A sheltered life

First thing, before I go into this, I want to be clear, I love animals, however, I do keep in perspective that they are animals and not humans.
I started volunteering at the Animal Shelter this week. I have always loved animals and thought this would be a great way to really get in there and give some love and helping out where there is a need. Catie and I went to an orientation last Saturday and it was enlightening. I remember when I took the Vet assistant class a year or so ago, I thought I would never get to use it, with the exception of my own animails. Alas, however, I used it today. Let me go back to Tuesday. I went in about 1115am to help. I had about an hour, I thought that would be enough to get my feet wet. I was able to help with laundry, I gave all the animals toys and treats. It was a great hour. Today, I had 4 hours available while the girls were in school. I got there at 815am and came in the back door. When I opened the door, there were 3 workers there and a dog. The thing that you hope never happens had happened. They had gotten a rush of animals yesterday and had to euthunize. I didn't know whether to cry or run. I knew it happens and I understand that it HAS to happen. For every child born in the US, 7 dogs are born. There is just not enough home for all the pets. There are not enough people who take care of their pets. It is very sad. So, the only thing I could say is, "where do I start today?" The supervisor apologized, she said they were trying to get done before I came in and that was the last one for today. I told her that I understood going into this that that was going to happen and it was okay.
So how did the rest of the day go? It was great! I helped with laundry a little bit, but mostly just folding today. I cleaned kittly cages and pet some sweet kitty cats. There was one that wanted me to pet him and everytime I walked by he would stick his paw out to get my attention. There was another one that was sick and in a lot of pain, so she had to be put down. Very sad. Moving right along, I helped to clean dishes, then I gave the dogs toys and treats again. That is always fun. There was one dog in the stray area where they hold incoming dogs for 72 hours before they determine their status and whether they are adoptable or not. He was so cool! If I didn't have a big dog, he would be a GREAT family dog. Everytime I would walk by he would talk to me and I would talk to him. He would sit and try be so still with his tail wagging a million miles an hour. He would bark at me to get my attention and when I would look at him he would try to be good, but it was sooooo hard. He wanted to be loved so bad. When they are in that section, they are not supposed to be messed with because they have not been checked out yet. You don't know demeanor or health status. Anyway, I talked to him all day. I hope he finds a good home. Next thing, lets see, I swept the halls and cleaned the baseboards in the cat room. (Yes, I actually cleaned baseboards!) I then got to go play with a little black lab puppy. He was really sweet too. Not very good manners though, but he was just a baby. He is going to be a big black lab and with some consistency, he will be a great dog! I got him to walk on a leash, sort of. He was starting to get that when I called him I wanted him to come. It was fun. He liked to chew on me or whatever was close more than anything. I have the marks to prove it. Then the lady that I had been "shadowing" more than anything today, she is a animal catcher, for lack of a better term, she does the pictures of the animals for the shelters Petfinder page online. I got to help hold/play/pose/love on the dogs so she could update the online page. That was totally fun! I was playing with them and loving them and rubbing bellies. They were so cute. There was two boxer puppies, probably 3 or 4 months old, a male that was tan like a lion and a female that looked like a tiger. They were little busy bodies together in the cage. Tiger was the first to get her picture taken. She was very shy and did not really want to leave my lap. She wanted to be pet on and loved on and once she got some of that, she started to come out of her shell. I can't wait to see which ones are picked to put online. The other one, Lion, he was a spit fire. He was all over the place, like my mom would say, full of piss and vinegar. He was an all around boy such a hoot.
I could go on an on about all the animals that we took pictures of today, but the sad part is, I don't know if they will be there when I get back. I hope they get homes. I know that I appreciate my dog and see him in a different light. I know how my cat felt when she picked me. I know why when I met her eyes that day at the Arlington Animal Shelter, she picked me and wouldn't let me go. I also appreciate all the hard work it takes to run a shelter now. There is so much to do. They are constantly taking phone calls and people are always bringin animals in, stuff always needs to be cleaned and laundry needs to be done for the next day. All of the animals get new blankets everyday and sometime more if there are accidents.
So, I pray that I will be blessed by and help bless the people that I come in contact with in this volunteer position. What a great opportunity.
Oh yea, I also got to take in a stray at the front desk. A lady came in with a stray that she picked up and couldn't keep. The dog was so sweet and wanted to be loved so bad. The even sadder part, she was sick with mange. The chances for her are not good. I guess the moral to this story is, take care of your animals. Make sure they are fixed. Make sure they have their shots. Make sure you keep tags on them or get them microchipped. The first thing they do when a dog comes in is check for a microchip, so they can get a dog back home. If you do lose your dog, call them to try find it. They will keep their eyes open for it. If you want an animal, check a local shelter first. There are all kinds of dogs there. Pure breds and everything. In fact, I think there are more pure breds than mutts there right now! Don't go buy one out of the paper or in a pet store. A shelter animal is loyal. They know what the streets are like and what it is like in the shelter, they appreciate what they have. I know it is crazy, but it is true.
So with all my soapbox talk, my closing statement is this, love your animals because they love you. God blessed us with these wonderful things to keep us company, try not to take them for granted, they are one of a kind.
Until we read again, here are a couple of things for you to look at...Burleson Animail Shelter petfinder list
http://search.petfinder.com/shelterSearch/shelterSearch.cgi?animal=&breed=&age=&size=&specialNeeds=&declawedPets=&children=&status=&id=&internal=&contact=&name=&shelterid=TX682&sort=&preview=1

