The Lazy Bum gets off the Couch

Well today is my last day sitting on the couch feeling sorry for myself. Well, I'm sure I will still have days where I sit on the couch feeling sorry for myself, but my supply teaching begins tomorrow. I am booked for 5 days, so hopefully the bookings will start up now and keep going.

The last month has been really hard, longing for a contract, facing the reality of life without one, making no money, watching everyone else go back to their regular, full routines. I don't know how people who don't work manage. It's the first time I've had in my life since I was 15 that I wasn't working, going to school, studying, volunteering, writing, being creative and trying to have a social life all at once.

I've been doing all kinds of things trying to express my creativity and keep myself busy. Cleaning, somehow has managed to stay low on that list of desirables. I have made bread numerous times (I can't wait for some decent yeast), cookies, muffins, supper. I have cleaned out the shed and the study. I have written a children's story I've wanted to write for years now. I got in contact with people I have wanted to for ages, written letters and cards, played in a garden, stained the deck, began writing in my novel again, become quite interested in a few t.v.shows (to my horror, the one eyed God has my attention!) Grey's Anatomy and Wind At My Back (a truly Canadian drama), and House (which I've loved for a year now), I've watched Oprah on occasion, and even Dr. Phil once, I've dreamed of doing a variety of things, emailed far more regularly, folded laundry far more often, and longed for social interaction in a real hungry way. I've become knowledgeable about ITunes and dreamed of travel. I've longed for work and questioned what I am to be about, what I am meant to do, where I am meant to be, who I am meant to be, how I can managed to be her. It has been an interesting season in my life.

A Glimpse

I was reading through my journal today and found this song I had written a few years back. Thought I'd share:

A Glimpse

In a heart so broken and filled with sorrow
Imagine what Mary thought;
As she knelt at the feet of the Master
And pained for the brother she had lost.

Just a glimpse of the hope that He offers
Just a touch of assurance from His hand…

It’s in the tears that slip from Jesus face
It’s in His love, arms opened to embrace
It’s in the truth that showers us with grace
He’s in this place.
He’s in this place.

On a blackened night the silence spoke
Of the Savior’s love from the cross;
As blood poured from the feet of the Master
Did they wonder at the heavy cost?

Just a glimpse of the hope that He offers
Just a touch of assurance from His hand…

It’s in the tears that slip from Jesus face
It’s in His love, arms opened to embrace
It’s in the truth that showers us with grace
He’s in this place.
He’s in this place.

Through this hurting world I will wait
I will seek the peace that He brought;
As I kneel at the feet of the Master
I will long for the truths that He taught.

Just a glimpse of the hope that He offers
Just a touch of assurance from His hand…

It’s in the tears that slip from Jesus face
It’s in His love, arms opened to embrace
It’s in the truth that showers us with grace
He’s in this place.
He’s in this place.

John 11, 19
~Heidi Carson
August 11, 2003

Harvest Jazz & Blues

Well it's here, Fredericton's own Harvest Jazz & Blues Festival! Tomorrow morning at 7:30 am, yikes! some of us will be meeting for the CBC Radio Harvest Jazz & Blues brunch where we will be singing and promoting the Playhouse concert tomorrow night. Smythe Street Cathedral Choir has the awesome opportunity of opening for Sista Monica! Check her out here at: http://www.sistamonica.com/index.html

This should be a real blast! I'm looking forward to having some fun with some great musicians and then sitting back, or maybe jumping to my feet with Sista Monica's charms-- woohoo for date night this week!

Celebrate! Celebrate!

Ok, another sucessful Saturday (after last weeks attack & success on the Shed)! Bright & early, migrane barely at bay, I headed in for choir practice for the Harvest Jazz & Blues Concert at the playhouse next friday night. Happily my headache seemed to subside throughout the morning and we finished early, ending at noon with a yummy stew Dot made for us. Dot is awesome!

I headed home with the headache rearing its ugly head--blasted thing--anyway, when I got home I fought it for awhile and couldn't take it any longer and went to bed and shut out all the light, I think I'm suffering from migranes or something. When I woke up I felt numb in my head, really weird feeling but I had things I had to do, so I attacked the bathroom cleaning, laundry and kitchen cleaning and by the time I finished those I was feeling the best I have in days. Relishing this, I decided today was the day to finish off the Study cleaning. That poor room since we've moved in has acumulated all the odds and ends, the things you just don't know where to find a home, along with say 300 + books, 150+ childrens books, 50+ recipe books, it's a full little room!

