Disco

Yesterday when Chris came home from work he was in a fun mood. He was playing a bunch of disco and 80's tunes and doing break dancing moves for Liliana. Next thing I knew we were all dancing around the living room to YWCA and Play That Funky Music. I love my fun husband!

The Lou

I never did write about trip to St Louis...

Liliana had so much fun- on Thursday night 3 of her cousins spent the night together at my sister's house. Whenever the cousins spend the night they have a tradition of going to the gas station and Bess lets each of them pick out 2 junk food treats. They LOVE going to the gas station. So, when I put L to bed they made their trip and by the time I came down to the kitchen the counter was full of Funions (is that how you spell those crunchy fake onion rings??), pringles, gummy bears, etc...

Then the next morning we went swimming. My sister Bess has a friend Robin that she has known since kindergarten. It has been a few years since I have seen Robin, but she was so excited to meet L. She is a teacher, so she is wonderful with kids and we all had such a great time at her house. We ate TONS, swam and just wore ourselves out. This was Liliana's first time to really go swimming- we took her in sprinkler type thing last year, but not quite the same. She has a cute new bikini and she loved swimming. She kept up with everyone and as soon as pulled away from Robin's house she was out cold. Kids have it made that the can sleep in the car- I was a little jealous at that moment that I couldn't sleep in the car with her!

We came home, changed, and then Bess, L and I went to Imo's Pizza. We were cracking up- first we spilled ranch dressing all over the ground and had to get someone to clean it up. Then we spilled our iced tea- we were making a scene just laughing. We weren't trying to spill things on purpose. So we decided we better get out of there before we spilled more stuff!

Then Saturday was the baptism. My cousin Bessy had a great reception as usual- there were at least 100 people there. She had lots of food, Greek dancers, crafts for the kids, take home gifts, etc... They had those fake tattoos, so L got her first Elmo tattoo. I heard "Elmo, Elmo" all the way home as she would point and get so excited about her new tattoo.

I remember growing up getting to spend time in the summer with my out of town cousins from Chicago, California, Canada and Greece. Those are some of my best memories and I hope I can pass that on to Liliana too.

Happy Father's Day

This was Chris' first Father's Day. It's crazy to think that last year at this time we had no idea Liliana even existed, much less would be our daughter. Life can be full of surprises.

3 days before FD Liliana and I were in St. Louis visiting family for a baptism. (more on that in another blog entry). I am not the type of wife that can be apart long from their spouse. I know many people travel and have to spend extended periods of time away, but I just am not wired that way. So, on the ride back to Madison I called Chris how many times? I missed him so much.

Since we were gone for 3 days, all Chris wanted to do for Father's Day was to be near us and have a low key time at home. He was in the mood for some sort of Italian flavors and salad. So, I made a yummy chicken and roasted red pepper alfredo pizza with feta and parmesan cheese. We cooked it outside on the grill and I also made a big salad to go with it.

We played a lot with Liliana- she was super wound up... she gets that way when we travel and she gets out of her routine. But it was hilarious and she was totally cracking us up. After her nap, Chris and Liliana went to go rent a romantic movie and get some treats for Mommy and Daddy to have when Liliana went to bed.

We snuggled on the couch with treats and we were in paradise. We have full schedules, so to have an evening to lounge around and chill with a movie was so great. It was a perfect first Father's Day. :-)

Emotions Galore

I thought about how many different emotions I experienced yesterday... These are just the ones that come to my mind right away. No wonder Chris had a hard time keeping up with me sometimes...

SATISFACTION- got a delicious ice cream cone and sat out on the terrace by the lake at UW eating it. the weather was gorgeous and the ice cream tasty.

SADNESS- i read my e-mail for the volunteer opportunities this week with AIDS network. one of the clients said he would buy someone a ticket to go with him to the amusement park and ride roller coasters. i almost cried when i read this.. someone has to pay a stranger to go to great america with him because he is lonely and has no friends to go with him. so sad.

DISAPPOINTMENT- i got a phone call from a venue we have been scoping out for our church services. they are wanting to charge us double of what quoted to us. gotta keep looking some more.

APPRECIATION- sometimes i stop and stare at liliana's blue eyes and just appreciate her beauty. she was on chris shoulders and she was leaning against his head b/c she was tired. her skin color with a white shirt against chris' dark hair just made her complexion glow and her eyes shine. it's good to stop and notice her beauty, not just her cuteness.

CURIOSITY- there is a co-op in town and so we stopped by to check it out. i love exploring new stores and seeing what kinds of goods they have. we spent forever in the loose tea aisle trying to see what blends would be good to try, scoping out the various cheeses, chocolates, on and on.. it was fun.

