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So, you’ve read the whole Bible, now what?

Late last year I challenged myself to read the whole Bible. Front to back. No skipping anything. A few weeks ago I finished my first time through the Bible and now I’m on my second time around. Before I get too far this year though, I want to record and share what I’ve learned, gleaned, and experienced.

At first thought, I’m not sure what I got out of it. I’m glad I did it. I don’t want to be a “Bible believer” having never read it, but I’m not sure reading it straight through made a difference on the surface. Just for context, I read it straight through just to get through it, to have a base. I didn’t read to study, understand, or go deeper.

Obviously, recognition is improved at this point. I can go to church and have a better idea of context, back story, characters…etc.

I hear more of the Bible in songs and that helps me to commit stories to memory better. For instance, the song Hallelujah by Jeff Buckley.

Well I’ve heard there was a secret chord
That David played and it pleased the Lord

David was the writer of most of the psalms…

But you don’t really care for music, do you?
Well it goes like this:
The fourth, the fifth, the minor fall and the major lift
The baffled king composing Hallelujah

…and he was a king

Hallelujah
Hallelujah
Hallelujah
Hallelujah
Well your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof

This references when David saw Bathsheba bathing on the roof. She was another man’s wife…

Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew ya

…He slept with her and she became pregnant; David had Uriah (her husband) killed in order to save face

She tied you to her kitchen chair
And she broke your throne and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

And this references Samson, his hair was to never be cut, it was directly linked to his strength, but Delilah tricked him in to telling her this, she cut his hair and he was overcome by his adversaries, the Philistines.

There’s a ton of Christian music with Bible verses in them but one of my favorites right now, Nobody by Casting Crowns has a verse like this:

“Moses had stage fright and David brought a rock to a sword fight”

Really the part that sticks out to me is David, he defeated Goliath, a giant by essentially taking a sling shot and a rock and shooting it at his head. So, “David brought a rock to a sword fight” is funny and accurate. Moses did have stage fright, he told God no three times due to his fear of public speaking….enter Aaron. By the way, this is the same David from Hallelujah, so that just goes to show you that if you think you’ve done too much wrong in your life to be loved by God, well you’re wrong about that.

It’s taught how awesome Esther is, and don’t get me wrong, she is pretty great. I’m glad to have another strong female with a name in the Bible. But I would argue that Mordecai, her cousin, is the one to talk about. He’s the one with the plan and the foresight. He orchestrated the whole thing! But I digress, maybe I missed something there…other than Esther taking the obvious risk of death by requesting a meeting with the King before being summoned…

One thing reading the Bible one time through has left me with, is more questions than I had when I started. But that’s a good thing. We should never be done learning or exploring. Like the saying goes, the more you know, the more you don’t know. I know it gave me more than I can think of, and it will show up in ways I won’t expect or recognize for the rest of my life. I’m excited to read it through again with a little more focus on studying and trying to recall things from last year and to see more connections throughout the Bible on my own rather than by someone else telling me.

Prompt #2

So, for my birthday a friend bought me a book of writing prompts – 300 to be exact. So Mike and I decided it would be fun to go through and do these together.
There are a few rules:
1. It’s time restrained – 7 minutes
2. You can’t look at the prompt until you’re ready to type
3. You have to stop, even mid-sentence, when the timer goes off
4. No edits after the timer

Prompt: Describe in detail one item that you would love to inherit from a relative, or that you have inherited.

Mike:
I think if I could inherit something from a relative it would be maybe my dad’s RV. I don’t know if I want the work related to keeping an RV going, but if I ever owned one; inheriting his would be the only way. I do have some memories of dad supporting RAGBRAI with it and we went on a few trips with it. If I had his RV I would make sure to go on at least two trips a year with it. I thought it was awesome when he bought it. It was such a commitment to just a hobby. I hope he gets a chance to have some more fun with it while he is still able. I’ve said I think it would be cool to tailgate a Vols game sometime in Knoxville. I don’t know if we will ever pull that together though.

Total other random item is Julie’s mixing bowls. I know there is a long line of people looking at them longingly…Not only are they nice bowls, Kandace and I have some great memories preparing for holidays cooking with them.

Ace:
It’s a ring. A simple ring with a gold band and a single diamond. I don’t know what size the diamond is but that doesn’t really matter to me.

This ring belonged to my grandma. Before she passed away she gave it to my mom and I hope to get it from my mom one day.

I may be holding on to a memory, but that’s all I’ve got. My grandma passed away when I was 10. She was one of my best friends. I loved going over to her house. Who knows why, there weren’t any other kids there, they didn’t have a ton of games to play, and the TV that I was allowed to use was one you had to turn the dial that was on the TV and then adjust the bunny ears for each station. But, I loved it. I would go camping with her and my grandpa in the summers which was awesome and I have fond memories of that. I would talk to my grandma on the phone often, and would ask to spend the night there as frequently as I could. To this day, I’m pretty sure I was her favorite grandchild.

