Joy vs. Happiness

These are not the same thing. 

I love and hate happiness. That sounds ridiculous, I know. I love being happy. I like to surround myself with fun and funny people, who often make me feel happy. I typically have a positive outlook on things. So, in those ways, I love happiness. I hate happiness because I see so many people chasing after it... and failing.

To me, happiness is just a feeling. It's a fleeting thing. It's a moment to moment kind of thing. It's right there next to all of the feelings available to us. Some people say they just want to be happy. But who can feel happy all the time? NO ONE. I know that we all know that it isn't practical, feasible, healthy, normal, etc. to feel happy all the time, but for some reason, I see more and more people stuffing their grief and struggle and trying to choose happiness instead. 

I'm not sure how you choose a feeling- mine just sort of happen. Perhaps people have a special gift and can actually choose which emotions they want to feel? I don't know how to do it without turning off all of the emotions or temporarily burying the tough ones until they come out sideways. Sideways emotions are never pretty.

Think about how weird it would be to feel happy all the time: 

You just failed your test, but keep laughing?

Your friend died, and you can't stop smiling?

Feeling so glad when your family member has health concerns.

That would be so weird. I think other emotions exist for the fullness of human life and relationships. Some things are worthy of our feelings of sadness, of fear, of anger.

I love and love joy. Joy is a bit different to me. I know this is just semantics, but to me joy is deeper. Joy is not a feeling. Joy is more like gratitude and deep gladness. You can hold it alongside heartache and it doesn't dishonor or disregard what or whom was lost. My sense of joy is tied to my faith. The promise of being loved always and forever by my creator, the promise of life, the promise of grace, the promise of God being with me through the good and the bad... all of that gives me joy.   

I don't want to be happy. I want to be joyful.  

My Favorite Hymns and WHY

I love hymns. I have most of our hymn book memorized. Or at least half of it. For a lot of the songs, I don't need to open the book, but I do anyways for hospitality sake. I remember when I was in high school, my pastor would tell us to leave our song books out, even if we knew the songs, because if anyone was new that day, they wouldn't feel weird to need using the book. Made sense to me. So, I hold the book anyways.

Sometimes people think that young adults don't like hymns. That's even not true. A lot, if not most, of my churchy friends my age also love hymns. 

Here are my top ten twelve (this is shortest list I could make) and WHY:

12. Go My Children, With My Blessing

We used to sing this as a closing hymn a lot at my church growing up. I especially like the older version of this hymn that has a verse 4 that's similar to the benediction we use most weeks.

11. I Love to Tell the Story

I have a complicated relationship with this song. I'm not always a fan of songs/hymns that presume that everyone feels the same way- like in this hymn, sometimes it's hard to love telling the story and definitely there will be people in the community that feel like they are lying as they sing these words. BUT, I also love this song, because of verse three: I love to tell the story to those who know it best, seem hungering and thirsting to hear it like the rest; and when in scenes of glory, I'll sing the new, new song. I'll sing the old, old story, that I have loved so long." I feel called to tell the "story of Jesus and his love" to the people who know it best. We are all called to different things. I feel called to remind people that this love is for them, over and over and over again, because it's easy to forget. 

10. This is My Song

This is the only patriotic hymn that I like. The song acknowledges that God loves the WORLD and at the same time celebrates where we get to live, wherever that may be. 

9. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing

I'm actually pretty sick of this song. I played it too many times. It's still on the list though because we sang it at our wedding and because of the end of the last verse: "Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above." I love that line because that's what I think every person of faith feels like- we can just feel that we are prone to walk away, so we pray that God would just seal our hearts in those moments of trust and faithfulness before we do.

8. Amazing Grace

Can you imagine 10,000 years and having no less days to sing God's praise? I can't! So, I love thinking about it anyways. Also, so many of the verses make me teary. Not even because of funerals, just because the words are so beautiful. 

7. How Great Thou Art

The words and music are beautiful and powerful. If you ever get in a room of Lutherans and hear them belt this song, you will cry and convert immediately (if you're not already a Lutheran).

6. We Are Called

I also sang this song too much, so I'm a little sick of it, but I just really love some of the words. Especially "Come, live in the light" and the last verse is my prayer for life: "Sing! Sing a new song! Sing of that great day when all will be one! God will reign and we'll walk with each other as sisters and brothers united in love!" So good. 

5. Christ Be Our Light

Look it up. You'll know why it's on this list.

