on becoming...

i am discovering that even in my 30's now, i am still such a work in progress. not that i thought any differently, but it is just strange to know that personality stuff i have dealt with forever is still going strong.

i wish i knew the secret to changing things about my personality. i wish i could just *not* be a particular way any more. but, i suppose, with 30 years of practice, it will take a bit more than a waive of a magic wand to change.

at the church sermon last week, the message was surrendering to god. i think this is definitely an area where i need to surrender myself and let god work in me. i have always had my insecurities and their manifestations in various parts of my life. i think, at 30, it is time to be more confident and self assured.

treasured

i made my first etsy.com treasury last night. i don't even have my own shop, but i just love the site. i couldn't get to sleep, so i decided to browse, and browse...and browse through etsy until i came up with an idea for a treasury. what else....BEES!!

it was so much fun to look for things to put together a treasury. i liked working with a theme, though it did make it a bit tougher. i don't really have the connections to make it very popular, but a girl can dream of ending up on the cover page, right?

if you want to check it out, please do so! and feel free to click on all the individual pictures too!

the art of beeing

i think i may just have to come up with another one soon. this was so fun!!

sleepless

sometimes i dislike my life more than others. when both of my girls are up screaming their heads off, keeping each other awake....i find myself not so thrilled with things.

heavenly chocolate butterscotch chip cookies

the other week i decided to make some home made cookies. i found a recipe that sounded good and i was off and baking! i had some remaining butterscotch chips that i thought would make a nice addition to the chocolate chip cookies. the result?

AH.MAZE.ING.

the recipe ended up making somewhere around 54 cookies. um. wow. i didn't really notice that when i began the process. see, i rarely bake. so coming out with so many cookies was crazy. but we sure did go through them!!

i repeated the process just a few days ago, minus the butterscotch chips, and, i must say, these cookies are just so fricken good!

*drool*

why hello, my old friend.

aaah, now i remember why i liked breast feeding so much. yes, yes, i loved the bonding experience and the closeness and the intimacy. i loved the look of my baby girl nestled in close and latched on to my body. i loved the vulnerability the whole experience was about. but that is not what i am talking about here.

friends, i will forever miss the absence of a (not so) good old friend. yes, that's right. old aunt flo. i forgot just how wonderful it was to have her out of my life for the last 17 or so months. you know how they say you don't realize what you have till it's gone? well, lets just say i didn't appreciate what i didn't have till it came roaring back into my life.

the lower back pain. the aches. the desire to detach the entire lower middle portion of my body from the rest of me. [sarcasm]oh, how i am so thrilled to have you back[/sarcasm] .

yes, i was looking forward to the ever so slight independence that would return with the separation of boob and babe. but oh, how i forgot about the ball and chain that would then attach itself firmly to my girlish nether-regions. that monthly dues collector...paid in, well, you know.

i will miss the beautiful communion of nursing. but i will be ever reminded of what i gave up. once each month, for approximately two weeks...from first ache to final drop, i will mourn the end of that stage in raising my children...the day the milk dried.

and they were singin' bye, bye my lactation device. froze my booby's cold white jucies till my boobies went dry. them good ol' babes drinkin' milk cuz they cried, singin' this'll be the day my boobs dried.

Book Review: Hand of Fate by Lis Wiehl

Hand of Fate is the second installment by author Lis Wiehl chronicling the lives of three friends linked by their connections to law enforcement as they solve the murder of controversial radio talk show host, Jim Fate. FBI Special Agent Nicole Hedges, Federal Prosecutor Allison Pierce, and crime reporter Cassidy Shaw are the Triple Threat Club; friends who share a passion for seeing justice done. When Fate receives death threats, he calls on Cassidy to enlist the aid of Nicole and Allison to help investigate the threats. As fate would have it, their help came too late. With Fate murdered by an unknown poisonous gas, it falls on these three women to try and make sense of the murder and discover, in the sea of suspects, how close the killer really is. While trying to determine if the murder was committed by one of the hundreds of disgruntled listeners or someone much closer to Fate, each of the Triple Threat members also tackle issues such as domestic violence, illegal immigration, drug addiction and rape.

While I enjoyed Wiehl’s first novel in the Triple Threat series, Face of Betrayal, I cannot say the same about Hand of Fate. Hand of Fate was painstakingly slow and filled with far too many sub-plots. Through Wiehl’s excess in scene description of the chaos in downtown Portland surrounding Fate’s murder and sub-plots that detracted from the central story line, I found myself quickly losing interest in the novel. Additionally, the character development of the three main women began to feel a little forced, as though Wiehl was trying to address as many issues facing women today as possible.

I am a fan of multiple story lines and plot twists, however I felt the writing was much better in Wiehl’s first novel. I found Hand of Fate rather predictable and was rather irritated by the obvious conclusion. Perhaps the ladies were too blinded by the onslaught of personal issues consuming each of them. Also, having read the first novel, I found that it is completely redundant for those who have read Face of Betrayal. While trying to make Hand of Fate stand on it’s own, the relatively verbatim descriptions throughout the book left me with déjà vu and wanting to skip ahead.

Overall, Hand of Fate was a disappointment. Had this book been a bit more focused with fewer sub-plots and issues for the characters to overcome, it may have kept my interest.

Thank you to Thomas Nelson Publishers for the complimentary copy of Hand of Fate (A Triple Threat Novel).

can i be done with it yet?!

i keep wanting to post my review of the book i read from booksneeze.com. i tried posting it a few days back, but then noticed that i couldn't post it, per their request, till a later date. well, i thought today was that date. so i posted it again. upon trying to finish the process up, i noticed that it is tomorrow that i can post it. so delete once again i did! aaah. let's just hope that amazon.com waits until tomorrow to post the review i submitted!!! i can't wait to be done with this review! lol