Lovely day off and a play date!!

so i took today off to spend some time not working and spent the day with a dear friend and a new friend being creative. we laughed, we talked, we created and thoroughly enjoyed our time together. i even snuck a couple of pictures so you could share in our fun...

Here's my dear friend!





Here's my new friend!

The creative stuff is in the middle...








i highly recommend days off, good friends, creative fun....and a digital camera to capture it all!!

enjoy your weekend!

peace.

check out the pics....

You can pretend you were there and dance along. just go to
www.picmyphotos.com,
password canterbury07 and see the Masquerade Ball.

You'll want to boogie oogie oogie til you just can't boogie no more!!!

peace

I am sunrise...

You Are Sunrise

You enjoy living a slow, fulfilling life. You enjoy living every moment, no matter how ordinary. You are a person of reflection and meditation. You start and end every day by looking inward. Caring and giving, you enjoy making people happy. You're often cooking for friends or buying them gifts. All in all, you know how to love life for what it is - not for how it should be.

What Time Of Day Are You?

off to the Masquerade!

we've got our good duds on and we're ready to go. mom and dad weren't here to take our picture on the staircase (!) so we did it ourselves. more photos later, if you can stand them!!!
GREAT event...the Skirvin was gorgeous, the party was terrific, a car got sold, a couple got engaged, people danced, the costumes were awesome and the fire eater and the belly dancers did not disappoint! Over all, an amazing evening, and i think they even raised some money. lots of fun, lots of friendly faces, lots to celebrate...

maybe you can come next year!

peace.

and we're off to see the wizard

Skirvin Hilton in OKC

actually, i know there will be belly dancers and fire eaters, maybe not wizards. we're going to Canterbury's Masquerade Ball tonight at the Skirvin and i'm excited! it's a great event...lots of fun, great music, good folks in great clothes and for a good organization. and the Skirvin...a definite must see if you're ever in OKC.

so i'm putting on my dancing shoes! and i'm taking my camera!!

peace.

the end is near...

for those of you keeping track of jim's dad in your prayers, the race is almost over. we received a call on Thursday that he is on oxygen pretty much 24/7, so dehydrated they can't continue his chemo, very swollen from steroids, not eating very much, not drinking very much. jim is trying to head to boise for father's day and we are praying that ken prepares himself, facing the truth, making peace. thanks for your support.

peace.

did you know penguins can type?

just kidding, sort of...I'm now the ghost writer for Phil the Penguin on his very own blog. so if you ever wanted to know what's in the mind of a bird, you don't have to look far.

www.philthepenguin.blogspot.com

Happy Memorial Day everyone! Looking forward to 3 days of whatever...

SFGH is tonight and we're actually going....thanks Canoe Guy for your persistence and patience.

peace!!

Wow, almost a month...

and quite a month it has been. the arts festival was only slightly dampened and the masses of people seemed to enjoy. our concert season is officially over and all survived! now on to summer!

My friend Phil the penguin (6 foot mascot for the OKC Philharmonic) has also started a blog. www.philthepenguin.blogspot.com. i'm Phil's ghost writer...hey, how do expect him to type with those fins!!

so it's been nuts and i'm looking forward to a little slow down. hope you enjoy your lazy, hazy days of summer too...

peace!

the sights, the sounds and OHHH the smells....

yes ladies and gents, the Oklahoma City Arts Festival is in full swing! Tornados be damned and rain, rain go away--we have art to see, pots to make and the world's greatest food to eat. From bratwurst and kraut to strawberries newport and chocolate dipped cheesecake, you can find it here. Live performances on the plaza and an amazing collection of pottery, jewelry, paintings, sculptures, photos, furniture and much more...
If you've never made it downtown to this event, don't miss it!!
Lasts through Sunday, April 29th.

a remembrance...

we have recently had several events in our lives that have been difficult to walk through. but with God's strength and ever-present help, we've walked through.

on this april 19th, i'm grateful that our city has walked through as well. on this day 12 years ago, i heard a sound that shook me, startled me, made me run outside and then hug my children and call my family and friends. a bomb had almost leveled the Murrah building and 171 human beings lost their lives.

the impact shook our foundations, our beliefs, our commitments, but before the dust had settled, we started walking through. our community was strengthened as we searched together, mourned together, celebrated together, wept together and pulled together. we are better for having been there and grateful to have walked through to the other side.

if you are ever in okc, go to the bombing memorial museum and grounds. you will experience the spirit of the people of Oklahoma and join in our walk.

and the deconstruction continues....