4. In the Bleak Midwinter

This is my new fav. Christmas hymn. Verse one paints a picture of a cold, bleak, and desolate, and COLD place, and that's the place where Christ comes. The second verse is really beautiful: "Heaven cannot hold him, nor earth sustain. Heaven and earth will fade away when he comes to reign. In the bleak midwinter, a stable would suffice, the Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ." He's so awesome and wonderful that even HEAVEN cannot hold him, nor EARTH sustain, and then the place that Christ is born is in a barn, this insignificant and humble place. The third verse is just precious. 

3. When I Survey the Wondrous Cross

I first sang this song in our high school church choir and then I sang it as a solo at the last church I worked at. The second verse is gruesome, beautiful, and poetic: "See from his head, his hands, his feet, sorrow and love flow mingled down. Did e'er such love and sorrow meet? Or thorns compose so rich a crown?

2. Lord of All Hopefulness

We sang this song at our wedding too! It has the same tune as "Be Thou My Vision" (which is also my jam), but the words follow the different times of the day and how God is a part of all of it. We picked it for our wedding, because it was like a blessing that God would be with us through all of our life together, even the days that are just regular. 

1. Gather Us In

This is my fav hymn of all the hymns. First, I love Marty Haugen and everything he's ever composed. I love that God would gather us in, all of us- the rich, the haughty, the blind, the lame, the old, the young, the lost, the forsaken, the proud, the strong, all of us. I love the overall hopefulness that God's light is streaming into our lives right now. The last verse is my favorite: "Not in the dark of buildings confining, not in some heaven light years away- here in this place the new light is shining, now is the kingdom and now is the day." We can glimpse God's work in the world right now, it's right now, it's right here. 

I also have like a hundred other favorite hymns. Come and have a hymn sing with me any day. I will always love that.

Bonus points for anyone who counts how many times I wrote, "beautiful." I'm not sure what the points will be for, and I won't be able to tell you if you are right, because I'm not going to count them.

ALSO, look up all of these hymns! AND TELL ME YOUR FAVORITES! I'm not yelling, just excited. 

A glass of water by my bed

Every night before I go to bed I put a glass of water on my nightstand. I actually don't know that I would call it a nightstand, because I've never called it a nightstand before. I think I'd call it a tiny chest of drawers that's right next to my side of the bed. 

Anyways, I almost never drink the water. But I need it. If I don't have a glass of water by my bed, my mouth gets all dry and I can't stop thinking about drinking water.

Sometimes people say that it's in my head and that I'm not really thirsty. Well, that might be true. But when I don't have a glass of water by my bed, I don't care if I'm real thirsty or fake thirsty, I just want water.

So, I never sleep without a glass of water by my bed. We always want the things we can't have. I don't know if that's true, and it's only partially applicable to this- I just wanted to insert a deeper thought in at the end. But it is kind of true when it comes to water by my bed. If I can't have it, I want it. 

In all seriousness, we are so lucky to have access to clean water. I can write this sort of funny thing about how much I need water by my bed, but I can really have water any time I want. I've never really been real thirsty. Lots of people are real thirsty. It's a luxury that I can have a glass of water by my bed.

Copycat Waving

Sometimes I copy people by accident.

Sometimes I find myself saying, "oh, me too!" before I realize that it's not true at all. I hate lying, so I always confess, which can be weird.

Here's an example:

Friend: I'm so not a morning person.
Me: I know! Me neither! (internal thought process: wait, yes you are. Why did you say that? You hate staying up late. You're abnormally chipper in the morning... annoyingly so.)
Me, again: wait, yes I am.

This happens especially when I'm waving at people.  Without thought, I copy whatever kind of greeting they give me. They wave all big with a smile, you gotta know I'm waving equally as big with an equally big smile. If I get a casual, "hello," I say "hello" in the same tone. They do a 2003 head nod at me, they get one right back, sometimes accompanied by a "what up." If they start a high five, then I... that's actually not a good example.

I'm sure subconsciously I just want to connect with them in a way that makes them comfortable. But why can't I wave in a unique way?

You know in the movie "Runaway Bride" how Julia Roberts always changes the way she likes her eggs based on who she's engaged to? Maybe it's the same way for me, but with greetings. It's hard to know.

My Gratitude Journal

I don't want to write this blog today. Because it's 10:20 and I'm tired. When I'm tired, I don't want to do things. (Also Jesse's out of town and he has the computer, so I have to write this on my phone.)

And sometimes I have to make myself do things that matter instead of watching tv. Today is one of those days. I'm really grateful that I'm making myself write every day in this blog. I'm proud of the little discipline that I'm working on, and I'm proud of the way that I'm using my time. I'm proud of being a creator rather than a consumer for at least this part of my day. 