All of this to say with a satisfied sigh, I'm celebrating! I had tackled it earlier in the summer but there were still several boxes & odds & ends which have now been obliterated, everything that is supposed to be in the study is in the study, anything that isn't supposed to be in the study is gone! Yeah! Most of what we have now is in a deliberate place or we've gotten rid of it or put it in storage!

Celebrate! Celebrate!

4 things about me... (no life activities)

I decided to do one those because you have no life activity forwards a friend of mine sent along, so here it is....
Four Things about me
>
> Things you may not have known about me.....
>
> Four jobs I have had in my life:
1. Dairy Queen girl Moncton
2. Summer missionary for Child Evangelism fellowship on Dallas native Reserve Manitoba, & St. John’s NFLD
3. Safe Spaces Director UNB
4. Research Assistant to the Chair of the History Department UNB


>Four movies i could watch over and over
1. The Pink Panther Movies (original)
2. The Sound of Music
3. A Walk to Remember
4. Star Wars


> I have lived Four places:
1. Moncton
2 Tilly Hall UNB Residence Fredericton
3. downtown & uptown Fredericton
4. Lincoln


> Four TV shows I love to watch:
1. House
2. Gilmore Girls (back in the day)
3. The Amazing Race
4. Everybody Loves Raymond (back in the day)


> Four places I have been on vacation:
1. Vancouver, Victoria, Kelowna BC
2. Cornerbrook & Gros Morne NFLD
3. Boston & Rhode Island (Honeymoon)
4. Bar Harbor


> Four websites I visit daily:
1. President Choice Financial Banking
2. Bible Gateway
3. my really cool blog site http://heidibillington.blogspot.com
4. District 17 & 18 employment information


> Four of my favorite foods:
1. Cheesecake—oh yum – oh yum
2. Thai food, all sorts – groan…..
3. Italian Pasta & oh Gelato yum yum
4. Chocolate ahhhhhh dark chocolate….


> Four places I would rather be right now:
1. New York city with some awesome fun girl friends, great sneakers and a limitless amount of money
2. Italy, oh Italy dream of mine!
3. Elgin on a storm day, snowed in
4. in my very own classroom, preparing for the next days awesomely fun and creative lessons

Savanna's 1st Birthday Party!

Savanna's birthday cake.

Savanna's 1st Birthday Party!

Isn't she just gorgeous! I love her cute smile! This is the birthday girl and I'd argue she knows it too! You should have seen her go! She took 28 steps unaided down our hallway, what a going concern!

Savanna resting in her new birthday present, a Winnie the Pooh lounger

Birthday princess

Savanna's birthday blueberries

Savanna & Mommy enjoy birthday blueberries

Savanna quickly figured out birthday time and opening gifts.

the birthday crew. Believe it or not this is just the crew in the living room, not counting those crammed into the kitchen and those on the deck. Somebody's a pretty popular baby!

it's the beautiful birthday girl!

'cuse you're all asking...

Ok, so no, I DON'T have a contract for the fall. Everyone's asking and frankly I feel like a major LOSER. Yesterday was so tough, everyone started back to school but me. I mean really, I know that hardly anyone I graduated with has a contract either this fall (yet anyway) but at the same time, I just feel it so hard. It's not about not having work. It's not even about not making money because I'll make enough supply teaching once it gets going. It's that I've wanted to teach since I was such a little girl and crammed my sisters into desk like paraphernalia and made our cabbage patch dolls sit in little desks my Dad made them and play school, with of course, me as teacher. Check out this pic!
It's that I feel so alive when I'm working with students, helping them learn some necessary skills but more importantly investing in their lives. I don't even know where to put my energy right now. I've started putting some more energy into my writing, which I haven't been able to do in years. I've just got to be doing something with some sort of lasting difference. I can't stand just working. I know I'm putting in my time until something comes along, I know that I will be making decent money, but in a lot of ways it feels so much like working at the Drycleaner again. Necessary work, to pay for necessary things, for basic living, but with no real meaning attached to it, I can't stand work/life like that.
So, thanks to all of you for caring, please feel free to pray for something to open up for me, but please don't ask me anymore. I need a bit of a break. I'll let you know if I get something! I will, I'll be so excited it will be written all over my face! Promise!

