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So last night, we went to the gym and had a good long workout, and then went to the video store and rented Deep Blue. Now, if you've seen March of the Penguins, which was amazing, rent this movie. Really. If you've got kids, rent it anyway. It's unbelievable. We loved it. 
If you've never seen March of the Penguins, and can't figure out why in the world you'd rent a documentary on a Friday night, well, let me tell you. March of the Penguins was really a documentary/story. It was moving and beautiful and left you in awe of a part of the world you'll never see. It's -70 degrees with 100 mph winds, you couldn't drag me there for love nor money. But, on a scorching summer day (+35 here yesterday) with a nice cold drink or bowl of ice cream, it's wonderful. 
Deep Blue was simply, a better movie. Did you know, that more people have left earth and gone into space, than have ever seen the ocean floor? The deepest parts, that is. They call the oceans, "the last frontier". If you've ever gone snorkelling, you'll understand. It's a completely different world there. 
I had a second grade teacher once, who gave us all a sheet of paper and told us to draw a fish. We were supposed to be as creative as we wanted to be. It didn't have to look like a goldfish or anything even really resembling a fish. We could use any color we wanted. When we were all finished, she told us that "chances are better, that the fish you drew actually exists somewhere in the ocean, than that it doesn't. The ocean is that vast". She's actually right. There are creatures down there that we haven't even named. 
To me, all I could think of was how incredible God was. It was like being in church, watching this film. If evolution was actually a viable option, why then, is the world so incredibly beautiful? How would we know? What part in the evolutionary process, of adapting and changing with whatever environment we're in, taught us to appreciate beauty? Why in the world does a dolphin expend unbelievable amounts of energy to simply play? 
Ten Shekel Shirt has a song that says, "there's something, about the ocean, that makes me rise up and praise you". I couldn't agree more.
I've been thinking lately. Note - Yes, this is going to be long - I'm processing something, I can't do that quickly as you may have noticed. We went up to Casper Mountain and did that music festival in this beautiful little mountain meadow. I had a good time. It's on dvd somewhere, which I have no desire to see, since I hate video of myself and the guy with the camera "loved the way my face looked when I worshipped". I don't want to know. Anyway, we were up there, having a good time, and even singing a worship song Peter wrote (beautiful), and I got to thinking...I love the way worshipping God feels. I think it's amazing that we're commanded to do something that so fills our soul. I don't know anyone who doesn't usually enjoy the worship part of church more than the sermon. Here's my question: So what?
I heard once, that God is far more concerned with our wholeness that our happiness. I like that...that's not true. I hate it, I don't understand it. God will give us pleasure in doing his will, but that's a gift. It's not to be expected. The thing that Christianity offers that no other religion does, is that our God is both Holy and Personal. Big and Good, as someone once phrased it to me. I don't think that we in the western world understand very much about the Big. The Holy. Asia has it down, they don't know a personal God. We have a Personal God who, I hate to say, we very rarely revere. Look at a lot of our worship songs versus a lot of old hymns. We've lost a lot of the holiness, the majesty of a creator King, who has many facets. What we know of him is true, it's good, and the world, especially Asia, needs it.
But what I've been challenged with lately, is worshipping God for who he is, not just who he is to me. This goes against everything my society teaches:
Every single thing you own or buy or love must be relevant to you. "Your life will be more enjoyable if you buy this" or worse "I love him because he makes me feel like this". Nothing anymore, seems to have any worth simply for what it is. We want, I usually want, a cookie cutter, microwave dinner version of God.
" I want your love as the main course with answered prayer as desert (answered, of course, the way I would like). I would like it ready in three minutes and to eat it while I watch a movie." I want to feel good about having regular quiet times. I'm not looking for a challenge unless it's something I can easily overcome, and thus feel better about my Christian journey. I'm growing. Good for me. God's holiness makes me nervous, and his conviction makes me uncomfortable. I don't understand the "God who thunders over the waters", so I will just take my "Jesus is my homeboy" t-shirt and be on my way, thanks.
And by the way, what a good Christian I am for wearing it, and thus, witnessing! Do we have a merit badge here somewhere? Seriously.
