The Jesus Year

This year me and most of my friends are turning 33. There are several years that have special things about them:

1: obvi
5: half way to 10
10: double digits
13: teenager
16: sweet 16
18: adult-ish
21: adult
22: when all year you get to sing Taylor Swift
23: what’s my age again?
25: quarter of a century
30: grown up adult
... then there’s
33: the Jesus year

I’ll stop there because I’m typing this on my phone and because we’ve arrived at the actual point of this post: that 33 is the Jesus year.

I’ve heard that scholars think Jesus was about 33 when he was crucified. So, when all my friends who are already 33 or turned 33 when I knew them, I told them, “oh, you’re the same age as Jesus when he died (and lived again, and destroyed the power of death, etc. etc. I didn’t add that last bit, but maybe I should’ve).”

Well, that’s it really. The Jesus year. It’s coming in like 6.5 months for me.

Outloud Thinker

I'm an outloud thinker most of the time. It's got its pros and cons.

Pros:

• I don't often have a shortage of words (arguably, the introverts would think that's really a con).
• I enjoy talking to people and processing things together.
• Sometimes I say things that others don't want to say or don't think to say. For example, I am quick to say sorry when I should say sorry and quick to share my appreciation for someone or their gifts. Those are some of my values, but also, if I thought it, I'll tell you.
• Starting conversations with random strangers isn't too difficult.
• You get to hear my train of thought, which I guess could be a pro, depending on whether you wanted to know it or not.
• You don't really have to guess what I'm thinking much.
• I can "write" a sermon by talking to myself in the car.
• Public speaking is pretty comfortable for me. 

Cons:

• I say things before I've thought them through.
• I put my foot in my mouth often.
• What I say right away isn't always the final product, so you've got to listen longer to figure out what I really think, or where I was trying to go with that thought (that's not necessarily a con unless you're impatient or generally reactive).
• I stew about things until I've said them outloud.
• Introverts don't really want to engage in whatever thoughts I have as long as I do.
• I can't always make sense of things or make a decision until I've processed it outloud. It's hard to make snap decisions in situations that aren't wise for me to think it through outloud.
• It's difficult to have private thoughts. I have them, but not that many.
• I interrupt a lot, because I get too excited to say a thing I thought.
• Sometimes I think outloud into a microphone during church and that is probably a pro and a con.
• From Jesse after I asked him what he thought the pros and cons were: "con: standing around listening longer than you wanted to, when all you wanted to do was go get some ice cream."

Well, there are more cons written down than pros, but I like being an outloud thinker. I think it's a decent way to think, and I'm going to keep doing it. 

Thesis statement

Here’s a working thesis I have: often the difference between a comedian and an uncomfortable over-sharer is delivery.

Feel free to ponder and/or debate.

Spring Hope

It seemed like an extra long winter this year. Especially the last two months with alllllllll the snow. Here's a list of things that make me hopeful that it won't be winter forever:

• Birds, just hearing and seeing them again
• Minnesotans identifying the birds, and various trees, again.
• Snow melting off the street
• Puddle rivers by the curb
• Seeing patches of grass again
• Sunshine
• Going outside in the thinnest coat or not even wearing a coat to walk in and out of buildings
• Not remembering where my snow pants are
• The forecast having a 60 degree day tucked in there
• Knowing what our yard looks like now
• Sunny after 5, and especially hopeful when it was still sunny at 7:30!
• Not having to dress our son in 60 layers to play outside
• Wanting ice cream

Momma's Fancy Shoes + Tool Set

Our two year old likes to play with toys. Here's a list of some of his favs:

• Things that aren't toys: kitchen supplies he can sneak out of the bottom drawers, Dad's tools, bracelets that I haven't worn in 15 years but I still keep in a drawer, Harry Potter books I keep not putting away, pens, magnets, "momma's fancy shoes," rakes, shovels, etc.
• His tool set, especially the drill
• His other tool set
• His other other tool set
• Mardi Gras beads that a lady from church handed out the day before Ash Wed. (Fat Tues? Shrove Tues? ...also what's a shrove?)
• This tray of rice we have that he can scoop with cups and spoons
• His baby
• "Big Bear" (a giant teddy bear)
• Daniel Tiger trolley
• Mimi (Jesse's teddy bear from when he was a baby that Aaron's claimed as his own and named Mimi)
• Easel that has a white board on one side and a chalkboard on the other
• His small kitchen
• Instruments
• Stackable cups
• His make-up bag (it has empty make up containers, an old blush brush, contact cases and empty contact solution, etc. I made his own because he always wants mine.)
• Cars
• His train (it's like one of those toy tunnel/tent things... it has a ball pit included)
• These little animal bath toys that squirt water out of their stomachs

He likes toys. He doesn't like "boy toys" more than he likes "girl toys." He wouldn't know what the differences were anyways. Want to know why? Because they're toys. And he's two. And there aren't any differences between them, we made those things up. 

