Who's Who

We just finished cleaning up after eating a very yummy meal of grilled steak, baked potato, green beans, and crescent rolls. These steaks were some of the best we have grilled in a long while. I say "we" but I do mean Keith. Garrett loves steak and will put it away. He told me he was done after eating quite a bit of it and then ran off to get a cookie (his treat for cleaning the living room which was a disaster). But after I cleaned off his plate, he came running back looking for more steak. I cut a few pieces off of mine and let him have at it. We certainly aren't raising a vegeterian. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

I thought I would give you a brief rundown of my "blog roll" on the right hand side of the page. Let me first start off by saying that I love reading blogs. I'm sure that's partly due to my nosey nature, but I also just love hearing what other people have to say. What their ideas and thoughts on a variety of topics are, how they parent their children, where they go on vacation, etc.

So these are my family members and friends who currently have a blog. I've put them in alphabetical order so I don't have the appearance of ranking my friends and family. Because we all know that won't end well.

1. My friend Alicia. Alicia is new to the blog world, but she is not a new friend of mine. I've known her since the 5th grade. Her brother, Jordan, is the same age as I am and we all went to the same church in southern Illinois and became good friends. Even though it's been 11 years since we moved away, we still keep in touch. She's a super sweet woman and a mom to 3 kids. One of which is my sister in law.
Ok, not really, but when her oldest daughter and my youngest brother were little, maybe 5 or 6?, they "got married". It was a church wedding and everything. I was the photographer and she was a beautiful bride. I believe she wore a lace doily on her head. One of the best weddings I've ever been to.

2. My youngest sister Christie. She posts very sporadically, but when she does post, it's very profound stuff. Well over my head and she's 9 years younger than me. Her latest post, which was from like 2 weeks ago! come on Christie!, is a list of 101 things she wants to accomplish in 1001 days. It's a very interesting list. And she's already accomplished one of them. When Christie was about 7 years old, I was babysitting my younger siblings. She and our youngest brother Jesse were jumping from the couch to the coffee table to another couch. I had already told them once to stop, but they certainly don't listen to me. :) Christie slipped on the coffee table and fell. I yelled at her to sit on the couch and stop crying because I had already told her not to be doing that. When my dad got home a little later, he examined Christie and discovered that in her fall, she had broken her collarbone. I still haven't lived that one down.

3. Our pastor's wife, Joy. She is such a sweet person. And probably one of the most talented people I know when it comes to decorating and coming up with creative ideas for decorations. For example, she has a window shutter hanging in their kitchen and she hangs pictures on it using clothes pins. It looks so cool and it's such a neat idea. Some day I'm going to hire her to come to my house and give me pointers.

4. My friend Mary. She is my oldest friend, haha. Not in age, but we've known each other since birth. It's very interesting when God gives you friends and keeps you together no matter the distance. Mary is one of those friends. We haven't lived in the same state since I was 10 years old. But we've still stayed in touch and keep informed on what's going on with each other. And when we get together it's as if we've never been apart. She has the best sense of humor and can always make me laugh. She's an RN and lives in Florida with her husband and 2 kids, Maddie and Sam. I saw her last October for a few hours when we both happened to be in Indiana visiting our families. That's one thing working in our favor now, both of our families live within an hour of each other, so the odds are good that at some point we'll both be up there at the same time and will be able to get together for a few hours.

