My Beautiful Feet!

This is so gross! Haha! I had to post about it though.

Okay, people who have been close to me lately have known that I've been having a little... foot problem. The bottoms of my feet were peeling off. Hard core. So gross! No, it is not athlete's foot. I've had athlete's foot, and I know it when I see it. And this was not it.

See, I went on this backpacking trip at camp, and my shoes were... not good. I had blisters before we even left. Anyway, I think I got blisters underneath the callouses that were already on my feet. Yeah, so they all started peeling off! It didn't really hurt, but it looked pretty nasty. It totally grossed everyone out who saw them. Myself included. That's pretty much all I have to say about the joys of yucky-peely-feet. (Chris, "Skin flaps..." Eeeeewww!) By the way, this is not what my feet normally look like. I don't have beautiful feet, but that is just a special kind of gross.

I am posting a photo of the flaky goodness. (Hmmm... sounds like a breakfast cereal. Oh. gross. Why did I just say that???) Anyway, Hope you enjoy!


Peeling away...
Anna

Main Entry: skin
Part of Speech: noun
Definition: covering
Synonyms: bark, carapace, case, casing, coating, crust, cutis, derma, dermis, epidermis, fell, film, fur, hide, hull, husk, integument, jacket, membrane, muktuk, outside, parchment, peel, pelt, rind, sheath, sheathing, shell, shuck, slough, surface, tegument, vellum

Main Entry: peel
Part of Speech: verb
Definition: strip
Synonyms: decorticate, delaminate, desquamate, excorticate, exfoliate, flake, flay, pare, pull off, scale, shave, skin, strip, tear off, uncover

Well. That was fun! Thesaurus.com. Gotta love it!

What to do, what to do!

So those of you that know me (which is probably anyone who would be reading this...) know that I'm not sure what I want to be when I grow up. Well, actually I know what I want to be, I just don't know what I want to go to school for. I want to be a good wife and a good mom. Unfortunately, this is not a recognized profession. You can't get a degree in being a housewife. Also, you have to have a husband, so... I'm kind of up a creek.

So school is kind of a rough topic of conversation for me, but here goes.

For as long as I have been alive, I have wanted to stay in Texas. I loved it when I lived there, I missed it when I was gone, I love going back to visit. Texas is my state. People ask where I'm from and I tell them Texas. The fact that I live in New Mexico is a pesky little detail that I try to avoid. I am from Texas, I just live in New Mexico. My heart will forever lie with Texas.

For as long as I have been considering going to school, I've concluded that I would go in Texas. Naturally. Of course. Why anywhere else?

When a few weeks ago I had the thought, "What if I'm not supposed to go to school in Texas," I was shocked. I didn't know what to think. Not go to school in Texas? Huh? Why not? Where will I go? That's absurd! There it is again... "What if I'm not supposed to go to school in Texas?" It kept on popping up in my head, but now it was God saying, "And if I don't want you to go to Texas, what will you do?" Truthfully, I didn't know what to tell Him. I wish I could've just said, "Cool, God. Somewhere else! That sounds awesome!" But instead I found myself saying, "Not Texas, God? But that's where I'm from! That's where my family is! That's the only place I've really been! I've traveled through other states, but Texas is the only one I'm familiar with. I can't go somewhere else! I'm afraid." I tried to talk myself out of it. Maybe I'm just thinking I'm hearing God. Maybe it's just... something else. But I would hear it. Actually, it was more like feeling it. "Go..." I can't. It's too big. Too scarey. No friends, no family... I'm afraid.

Then He told me, "Read Joshua." Joshua? A book about spying out lands, conquering, pillaging, plundering... Why Joshua? What does that have to do with anything? Whatever. I opened the book up, and there it was. "Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the LORD your God will be with you wherever you go." It's hard to argue with that. "Have I not commanded you?"

So here I am, looking at schools outside of Texas. The problem is that I'm not sure at all what I'm looking for. Should I look by location? Should I look by cost? Should I look by career? If I'm looking by career should I look by what sounds fun to me? Or by what is more useful in the future? Can God use a degree in art as much as He can use one in communications or business? Is it okay to study something that I don't see quite how God would use? I mean, I know that God can use odd things like theater or illustration, but it seems more likely that He would use something a little bit more... traditional. Like business.