I am guilty of this. God is very patient with me. I still feel good about my quiet time, I love to worship, and how it makes me feel. How amazing is it that while I would totally ignore a part of God's character, he would still bless me with joy in the small sliver of him that I am comfortable dealing with daily? He really is personal and wonderful to us. I don't like that I take it for granted. God feels distant and I cry like a little girl, angry that I'm being "ignored". Again, who cares? Why not pray, "God, is there something you're trying to teach me here? Am I going through this difficult time where you feel so distant in order that you actually draw me closer? Is it possible that I'm not getting a raw deal, but that you trust me enough to allow this, knowing I will make it and honor you?" I'm terrible at this. Why would I honor God with my struggle when I can be happy just worshipping and reading psalms? (Not Job, he challenges me to change). I'm grateful that He's patient with me. I'm (and everything in me revolts at saying this) grateful that God would trust me enough to let me struggle. He wouldn't do it if he knew I couldn't take it.
I had a really bad week last week. I cried non-stop. I couldn't tell you why I was sad, I could tell you that God had abandoned me and I couldn't take it. He felt holy all right. Holy and distant and vague. I was scared. I considered anti-depressants. Nothing made me happy, everything made me feel weak and small and sad, just plain sad. I felt frantic and panicked. See, my issue with God is I think the bottom is going to drop out. All the time. I think it with Peter and most people I love. This is great for now, but it can't last, nothing does. I then screw things up so that I'm right. God doesn't care. Trust me, I've tested it, with nearly disastrous results. I've been learning to change this about me. That the core beliefs I formed as a child and carried into adulthood are simply false. They need to be changed. I'm afraid more than anything, a lot of the time. God is working on this with me, and last week, he believed that I had come far enough that he could leave me a little while, and see how I did - with very good reason. I freaked out for three solid days, scaring Peter half to death, and then came back to Jesus, confessed that I was a cry-baby scaredy-pants, and that he was Holy, and that his character was true, regardless of wheather I understood it. He showed me that I had been very wrong and not extended forgiveness for somthing that I was being a total jerk about. I dealt with it. I recovered. I feel a little stronger than I did two weeks ago, though a little shaken and sheepish. It's okay. It's going to be tough sometimes. "God disciplines those he loves". I don't get it, I don't know what he's up to, though I desperately want to, it's not important. He is who he says he is no matter how I feel about it.
I want this part of God. I want him to trust me enough to reveal it to me. I want to trust his character so that the next time I need a little discipline from my heavenly Father, I'm not going to believe that he's abandoned me. He's not going to do that, but he's also not going to let me keep my cookie cutter version of him either. "Take it or leave it Mellie, this is who I am. You can trust it, you're going to need to trust it". No more microwave dinners for me.
So I promised to post these forever ago, pictures of my little niece, Naomi Jasmine. She's turning four next month, and every time we see her, we have so much fun with her. She totally cracks me up and I love being Auntie Mellie to her. These were all taken a few months ago, when Peter and I took Naomi for night to give her mom and dad a "date night". Bath time was a good amount of fun.
She's definitely a bit of a princess sometimes, but is a good little girl, and very smart. It comes from being around too many adults, I think. The other day we were having cake and coffee over at Peter's parents house, and she stopped eating her cake and told her mom, "I don't want any more cake, it's making my tummy a little bloated". She lifted up her shirt so we could see and said, "mom, why do you give me so much sugar?" and wouldn't eat another bite. We all cracked up.
She's really smiley and very affectionate, and loves to see me and Peter cuddle or hug or kiss. We played "wedding" with her the other night, and I had to be the bride and Peter had to walk me down the aisle and kiss me at the end. She loves to sit on our laps, when we sit side by side watching a movie or something, and quietly makes us hold hands, or looks up at us and says, "kiss!" and we do, and she giggles and snuggles back in.
This was right before I hit a snarl in her hair that made her a little less than happy. Typical female. She loves her Uncle Petey desperately though, and is pretty happy to ham it up in front of a camera.
This is me trying to show her how to flex her muscles. It took a minute to catch on.
This is us threatening Uncle Petey with bodily harm if he didn't leave us to our bathtime. I look like a moron, but she's so cute I had to post this picture.
The other day, we were all again at Peter's parent's place, and she said to me. "Auntie Mellie, you're a parent, right?" "No honey," I told her, "Uncle Petey and I don't have any kids yet." She thought about this for a while, looking a little confused as to why that would be and said, "You don't know how? When I get married, I can teach you!" She's very generous.
