May & June Update

Hello all! You may be wondering if I've dropped off the face of the planet, I have not. :-) I just have not felt like blogging or doing any book reviews. :-) So what have I been up to the last two months. Nothing overly dramatic, but here's a summary:

Family News, Church, Work, & Other Random Things

In May, my sister Sarah graduated with her Bachelor's in Spanish. We endured the long ceremony (some of us read a book) and then afterwards we went to spend the afternoon at another family's house. :-) It was a fun day overall and it was my first Saturday off from work since I started at the craft store! The next week, Mom, Sarah, and I all went out for a ladies luncheon with the ladies at church and then went shopping afterwards. It was fun, but the only thing we really bought was candy. :-)

Josh finished up his college classes this month and is enjoying having some free time again. (at least for now, eventually I will probably be pestering him to do projects. :-) ) Andrew just completed his Iowa tests this month, and will be working on math this summer, otherwise he is done too. So we are all glad to have the school hurdles done for a few months, and we're hoping to spend the summer getting together with people and having people over. (if we can work around our crazy work schedules!) At this point we are not planning a family summer vacation.

However, in July, some of us will be going to Texas with others in the church to do a Vacation Bible School. We will be working with missionaries that our church supports. (I'll give more details on this as it approaches) Lord willing, I will also be going, and at this point I'm in charge of snacks. VBS here in Ohio is the first week in July!

I haven't gotten around to trying any new recipes yet. But I did have fun working on making baby shower presents and experimenting with some new patterns. I recently bought a bunch of clearance baby yarn and I'm trying to decide on a pattern to make with it. Still haven't made a decision yet. :-)

Our room is also looking better, I still have to return photos and sort through some church history stuff, but all the scrapbooking supplies have been put away!

This month my siblings and I went out with some friends to see the movie "Up." It was a really good movie, definitely one of the better Pixar shows! We had a great time and afterwards enjoyed eating dinner together and chatting. :-)

Work has been about the same, nothing overly exciting in this area. I did learn something "new" recently, called "queing" (I've yet to figure out how this is spelled). It mostly involves checking items with a "pricing gun" and if it says we have 2 and there aren't any items there I put in "0" in the gun. Pretty easy but somewhat time consuming, which means my nicely organized routing of getting my work done on time is now somewhat "off."

What I've been reading

I've still not totally gotten back into my usual routine of reading. But in the last couple of months I re-read some old favorites. One of those being the "Anne of Green Gables" series. Sarah and I recently watched the movies and I had to read the books to remind myself of what "really" happens. :-) I also just finished reading for the second time, "To Kill A Mockingbird" another great book. Again, I read that because we just watched the movie. (notice a pattern here?) I highly recommend the movie version and the book version of "To Kill a Mockingbird" (just be aware of some swearing in the book). I was also going to try and read "War and Peace" (Sarah picked that out) but after reading about four chapters, I tried to skip to the end to see if I could figure out what happens, and was unsuccessful. :-) I have my doubts that I will try to finish it. :-)

Update on my Aunt

A major praise in this area! One of her "counts" (I can't really explain the details well) has been consistently going down. This means her new chemo treatment is working! We're thankful to hear the good results and I suspect surgery will be coming up in the near future. Thank you for your continued prayers!

What's next

Well, I ahem, maybe will be working on book reviews this summer. :-) Obviously I keep saying this and it doesn't happen, so you can come to your own conclusions on whether this will happen or not. :-) I expect the month of July to be busy with VBS preparations, getting together with friends, some cleaning, hopefully a book review, and maybe some craft projects. :-)

Thank you to all those who still stop by and I hope you have a great day and a wonderful summer!

~Amanda~

Quotes of the week for May

Week 1

Books have to be read (worse luck it takes so long a time). It is the only way of discovering what they contain. A few savage tribes eat them, but reading is the only method of assimilation revealed to the West.
~E.M. Forster

Weeks 2 & 3

Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.
~Harper Lee
(I believe the above quote may have been taken from the book,"To Kill a Mockingbird." I'm not positive though.)

Week 4

From my point of view, a book is a literary prescription put up for the benefit of someone who needs it.
~S.M. Crothers

Quotes of the Week for April

Here are the quotes for the month of April. Have a great day!

Week 1

Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.
~Groucho Marx~
(an actor from the Black & White days of movies :-) )

Weeks 2 & 3

A book worth reading is worth buying.
~John Ruskin~

Week 4

I would never read a book if it were possible for me to talk half an hour with the man who wrote it.
~Woodrow Wilson~

April Update--I'm back! (almost) :-)

Hello all! Well, today is the last day of April, and I was hoping to do a book review, but it probably won’t happen. So, here's what I've been up to...