I thought that perhaps I should search for a ministry first, and then perhaps I could find a school that would be in the area. I searched for ministries online today, but I didn't find much that stood out to me.

However it happens, the fact is that I need to leave. Not to leave would be disobedience to God, and I'm writing this now so that all of you know. Maybe posting this will help me. I don't know. I'm terrified of leaving, but I shouldn't be. Remember Anna, "Be strong and courageous... I will never leave you, nor forsake you..." Don't forget!

Wow. It just hit me how bored you must be reading this. I mean, while this is pretty much what has been consuming my thoughts lately, I can't think of how it could be interesting to you. So sorry about that! I won't bore you any longer, but please do be praying for me!

Still confused,
Anna

Later in Europe...

Okay... Sorry I haven't posted this sooner. I've had it written out for a little while, I just haven't posted it. I'm not going to promise that I'll post again. I'm really not dependable! Anyway, I'll post what I had written down already. Enjoy!




The next few days were not quite so eventful as the first. We were staying in an American lodge, so it made things a little bit less interesting, but a lot less complicated and confusing.

We went skiing for about 2 days. It was a lot different from skiing around here. It wasn't that the slopes were particularly difficult, but around here you learn to ski on ice. I had no idea what to do in that powder stuff. I hadn't learned how to balance on my skis to keep my tips above the powder. After about the fourth wipe out I was thinking, "Get me out of this stuff! Let's find some ice!" The upside to wiping out in powder is that it doesn't hurt very much. Embarrassing, but painful to my dignity alone.

Learning the lifts was a challenge.  Instead of having a chair that is attatched to a cable, they have these bars that are shaped like an upside-down T. You grab the bar and place it under your... er.. bum, and then you let it pull you up the slope.  DO NOT SIT DOWN ON IT!  I learned this on my way up the bunny slope.  Unfortunately, Josh and I were going up together, so yeah.  We beefed it.  Big time. I just knew that all those little German kids who have been skiing since they were 9 months old were going to point and laugh.  I don't know if they did.  I avoided all eye contact.

After our second day of skiing we packed up our stuff, checked out of the lodge and hopped a train, Italy bound.  I must add that I was beginning to feel really bad.  I felt similar to an old, wilty, slimy piece of lettuce, only my throat hurt and my lungs were really tight.

We rode the train straight through Austria.  Neither of us really had much desire to stop there, so we didn't.  This was the glory of taking a self-guided tour.

Once we had crossed the Italian border, the police hopped on the train.  Those guys were really scary. I'm not sure if they were trying to look really intimidating, but they did.  They were just fine with my passport, but they weren't sure what to do with Josh's military ID.  Now, Josh and I were a little freaked out, because we had heard rumors before we left that the Italians can be a little... difficult.  Some people said you couldn't get in the country with a military ID, some said you could get in but you couldn't get out.  Since we were a little disturbed about this we asked the lady who sold us the Eurail passes.  She had done some research and told us that we should be good to go with the military ID.  Here with the Gestapo... I mean the Italian police, we weren't so sure. They looked at it, grunted, then asked Josh if he had a passport.  Josh replied that this was a military ID and is acceptable as a passport.  They asked what his occupation was, so he told them he was in the U.S. Army.
"But what is your job now?"
"That is my job. My profession is being a soldier in the U.S. military."
They said a few things to each other in whispered tones, looked at us through squinted eyes, wrote something on their clipboard and then told us we were okay.  This was met by a flood of relief on our parts.

