Regan - Yeah, I'm a Geek

My big sister is about a month and half into her breast cancer fight.  We got to spend the weekend together in Fairview and spent sometime Sunday morning setting up a new blog that is dedicated to her breast cancer fight.  Check it out at www.metishawelsh.blogspot.com for the latest news.  I will be keeping the blog updated for Mark and Tish since they have no high speed internet.  

We had a really great weekend!  Tisha’s liver biopsy was Friday afternoon so they weren’t able to come to Fairview until Saturday morning but Saturday was a gorgeous spring day and we spent it at Ewbank Ranch.  We did some four-wheeling, enjoyed the sun shine, walked some trails and roasted some hot dogs.  I also got two new Wii games:  Wii Play and Cars.  Both are too much fun!  Wii Play has cow racing.  Yes, cow racing and mom was out of control with it.  With Cars, you can go tractor tipping like they do in the movie, race through the town or do cup races.  All very cool!  The Wii is definitely one of the top birthday presents I have ever received!

Last Friday Jeremy surprised me with an early birthday present – a Nintendo Wii.  And all I can say is Wii!!!!  The Wii is so much fun!  Mom and Dad and Mark and Tish came to T-town for the weekend and we Wii’d all weekend :)  We all created our own Mii’s, and spent the weekend in the midst of Wii bowling, golfing, boxing and tennis.  I woke up Saturday morning with a sore arm from tennis!  Dad is the king of boxing while Mark cornered bowling.  We had a great time laughing at each other.  We even got to spend Saturday with our great friends John and Lori who also got in on the Wii action.  We spent so much time playing Wii, that it became odd to have the TV on cable.  And in case you haven’t heard, always wear the wrist strap when Wii’ing; we have a dent in the ceiling to prove the importance of the wrist strap!  :)  All in all we had a great weekend!  It was good to be together as family during this time and great to spend time with John and Lori.  But for me, it was great to have small Wii breaks from cancer, DOT, work, and just adulthood in general.  

Thanks Jeremy for the Wii!  And thanks family for Wii’ing with me!

 I’ve finally followed through on my statement and uploaded Disney pictures.  Check them out and be glad I only uploaded about half of them :) 

A lot has happened since my last blog.  There seems to be a vicious pregnancy virus going around!  ;)  There are four beautiful women in my life who are pregnant.  So in the next 8 or so months, I will gain two second cousins, a new little friend, and most excitedly, a niece or nephew!  That’s right, I’m going to be an aunt!!!  Jeremy’s sister is pregnant!  I’m very excited to be an aunt and have already bought the little one gifts!  It will be spoiled by this aunt.  So my biggest congrats and love to Jami and JD, Sara and Paul, Lori and John and Breanne and Chad.  Good job ;)

Work is as crazy as always.  There are a couple of potential new positions that will be opening up in my company.  One that I would be particularly interested in but I don’t know if I will get a shot at applying for.  I still enjoy being a solution manager, but the 50 hour weeks and high stress are getting me a little down.  But it’s going to be an exciting and high growth year at Anyware Mobile Solutions and I am excited to be smack in the middle of it.  Just to put it into perspective, I have had 4 new people start on my projects in the last 3 weeks.  It’s a wild ride!

On the personal front, Jeremy and I are having adult growing pains.  There is so much we want to do in life, and so little time and money.  We are both becoming passionate about opening our own auto body shop in the next three years.  There are so many questions and so many unknowns that it is over whelming.  How do we raise the money we need?  What location?  How do we get our name out?  What about advertising?  Who will do the painting?  Will it be successful enough to support us both?  Etc, etc, etc.  Of course we also want a bigger house, financial security and eventually a family.  Some how all of those “wants” don’t seem to fit together.  Who knew being an adult would be so complicated :)

But the baby virus, job stress and “wants” have recently been over shadowed by the unexpectedness of life.   We found out last week that my big sis has breast cancer, breast cancer at the age of 29.  My heart still jumps when I say the word.  Its one of those life changing events that makes you feel sad, angry, terrified, obstinate, passionate and numb all at once.  But my sister is amazing.  Truly amazing.  She is strong.  She is beautiful.  And she will beat it.  And her husband should be up for Man of the Year.  He is protective, strong, compassionate and loving all at the same time.  They are two amazing people and I will do whatever I can to help them through this.  I want to take this from her.  I want there to be no such thing as cancer.  I want a miracle, but God hasn’t yet met my demand.  So for now, we are taking it one step at a time and trying not to look past what we know.  But the test results, doctor appointments, and information just don’t come fast enough.  I just want the world to stop and to revolve around her so we can focus on Metisha being healed.  I want to get her healed and then go back go life so she doesn’t have to go through this for long.  But that’s not an option.  So all of a sudden, our everyday vocabulary contains new, somewhat scary words.  Words like biopsy, pathologist, infiltrating carcinoma, radiology, chemo, surgery, oncologist.  But at the end of this, we will add a very good word:  VICTORY.   