I really appreciate seeing my kiddo wearing "momma's fancy shoes" (high heel boots are his fav) and playing with his drill and hammer. I'm pretty glad that these weird lines that we made up to are getting a little blurrier. 

Joy > Happy

Want to know my soapbox? It's pretty much this: happiness is an emotion and it's fleeting, joy is not. Joy is more like gratitude and grace and peace, and also it's a paradox because you can have it at the same time as grief and loss and pain.

I get that it's a weird soapbox to have, but it also seems really important in a culture of people chasing after happiness. Because I'm just not sure we can get it, at least no more than we can get anger or frustration or sadness or silliness or other emotions people can have. They're all fleeting, and when I'm feeling particularly introspective (and joyful, probably), I think that the complexity of human emotions is beautiful. And even though I'd never wish to have the grief that I've had in my life, I'm grateful that I've been able to see it as lovely. Loss aches so much because of love, and I'm really glad that I've gotten to love a bunch of people.

Here's my fav. song about joy that I have only ever found in Ascension's Senior Luther League Songbook:

JOY

Sing when your spirit is down
Run when your mind is weary
Love when the world despises you
And pray, to receive a very strong feeling
and a very strong mind
and a friendship that will last a very long time.

Trust when you've given up hope
Wait when you are impatient
Give when your goods mean much to you
And look to the cross on calvary,
it will give you a peace
and a lifetime of a joy that never will cease.

Socks on Hands

Kids sometimes do weird things. Like how our kid likes to sleep with his socks on his hands. We don't know why. He would periodically do this when we were driving to the store- he'd pull off his shoes and socks and then put his socks on his hands. It was kind of funny, but also frustrating when he'd do that in between every stop while running errands. I don't really want to put his shoes on 5 times in one hour.

Recently he started going to a new daycare and apparently he's been starting to do the socks on hands thing at naptime.

Then he asked for them for bedtime.

It's a little weird and I don't know if I should readily provide him socks to do this, but also he's 2 and not always the best sleeper, and sometimes we get desperate. If we have any indication that there's something working for better sleep, we do that thing.

One time he had a good sleeping through the night stretch and the only thing I could think of that we had done was place his cabbage patch doll ("Baby") and his bear ("Mimi"- he named him) next to his crib so they could "keep an eye on him." We just kept doing that for like a month, and we even found a big enough bag to shove Baby and Mimi in so they could come with us to California in December. That stopped working (if it ever actually was the thing that was working), so you gotta know we've been trying socks on hands in the middle of the night these days.

Speaking of sleeping, I need to do that now.

My socks will remain on my feet though.

Fav Outfit

Here's what my fav outfit for the current weather:

• jeans
• tank top
• zip up sweatshirt, 1-2 sizes larger than the rest of my clothes
• socks
• slippers

It's especially my favorite outfit on Sunday afternoons. I don't really like being dressed up, and I am usually dressed up on Sunday mornings. I have a pair of boots with heels. They hurt my feet a lot, but I like that I can wear socks with high heels and also that my pants don't drag on the floor as much. When I get home, the first thing I do is throw those terrible shoes in the back of the closet and put on the trusty jeans-sweatshirt-slipper combo.

Did You Drink Water?

My answer for most ailments or possible ailments is: how much water did you have? Maybe go have another glass of water?

Does your head heart? Drink some water.

Tummyache (you're allowed to call a stomach a tummy when you're talking to a small child and also when it has an ache)? Drink some water.

Tired? Water.

Stuffy nose? Drink more water.

You had two glasses of wine? That's not an ailment, but just drink at least two glasses of water just in case. Some 32-year olds get tummyaches pretty easy.

Well, it's possible there's only really a handful of things. But they're pretty common ones.

Mostly, drink a bunch of water. It's good for you.

Here's some water options I like:

1. Sparkling

2. In a Nalgene

3. Hot, in a cup, like having a cup of tea, but with no tea.

4. With cucumbers

5. With mint

6. With lemon

7. In a can labeled La Croix, but that's only in a pinch. And the pinch is that I ran out of the carbonator thing for my soda stream.

