A Years Reflections

This time a year ago, I was sitting in a hospital bed in absolute disbelief that I had finally met the babe that I had been carrying for the last 9mths.

The pain of the night earlier had all been forgotten and I was now staring into the beautiful blue eyes of my daughter.


This past year I have learnt so much about myself and my family and most importantly about God.

I have had my faults clearly brought forward! Not necessarily a pleasant thing, but a necessary thing none-the-less. I have had my eyes opened to the things that I need to deal with and the areas where I desperately need God's grace.


I have learnt about love - just how deep it is possible to go! That there is absolutely NOTHING that I wouldn't do for you my 'specious' daughter.

You have made me laugh so much more in life! You are hysterical! Dada says you have no chance seeing as how you are with me all day...but you are truly a crazy one! Those faces you pull...the noises you make...the actions you do...the predicaments you get yourself into! My stomach is constantly sore from laughing so much.

(Like I was saying!!!)

You have made me a mumma...which is all I have ever wanted. I still stress that I'm not fulfilling my 'duties' that I'm letting you down in huge ways. That I stuff up too much to make up for the good stuff.

My prayer for you as you enter into this next year is that you will continue to grow healthy and strong. That you will continue to make those around you laugh and smile. That you will start to learn to know about Jesus and the love he has for you. That you will listen to you mumma and dada - we only have your best interests at heart! - that you will continue to grow into a joyful girl.

Feb 2008 I prayed for God to heal my heart. And he has...with a beautiful daughter none can match. You are the part of me that was missing and I am such a blessed woman because of you. You have healed my heart and brought me joy...my beautiful Emery Joy...

I love you with all of my heart 'specious'. Happy 1st birthday xoxoxo

Life Observations #6

30. There's no worse feeling than that millisecond you're sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

31. I'm always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten page research paper that I swear I did not make any changes to.

32. "Do not machine wash or tumble dry" means I will never wash this ever. (or in my case...who gives a rats tutu...I'll wash it however I want!!)

33. I hate being the one with the remote in a room full of people watching TV. There's so much pressure. 'I love this show, but will they judge me if I keep it on? I bet everyone is wishing we weren't watching this.It's only a matter of time before they all get up and leave the room. Will we still be friends after this?'

34. I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Dammit!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voicemail. What'd you do after I didn't answer? Drop the phone and run away?

Life Observations #5

21. I find it hard to believe there are actually people who get in the shower first and THEN turn on the water.

22. I can't remember the last time I wasn't at least kind of tired.

23. Bad decisions make good stories.

24. Why is it that during an ice-breaker, when the whole room has to go around and say their name and where they are from, I get so incredibly nervous? Like I know my name, I know where I'm from, this shouldn't be a problem....

25. You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you've made up your mind that you just aren't doing anything productive for the rest of the day.

Life Observations #4

These are some of the funniest so far!!! I love 19 :)


16. I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars teams up to prevent a d1ck from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers!

17. Everytime I have to spell a word over the phone using 'as in' examples, I will undoubtedly draw a blank and sound like a complete idiot. Today I had to spell my boss's last name to an attorney and said "Yes that's G as in...(10 second lapse)..ummm...Goonies"

18. What would happen if I hired two private investigators to follow each other?

19. While driving yesterday I saw a banana peel in the road and instinctively swerved to avoid it...thanks Mario Kart.

20. Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

Life Observations #3

11. The only time I look forward to a red light is when I'm trying to finish a text

12. Lol has gone from meaning, "laugh out loud" to "I have nothing else to say"

13. I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

14. Whenever someone says "I'm not book smart, but I'm street smart", all I hear is "I'm not real smart, but I'm imaginary smart".

15. How many times is it appropriate to say "What?" before you just nod and smile because you still didn't hear what they said?

Life Observations #2

6. There is a great need for a sarcasm font.

7. Sometimes, I'll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realize I had no idea what was going on when I first saw it.

8. I think everyone has a movie that they love so much, it actually becomes stressful to watch it with other people. I'll end up wasting 90 minutes shiftily glancing around to confirm that everyone's laughing at the right parts, then making sure I laugh just a little bit harder (and a millisecond earlier) to prove that I'm still the only one who really, really gets it.

9. How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

10. I would rather try to carry 10 plastic grocery bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

Life Observations

I received an email recently with over 40 life observations. I'll slowly post them, maybe only 5 at a time.

1. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you're wrong.

2. Have you ever been walking down the street and realized that you're going in the complete opposite direction of where you are supposed to be going? But instead of just turning a 180 and walking back in the direction from which you came, you have to first do something like check your watch or phone or make a grand arm gesture and mutter to yourself to ensure that no one in the surrounding area thinks you're crazy by randomly switching directions on the sidewalk.

3. I totally take back all those times I didn't want to nap when I was younger.

4. The letters T and G are very close to each other on a keyboard This recently became all too apparent to me and consequently I will never be ending a work email with the phrase "Regards" again.

5. Do you remember when you were a kid; playing Nintendo and it wouldn't work? You take the cartridge out, blow in it and that would magically fix the problem. Every kid in the world did that, but how did we all know how to fix the problem? There was no internet or message boards or faq's. We just figured it out. Today's kids are soft.

