Valentines Day

Valentines Day. Some may say it's commercial. Infact I think almost every man you ask would say it's commercial. My husband has said this in the past. I have a couple of Valentine stories I am going to tell here.

One year while I was still a newlywed. Joe bought me roses. I was so excited, they were beautiful, and I was young and in love. We got married in January, and this was our first Valentine as husband and wife. Well I went to work the next day and while I was gone, Joe placed my new roses outside in the sun!!! I walked up to our apartment and to my suprise, my flowers were sitting on the pourch! 1 day! I had my flowers for 1 DAY! I was very upset, as you can imagine. Joe said he thought they needed some sun! ugh!!!

The next story that comes to my memory is about Br. Saul. My husband worked with him while we were living in Colton. This man has a very, VERY conservative nature. He could be discribed as very thrifty. I have met him and his wife, and they are very much in love. He is a great provider to his family and his wife is a stay at home mother to their 3 children. Joe asked him what he was getting his wife for Valentines Day. I am sure they discussed the topic over their eight hour shift, many times, but it came down to this one statement, that my husband thought was very clever. "I love my wife everyday of the year, I don't need a special day to show her." When he came home and told me this I yelled "What a cop out! I can't believe someone would say that!" Bro Saul's wife recieved a beautiful Valentines gift that year. Joe was later quoted as saying that Bro Saul said, "That comment about Valentines day was just a cop out!" Can you believe it? We have laughed about this story many times, and acutally are both laughing about it right now. LOL

My next story isn't so funny, but more romantic. Have you ever heard of the song "The Twelve Days of Christmas?" Well, I had the three days of Valentine, last year. My wounderful husband brougt me flowers to work 3 days in a row. A different flower every day with the Roses coming on Valentines Day. I have a beautiful picture of my roses that I will try to add to this post at a later time. By far the best roses I have ever recieved. They were saved from a day in the sun too! (I acutally said that to him, DON'T PUT THEM IN THE SUN!) They lived beuatifully for 14days, when one by one they slowly died away, the last one at day 18.

This year was different. I was at work anticipating what would happened on this special day. Some of the other girls I work with recieved there flowers by 9AM. I didn't recieve any. I wasn't sad, because of the flowers that I recieved last year, and the romantic I know my husband to be, I knew there would be something coming. When he came home I was already making dinner, and he came in and there was nothing in his hands, I felt a little crushed. It didn't help that I was starting to feel under the weather. But true to form, he went and got the gift he had already bought me. A box of my favorite candy, SEE'S Truffles. We have been married nine years and he got it just right today. But no flowers. I wasn't mad, maybe a little disappointed. Then he gave me another bag. I pulled out "Garfield-large and in charge!" I had told him weeks ago that I wanted it, but until then I had forgotten. I was so excited, I jumped up had hugged him and yelled, "You just redemed yourself!", "From what?" he said. "I was sad I didn't get flowers this year, but now I AM HAPPY!" I was very excited. I guess men do listen sometimes, huh?

The moral of the story is, some men MAY treat there wives like they are a queen year round. But to be truthful to you, I like being treated like a queen on Valentines day, for one reason. If I was treated like every day was Valentines day EVERYDAY, then it wouldn't be special. I love my husband, he's a great provider, soul mate and friend. I wouldn't trade him for anyone else. God knows what we all need, and when I needed him, God sent him to me. GOD saved me, but he used this man to point me in the right direction. I thank GOD for my husband.

RESPONSIBILITY

"Nothing strengthens the judgment and quickens the conscience like individual responsibility"
Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Judgment-A formal utterance of an authoritative opinion.
Responsibility-Moral, leagal, or mental accountability.

This quote caught my eye today. It was on (of all things) my box of caffeine free tea I was making. I started to think about the things we are responsible for. The things that I am responsible for I am accountable for, but to who? Morally I am responsible to the people around me. Leagally I am responsible to follow the laws of the state and town I live in. Mentally I am responsible for the chocies I make in my life.
I want to be sure that morally I am doing the things that will please God. God lays down the foundation for our Moral standards in life. Without God in my life where would I learn a standard of living? Does not the bible teach us that we are to abide by the laws of this land? Are we not to give the rulers of our nation support and prayers? Legally I need to be a responsible citizen.
Now what about mental accountability? I have a personal responsibility to God to exercise my "free will" in a way that will please HIM. Everyday, I have to make a choice to follow his way, and live my life in a way that I can be found "Holy and acceptable" in his sight.
God is at the very essence of the aspects of responsibility. You can turn everyone of these aspects selfishly inward, and someone who doesn't believe in God, can find that very easy to do, but for a child of God, our responsibility needs to be focused on HIM.