This relief was, however, short lived.  Not 5 minutes later a train attendant came through the cars. After about the third language he said in English,
"Tickets please."
Josh found the Eurail passes and handed them to him.
"Where are your global passes?"
Josh looked at me, I looked at him...
"Global passes?"
"Yes. You must have a global pass to be on this train."
"I don't understand. The person who sold us these tickets told us that we could ride any train with this."
"Yes, but you must have a global pass."
"Why?"
"You must have the Eurail pass, and you must have a global pass to ride this train."
After a lot of confusion we figured out that in order to ride a train legally across a border, you had to have a global pass. The guy told us they cost about 5 Euro.  Then he looked around, looked over his shoulder and told us, (this is paraphrase)
"You know what?  I'm going to let you skate.  You're cool with me, but I get off the train at Bolzano.  There is going to be a different attendant checking passes, so he might get you.  The worst that can happen is that he'll make you buy them and then charge you a fee."
Okay.  That's cool.  Well, when they new guy hopped on the train he came through, checking everyone's tickets.  When he came to us and asked to see our tickets, Josh looked at me and then started digging in his pockets to find the Eurail passes.  We were kind of sweating bullets.  After a couple of seconds the guy said,
"Wait a minute... how long have you been on this train?"
"Since Germany," we replied.
"Oh.  Never mind then."
Whew!  And so God spared us from the fee.

My First Day in Germany

I recently returned from a 2 week vacation to Europe, which was awesome!  I promised to post some stories from my trip, so I think I'll basically just start at the beginning and tell ya what stands out.

The thing that stands out in my mind most of all are the people that God sent to make sure were safely on the right path.  Or train.

Okay, first of all, getting to know the train system is difficult.  It probably wouldn't be quite so difficult if I had been around trains more often, but come on!  I was born in Texas!  We don't use a train system there.  Because Texas is awesome.  And waaaay too big.  Anyway, we had no clue what we were doing.

We decided to do what all ignorant tourists should do and headed to information.  Behind the information desk was a young man.  He was about 23 or so, (the work force over there seems a lot younger. I don't know if it's true, but it definitely seems that way,) and had blue eyes and blonde hair.  He was wearing a faux-hawk, an earring and a very bored expression.

Josh asked the guy if he spoke English, to which he replied that he did.  Josh told him that we needed to get to Garmisch, so he printed a piece of paper, handed it to us and waved us away.  Okay...  The piece of paper was a train schedule, so that was cool, but we didn't know where to get tickets.

Josh decided to hail a person about our age since most of them speak English.  He found a guy and asked if he could help us.  The guy took the paper, looked at it and said, "Hmmm..." and started walking toward a gate.  He found the gate, looked at the paper, shook his head, walked to another gate, shook his head, walked back to the first gate...  After a little bit of fiddling with a machine and a lot of head shaking he pointed us back to information.  We told him thank you for trying and got back in line.

At this point I must add that in front of us this time there was a man with... um... a rather large hole in the seat of his trousers.  It was kind of hard not to laugh.  Surely he knew it was there...  It was quite cold and drafty.  Why didn't he go home and change?  Or buy a different pair of pants?  I'm not sure.

Anyway, back in line we were kind of hoping for a different information guy this time.  No such luck. We came back up to the counter and he rolled his eyes.  We told him that we didn't quite understand and tried to explain exactly what we needed.  He sighed, took the train schedule, scribbled a 9 in a blank spot and handed it back to us.  Yeah.  Thanks, guy.

We went back out to look for the gate that we needed.  While we were searching we overheard some people speaking good English.  Josh went up to a lady and asked her if she could help us.  She was so helpful!  First, she took us to information again and explained in German that we were trying to get Eurail passes.  The apathetic young man looked at us like we were stupid and told us to go to a different place.

The lady took us to the new place, where there was a lady who spoke pretty good English as well.  After making sure that we were in good hands she went her own way.  The lady that she left us with was extremely helpful and resourceful. She answered all our questions and told us a whole bunch of stuff we needed to know.  She sold us Eurail passes, (expensive, but invaluable if you don't know what you're doing) gave us a map, gave us a timetable of the European train system and wished us luck.  What a nice lady!

After we finally had our tickets we hopped on a train.  (I guess that 9 helped after all!)  Once we got on the train the attendant came and asked us for our tickets.  We showed him our Eurail passes and he took them, nodded his head, smiled and handed them back to us.

