Reading Books

You may be asking where I have been - it seems like I am going longer between posts. I have worked a few days - two days last week and I am doing Kindergarten tomorrow. But mainly I have been reading. I have always liked to read and almost always have a novel on my nightstand. Since I started blogging my reading time has been consumed with reading about other people's lives and ideas. Since Bobby's arrival I have been reading more books and spending less time on blogs. He has challenged us to read through the Gospels three times in the year, and I have finished Mark and started Luke. I also read his book, Kingdom Come and just finished N.T. Wright's book, Paul. I am also re-reading the Stone-Campbell Movement by Leroy Garrett. I've started Nancy's book, A Red State of Mind but got sidetracked. It is really fun to read and you can order it from Amazon as you can the other books I've mentioned. N.T. Wright seems to be quoted by a lot of people lately such as Mike Cope and Simply Christian seems to be the one most often quoted. I didn't buy that one because I plan to borrow it from Bobby. I hope it is easier to read than his book on Paul. I had to keep my Bible and a dictionary handy to get through it. I have also seen a couple of movies - Tom went with me to see Dreamgirls (second time for me) and I took Talya (Bobby's youngest daughter) to see A Night at the Museum - also for the second time for me. Talya spent the night with us one night when Rachael was in the hospital and it was fun having a little girl around. I learned about Webkins. Oh yeah, my friend Sandy and I went to see Music and Lyrics - it was cute. So as you can see I have been busy.

Checking In Part 2

I passed my qualifying for competition. I ended up turning in a tape or rather recording it during rehearsal on my iPod and emailing it to my section leader. I wish I could get over my fear of singing in a quartet. I guess if I would just find three other people who would be willing to sing with me in a quartet and just do it that would help. Of course there is the other possibility that I shouldn't be singing at all - except at church. My voice will always be pleasing to God. The retreat this last weekend went well. Our coach made some changes in interpretation but we still have six weeks to go before competition.

We have not been to the Y to excercise this year on a regular basis and by that I mean I don't think we have been more than once or twice. Today is rainy and it is a good day to stay inside. Of course if it were sunny I would say it was a good day to do something beside exercise. We HAVE to get back in our routine.

This Saturday night we are going to a Sweetheart Dinner at a Sheraton Hotel. It is being sponsored by the Band of Brothers at Church. Tom and another man have been planning it and it looks like it will be fun. He didn't have a large response because of the expense. Hotels always charge too much, but he wanted it to be special- plus he really didn't know how many people would respond and we wanted to have a room big enough. We will be having entertainment - a quartet from Sweet Adelines made up of our chorus director and one lady from our church and two other great quartet singers. They are not an official quartet (meaning they don't sing in competition) but they sound really good together. Our director sings in a quartet that will be singing at the international competition this fall in Calgary, Canada. She had bronchitis last night and wasn't at rehearsal, so I am praying she will be well by Saturday. Our song leader and his wife will also sing a duet and there are some other surprizes for the ladies. Tom has really enjoyed the planning for this. He was involved in some fund raising dinners for the City of Children ( a Church of Christ children's home in Ensenada, Mexico) in their early days in the 70's. I love seeing him excited.

We are so fortunate to have Bobby Valentine as our new preacher. He is enouraging us to pray daily for Palo Verde, him, our youth minster, Clay Utley and our elders daily at 8:00 AM. We told him we would - if we were awake at 8:00 AM. Being retired we don't have a schedule but we will pray at 8:00 someone's time.

I will try to be more consistent in writing. Even though I haven't been writing daily I still read daily.

Checking In

I guess I better check in. I haven't wanted to post because I have to admit I didn't pass both my songs. I still have one to tape during rehearsal time next Tuesday. It is a lot easier for me to do it this way than in a quartet situation. Our retreat is next weekend and I have to have passed both songs before we go to retreat. They run through my head all the time and of course they are right in my head and in perfect pitch. For some reason they don't always come out right -if I'm nervous. So here's hoping I pass Tuesday night.

We almost went to Orlando Tuesday and would have come back today. Yesterday morning we woke up to the news of the tornados in the Orlando area. I said "Thank you God that we didn't go". I think Florida is a very pretty state, but they have way too many natural disasters. Arizona is a haven. No tornados, hurricanes or earthquakes. We do get our monsoon rains in the summer, but we are grateful for them.

Tom and I saw Night at the Museum Thursday afternoon (bargain prices, of course). We both enjoyed it. If you haven't seen it yet I would recommend it.

This morning I went to a baby shower at church. The expectant mother received lots of cute baby gifts, but I am much too old to get excited about baby gifts - unless of course unless it was my grandbaby. What do you think of the 67 year old mother that lied about her age to the doctor and gave birth to twins? Now that is just plain nuts!