Dr. Suess

"And will you succeed? Yes indeed! Yes indeed! Ninety Eight and Three Quarters guarenteed!"


Saturday, April 28, 2007

Kylie Jade Kesterson

Kyliebug1

Last June, I posted about a friend's baby, Kylie They'd found a tumor in her brain ...and they were going to operate ...and we needed to find out. What was the tumor? was it dangerous? It was, in fact, very dangerous.



kyliebug2

Teresa and Kylie Kesterson, and family, began a fight to fight this monster ... an ATRT tumor.

This morning at 4 am, Kylie went to be with Jesus.

No more pain, no more needles, no more surgery. She can see normally out of both eyes and she can run and play like other 2 year old girls.

Kylie Bug ... you touched my life in a way you'll never understand. You were a sweet little girl, with a firey spirit and I will forever be glad that you were a presence in my life. Thank you.

Kylie Jade Kesterson
January 18, 2005 to April 28, 2007,


Brendan,Tyler,Kylie
Kylie with her 2 brothers.

Thursday, April 26, 2007

Denominationa footfalls

You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan. You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God's grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavly by John Wesley and the Methodists.

Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan

93%

Fundamentalist

79%

Reformed Evangelical

64%

Neo orthodox

61%

Emergent/Postmodern

43%

Charismatic/Pentecostal

39%

Modern Liberal

36%

Classical Liberal

29%

Roman Catholic

21%

What's your theological worldview?
created with QuizFarm.com

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Friends don't let friends ....





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6zWhM1woRI

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

Power

In the first month of my blogging ... I blogged about discovering that my life could be compared to a train ... and this week ... I came across a train on it's tracks and it made me think of life in terms of a train once again. I'd forgotten about my own life comparrison to a train. Until I decided to blog about it.

The minute I started to do so, my brain went ..wait? What did I say before ... So, I found it ...

Tuesday, November 30, 2004
I have learned I am a ChooChoo train
......

I think I have figured out how I cope with things. I've been calling it compartmentalizing, but it's more than that. I have people who will come up to me a week or so after I've been sick, or after the boys have been sick and ask if everything is ok and I just give them this blank look, I've gone on, I have no clue what they''re talking about. Those things happen so much, once it's over, it's over ... I just say that I've compartmentalized it and gone on, and that's the best explination I've had ... but today, I came up with a better one ...

I'm a train and I have all these train cars that I have that I'm tugging behind me. Some, like lupus, MG, kids with TS are permanent, other's like flu and Bj's meningitis are temporary.
When I get sick with the flu, the flu car gets coupled to my train, making my train just a little harder to pull, I need more steamto get to where I'm going. But when the flu is over, I stop,and uncouple that car and leave it behind, going on with my journey.
The eating disorder car, that's probably a permanent car, but it's cargo has been unloaded, it will always be attatched, but the heavy burdened load it was weighted with has been removed, so now, it's just an empty car that I have to be careful doesn't get loaded up again.

I have to be careful that I don't keep going on my journey with train cars that don't need to be still attatched. If one is done, it's important to remember to stop and uncouple it, dragging cars that are no longer existing, is going to make my journey harder. (If I'm constantly thinking about how many cars of colds I've had this year, and not uncoupling them, I need to know how many I've had so my doctor's can take good care of me, but not dwell on them so to speak)

I also need to make sure that I have all the appropriate car trains attatched. So that my train is properly balanced. I have my church car, my family car and my friends car.

When the journey gets hard, is it the tracks are going through mountainous regions ? or is that I have more cars attatched and are they permanent and therefore I need to figure out how to add more coal to the engine? Or is it that a temporary flu car has been added that will shortly be uncoupled and out of my way?
*************************************************************************************

So ... I've got that part figured out ...but what I failed to figure out was ...who and what is controling the engine cars? AM I the engine cars? Am I the engineer? Do I simply hire someone? Contract that job out? Or, am I the engine of the train itself.