There are a lot of things in my life that are good for me, but I don't always want. For example, eating more salad and less nachos, exercising intentionally, reading more articles and books that matter and less online buzzfeed quizzes, you know?

One of the daily practices that I try to keep is writing in a gratitude journal. A friend of mine gave me this one several months ago, here's a pic:

Almost every night I don't want to write in it. I keep it by my bed so reflecting on the things I'm grateful can be one of the last things I think about each day. For some reason though, it's this giant burden to reach over and grab the journal and a pen and write. It takes me 2 minutes. I become more grateful and joyful. It's very convenient. This particular journal doesn't have many spaces to fill up and there's a spot for every day. It's so easy. I don't know why I don't want to take the time. That's a reflection for another day perhaps. But, the point is, I make myself write in it. Because it's important. And I makes me a more grateful person. And if I get "too tired" too many days in a row, I just might not remember for months to be grateful. 

Sometimes you have to do the things that are good for you, especially when you don't want to do them.

So I wrote this post, for discipline sake and because it's good for me.

Now I'm going to make myself write in my gratitude journal and go to sleep. 

Thanks for reading this, You! 

Celebrities I'm not willing to be a fan of because I won't lose hope of being their best friend

(...or at a least distant acquaintance)

• Mindy Kaling
• Ellen DeGeneres
• Amy Poehler
• Ellie Kemper
• Kristen Wiig
• Anna Kendrick
• Ike Barinholtz
• Jennifer Aniston
• Tina Fey
• Steve Carell
• Jennifer Lawrence 
• Jenna Fischer

It's not a very long list, because you really can't be everyone's best friend. 

I pretty much just love funny people (and people with great hair like Jennifer Aniston. She is funny though! She's funny AND she has nice hair. They're not mutually exclusive.) and this list of people are really fun (I'd imagine, since I've never met any of them. Actually, I sat near Steve Carell at the airport once, but I didn't know who he was at the time. Biggest regret of my life probably.) and really funny (I bet English majors are so mad at me for this "sentence").

I wish I knew how to act, because what I really need to do is be a on a hit comedy show. Then, we will develop our friendships over time, working together, laughing at all the hilarious jokes we have to say, and bonding. Or actually ACTUALLY, I need to learn how to write scripts, because then I could hang out with all of the funny people who write the funny things for the actors to say. 

Who has a connection to any of these people? Are they looking for a new best friend? Or how about an acquaintance? I can work with either scenario. But for real, I've got to know people who know people who know other people who know one of these celebrities.

What I Dislike About Winter

This winter hasn't been bad at all, but that doesn't mean I necessarily like it now. Here's a list of what I dislike about winter:

1. It's cold.
2. I don't like being cold.
3. It seems like a lot of work to leave the house at night time.
4. It takes me an additional 30 minutes to an hour to get ready in the morning: up to 30 minutes to convince myself to get out of the warm bed, 5 minutes to put on all the extra clothes I need to walk the dog, 15 minutes to blow dry my hair so that it won't freeze, 5-10 minutes to heat up the car, then get all the outside clothes on again.
5. Vitamin D deficiency.
6. Lethargy.
7. Walking back to the car after eating dinner out.
8. My family and friends in CA tell me about how it's been a FREEZING 60 degrees. I want to take this opportunity to remind all of you that freezing starts at 32 degrees and goes down from there.
9. Having to run outside to turn the car on so that I can leave in the morning.
10. My coffee gets cold instantly on my way to work.
11. It's not very sunny and that's sad.
12. Two days after it snows and everything looks gray and gross.
13. It gets dark at 5:00 pm.
14. Walking the dog in snow pants, snow boots, and a down parka.
15. You don't just want to sit outside on the deck.
16. I watch 100% more TV.
17. I feel fatter because I have to wear a lot more clothes.
18. You can't just bring a picnic lunch somewhere.
19. -20 degrees
20. All of the neighbors are inside and I don't get to chit chat with them while I'm walking the dog.

But so that I don't leave this on a pessimistic note, here's a couple things I DO like about winter:

1. When it snows, it's pretty.
2. It's fun to have a snowy Christmas.
3. Snowshoeing. 
4. Sitting in front of a fireplace.
5. Drinking coffee all day.
6. Always having a conversation starter with strangers.
7. No one judges you as much for watching Netflix all day.
8. Snow days.
9. It's kind of cozy if you're inside.
10. My winter coat that feels like I'm wearing a sleeping bag.
11. We seem to make chili a lot, and I like chili.
12. Walking in the woods at my in-law's house.
13. It's so hopeful when it stays light out until 6:00 pm.
14. I have better boundaries with work- I rarely stay in the office past 5 if I don't have a meeting. It's hard to convince yourself to keep working when it looks like bedtime.
15. Not feeling guilty about taking a Sunday afternoon nap.
16. Walking in the snow.
17. Winter hats.
18. Wine.
19. Ice skating outside.
20. Building snowmen.

