Prayer

Recently I have been very convicted about how I live my prayer life. I don't know if it's the new year or whether it's the fact that I have so much on my plate now, or whether God's just waving a red flag in front of my face, but I now feel more of an urge to pray at random times and when I'm in the middle of something.



To be more transparent than I usually like to be, I'm stating for the record that my prayer life has never been a strong one. I just never became good at normal, ritual prayers or daily wake-up or good night prayers. I'm a sporadic pray-er.



I want to ask you to help me pray for peace of my own mind. I don't want to spoil my own wedding by being too up tight and freaked out over it. I know that where God wills, there's a way. And praise Jesus, marrying Daniel is one of those things I have prayed fervently about. I believe with all my heart that it's God's will for us to wed. Now I just need to remember that if God wants it to happen, it will. It won't matter if we are flat broke or millionaires.



Now, if only I could tattoo that on myself.



Book Suggestion: "Esther" by Charles Swindoll

This is an excellent character study in a series done by Swindoll. He covers several key biblical people including: Job, David, and Jesus. Esther is a must-read for women. I am on my third read through, and have actually made it my bible study for the new year. If you ever need a model for courage, Esther is your girl. Just read her story in the bible to catch a glimpse of this girl's grit. Read Swindoll's character analysis to get the fleshed out reality of what she went through and how she can be a role-model to every Christian woman today.

My Blog

MMkay, I've officially made the executive decision that I don't have enough time or motivation to write about only pop culture stuff. Yes, it's true. So, from now on, I'm going to write about whatever pops into this little brain of mine and you can read it, deal? Deal.

Soooo, Thanksgiving! Yay! Daniel and I spent this one with my family and he survived the onslaught of crazy family members. Go him! And go me for not worrying about it a lot. All went fairly well. We ate, we watched so much football it was bordering on obsessive, and we went to see Twilight the next day. Loved the Twilight part, hated the way they made it. It looked so amateur. Pah-lease try harder to at least let me delude myself into thinking you tried on this one, okay? Jeez, it made so much money, but not on it's cinematic effects. I mean really.

So Logan's officially 13 weeks into potential daddyhood. I know, frightening thought of frightening thoughts. My baby brother is going to be a DADDY. He and Kayla (the mom) seem to be handling all this in stride. Mom and I are freakin' out a little. She's in her second trimester. At the beginning of June, I'm gonna be Auntie Em. I'm just not ready for these things yet!!

Work is starting to really hop. But of course, it's retail so I saw that happening. Unfortunately, it's not hopping quite as much this year due to financial difficulties of the populus. Come buy books people! We've got some sweet ones. And while you're there, pick up a coffee and a cookie, maybe a few cds. DVDs wouldn't kill you either. :) Just sayin'.

Christmas. Blech. Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas. But working in retail, and seeing the "true" Christmas spirit in shoppers can put you right off the holiday happy train. People are getting meaner and more impatient. I swear, it's like they forget that we're human beings with feelings too. They want what they want and they want it NOW!!! God forbid we're sold out, because they need it tomorrow morning at 7 am and it's 10:30 pm now. That's totally our fault. -Cue eye roll.

I've decided I'm going to put book recommendations on here because who better than me, really.

Read "The Shack" by William Young, if you haven't already. It's a brilliant book that will liberate you if you go in with an open mind. It's religious fiction, but man are there some whopper morals built into that book! Buy it, read it, love it, share it!

Retail Rants

There's a book at Barnes and Noble called "Waiter Rant" and it is all about being a waiter and the kind of crap you put up with. So, recently I saw this and decided that there should also be a book called "Retail Rant: The pay sucks and so do the people" or something similar to that.

There are things I've noticed in my stint as a retail employee. These are things I would like to bring to your attention so that you are wiser. One- we don't get paid nearly enough to deal with the kind of crap many people make us deal with. Being paid under eight dollars and hour is already degrading enough without pissy people coming and making our days worse. Look at it this way if you will: Work in general puts people in bad moods. We're already on edge. If people keep treating us as though we are subserviant, at some point we will explode. If you frequently do this, there's a better chance that it could be you.

Another point I'd like to make is this: we may be paid next to nothing and work in a position that very intelligent monkeys could fill, but we are not stupid. Okay, I'll cede that some retail workers (read teenagers) could use a few brain cells sometimes, and there are some people who just aren't up to 75 on the IQ scale. However, there are those of us who fall into two other categories. The first category is that we were desperate for income, okay? The economy blows and no one wants to hire and almost college grad. So we took what we could get. This does not mean we sold our intelligence once we went on the payroll. The other category is comprised of people with good paying jobs who still need more money to live well, or make ends meet. I personally know several people who fall into this category. They are smarter than most people combined, but for some reason, need the extra cash. Take one of my good friends for example. He is an executive at an insurance company but his daughter just entered Princeton and I can tell you first hand, college is not, I repeat NOT, cheap.

The last thing I'd like to point out is: we do everything so please try not to make our jobs harder. I understand you don't realize some things you do wrong. However, we do not like cleaning up your trash, picking up after your children, or jumping through hoops for your aproval. It's a job. Most of us don't do it because we always dreamed of being in retail. We go, we work, we get paid. Sure, we'll be nice if you are. We are people after all. But the next time you come in with a bad attitude, snapping at us and acting as though we're incompitent, just remember: we don't mind wasting your time and walking you around the store five times before taking you to what you want. Actually, we often enjoy it.