A Few of Pearl's Favorite Things

I figured since I'm always talking about my own and my husband's antics on here, I should probably give a little lime light to the family pet. Her name is Pearl, she weighs 5.5 pounds, and she is a mix of a Poodle and a Maltese. Enough words though, here's a day in the life of Pearl.

She sleeps...

a lot.
Then she asserts herself as queen of the stairs,
in case there was any question.

She also likes to help with the laundry.

After going for a drive,

she gets the itch to go around the house and
collect all the socks she can find.
Six, in fact.

Piling them up to take a picture didn't last long...

All in all, it has been a good day.

Dancing in a Strobe Light

I kept telling myself that when the weather warmed up I would start running again, but, then I remembered that I live in the Midwest. So, I finally stopped kidding myself and in the last few weeks, Mr. Treadmill and I have become pretty good friends. However, I've noticed this psychological hurdle that I have to overcome each time I workout on one of them. After a little while I start to space out, you know - get in the groove, and run for a while, and by the time I look down at that screen that tells me how I'm doing, I'm sure that I've run at least a mile and that it's been a full 10 minutes. Disappointingly, more often than not it reads ".3 miles" and somewhere around 3:oo.

The last couple weeks have been like that for me in a lot of ways. I'm sure that I'm moving at full speed, but when I look around, it's like someone hit the lights on me and turned on the strobe, making everything I do appear unnaturally slow. Graduation couldn't come soon enough. I am so over my general ed. classes (thanks Music 101, but I took IB Music Theory in high school, and I'm just not that into you). The walls of this little apartment get smaller every week (or maybe we just get more crap), and I want to live in something I own. The weather is so freaking schizophrenic; couldn't it just be Spring already?!

This all may have to do with the fact that, as a kid, I hit my head really hard once and broke my ability to be patient - at least, that's what I tell Dan. Ever since that accident, I've had this on and off desire to start sprinting in the middle of the long-distance races in my life. But you know what? Today I decided to not let my recent strobe-lit life get to me (or my broken patience gland). Where I am right now in life is good, in fact, it's great! If I started sprinting now, I would miss my last 2 months here, living right next to some of the best friends I will ever have, seeing and interacting with people of vibrant faith, learning from wise professors and mentors. I would run right past the amazing things about this time of my life, and that would be a really big bummer come May 12th, when everything will change.

So crank that techno music DJ, and bring on the strobe light dancing.

The Iniquity of Us All

I have been part of the drama ministry at our church for about a year now, and it usually involves taking on a character, either contemporary or biblical (Mary at Christmastime) and acting out a scene or sketch that relates to the sermon.

The Good Friday service tomorrow is different, and it will be difficult. I will be playing myself, reading and trying to comprehend Isaiah 53 in front of the congregation. The worship pastor will be playing the piano behind my words, and during the run through yesterday I had a hard time emotionally. These words are just so powerful:

Isaiah 53

Who has believed our message
and to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?

He grew up before him like a tender shoot,
and like a root out of dry ground.
He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him,
nothing in his appearance that we should desire him.

He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.

By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
And who can speak of his descendants?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken.

He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.

Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.

After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied ;
by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.

Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors

Minnesota. Nice.

Well folks, it's official. Dan and I will be returning to his motherland after graduation this spring. No not Sweden. The closely related cousin, Minnesota. For those of you west of the Mississippi River, there are some very interesting things to know about Minnesota, doncha know. For example, the following Minnesotan phrases are not in fact folklore, they do actually arise in conversation:
"Uff Da" means "Oh Boy" or "Wow".
A "Hot Dish" is the same thing as a casserole.
"You Bet" means OK (Also heard often as "Ya, You Betcha".)
"Ya" means Yes, Yeah, Yup, You Betcha, You Bet. (See above).
The "Nordeest" is Northeastern Minnesota, where Lake Superior is.
"Minnesota Nice" is how they treat you here, pronounced "Minnesoooooda nice".

The state muffin is blueberry (thanks, internet) and it has more shoreline than CA, FL and HI combined (thanks, 10,000 lakes).

Also notably, the state of Minnesota is the largest producer of blondes in the US. I sat in an auditorium the first time I visited the state and was extremely aware of the lack of brunettes, red heads, and otherwise! Maybe I shouldn't have died my hair brown. Like a sore thumb I tell you.

Well, we came up to this North Star State for a few days visit this week to hunt for houses and jobs. Here's the shopping list:

A job for Dan (____)
A job for Allison (check)
A house for Dan and Allison (____)

Dan is pursuing jobs in the medical field, but it's hard to come by something that's not entry level or doesn't require a specific associates certificate. We'll see what God provides for him! Maybe being Swedish and all, this could be his future:


I will be starting out the rest of my life as a preschool teacher at New Horizons Academy! I actually worked there part time two summers ago and I am so excited to be back working for and with the wonderful people there. After I figure out the whole teacher certification transfer, I'll be looking for an Elementary school classroom of my own.

