iBid Farewell

Outside my Window:  Cold, windy, several inches of snow on the ground and everything looking like crystals.  We had an ice storm earlier this week and are currently without power.  I am blogging from a remote location.  It looks beautiful but the rustic living is getting a bit old.  People are beginning to get power back so hopefully we'll be restored by the weekend.

What's on my Mind:  Making choices about which organizations and activities to stay involved in both personally and with/for the kids.  There comes a point when you can't do everything and you need to prioritize.

Had a fun outing a while back with my choir buddies to Columbiaville.  We went to lunch then shopped at a new choir supporter, Inspired, a really cool repurpose shop, then went on a tour of the William Peters Mansion, who was a lumber baron.  Very cool place, wonderfully renovated, they do parties and murder mystery dinners there plus it is a bed and breakfast.

Thankful for: Two wonderful concerts with an amazing group of singers.  Very impressed with how our sound is developing.  The Friday performance was packed out and we had a great turnout on Sunday as well.  Looking forward to "All Creation Sings" in the Spring. 

Creative Endeavors: Working on a poster design for the 2nd Annual North Branch Cross Country Spring Fitness 5K.  Almost complete and will be distributed about town after the new year.  Also lighting the fire under the Lapeer County Concert Choir board of directors to expand our educational outreach, more info to follow.

My Latest Project:  Setting up attendance at National Honor Society meetings in schools around the area to go in a recruit kids for 4H camp counselor training.  Rob and I have also become involved with the FRC Robotics team for Ed-Tech and North Branch.  The kick off is at Kettering on January 4th then the real excitment begins!

My 3 Sons:  Ben's experience at the First Tech Robotics challenge was a bit of a frustrating day but he kept it together and came in 10th out of 21 teams which isn't bad considering he never got to drive the robot before the competition due to technical difficulties.

Ethan made it to finals at his first middle school forensics tournament at Hartland and finished 6th in his category (Poetry).  The state competition at Central Michigan University was pretty fierce and he did not receive any awards there.  He is going to use his 3 Wizard poems by Jack Prelutsky piece one more time in January then begin working on a duo with his buddy Noah for the spring tournaments.  

Fox did his first Model U.N. event and is looking forward to the new topice of World Economics which he feels will be more interesting for him.  He is also waiting to do an interview for National Honor Society to be a buddy to an elementary student and has started attending meetings for the high school robotics team, they are pursuing him to be their "money man" and keep track of their financials as well as acting as a team manager. 

The First Born:  Single again.  Down to one job but that's good.  Judged her first Forensic Tourny at Central and is planning to do more and try and come help mentor the middle school team.

Employment News: I worked at Honeyflow filling holiday orders and have been subbing.  Rob is at the end of his unemployment and we just got the account for his new business, Kings Mill Technical Services, set up at a bank in town.  The calls have been coming in pretty steady and hopefully will continue.  Since we've been down this road of self-employment before we have a little bit better plan going into it so I believing this will a succesfully move.

Hoping to Improve:  Making time to write.  Running schedule has been messed up because of the icy conditions.  Looking forwarding to running my first 8K on Jan 31st regardless of training.  Below is the HSXC team at the Fall Sports Banquet.

Food for Thought: I've been reading a great book called Food Rules: An Eater's Manual by Michael Pollen that really enforces the thought behind the food choices we make.  It helps me stay true to the cause of fresh eating especially when the schedule gets busy and "fast food" gets tempting.  My friend who battles with arthrtis has adopted a no wheat and no sugar routine over the past few months and has noticed a remarkable difference in her condition, basically no inflamation and very little pain/discomfort.  What you eat matters and heals if we just give it time for the body to accept the change.  Taking a pill just covers symptoms for a time but doesn't really heal anything.....just saying.

Last Words:  Here is my mantra for the new year ....