there's no place like gnome.

Turns out vacation for Lindsay also means no blogging for Lindsay.

Sunday was Christmas and a merry one at that.  Just Dance 3, the traditional card game of 31, and a Packer win.

Monday was lazy.  Movies were watched, How I Met Your Mother episodes played, and naps were had.

Target Tuesday followed with Molly and Erma Emma.  It was a game for Molly, creating as many odd and getting-inside-objects opportunities as possible.  [Please note these were all situations in which Molly said, “Take my picture!”  Provoked by Erma and I she was not.]

Today was lunch with two college friends [one who currently resides in CA and one in WA] and a spouse [one of theirs, not mine] in Madison, followed by outlet mall shopping in Wisconsin Dells with sem friend, Cassie.

Tomorrow is coffee and movie day.  Friends, aunt, cousins, and sister plus I will all venture to We Bought a Zoo.  I’ll give you the full Matt Damon report at a later date. 

Friday = Banana Christmas and Saturday = TBD.

Oh, what a lovely week of vacation.  

How was your Christmas?  The week that follows?

It’s the Christmas Eve wrap up!  [If it were Joel & Melissa, it would be a rap up.  I miss that rapping pair.]

One service this evening at 5pm at ROG.  Candlelight with Holy Communion and a whole lot of carol singing.  My sermon will also be no more than six and a half minutes long.  I’m going to talk about how Christmas is crazy.  This may also include wrapping the banana dog in a box for part of the children’s message.  Crazy is the word!

After the service, I’m heading to Owatonna for the Christmas Eve of misfits.  Paige, jD, Lauren, jD’s brother, the cats, a fondue pot, the game Spot It!, and I will comprise the misfits.  A week ago I was thinking about how sitting at home alone on Christmas Eve would not be fun.  That same day, I got a phone call from jD inviting me over.  Misfits think alike.  I’m looking forward to it with much anticipation.  It might even be a little … crazy?

I blogged a bit about being a pastor at Christmas here yesterday.

Mystique keeps falling over.  I’m not sure what kind of angel games she is trying to play with me.  She’s too full of glory to stay still?

Tomorrow, there is one Christmas Day service at ROG at 9am.  Immediately afterwards, this lady and her dog are Wisconsin bound because – have you heard?  I’m on vacation thru January 1st!  AND rumor has it January 2nd is a holiday.  Here’s to a week of leisurely reading, cousin time, and seeing long-lost friends. 

Merry Christmas, friends.

Christ comes as a baby in the manger not just to give us more of the life we know, but to give us new and abundant life altogether. For in Christ we have the promise that God will not stop until each and every one of us have been embraced and caught up in God’s tremendous love.  God will not stop until each of us have heard the good news that “unto you this day is born a savior, Christ the Lord.” [Oh, David Lose.  Thank you.]

Angel from the realms of glory from her box.

Here she is.

[applause?  loud gasps?  shock?  hark?  I’m uncertain of the appropriate reaction here.]

Turns out Mystique is not only 68 inches tall and has indoor/outdoor possibilities – she’s covered in glitter.  [enter vacuum]

I put her outside tonight with much struggle and many yards of extension cords.

Drive past and you’ll see her in all her glory.

Hark.

In other news, I would so be at the theater tonight seeing Girl in the Dragon Tattoo if I didn’t think it would freak me out too much to come home to an empty house alone.  [Even though I’ve read the books, I think the film adaptation might freak me.]

Also.  I began listening to Tiny Fey’s Bossypants on audiobook.  Hilarious and super entertaining.

My college roommate, Amanda, and her husband are passing through Austin tomorrow on their way to WI.  We’re going to meet for supper.  At Hy Vee.  [Don’t judge.]

And, lastly, I sent this to my brother [or rather his dog] in Alaska today:

Phone books were delivered a few days ago.  They arrived in bright yellow bags, tied shut, and flung on the ground underneath the mailboxes.  

Please help me understand why one also was dropped off at the cemetery.  

I understand the cemetery has a fire number.  Understood.  But there is no mailbox.  No office on site.  

Why?

Mabel and I took a walk to the cemetery this afternoon, joined by our neighbor dog friend, Neutron.  I debated picking the phone book up, throwing it out, thinking that would make me an environmentalist, out saving the planet.  [*cue theme music*]  But then I thought – what if there is really a reason there is a phonebook at the cemetery?  What if I picked it up and then someone came along to retrieve and had to wonder, “Where is the phonebook at the cemetery that I just came to pick up?”  Never mind the fact that it was dropped off five days ago and still sits there.

So I left it … just in case.

I’m just going to start out by admitting straight up what this post is about – I’m going to brag about my confirmation students.  There.  Now you know.

First example.  Last week, we began our time together by sharing highs and lows.  There are four seventh graders in my confirmation class – three ladies, and one gentleman.  The gentleman never says too much.  He’s pretty quiet but very considerate and cooperative.  When it came time for him to share highs and lows, he said he didn’t have any lows.  His high was that he was back at confirmation after missing the previous week.  Warms my heart!

