Saturday Mornings

I love Saturday mornings. The last 3 Saturday's we've been up at normal work times, but today, we slept in. Well, not really slept in, but we stayed in bed until 9:30am and it was great! We both woke up around 9, but we just laid in bed talking. I love mornings like this! We talked about anything and everything and it just feels good. We didn't solve the problems of the world, but almost. I love Daniel so much. I love how easily we can talk about whatever we want.

Now, we're sitting on the couch, drinking coffee and I'm eating my favorite Saturday breakfast, oatmeal. Yummy!

Randomness

I don't have a lot to say, but I thought I'd post something since it's been so long since my last entry.

Daniel is off work this week. He had no work, so he's home. It's a bittersweet thing. The obvious bad thing is that this is a week that he won't get paid. OUCH! One underlying good thing is that he is working on our construction project, our master bedroom. He's gotten a lot done in 2.5 days and I'm continually impressed by his talents. The way he can take an empty room and create a beautiful living space is unbelievable. It's a gift, one that I don't have, but am thankful he does! Another plus side to this "time off" is that he will be eligible for unemployment should it happen again. It shouldn't and we should be okay once it starts to warm up again, but it's nice to know that we have some options should it happen again.

I met my mom and dad at a local restaurant last week and we each had a shrimp poboy and they were divine. My dad has talked about this sandwich several times over the last week. He keeps saying he wants to go back to I Zee Zee...Huh? Yeah, the restaurant's name is Cafe Zydeco, but somehow he only remembers the Z in it and calls it I Zee Zee. Too funny. The funniest part of all is that the first time he said something about I Zee Zee, I had no idea what he was talking about and my mom knew right away. I guess that's what 44 years of marriage does for a couple! God love 'em!

I can't get the Jitterbug commercial theme song out of my head tonight. I hope I can sleep! Speaking of sleep, I'm going to bed!

Counting Blessings

Yesterday there was a funeral at my church for a 19 year old girl who died of cancer. I read her obituary in the paper on Wednesday and something tugged at me, but I couldn't figure out if it was just the natural gut-wrenching feeling of reading about death at such or young age, or something else. On Thursday, I was talking to my mom and she said she had to work at the funeral on Friday. She asked I remembered Stephanie. I asked if I should because I felt like I should. Back in October, my mom and I helped with the spa portion of Mending in the Mountains retreat for cancer survivors, sufferers and in between. There was a young lady there and I talked to her at length. She wanted to be a Kindergarten teacher and I shared some of my teaching experiences. She was an amazing young lady. She had very little hair, no eyebrows, and looked run down, but she was so optimistic! It was an amazing experience for me! Well, it was that young lady who had passed away. I looked at her picture again in the paper and then I recognized her. Her smile, mostly. She married her high school sweetheart in December 2008, after being diagnosed in May of 2008. She died February 1, 2009. I cannot imagine the grief her husband in enduring, or the rest of her family. I wish them peace and comfort knowing that Stephanie is pain-free now.

Then, yesterday I was calling on one of my doctor's offices and one of the PAs came out and he looked distraught. He came up to me and said that he just had to tell a 22 year old young man that he has lymphoma. He talked about what an amazing young man he is and how hard it was to tell him. I got teary. Can you imagine being 22 years old and hearing that you've got cancer? I can't imagine it at 31, 45, 56, or 60 for that matter, but 22? Really? Your whole world changes in a heartbeat!

I have so much to be thankful for. My family has some history of heart disease and diabetes, but otherwise we're quite lucky! I thank God everyday for all my blessings! And I pray that He will keep these families in His loving arms and bring them some peace.

I'm counting my blessings again today, and everyday!