Our beautiful neices have both celebrated their 1st birthday's this past month and they both had their gorgeous little mugs taken. Here is Savanna. Isn't she a doll?

Busy days...

Ah, the busy days....

Wednesday Chad's Nannie from Bar Harbour arrived for a visit. It is always so much fun and such a pleasure to have her stay with us. I really enjoy having her around. She arrived for Savanna's 1st birthday party on Saturday.

Thursday evening I had a music practice for the HARVEST JAZZ & BLUES FESTIVAL yeah, the choir is singing!! (announcement to come), anyway but before that Chad & I went down to the bus station to pick up his brother Doug, who also was coming in for Savanna's birthday party. I really like Doug, he's a "real" guy, you know, the kind who know's how it is and doesn't pretend it's any different. hes fun, great conversationalist, smart thinker, and "easy" person to have stay in your house. So we acidentally got the times mixed up for when he was going to arrive so we just sat on the back of the car freezing our toesies off and hanging out.

Little side note here. There was this couple who arrived after we did and pulled in next to us. He got out and helped his wife get the walker out of the back for her. She sat down on the walker and waited. Meanwhile a young, voluptous woman in her early twenties came storming off and starting totally telling off her mother about some non-existant express, meanwhile we're left just staring beside her. I can't believe she's ripping into her mother like that (firstly), secondly she has absolutly no shame whatsoever to do this with us sitting right there. People today, absolutly no respect. Grunt.

Anyway, we really enjoyed having Doug & Nannie in and Friday I made my friend Donna Knappe's amazing Spicy chicken penne for supper. Yumm, yum. The Billington clan came over to decorate for the big party and we had yummy din din. Thanks Donna for the dish it is delicish!

And Saturday morning dawns. We were ready for a party. Savanna was such a doll. I can't wait to get the pictures back. She certainly got a good grasp on opening gifts and she had a butt load! So many gifts for someone so little! The house was full of celebrants, somewhere around 20 I think, what a party! it was a full day. Savanna had a blast, I think, and got such lovely things too. I love baby clothes-they're so great and tiny!

Sunday was a full day of church. In the evening desperation called and I played piano in the band for the Street Invaders finale. How awesome an evening to hear how teens were challenged by God's word and the importance of sharing the hope Jesus offers. They all seemed to be assured in their own worth in Christ too, which is great. We will have to continue to pray that now that they head back to their homes, the truths they learned will remain a changing and challenging factor in their day to day lives.

Dawn Monday morning. Bright and early Chad & I arrived at the church to meet up with Joel & Anne Calabrese. Their flight back to Colorodo Springs flew out of Vermont so we had agreed to drive them down and bring their van back. We had a really great drive of laughs and great conversation, and of course a few naps along the way. It's amazing how much more comfortable driving for long distances can be in a vehicle built with some comfort! :)

We saw wild turkeys! just walking along the highway. I've never seen a wild turkey before, it was kind of neat, although they looked pretty skinny for dinner. Do people hunt WILD turkeys anymore? The neatest little town called Sharon, Vermont, captivated my attention along the road. Just a few houses, a tiny town, nestled in among the moutains, those rolling moutains, in a tiny valley. I'd never been to Vermont before, the mountains are stunning, in a different way then British Colombia. The moutains of Vermont roll at different depths and you can see many of them in, kind of like a pop up, 3-D book, all at the same time.

We stopped for the night in Shelburn, near the Burlington airport and went out to a lovely restaurant called the Tuscan Kitchen, with dangerous garlic....ah the danger of garlic.....ah the delights of garlic.....

We dropped the Calabreses off at the airport and hit the road yesturday morning stopping off in Kittery for lunch. Ahhh Kittery, an amazing experience. Unfortunatly, or perhaps fortunatly for our bank account, we didn't have much time in Kittery, but we did stop off at Carters, a favorite of mine. They have the most adorable baby clothes. We got a totally adorable outfit for each of our neices for Thanksgiving, I'll definilty have to get a picture some how and post it around the holiday.