The engine of the train, is in fact, it's most important factor.
train

Without an engine ... the train simply sits on the tracks ... doing nothing ... and going no where ... just sitting waiting for the cargo to be loaded or unloaded. Sitting there ... rusting ...useless in their journey. Their wheels cannot be used for what God intended the wheels to be used for, because the engine is not pullinging them. 2train
They sit ... quiet, and unassuming, apparently useless, maybe having had a use at one time, but now pitiful and with soemthing to be written off as potentially useful.


With the engine, the train can work ... in the coldest of weather, to work in the snow and the ice ...and in the lonely times. When others say it may not be the wisest time to go, the Engine gives the train the power and strength to go where it needs to go .. to keep the train on the track ... and to get to the destination, safely. train Sometimes a lonely, quiet steady job, but it will get done.

Then there are the times when it feels like we're never going to be seen or noticed again, the train engine, will for sure, get ALL the glory. 4train The maginficent engine ...and all it's hard work ... everything it's done to save us ... and all it's done to put help us ...to save us and to guide us ..to protect us and to lead us ... and we just want to be shown off ...just a little bit?

Would it really be such a shame for the train to want to be separate from the Engines every now and then? Is it really that important/ Do we REALLY have travel wITH the engine every single time? Why ... why can't we, as the train make it on our own ...just once ... we could give the credit to the things the train engine had taught us ...

So I think ... tonight ... we are going to try .... to do things ourselves.
3train

The train itself will move the heart and goals and dreams of the spirit along. Making sure that the callings of God and the work He's called us to get done. The train, without the Glory Seeking Engines ... will now be responsible for getting the body and the body's family to all appropriate functions. Physically and emotionally.
This should be an exciting time in the New Eagler Transportation system!





What? ... What? ... you mean there is a problem? What? You've had all of a couple of minutes and you can't even get going? What do you mean you can't go? It's simple ... the back car has Nanna on it, she needs extra care and be transported to and from work. Get going!

What?
What? push it?
What? we can't? are you serious?
not even a little?

Well, get nanna to sit and take a day off.

Sigh ... prayer car ... what do you mean the prayer car is falling a part. Yes, I agreed to pray for a certain number of people, Beths, house, and Melissa at college, Wanda, and Mom. The funeral today ..what's the problem? What do you mean?

WHY do I need a train engine to pray? oh that just doesn't make sense! I'm going to have to come back to that one!

I'm so frustrated, how hard can this be ... lets try to get the directions straight ... shouold we go this way or that way...the map isn't even clear! There are so many decisions, Why is it when I'm reading this in the navigators car, it all makes soooo much sense????????

I'm going for a walk ......
1Train


The full train ... the engine .. it gives the train it's power ... the power comes from the Holy spirit ... it is the guidance needed, the navigation ... the wisdom ...
The engines ... give extra power .... for the prayers to be powerful and spirit led!


The train .. .is all me, but cannot function without the fullness of the holy spirit ( the train engine) He is the one who enfuses my train with the power to be what it was called to be ... and is destined to be.

We saw a train sitting ... 3 miles from it's train engine ...and the engine just drove off ... leaving it's train sitting there and I thought ... no Lord ...please, don't ever leave me .... take me along with you. Infuse my train with your power. I am useless without you and I simply want to be your servent to do your desire.



3train





1Train

Thursday, April 12, 2007

Paradigm Shift

When I took intro to psych I first heard the term Paradigm shift. I could not quite grasp it ...and I could not get my brain around it ...no matter what I did ... I could not understand what the concept meant.

So, Sunday, a speaker comes and is explaining the ressurrection of Jesus Christ and how it changes the face of religeon for all of mankind forever and my brain went ... CLICK! PARADIGM SHIFT!!!!!!!!

So, while the speaker didn't use the term ... I finally got the concept. In doing so ... it was a puzzle piece to my life that I needed ... desperately.

I have mentioned a few times since moving into my new house and having my book published that I've had a bit of trouble enjoying the fruits of the wonderful blessings in my life. The change and adjustment has been so severe I just can't seem to get my brain wrapped around what has happened or why and how and why I ended up here ... and welll ... quite frankly, it felt like I was a complete fraud taking advantage of a system or program or something. I had no business getting the blessings I've been given.