A few days later, she asked again. "Why don't you have kids yet?" I told her that "Uncle Petey" and I would have kids soon but not yet, she had to wait a while. "But what if God sends you a baby now? I think he will." This last "prophecy" made my mom and sisters in law very happy.
She's a fun little kid, and though not very skilled in predicting the future yet, (she thinks everything, including a full term pregnancy takes "seven minutes") she makes me laugh every time I'm with her. Maybe we'll have to do another overnight outing again with her. She's fun to spoil and play with and teach things and wrestle with. We love her to pieces.
This folks, is the pretty part of Wyoming. Not to be confused with where I live, as that is slightly different. It takes about 7 hours to get here, to the Tetons where one can find some of the best camping and skiing that a place could offer. On the backside of these mountains is an amazing ski resort. I want to go next winter for at least a little while. 
This is me next to the waterfall in Yellowstone. We had a great time, spent five nights in the park, after getting there really late. Because we were camping at about 10,000 feet elevation, the weather was a little strange. The two days before we got there, they had sunburned, it was so hot. The next day, I had breakfast in the sunshine, then had to run for cover as the rain and hail came in. By evening it snowed, and at night it rained again. Luckily for us, our tent stayed warm and dry, and before we left I petitioned mightily for double sleeping bags, which I won out on. Nights were spent with Peter much too warm because his wife in her flannel was snuggled right in. He'd move away, I'd get cold and follow him until in my sleep, I actually chased him right off the mattress and he had to wake me up and ask me to move over.
This is Peter and his dad standing next to one of the gysers. Yellowstone happens to be one of only 3 places in the world where you can find active gysers. Iceland and New Zealand have some also. There are lots of places to go hiking where you can get right next to them. This was on about a 2 mile hike we took, where despite the weather, I got rather sunburned on my face. Nothing like "tomato face" to go with no makeup (okay, a little makeup. Don't want to scare the wildlife) and greasy hair. The mist is coming from one of the gysers and smells just like the water when you boil a bunch of eggs. It's a little smelly, but it's such a neat place you don't really notice so much.
This is a picture I took of one of the hot springs. The sulfur makes the edges really yellow but the pools are so small in circumference (biggest we saw was about 20 feet across) and so deep the pool goes from the prettiest blue, to black in the middle. The water is crystal clear and there's no bottom to the pools in sight. It freaks me out a little. What must live down there? Nothing likely, since most of the pools are actually boiling hot. We were freezing at this time, and they looked so inviting.
This is just a cool little gyser that blows that funny smelling gas. It looks like a little steam engine to me, we thought it was funny. 
Here you can see the pit in the middle of the pool where it just goes deeper and deeper until it goes black. Creepy I tell you. The hot springs are right next to the lake, and way back when, the explorers of this place used to catch fish in the lake, and boil them right there in the hotsprings. Sounds a little gross to me to cook already yucky fish in sulphur smelling water, but hey, that's just me. Can anyone tell I have a tour guide for a husband? I learned a lot about a lot of strange things on this trip.
This is the "Grand Canyon of Yellowstone". The river cuts through the rock a really long ways down, as you can see by the teeny little walkway that goes down. We didn't get to go down here, too much to see, too little time to do it all, even in five days.
This is me snuggling with my husband, who still liked me even though I disturbed his sleep. It's okay, we usually went to bed around 11pm and didn't get up till 10am. I love camping. We hung out around the fire in the evening and read the last of "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe" (we're reading all the Chronicles of Narnia to each other). I love this man. What a doll.
This is just a cool picture of the steam vents on our hike. There were so many amazing things to see here. In a lot of the places you can't walk anywhere off the path because the earth is really thin in some places and you'll fall right through. A little boy had fallen in just before we got there and had some pretty severe burns, but is doing okay last we heard. Poor little guy.
This is a really pretty waterfall that I hiked down to to take some nice pictures of. The sun was hitting the water really beautifully. I have a better picture but I can't figure out how to turn it around, when I post it, it's sideways, so meh!, what can you do?
An overlook of the major waterfall that feeds the little one in the picture before this one. Again, I have a prettier picture of it, but can't seem to turn it around. Peter thinks I have to save them somewhere and edit them and then load them here. I couldn't be bothered.
