Sabbath -non rest- rest day.... :D

 

Today I had my last concert of the year. We sang two songs after church, and then had concert in a small church with good acoustics in town. I have been sick, well not really sick just not 100% as afar as allergies or what have you, for the past two weeks, so my voice gave out on the last song. Could still speak, mind you, just couldn't find the voice to sing the last 2 bars. 

We arrived an hour early, as we were unsure what time I was to get there, so I sat out behind the school you see above, wrote a journal entry and enjoyed the view. Got to see my best freinds boys today, which was wonderful, but we all had to many thigns to do and to many people demanding our time, that we only got tos ay hi, grin across the room and wave. However we made appointsments with the olderone to visit on the mission trip. 8 hours one way on a bus... I am sure there will be time then.

Going to go eat and dig in to a bible study. Have lots to sort out. This holiday stuff has got me edgy!

cheers

Belifes, and clashes

Doesn't this little guy just make you grin? Sure did me. This past week had been a bit heavy for me. After my conversation with God last Thursday, and my eyes being opened to the fact that I may have been worshiping gods from the other side of Jordan ( Joshua 24:15) I have been studying.

Last night I realized that I had been worshiping false gods, on occasion, with out even knowing it. That was tough. Its hard to realize that. I understand how people feel when they are presented with a bible truth that they are not aware of, and then they are forced to make a mental transormation... should I follow or should I ignore. Its not an easy one. I ended up taking a midnight walk last night to quiet it all.

Today I was woken with a message from a friend. She wanted to go walking. So we did! We had a fun time, chatted, petted a horse, and then got caught in a thunderstorm. It is so much fun.

I am currently resting my legs, cooking sweet potato soup ( with carrots, onions, garlic and orange peppers) and enjoying the afternoon. In a few hours I have choir practice, then I will come home, make a light supper and fold my laundry and clean up my kitchen.

Only two week to go until Impact! 18 days in fact. Looking forward to it.

My birthday dinner/trip

Three lettuces salad with fresh mozzarella and grilled cherry tomatoes

 My wonderful husband treated me to a trip to Copenhagen, on a mini cruise. The first night was simple. We ate deli sandwiches, ordered non-acholic drinks from the bar and listened to the oldies band. By 11 we were asleep.

Curried vegetables and tofu balls

 Kyrre woke me on my birthday. He never wakes up early, but thankfully he did this day as my alarm didn't go off. We got up, dressed and enjoyed a lovely buffet breakfast. By 10 am we were in Coppenhagen and searching out the Round tower. We spent about an hour in the tower taking in the view, imagining what the town must have looked like in the 1800's when the visitor we were thinking about was there, and taking pictures/video.

Vanilla Bean ice cream, three berry passion-fruit sauce, and a lava chocolate cake

 We spent the day hiking up and down the cobbled stone streets looking through shops and taking in the sites. At one point the guard changed at the palace and we followed them down the street. It was rather fun chasing them down and listening to the music.

Not a drop left

That night we ate supper after a mid afternoon nap. As you can see from the pictures, it was fantastically good. The restaurant was the most expensive when we had ever eaten on, but as it was on the boat I choose it over the all you could eat buffet. It felt more romantic and celebratory.  After dinner kyrre and I walked around the boat, bought some snakcs and played a game togheter until the band came back on. I was exhuasted from theday and turned in at 10.

The next morning we woke and showered, headed to breakfast, packed up and then enjoyed watching Norway come back into view. I got a frantic call from my boss asking when I was coming into work, so I headed there as soon as I got home and worked until 7. thankfully we got a 4 day weekend after that. 
I took over 100 pictures on this trip, so I don't think I will post many more on here!

All in all it was a wonderful trip and I was so pleased to get it as a gift. I don't really feel one year older, but I am now. Although I do feel like I experienced a lot more than usual in my last year!

Sunday

Its Sunday. I had a very fun weekend. Sabbath we went to a friends house for sabbath lunch and ended up staying and talking until 2am! I have not done that in AGES..... But I had some good healing time.

Been tired today though, surprise surprise, but I still managed to get alot of house work done.

The neighbors had a birthday party for their 2 year old and invited us out for cake. We accepted and took with us Banana/blackberry ice cream made with rice milk, and no added sugars. They all really liked it.
The baby girl, 5 months, latched on to me, and I got to play with the other two as well.

I know I promiced to write about my trip to Coppenhagen, haven't managed to get to that yet. Hope to soon.