The better it got, the more guilty I began to feel. Then, it all came together ...all at once ...and the puzzle piece ... in one fell swoop fit together and my life was changed .... I went through a HUGE Paradigm Shift.
Nothing would be the same ...not the way we look at things, not the way others look at us ... not the way we do things ... everything involving our lives required us to change the way we lived life on this planet.

And I froze in fear. I could not function. I had this wonderful beautiful house. I had this terrific marriage and wonderful boys ... I have a book that's published and they're paying mme for it. I have friends, who really love me. I have a safe house that is beautiful and I can have friends over. I have a church that I'm active in, and I have leadership responsibilities as well as privileges in ... my health, while not good, has been far worse.

Just what in my life would be changed? What could you change? What if I were given the chance would I change? Really ... my health, ya,that's a given ...but in the grand scheme of things, that's a small thing I can function ya know?

So ... I've got this great life ...so why am I frozen?

Then I learned about Paradigm Shifts ...and I learn that they ALWAYS move ...from one state to another ...and the second state is ALWAYS a more positive, more stable state ...but that the GETTING to the state requires a lot of churning, and sometimes violent turning of ideas, ground and moving around of things standards up turned ideas upended ... the paradigm shift might happen violently and suddenly but there is years of hard work and preperation that goes into the paradigm shift!!!! no paradigm shift happens out of the blue and they all happen because of someone's hard work and perserverence.

So ... I'm sitting on the other side of a paradigm shift ... just having my life as I knew it, up ended ... the life I knew ... one of poverty, dilapitated trailer, bad marriage and unknown name and no career of any sorts to suddenly ... litterally ... over night ... to a good marriage (great? marriage?) a solid house, light on the path of the tunnel to get out of poverty and a career!

Success ... failure to success ... overnight ... literaly!

Granted .. it didn't happen quietly, or without pain or lots of pain and churning to get there ... there was tons of preperations to get us to this point ... but it happened. But when it happened, it awas not a gradual process like one might expect, it was a Paradigm Shift.

My reaction was to become stunned and frozen.

I didn't quite realize it ... but I had reacted with guilt. I'd felt like ... I'm the girl who fails. I'm the girl who doesn't complete things. I'm the girl who doesn't finish. I'm the girl who is irresponsible. I'm the girl who doesn' do what I need to do to accomplish what needs to get done. I don't deserve to have good things.

There fore ... this good marriage
this house
this book being published
this great family
this set of friends
these responsibilities at church

They all belong to someone who has earned them ... not to me! I've stolen them from someone else ...they are not mine ... I've stolen someone else's birthright! I felt guilty and horribly horribly desperately guilty for what I had. Enjoying what was in front of me wasn't happening ... All I felt was guilty.

This week ... I've been challenged to name what went into the forming of the paradigm shift .... and to name the last time I failed, the last time I quit, the last time I didn't complete something or was being irresponsible ...
I don't know ... I can't find those ... they are not parts of my current character!

Who I am now ... is determined ..and I have perserverence ..and I have patience and I have self control and I have the wherewithall to do what God has called me to do ...and you know what ... I didn't steal these things!

They were not handed to me on a silver platter (as I had been feeling they had) I worked hard for them, and God really was working with me ...and is simply rewarding me and now he wants me to be a good steward of the things he's given me.

wow. that's a whole nother subject isn't it?

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

inner child







How Old is Your Inner Child?




My inner child is six years old!

Look what I can do! I can walk, I can run, I can read! I like to do stuff, and there's a whole big world out there to do it in. Just so long as I can take my blankie and my Mommy and my three best friends with me, of course.
Take this quiz!









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Saturday, April 07, 2007

Stones will cry out ...

Luke 19:40

But He answered and said to them, "I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out."

Chilnualna_Falls Yosemite National Park

I was raised by a mother who loved to sing praises to God. From the time I was barely able to talk, I knew what praising God meant. I don't know when I learned to love praising God ..but I knew very young ...that He loved me ..and I loved Him ...and I could never sing His praises enough.

