Busy Day

The day before we leave is always so busy. No matter how much we plan in advance, it always seems like we have a hundred things left to do that last day. The first thing we did was return those library books I forgot yesterday. Then we went to get the oil changed and from there to another department store so I could look for a shirt while they were on sale. I got one that is so pretty -- one of my favorite colors, dark blue, and dressy enough for church. After that, we went to the grocery store to pick up a few things and came home. Since then, I've been busy cleaning. I always like to give my room a really good dusting and vacuuming before we leave and then I decided that while I was at it I might as well put away my spring stuff and clean out my dresser.


This is my pink pansy quilt. I'm kind of tired of it, but it goes with the other colors in my room, so I haven't changed it. My hair's looking kind of frizzy in this picture.......:)
Here's one shelf I had to dust. The little figurines are the last things my Grandma gave me before she died.
My dresser is cleaned off!
I decided to polish and organize my shoes, too!
When I finally finished cleaning, I began packing. I'm pretty quick at this. I've had lots of practice since we've been living away from our hometown for eight years and going back to visit about every three months. Sometimes, I even wait until I wake up the morning we're leaving to pack. I thought I'd go ahead and get some of it done today, though. All I have left to do tomorrow is pack up my makeup, hair styling stuff, and some books. Speaking of which, I should probably go get all the books I want to take right now and put them on the table so I don't forget any when I'm half asleep tomorrow morning at six.

It's been one of those days...

I had my whole day planned out: we were going to go to JC Penney early because they have a sale going on, then come back in plenty of time for me to leave for the art lesson I had to reschedule for today since we're going to be out of town next week. On the way to my lesson, I was going to drop some books off at the library, thus ensuring we would not accumulate any fines during vacation (I can't even count how many time that's happened). It really seems like you should never try to plan things exactly to suit your own ideas. I don't think it's worked for me yet. We did go to JC Penney, but even though I tried on approximately twenty shirts, I couldn't find any that I really liked. All I wanted was one or two new shirts in fall colors with longer sleeves while they were on sale, but I couldn't find any that I liked enough to buy. I found a couple that were okay, but I decided I'd have to go to another store to look before I bought anything. After we left, we had three stops before we ever got home. Once we were there, I went through all the library books that would be due and stacked them neatly for me to take when I left and got all my art supplies ready for my lesson. My mom told me she wanted me to stop by the grocery store on the way home and pick up a couple of things. So, I get in the car when it's time to leave and begin my drive. I was well on my way when I realized I'd forgotten the library books. That's great. Now we have to drive fifteen miles to the library tomorrow. As soon as I had gotten over being totally annoyed with myself for that, I realized I was following a really slow line of traffic led by some kind of farm equipment. That added an extra ten minutes to my drive and I drove up in my teacher's driveway with just three minutes to spare. Art lessons were pretty uneventful. At least it wasn't a repeat of last week when I backed off of the driveway and almost went into the ditch. When I left I stopped by the grocery store and picked up what I needed. After driving through heavy traffic for twenty minutes, I made the last turn before our house. Only half a mile from home is a train track and the train was coming. Not coming, but creeping by until it came to a stop. It just sat there, not going anywhere, until cars started turning around. I tried to wait for it to move because I was so close to home, but finally I turned around and had to drive for another fifteen minutes through heavy traffic to go home another way. I really needed a chocolate candy bar when I finally got home.

Pride and Prejudice

Yesterday, we decided to watch all six hours of A&E's Pride and Prejudice. I had been wanting to see it again for a while and it was a good day for it because I didn't have anything in particular that I needed to do.

There was a new version of Pride and Prejudice made last year, with Keira Knightly playing the lead as Elizabeth Bennet. Most people that I know prefer the A&E version. I do too, but I don't dislike the Keira version. She did a good job as Elizabeth. The main reason I prefer the A&E version is that it's just plain prettier. The dresses are prettier, the music is prettier, the houses are prettier, and everything in general is more elegant. In the Keira version, the ladies' hair always looks like it's falling out of place, the windows are dirty, the yards are muddy, and the dresses are a lot plainer. I'm sure it's meant to emphasize the way things "really" were back then, but I like to see everything look neat. So, this is another one of my favorite movies! Everyone should watch one or both of the two versions. Each is unique in their own way and both are good.

Comments

I didn't realize the comment feature was automatically set up so that only those with blogger accounts could use it. It's taken me all this time to figure that out! Anyway, now I've changed the settings so that anyone who wants to leave a comment can.

How Much Can I Read?

http://www.boundlessline.org/2007/09/help-for-the-wa.html
This is a blog post Boundless published a few days ago. It's kind of a spin-off from one they posted a few weeks ago that discussed a recent study which showed that one in four adults surveyed read no books last year. Since then, different bloggers have been suggesting book lists and tips for reading. This list, though, is really formidable.

"1. Maintain regular reading projects. I strategize my reading in six main categories: Theology, Biblical Studies, Church Life, History, Cultural Studies, and Literature. I have some project from each of these categories going at all times. I collect and gather books for each project, and read them over a determined period of time. This helps to discipline my reading, and also keeps me working across several disciplines."

All I can say is "Wow!" It's pretty pitiful that I'm struggling to keep a few history and literature books going at the same time.

"3. Read all the titles written by some authors. Choose carefully here, but identify some authors whose books demand your attention. Read all they have written and watch their minds at work and their thought in development. No author can complete his thoughts in one book, no matter how large."