Church
April 26 our church celebrated 90 years, and the entire month was spent in preparation for that. I scrapbooked every spare second I had, at least it felt like it! Sarah and I stayed up till 3:00 a.m. finishing up last minute preparation, but we did finish! On the 26, we had a lot of visitors and it was great meeting a lot of people I have never met before, and seeing some old friends. Yes, it was worth all the effort! (oh, and when I got home I completely crashed, and I am happy to report that Monday morning I felt well rested and re-energized :-) ) We also had a deaf choir with us that Sunday, and it was really neat to see.

Work
Has been going well, nothing too major to report on this front. I’m still doing down stocking and I am enjoying my time there. (my co-workers have noticed that I’m starting to relax and “warm up” to them a little more) I was able to introduce Mom to one of my favorite managers there this month. My schedule is starting to be more regular, and I can plan things better these days, which I love!

Blogging/Reading
Well, obviously I haven’t done a thing with blogging this month! Last week I did not even check or monitor the blog at all. I’m really hoping in May I can pick up the slack and do some reviews! I don’t believe I read a single book in April.

Other April Tidbits
We made some more trips to see my “niece” this month, and our Pastor’s wife just had her seventh baby earlier this month. So, I’m having fun seeing TWO babies at church on Sundays! :-) Dad preached the Sunday that our Pastor’s wife had her baby, and I’m hoping to do a blog post of that sermon in the future.


What’s next
Well, first of all, cleaning the disaster that was once called “my room” is on the top of my “to do list.” :-) Filled with scrapbooking supplies, pictures, and church history, it’s pretty much an exploded disaster. :-) May is looking pretty busy, Sarah has her college graduation, church is planning on some ladies events; a Saturday luncheon/shopping trip and a baby shower. And I’m hoping to get back to reading, blogging, and maybe try some new recipes!

Update on my Aunt
Thank you to those of you who are praying for my Aunt! This week we learned that her two chemo treatments have not been effective, and they will be trying a different type soon, this has some potentially harmful side effects, one of which is damage to her heart. Pray that this new treatment could work! Without going into specifics, some new developments in their financial situation also came up this week; continue to pray for them in the financial realm also.

I believe those are all the major highlights of the month. I'm incredibly glad to have April 26 over with and am looking forward to having more time on my hands to devote to
other things. :-)

Have a great week!

~Amanda~

March Update

Hello all! Sadly another month has gone by and I have not done a book review! Well, technically I still have a couple hours left of today, but somehow I think my other responsibilities will take a higher priority. :-) So, here's another one of those rambly random updates on what I've been doing this month!

Work:

Work has been one of the main things that has kept me busy this month. Gone were the days I thought I'd only be working 15-20 hours a week (or even 4 hours!). I am regularly working 30 plus (maybe close to 35 hours) a week. My two days off are consistently Fridays (piano lessons and catch up days) and Sundays (church). This is one reason why I'm not blogging, I simply don't have time!
It doesn't appear work will slow down in the near future either, I just accepted a new position at the store where I will be "down stocking." (and as far as I know, it doesn't involve a pay raise, in case you wondered :-) ) This involves taking overstocked merchandise from the boxes on the top shelves and putting them in their usual spots, if they fit. I'm grateful for the opportunity to have more hours and a slightly more regular routine, but I sort of wish this was happening in May; March and April are hectic for me at the moment! :-)
No, I haven't been job searching for Administrative positions lately, no time and not much motivation. :-)

Church:
I've mentioned before that our church is celebrating 90 years in April, and I volunteered to be part of a committee and plan a scrapbook. This is the second main reason I'm not blogging. This has involved a lot of responsibility and planning. Thankfully my sister is also helping out, otherwise I'd lose my mind! :-) Without going into endless details of what I've been up to in this area, pretty much every spare minute not spent working is spent sorting pictures, scrapbooking, planning scrapbook days with the ladies at church, making plans and lists, and a variety of other things.

Reading & Blogging:
Well, at the moment I can't really think if I've even read anything this month, yes I did! Early in the month I was reading books and then selling them. :-) Not very many though. Hopefully my reading will pick up in May. (poor books, I'm sure they miss me. :-) ) As for blogging, my apologies about not having anything posted, I will really try though, if not in April, definitely in May! Thank you to those of you who still check on here to see if I've posted anything though!

