My Moma is in town this week and she brought our friend Cheryl with her. Tonight we went to The Cheesecake Factory and on the way home we found this building.

I had to turn around to take the picture and both ladies just laughed at me!

In honor of being homethe past two weekends, here are 13 of my favorite things of home.

1. Madison; we got our first little Shih Tzu my junior year in high school. She is our dainty little queen and I miss her trusting eyes when I am not here.

2. Morgan; we got her in my sophmore year in college and while we are not supposed to have favorites, she is mine. She may not be as dainty as Madison and sure she is a little chunky, but that is what endears me to her.

3. The openness of that house. The living room just goes on for days. I never realized how big it is, but after six months of 538sq ft. it looks BIG!

4. The easy and playful banter I have with my Moma and my sweet brother. I get their jokes and their senses of humor and they get mine.

5. The familiarity of the terrain.

6. Being in the presence of my whole family at the same time.

7. Lazy Saturday evenings with friends, family, and steak! Yumm!

8. The sound of nothing but crickets. Just say no to delivery trucks!

9. Sitting around the kitchen table on a Sunday afternoon with my family, laughing till I cried.

10. The couch…it is so comfy!

11. The weather…last Saturday it was chilly and overcast. It was just one of those days that was perfect to curl up on the comfy couch and watch a sappy Hallmark movie.

12. I get to be Kathryn in every way that counts.

13. Even when I’m wrong and crazy they love me!

If you ever want to see two women running crazily down the street, get a bunch of people to start screaming the title! That is what happened when a friend of mine and I were walking across the street to the site and all of a sudden we heard screaming and then “Move that bus! Move that bus!” We took off, thinking we were about to miss it, only to get there to find they were just practicing and getting video footage and then we stood there for 3 hours. It was GREAT!

The house is amazing and supposedly it is the biggest house they have ever done at 6,000 sq. ft. Eleven of my apartments could fit into that house! Now that is perspective.

Here are some pictures from last night and today…

Look at that assembly line of Sears bags!

There’s Paulie!

And Ed!

Hopefully I’ll get some more pictures up here later but at the moment I am beat.

 

 

Guess what I did tonight…Yep! I went to the next house on Extreme Home Makeover. It is about 15 mins. from my apartment. It was so cool! They had people park in an old abandoned parking lot a couple of blocks away from the house and they shuttled people over to the site.

The tents were up and the lights were blazing. It had the feeling of a fair with all of the people and the noises. People were actually selling hotdogs and drinks in their front yard.

Seriously, it is like the house that never ends and the picture that does not do the house justice.

Check out all of those blue shirts. Speaking of blue shirts this city is going crazy with all of the Extreme Makeover business. There were a couple of people with the blue shirts on at Wal-Mart the other night and when I saw them, I almost squealed. Thank goodness I restrained myself, cause that would just make me look silly!

This is the VIP section where only people who had passes could go. Look at them with their chairs and their plants! Who do they think they are? It is my birthday! I should have gotten to sit in a chair, under a tent, with pretty plants surrounding me. Okay, I’m done being spoiled!

This was such a fun way to spend my birthday evening! With my friends, on an adventure! And the best part is, I think we are going to repeat it tomorrow because that is when Tye shows up with the megaphone shouting “The family comes home in 24 hours!”

UPDATED 2/23/06 10:50pm

We went again tonight and I have more pictures to post tomorrow, I’m just too tired to do that now. Here’s something to keep you guessing until tomorrow though. I saw three of the designers…can you guess which ones?

On Friday I did what I’ve been dreading…I got a Florida license. I drug myself down to the DMV and I made it legal. I am now a legal driver in Florida as well as a registered voter. The woman who was helping me asked me for my Georgia license and I asked her if I would get it back and she looked at me funny and said, “Ma’am, you can’t have two licenses.” Well, as I handed it over to her I started to cry and when she handed me my Florida license I thought to myself, “I’m really moved!”

As I shared this with my neighbor he said, “Aww, you’re a real Floridian now.” I quickly told him that I certainly was not, that I would always be a Georgia Peach and no piece of plastic would ever change that.

Simply one more part of saying good-bye.

Then this morning at church the Lord reminded me of my feelings of disconnection with the Body of Christ and He made it very clear what I was to do about it. I was to become a member of First Baptist Church of Orlando. Thus began an inner dialouge that went something like this…

“I want you here, baby girl!”

Lord, I know, but Edgewood is my Home!

“I know, and Edgewood will always be your Home, but I want you here, now!”

But, what if Edgewood stops sending me their weekly newsletter. I can be an active part of this church and not be a member. Why do I have to do something so permanent so early.