Anyway, that's the catch up on everything, I must go and do someone productive today!

it's Chad and the jelly beans! The big picture on the back wall shows the 4 stages of Jellybean making, and then there's the colourful array of jellybeans at his side. yummy yummy.

Ok, so I had to put in this picture, please email me your answer to the big question: What is this? This is my sand creation from April & Angela's birthday bash at the sea. I have definite ideas as to what my creation is, but really what do you think it is?

pictures

the pictures are in! Prepare for the updates!

Today

Today, I cleaned our blueberries from Monday's picking--28 cups! Not bad for under 2 hours of picking, I'd say, and that's just Chad & I. Sharon picked between 16-18 cups, Shelley the same, and I don't know what Mom & Dad got. So I froze them for now, I wonder what I should make.

I also got the house pretty tidy before we go away. Chad & I, and the staff of SSC are headed down to the Willow Creek Conferences on Leadership, in Moncton tomorrow morning, through Saturday. We'll return Saturday night after Kaitlyn's first birthday party! Hard to believe she officially turns One Year Old this coming Wednesday-what a year!

Check out Willow Creek if you get a moment:
http://www.willowcreek.com/events/leadership/

The St. Stephen Chocolate Factory

Well, yesturday was great! Chad & I planned to meet Mom & Dad, Nanny & Grampy, April & Trevor, Angela & Kaitlyn in St. Stephen for a picnic and then we had booked a tour at the St. Stephen Chocolate Factory. It is Chocolate Fest in St. Stephen this week. We had tons of fun!

The tour was neat! We all had to line up with our hair nets (oh and for Chad, the beard net too) outside the factory. Even Kaitlyn had to wear one! We had to take off all jewlery too, I guess they don't want any diamond chocolate treats! Then they took us around throughout the factory showing us how pepermints, jellybeans and finally chocolate is made. I must admit to you that the smell of those machines mixing with candy and chocolate is not at all appealing!-gross! But I did manage at the end of the tour to fill my boots with chocolate. Unfortunatly because so many people are allergic to nuts, they didn't have many if any chocolate covered nuts out for sampling and they are my favorite! Kaitlyn was so interested in it all and got her first taste of chocolate cherry and a piece of black licorice that she absolutly loved to slobber up!

After the tour we drove downtown to the old factory which is now a museum and chocoliter, or chocolate store. Here, they had tons of chocolates to munch on as you went through, a chocolate history, chocolate carvings and movies on how the factory came into being, some of the initial employee's interviewed and more chocolate chocolate chocolate! By the time we left the museum we had all seen enough chocolate for, well, a little while :)

I went on the hunt for a charm for my bracelet, chocolate or St. Stephen, but was unsuccessful and then we all met to look at a gift shop, where Kaitlyn proceeded to fill her little feet and hands with splinters on the deck outside--yikes, they looked nasty. So, for the next hour or so we waited around while Mom tried to pry the splinters out of her little feet.

When Mom had done as much damage as she dare we went down to Pizza Delight for supper, where Kaitlyn proceeded to continue being the star of the show, showing us she would be 1 year old with her index finger, playing patty cake, cheering and giving applause--she is so much fun at this age!

After dinner, we walked up to Scoops, an icecream shop with a huge amount of falvors and most of us got an icecream, including Chad who also had to go next door and get some deep fried frenchfries.

All in all it was a great day, and as usual just so nice to hang out together and have some fun.

If you haven't been to the St. Stephen Chocolate Factory, you really should take a trip down during their one week Chocolate Fest. I don't know if tickets for this year are all sold out, but book it in your calandar and check it out--it's really econimical too! I'll post pictures once I have them developed!

http://www.chocolate-fest.ca/
http://www.chocolatemuseum.ca/

Blueberry picking

Today was a great day. Chad & I, Shelley, Sharon & Chad's Grammie, headed out around 9:30 this morning for my parents place in Churches Corner near Elgin NB (aka--the woods & mountains of now man's land New Brunswick). We arrived in time for lunch after I showed off the awesome Gordon Falls along the way. Mom had a great lunch made for us, subs and April had made chocolate chip cookies. Trevor & April, Mom & Dad, Angela & Kaitlyn were all there too. We ate up lunch and showed off Mom & Dad's digs and then headed up to the lookout for blueberries!