So the ring, doesn’t have a significant part in the memories, but it started with someone who was very important to me and it now belongs to the most important woman in my life now. I think maybe it’s a symbol of love and memories, but also strong women. At least I think that’s what it means to me.

I don’t want the ring today. I want my mom around more than I want the ring, so if I could trade the ring for forever, I would. That’s not realistic though, and so to have something so simple and beautiful to have with me each day…

Pi Day

Yesterday was Pi Day – 3.14, so I made a pie!

I’ve never made a lemon cream pie, so I thought I’d try it out. Here’s the recipe:

Ingredients:
1 Lemon, slided
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 cup powdered sugar
1.5 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup sugar
7 tbsp butter – unsalted
2 cups sweetened condensed milk
8 oz Mascarpone cheese

Instructions:
Graham Cracker Crust
Spray 8″ pick plate w/ non-stick spray and set aside
Mix the graham cracker crumbs, butter, and sugar in a medium bowl
Press the mixture into your pie plate along the bottom and up the sides. I use a large spoon to press the mixture on the bottom and then my fingers to get it up the sides.
Put in the freezer while you make the filling!
Lemon Cream Filling
Mix the Mascarpone cheese and powder sugar in a medium bowl until smooth and creamy. Set aside.
In your mixing bowl (the bowl for your electronic mixer), whip heavy cream until soft peaks form, add the lemon juice and continue mixing until stiff peaks form.
Add Mascarpone cheese mixture into the beaten heavy cream and mix on low speed just to combine.
Slowly add the condensed milk and beat until well mixed.
Get the crust out and pour the lemon cream mixture into your pie crust. Refrigerate for at least 6 hours, or until firm
Whipped Topping
Beat heavy cream and powdered sugar together in a mixer until stiff peaks form
Spread/pipe/decorate pie with the whipped cream and decorate with lemon slices.

Review:
This was a relatively easy pie to make. The graham cracker crust can be tough to get it to set well. I’m still working on my crumb to butter ratio. I might take it down to 6 tablespoons of butter. The freezer is key though.
I used store bought lemon juice. Bad idea. There wasn’t a ton of lemon flavor, so I think it would have been better had I used fresh lemon juice. Next time.
I skipped out on the whipped topping, because it was only me and Mike eating it. Not worth the effort. I did decorate it with the lemon slices though. I’m not sure the point of this, just for looks? Do you eat the lemon? Do you squeeze onto your pie? I don’t know. I squeezed it onto my pie so I’d get a little more lemon flavor. I might add a little graham cracker crumble to the top too…
Overall, not a bad pie, I think I just had the wrong expectations (lemon merengue flavor). Each bite got better and better. Overall, a good pi(e) day!

Writing Prompt #1

Prompt: What is the best road trip or vacation you have ever taken? Who was there? Where did you go? What did you see along the way?

Ace:
I don’t even know. I feel like it would be cheating if I picked the road trip that moved us from Colorado to the District. No, that’s not the best one. The drive we took from Colorado to Yellowstone/Tetons/Glacier National Park was probably the best road trip and vacation. There were parts that went horribly wrong, and it wasn’t the trip that it was “supposed to be”, but it was a lot of fun.
So, who was there? Me and Mike.
Where’d we go? We drove north from Colorado Springs with the goal of Yellowstone National Park and Glacier National Park.
What did we see along the way? Well, I’ll tell you what we didn’t see, we didn’t see a bear. All I want is to see a bear in the wild. Until then, they don’t exist, the ones in the zoo are fake.
Yellowstone was more beautiful than I anticipated. The geysers were cool, but my favorite areas were the melting pot areas. I don’t remember what they were technically called, but I loved walking around the area and seeing all the awesome colors. It’s crazy what nature can do.
We hiked part of the Tetons, which was cool, the lake was awesome to just relax and stare at.
Glacier National Park…

Mike:
This is not a fair question since I have been on a ton of vacations with the love of my life and a few cool trips before we even met. I am excluding when we eloped, because although it was a vacation, and resulted in one of the best parts of my life; I don’t think it is fair to all the other trips we take.
I think the best vacation I’ve taken so far, excluding eloping with Kandace was hiking Kilimanjaro with Kandace in Tanzania. She got there a few weeks ahead of me to do medical missionary work, but she met me at the airport. The first morning while eating breakfast we watched zebras and monkeys while I sipped fresh coffee. We spent the next week hiking the mountain with 11 locals supporting our trip. We laughed a lot, shared some “personal moments,” and took in amazing views every day. After the hike we spent a few days at the compound she had been the previous weeks.
This is my top trip since I had the chance to spend time with a vibrant resilient culture for almost two weeks and we were active every day with some new experiences. I came home the right amount of tired and refreshed since it was a total disconnect from work…

Due Date

Who knows if this is the day our mini would have come, but it is the day we anticipated their arrival.