Other things:
In addition to all of the above, I've been busy selling books for friends, which has been involving people coming to the house and looking/picking them up. The most noteworthy one was when a group of 10 young adults came over at 10:00 at night on a Friday, in our basement. Needless to say, life is never dull around here. :-)
I mentioned before that I was able to see a production of "Les Misérables" I also got to see one of my younger friends from church in her ice-skating competition. These two things were the "fun" highlights of my month. :-) I also had a piano recital this month.

Prayer Requests:
If you think of it, and have a desire, I certainly would appreciate any prayers this month! There is still much I need to get done, and I feel somewhat overwhelmed with responsibilities. I know that it will get done in time, but I need endurance and sometimes I have to watch my
attitude. :-)
Also, on a more serious note, my Aunt has been diagnosed with cancer, and her family and mine would appreciate prayers and wisdom for the doctors on how best to treat her.

I believe those are the highlights of the month. I've enjoyed seeing my little "niece" (okay, technically she isn't my niece, but my best friend is like a second sister, so I call her a niece :-) ) a couple of times and I hope visits will increase in the future. :-)

Hope you have a great week!

~Amanda~

Quotes of the Week for March

Here are the quotes for the month of March, have a good day!

Weeks 1 & 2
Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it. It enriches the necessary competencies that daily life requires and provides; and in this respect, it irrigates the deserts that our lives have already become.
~C.S. Lewis

Week 3
I know every book of mine by its smell, and I have but to put my nose between the pages to be reminded of all sorts of things.
~George Robert Gissing

Week 4
That is a good book which is opened with expectation and closed with profit.
~Amos Bronson Alcott

Poll Results--02/27/09--03/08/09

Hello all! Well, here are the poll results and a brief update. :-) Last week was insanely busy for me, and I completely forgot until the end of the week to put up a new quote for the week! Oh well! This week is also promising to be just as busy, maybe a little less so, but not by much. :-) Last week I enjoyed seeing a high school production of "Les Misérables" that had a couple of friends in it, and I was able to see a friend in her ice-skating competition, between that and working 30 hours last week, sorting pictures, and other responsibilities, blogging is just not working these days! :-) After seeing "Les Misérables" I am in the mood to read the book. :-) However, since it's a French novel, and they are notoriously long, I will probably have to hold off until the summer. :-) I may do some posts on that, if I ever do read it! Anyway, onward to the poll results!

First, thank you to all who participated! I think I got a couple of new voters on these polls and it was fun to see!

Would you like to see updates on what I'm doing on a regular basis?
Total of 4 votes

Yes............................................3 votes (75%)
No, they are irrelevant to the blog............0 votes (0%)
Don't care.....................................1 vote (25%)
What's an update? :-)..........................0 votes (0%)

Well, interesting, I'm glad that most of you enjoy my random updates I do. They are much easier than doing book reviews, and I can usually fit them into my schedule better. I will keep that in mind! :-)

Would you be interested in reading a summary of the marriage conference I attended in January?
Total of 5 votes

Yes...................4 votes (80%)
Not really.............1 vote (20%)
Don't care.............0 votes (0%)
I want a book review!.........0 votes (0%)

Wow! I wasn't quite expecting everyone to be so interested in my notes.:-) Once I get some time I will start working on getting something up here for you to review!

What would you like to see reviewed next?
Total of 4 votes

Finish Prince Caspian.....0 votes (0%)
The next chapter in Spiritual Disciplines.....0 votes (0%)
Noel Piper book.........................0 votes (0%)
Pleasing People..........................0 votes (0%)
Something by "The Dad".....................1 vote (25%)
Movie Review..................................0 votes (0%)
That Voice of the Martyrs book you promised us in November!.....3 votes (75%)

Hee! Well, yeah, I guess the Voice of the Martyrs book has been on my list to do long enough, between the marriage conference notes and this, I will try to have one or the other up this month! I really will try! :-) I will also see if Dad is up for doing an article soon. :-)

Thanks for all of you who participated! Hope you have a great week!
~Amanda

Quotes of the Week for February

Hello all! Here are the quotes for the month of February.

Week 1

If you have never said "Excuse me" to a parking meter or bashed your shins on a fireplug, you are probably wasting too much valuable reading time.
~Sherri Chasin Calvo

Week 2

Most books, like their authors, are born to die; of only a few books can it be said that death hath no dominion over them; they live, and their influence lives forever.
~J. Swartz

Week 3

Having your book turned into a movie is like seeing your oxen turned into bouillon cubes.
~John LeCarre

Week 4

Far more seemly were it for thee to have thy study full of books, than thy purse full of money.
~John Lyly