This is the Tetons coming up out of the lake. The coolest thing about the Tetons is that it's pretty much flat around them, but then they jump out of the flat brown land around them and there's just a few really tall mountains. It's amazing... A major point of the trip was to find good homemade fudge. There was none to be found in the enitire park, but if you drive 100 miles from our campsite to Jackson Hole, you will find a nice little fudge shop with fresh fudge, of which we bought 2 1/2 pounds. I'm still eating mine.
So there you have it. I think we're going on smaller trips over the next few weeks, which I'm looking forward to. I'm still denying the fact that there's a pile of smoke smelling laundry in our car. I don't want to think about hauling it up to my apartment, stinking the place up, and then paying a million dollars in quarters to wash it downstairs. I may ask my in-laws if I can come over and use their washing machine and dryer and make dinner in exchange. We'll see. Anyway, that's it. I haven't posted a ridiculously long blog in a while, so there you have it. It's also too long to spell check, so I'm sorry if you've been reading this and getting annoyed.
This evening, right after work, Peter and I are taking our summer vacation. To Yellowstone National Park, all of the pictures below are from right there. We're going to have to drive over 8 hours and get there really late tonight, but by this time tomorrow, I will be waking up in a tent next to my husband, who will hop out of bed to make me eggs and bacon over the fire. I'll drink really bad coffee (actually I have little Tim Hortons packages to bring along), and sit in a lawn chair wrapped up in my blanket in some sweatpants and one of Peter's hoodies and read a book while my breakfast cooks. Other than cooking breakfast on most Saturday mornings, Peter doesn't cook at home, and for this reason: when we camp, I don't cook. I'll throw a hotdog on a stick, but that's about it. Peter loves it. Cooking outside, chopping wood, doing all that guy stuff. I love him - he's such a boy.
We get to go hiking right here. It's not going to be super hot, so it will be great for hiking around. I just got some good hiking shoes and I can't wait to break them in. This is by far, my favorite way to get exercise. 
We're going to see Old Faithful and watch it shoot 70 feet into the air and poke around the 100 year old lodge. If it's raining (a possibilty this weekend) we may curl up next to their enormous fireplace with a coffee. (Everytime I blog I mention coffee don't I?)
Though I am Canadian, I have never seen a moose in the wild. I'm hoping that changes this week, I think it would be so great. The last time Peter's family went camping, they were sitting around the fire in the morning and one just wandered by. Silly Americans monopolizing the moose sightings. I'll show them.
This is near the lake we're camping by. There's steam everywhere because of all the hotsprings and gysers. Unfortunately, no hot springs you can swim in, they are literally boiling hot, that's okay, it's going to be too chilly to swim.
I can't wait to go, see the sights. Apparently Yellowstone gets millions of visitors per year, it's all worth seeing. At this point though, I'm so camping starved that I would just about pitch a tent on my deck. I figure that one of the best things about being married by far, is the double sleeping bag. Peter and I both have really amazing mummy sleeping bags but I petitioned mightily for some cheapy bags we could zip together. Other than coffee and eggs and bacon in the morning in front of the fire, this has to be, the best part of camping.
I'm very excited about this part of the trip. The Tetons (french for "breasts" - dirty frenchmen) are about two hours of beautiful drive from where we're camping, as well as Jackson Hole, a really cool little town at the base of them. Apparently you can see Harrison Ford walking around town. Umm, wahoo? Peter's dad looks just like him anyway, I'm sure he'll be asked for his autograph while we're there. I want to drive over and poke around the town. I've only ever driven through and I loved it. Even the Wendy's there is a little log cabin. It's so cute and quaint. I'm a sucker for quaint mountain towns. So folks, I'm gone. I'm leaving behind the terrible Oilers tradgedy, the people who I have to talk to at work all day long who have minimized our site page and can't get it back because they don't understand that they've just minimized, nothing else. The page works, you just can't use a computer, and I'm not your PC support-sorry. (little work rant there for ya) I'm leaving my house, and the decision of what to do in Gillette on a Saturday when there's nothing to do in this town. I'm going to relax, sleep in my tent with my husband, visit with his family, read a book or two. Watch my gorgeous husband play guitar in the firelight and sing. My gosh I love camping. Honestly, I've been on a cruise (WASTE of money) and this is better by far. I'll be back Sunday night. Have an awesome week everyone. I wish you were all coming with me. Okay, maybe not Trav, cause he's got tattoos now and is a little weird, but eveyone else? You bet. Drive down and join us! Bring a tent and some eggs and some Tim Hortons coffee if you're coming from Canada, mine'll run out after a day I'm sure.