And my lovely Oreo See he wants you to be good to your animals too!

Caution : God In Progress

God is at work all the time. Sometimes you see him, sometimes you don't. I have had both of those in the last 2 weeks. I remember in elementary school, walking down the hallway and my teacher saying, " You have to watch where you walk so you don't trip." From that moment, I was impacted so heavily, that I was obsessed with watching my feet, so I didn't trip. Later on in my years...probably middle school, I am sure I was not as obsessed with it, but I was told that if I look down at my feet all the time, I can't see where I am going. I should always look up where I am going and trust my feet to take me there. Huh, makes sense, so I started holding my head up, confident that my feet were going to take me where I needed to go because I could see what was coming. A few years later in high school, I was one of those girls who read the horoscopes and twisted them so that they always meant something to me. Don't laugh, you did it too! :-) Anyway, in one of those magazines that I wasted my money on, I was reading an article about body language. It said that if you walk with slumped shoulders, watching your feet, you were afraid of the future and not confident, always preoccupied with the here and now and to be careful of walking while looking down, because you may not trip in a hole, but you might it smacked by a tree branch! That was funny, but scary too, because in a weird way, it was true. Then it went on to tell me that you should walk with good posture, stand up straight, hold you head high and look forward onto the path that you were walking on, because even if there is a hole, you will see it with enough time to react to it and you can move out of the way of the tree branch. That made so much sense to me. Winners both ways!

So, with that story, I am writing to tell you that sometimes, it is hard to look up while we are walking the path of life. Whether it be money or children or family or inanimate objects that breakdown, we seem to focus on the here and now. It is hard not to do that though. We get so wrapped up with the life that we live, the things that we have, the stuff we get busy with. We go to church and look up and forward to the future of Heaven with God and Jesus, then we get home and start looking down again. Next thing you know here comes Satan with that big ole branch and smacks us down, again, and we wonder, "Why did that happen to me?" We don't see it coming because we weren't looking up preparing ourselves for what the path is going to be like. If we were prepared, we could dodge some of the problems, and the ones we can't, well, they won't hurt as bad. How do we prepare ourselves? READ GODS WORD. Let it penatrate you, let it fascinate you, let it entertain you. I have been and let me tell you what. It is frickin awesome! I am reading the Old Testament and it is great. It is really inspiring reading the stories that God told so long ago and I have heard but never fully read. All this time, He was right there and I had no idea what I was missing. What else can we do? PRAY. Do it all the time, silently, happily, graciously, sadly, loudly, however you need to, just do it. He hears them. One thing to remember, His time is not always your time. Things don't happen exactly when you want them to. He is faithful though. He will answer them, one way or another. You have to keep your eyes open though, because he doesn't always hit you with a brick, sometimes it is a feather and you don't even feel it. It happened though and you might still be sitting there waiting. That brings me to another thing, I am sure you have heard it before, hindsight is 20/20. When you do miss it, after some time passes, you can turn around and see that he did answer your prayer, maybe not the way you anticipated, but he did. I always wish that I could have relished in it when it happened. That is why I try to keep my mind ever present for God working right now in me and around me. But I am not perfect by any means. That's why I remember to turn around and look to see what God has going on with me. Sometimes, I am rather surprised. He has big plans for me and it is scary that he trusts me that much.