What a pile of them! Chad & I easily filled between 8 & 10 litres of blueberries in under 2 hours. Everyone did equally well--filling out boots. Because of the strong winds there were few bugs and the cloud cover made for a comfortable day out of the hot sun. It was great!

We returned home for some visiting and lassagna & blueberry cheesecake for dessert--yummy! Of course Kaitlyn was her usual doll-self, I love her so much! And hopefully I got a couple cute pictures of her. Angela had her pictures done for her birthday and I was thrilled to get copies for my wallet and coffee table at home. I love to show off the neices!

We returned home around 9pm, a little tired, but happy and tons of blueberries in tow!

A great Holiday Monday!

Shelley's vibrant hair

Ok, so it's mostly my fault.

Sunday night I was hanging out after church talking with Shelley when suddenly I noticed her hair had gone nearly completly GRAY! Keeping in mind that I'd done a home job on her hair a couple of time before and it turned out really well, I said "What are you doing tomorrow! We're dying your hair!"

So we met at the Superstore and picked out an auburn colour with blonde highlights. We had fun mixing the potions with the magic wands and applying it to her hair, but honestly, wow--it had a really interesting turn out! Lets just say VIBRANT hair colour--red,orange, blonde, Vibrant! I'm praying it will settle down a bit. At least Shelley's pretty easy going about it.....it will grow out..... Until the pictures come along.....

Ahhhhhhh, the Spa!

Saturday, Amy booked me for the afternoon for a post-graduation suprise. She wouldn't tell me anything about it except that it was a suprise, I needed to dress for the weather (she hoped it was a nice day) and bring a flashlight. Needless to say I was very interested. When she picked me up she took me for icecream at Tingley's--always yum! And the for a roundabout drive in Fredericton asking me questions about my fitness level, saying she'd probably need to go for a shower after before work, etc. I was really interested, and kinda thought we must be going on a hike through some cave or something!

Anyway, the little nimrod was just playing with me, but brought me to Avalon Spa for an hour massage. This extra fun because we both went together! I didn't even know you could do that kind of thing in Fredericton! Anyway, we had an hour of absolute bliss! If only I could afford to do that on a regular basis! It was so wonderful and what a great gift!

Another Dream Come True!

Now, as many of you would know, I have wanted a piano, or something with really great sound, full hammer action and full keyboard length ever since I moved out from home, nearly 9 years ago. How often I have longed for something to sit down to and express myself in a way I had come to love and find solice, but I was so unhappy with anything I might be able to afford in the keyboard range that I held off, believe that someday, I might be able to buy my own piano.

So this past weekend when a touring company came through Fredericton with a major piano sale, Chad & I decided it would make a fun date night to go up and dream a bit. When we got there, they had some amazing piano's, one German grand was so beautiful and one of the staff played it for us so beautifully. We dreamed a little and left. Always, after doing this, and trust me I've done it for years, leaving empty handed yet again has made me feel like a little part of me died again. I was a little sad when we left to say the least but I just knew there was no way we could afford a piano at this juncture in our lives. So we went for icecream! LOL!

While licking our cones Chad suggested we go to our local music distributor and friends shop "Tony's Music Box" and look around. When we got there Mike helped us look at some really great electric piano's, with good sound, full hammer action and full scale keyboard. He got us a few prices to mull over and then we found this baby.

Mike sat down to show us what it could do, and you'll never guess what he started playing...."Somewhere Over the Rainbow". I couldn't believe it and started laughing! I soon informed him that my mom used to sing that song to me when I was a little girl, and the first time Chad met me I was singing that song at a youth play, and the first movie we saw together it was playing in the soundtrac, and because of this we had decided to have me walk into it on our wedding day! It seemed ironic or something.

I didn't think we were seriously looking at keyboards Friday night, but Chad had other plans in mind. He asked me if I would be happy with this one (I thought he meant down the road) and I said, of course. Then he asked me if I wanted to take it home tonight. Laughing I said again "of course!"
"Ok Mike", he said, "lets do it!"
I couldn't believe it, I'm not sure I still can. But trust me, at 12 midnight when I called my parents in Moncton with the news and played them a piece over the phone, it truly was amazing, another dream come true!