A medical missionary should never feel guilty for the work they have done

 

For over six months now a conversation has played in the back of my mind. The circumstances and individuals involved are not important.... only that found peace today.  I have been praying about it, trying to find out if I had really done something wrong in a situation I felt I had done the right thing. I am assured now, that I did not do anything wrong, but this incident has cost me the trust in an individual I would rather have kept it with.. on both sides. For now I find that I question motives, and thoughts, and at a job where the situation should have been accepted and praised, and where the person who has criticized me for the incident should have taken care of them-self.

I had been given a job to do. An individual who worked there, had a minor face surgery that day. With in 15 mins of arriving back from her surgery, she began acting very unlike herself. It was more and more clean over the next hour that she needed to be put to bed. Thankfully I had completed 95% of my job, finishing the largest part with her help... at my protest, and so I asked the others on my team if they felt they could handle the last small half hour job so that I could put her to bed. They had also noticed that she was not in her right mind, and agreed. So I took her to her room, and gave her a massage until she finally rolled over and fell asleep.

It took an hour, and after wards I found out that she didn't remember anything from the rest of that day except that I had taken her to her room and given her a massage. She didn't even remember us talking, or any work she did that day after she woke up.  She had been very desperate to have me with her before I took her to her room. 

This is a form of medical missionary work. I was not able to do anything else for her that day, but helping her get to sleep, easing discomfrot, fear/nervousness, and bringing a since of calm to a hurting individual _IS_ medical missionary work. 

That morning when I woke up, I had surrendered my day to Gods hands and asekd Him to show me what he wanted me to do. This was what I was impressed to do. I had covered my bases so that others were not weighd down with extra work, but this was not noticed, and I am still being seen as one who cannot carry their weight of the work.

 Let me ask you this. Was I am Martha or a mary in this situation? Did I handle it right? 

I for one no longer feel guilty about it, in fact I am happy that I was able to be Gods hands at that moment for that hurting confused soul. I am saddened as the individual who has on 3 separate occasions commented on that particular moment as being a reason I am not a stable person, should have seen the situation and been there to help. After all they had worked with the individual for 8 years. 2 years longer than I had even know her, and they didn't even notice she was not herself.

 

Titles can be difficult to find

I am now 31. Oddly enough, I always thought that you turned into an adult at 30. Anyone could guess why, I havn't the faintest clue. I mean... I married at 25 so, shouldn't I have been an adult then? I find myself doing or saying things that I think are childish... but then i realize that I am not childish. Just playful. I know many adults like that... ones that don't allow the world to bog them down, and allow them selves to have fun or think out side of the modern day box.

But there are moments I wonder.... wonder if I am useing myself to the full potential I am now, and allowing myself to be molded into a new form with even more potential.

I have been at my "job" for nearly 9 months now. And I find that I still don't know what the others do. I start to chide myself on this, but then I remember... all of them have worked here for 10 years or more! It's not wise to pick on myself for not remembering how much a shirt costs off the top of my head, or yarn for that matter. There is always lots to learn.

The above picture found itself on to my computer a while back. It was so naturally, serene, peaceful. Just looking at it made me desperately want to go out walking through the woods. I haven't done much of that lately. The reason being it takes 20 mins to walk to the nearest woods, and then an hour or more around that stretch. It doesn't sound long, granted, but usually I have time in the evenings and my feet are already killing me from standing on them all day. So I go out for a walk by our house. I also do not want to walk through the woods there just yet. I am not used to walking them alone, and since my wakling buddy is no longer around, I am trying to train in my hubby. He is doing really well, but some things are not quite on the book yet.

Saturday he slept in, and we missed church. So we packed a pick nick and headed in to a different stretch of woods. We walked for 3 hours... hiked is more like it. We decided to follow this road we had never seen before, then cut across the top of the lake to find our way back from a cabin we had seen on the other side. Apparently the cabin is rarely used as there wasn't a clear path to go back on. We ended up forging our way and although it only took an hour and a half, I am quite certain we walked close to 3 if you considered the zigzag formation we had to take up and down hills and around swamps. The miracle was we only saw 1 mosquito the entire time.

My husband took me to Coppenhagen for my birthday. I want to tell you about it, but I have been neglecting my house and only have a few hours left before my 4 day weekend is gone. I should run to it. Will update on the trip later.

I will say though that I have been doing much better. I am finding that I am happy again. Sadness will always linger around corners, but my overall view is happy.  I look at the world around us and see where we are, and it makes me wonder why I am so concerned about some things that worry me. But I am finding it easier and easier to let go and smile. Still looking for work, so that is something to remember for me.