Now, this is something I do frequently. If I read one book by an author and like it, I generally read practically everything else they've written. In some cases, it's not so easy. Do you have any idea how many books Charles Dickens wrote and how long each of them are? I have really appreciated my new "discovery" in Elizabeth Gaskell's writing, though, and I plan on reading a lot of her books.

"4. Get some big sets and read them through. Yes, invest in the works of Martin Luther, Jonathan Edwards, and others. Set a project for yourself to read through the entire set, and give yourself time. You will be surprised how far you will get in less time than you think."

This is something I really should do. I haven't read nearly enough of these books.

"5. Allow yourself some fun reading, and learn how to enjoy reading by reading enjoyable books. I like books across the fields of literature, but I really love to read historical biographies and historical works in general. In addition, I really enjoy quality fiction and worthy works of literature. As a boy, I probably discovered my love for reading in these categories of books. I allow some time each day, when possible, to such reading. It doesn't have to be much. Stay in touch with the thrill."

This is something I do a little too much of. Apparently, my reading is slightly unbalanced. :)

"6. Write in your books; mark them up and make them yours. Books are to be read and used, not collected and coddled."

Here we totally disagree. I do not write in my books. I don't mind neatly underlining meaningful or important phrases, but I hate to see my books get all marked up. I take my notes in a notebook. I really hate it when I check out a library book and it's all marked up. Just this morning, I was reading a large Civil War history book from the library and saw that someone had scrawled all over the margins of this big, expensive book. Arrggh!

I appreciate articles like this because they push me to go beyond what I usually do. I may read several books a year, but I need to learn to read a variety of books. I have a lot of catching up to do in a lot of subjects! : )

Fall

http://www.allposters.com/

The weather has changed so much around here. Only three weeks ago, the temperature would be around 100 degrees everyday, but now the afternoons are warm and the evenings are almost chilly. I'm glad. I love fall much more than summer. It is just too hot during the summer. Fall is the perfect time of year to do anything -- take walks, read a book outside, play a little tennis, go shopping, or even take a hike. I'm hoping we can go on a hike when the leaves change colors so I can get some good pictures.

Fall weather does make it difficult to pack for a trip, though, because it means I have to bring cooler clothes for warmer days and warmer clothes for cooler days. I'm already trying to figure out what will be the best things to pack when we travel down to visit our family next week. We were supposed to take our last trip back home for the summer three weeks ago, but it didn't work out and our vacation got pushed back to next week. So, we were planning on leaving this Saturday. Now that's not going to work out, so we have to wait to leave until next Thursday. Changing plans so many times is NOT fun, but we have decided, definitely, once and for all, that we are leaving Thursday. If we push it back any further we might as well wait until Thanksgiving. This way, at least, we'll be able to stay longer -- about ten days. Anyway, it will be great to go home for a visit and we've already have plans made to do some fun stuff with family and friends while we're there.

Artwork

I just finished my drawing of the house yesterday! I haven't framed it yet, so I added a border to the picture so I could get an idea of what it would look like with a black frame. I did have to crop off some of the drawing to make the border work. It was such a relief to get it finished. A lot of hard work went into the details on the porch and columns, but you can't really see them in the picture.

This is a painting I just finished. It's okay, but I've got a lot to learn about painting. No matter what I did, I couldn't make the grass look right, and the trees are pretty bland. You can click on both of these pictures to make them a little larger. Now I've got to pick out my next projects and get started on them.

The Nativity

We watched this movie Sunday night. When it was on at the theater last Christmas we never got a chance to go see it, so we decided to rent it while it was available on cable. Some movies I've seen that were supposed to be based on the Bible took way too many liberties, but this was actually a good movie. It wasn't perfect, but it was good. Definitely worth seeing. The journey to Bethlehem really portrayed what it must have been like. I had never given it enough thought, but seeing Joseph struggle to lead Mary on the donkey up rocky trails until his feet were bleeding and how they had no shelter at night in the open plains, made me think about it. I liked it. Despite some flaws, but it was mostly accurate and a lot of dialogue came from Scripture. There is a much better review of it at http://www.pluggedinonline.com/movies/movies/a0002990.cfm.

9/11/2001

We will never forget.

Weekend Photos

This is me in our backyard. There is a really pretty park right behind our house, so it makes a good background. Gabrielle.............

Me and Princess. Yes, she's in an old doll stroller. We put her in it just to see if she'd fit and had to take a few pictures. She loved it and I think she looked pretty cute sitting in it. : )

Mmmm......

Mama made banana pudding for dessert tomorrow. It looks sooo good!

Church News

Last Sunday, one of our pastors told me that they are going to start a church plant in a town closer to us. Our church is exactly an hour away from home and this town would be about 20-25 minutes closer. There are already about forty people interested in attending the new church. I don't have a definite idea of their plans, such as when it will start and where they will meet, but he sounded like it will be soon. I'm pretty sure we're going to visit it when they get it started. In a way, I'm looking forward to it -- visiting a new church with new people is always exciting and the drive will be shorter-- but at the same time, I would miss seeing my friends at the big church. So we'll have to wait and see how everything goes.

Flowers and a Butterfly

Isn't this a nice picture? Gabrielle took it at Grandma's house the last time we were there. She had to try several times because the butterfly kept moving, but this picture was worth the trouble. I want to try to paint it sometime, but I should probably complete a few simpler paintings first. :)