Example the second.  Last night, we were only half a class with two of four present.  “I like coming to confirmation,” one said.  The other continued, “I like reading the Bible.  It’s really interesting.”  They both asked if they could stay later and so they texted/called their parents and stuck around an extra twenty minutes.

Third example.  With the two that were present last night, we talked a little bit about the bullying that happens in schools.  It’s real, people.  Fact is, one of the students in my class [who wasn’t there last night] is – unfortunately – a target of bullying.  A., one of the ladies last night, talked about how she stuck up for the other confirmation buddy in the middle of bullying.  She’s a petite little gal but she’s not afraid to tell a bully how it is.  Props to her.  Props to her.

Fourth.  We made graham cracker gingerbread houses in the last twenty minutes [plus the extra twenty minutes they asked to stay after].  We had fun.

It’s not even 8pm and I’m exhausted.  Like super sleepy.  

And I’ve not much to say.

But I wanted to at least check in.

So hi.

I blogged here today.  Do check it out and read the article.  It’s a well-written, thought-provoking angle that may well alter the way I interact with certain age groups.  

Work is going well.  Busy, busy.  But well.  It’s the children’s program this coming Sunday which means I can do the no-sermon dance.  But I have two next week for the eve and the day so it evens out.

I’ve had an itch to go see a movie lately.  Suggestions?  I know Girl with the Dragon Tattoo comes out next week.  Psyched.

I’m going to try my hand at truffles this weekend, package them all cute like, and give them to my council members as a thank you at the council Christmas party this Sunday evening.

Christmas cards have began to arrive in my mailbox.  I love getting the mail!

And because I’m out of things to say, I’ll let images say a bit more for me.  Meet my “words of wisdom and humor” pinterest board.

People, places, things, and links that are making me ridiculously and incandescently happy as of late:

. the bloggess.  I cannot believe how incredibly funny that woman is.  She is made of awesome and I will buy her book when it comes out.

. feminist Ryan Gosling.  Crazy thing is – thanks to Andy Root [my academic advisor and professor at sem] – I actually know what a few of those mean. [that might be pushing it. correction: I have at least heard the terms/people.] [added: oh man.  there is a typographer ryan gosling too.  this is funny.] [second add: Handmade Ryan Gosling.  Literary Ryan Gosling.  They don’t end!]

. a clean kitchen.

. new snow boots [in brown] so Mabel and I can frolic together.  They will also be good for snowshoeing; who wants to go?

. quoting Lord of the Rings.  [cue my sister rolling her eyes]

. as of noon today all I had done was watch three episodes of Dawson’s Creek and drank coffee.  hello saturday perfection.  [nevermind that blogging now is an attempt to procrastinate sermon prep]

. I plugged in my antenna cable after I finally found it hiding in a box in the basement.  I can now watch HIMYM, Big Bang, and Modern Family.  [no NBC; no Office]

. Josh Groban.  I have a renewed love for the crooner.  He cohosted with Kelly Ripa last week and turns out he’s hilarious.  No words can describe but this and this may help.  I tweeted him and told him he was adorable.  No response.

. [sing] oh christmas cards, oh christmas cards.

. a bedroom that is finally starting to feel like I live here.  new wall color, things hanging on the walls, a proper bedside table, and new curtains.  huzzah!

My age as of yesterday.

It was a good birthday made wonderful by the happy happenstance of location of awesome friends.  Southeastern Minnesota has treated me quite well by the presence of many familiar and friendly faces.  You know these people well – I talk about them all the time!

I had lunch in Rochester with Karen, my pal at the synod office.  I arrived at the synod office after doing a  care center visit and the synod staff present sang happy birthday to me.  For cute.  Karen and I went out and about and had a long pleasant lunch, celebrating my birthday on the day and hers a week earlier.  She gave me a plastic gnome with a mushroom parachute.  More about that later.

In the evening, Mabel and I welcomed Paige, Lauren, and jD for dinner.  Remember that Thai chicken pizza I meant to make last weekend but work got in the way?  It was a group effort and even with four people, it took us longer than the thirty Rachael tells us it should.  In the end, it was worth every matchstick  cucumber and every zested piece of cheese.  [Zested because I don’t own a cheese shredder.  Now – twenty four hours later – I recall that my food processor can shred cheese.  Don’t tell Paige and jD.]  It’s a pizza with plum sauce, bean sprouts, scallions, and peanuts and incredibly delicious.  A definite to-be-made-again recipe.  [Got that, Lynn?  Give it a try!]

Following dinner, things got out of hand.  I had asked jD to bring his electric drill; I needed assistance hanging a heavy mirror in my bedroom.  Done.  We threw the tiny plastic gnome with mushroom parachute down the stairs [“This parachute is a napsack!”], and we watched Modern Family [our show of choice when gathered together], laughing at Phil Dunphy.  We finished off the birthday evening with a lemon cake Lauren made [so good!], many Friends references, and a game of scrabble that lasted us until 1am.

By way of birthdays, I give this one two thumbs up, one high five, seven fist bumps, and one complimentary “balls to you!”  

Here comes year 28; may it be a happy one!