We won’t be meeting our first mini. We don’t know if we will ever have a mini.

I have the most amazing husband and I definitely couldn’t go through this without him. But, it’s still the loneliest thing I’ve experienced.

I know a significant amount of people who have had this struggle, fortunately they are all on the other side now. Honestly though? It doesn’t make me feel better. I still feel alone. I still feel a mountain of sadness. I’m still scared.

Just over three years ago Mike and I decided to stop preventing pregnancy. I was still in PT school so we weren’t “trying” per se, but we were going to happy if it happened. Time went on and we never conceived.

About a year and a half ago, we looked into finding out why we weren’t getting pregnant. It turns out I wasn’t ovulating. I had regular periods but never ovulated. I was put on Clomid to induce ovulation and was monitored to make sure it was working. It was.

After our third cycle on clomid, we found out we were pregnant!!! We were excited but cautious, apparently for good reason. 10 weeks into it we finally decided to buy some things. Then it went downhill.

We went in for our first ultrasound, when we were supposed to hear the heart beat. There wasn’t a heartbeat. There wasn’t a growing baby either. The doctors ran some tests and the results indicated my body was undergoing the early stages of a miscarriage. I had three options. 1. They could go in and remove “the tissue” 2. I could take some pills that would force the elimination of “the tissue” 3. I could wait to have it happen naturally, but only for a week.

I opted to wait. The first two options didn’t really seem like options to me. That night/the next morning I miscarried. Physically, my periods are worse so thanks for that preparation. Emotionally, nothing can prepare you and nothing can comfort you. There’s more I could say here but really, I don’t want to. I do want everyone to know how great Mike was that night. He was in the bathroom with me, holding my hand, rubbing my back, racking his brain trying to figure out what he could do to help, how he could take my pain away. He was hurting too. He was amazing, obviously I could have “done it without him” but it would have been worse. The days and weeks and months after would have been worse. I’m so grateful I didn’t have to do it without him.

I had to wait for my cycle to return before we could continue trying to make a mini. It didn’t take long, so that was nice.

The doctors decided to double my dosage of clomid. Nothing happened on the first cycle. They decided we needed to move to IUI – intrauterine insemination.

If you want to know more about the most invasive and impersonal experience, let me know. We can talk.

We did IUI with HCG trigger and clomid twice. Still nothing.

Now we are here. Meeting the day we had hoped to greet our mini but instead, it’s just another day. We’ve done another cycle of IUI and we’re in the holding pattern for a couple of weeks. Long before we even knew we would have this struggle we had decided (with the option to change our minds) that we didn’t want to do IVF. As of right now, we still don’t. We’re told we can do IUI up to 3 more times and then we can further discuss our options. The rest is us working on trusting God and His timing.

I’m not sure what we are trusting Him to do. Bless us with a mini? Take the desire to have a baby away? It’s hard. I’m a hard worker, a goal oriented person, an achiever. I can’t do this. This is not in my control. I can’t work harder to make it happen, I can’t make a plan to reach this goal, I can’t take the steps to reach the achievement. I have to give it to God. I wish I knew what I was asking for and what the answer is going to be. I wish a lot of things.

I do not wish for this to be anyone else’s story, but it is. And so, I write this for you. To take away some of your loneliness and despair. I can’t take away your pain or heartache, just like no one can take away mine. I have no advice for you. All the advice I get makes me want to punch people in the throat. I am happy to listen and talk about it though. If we are all alone in this, well, we’re together in that.

It’s all Relative

There are potentially 2 back stories here, but one is really long and unnecessary, so I’ll just give you a few details about the other.

At our apartment, we have a concierge who takes our packages, signs them into a system, and then we automatically receive both a text and and e-mail notifying us that we have a package.

The other night while I was at work, I got a notification that I had received a package. Sometimes I do some shopping and forget about it or don’t realize when it’s going to show up. But this time, I was pretty confident I hadn’t ordered anything.

Turns out, I hadn’t! My Aunt Kathy made me some amazing gear, despite the fact that she roots for the wrong team!

I was so excited about this for multiple reasons. 1. Hawkeyes, duh. 2. Unexpected birthday surprise 3. She read my blog.

So, a take away from this, don’t assume people don’t care about you, despited your relationship. Remember you aren’t in this world alone, and it’s always great to encourage someone else without even knowing it.

Thank you Aunt Kathy for the gifts. I’m super excited about all of it, and super grateful you were able to turn away from Big Red for a few minutes! 🙂