FIRE!

Yeah, so it's true, yesturday I nearly set the house on fire. You know it really isn't an advantage when parents keep their kids out of the kitchen--grunt, I'm such a novice! So last week sometime Chad & I were looking for a quick lunch and he took two of our new potatoes and cooked them up in the microwave. I distinctly recall him saying he put them in for 15 min. So yesturday, quite hungry and wracking my brain for something to eat for lunch I took two little new potatoes, cleaned them off put holes in them and put them in the microwave for 15 min.

Most of you can guess what happened. At the same time I was doing laundry and then the phone rang. After answering the questions from the person who called I hung up and looked up over across the living room towards the loveseat where to my astonishment I saw big billows of smoke. "Oh my gosh! something's on fire behind the couch!" I thought to myself. When I jumped up, I suddenly noticed that the whole house was filled with black smoke! Running to the microwave I saw that all of that smoke was coming from it--billowing out the door. Quickly I opened the microwave, turned it off and observed my lunch. Two tiny black coals. I poked it with my fork and it fell apart, two empty coals.

Needless to say my lunch was ruined, my house smelled like someone had been smoking a chimney in it--all day, and I banned myself from using any household appliances for the remainder of the day. Now this morning I'm going to be making bannana bran chocolate chip muffins, I pray we'll do a better job.

Gotta get that Fire alarm checked too!

Our FIRST Anniversary!

Well, we've made it! Year one of being married! In some ways it is so hard to believe, I mean really, once you've been married for a bit it is really hard to remember what it was like not married. In some ways the year has flown by, in other ways it seems like we've been together forever-I don't mean that in a negative way either.

Being married to Chad is a blessing from God. He, is human like everyone else, but I know beyond a shadow of a doubt God planned us for each other. Chad's sense of humor, love for God, consideration, education--are all things that I love so much in him. We laugh so much in our house! It is so wonderful to "witness" each other's lives. That, of course, isn't to say we don't have our moments, marriage is hard, working with someone else on everything in your life takes work. But the laughs, the tears, the quiet walks together, the conversations, the silent moments holding hands--they make for a rich life, one I would not change for anything.
So you ask, what did we do on our anniversary? ;) Chad preached in our two morning services and then the church was gracious and gave Chad the evening off from church responsibilities. We came home and had a light lunch and a nap and then headed off to Suwanna Restaurant in St. John. This is an amazing Thai food restaruant where we actually had our first date just a little under 2 years ago. We hadn't been back so it was nice to reminice.

The drive down was much the same as our first date, wet and foggy. We arrived a little early for our reservation so we went and checked out the Reversing Falls which neither of us had seen before and then went to dinner. I have been inspired (Thai food does that to me!) We had this delicious Matussumen (not likely spelled right) which I just moan in pleasure over everytime I eat it, so I'm going to try to make it and Pad Thai, in the next week or so, I'll let you know how it turns out. So we talked, reminising on the good things that happened this past year, and savored our delicious food.

We arrived home, probably around 9pm. When I walked in the kitchen there was a bit present all wrapped up on the table, it hadn't been there when we left. Anyway, I said to Chad "What's this! I thought we'd decided against gifts!" Where we had such a lavish vacation we're trying to cut back a bit now. Anyway, he said to open it and when I did I was sooooooo estatic! It was our wedding album, the finished product, and I must say it is so absolutly beautiful, I would wait another year for it, but I'm glad I don't have to. I poured over it's pages several times, I wish you could all see it, it is truly a work of art. I guess that Mark Orienstein, our photographer FedEXed it to Chad on Friday so he would have it in time for our anniversary. Chad kept it a secreat without even looking at it first, wrapped it up and saved it for us on our 1st anniversary. How special it is! Anyway, with this to end the evening, we had a bit of our wedding cake top which I guess is traditional and called it a wonderful first year. I posted a couple pics to remind us of the day last year!

Savanna

I really like the way the light plays on her face here too.

Beautiful Savanna

I love this picture of Savanna, she's so precious!