Also, here's a list of things I'm grateful for, despite not liking winter:

1. A winter coat.
2. A house with heat.
3. A puppy that makes me go outside and enjoy the day.
4. A car.
5. My car has heat too.
6. I have warm food.
7. I have a space heater under my desk.
8. Every birthday or Christmas gift, Jesse has given me the right kinds of winter gear.
9. That automatic start exists for cars, and the hope that one day I could have that.
10. Heated insoles for my shoes.
11. Friends and family to hang out with and play games with inside.
12. Hot chocolate.
13. A working coffee pot.
14. Netflix
15. Books
16. A husband that really likes winter and can teach me more things to like about winter.
17. Calcium + Vitamin D gummies.
18. A family in CA to visit this time of year.
19. Seat warmers in the car.
20. If I ever get sad about winter, I can pretend that it's still December and listen to Christmas music, or really really pretend that the snow is just sand and I'm walking along some beach.

Medium Talk

I'm great at small talk. I love meeting people, finding out where they're from, what they do, who they know, etc. I am constantly meeting new people- networking groups I'm in, conferences, new families at church, friends of friends, camp, etc. so it's not uncomfortable for me to have initial conversations with people.

I also really enjoy deep and meaningful conversations with people. I love to have people teach me about their religious and political perspectives. I love hearing about big moments in peoples' lives that have shaped them and changed them. I love conversations where we get to know things about each other and conversation leads itself to sharing the important things to us.

What I'm not good at is the stuff in between, which I will call "medium talk." So, what I mean by medium talk is the next step up from small talk up to a few notches below we're good enough friends to figure out how to talk about things that matter. I don't really know how to ask questions in that zone in a way that doesn't feel forced or awkward for them or me. For example:

Me: Hey! How are you?
New friend: Good, how are you?
Me: Good! What's new?
New friend: oh not much.
Me: Cool!

I could maybe try "what are you doing this weekend?" after this, but if further conversation hasn't ensued after weekend talk, any get to know you kind of question I can think of is going to be WEIRD. Try out any of these after "cool!" and see if they wouldn't make you feel uncomfortable to ask or be asked.

• What's your family like?
• Are you happy in your job?
• What do you like to do?/ Do you have any hobbies?
• Do you have any pets?
• What would you do with a million dollars?
• What do you think about the political candidates?
• Have you seen any good movies lately?

You may have better questions than I do, and if you do, I bet you're better at medium talk than I am, because these are the kinds of questions I'm thinking of asking.

Since asking the questions I can think of are weird, my next two best choices are to:
a. Say, "great to see you!" and walk away to then hover at the snacks table (assuming I'm at a party with a snacks table.)
b. Talk about myself and hope something that I've just described will connect with them and they can build on it.

Both strategies work just fine, and I make it to real friend zone with plenty of people, but that middle zone is tough and awkward. Good medium talkers, how do you do it?

Our friendship is a legal adult

Rachel, Stephanie, and I became friends in seventh grade at confirmation. We all went to different schools at the time, but going to church twice a week brought us together. At first we were just church friends, and then we were all the time friends, and then we were pretty much a part of each other's families.

We've been through all of our awkward phases:

• Rachel's haircut in 1999.
• All of us trying to figure out how much of your eyebrows you should pluck.
• When Stephanie and I made our own costumes for the homecoming dance because it was medieval themed.
• Dramatic and uncomfortable encounters with boys, like that one time I broke up with Rachel's date for her over the phone and he never realized he was talking to me.
• When I wore about a quarter of an inch of eyeliner every day.
• Overall shorts, braids, and occasional tube socks.

Here's a list of some of the important things we've done/been through:

• high school graduations
• went on long trips together
• supported each other through loss
• grieved together
• annoyed each other like crazy
• made each other cry because of laughing too hard or being too sappy
• been to The Coffee Bean enough times to keep it in business
• shared faith together
• celebrated with each other on our 21st birthdays, and almost all of the ones from 12 years old until I moved away
• they stood up for me at our wedding
• drove around TO blasting Bohemian Rhapsody and wondering why we weren't the most popular girls in high school
• encouraged each other as we pursued the careers we had wanted since high school, and now we encourage each other because we have them,
• continued to be best friends and connected to each other, despite me living so far away from them

This year we will have been best friends for 18 years. Our friendship is old enough that it could buy a lottery ticket, go to college, or vote. We've been friends now much longer than we haven't. I am seriously grateful.