I wonder if anyone even checks this anymore but my aunt told me at Thanksgiving that it was time for an update.  

So first for my big announcement of the day:  I finished 3^rd in my fantasy football league at work with a 6 and 7 record!  That is cracking me up!  I even beat my VP who is a former OU player.   So how do you get 3^rd with that sorry record?  Well, I just had to be in the top 6 to make it to playoffs and I was number 6 of 10.  Then my team did really well in the playoffs with my only loss being to the league champ.  So for me, it was a victorious season in fantasy football and Team Chick may come back for season two!

So what I have been up to since September 7^th?  Mostly work and traveling for work.  This job is just crazy.  One of my projects that started out as a small $200K project has gone out of control and busted into a $5M project.  I realize it’s crazy to complain about a project where the client just keeps throwing money your direction, but this one is moving much faster than my little company can keep up with.  October and November where extremely stressful and extremely under staffed and I think Jeremy was ready for me to quit my job and I was ready to run away.  But I survived, and I have found new calm J 

So where did the calm come from?  A seven day vacation to Disney World!  I left my smart phone behind which meant 7 days of 0 phone calls, 0 voice mails, and 0 e-mails and it was pure heaven!  7 days of just me and Jeremy hanging out together with no responsibilities and no distractions.  We didn’t even have one fight J  Everyone needs to go to Disney World this time of year.  The Christmas decorations are beautiful and the Christmas extras are pure Disney magic.  My favorite Christmas extra was the Osborne Light Spectacular at Disney Studios.  They cover two streets that look like New York in over a million lights.  The buildings are covered from top to bottom with lights and there additional light up decorations every where!  Then at dusk, they turn the lights on and they dance to Christmas music while snow falls!  It was indescribable!  I’ll try to post Disney pictures in the next couple of days but I have over 1G of pictures so I have some sorting to do.  In the mean time I’ll give you a run down of my Disney Top 10:

1.       Spending 7 carefree days with Jeremy

2.       The Osborne Light Spectacular

3.       The Animal Kingdom – no zoo even comes close

4.       Staying at the Wilderness Lodge

5.       Expedition Everest roller coaster

6.       California Sorin ride

7.       The food.  We ate like kings thanks to the Disney Dinning Plan.

8.       Watching Jeremy’s face when he came down the first ride at the Typhoon Lagoon water park.  This was his first water park.

9.       The fireworks at Epcot

10.    Eating a Mickey Mouse ice cream bar in honor of the Karber clan

And to the Karber clan:  I missed you all much while we were there!  It was fun remembering our Disney moments at each park.  And we all need to go to the Animal Kingdom with Uncle Dan J.  The commentary would be endless!  I love ya all!

I hope everyone is having a blessed holiday season!

Well, I missed about 25 days of my Purpose Driven Life blogging.  Woops …  I did read the book but I didn’t find my purpose; I found a really big problem.  Now I realize this is not going to be a shock to most of you and you could have told me this along time ago, but it’s a new revelation to me.  Are you ready? 

I never say no. 

I have a problem and that was what God showed me through Purpose Driven Life.  I feel like most days I race around like a crazy person with a “to do” list a mile long and at the end of the day, my list has grown, not shrunk.  Why?  Because I never say no; I always say yes and I take on more than I should.  I do this at work, at church, in my relationships.  So I know the problem, but what is the cause?  I’ve identified that also and it’s a lie.  I carry around a lie that says “I’m not important.”  So the way I make myself feel important is by always saying yes.  Because if you ask me to do something and I say yes then you need me and that makes me important.  But if you ask me to do something and I say no, you will not need me and you may never ask me to do anything again and then I will not be important anymore.  So now what?  I know I have a problem and I know the cause but what is my exit strategy?  I don’t know but I’m open to suggestions …  I did unload one duty.  I’m not leading a small group this term.  That was something very hard to give up because I LOVE leading small group and those women impact my life in so many ways.  But at the end of the day, I feel crazy, ungrounded and like God is working hard on me and I didn’t feel like I could give those women the 100% they deserve.  So I’m taking a term off to just be a group member and to try to learn what God is trying to teach me.

So part of the craziness has been my travel schedule at work.  In the last four weeks I’ve spent 3 days in Austin, 3 days in Plano and 2 days in Kansas City.  Right now I’m sitting in the Kansas City airport waiting for my flight that’s now an hour late.  Here’s some irony.  I flew because I was too tired to drive by myself for four hours but now I could have drove and made it home faster than I will flying!  Tomorrow I’m off for a day trip to Plano.  I’m dreading that one because I’m flying which means I have to drive through Dallas to Plano and I hate driving in Dallas.  Oh well, I think its still better than driving 8 hours by myself tomorrow.  So right now, home is where the suitcase sits.