My parents helped to start a church when I was young. Mariposa Christian Fellowship. We called a pastor from Alaska down to pastor it. Leonard and Elaine Wilkerson. They were a wonderful couple and my mom was very close to both of them. We all were. Sometimes I would sit next to Elaine during the services ... but I always sat where I could see her.

After church, I'd go up and give her a hug. She'd always smile and hug me and say "as long as you're around, the rocks will never get their chance!"

Several years ago, Elaine died of breast cancer. The last conversation I'd had with her, she'd told me "never give those rocks their turn!"

My mom would always giggle/laugh. You could see her motherly pride.

So, it's 2007 ...and I've been asked to, yet again, sing with the praise team for an Easter special. Once again, my voice is terrorizing me. Confidence fading and fear rising I had decided to back out. Today ... I had decided I just could not it. During the final rehersal, my chest was hurting so badly I could barely stand. So, while we sat down to say the final prayer, I started to ask God to give me the words to tell my director that I was going to back out.

Our director started to talk about the priviledge that it was to do this, and how happy she was we could. She mentioned how awful it would be if God had not given us music! How terrible that would be. Then she switched gears mid sentence and mentioned some rocks on her piano at home ...that were there to remind her ...that if we don't praise Him, the rocks will cry out.

I felt a finger tap me on the shoulder and I looked around. I didn't see anyone who would have touched me. My director had tears in her eyes ... and I suddenly knew ... I had almost let the stones cry out.

I felt like God had wanted me to do this because my mom had so enjoyed watching me sing when I was a teenager. I don't know how many more Easter's I have with my mom fully here ..how many more Easter's will she be aware of what is going on around, will she know that it is me singing in the group? How many more will she know that it is her daughter up there? So, I'd agreed, just for my mom ...and I almost backed out ...

I almost let the stones cry out ...

yosemite

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Aware of April

One of the most staggering statistics regarding sexual abuse is the numbers that go unreported.

Many say they read those numbers with a cautious eye ..jaded eye ..or simply don't believe them.

They don't understand how they can come up with numbers of 'unreported' incidences ...

I did some looking into that ...and I think, I got it figured out.

I ... am one of those who have gone unreported.

My 'incidences' have never been reported to the police. No sherrifs department, court house or district attorney's office has ever even heard of me. I'm not listed in any crime victims data base ... I've never been seen in the hospital and had a 'rape kit' done on me ...

But .. I did ...after 30 years ... tell my psychiatrist. I am one of those who have told ..but did not report. I have become one of those numbers of "every year ... people are injured and it goes unreported."

The word reported ... if I'm understanding correctly .. is a legal term, rather than a revealing term.

I have never pressed charges ... I've never reported it.


So ... the next time you see one of those statistics ... take your skeptisism out of the way and make room for the truth ...they were never reported to the police or to the legal authorities who could do something. But it was told, to someone ... a doctor, a psychaitrist, a therapist ...who had to keep their name and identity confidential ... but could let a fact gathering group know ... unforunately, I've got yeat another one who won't tell.

So, I'm going to borrow a blog doctor for instance because she is someone tangible to most of us ... IF I'm understanding this correctly ...

If Dr. Deb had 10 patients this month who were assaulted. 2 told the police ...and only 2 told her ... and the rest kept it a secret .... for 10 years ....

her statistics would be

2 reported
2 non reported
6 fine as far as we know ... 10 years later they tell her, but don't report to the police
now ..they are
6 non reported.

All are hurt ... all injured ... and all wounded. Some start their journeys of healing right away, but some choose to try to hide it and try to self destruct and ause avoidance techniques to deal with it before they finally try to put themselves together the right way.

None of them that did not turn in an official report to the police are considered a reported crime. Even if they did, in fact report the crime to their doctor, if nothing legal was done, it is considered, a non reported crime.

Is that ... clear as mud?

For those in the medical feild ... please feel free to correct me ...and hijack my comments to help clear up the muddy waters.

Keep the candles lit .... one candle at a time ... we can take back our lives.

Sunday, April 01, 2007

April

SAAM Logo

More information will follow this month.

Just in what form ... yet to come ... I'm not sure. But for now, today, April first, I will start with that banner.

Hat tip to Fat Doctor