Here's some fun pics over the years: 

I love you guys! 

We'll be friends until we're old and senile... and then we'll be NEW FRIENDS!

Gray Hair, Don't Care. Yes I do.

I remembered at 2:30 this morning that I forgot to post yesterday. When I remembered, I was lying on the floor of a church's fellowship hall watching Guardians of the Galaxy with forty 7-12th graders. We had an all-nighter from 7 pm to 7 am. At 2:30 am I thought, I could still write something (even though it's not Friday anymore, I still haven't gone to sleep yet, so maybe that counts?), or I could just close my eyes for a minute. To help me decide, I closed my eyes, just to see what that would be like. It helped, because I just kept them closed. It's true what they say, sometimes not making a decision is making a decision.

Let me tell you about all-nighters. They hurt a lot. Kids are so fun and have so much energy. Kids love all-nighters, and so I love scheduling them for the students at our church. The day after is pretty rough though. I took a four hour nap and since then I've pretty much moped around the house like I have the flu. I'm really grateful and glad we did it, but I also know that every year I do these, they hurt more. Some people call this AGING.

When I first started at Our Saviour's, I was 23/24 years old. We had a lock-in at church (if you don't know what a lock-in is, it's this: essentially you play games and watch movies and sleep on the floor). I brought a cheap sleeping bag and pillow and bragged about how I didn't need some air mattress. I was a little self-righteous and was convinced I was not going to be one of those adults that wouldn't sleep on the floor with all of the kids. Why do they want so much comfort? (insert laugh/cry emoji) Then, I tried to sleep on the floor. You know what? It hurt. Everything hurt. I barely slept two hours. My muscles hurt. I think my bones hurt. My ego hurt. I learned something that day. Sleeping on the floor actually hurts your body. And I was at most 24.

Now that I'm almost 30, I'm much older and possibly wiser (insert two or three laugh/cry emojis). I'm short and people associate being short with being young. That's really weird to me, because how many people do you know that just keep getting taller with age? They don't. I stopped growing at 13, like most women. Some people are 40 and they're 5 feet. Some people are 15 and they're 6 feet. After like 13, height is not a good judge of how old you are. So why do people tell me every week that I look like I'm a teenager? I'm not really sure. They should look at my face and the top of my head more. There they will find wrinkles around my eyes and six or more gray hairs. I had five and plucked them all, and then six took their place. They don't seem to be deterred by being plucked.

I'm in a weird time in life where I am starting to see different signs of aging and I'm starting to experience that feeling of wanting to just halt at 29, but at the same time regularly need to defend (defend sounds a little more serious than I want it to, but I can't think of a different word. Because I'm tired. From the all-nighter. Because I'm aging.) my "being old enough" to do the work I've been called to do. How can you be not old enough and not want to age at the same time? I always wanted to be someone who embraced every sign of aging, because it would be a sign of a life well lived. But, I'm human, and sometimes I don't want gray hair and sometimes I want to be able to stay up all night or sleep on the floor and it to not hurt. But, like my dad and the Rolling Stones always say, "You can't always get what you want." :-)    

My High School Quote Book

Because I was a reflective and insightful high school student, in eleventh or twelfth grade I made a quote book where I could write down all of the cliches that changed my life. Check out the cover:

And, here are some of the quotes:

"When the door of happiness closes, another opens, but often times we look so long at the closed door that we don't see the one which has been opened for us." -An email forward

"When you were born, you were crying and everyone around you was smiling. Live your life so that when you die, you're the one who is smiling and everyone around you is crying." -A friendship book I had

"Every man dies. Not every man truly lives." -Braveheart (Also! Fun fact! In my way distant ancestry, our family is a relative of William Wallace!)

"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." -Eleanor Roosevelt, and this was quoted in The Princess Diaries, which is how I knew about it.

"When it is dark enough, you can see the stars." -Charles A. Beard (I still like this one a lot) (Also the internet also says that Ralph Waldo Emerson and Martin Luther King, Jr. also said this. I also just said this, so you can also quote me).

"Friends are angels who lift us up when our wings have forgotten to fly." -So many email forwards and AIM away messages.

