And you thought I'd never come back...

Dear Stacey,

(in case anyone other than Stacey reads this...I'm trying to make my posts a bit more personal. She's my sister and wonders how I can take the time to post on my blog and then not send her a personal email...since I didn't send her a personal email today I'm hoping this helps!)

Up and out of the grave, I have returned! Actually, I have been everywhere but a grave and doing so many blog-worthy things that I haven’t had any time to even consider continuing my bloggy addiction. Right now I sit in a hotel room while Karis is taking her much needed and daily 3 hour nap. The mission is having our first conference away from a “base” where we are basically being spoiled and going to meetings all day. It’s great! I must admit after so much activity the past 6 weeks I wasn’t really looking forward to this week but now that we’re here I realize how rejuvenating this week will be for me (all of us!).

With too much to write about and too many pictures I’m going to condense what I could very easily make into 15 posts into one post and summarize the trip we took to the good ol’ U.S. of A. I came back so grateful for having such a generous brother...I never imagined how much this trip would mean to me. However, on the plane ride there I questioned my sanity, the value of my life, the value of my daughter’s life and wondered if I should fake some sort of breathing difficulty to get the plane to land somewhere in South America (and then of course figure out how to get back home after the fact). Yes, it was really that bad. I better not try to explain the amount of frustration I felt towards my child the first 6 hours of that 9 hour flight (just writing about it is making me feel all anxious) but I think this picture will describe perfectly how we both felt…

And please keep in mind that this picture was taken BEFORE takeoff. I was still enjoying thoughts about what we’d eat as soon as we landed in Orlando. 30 minutes after this picture was taken I promised God that I would fast the entire trip if only He would please put me in a temporary coma for the next 8 1/2 hours. Turns out that 6 1/2 hours would have been enough.

Skipping past the initial part of our trip (cutting Elve’s hair at night and our fun blog party) we made a surprise and quick trip up to TN to see Jonathan’s parents. I wasn’t sure if it was really going to be a surprise but it turned out that it was, which made it really fun! Mom stopped the van a few blocks in front of my in-laws house so that Karis and I could walk up to the porch discretely. I put Karis in front of the door, rang the door bell and let her say “surprise” as J’s mom opened the door. Her reaction was classic.

We had so much fun the next few days. Some of the activities included….

Tea Parties

After Dinner Bible Stories

Early Morning Cartoons

Hanging out (getting spoiled) by Vovô and Vovó

Reuniting with some great friends!

Back to Tallahassee, more family and the Good Cents store. We still continued to go twice a day for the next week (not the week of the wedding) and found lots of treasures! Makes me want to move back to Tally just for that :-) Here are a few highlights of our time before the wedding…

Hannah Montana PJ's

My brother Jon Jon is very philosophical. He is amazing and I am very proud of him for everything he has done and everything he is doing to serve the Lord. However his philosophical thinking can really stress me out sometimes. On the way home from TN we got into a discussion about clothing where my mom and I were trying desperately to convince him to dress a bit differently than he presently does (if you know him then I have no need to try and explain to you why this was our goal:-) His question is “What is the purpose of clothing?” It turned into a very lengthy and drawn out discussion where he made lots of good points that neither of us could argue with. My final conclusion...I have nothing to base my dislike for his choice of clothing on and unfortunately can’t find a spiritual reason to convince him to dress more according to my taste. Anywho, one thing he mentioned was some of the brands and slogans that we wear to express different ideas, etc. Even though there are some brands who cater much more according to my taste I don’t really think about advertising for certain brands since my clothes almost always come from a 2nd source (2nd hand stores vs. the stores themselves). He said something like “when you wear a shirt that says ‘Gap’ you are basically saying ‘I’m not really cool but Gap IS and so now I’m wearing this t-shirt to be cool like them.” or something like that. If he reads this he is probably going to die with my paraphrase. It really got me thinking though. Then it got me feeling stressed. I have always enjoyed not thinking about what I am or am not promoting by wearing my cheap clothing. However, now I can’t post this picture of Hannah Montana pajama pants without saying “I am not cool. Hannah Montana IS cool. Now I’m cool because I’m associating myself with Hannah Montana.” Not really. What I’m really saying is “wow, these pants are so soft and comfy and were on sale at wal-mart for $4! I’ve never watched Hannah Montana in my life so please don’t associate me with anything she does that I don’t agree with!”

Lots of fun with Grandma's dress-up clothes

Technology overload

Dumpster Diving

It was the weekend that the FSU students who graduate in the fall move out so Kimmy and I thought we’d scour the town for some treasures. We realized as we pulled out of the driveway it was lunch time...hey, no problemo! Little Caesar’s Hot-n-ready here we come. One large pizza later we returned with a nice area rug and this awesome (and I mean awesome) solid wood shelf thingy that I now hear my mom discarded immediately after my return to Brasil. Crazy woman...it was really cool. You would probably love it so if you live in Tally drop by their house and see if it’s still out there on the side of the road. Once mom sees it in one of your homes she’ll regret letting go of something so spectacular. For sure.

Perhaps our trip will be in two posts instead of one. I still have 243 pictures of the cutest flower girl in the world to show off!

It's good to be back into bloggy-world...or at least partway back. I probably won't have much time to catch up on all of the blogs I enjoy reading but that day will come in about 8 days!


Your loving sister,