Topics o'plenty...

Oh, married life...how I must learn to balance all of your different facets. Would you mind possibly putting a few more hours into my day? Maybe that'll help me tackle everything without the weeks flying by and me failing to accomplish it all...I'm sure it would. Or maybe I should just give up my hobbies for a while, that could help - I haven't completed anything hobby-wise lately - I'd have a lot more time for home and wifely things that way, right? Oh, married life...give me your wisdom.

Music
Right now I'm listening to Craig Lyon's new album, Goodbye You. I met him through Dan, who met him through our friends, and we saw him play in Cincy a few times. He moved out to LA so we obviously can't see him play, but he just released this album and is up for some awards. Very cool guy and mucho talented, so go check out his myspace or buy his new album for only $10. My fav song is Change, listen to that one first . ;) If you go listen or buy, let me know what your fav song is.

Books
I've been on a book craze lately. In the last few years, the most I've read included Harry Potter one and two, and some Chicken Soup books. Easy reading. But after reading about different book reviews in the blog world, and getting a book to read for our small group, I was kick-started into an obsession. Here's my list lately - holding myself back from buying more until I can finish what I have (flashbacks to being a child and not finishing my dinner, ick).

I know, I'm WAY behind the times here. Harry Potter THREE. But what can I do? I was on chapter five in this one from a couple years ago, but I decided to re-read those five chapters before moving forward. I was toying with the notion that I had already seen this movie, because I remembered it SO vividly, but now that I've read more I'm sure I haven't seen it. I'm halfway through this book - switching between this one and our small group book.

This is our small group book, and one that's really helping me to see what marriage was designed to be.
[This is no ordinary self-help book on the Christian family; it focuses far less on how to improve one's marriage than how one's marriage can improve one's Christian faith. Author Thomas even goes so far as to suggest that "God designed marriage to make us holy more than to make us happy," an idea that may shock romantically inclined Americans.]

I read a few pages of this one on Google book search after seeing it on Gina's blog. I was immediately pulled into the story and HAD to buy it. It has a longer description than I want to post here, but check it out here. I won't be reading this one until I finish one of the first two...drats.






Disregard the "search inside" thing on my pretty picture. This one is from the same author as above, so I read a few pages of it and was SUCKED into it, too! I also won't be reading this one for a while either, but I'm darn excited to start it. It has a similar murder theme like The Lovely Bones, but is based on the author's life.



Kitty babies
I haven't shown any pictures of them in a while, so I have some today! Our babies have gotten so big and have such different personalities. Merry does this thing now where Dan will open our bedroom door in the morning, while I'm still in bed snoozing, and she'll bust through and jump up on the bed to lick my face and nudge her head into my hands. For some reason she won't do this when the situation is reversed. If I open the door and Dan is still in bed, she'll still jump onto the bed, but doesn't bother waking up Dan or licking his face. Dan says he's trained her well. Right now, Merry is laying under my desk and licking my TOES every so often. Gotta make sure they're clean, I guess!

Urpel is still very independent. She likes to lay on the couch with Dan, but must approach the situation herself. If you try to approach her she's more keen on running away.

We bought them a blue feather toy because the last feather toy we bought them only had three or four actual feathers in it - they had them ripped out within a few days. They're in love with this thing. One day Merry tried to get it up on a dining room chair with her so she could lay/play with it. Hilarious! Oh, and see my little clown there... Merry with the circus collar? We thought that was too funny at the pet store so we picked it up with the blue toy. The girls didn't think it was as funny, and kept looking around every time the bells on it would ring.

Urpel and I, after she got the collar treatment... mwa-haha. She looks happy, right?

And LOOK! The first one was Merry at Christmas time, and the second was Merry today! My baby is as big as the sink! And unlike her younger days, I had to put treats in the sink to bribe her into it.

Ch-ch-ch-changes
Because Dan is SO awesome, he made some changes around the kitchen...

And I decided to switch up our bathroom a little... and there's Urpel taking the last of Merry's bribery treats.

Dan put a couple not-in-use monitors into storage so I could have some extra desk space for CRAFTY things. Now I just have to figure out how I want to arrange things in the baskets we have, and get rid of the mess in here. Sounds easy, right?

Other random things lately...

• We bought Fla-vor-ice popsicles at the store yesterday and I've had three already. I forgot how GOOD those things are.
• Website work is moving sloooowly with the combination of life - see discussion at beginning of post. I'm also not sure what direction I want to take in displaying samples, and that zaps time trying to figure it out.
• If you have some room in your prayer life, throw in a good one for a family in our small group. They've been going through a very rocky time and have so many things to deal with every day. Much appreciated.