"A smile is a curve that can set a lot of things straight." -My senior quote in our yearbook (also I spelled it "strait" in my quote book)

"At first you don't succeed, dust yourself off and try again." -Aaliyah

"Bart, with $10,000, we'd be millionaires. We could buy useful things like love." -Homer Simpson (that's still really funny)

"The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain." -Dolly Parton

Those are the funniest ones, but I had some pretty good quotes in there too, like:

"You will find as you look back upon your life, that the moments when you have truly lived, are the moments when you have done things in the spirit of love." -Henry Drummond  

"Optimism and hope are radically different attitudes. Optimism is the expectation that things- the weather, human relationships, the economy, the political situation, and so on- will get better. Hope is the trust that God will fulfill God's promises to us in a way that leads us to true freedom. The optimist speaks about concrete changes in the future. The person of hope lives in the moment with knowledge and trust that all of life is in good hands." -Henri Nouwen.

"While optimism makes us live as if someday soon things will go better for us, hope frees us from the need to predict the future and allows us to live in the present, with the deep trust that God will never leave us alone but will fulfill the deepest desires of our heart." -Henri Nouwen. (WAY TO GO eleventh grade me for having TWO Henri Nouwen quotes!)

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that." -Martin Luther King, Jr.

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could, some blunders and absurdities have crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; you shall begin it serenely, and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your own nonsense." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

What were your fav. quotes in high school?

The world needs people who have come alive

"Don't ask yourself what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is people who have come alive." Howard Thurman.

This quote is hanging up in my office, so I remember every day to do the things that make me come alive.

Lately one of the things that brings me the most joy is to see people doing things they love, and watch them loving it openly and proudly. It's almost like watching little kid version of them. Which I guess sometimes means, the less reserved, the less scared, the less embarrassed, less guarded, etc. part of them.

I remember a girl in seventh grade choir who loved to sing. I knew that she loved to sing because every day she would close her eyes and get really into the music. I didn't appreciate how beautiful it was to watch her love singing.

We had a swing set on my college campus. One of my best friends and I would go swinging almost every day. Sometimes we would go in the afternoon while the football players were practicing across the street. Then she'd start singing, really loud. People would walk by, going to class. I was always a little too shy and a little too embarrassed to join her, but I loved watching her be ridiculous and awesome and love life and be so much braver than me to sing when she wanted to sing, and swing when she wanted to swing (I added that second part for rhyming sake).

When have you seen people really loving something?

I can think of so many. Here's a few:

1. A friend who loves snorkeling so much.
2. Harry Potter fans everywhere.
3. Friends who love reading all day.
4. My family that love-love-loves Disney.
5. My sister and her husband who dance in public all the time.
6. Friends who love doing theater and improv.
7. My BFFs from home who are doing the jobs they dreamed of doing when they were little.
8. Pastor friends preaching.
9. My dad's love for his workplace, Costco.
10. My mentor's genuine love for working with youth.
11. My other mentor who starts half of her conversations with, "Do you know so-and-so? I just LOVE them!"
12. A woman at my church who has just been freed to ask all kinds of questions about faith and the joy that she has asking them.
13. My husband who loves '90s rap.
14. Friends that love going to school and love learning.

It's not just that they love things. They love things without wondering how others will feel about their love of that thing. I don't know how else to describe it, but it seems like what "coming alive" is like.

"Try this!" or "I Lava You"

I get really excited about things. Sometimes it's a movie, sometimes it's some new health kick I've gotten on, sometimes it's a restaurant, sometimes it's some new invention that I've just learned exists. And when I get excited about something, I tell everyone that they should try and/or know about that thing.

Here's a recent list of things I've needed to tell everyone about obsessively:

• essential oils
• the soda stream
• sparkling water in general
• Chromecasts to older adults that don't know about them
• the excellent happy hour prices at Bonfire
• preaching without a manuscript (but cautiously, because I don't want to come off pretentious)
• The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt
• our Wednesday night meals at church
• Vino in the Valley (it's a restaurant in Wisconsin)
• neti pots
• Zicam
• Daiya- fake cheese that melts
• The Mindy Project
• wanting to be best friends with Mindy Kaling
• Brene Brown and all of her books
• Nadia Bolz-Weber and the way she talks about God

There are more. 

Last summer I went to see the movie Inside Out. Did you see it? Do you remember the Pixar short before it? Lava?? It's so good. I listened to that song on repeat for weeks and made everyone who got in my car listen to it on repeat with me. I also was a little obsessive about Inside Out, but not quite as much as Lava.

Actually, wait. Listen to this. If you've already listened to it, listen again.