We traveled on that train for quite a while before we got to our stop.  Every time we would stop the train guy would come through the car, ask the new boarders for their tickets, serve some people some tea, and eye us carefully as we walked by. This unnerved me at first, but I got used to it.

When we got to the stop marked on our train schedule we got off the train.  Before the train pulled away the train guy hopped off and called us back.  I was thinking, "Uh oh... did we forget something? Were we supposed to do something?"  He said, "Are you sure this is your stop?"  We showed him our schedule.  He looked at it and nodded, made sure we knew exactly where we were going and where the correct platform was, hopped on the train and rode away.  Once again God was watching us, using the careful eyes of a kind and helpful train attendant.

The next train that we got on was... not so nice.  Actually, it was kind of ghetto.  You're not allowed to smoke on trains, but on this train everyone was smoking in the gaps between cars.  This is kind of dumb, because all of the smoke comes in the car anyway.  I'm sure all of you know my opinion this, but I think that having a "smoking section" is kind of like having a peeing section in a pool.  Sounds nasty, but it's true.

So here we are in our smoky, smoky little train when this guy boards.  He kind of looked like a homeless guy.  He was smoking a hand rolled cigarette and carrying this huge backpack.  He was talking to himself.  I thought this was kind of weird, but Josh looked at me with this knowing grin and said, "I'd bet he's listening to an MP3."  He was right.  It was kind of funny because the guy would all the sudden break out in song while dramatically pumping his arm, rocking out on his air guitar.

All of a sudden he notices us staring at him.  It wasn't the fact that we were staring that caught his attention because everyone was doing that.  It was Josh's fatigues.  The guy had apparently been in the German military and recognized Josh's duffel and jacket as American.

He immediately asked about it and launched his story.  And goodness me, this guy was a total nut case!  He told Josh that he had been in the special forces for 13 years.  Yeah right.  He was probably in the service, but 13 years, but SF?  Probably not.  Josh later said that perhaps the guy had some serious post traumatic stress issues.  Maybe that was it.  I don't know.  Anyway, he was very apologetic that Josh had to be in Iraq.  He was convinced that President Bush is evil.  He would solemnly shake his head and tell us how sorry he is that we have to put up with the guy.  I refrained from telling him that he could keep his apologies and I'll keep President Bush.  Thanks very much.

He also had this thing with the word, "Loco." For example:

"Have you ever heard of ______?" (some little German band)

No, we haven't.

"Oh, well, if you like metal you'll love them. They are really great."  *starts dramatically playing air guitar again*  "Oh, man.  It's loco."

He repeated this routine several times.

I'm not sure if it was his really strange behavior or his empty bottle, but something gave me the impression that the strange man on the train was intoxicated.

When we finally arrived at Garmisch, we were still pretty confused.  The guys at the USO had given us directions from the train station to Edelwiess, but after one attempt we gave up.  The directions were just not clear enough.

We walked over to a group of guys standing around and asked if they spoke English.  "Yes, we do."  Uh oh...  This guys English is a little too good.  "Do know where Edelweiss is?"  He grinned smugly and said, "It's too far to walk."  Oops.  Next thing we knew we were in his cab, racing to our destination.  Lesson learned.  Never ask a cab driver for directions unless you are willing to pay his fee.

Free Gift?

Listening to a sermon, I started thinking about God's gift of salvation. The person speaking referred to it as a free gift. That expression really irritated me.  I did much thinking, and this is my conclusion

I can honestly say that I have never given or received a free gift.  All gifts cost someone something.  Every gift requires some form of sacrifice.  That's the whole point.  You give a gift to someone so that they don't have to pay for it.  You give a gift to let people know that you love them so much that you don't want them to pay for it.  Even those cheesy gifts you get from department stores cost someone something.  And I'm not talking about the free* gifts.

The gift of Salvation is no exception.  In fact of all the gifts ever given, it is the most expensive by far.  What it cost both the Father and the Son are unthinkable.  Of course it cost much physical pain, which is where most of us would draw the line at giving a gift to an ordinary person.  It cost the Father turning His back on His beloved Son.  It cost the Son watching His Father turn His back, a sight He had never seen.  He was separated from the Father for the first time, which caused Him unthinkable anguish.