i am grateful for a house with more than 1 bathroom. i started there to remind myself!!! our bathroom is officially a shell. in ripping out sheet rock, you discover nasty things. LIKE, when the previous owner signed the disclosure on our house, he failed to mention to previous water damage in the master bathroom. now before you defend him, understand that it is obvious that the previous damage had been somewhat repaired, so he knew. but i am getting a new bathroom, reminder #2 to be grateful.

now on to the fun stuff. i've picked out the tile, very tuscan looking. and the new fixtures, also old world. the shower is almost framed in and it will actually be larger than it was by a few inches. we won't have to bend backwards to rinse our heads because we are raising the shower head to the 7 foot mark! YEA!!! and once we are finished the bathroom will be one room we can mark off the "Boy this house was built in tht 70's and still looks like it" list! then on to the...to be determined.

so, i am grateful. we've had the resources, the help and the time to fix the bathroom. thanks todd, you and jim the tool man taylor have done a great job!

peace.

adventures in the new old house

we knew when we moved Easy St. (yes literally) that we would need to do some updating to our 1974 home. we loved the layout and the space. the quiet older neighborhood with even older trees. the feeling that the cleavers lived close by.

wallpaper updates, no problem. new paint, not my favorite, but no problem. kitchen counters, current ones are not totally awful, i can live with them for a while. master bathroom, definite update material, but functional and who really sees it but us. AND THEN......

the carpet seemed a little moist, we discovered the drain pan was leaking and so our sometime update has become a NOW repair and update. so Jim the tool man taylor, hammer in hand, is armpit deep in destruction, i mean demolition, of all the tile surfaces in our bathroom. he'll tear it apart and we'll pay the nice man bruce to put it back together.

then comes the hard part, choosing what i want it to look like! some dear friends have given us a significant amount of beautiful travertine tile. not enough for the whole job, but a nice start. i have to pick countertop for the vanity, tile for the floor and coordinating tile for the travertine shortage. all within the ever looming budget. should be fun. a little daunting. i need to find my inner interior decorator. this is why we built a new house the first time!!!

so the journey begins...lots of banging, crashing, breaking tile noises, and now he's laughing...maybe i should go supervise. nah, i'm going shopping...

peace!

Delight....

So this morning I'm awake at 4am and my brain won't go back to sleep. After tossing and turning for a while, I turn on the light and decide to spend some time with God. Being the super-spiritual person that I am, with the detailed study plan for all Bible reading that I do, I use the very scientific F-L-O-P method. You know the one, you flop open your Bible and read where it lands....ANYWAY. This morning, it fell to Psalm 35:4

"Delight yourself in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart."

I've read this verse a million or so times and the first part really sticks out to me today. Delight yourself in the Lord...hmmm...delight myself.....delight. What does delight really mean? So I looked it up.

de·light
–noun

1.
a high degree of pleasure or enjoyment; joy; rapture: She takes great delight in her job.

2.
something that gives great pleasure: The dance was a delight to see.
–verb (used with object)

3.
to give great pleasure, satisfaction, or enjoyment to; please highly: The show delighted everyone.
–verb (used without object)

4.
to have great pleasure; take pleasure (fol. by in or an infinitive): She delights in going for long walks in the country.

happiness, gladness, delectation. Pleasure, enjoyment, delight, joy refer to the feeling of being pleased and happy. Pleasure is the general term: to take pleasure in beautiful scenery. Enjoyment is a quiet sense of well-being and pleasurable satisfaction: enjoyment at sitting in the shade on a warm day. Delight is a high degree of pleasure, usually leading to active expression of it: delight at receiving a hoped-for letter. Joy is a feeling of delight so deep and so lasting that one radiates happiness and expresses it spontaneously: joy at unexpected good news.

Here is my version now of Psalm 35:4

"Have a high degree of pleasure in the Lord, usually leading to active expression of it with a joy so deep and so lasting that one radiates happiness and expresses it spontaneously and He will give you the desires of your heart."

Hope it blesses you as much as it did me, even at, now 5:30 in the morning!

Have a delightful day!

I had no idea...

after learning the soundtrack to Man of LaMancha, and singing it for most of my childhood, and even singing along last night during the stage production, I was in for quite a shock!!!

i thought i knew the story, but the soundtrack alone leaves out some detail...like crazy people in prison, much sensuality and gang rape and ritual cleansing by the church for crimes against it. wow, i was dreaming the impossible dream and fighting the unbeatable fo and i think it's a good thing that's where it stopped for me at 10 years of age.

i've could have been scarred for life!!!

the production was very good, i cried, i laughed, i boo'd, i fell in love, i saw redemption...it was a good night!
peace.