5. My cousin Melissa M. Melissa and I are only 3 months apart, so as far as my cousins go, we're probably the closest simply because our age has helped to bond us together. Had Melissa been born closer to her actual due date, we might have been more likely to share a birthday. But Melissa and her twin sister Melanie were born prematurely and only weighed about 2 pounds or less. Melanie only lived for a few weeks, but Melissa is a fighter. She's still full of spunk now at the age of 30. She lives not too far from Boston with her husband and 2 girls, Katelyn and Madelyn. She and I were pregnant together with our first babies and they were born only 6 weeks apart. Now she posts about all she's learning in regards to natural living and eating organic. She's trying to guilt me into giving up my store bought, non-organic milk. But I've managed to resist thus far. :)

6. My friend Melissa R. This Melissa is the sister to my friend Mary. Mary and Melissa are 2 out of 7 kids. I spent the first 10 years of my life growing up with all of them and still consider them to be part of my family. Their family always had so much fun and there was always something exciting going on at their house with 7 kids. And it always seemed like somebody had a broken bone. I cannot imagine what life was like for their parents. One of my first memories with Melissa is of her giving me a ride on their 3 wheeler and we almost tipped it over when we took a corner too fast. Melissa lives in Arkansas with her husband and 4 boys. Not only that, but she's homeschooling them. All 4 of them aren't school aged yet, but I still tip my hat to her for taking on that challenge.

7. The senior pastor at our church, Pastor Brent. Not only is he our pastor, but he's also currently my boss. He's a good boss and always very complimentary of my work. He's an excellent pastor and has done some amazing things at our church. His current vision for reaching all the unchurched families in an 8 mile radius of our church by 2010 is very inspiring. It takes a lot to get Keith fired up about something, but this is definitely something he's excited about. Keith thinks that our pastor and my dad would do some amazing things if they were ever given the opportunity to work together.

8. My cousin Phoebe. Phoebe's story is very interesting, in my opinion. Several years ago she was hired to work for Compassion International. Compassion is one of the organizations where you can sign up to sponsor a child in other countries. In the past, I know part of Phoebe's job was to take groups of sponsors to various countries to meet their sponsored child. I think she also did some of the photography for Compassion's magazine and maybe even wrote some of the articles. Now she is living in Rwanda where she runs a big part of Compassion's Africa division. (This is all from what I've understood from Grandma, so, Phoebe, if you're reading this and want to clarify a little, please do so!) I haven't seen her in many years, maybe since my wedding, I'm not exactly sure. She was back in the states this fall for her wedding, I wasn't able to go to Wyoming to attend, but from all the pictures I've seen, it was gorgeous. So now she and her husband are back in Rwanda. I think they are awesome for doing the work that they're doing.

9. My cousin Stephanie. Stephanie is a newlywed (Garrett was a ringbearer in her wedding back in August), a school teacher, and a newly expecting mom. She's due about 3 or 4 weeks after I am next summer. We should all be extending our sympathies to her for the fact that she'll be 9 months pregnant in July, in Texas. It's not going to be pretty, Stephanie, I can already attest to that. Stephanie is Melissa M's sister. Growing up, whenever our families would get together, Stephanie, Melissa, my sister Grace, and I would always do fun things together.

10. The associate pastor at our church, Steve. Steve is married to Joy and they have 2 boys. He shares some of the funniest stories about their boys. I find myself laughing out loud and reading them to Keith. Steve is extremely smart and his blogs prove it. Many times he goes over my head, but I thoroughly enjoy reading his thoughts and opinions on things, many of them theologically based, though I rarely feel qualified to comment on those posts. He reminds me a lot of my dad in that their personalities are very similar. My first memory of Steve was on a Sunday when we were visiting the church for maybe the second time. He came out onto the stage holding a paper plate and a styrofoam cup, pretending to be finishing his breakfast. Then he threw them into a trash can and started talking about the disposable world that we live in. That's all I can remember from that sermon, Steve, sorry, but it has stuck with me after 5 years or so. He's an awesome speaker. Just recently he spoke on Beer, Blackjack, and Bootscootin'. What the Bible says about drinking, gambling and dancing. I found the series to be very interesting and dead-on.

So that's my "blogroll". Maybe somebody on my list has caught your eye and made you want to read more from them. Check them out! I'm sure they would love to hear from you and have you read what they have to say.

And now it's time for me to go take my Sunday afternoon nap. Garrett's asleep and Keith is gone so it's the perfect time for catching some zzz's.