Last year, the Pittsburgh Steelers won the Superbowl (with the help of the 12th man in stripes, but that's another story.) Their quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger was the youngest QB to ever win a Superbowl, at age 23. He's amazing. When I made my Madden team Ben was the quarterback I signed, no matter what the cost of the contract. I love him.
He had an lucky start to his carreer, when the Steelers' regular QB was injured in the 2004/'05 season and 'Big Ben' had to start. He surpassed the record for wins by a rookie quarterback, going 13 and 0. When the starting quarterback, Tommy Maddox got better he didn't get his starting position back. Ben was simply too good. The next year, his performance at the Superbowl itself left something to be desired, but up until that point was amazing, especially for such a young guy. We'll blame it on nerves. It is, after all, the most televised event there is, if I'm correct. He's making millions, unlike a lot of 'NFLers', doesn't seem at all cocky when he's interviewed, he just seems like a nice guy, having the time of his life.
Today, while riding his motorcycle he was in an accident. He's in surgery as I type, and there's not a lot of info right now other than that he flew over the handlebars and smashed his face into the windshield of the car. They think he's busted his jaw, and lost most of his teeth; which NFL-wise would be the least of his problems should he get away so "lucky". The pictures of the car show a pretty sizable dent in the passenger side near the wheel, and a head-sized smash in the windshield with one below that which everyone will be praying is not his arms, hands, shoulders, knees, or honestly, any other part of his body. It was pretty scary looking. All they know is that his injuries are not life threatening.
Here's my issue with it all: He wasn't wearing a helmet. He never does. He doesn't 'like it,' I believe he's said before. Now that I know he isn't going to die, I don't mind saying, "what a complete idiot!" He's been given the chance of a lifetime, a chance that a million boys and men (and likely some women) around the world would give up nearly anything to have, especially if you pair it with his ability and his opportunities. And he will not give up the feeling of having the wind in his hair as he rides his motorbike. If he can't ever play again he will lose literally millions of dollars, and the ability to do what he loves most. Not to mention possibly never riding a bike again. All he needed to do was put on a helmet.
Due to this, and another motorbike accident involving an NFL player some time ago, many coaches and owners will be rethinking having a "no motorbike clause" in many signing contracts. You want to play in the NFL, you don't get a motorbike. Get one when you retire with all your millions. Honestly, people in everyday situations give up all sorts of things for their jobs. People make sacrifices and usually, to do a job that they hate. My father-in-law barely ever gets a break from his job. His boss treats him like garbage and he's on call almost all the time. He can get called from bed to go and deliver medical supplies, he can be in the middle of speaking at his daughter's graduation (they gave him a few hours off for that one) and if they need him, he goes. But he took the job, and that's what he does, and what he gives up to get a paycheck, and not a great one.
I love Big Ben. I hope for his sake, and his families' sake also, that he recovers fully. I also really hope that when his face impacted that car this morning, that it brought him to his senses. Get well Ben. Get well. And for the love of Pete, get a helmet.
A funny thing happened yesterday. My amazingly talented husband was asked to join a worship band that's playing the Casper Mountain Christian Music Festival,and maybe a couple other places this summer. They're called Temple Praise. Peter's friend Eric plays with them, a couple places a year, so they needed a guitarist, and Eric reccomended Peter for it. Eric's wife Cary sings with them, so I was going along to practice yesterday to watch and simply due to a severe lack of good worship in this town, and having heard them play before, knowing I could get some there. Seriously, the only songs I can remember hearing at chuch (when we go) is "Jesus on the mainline - Tell him what you want!" and "...He sees the babies crying, the old folks dying, and He gives us all his love." (this last song must be sung to a cow-poke-y guitar by a man who looks alarmingly like John Denver). Worship at our church, as I've experienced it, sounds like camp songs when you're in fifth grade.