I, Don Quixote,....

i have fond memories of the Man of LaMancha. i had the record album as a kid (you know, the big, black cd looking thing with grooves in it) and i memorized the entire soundtrack. I used to sing it around the house, i brought home a statue on Don for my room, i dreamed of being Dulcinea, it was awesome. And tonight....it's LIVE!!!

i'm going to see the stage production and i'm so excited. nice treat for a tuesday night. and as mom says, "once we get that sangria squirrel drunk, it will be an awesome performance regardless!"

so here's to don, dulcinea and a rocking sangria squirrel!!!

peace.

So March on in...

this year is passing so quickly already. i'll still need to finish unpacking. i still need to clean out the garage. i still need to detail my car from the many dog rides during the move.

however, i've been looking through things that i've moved with me to my new office and i found a list of things that i've collected through the years. some are good reminders, some are funny....hope you enjoy them!

“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.”
Bill Cosby

“In order to be a realist you must believe in miracles.”
David Ben Gurion

“I am always doing things I can’t do, that’s how I get to do them.”
Pablo Picasso

“Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch you words; they become actions. Watch your actions, they become habits. Watch your habits, they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.”
Frank Outlaw

“…choose today whom you will serve..But as for me and my family, we will serve the Lord.”
Joshua 24:15

“Not even a sparrow, worth less than a penny, can fall to the ground without your Father knowing it…you are more valuable to him than a whole flock of sparrows.”
Matt 10:29-31

“It is amazing what you can accomplish when you don’t care who gets the credit.”
Anonymous

“Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, to mind you own business and to work with your hands, just as we told you, so that you daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.”
I Thess 4:11-12

“Stir into flame the gift that is you.”
2 Timothy 1:6

Sing like no one can hear you, Love like you’ve never been loved, Dance like no one is watching.

“I ran up the door, closed the stairs, said my pajamas and put on my prayers, turned off my bed and jumped into the light...all because you kissed me goodnight.”

"They may see the good you do as self serving, Continue to do good.
They may see your generosity as grandstanding, Continue to be generous.
They may see your warm and caring nature as a weakness, Continue to be warm and caring. For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It never was between you and them anyway."
Mother Teresa

Scintillate, Scintillate asteroid manikin. (Twinkle, twinkle little star)

Missiles of ligneous or petrous consistency have the potential of fracturing my gaseous structure, but appellations will eternal remain innocuous. (Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me)

peace.

so 43 and counting....

yes, today is the day. i'm 43 and it looks a LOT younger than i ever imagined. :-)

i truly believe that age is a state of mind. i have a dear friend who is 87 and as with it as she ever has been. young at heart keeps her young at mind.

i've decided that if age is a state of mind, i'm just not moving to that state!!!

so here's to another year on the planet. hope you enjoy yours as much as i'll enjoy mine. started out with a catered lunch, flowers from my sweetie and many good wishes. does life really get better than that?

peace.

Priceless

we've all seen the commercial, ring $6000, plane trip $1250, Mr. Suki-Dad, Dad-Keiko, Brian-Mrs. Suki blah blah blah

well, here's my version

1 new job-priceless
no office drama-priceless
no migrains, back pain, loss of sleep-priceless

so, I guess the best things in life are free.

Yes ladies and gents, it's been a B-E-A-utiful couple of weeks. And to top it off, I get President's day off too.

I have wondered in moments of weakness if I did the right thing by leaving my last position. I would say a recovered life is proof enough. Life really is too short to stay stuck. What's stopping you from moving forward? Change it if you can, it's worth the risk.

peace

happy birthday hubbie!

It's just another day
in just another year
in just another cold february month
but today seems a little brighter
my step seems a little lighter
cause today i celebrate the one I love.

Happy Birthday Hubbie!!!

Here's to many, many more....

a weekend of jazz

this is going to be one cool weekend. the Legendary Dave Brubeck is in Oklahoma City and performing with Canterbury. more accurately, we're performing with him. my mom pulled out her playboy album from the 60's with Brubeck on it and i hope to get it autographed for her. there is such buzz about being on the same stage with this 86 year old legend. one of the highlights in my singing career. he's being honored as a jazz legend in New York at the Kennedy Center in early March.

To be alive and a legend, wonder what that feels like. to have had such impact in one area of anything that you will leave a mark on it forever. wow...

so i'm stepping on the stage and singing with this man who focused his talent and changed jazz forever....

peace.