I Am Sustaining

Wow, what a week!

104 Transfer Students, 96 Transfer Parents, 318 Freshman Students, and 482 Freshman Parents later (that's exactly 1,000 people, in case you were counting) the first week of Summer Orientation 2009 is officially done.

I have been so incredibly amazed at how well this week has gone. My colleagues, my student staff, and all of the new Belmont community members have blown me away with their energy, their excitement, and their desire to really make this orientation great.

I've learned a lot, even in just the last week, about how all of this is really supposed to work. Who supports me, what sustains me, and how I rather enjoy the execution much, much more than the planning.

I am whole, a week later, thanks to many things including the Lord, my wonderful husband, family, friends, co-workers, and students.

Also thanks to these incredibly material but amazing things:

The Keen Whisper. These things, after a short run with a different pair of new sandals and eight blisters to show for them (which will go unnamed), have been like heaven for my feet.

"Manners" by Passion Pit. It's the only sure-fire 5:30AM drive-to-work and 10:30PM drive-home pick-me-up. It's an amazing album.




Royal Robbins Discovery Skort. I've got no shame in bringing back the skort, especially when I'm running around for nearly sixteen hours in a day.

And no thanks to coffee, which I gave up for the week and did fairly well without (despite getting very little sleep and running on fumes by the end of some days). It's never smelled so good in my life, however, considering most of my students have been running around in the mornings with a cup of it permanently attached to their hands.




We are taking the weekend off at the lake, and I couldn't be more excited about the prospect of sunshine, the water, the great weather, the warmth, a stack of good books, the food, and the time away.

Hope y'all have a great weekend!

Post-Thanksgiving Reflections

What a great day! Seriously...

I spent all of yesterday morning shooting pictures of our adorable niece and nephews, Neeley, Luke, and Parker, as well as their parents, Brad and Wendy, out at their farm. Cliff was a great assistant, and I'm really excited with a lot of the shots. If I had our computer, I'd probably have something to show for it, but you'll just have to wait until next week to see these beauties.

Later, we had an early Thanksgiving meal out at the cabin with all of Cliff's parents, aunts and uncles, cousins, siblings, and nieces and nephews. You can imagine in a fairly small hard-wooded cabin, it was a pretty loud and raucous time. I did manage to take a nap and get some time to talk with my family, though, so it couldn't have been that bad. We made a last-minute decision to stay out at the lake last night and kept Neeley, Luke, and Parker there with us. We managed to tweak the bunny ears enough to catch "The Incredibles" on the TV and watched lots of the boys (my husband included) playing "Halo" on the XBOX 360.

It was a beautiful morning out at the lake, today, so we attempted to stay there as long as possible. Which basically means until we got so hungry or so tired of wearing the same clothes from the day before, that we just gave up. Unfortunately, most of the food stores from the summer have been depleted and everyone took leftovers home, so all we had this morning was a loaf of bread and maybe 3 cups worth of milk. I managed to improvise and whipped up some cinnamon toast, which was mighty tasty if I do say so myself.

Since we left just before lunch, we drove the kids back out to the farm and we just can't really seem to find the motivation to leave. It's just wonderful out here, and having no plans and no responsibilities and nowhere to be is just nice - if even for today.

I'm thankful for that, among many things!
I hope you all had a very happy Thanksgiving, and we're sorry we didn't manage to get on here to say so!

Like Any Other Day

Tomorrow is June. Tomorrow is June, June, June, June, June June June.

Can you believe it?
Wow.

Today was good, out of the ordinary, but good. I wrote the morning away at Starbucks, had a fabulous lunch with Jody, meandered through the mall aimlessly and found my bridesmaids' gifts and possible shoes - lost myself in Williams-Sonoma in pursuit of Microplane grater (and loved every minute of it), and took Cliff to get his haircut with Iz. We had dessert before dinner, eating Coldstone on the way to the grocery store where I picked up goods for the dinner I made tonight. Poached salmon, brown rice and orzo pilaf with roasted garlic, and parmesean asparagus. Yum!

I am excited for this weekend - what could be the Bridal Tea to top all Bridal Teas and the company of good friends. Let's pray that the rain holds back for Natalie and Ryan and Cliff and me for time out at the lake! And if not, let's pray we don't get cabin fever and sick of gorging ourselves with strawberry and slough goo. Mmm.

Ah - June! Crazy...