I want to be able to focus on what God wants me to focus on and not what others are doing/not doing. I want the Judgment in my life to be self focused, and I want to be responsible and accountable for my actions. In this way I will find strength in God.

Starbucks

Today is the first day of our church wide caffine and sugar fast. I thought a lot about it last night. I even thought about going to starbucks last night on the way home from church, since the fast starts today. We didn't go, but I thought about it.

This morning I woke up and had a thought about coffee, like I do every morning. Then I remembered the fast, no Starbucks this morning. I got the kids to school and as I was driving a thought hit my mind, or should I say revalation hit my mind. DECAF-SUGAR FREE LATTE!!!! I laughed out loud, Starbucks here I come.

CALIFORNIA ADVENTURE

Having fun at California Adventure, and getting ready to get on "Sreaming" Kevin, Jose, and Ariel. Not picutred Sis Cathy and Alice and Madison. It was very cold and tears were running down my face as we got off the ride, but we all were laughing, and had great fellowship.

Toby

On friday I came home and "Toby" who is my 14 year old cat, started acting funny. I didn't even have time to take my shoes off, and still in my work clothes, I rushed him to my work. He seemed to be batting in the air at nothing. His eyes glazed over and I picked him up and he was really stiff. I thought he was choking because his neck was bent downward, and he wouldn't straighten it up. My thoughts were, seizure, brain tumor, kidney failure (which can lead to a buildup of ammonia in the brain), neurologic disorder of some sort. But there is a reason I am not the doctor. These were all logical differentials of possible problems only running more tests would tell us what was wrong.

By the time I got him in the car he was acting normal again, just a little groggy and weak. His doctored ordered a blood test, everything was normal. Then we did a blood pressure which was also normal. She ordered an EKG, here was the diagnosis. My cat has HCM/Hypertrophic cardio-myopathy. Heart disease. We gave him some medication/beta blocker and he hasn't had another episode that I am aware of.

This is a very bad prognosis long term, and you just keep them comfortable until you put them to sleep. I have seen several cats die of this. My cat will never die of this disease. I will put him to sleep long before he begins to suffer. They do suffer at the end stage of this disease.

My co-workers and I always laugh that if it's sick and it's an orange cat then it's either, kidney disease or diabetes. It just seems they are more prone to those diseases. I really was not prepared for this. I really thought him would end up with one of the other two diseases. HCM is much more common in exotic breeds like persians an himalyians. I have a co-worker that has a 4 yr old persian cat that was diagnosed with the same thing last week. I guess it's not that uncommon.

There is acutally a funny end to this story. My doctor decided on medication for Toby and gave it to me. I took a look at it:

Atenolol 25mg.

I looked at her and said "Huh, thats funny this is the same exact medication that my husband is on." she looked at me and started laughing and said, "Well if Toby ever runs out of medication he can borrow a pill from your husband!"

When I got home I told Joe what medication they put Toby on and he said "Well, I know who's gonna get the last pill if we ever run out!" Of course he was just playing. So Toby will have an Echocardiogram done on Friday, and a repeat EKC, we will monitor his progress and keep you all updated.

Toby's nicknames: Tobis, Tobie-wobbie, McTobe(his Irish name, he is a red head), Handsome boy, Handsomest, Tobis dias(Thats his latin name) and many more.

Why paint cats?

I have several of these pictures on my computer. You will all be pleased to know that no cats were harmed in the making of these pictures. They are all computer generated. I thought I would share a couple because they are interesting to look at.

Just some thoughts

I was working on some stuff for school, and I came across some quotes throughout the text. They are applied to business, but it's funny how you can apply it to church.

"Change is inevitable-Growth is optional" As time goes by, you will change, but whether or not you have spiritual growth with your change is up to you. I think it has a lot to do with your out look. People don't grow with change, if they are not mature. I want my growth to transform into a mature relationship with Christ. I want to grow with HIM.

"Competition is not how you compare to others, but how you compare to your potential" Sometimes we get caught up in what others are doing or with what others have, etc. We must all realize that we are not in competition with our fellow saints, but rather struggle within ourselves to obtain our ultimate potential. I want to be productive, to my ultimate potential.




"Winds of change can bring oceans of opportunities" In my work text, it explained that you can have plenty of wind around you, but when you are on dry land (spiritual or otherwise) You are relatively unchanged by the wind. It may even feel good. You need to get out there on the OCEAN, where you can move with the water. The wind may make it choppy water, with high waves, but unless you are in a situation where you can be moved around, you will not find the opportunities that change brings into your life. You need to be in a FLUID environment, which may be harder to steer. You can't navigate as well. Adapting to a new environment (the sea/water) is necessary as things change. I want to be able to adapt to new changes in my life. But one thing that was left out in my work text is, who is really steering my ship? My work text says you are but I know from a spiritual stand point who I want steering my ship!