“You have been here for five months! I want you here…just do it! Don’t think about anything but that. I want you here!”

So, instead of arguing any further I went to the front and I met a woman named Donna who walked me through the process. She was so great and patient with me as I boo-hooed my way through my story.

For 24 years I atteneded Edgewood. 24 years worth of laughter, tears, growth, songs, friendships, Sunday School classes, Bible Studies, choir practices, Praise Band practices and the list could go on and on. Edgewood is as much my home as the house I shared with my parents and my sister and brother, and they will always be my family. But facts are facts and the fact is, I am not in Columbus, GA anymore and I need that Home and Family here in Orlando. I am a relational being and I need relationships here. I need laughter, tears, growth, songs, friendships, Sunday School classes, Bible Studes, choir practices, and Praise Band practices here.

For some reason this is so much harder than I thought it would be; moving my letter of membership. Somehow it feels as if I am betraying the church of my youth by becoming a member of First Orlando. I think that is what the enemy wanted me to believe so I would continue to feel disconnected but I know the sound of my Abba’s voice and it was clear this morning.

Please join me in prayer that I would find a place of my own in this enormous church. That I would force myself out of my comfort zone and plug into the singles ministry and the music ministry. It is so hard to do this when you are by yourself and it would be so easy for me to remain a wallflower and get lost among the masses, but I know that is not why the Lord wants me at this church. Please pray that I am brave enough to find out why He wants me here.

Since I moved I haven’t been able to get NBC on my television. Not a problem on most occasions seeing as how my favorite shows are on ABC, however, the next two weeks are not “most occasions”…the Olympics are on. While I do not need to have them on the entire two weeks I do like to have it on in the background and then I love to watch the figure skating and the skiing. Well, I fiddled with my rabbit ears for about 15 minutes and guess what I am watching…Lars Bystoel from Norway kicking butt on the high jump.

And while that is in the background I am in the middle of my lastest scrapbooking project. Several weeks ago my sweet friend, Jen, yet another avid scrapbooker, suggested that I go to Big Lots to check out their scrapbook section. Seeing as how there is a Big Lots almost across the street from me I decided to head over there this afternoon. You have to sift through the trash but do they ever have some good deals. I did not spend over 99 cents for any one thing. I LOVE it!

I love this hobby. It is one of the only hobbies that I have never needed anyone to tell me I’m good at. Now, I know that sounds vain and I do love the positive reinforcement that I get from people but when I look at a finished page and I start to giggle because all of the hard work and the hours, sometimes, that go into one page are worth it because it looks awesome! Now, could they be published in a scrapbook magazine? That remains to be seen. Maybe one day I’ll submit some pages, but for now, I do it for my enjoyment and memory keeping and for the friends who trust me with their memory keeping.

So while I am waiting for my metal embellishments to dry after I added some color to them, I thought I would share one of the pages that I completed this weekend with you. It is the title page of an album I am working on for a friend of mine.

 

So this morning was an early morning…but sometimes, in the words of Beth Moore, you just have to do the thing, and the “thing” this morning was getting up at 6am. But it was all for a good cause…pancakes and manatees!

First, we went to the The Old Spanish Sugar Mill where you can make your own pancakes. They bring out the batter and pretty much anything you want to put in them and then you can go to town making your pancakes. I put pecans in mine! YUM!

Then after we stuffed ourselves (Seriously…I was stuffed after 2 1/2) we went to Blue Springs to see the manatees. One of my friends brought her three children and they were so fun to watch as we discovered these huge, not as cute as I thought they would be, animals. Even though they weren’t cute, it was pretty amazing that they were RIGHT there. This baby and moma were right underneath the dock that we were standing on.

The glare on the water at this angle was really bad. Here are some better pictures…

Do you see all of the things that look like oval shaped rocks under the water in the distance? Yep…those are ALL manatees! It was amazing. They woud come up for breath and you’d get to see their cow-looking noses. It was cool.

In my last post I mentioned that I couldn’t hear the word manatee without hearing the song “Barbara Manatee” from the Veggie Tales in my head. Well, I’m pleased to announce that I only began singing it about a half dozen times instead of the continual loop that it was taking in my brain. It is all about the small accomplishments, folks!

It was a fun morning and now that I have had a nap, getting up early this morning to go, doesn’t seem like it was such a chore.

The new Day of Truth promotion video, by Alliance Defense Fund, came out recently and my good friend, Mike is in it. This video is getting a lot of negative feedback from several sites that do not agree with the message, so I have decided to talk it up on the positive side. Mike, you did a GREAT job!