Now, I realize that I am admittedly, and almost proudly, a snobby ywamer. I'm used to worship three times a week by people who have CD's out, whose songs you've likely sung in church before, not mine, but maybe yours. Campfire worship is a struggle for me, and a huge part of why we don't usually get up for church at 7am on Sunday.
So I get my grape milkshake from Dairy Queen and we get there, meet the other people who are practicing, and the main worship leader, Robin, starts handing me music sheets, and talking about getting me linked with a mic. I lean into Cary and whisper "am I supposed to sing here?!" she laughs and says it looks like it, so I am inadvertantly pulled into the band when they inevitably sang a bunch of my favorite worship songs, that of course I hadn't heard in forever and was just so happy to hear again.
Now, I can sing. I'm not tone deaf by any stretch of the imagination, and have been on worship teams before in ywam (no CD for me though). I sing with Peter all the time. I love singing harmony, and I can hold my own. Peter says I'm really good, but would be better if I believed I was really good and sang good and loud. I can't do that. At least I thought I couldn't.
So we start singing these songs and I'm so happy to hear them and the musicians are so loud I figure I'm good, especially since the mics cannot be found. And we have two guitars, a keyboard and a drumset all amped up in a tiny little room. I belted it out. It felt really good to just worship again. I love to sing, I love their style, the worship, the simplicity of it, and that it wasn't so much a band practice but a bunch of people just getting together and worshipping. The worship leader, a lovely woman, heard me, and set me and Cary next to her so she could hear us better. By then I figured I'd started, I may as well finish. She said the harmony was really pretty, and by the end of the night I'm officially signed up for four or five more practices, and am singing with them at this festival. It was all very funny to me, and to Peter who tells Robin that I sing really pretty harmony, because he's always trying to get me to sing more, and to believe that I can. So there you have it. I'm in, for now at least. For the Casper Mountain Festival and maybe something in Buffalo later on. And maybe one here in the park. Weird. I'm excited, I love the music, and I love the idea that five times over the next two weeks I get my worship fix filled, I've missed it a lot.
Check out the link, and the pictures. The tattooed guitarist is an old friend of Peter's (the one who can't make it this year). They used to play in a band together called Your December and there is some very funny video of a couple of their "gigs" - Peter was 20 or so. The drummer is our good friend Eric. Apparently the audience is pretty much a bunch of sweet Christian hippies and bikers, but there's some good bands there (Lamb, if you're old enough to remember them) this year, and a speaker from India, who I'm going to love hearing. I'm excited about it all, no matter how I stubled into it....
So last night, we went to the gym and had a good long workout, and then went to the video store and rented Deep Blue. Now, if you've seen March of the Penguins, which was amazing, rent this movie. Really. If you've got kids, rent it anyway. It's unbelievable. We loved it. 
If you've never seen March of the Penguins, and can't figure out why in the world you'd rent a documentary on a Friday night, well, let me tell you. March of the Penguins was really a documentary/story. It was moving and beautiful and left you in awe of a part of the world you'll never see. It's -70 degrees with 100 mph winds, you couldn't drag me there for love nor money. But, on a scorching summer day (+35 here yesterday) with a nice cold drink or bowl of ice cream, it's wonderful. 
Deep Blue was simply, a better movie. Did you know, that more people have left earth and gone into space, than have ever seen the ocean floor? The deepest parts, that is. They call the oceans, "the last frontier". If you've ever gone snorkelling, you'll understand. It's a completely different world there. 
I had a second grade teacher once, who gave us all a sheet of paper and told us to draw a fish. We were supposed to be as creative as we wanted to be. It didn't have to look like a goldfish or anything even really resembling a fish. We could use any color we wanted. When we were all finished, she told us that "chances are better, that the fish you drew actually exists somewhere in the ocean, than that it doesn't. The ocean is that vast". She's actually right. There are creatures down there that we haven't even named. 
To me, all I could think of was how incredible God was. It was like being in church, watching this film. If evolution was actually a viable option, why then, is the world so incredibly beautiful? How would we know? What part in the evolutionary process, of adapting and changing with whatever environment we're in, taught us to appreciate beauty? Why in the world does a dolphin expend unbelievable amounts of energy to simply play? 
Ten Shekel Shirt has a song that says, "there's something, about the ocean, that makes me rise up and praise you". I couldn't agree more.