Moving right along. God is answering prayers right now faithfully, in our family. It is amazing to see how big He is doing it right now. I give him all the glory! The things that he is doing are awesome and will allow us to bless others down the road. I can't wait to see what he has in store. Things that looked so bleak 1 and 2 weeks ago have grown to be bigger than they were before. You can see how I was just a couple of posts ago, and now, well, look where I am now. I was totally wrapped up in the here and now. I heard a song on the radio and was moved by it. After that, I started to come out and refocus and told my friend about the song by Mercy Me, Bring the Rain. I will end with this songs chorus and a thought to keep you looking up and moving forward:

Bring me joy, bring me peace, bring the chance to be free, bring me anything that brings you glory, cause I know they'll be days when this life brings me pain, but if that's what it takes to praise you, then Jesus bring the rain.

So, with that being said, the rainbow will eventually come and the sun will eventually shine. It will not, however, happen without a storm though, so I will take some rain and patiently wait for it to clear.

Until we read again ~

Hello from T town...

Boy I feel like I have been so far away lately. Living in the now world, so caught up in all this junk. I got sick yesterday, it was terrible. When you are sick like that it make everything seem so trivial. Anyway, I am better today. Actually almost like I was not sick at all. Almost.... Getting better every hour.

So, I have been reading my bible still. It is a great story. I never really understood it, but there is so much in there. I am in Kings/ Chronicles right now. The bible I have is a Chronological bible. It is really like reading a book. The person who did it starts each book with a blurb about what it is about to help you understand what it going on. I love it! I have learned so much and so many things make so much more sense when read it in order.

I see how much we can really gain by understanding what happened to God's people back then. They were like us to some degree on a much simpler level. They were good then they fell away, then God punished them and they came back. Like a yoyo...kinda like we do now. Except we are in the end times and things are really beginning to move.

Anyway, you know those days where you think you got it then don't...today is one of those days. I guess I will just keep plugging away and hopefully I will feel lots better tomorrow and things will start to make more sense. I will keep you posted.
Until we read again...

Answered prayers

Funny how God works so quickly when you lose it. I had an answer to my post within 3 hours yesterday. By the end of the day everything had turned around and I was feeling better. How awesome is that? I guess he just wanted me to let go and give it up. Why is it that it is a continuous battle to hold onto stuff? Especially when we know that we don't have to? Why do we question his intentions intead of trust that he knows what he is doing? He has the answers, we should just remember to turn to him when we have the questions....

On another note, I have been reading my bible during my workouts on the bike. I read Ecclesiastes the last 2 days. I had no idea what it was about or I might have skipped it till I was in a better mood. How sad King Solomon must have been when he was writing it. He had everything and still realized at the end how meaningless it all was without God. It made me sad too. As a human being we put so much weight on our things that we have. Material things, Relationships with others, what we think, the choices we make. All of it we do is to impress others and for the opinion of others. Really the only thing that should matter is bringing glory to God. Really the only thing we should care about is hearing from God, " Well done, good and faithful servant." However, what matters nowadays is, "Whoever dies with the most wins." King Solomon died with the most and probably died thinking, "Everything is meaningless, without God." He screwed it up and knew it. How sad. I pray that God will not allow us to come to that end. I pray that we can live our lives bringing glory to Him through what we do and who we meet along the way. I pray that when we die, we can hear, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Until we read again...

Ahhhh! One of those days again...