Is that not the CUTEST? Volcanoes falling in LOVE! And with such a good pun!!! I lava you. 

My sister even made me this for Christmas:

I really lava it and her.

I get really excited about things that I like and really want others to know about them too. I figure, if I had a good/meaningful/happy/etc. experience, I want to be able to give other people a good/meaningful/happy/etc. experience too. It's like a gift!

So, if I've told you to try something, know about something, watch something, listen to something somewhat obsessively and possibly was a little too pushy about it, just know that I was trying to give you a gift. My heart was in the right place.   

One time we said the dog would never sleep in our bed

We did say that, a while ago. When we first got our ridiculous pup, Autumn, she slept in her kennel every night. But, promptly at 5:45 or 6:00 am she'd start crying and barking until we let her out. She did this for about a year. And we hated 5:45 am. Then we decided to see how she'd do if we put her bed on the floor of our room. She let us sleep until 7:30 or 8 even! This was a miracle.

But she seemed to think the floor was still a little too far away from us, so in the middle of the night she'd hop right in the middle of the bed, in between us. We always said we would never let our dog in bed with us, but when you wake up and there's a cute puppy snuggling with you, you're not going to make her move.

One time I woke up to Autumn's head right by my head. Somehow when I was sleeping she had crept into the bed with us, got under the covers, and was now sharing a pillow with me. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? It was the cutest. And now we are *those* people.

Everyone always says they're not going to let their dogs sleep in bed with them, and everyone always caves. Because puppies are so cute and sneaky. (Even as I'm typing this, Autumn quietly sneaked into our room and stole one of my slippers and I couldn't even be mad because she looked really cute doing it.) If we're not careful, soon we're going to be sleeping on the floor next to the bed, or in our own kennel until we cry.

Look at these pictures and tell me you could say no to her.

My Phone is Spontaneously Calling You

Today at church we talked about temptation, because we were looking at the assigned gospel text which was about Jesus being led out to into the wilderness and being tempted by the devil (Luke 4:1-13). 

I started thinking if there were a new TV show called "Temptation," you'd just assume it was some kind of racy show where people were almost cheating on their significant others (but somehow they'd make you feel like it was alright, and then you'd be mad about being tempted to think that it were okay). If I were going to create a new TV show called, “Temptation,” it would be about a girl who just made a new year's resolution to eat better, but then she's constantly put in situations where her friends are eating the largest, most delicious piece of cake, and they're really generous so they keep offering her pieces of it. That might be better for a mini-series or a Pixar short. 

Temptation for me is about instant gratification, and being distracted from what we actually want, need, or hope for, or from who we want to be. It's about the desire to walk away, even for a second, from the lasting things of life to the not lasting ones. Sometimes it's cake. Sometimes it's more damaging. In a more faith-ful perspective, temptation is the desire to walk away from God. For me, little or nothing is lasting besides God, so anytime I want to put my faith somewhere else, even for a second, that's temptation.   

When I'm in a situation where someone is talking about someone else with me, I can be tempted to join in. It might be because I'm already feeling uncomfortable about myself, or maybe that I just want to connect with the person talking with me, or that I'm feeling nervous about calling the other person out, or I get swept up in the temporary good feelings of passive aggressively venting, or some other reason. This is just an anxious habit (but it's also my conscience), but if I give into that temptation, I start getting really nervous that the person is standing right behind me, so I look over my shoulder every other second. The funnier thing that I do is check my phone a lot. Even though I've never owned a smart phone that has pocket-dialed someone, I'm convinced that my phone has spontaneously called the person that I've said something about and they've heard the whole conversation (I also check my phone a lot if I'm belting some song or talking to myself, and saying weird things that I'd be mortified to discover someone had heard... that doesn't totally apply to the rest of this post, but I wanted to include it). I take this as my red flag that I'm heading down a path that I'm not going to like. I don't know that I've ever said something unkind about someone else and felt good about it later. I mess up plenty, but that pit in my stomach usually tells me pretty quick when I've acted in a way that stands in contrast with who I want to be. 

Before I get all preachy, I'll stop there. :-) I guess what I'd want to leave with you all today is to choose the lasting and important things in your life. One way to do this is to randomly dial people in your phone and make sure that you like they you they're hearing. Or to not own a phone? Temptation is tricky.

Nachos

I love nachos. I probably eat nachos for half of my meals every week. And I'm just not even kidding. We almost always have leftover Mexican food, because I can pretty much cook one meal, and that's some version of a burrito. Jesse asks me to make burritos usually once a week. I'm not sure if it's because he likes when I make them or if he just knows that's the meal I can make. I think it's probably the latter. That's really nice of him actually.