I did have a really great Labor Day weekend.  We spent the weekend in Fairview.  The weather was cool and it rained!  It was so refreshing.  We spent time at the Ewbank Ranch enjoying the cool weather and fixing up Mom and Dad’s RV spot.  Mark and Jeremy built benches around a fire pit and made a sign.  Their spot is on the edge of the canyon and it felt like we were in the mountains.  We spent Saturday and Sunday evening eating around the campfire, roasting marshmallows and laughing.  It was exactly what I needed!  Again, thanks to Uncle Phil and Aunt Judy for sharing their piece of paradise with us! 

So I guess the delayed flight was a blessing because I at least got to blog again!

Thought of the Day:  We are Meant to Belong to a Church

We are meant to be an active part of a church family.  Jesus called us to be a member of a church family and to contribute to that family.  Through the church family, we identify ourselves as a believer, helps you grow spiritually, helps you develop your talents and spiritual gifts, helps you take your mission into the world and holds you accountable.

I completely understand and agree with this point.  I wouldn’t be at The Heart if I didn’t believe in the benefit of the church family.  When Jeremy and I moved to Tulsa in June of 2002, we already knew about The Heart and we didn’t want to have any part of it.  It was small, it was involved, it was personal.  We were looking for a big church where we could slip in and slip out without have anyone getting involved in our personal life.  So we didn’t go.  Then a high school buddy, Paul, moved to Tulsa for an internship at The Heart.  Paul called and invited us to The Heart and asked us to dinner and invited us to The Heart.  I knew he wouldn’t quit until we at least visited once so we resolved to visiting once, but just once.  That Sunday Mike preached on community and how we need to be part of a community.  We are designed to need community and the church is community.  I said, “Ok, God.  I hear you but I don’t want to be pressured to be involved and The Heart is so small, we would have to be involved.”  That week Mike invited us to dinner and we decided to go.  Mike and Kim were so warm and personal we found it easy to share with them and we really enjoyed the dinner.  So the next Sunday, we decided to go back.  That Sunday Mike continued preaching on community and how we have to give to the community to get back from the community.   I said, “Ok, God.  I hear you, but I’m not spiritually well enough right now to contribute to a church that is this small.”  But for some reason, we went back for a third service.  At this point, we had been in Tulsa for about 3 months and I my company was fixing to lay-off 1/3 of the company.  This was my first job out of college, I had no history with this company and we had just bought a house.  I don’t remember exactly Mike’s message that Sunday, but it discussed how we are a part of several communities and work is one of those communities and God wants to carry us through our hard times in those communities.  I sat in the back row that Sunday and cried through half of Mike’s message because God told me he cared about my job status and would carry me through.  I decided that day that if God spoke to me three times in three Sundays at the Heart, he really wanted me to be a part of this community.  It’s been almost four years now and I am happy being an active member of this community.

Thought of the Day:  Love Is What Matters Most

  I’ll start off by hitting the high points.  We are called to love because God loves us.  There’s no better way to be like him and to worship him than by loving.  Above and beyond, we are called to especially love everyone in the family (Galatians 6:10).  Since love is most important, that means relationships are most important.  The way we show love in relationships is by putting our time into those relationships.  Nothing shows love more than giving someone your time.

It seems like every day I keep coming back to one of two themes:  time and money.  Even my bull-head is starting to catch on that God is really trying to teach me something here. 

The first statement today that caught my attention is that we are especially called to love everyone in the family (the family of believers of Christ).  As I thought about that statement, I realized that some of the people I find most difficult to love are in the family.  And these are the people I should love the most.  Interesting.  Why?  I think it’s because I expect more out of people in the family and so I get irritated and frustrated more quickly.  But I shouldn’t pick their splinter when I have California Redwood sticking in my own eye (just a little bit of paraphrasing there).  To do item:  try, everyday, to unconditionally love those in the family and do not avoid situations where I can love them.

The second statement that caught my attention is that we show love in relationships with our time.  Ouch.  Not my strong point lately.  The only relationship I have put time into lately is my marriage, and even then Jeremy has to remind to stop and be still and focus on us.  Again, ouch.  But the thing is, it isn’t necessarily that I don’t have time to spend on relationships, it’s that I don’t feel like I have energy.  I feel like I’m so tired and so worn down and need to so much work on myself that I don’t have the energy to pour into anyone else.  But the ironic thing is that I’m usually lifted up when I do put my energy into someone else.  The other reason I’ve isolated lately is because I know my life is not exactly on the right track.  I’ve been too work-oriented and not dealing with the lessons God is trying to teach me.  I know that if I invest time in relationships with those closest to me, they will call me on the carpet for this.  They will challenge me.  They will hold me accountable.  And it’s just easier to ignore the God lessons and press on with “life”.  I remember telling Bridget about 2 months ago that I just felt the need to sit down and cry but I didn’t want to let myself because I didn’t want to deal with it.  Guess what, 2 months later and no crying session.  And I’m not going to lie.  Work is hogging time.  Just last week I passed up the opportunity to spend a fun day with Mom and Tish at the water park but I didn’t go because I needed to work.  To do item 2:  stop running from God’s lessons. Stop ignoring his prodding.  Get real with myself.