What is free about that?  Nothing.  Nothing at all.  Perhaps "all expenses paid" is a better way to describe it.  It is a gift, yes.  It is given to us so that it costs us nothing, but free is something that I can never call it.

I hope I never overlook exactly how much that "free" gift cost.

Anna

Here I am again...

I was recently reprimanded about not updating my blog often enough. Totally true! I apologize for the fifth or sixth time.

Over the last couple of weeks I have thought of many things to blog about, but I can hardly remember any of them now, so I'll just stick to my original idea, a list of things I love about my church.

• Okay, one of my most favorite things about my church is that they don't hesitate to fill up the baptistry and dunk people. At a lot of other churches I've been to, you had to add your name to a list. I understand that water costs money, but come on, Church!  If people want to be baptized they want to do it now!  Why tell them that they have to wait a month, or until they have enough people to make it worth while.  Why run them through like a herd of cattle?  These are people. Isn't one person enough?  I say it is.  Apparently my church agrees, because when people ask to be baptized, they are dunked the next Sunday.  Love that!

• Another thing that I love about my church is that if you're willing to serve, they will find an opportunity for you.  I've been in situations where churches almost looked at an eagerness to serve as an attempt to run everything.  How wrong!  If God burdens a person's heart to serve, who are we to tell them they can't?

• Kids, kids, kids!  I know I've said this before, but I love the fact that there are kids running out our ears.  We are a young and growing church, and I love the fact that there are so many children around all the time.  These aren't only children who attend with their parents, these are children who are coming from foster care and stuff.  There are 2 reasons that this excites me.  First, I think it's absolutely fantastic that they are coming.  I'm glad they feel comfortable, and I'm glad that we have an opportunity to minister to them.  Second, I think that it adds a whole different dimension to the way we treat church.  Children can add so much to things without even knowing it.  That's one of the things that I love about teaching Cubbies.  Some of the things they say really make you go, "Huh...".  It's really incredible.

That's all I have time for, but hopefully I will be able to update this soon. I'm going to be off all next week, so I should have some time. I'm going to Europe! But that's for another post on a different day.

Anna

Just Stuff

I don't have that much to write about, but it's been a while since I posted.

I recently started a new job.  I'm working at Dillard's in the home department, and it is a lot of fun.  Training was not fun, but the actual job is.  In training I watched 14 videos. It was probably one the most boring 2 days of my life.  The thing about videos is that I do better with hands on, not just visual training.

I had a hard time on the floor at first, but after a couple of days I started to get the hang of it.  Now all I have to do is learn my department, which could take a while.  My goodness!  There is so much stuff in it!  We have everything from crystal to luggage.  We have bath linens, bathroom accessories, baking and cooking pans and utensils, bed linens, kitchen appliances, table linens, dishes and... (drum roll please,) a SINGING EGG!  I know you all need one.

This beautiful piece of... um, junk is a wonderful gift for that mother-in-law who has everything (guarantee you she doesn't have one of these!) or simply as a dust catcher on your own coffee table! It is a cute(?) little gold and silver egg that you can wind up to hear one of your favorite songs, complete with a little heart thingy to put a picture of a loved one in.  Just wind it up and look at little Suzie while listening to 'You Are My Sunshine'.  Come and get yours today all for the tiny price of...  Well, actually I don't know how much it is, but it's probably an audacious sum of money for such an ugly little knick knack.  The really cheesy thing is that it doesn't even open up by itself.  You have to do it yourself.

Okay, so now that I have told you about the singing egg, the most embarrassing thing in my whole department, I will move on to better subjects.

I'm really super excited because I called an acquaintance this week about getting involved in a college study group.  I'm pretty stoked.  It's been so long since I've actually been involved in a Bible study.  I have missed it so much.  I miss being able to watch people growing beside me.

The last thing that I have to say is that I was totally grossed out by the Rolling Stones Superbowl halftime show!  Who wants to watch an old guy wearing girls clothes jumping around and shaking his butt?  And you gotta love those happy arms.  Sorry, Mick.  Sick.