So with all those leftovers, I make nachos.

Dairy is my unrequited love. I love it, but it doesn't love me back. It makes nachos difficult. But, I found fake cheese at the store and it even melts, and if you put enough other ingredients on top of it, you can't even tell that much that it's fake.

If I had all of the ingredients that I wanted, here's what my nachos would look like: tostitos scoops, daiya cheddar not actually cheese, refried beans with the green chilis in them, shredded chicken, guacamole, sour surpreme (fake sour cream), salsa, and taco bell fire sauce. I would put other vegetables on it if they were available and other people were watching me, but if I were alone, I'd skip them.

We had my brother-in-law's birthday party at our house tonight, and guess what we ate? NACHOS. We were talking about how nachos taste so delicious, but the minute you mix them up, they look disgusting. Like a plate of tan goop. But then, you keep eating them anyways.

Every night I try to write in my gratitude book and I write down at least five things that I am grateful for from that day. I went back and read a bunch of them the other day, and I wrote nachos down so many times. It's probably because I make nachos right before bed several times a week. Jesse says that is one of the worst things I can do. I think it's one of the best things, because I go to sleep so happy and grateful.

Guys, this is kind of boring. I'm bored at least. But, I'm also proud of myself for thinking of so many things to say about nachos. I actually think I could add a few more paragraphs, but I won't, because I want you to keep liking me.

A Post About Posts

I brainstormed a list of titles of posts the other day, so that I could just pick them instead of trying to think of something to write about each day. I think that if I ever became famous and wrote a book about random things I was thinking about, these would be the chapter titles.

Here's some of the list so far:

1. Nachos

2. Unfunny Funny Jokes

3. If I had enough money, I'd pay myself to be a comedian.

4. Making Jesse talk to me before bed

5. Gray hair, don't care. Yes I do.

6. Theological Questions

7. I want to be...

8. Our friendship is a legal adult

9. Yes, yes, yes, yes... NO.

10. Things I hate about the winter

11. Things I'm nostalgic about.

12. My favorite hymns and WHY

13. Sometimes I don't feel like talking.

14. I'm not very good at buffets.

15. "How old are you?" and "If I had a dollar"

16. Celebrities that I refuse to be fans of because I will not lose hope of being their best friend

17.   Joy vs. Happiness

18. One time we said the dog would never sleep in our bed

19. My high school quote book

20. The world needs people who come alive

21. Friendship over basic needs

22. My phone is spontaneously calling you

23. What I miss about home

24. Restless leg syndrome and other diagnoses I've given myself

25. Is this blog helping me become friends with Mindy Kaling?

26. Clever Funny vs. Gross Funny and/or Ellen vs. other comedians

27. I love giving money away

28. My sisters

29. Try this!

30. You should read Brene Brown's books

31. Pizza Luce brunch

32. Tubing and funny fears

33. That time I almost drowned

34. I'm scared of talking about politics.

35. Copycat waving

36. The Extravaganza

37. Being clairvoyant

38. You don't need good grammar all the times.

39. Gratitude journal

40. A Haiku

41. A Short Story

42. Learning Spanish

43. Things that I experience as a pastor

44. Medium Talk

45. I use my cell phone as a mirror

46. Seasons

47. I'm scared of what my future children will be able to do

48. Sometimes I want to learn how to hunt, in case there is an apocalypse

49. Pinterest Christmas

50. Time-giver

51. A letter to everyone I love.

52. A glass of water by my bed

53.  Will you be my ducky wucky?

54. Sermon-writing process

55. Crying at Disneyland

I might not even use them. Or I might! 

Give it up for... Lent!

I started a blog!

And I'm going to let people see it!

I've started a few blogs before, but always got too nervous to tell anyone about them or write more than one post. So, for Lent this year (aka until Easter), I'm going to make myself post something every day as a practice.

Here's what I hope happens:
1. I get a little braver.
2. I will have to do something creative every day.
3. I will follow through with something that makes me nervous.
4. Maybe people who read this will get a little chuckle out of it, because I plan to only be about 10% serious (THAT'S HOW I CAME UP WITH THE NAME). I want this to be light-hearted and random, like me.
5. Maybe I'll even want to keep doing this?

THANKS GUYS!

Also, whenever I hear the phrase, "give it up for Lent," I re-say it in my head with an announcer voice and imagine everyone is clapping and cheering for Lent. If you don't get it, I'll say it out loud to you next time.