A cat on my arm makes typeing hard

It's been a while since I have blogged. I have thought about it many times, but sometimes knowing others read what I write can be a bit daunting. but today, I am just writing for me, and allowing you to read.


I would say not much has happened, and that is partially true. The students came back, the end of march, and headed out for another two week trip. We picked them up and dropped them off, making the airport parking attendant mad as we took nearly 20 mins to load the 22 people and luggage in to the two vans. It wasn't entirely our fault. They only have a paid parking place near the airport, and we hadn't been given money for the parking. The only other option was making the 22 students and staff walk 20 mins to the free parking area, at midnight, and then try to load them all up. As it was we got back home at 2am.

During the Easter work break, Kyrre and I traveled down to spend the weekend with our niece and nephew. It was a nice visit, but the two are wild animals half of the time, and I got bit, in the thigh, once... which nearly resulted in the child getting slapped. Thankfully I was able to stay my downward swinging hand.

Work has been doing well. Three weeks ago I started teaching a knitting class Thursday nights to an ever changing group of female immigrants. This group will be here another two weeks, as they are here for about 2 months before heading to their final destination, and are between the ages of 15 and 22, if I should guess. They are not used to talking about ages.

Probably the worst thing that has happened, is that Vivian's mother is still being pestered with phone calls. She was used to getting only calls from Vivian and a few others, but now she gets them constantly. I know this is an exaggeration, as the times I have been over to visit, the phone has rung... once?

But the weekend I was heading out for Easter I called her to see if her plans had changed, and to say hi. I didn't reach her so I had called her boyfriend just to see if she had gone away fro the weekend and to pass on the message that I had not found out if someone she was not interested in seeing was coming to church or not.

The following Wednesday I went to deliver food to her from the school, and decided to call first. I didn't reach her, so I called 2 more times that evening and gave up telling Kyrre he could have the soup for lunch the next day. On my way to work I called. When she didn't answer for the 4th time, I swung by her place to see if I could see she was up and around. When I couldn't see any sign of moment, I called the head deaconess at our church to see if she had talked with her. she said she would try to call her and would let me know if things were amiss. A few moments later I got a call from Vivian's mom.

she was furious with me. She opened the conversation with... I think we should stop calling each other. I am fine, and you should not be so worried.

I explained the calls, and the situation, and managed to get her calmed down. She then told me about being tired from all the calls and saying she needed a break, so I agreed not to call for a while. That was two weeks ago, and I still haven't found the heart in me to try to call her. I have an email for her from her grand daughter, as she doesn't use the computer, so I will have to call next week and give it to her, but I have to admit I am nervous. I know she took out her frustration on me, and that I didn't do anything wrong, but it still makes me feel bad. Many of us are concerned for her, as she is alone now and has some pretty major health issues. Her grand kids and her daughter, before she died, have/had asked me to keep an eye on her. She had been asking me to visit and ding the calling, but I still felt I needed to give her the space she asked for. Hopefully next week will go ok. I'll will just deliver the email, and leave... break the ice again as it were.

I was thinking about it today when I printed off the email, and it upset me. Which didn't help the evening. The students were presenting about their trip to Honduras, and I was distracted. I kept feeling like Vivian was there, or maybe it was me missing her being there. But I went up stairs and found a place to be alone and cried.

Then at the close of the evening the girls sang a closing song, and one of the boys played he guitar. I was find until I looked at him... and I had to get up and leave. I had tried to ignore the fact that Vivian's voice was gone from the group, but somehow having her not be behind the guitar, and having it be a student, a male student, made the fact even worse. Even the translator had been different. It was all too much. I headed into the kitchen to hide and try to control my emotions.... but one of the boys, was there. He came over and put his arm around me shoulders. I knew that fighting it back would make it harder to stop, so I just turned and cried into his shoulder ( he is over 6 ft) and calmed down and quickly as I could. I then cleaned up headed back out in the candle lit dining area where it would be harder to see I had been crying.

I miss her so much. I know there will be moments like that still, and that it will get easier to bear, but I have to admit I was embarrassed to start crying in front of the students. Thankfully only one saw.

Last night I worked til 9, which meant I had today off. I needed to clean the church and go to my physical therapist, and I planned to get up early and go... but I was hurting, and when the children up stairs got up and started playing their radio at 5 am ( ok ok it was 7, but when you have a day off and want to cuddle in with your hubby if FEELS like 5) I just rolled over and cuddled in and decided that if  I get pregnant, we HAVE To move before our little ones learn from their example.

I need to stop now, my cat is standing on my arm, making typing very very hard.

I want a hot coco. Is that wrong?