One of the World’s Greatest Grandma’s

During all of the hustle and bustle, it’s important to remember why we do it all.
You see, I have one of the world’s greatest Grandma’s. She is generous, kind, loves kids and always has a story ready at the helm.

I love her and will continue making her a loaf of banana bread each Christmas-after all, it’s a “healthy snack”, according to her-due to the bananas. But, so is ice cream because it’s a “dairy product”. She ignores the whole sugar thing…

I kind’ve owe her since she made the world’s best Dad. He’s the guy with the beard right next to Grandma-sporting the purple hat.

It’s easy to forget why we are spending so much time on each gift, card sent or goodies baked. I want to remember while I’m wrapping presents, baking goodies or sewing one last present together that just why I am doing it.
Merry Christmas!

Have a Best Friend?

This may be totally gratuitous, but I feel something needs to be said.
I have great examples of women who love their husbands, however I’ve overheard others say they may not quite be “in love” anymore. I don’t know what’s going on there, but I am choosing to stay in love. Till death do us part.
I’ve learned that you can either praise or raze your husband-it’s up to you. And I’m not perfect-trust me-oh baby, trust me. But I try.

So, I think it’s time to praise our husbands.
They have an enormous amount of pressure to provide for their families (I know some of us women work, too). They may feel tempted to keep up with the Jones’, they may at times worry if they can be both masculine and sensitive, and they wonder if they’ll ever be able to understand our every need and be able to aptly read our minds.
And they try to always listen to us the moment we want to be listened to, even if OU is playing OSU.

 
So, let’s hear it for the husbands that understand our “crazies”, our cravings and our cats.

Take this guy for example. He’s really cute, right? (Well, you don’t have to agree with me, that’s ok.) But what I love about him is that he can be so good looking and then not be afraid to do something like this…

 

…which makes him look completely ridiculous. And he does it just to make me laugh.
I bet you have some examples of things your hubby does just to make you laugh.

 

So, sing for joy when they are willing to dress up and embarrass themselves with a ridiculous costume year after year for your Christmas cards. (Even though deep down you know they truly enjoy it.)

 

Let’s cheer on our men when they do listen to us and react in such a way that you know they thought what “she said to you was just ridiculous and can you believe that of all people, she wore that to the function…I mean really, pink and red together with her skin combination?! Can you believe it?”

 

And they hold our coffees and our purses why we find a hair tie to tame the wild mane so that we can shoot another picture of the ocean.

 

And if they allow your weird decorations to ride around on their dash or take over the dining room table in their house, then you know you’ve got a good one.
Don’t ever let go. That is your best friend.

I need a Haircut.

Dear Readers-
In the midst of going on tour, coming home from tour, decorating for Christmas, prepping for my sweet mother-in-law to stay for a month, a nephew being born and making presents…I have neglected something far too long.

And I think it’s about time you knew. This is getting absolutely ridiculous. I need a haircut.

This lady on my left is my BFF Cynthia. Even she said that I need a haircut.
But I still think I could go another few months, perhaps.
It is obvious that I need something to help with my frizzies, I know. I received many great ideas in my post, Hair Issues.

So, ignore my weird arm positioning and the frizzies-to focus on the length of my hair….any thoughts on that?

Love-Rebekah the hairy one.

Pruning and Growth-Ouch.

Dear Readers:
Have you ever had everything pruned from your life all at the same time and totally out of the blue, causing you to wonder, “What the heck just happened?!”.
(If so, I would love to hear about it. I think it’s encouraging sometimes to know that you are not alone in the stage of life you are in.)
However, one thing that I have learned-just like in the world of gardening-pruning creates growth.
And, I want to grow.
But sometimes, I don’t enjoy the growing pains. There’s a reason they’re called “pains“.

The first major change in my life this year was losing this guy-Cowboy.

It may be just a cat to the rest of the world, but he was my buddy for eight years. Cowboy rode on my shoulder as I: did the dishes, folded laundry or talked on the phone. He looked for me and would make ewok sounds if he couldn’t find me. He slept on top of me most nights and lept into my lap as soon as I allowed. He passed away too early.
I really didn’t think I could miss an animal this much, but I do.

 

This is not our old church-it’s some Catholic church somewhere..
After attending our church for the last ten years, Biceps and I knew it was time to leave. That meant, the end to him drumming every Sunday morning, the end to us teaching the youth, the end to mowing the lawn and caring for the church’s general overall cuteness factor.
And it also meant the end to our relationships with our pastors and many of our friends.
It was weird to quietly fade into the night. We are presently living in the “Bible belt” so finding another church isn’t a problem. We just want to be at the right one. There are a lot of weird ones out there.

 

Biceps has pretty much quit doing this (kicking butt on stage) for over fifteen years. I have been to thousands of his shows, toured for years with him and his bands, sold merch, drove the bus, did the accounting, wrote the thank-you notes and ate the crappy food.
This life as the band wife has been wonderful and exhausting.

 

But presently, he has started doing this.
No, not serving chili…being a fireman and serving chili at the Firemen’s Chili Feed.
I know, he looks good doing both things, really.

 

And then lastly-my lovely Iweb site crashed earlier this year-leaving me stranded for months without the ability to blog. I lost contact with almost all my blogging buddies, missed out on fantastic link parties and had to rebuild my readership/friends/followers. (Won’t you be my friend, please?)
The Iweb pruning caused some major growth within me.
And while I watched my friend’s blogs grow and grow, I was forced to sit back and save my pennies, waiting to hire someone to rebuild my site in a better platform. This new site is much better, but I am still dealing with the repercussions of being out of the blogging community for almost 8 months.
Unexpectedly, the world didn’t end without my blog up and running.

With each passing year, I gain the growth from pruning-along with a few gray hairs. But isn’t that why gray hairs are referred to as wisdom?
But each trial, each pruning session, has brought me closer to the fact that I know nothing, and reconfirmed that everything I own could blow up and I’d still be ok.
So, with the pruning there are the “pains“.
But, I suppose what I’m saying is that I can survive the pains.