Wow! It’s mid-December?! Holy Cow!
It’s been a fast and crazy two weeks. Let’s see if I can play catch-up in one post.
1. I have a new job. I started a new position with the Dallas County Community College District on Dec. 5th. I’m not completely sold that this is the career for me, but I think it’s a lot closer in the right direction. My official title is: Curriculum Management Content Specialist. And guess what — that’s actually what I’m doing so far!
I enjoyed my time with the county but the further along I went, the further I realized it wasn’t quite for me. My boss was great, my co-workers were great, the hours and benefits were great, but in the end I felt like the money could be better spent on paving roads than on paying my salary. Also this opportunity came available when I wasn’t even seriously looking and I felt like it was where God was leading me next.
The job itself is working with the district’s catalogs and maintaining, posting and revising them online, as well as putting together a “print” version that will be stored as a PDF on CD for various groups. I’m also getting to do some graphic work along with the web and database work so it should be a great experience either way.
2. Well that’s about it. Just kidding.
3. Things around the house have been busy as well. We had our community group Christmas party on Dec. 7th, followed by a men’s gathering/challenge at 10 p.m. that night. It’s part of a 9 month series we’re doing on challenging men to be stronger men of God. I put together a website for the challenge and just now finished editing the video from our first gathering.
The basic idea behind the challenge is that once a month we’ll pass out GPS coordinates on Sunday morning and post them on the website. The following Friday night – at 10 p.m. – the men in the church will meet at that location for discussion and a challenge from Brian. He’s also following up with a challenge that is e-mailed/txt’d/ or printed out for those interested.
The idea is that there is a bit of a challenge in finding the location as well as coming at the scheduled time. You have to make some sacrifices to be a part of the event – just like we have to do to be men of God.
I’m looking forward to the other meetings. Our first meeting was on an island in the middle of Lake Waxahachie. The coordinates simply took us to a boat ramp where we gathered and 3 john boats carried us in pairs to the island where a bonfire and Brian were waiting. Very cool.
Brian mentioned yesterday that he’s amused at the difference between our church and others. He told another pastor about the idea and the man responded, “Yeah that sounds like a great way to get deacons and elders for your church. That’s when you find out who you want to lead your church in official capacities.” Too bad we don’t have deacons or elders. Ha.
4. We had four parties to go to last weekend. Our community group Christmas party, a birthday party for Gracelyn, a Christmas party at Daniel and Allison’s and the CWF Christmas party. Whew! What a weekend. And our friend Andrew was “bab-a-tized” Sunday morning (I’m working on that video too).
5. Monday, Dec 10 brought work again and then we went to Mesquite that night to enjoy an After Hours Improv show at our parent’s church. Always good entertainment.
6. Wednesday, Laurie stayed home from work to rest and catch up on her sleep. All the going, going and going along with her heart working overtime wiped her out.
I was somehow able to convince her to hold off with painting our bedroom during the day, but after I got home she went to work. She painted one wall a cool rich dark purple to match the comforter on our bed. I’m just surprised she hasn’t posted pictures of it yet. That took up most of the evening, while I worked on “tweaking” a (Unit 4) photoshop project.
Thursday evening she finished touch-ups in the room.
7. Friday was another Christmas party at work. I think that was the 4th one I’ve been to since I started at DCCCD. Let me think back… We had a chili cook-off the 2nd day I was there, a pizza party the 3rd, the Chancellor’s Christmas brunch earlier in the week and then the lunch/party at a Mexican restaurant in Mesquite for another team I’ll be a part of. And there’s one last party on Wednesday of this week.
8. Once the party was over, I tried to do a little Christmas shopping but gave up after visiting three stores. Just couldn’t get myself in the mood to fight the afternoon crowds.
After Laurie made it home we went to Bob and Vickie’s for some dinner with the rest of Laurie’s family and then headed over to Jed’s house for a Christmas party there. Jed will be marrying Jen, Laurie’s maid-of-honor in June. I think Jen’s enjoying taking the “bachelor” out of Jed and his house. I’m not sure who’s worse – me or him. I guess we’ll have to quiz Laurie and Jen after the wedding.
9. Saturday we slept in finally and then got up and cleaned, ran errands and cooked dinner for friends to come over for dinner. Matt, Kathryn, Daniel, Allison, Richard, Amber and Gracelyn all came for dinner. We had a great time – and took no pictures :-(. We usually end up playing games after dinner but it was nice to just sit and talk around the table afterwards.
Laurie fixed her infamous potato casserole and I cooked up a green been casserole and a pot roast. We decided afterwards that we’d stick with the cheaper roast meat when doing pot roast – chuck roast doesn’t seem to be as tender and also seemed to be a lot fattier (there’s more on that story but I’ll save you the details for now).
10. Are you still reading? Geeze. Bored at work I presume.
11. Sunday we had church as usual and then Brad and Jen came over with their kids and Laurie took some family Christmas photos of them. Lots of pictures – hopefully some of them turned out good. Getting two kids to sit still for too long is pretty hard so luckily we had lots of room for pictures on our camera disk and lots of time ;-). It was great to spend some more time with Brad and Jen and the kids as well. Brooklyn even volunteered to help me clean the back door where Presley has left her muddy paw prints.
And sadly, in the midst of it all, the Cowboys lost… dang that Jessica Simpson.
Well that’s about all I have on December for now. I’m sure I’ve left something or someone out and hopefully Laurie will get a chance to stop and fill in any gaps. But of course if you’ve been following my Twitter feed you already knew a lot of this anyways ;-).
Hopefully I’ll give my tips for riding DART before too long. It’s been cooking in my head since the 5th.