It has been a rough morning to say the least. Things that I don't want to have happen are happening all around me. I feel like I am in a swirling toilet and ready to go down the drain. I can't go into any details because well, I don't want to put people on the spot or hurt anyones feelings. I am frustrated and sad. I can feel God moving in me and wish that He would just hurry up to move in other people too. I know there is Gods timetable and my timetable. Mine is a lot faster though. Do you ever have those days that you just get frustrated!? I can feel Satan trying to attack my mind right now. Saying those negative things that can bring you down. The only thing I can do at this time is pray for God to take him back down where he belongs. I guess I need to sit down and just chill. "Be still and know that I am God." Maybe God is working in me and not ready for things to move along just yet. I wish he would just give me some sort of sign, so that I know that things are at least moving. Sorry, I had to get some of this out. I don't have control of anyone or anything. Just me. God is all powerful and he knows more than I do, so I will just be still and let him do his work in us. Pray for peace for me and to let God do his work in me and others.
Until we read again...Praise Him!

I have started a downward trend

I snagged your interest with the title huh??? Well, it is not what you think. One of my New Years Commitments that I made was to my health. I have let it "weigh" me down for too long. I can feel aching in my knees and ankles. My blood pressure has started to go up. I decided that I need to take a stand on my health. I am a control freak and I CAN control that. I got together with my best friend in Oregon, Laura. She wants to do the same thing too. (Although she has been working out for a while now.) She and I started on 2Jan being accountible to each other. We email each other every day to tell each other what we ate and what we did. Our goal calories for the day is our weight times 7. (Not much I know). 64 Ozs of water. 30 minutes of activity. We keep each other motivated. It is totally awesome. That was my biggest thing about Weight Watchers is being held accoutible and motivated. Now I have Laura and I can do it for free! It is working too. I have lost 3 lbs since I started and I feel great! I am excited to get my blood pumping and while I do it I have been reading Gods word. (I read while I ride my stationary bike, don't worry).

So, I will keep you posted as I go forward in my journey with someone who is 2000 miles away. When I go home to visit this summer, we are going to celebrate our weight loss with a day at the spa, getting massages and pedicures! What a great time that is going to be!

Keep us in your prayers that we don't hurt ourselves and we can continue to drop the pounds and make ourselves healthy. Also pray that we have more good days than bad and that when we do have bad days, we can not get discouraged. This is not a diet but a lifestyle change to be healtier. Thank you Lord for showing me with sutble hints, before it was too late!

Until we read again...

Happy New Years - bah humbug

Ok, so I have been trying for 3 days now to think of something witty to say for my New Years post. How about, whoopie doo! Yes, it is a new year, yes it will be a continuing new me, everyday. That being said though, everyday is a fresh start for me. Don't get me wrong...I am GLAD it is 2008. I am glad last year is OVER. I am glad that this year, is brand spankin new and that I have a whole new slate to start working on to change the things I want to change and do the things I want to do. I have been wanting to do things for a long time, but have continued to do the things that I don't want to do anymore. I keep coming back to what Paul says in the bible. I believe that it is Romans 7:15-20. Read it, you will see what I mean. It is a viscious battle that is waging inside of all of us. So, this is the year that I will do what I want to do and not what I want to do. Make sense...Read Pauls writing again...it will. :-) I have set up a support system and I will do it. I have all kinds of ramblings going through my head so I won't throw those at you but I want you to understand that this year, the new year becomes a new me. I will pray for this to come to fruition on many levels. I will also pray for you all because I know that you will have the struggles for yourself. May you all be lifted up in your lives to the light that keeps us warm on these cold winter months and cool on the hot summer days. May God bless you all in the coming year and may this be the Great '08! Until we read again....

movie review - Ratatouille

Well, we pay per viewed this movie last week. It was very cute. It is a Pixar movie and well worth the $3.99 we paid for it. My girls loved it. There was not any bad violence in it, no cussing or anything of the like. There were good guys and bad guys and none of which were negative and they got was was coming to them in the end. Basically if you haven't seen the commercials or if you don't know what it is about, then let me tell you. There is a little mouse named Remy who lives in France with his little mouse family. He realizes that he likes to cook and oddly enough can read to do so, although, he uses his nose and not so much the recipe to do so. (I like to cook that way too.) Anyway, they get caught by the owner of the house and all run out and get seperated in a drain pipe. He ends up in Paris near a fancy restaurant and befriends an American waiter and they learn to cook together and become the rave of the town. The movie is a happy movie that, in a round about way, teaches you to learn how to do things for yourself and not just take from other people (or mice). I liked it and I am sure will watch it again with my girls...over and over and over.