Avoid the Top Reason for Marriage Failure

By Rob Furlong
Challenge Newspaper July 2009

It was rather sad to read recently about the collapse of the celebrity marriage of Aussie singer, Peter Andre. Andre and his wife Katie Price were married after falling in love on a reality TV show called “I’m a celebrity…get me out of here!”

Over the course of their three and a half years marriage they have gained notoriety for their heated arguments that have been screened on yet another reality show. The couple has gone from a literal Cinderella style wedding to a separation that has become very nasty and hurtful and played out in full view of the public.

It seems to me that there is always a common thread running through the collapse of celebrity marriages: selfishness! Celebrities are involved in an industry that caters to their every whim and desire, no matter how ridiculous it may seem. The entertainment industry feeds that most basic of human weaknesses, self-centredness as well as fostering and promoting it. So when you have two people involved in an industry like that you can expect a lot of selfishness to come out in their marriage relationship. No wonder celebrity marriages implode so often!

But here is an interesting thought — we are no different in our relationships! It has been my experience that the number one reason behind the collapse of a marriage is plain, old fashioned selfishness.

Why won’t a husband pick up the tea towel for his wife and dry the dishes for her? Selfishness!

Why does a wife disregard her husband’s wishes and still
buys her “must have” new dress or shoes? Selfishness!

Why do two people refuse to listen to each other but still
expect the other person to listen to them? Selfishness!

Why does a husband or wife seek to find comfort in the arms of another lover? Selfishness!

Whether you are a celebrity or not you are still infected by the terrible disease of selfishness. And when selfishness goes unchecked in a marriage it usually spells out death for the relationship. Our tendency toward selfishness is clearly in mind in the following quote from a marriage counsellor:

“Marriage is not so much about finding the right person as it is about being the right person.”

As simple as that statement is, it has enormous consequences for you if you decide to put it into practice because it forces you to stop focusing on yourself and to begin focusing on the other person, which is the essence of true love.

I find this kind of wisdom about relationships in the Bible, especially the Proverbs. Here are just two for you to think about:
“An excellent wife is the crown of her husband, but she who shames him is as rottenness in his bones.”

Excellent here refers to a virtuous woman — a woman of tremendous class and quality. A woman who is proud of her husband; one who shows him respect and is unashamed to do so. Such a woman has the highest place in man’s life — she crowns it! But a woman who openly despises her husband and is constantly critical of him and his decisions is like an infectious disease. Simply put, a woman can make or break her man. If she is going to “make” him, then she will need to be unselfish.

And husbands are also told “to rejoice in the wife of your youth”. In other words, instead of moaning and complaining about what she does and does not do, remember why you married her in the first place and keep on encouraging those good things in her today. How easy it is for us men to forget all the good things about our wives and only focus on the negatives that we see.

If we want to change our relationship for the better then we must stop focusing on ourselves and begin asking ourselves how we can better serve our partner — this is called unselfishness and it has the power to transform both you and the other person.

Isn’t it time you picked up a tea towel?

Name Calling

I (we) have a few names we call Emery.

Eme

Eme-joy

Eme-joy joy joy

Ssspecious girl

Sweet Cheeks

Bubba

Bub-o-luv

(this one is from her Grammy) Myjy (pronouned midgy)

Ssspecious girl came from me one night. I was trying to tell her she was special to me and a precious girl and I accidentally said ssspecious. It's stuck ever since!

And myjy is my mums name for her. It stands for My Joy

I don't know if I ever went through the names we gave to Eme.

Emery was a suggestion from Russell. It was the name of one of our bands we enjoyed and we thought it quite a pretty name for a girl.

Joy is my middle name and I wanted to pass it onto Eme as it holds quite a bit of meaning in our family. My mum had 3 miscarriages before she had me, and when I was born I was such a 'joy' to her and dad. After I had my miscarriage I decided that if we ever had a girl, her middle name would be Joy also. Considering my mum thought she would never have children, let alone grandchildren...I thought it would be a nice reminder of God's grace and faithfulness.

Kade (her 2nd middle name) is a combination of my mum & mum-in-laws names. KAren & DEnise. I thought I had invented a name, then found out it's actually a real name (for boys)

So, there you have it. What's behind a name...

Who has an interesting story about their name or their children's names?

Domestic B!t@h

Dropping my husband off at work the other morning, I notice that a mum dropping off her kids at school was driving a huge 4wd with a sticker on the back window...it said "Domestic Bitch". Strange I thought...

The next day I see a young girl driving down the freeway with a sticker on her back window saying "Queen of Bitches". Strange again....I thought....

That was until I saw someone else with a number plate that said "beyooootch" (or however it is that you spell it!)

This is when I started to wonder if I was possibly missing a few screws up top. Am I missing something? Did I miss the memo that came out saying that it's now cool to call / refer to yourself as a bitch?

I personally think of the word/name as a really sharp word! I think it is a really 'cutting' word and not one that I would ever want to use to describe myself. Yet, so many women, young and old, are starting to refer to themselves in this way.

As I said, I may be missing a few screws/nuts/bolts...but I honestly don't understand this new 'fad'.