8. Filtered.

9. Bottled. Scratch that. I don't want to waste bottles, but I really like that mineral-y taste that you can get.

10. From Jesse's bottle, when I forgot mine.

11. Used to make coffee*

So, there are some ideas for ya.

*While it would be delicious to exclusively get your water intake from #11, that much caffeine will probably make you crazy and sick.  

 

YOLO. Exactly.

Do people still say YOLO? (Fam, it stands for You Only Live Once)

Well, for the sake of this, if they don't, think back to like a year ago when they did, or maybe two. I don't know. I have a kid. I'm too tired for trends.

People usually say it when they're about to do something risky or stupid. *Insert risky and stupid things people might want to do* It's like a "what have I got to lose?" or "this is my chance to try this ridiculous thing," "I think people might think I'm brave after I try this" kind of thing... YOLO, might as well try it.

Here's what I think: you only live once. Why are you going to risk your perfectly okay, possibly even great, life? To me, YOLO should really be reframed. YOLO, how are you going to be the kind of person you're proud of? How are you going to care for your family and your community? YOLO, are you caring for yourself in a way that gives some hope for a long life or that demonstrates you think life is precious? YOLO, maybe you want to watch less TV and try not to mindlessly scroll on the internet? YOLO, maybe you'll be risky in the important ways- like loving someone else, like sharing who you are, standing up for those who are vulnerable or looked over, or taking steps to live out a dream you've had? YOLO.

So, how are you going to do it?

Home & Garden Show + The Art of Saying No

A few weeks ago we went to the Home & Garden Show- it is this giant event where a zil home improvement vendors have displays and pamphlets to give you and try to convince you to hire them to do whatever home improvement project you might have. We took all the pamphlets. The other thing I did... I did (Jesse was smart enough to never do this)... was enter a bunch of contests to win a free bathroom, free basement renovation, new patio, etc. I knew I wasn't going to win, but I put my name and all my contact info on like 10 sheets just in case. I did not win a free bathroom, free basement renovation, or a new patio. But I have received several phone calls cornering me into a free consultation. And now I have some real life practice saying no to people. It's good for me because I'm not good at saying no normally. But, I'll probably get several more contractor-like vendors calling me soon to say no to. Practice makes perfect.

3 Awkward Pics

Sometimes there are these very quick viral posts that go around- like the one where you were supposed to show your first fb pic and your last, or the one where you were supposed to pick three characters that described who you are, or there was another one where you picked your celeb doppleganger. You know these kinds of things. There's like a million of them. I had an idea for one: three awkward pics. You just pick your three most awkward pics and everyone laughs because we're all a little awkward.

I'm not sure if these are the three I'd pick, but here's three pretty awkward ones:

That was way more than 3. I got carried away, but also I didn't even look that hard. They were all old profile pics from fb. I think that says a lot about me, actually. What do you think are the top 3 here? I know I probably have even more awkward pics if I kept looking. This is why I never tried to start a thing. 

Please Don't Pick Your Nose

...that's just a good rule in general, I think. At least in public. But also in private if you haven't washed your hands. My number one fear of all time is throwing up, and I'm HYPER aware of how stomach bug germs spread. During the late fall through early spring, I just assume stomach flu germs are on everything. So, if I touch anything without washing my hands, I assume that the stomach flu germs are on my hands. And if they're on my hands, I know that if I rub my eyes, pick my nose, or put my fingers in my mouth without washing them... I just put all the stomach flu germs in my body. So, I don't do that, and I wash my hands about 3x more than people should. I'm really walking the line between cautious and crazy. In conclusion, don't pick your nose. And, like, keep a hand santizer around.

Christmas Cards

Let me show you what our Christmas cards looked like this year:

They said Merry Christmas on them too with some fancy font. You didn't get one though. No one did. 

I decided this year to be so smart with our money and get the best deal. I found a groupon for holiday cards- $25 for 100 cards. That's really the cheapest I've seen, plus I had some promo code I could use- so I got a voucher for 100 cards and spent maybe $16? I was so excited. I told a lot of people about my sweet deal.

Then I went to buy our cards. I logged in to printerpix. 

Yes.

Printerpix.

That was the red flag.

It took me several tries and one online chat with a support person, but eventually I could place the order, and so I clicked on 2 sets of 50 cards.

Two weeks later, on Christmas eve, our package of cards arrived. It was really light. Too light. Maybe a proof? I opened it. There were two cards and two envelopes. Just the two.