We are officially in the market for a (small, not glamorous, fixer-upper) house! We found a real estate agent that Dan went to High School with and we went out today to look at a couple of houses on the market and kind of get an idea of what we can afford. These specific houses weren't anything we fell in love with, but just being out there and looking at property that could potentially be ours is so exciting. It is and will be only out of the Lord's blessing and mercy if we are able to move from college into a home we own!

Uff dah! That was a long update, doncha know!

Radio Re-runs

In my experience with radio stations, (i.e. in high school, when the ipod was just a twinkle in Steve Jobs' eye) I had one primary complaint: they play far too many commercials. The radio is on in the background at work, and based on my more recent experience, I would officially like to retract the afore mentioned complaint and file a second: they play the same 15 stinking songs over and over and over and over.

and over.

One of those songs that I've been hearing repeatedly is a country song called "Cleaning This Gun", and if you couldn't quite place it, it is in fact quintessentially country. I laugh every time it comes on (which is often). Here's why:

(Cleaning This Gun Lyrics)
I can't begin to count the theories I've had pounded in my head that I forgot. I don't remember all that Spanish or the Gettysburg address, but there is one speech from high school I'll never forget.

Come on in boy sit on down and tell me about yourself. So you like my daughter do you now? Yeah we think she's something else. She's her daddy's girl, her momma's world, she deserves respect, that’s what she'll get, ain’t it son? Hey y'all run along and have some fun. I'll see you when you get back, bet I’ll be up all night - still cleanin' this gun.

Well now that I’m a father I’m scared to death one day my daughter is gonna find that teenage boy I used to be that seems to have just one thing on his mind. She’s growin' up so fast it won't be long before I’ll have to put the fear of God into some kid at my door.

Come on in boy sit on down and tell me about yourself. So you like my daughter do you now? Yeah we think she's something else. She's her daddy's girl, her momma's world, she deserves respect, that’s what she'll get, ain’t it son? Hey y'all run along and have some fun. I'll see you when you get back, bet I’ll be up all night - still cleanin' this gun.

Now it's all for show ain’t nobody gonna get hurt. It’s just a daddy thing and hey, believe me, man it works.

I hope you were able to enjoy that as much as I do. I just get this picture of a father holding a shotgun and a cleaning cloth, talking to a little pubescent teenager shaking in his boots. My personal favorite: " It won't be long before I’ll have to put the fear of God into some kid at my door". Classic. But lucky for you, you won't have to hear (ok, read) this song 16 more times today. Thank you, radio.

Flood Waters

Dan and I have had flooding/water damage five, count them, five times since we moved into this apartment 10 months ago. That means that about every two months our floor looks like this:

like it did this morning.

At 7:44 this morning (per the microwave clock), I was walking to the cupboard to get a bowl of Quaker Oat Squares, and my left foot was surprised to land in a puddle of water. Seeing that it spanned the length of the kitchen and into the dining area, I yelled to my poor sleeping husband "DAN! WATER! ON THE FLOOR! FLOODING!"

Without a single expletive (I'm so proud), Dan sprung into action, grabbing the bin of flood towels we keep on hand and actively searching for the source. We're pretty much professional flood handlers at this point.

With expertise we sop up water, wring out towels, move stuff away, reuse the towels, turn on the dehumidifier, look for the cause, call our landlord, sequester the source, and sanitize the affected area.

The best part was that our dog Pearl was just thrilled that there was action going on so early in the morning. She was close at my heels as I frantically moved things to higher ground away from the water. That looked something like this:


And when Dan wiped up the shallower spots of water with a towel, she chased the towel and pounced on it. Every time we took the heavy, soaked towels outside (in our pajamas) to wring them out and re-use them, she was right there with us, jumping to try to catch the falling water.

According to the microwave, it was 8:06 when we declared the water officially contained, having soaked up all of the water and removed the leaves that clogged the drain that caused the puddle that seeped into the house ...that Jack built...

Flooding has been quite the reoccurring theme of our first year of marriage (alongside burning food on the grill, putting up with nerdy sci-fi shows, and learning that sometimes, girls just cry). We have learned so much from it.

From the flood specific: have lots of spare towels and know where they are, buy plastic bins for things instead of cardboard boxes, and dehumidifiers work wonders for a yucky, humid apartment

To the relational: Dan likes to fix things, so he tracks down the source while I take damage control, and the best thing to do is stay calm and not get upset (that, say, my new tweed high heels got soaking wet); everything will be fine.

So, at 8:08 as I sat down on the couch with a bowl of Quaker Oat Squares, I had one thought in my mind:
Dan and I make a pretty good team in this thing called life.