NOT SURE WHAT I WAS FEELING- chris watched L so i could go to barnes and noble for a little while. when i got there i had no idea what kind of a mood i was in and what i wanted to read. so i kind of wandered around aimlessly and then finally got a few books and sat down, still even then not sure what kind of mood i was in.

FATIGUE- i was worn out in the afternoon, so while L took her nap, i also took a little cat nap. i needed it.

SURPRISE- chris went to return some library books and when he came home he had a big glass of iced tea for me. for some reason i am bad at making iced tea. i love the iced tea from his work, so he always brings some home for me. even though he was off today he stopped by and his boss let him bring some home for me anyway.

BOLDNESS- we have some new neighbors that moved in and they seem like a super cool couple. their daughter, lily, was playing outside for a few minutes with liliana. when we came in i told chris we needed to have them over for dinner to get to know them better. so i marched to their door and invited them to grill with on on tuesday. and they said yes. :-)

CONNECTION- we always say bedtime prayers, but after we did, chris and i had this super great time of sharing what God is doing in our lives. i felt so connected to chris and Jesus after sharing- it was one of those rare, special spiritual connection times.

Bikers and Bars

Last night our friends watched L so Chris and I could go out together and meet people. For those who have never church planted, basically when you first move to a new city, you try to meet as many people as you can. The technical term is called "gathering" or I guess in the corporate world it would be "networking". Chris and I are not really interested in gathering Christians going to another church.. we want to see people meet Jesus so we are hanging out at non-churchy places.

So...
Wed night is bike night in Madison. Not Schwin bikes, but Harley bikes. Chris and I have a motorcycle- not for status, but for a cheap and fun way to get around town. So, we thought we would go check out "bike night". It was actually cool in the fact that literally hundreds of motorcycles are parked all over this location and it draws quite the crowd. However, we are so not the biker types. Everyone was decked out in their leather clothes and boots, bandanas on their heads, showing off their latest Harley gear. Here we are in our jeans and tennis shoes and a Honda Shadow motorcycle that totally needs to be washed!

It ended up being good though.. we ran into one of the bakers at Chris' work and also our realtor, who we like a ton. It was great to see her and talk and we hope to hang out again.

Then we went to this local bar. Chris met a bartender there who is Greek, so I had to go meet her. I love her! We hit it off immediately and by the end of the night exchanged phone numbers so we could meet up to go get some Greek food.
However, the funny part is that I have zero tolerance for alcohol. I really like the taste of good beer, but if I drink an entire beer I get really sleepy. So I am sitting at this bar and I can feel myself getting drowsy after about half a glass. So I switched glasses with Chris and made him finish mine so I wouldn't fall asleep in the bar.

The things we do for Jesus! :-)

"ouch"

Liliana learned the word ouch last week when she got a scratch on her foot. So she is keenly aware of any "ouches" in sight. After her ouch, were reading the Bible and when she saw the picture of the Good Samaritan she pointed to the wounded person saying, "Ouch".

So.... this morning I woke up with a big ol' pimple on my chin. When L saw it she just stared and immediately said "Ouch". All day long she kept coming back to me, pointing to my chin and saying "Ouch".

Yeah, I'm not so sure I like this new vocab word anymore....

AIDS network

Today I went to an orientation meeting to begin volunteering with the AIDS network in Madison. I really hadn't given much thought to AIDS until last year when I went to Rwanda and met so many people that were HIV positive- many women and children. During the genocide, one of the ways they wanted to kill people was for soldiers who were HIV positive to rape women and thus spread their virus. What a cruel and awful tactic!

So, while we are still involved in work in Rwanda, I thought it would be good to get involved locally with AIDS patients.
The office is located on Willy St, which is where many homosexuals live and boasts of endless gay friendly shops- rainbows everywhere. There was a part of me that felt uncomfortable being there- not because I don't like gay people, but because I feel like gay people won't like me since I am a pastor by vocation. I guess "reverse discrimination". At the beginning of the orientation we had to tell why we were interested in volunteering. I explained my trip to Rwanda and the head guy was so impressed and wanted to hear more. So after it was over he asked me what organization I was with there and I said it was Vineyard, which is a church, there was a hint of disappointment in his voice. Oh well.

I think this is going to be a good, eye opening experience for me. I can't even begin to imagine the hurt and judgements that homosexuals have received from church people. You just feel the tension in the air when gay and Christian are used in the same sentence- on both ends. My desire is to be a learner- I believe the gay community has things to teach me and I want to learn. I want my love to grow and hopefully in turn offer love to those whom I will serve.