What you want is not always what you get.....

It turns out that sometimes I might or might not misinterpret Gods plans for us.  Tracy believes now that we need to stay in Vegas.  Obviously the market is horrible and we can't sell our house for anything near what it's worth.  His work is consistent despite the economy...14.3% reported unemployment.  I have reason to believe the unemployment is much higher but that's who is still receiving payment...we aren't talking about those underemployed, not taking unemployment any longer, or just given up folks..but that's a story for another day.  Regardless....I have to resolve to accept that I am stuck in Nevada.  I guess you know I don't enjoy living here.  From the outside it might seem like this is a great place to live...lots of entertainment....places to go...things to do....and all the time I'm trying to find a good place for family stuff.  I wish I knew Gods' plan.  I wish I knew why were led here.  God know why we are here.  Maybe he will let us in on it soon....in the mean time, I guess we stay here and I try to be happy and make more family through friends.  It's life...we are meant to live it even if we don't know why things are the way they are

Nut, Crazy, Psyco, Racist, Nazi, etc....

So if I disagree with your political position you can call me names? I guess I'm starting to get a little bothered that some of my "friends" think that they can call anyone who doesn't agree with them politically or socially little "names".  Truthfully I do not currently affiliate myself with a particular party.  They are all starting to get under my skin.  I'm a social and political conservative so most people assume I'm a Republican or a Tea Party member.  I usually have voted on the Republican side but am willing to look at any candidate whom I believe would stand up for my values and principals.  That also means that I am more than willing to get rid of ALL of the politicians on the hill right now that have made a long career of being a politician.  They've screwed things up and frankly I'm done! 

What bothers me most is that I am not finding liberals who believe as I do.  I would like to. We might be able to actually get somewhere if there was true "tolerance".   Do they really believe that "someone else" caused all this chaos? 

Here are a few names being called out this week both from left and right that I can remember:  psyco,nut, racist, nazi, intolerant, unintelligent, irresponsible, stupid....
I'll let you decided what side these names were coming from but it was largely one side and I don't know how you can call out those names and expect to be able to have a conversation with the other side.  Come on people....

History can be fun......

This week a picture of my 8th grade graduation popped up on facebook.  One of my friends commented that I should check it out and see if I could find myself in the picture.  And the adventure began.....

I haven't spent a lot of time thinking about grade school.  Anyone who knows me, knows that I've put most of my early life behind me.  I always felt out of pace with my upbringing.  I'm starting to think now, it had more to do with my folks moving every year until we moved to South Bend in 1972.  Until then, I had attended 3 other schools.  Nuner was a scary place.  Everyone seemed to know everyone and their extended family seemed to live around the same area.  I was "the new kid", and if I fit, I didn't know it because I was so insecure about being the "new kid".

Fast forward to this week.  When the picture surfaced and people from my class started talking I realized that we are all really normal people.  We have lives, kids, experiences and I'm no different.  All the "popular" kids are just people too...and the geeks like me turned out just fine from what I can figure out.  I'm sad that to find that some of those little faces are no longer with us.  I only have vague memories of them but they exist as part of the time when my family finally set down roots and gave me a history to be able to look back on. 

Life is good and old friends and new are a great blessing

Hiking!

We had such a lovely hike today.  Generally speaking, though I love to go out in the open, I'm not a very athletic sort.  Today we were invited to go hiking with one of our friends-a youth group-and some friends of his from work.  We had about 30 of us.  Sarah did not want to take another hiking adventure but since we are the grownups....we used our executive decision to go anyway :)  Despite the fact that she claims she hates hiking, she lead the group up the top of the hike and seemed to be enjoying herself...not that she will admit it now!  I even made it most of the way without wheezing away.  (allergy induced asthma symptoms are annoying!) It was a beautiful day and I'm so glad we made the jog up there. 

The Bodies Exhibition

We weren't allowed to take a camera inside the exhibition so I could only copy one from the internet but you get the idea...the exhibition is "real" meticulously dissected and preserved bodies showing muscular, reproductive, respiratory, circulatory and other systems of the human body. Many of the bodies were posed in athletic poses to expose certain aspects of the body.

What was most interesting is how the kids reacted to these things.  I think if it had only been ours there may have been a different reaction...however, with the addition of 2 additional kids, we had the issue of some social reaction as well.  The bodies shown in full were primarily male showing all body parts.  Although we had generally talked about these things, seeing them in full detail was at first disconcerting.  This didn't really detract from the learning experience though.

I did not realize that there was a room devoted to fetus's.  There were quite of few fetus's at different stages of development.  I don't think Sarah or her friends will ever think that a fetus is not a baby after seeing those tiny little fingers and toes fully visible at such early stages.  I think those alone, will bring up some fascinating discussions in the future!

We were thrown a bit of a curve when we went to pick up Sarah's friend and the little brother came out the door as well. We had no reason to elect to take him, but after checking quickly to make sure it was age appropriate, we proceeded forward...after all what is one more kidlet in the whole scheme of things! 

Fast forward through the exhibit, which was well worth going to....and dinner at the Asian Buffet...we dropped the kids off at their house for a surprise sleepover.  I think overall this was a really nice family day.  I hope everyone else is celebrating their long weekend doing something fun and wonderful!

Finally....our camera has arrived

Sometimes I'm so happy with customer service.  It has been rare these last few years.  The experience with our camera has proven that every once in a while, it still exists! 

We had Sarah's birthday party at LaserQuest.  It is run by some fairly young folks that have yet to be anything but helpful and polite.  We were towing out all of Sarah's birthday presents and party supplies at the end of the party.  Somehow, our camera managed to get tucked under a chair and we left without it.  Thankfully, I was looking for it right after we unloaded the car and realized we had left the camera behind.  We called quickly and the staff put the camera in their office and told us to come and pick it up at our convenience.  We decided to go after church the following day only to find out it was stolen out of their office!  They could easily have not done anything since it is clearly posted that they are not responsible for items left behind.  Instead they quickly offered to replace the camera but just needed to figure out how to get it purchased through their corporate.  Fast forward through the search for receipts/box/or info on our camera, the corporate guys bought us a similar in price camera (an actually much better than the one we had) and had it shipped to the LaserQuest where we picked it up.

Thanks to LaserQuest I have a new camera to enjoy and be able to continue taking pictures of our lives!  I will definitely go there again and recommend them to our friends!

School Begins Again

Here we are again at the beginning of the school season.  Sarah has made it through her first week of 7th grade.  It barely seems possible!  Yesterday she was starting kindergarten!