Anna

The Prayer

The other day while I was at work this table of 6 came in, and the other servers most graciously decided to give it to me.  (Thanks, guys.)  Well, it was supposed to be 6, but it ended up being a lot more than that.

It all started out with like, 2 old ladies.  I cannot tell you how much I dislike waiting on tables of old ladies.  They are very picky, and downright impossible sometimes.

They don't actually look at the menu, they just order whatever the heck they want.   "Yes honey, I want 2 pancakes, 1 egg scrambled hard, (and honey, I mean hard,) and 1 piece of bacon.  Oh, and make that bacon extra crispy."  Okay, well, we don't really have anything with one egg and one piece of bacon.  I'll have to put everything under sides, okay?  "Okay, honey. That's fine."  They all get almost the same thing, and then when you take it to their table they can't remember what they ordered.

Here I come with the hot plates...  Okay.  Who ordered Harvest Grain and Nut pancakes? "Well, I had some pancakes, sweetie."  Were they Harvest Grain and Nut? "Well, I guess. I don't remember. Just set them here."  I set them down and she tears into them.  Now some lady across the table who was so busy gossiping that she didn't even know I was at the table looks over and says, "Harvest Grain and Nut! Those are mine!"  Um, well, your friend here who doesn't know what she ordered has already poured boysenberry syrup all over your pancakes.  "Well, go get me some.  I don't care if I have to wait 20 minutes.  I want my Harvest Grain and Nut pancakes!"  Turns out that this lady does care if she had to wait 20 minutes, and the one who ordered her bacon extra crispy is suing IHOP for the cost of her ruined dentures.  Well, that may be a slight exaggeration, but it really is difficult!

Anyhow, it started with 2 old ladies and ended up being about 9.  Woohoo!  They weren't that bad, as far as The Clovis Widows Club type tables are concerned.

I had sort of picked up that these were a bunch of church ladies, and they were having a fabulous time sharing prayer concerns and all the details on their most recent surgeries.  Their most recent surgeries, and also the surgeries of their husbands, friends, family members, their roommates in the hospitals, and their pet poodles.


Their food comes out, and I get it all ready to go.  This time I was prepared.  I had everything written down and pulled it exactly how it would be set on the table, that way we wouldn't have any Harvest Grain and Nut or egg mix ups.

I had put about half of the food down and about 5 plates in my hands when one of the ladies has a very bright idea.  "Well now, why don't we say a blessing?"  Whoosh!  They all join hands and bow their heads.  Okay... Here I am holding plates.  I thought, surely they'll remember I'm standing here.  They'll make it short.  My, my.  I was so wrong.

"Dear Heavenly Father, I thank you for this wonderful opportunity for all of my friends to come out to breakfast on this beautiful morning.  I thank you for the cold weather, and I also thank you for the beautiful sunshine."  Cool. Maybe she's almost done.   "And Heavenly Father, I thank you for Ruby.  We are so glad to have her with us today, and Lord, I also thank you for Alma.  I'm so blessed to have her in my circle.  You know what a wonderful friend she is, Father."  She proceeded to thank God for every person at the table.  "And dear Lord, I thank you for Leona. You know that she can't get out much anymore, but I just thank you that she could be with us today.  You know what a blessing it is.  And Father, I thank you for her daughter, Linda.  Thank you so much for her servant heart and for her kindness to her mother, Father..."  Then she started going over all of the prayers that the ladies named while they were ordering.

Finally, she started to wind down a little.  I thought, Whew!  Finally she's going to end it!  I almost died laughing when she continued, "And Heavenly Father, my heart is heavy because we didn't reach our Lottie Moon Christmas offering this year.  I just pray Father, that you would instill a desire, a generousity in everyones hearts that they will give, and that Jesus, we would be able to reach our goal."  On and on!  It was the funniest thing!

Anyway, I did eventually survive the table.  They were really a sweet bunch of old ladies.

May you always reach your Lottie Moon Christmas Offering goal, and may your Annie Armstrong Easter Offering be successful, also.
Anna