You can visit the website here and watch it for yourself. This site is also a great place to find out how you can get involved in the Day of Truth in your school and community on April 27, 2006.

I hope you will take the time to go check out the video and website.

Can you believe the entrance to this place? I mean, seriously…it’s like it’s own little, er I mean, hugantic (props to Randy) compound!

We spent all day at the Magic Kingdom, and when I say all day, I mean ALL day! We got into the parking lot at about 11:15am and we didn’t pull out until 10:00pm. It was fabulous! Can I just tell you, it was the best birthday party I’ve ever been to! I mean these people really went out of their way in the decorations…just look.

Anyway, enough silliness…One of the first places we went was to “City Hall” to get Mike an “It’s My Birthday” button. Everywhere we went Disney folks were wishing him a Happy Birthday. That is always fun!

The rain was pretty good to us, although it did start sprinkling enough for me to break out the poncho. That poncho would later keep the super cold wind from cutting into my skin after the sun went down. Now I am not a wimp when it comes to the cold, in fact there are times when I prefer it to be cold but, come on! It’s just like Florida to not be cold when you want it to and to be cold when you don’t want it to. We found ourselves going on silly indoor rides just to stay warm. By the end of the night, major thawing had to take place.

Okay, time for some more pictures…

Pictures of this castle have never done the structure justice. I squealed like a little girl about a half dozen times yesterday and I believe the first time was over seeing this in person. One of the other times I squealed was when I finally saw Belle. The 24 year old Kathryn knows that at the end of the day the actress takes the Belle costume off and goes back to everyday life but the 5 year old Kathryn still thinks she is the beautiful princess that tames the Beast into falling in love with her. Her love for her father and her purity and strength literally transforms the Beast. It is a beautiful story and it is my absolute favorite. So…when I saw her in the parade, I squealed.

One thing that disappointed me was the lack of Disney characters amoungst the people. I also thought that they would be mingling. But maybe they have to keep them hidden in those secret Disney tunnels for security reasons. Anyway, this is the closest I got to Mickey ALL day.

Speaking of secert tunnels…we went to Tom Sayers island and they have secret tunnels and neat forts and barrel bridges. A little boy could get lost in his imagination there. In my opinion, it was the ultimate backyard for boys and for the occasional adventurous little girl. Well two little boys were definitely making themselves at home there and as Mike and I were emerging from one of the secret tunnels one of those little boys fell from the sky right on top of me. Well, not really from the sky but that is what it felt like. They had been playing on the hill above the tunnel exit. I am so glad I was there to break his fall because if I hadn’t he would have hit his head on the rock that was all around us. I didn’t fall but I can tell that I will have a pretty nasty bruise on my shoulder in a day or two. Anyway, the little boy just got right on up and started laughing. I’m glad he was okay.

Now, onto the rides. There were a couple of Disney staple rides that I HAD to ride and most of them were the rides you associate with Disney World. For example, the Teacups, Dumbo, It’s a Small World, the Magic Carpet ride. Not what you would call grown-up rides. But Mike was a trouper and he humored me. While we were standing in the very long line for Dumbo we met a 3-year old little boy and his daddy. His dad was sharing that it was his first time there and that they were also there with his mommy and his 8-month old brother. He also shared that he wished they would have waited a couple more years before they brought him for the first time. Then I shared with the little boy that it was my first time at Disney World too. He looked at me as if to say,”Sheesh Lady, where have you been?” It was so funny.

My favorite ride there was Thunder Mountain. Nothing super special, just a fun ride! Spalsh Mountain was fun too. It was about 8:00 and freezing cold and there was nobody in line for it and Mike asked if I wanted to go again. So I put on my poncho (it was freezing cold. I was not going to get wet!) and we got on the ride. No one else was in our boat and there was no one in the boat in front of us or behind us. It was so cool! The best part about this ride is the anticipation of what is coming. It builds and builds until you are on the top of the drop and then you just fall. So, once we got to the drop off zone and there was no one waiting…we went again. We didn’t even get out of the boat. It was too cool!

As you can probably tell, I had a blast! Thanks for being born, Mike!

Okay everybody, you have to come visit so I can go back!

 

In honor of my friend’s birthday we are going to Disney World! It may be rainy and nasty, but I’m not going to let a little bit of rain keep me from going to Disney for the first time EVER!

I’ll be sure to blog all about it and maybe post some pictures!

Happy Birthday, Mike! Way to take back the rainbow!

Updated 2/4/06 10:55pm

I just got home…zzzzzz! Every muscle in my body aches and I am too pooped to tell you all about it now. Just know, we had a great day full of fun and laughter and lots of happy birthday wishes for Mike…those people at Disney are so dang friendly!