Shipping was $10 I think. 

It's hard to know if they switched the quantities from 50 to 1 or if it was user error, but I'm pretty sure I did it right. I emailed the company asking for them to print new cards for me and they said they could help if I paid them another $7 for shipping. I didn't trust them and it's like March now, so I just swallowed the $25 I spent on 2 cards (that I also kept, so I wouldn't have to pick who got them, and mostly because I lost them).

Merry Christmas! (if you've been waiting to hear it from me) 

 

I Might Have Told You This Story Before

My family and I have a real gift for telling the same stories over and over again. If it's a good one, tell it again. Oh the person you're telling it to says they've heard it before? Go ahead and pretend you didn't hear them say that and tell it louder. It's the way we like to do it. Jesse and I have been together over ten years now, so he's on his 4th, 5th, 10th telling of some of my stories. My dad has 10 go-to stories that I can recite by heart and sometimes I do while he's telling them. My mom and I talk on the phone all the time and will regularly have several of the same conversations. But they're good ones, and I like them, so why not go through it again?

I do a sort of lie regularly. I say things like, "I might have told you this story before" which means I've DEFINITELY told you this story before, but for some reason it seems like I should tell it again, and you'll be more receptive to it if I acknowledge that you might have heard it before I tell it.

Aaron's learning the family skill. His first story he pieced together was this fall when he was just starting to talk. He figured out how to say "bird, Autumn, eat... no no no!" Can you guess what happened? Our dog, Autumn, tried to eat a bird that was stuck in my in-law's indoor porch and we yelled, "no no no" and got the bird out before she could get it. He covered all the highlights, really. He told that story over and over and over and over again.

Here's another example: on Saturday we went to Chipotle and he fell off his chair and bonked his head. After he calmed down, he walked up to everyone at our table and told them individually, "Fell off chair. Bonked head. Cry." and to several other patrons that he didn't know. And later to me again, and Jesse when he got home.

I don't really know how to conclude this one, I thought it might be funny if I just copy and pasted everything up until this point, but I guess I think it's funnier to tell you that than actually doing it. 

Low Carb for a Better Carb

I don’t really like juice. It’s really sugary. And has a bunch of calories. And it’s not even cake. I figure, if I’m going to have a bunch of calories and sugar, I’m going to at least be able to chew it and it should have chocolate frosting. 

Sometimes I eat less carbs, so I can have better carbs later. Like today: I had a protein shake for breakfast, a chicken wrap on a low carb tortilla and vegetables for lunch... and then had 1000 sushi rolls, wine and some chocolate truffles for dinner. I don’t think I did this wrong. I just redistributed all of the carbs... to the time of day when they’re likely not to be burned off... but  still. Low carb, for a better carb. 

One more time, or two or three.

Hello! I'm going to do this blog again for Lent. It turns out that I really like writing about random stuff for six weeks out of the year. I made a list of topics the other day, but I can't really figure out what I meant by 1/3 of them, so that adds an extra layer of creativity.

I started this blog 3 or 4 years ago because I wanted to do something creative and I thought it would be a good practice in being brave/vulnerable/etc. It was. I keep thinking that I won't do this blog again the next year, but then I think of a bunch of topics I could write about. I figure I'll stop when I stop thinking of things I could say.

Here's what I've got so far for possible posts:

1. Christmas Cards
2. Manna
3. Book Titles
4. Endurance
5. Please Don't Pick Your Nose
6. Last Meal
7. Low Carb for Better Carb
8. Did You Drink Water?
9. 3 Worst Pics
10. Questions I Have Right Now
11. Questions I'm Going to Ask
12. Funny Things Aaron Says
13. Delivery/ Say It Right
14. Fav Outfit
15. Things My Parents Taught Me
16. The Jesus Year
17. What Harry Potter Character Are You and Why?
18. Good Looks Throughout the Years
19. How Do You Learn to Be Afraid of Something?
20. Momma's Fancy Shoes + Tool Set
21. Spring Hope
22. Skinny Mirror
23. Outloud Thinker
24. The Gym
25. Things that Always Make Me Cry
26. Fragments
27. A List of Things that Made Aaron Cry
28. YOLO. Exactly.
29. Repeats 
30. Holy Moment
31. Arm?
32. ABCs
33. Home & Garden Show + The Art of Saying No
34. Good Lines in Hymns
35. Predictive Text
36. Socks on Hands
37. Inside Joke Book
38. I Might Have Told You This Story

If you have some other good ideas, tell me!