The Patient

Timmy is doing well.

Most of you know that Timmy had his tonsils and his uvula (the dangly thing) removed this morning. He did great and is doing well. Sore and tired but good. He has the next, I think, 12 days to recovery, so have no pity on him :)

Side note: don't you love Wikipedia.

So It Begins

Although we are still five days from the end of the month, Timmy and I decided to begin our Christmas in July celebration early since he will be seriously medicated for the first weekend in July. As most of you know, this is our second Christmas in July. What began last July as a fun way to try to get me to enjoy the "Christmas" season ended with the greatest "Christmas morning" ever and a beautiful diamond ring to forever remember the occasion. Now, we hope that it was the beginning a new tradition for us.

Unfortunately, there was no room for the tree in our livingroom.
So, the tree is in the diningroom.

Once again, the tree is decorated with the beach toys from last year's tree.
Beyond the beach toys, there are a few additions to the tree.

The Guinness tortuga - one of Timmy's gift last Christmas in December

The official "Our First Christmas Together" ornament - que emocion.
On the flip side of the picture, it says "ours is a love for all seasons"
- again, que emocion.

I won this picture frame two years ago at the annual Rolon pollyanna exchange. It was my sister Patty's contribution to the game. Definitely not something we wouldbuy ourselves; definitely something she would buy. But now it holds last year's official Christmas in July picture.

Santa was a gift my freshman year of college. He has since been part of my holiday decorating. Squeeze his palm, and he dances and sings "Jingle Bell Rock." I know, it's hot.

There's my boy, listening to some Christmas music. Above the closet door, aka the mantle, are our stockings. They were the source of inspiration for our blog address and Timmy's email address. When he got them last year, they lay beside each other and read "TM" - trademark.

That's our desk with my mini. For the holiday seasons we have pulled out the red amarylis from the wedding. Yeah for artificial flowers. It is so nice to still have them. The white magnolias are in our dining room, and my bouquet is in our second bedroom, aka my closet. Beside the amarylis are the little santa-like creatures that have also decorated my bedroom for the last several years.

And then there's the snow monster. He belongs to Timmy. If you squeeze his paw, he growls at you. Then he dances and sings, "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas." My Santa doesn't like him.

Granola This!

After reading Bridget's Blog I was inspired to show the world exactly how "at one with nature" we are here at the Kaiser household. As exhibit A, I give you the events of my afternoon:

First, cans were purchased at the Home Depot.
(Though you should go here instead, if you can.)

First can labeled:



Norwood collects glass & aluminium, so this can will go to the curb on the 1st & 3rd Wednesdays of each month. We don't have any aluminum, because it's beneath me.

Second can labeled:



As you can see, we partake in more than our fair portion of juices. Up until now the bottles had just been collecting on the back porch, as Norwood does not collect plastic. After emailing the county recycling rep (recycledelco@comcast.net), however, I learned that plastics can be dropped off at the Waste Management on Oak Avenue in Primos. Sweet.

Third Can labeled:



Turns out all of our milk jugs and most of our plastic orange juice containers are type 2 plastics, so they get their own home. Again, these will need to be dropped off at Waste Management.

This leaves cardboard (I'm still trying to figure out if & how it is sub-sorted) and our old friend:



Okay, so we already had a garbage can, but I felt like he needed a name tag too. After all, without him we wouldn't need to have gigantic smelly landfills or new-fangled trash to steam plants. Yay garbage.

Oh,one last thing: don't forget that your plastic shopping bags can be dropped off for recycling at most supermarkets now. (Unless you're already recycling them by using them as trash bags for the wastebasket in your bathroom or something.)

By your powers combined....

Kinship Cookout

Yesterday was the first official day of summer, and yesterday was the first kinship cookout of the summer. Here are a few pictures.

Dave, the grill master; Rachel, addressing her plain burger; Timmy, the photographer

After many offers and many rejections, Neily finally accepted one of our invitations.

My beautiful, beautiful boy. No one can take my heart from you.
Not Jeremy Kushnier. Not even Ryan Gosling.

Kris, the hostess with the mostess

Ashlie, flying solo (Steve stayed at home with Willow);
Marti, looking cool with her sunglasses and tank.

After dinner, the boys left us to play some bocce.

While the boys played, the ladies went for a walk. Here are the ladies of the Collingdale group (except me). Doesn't the lit fountain look cool!

Wonderful evening. Good times. Thanks for a fun night.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As if finding out about Aida wasn't excitement enough! I checked out Kush's message board for the first time in months. And Kush put a post up that he is doing a show in Philadelphia. Kush in Philadelphia! Ah!!!!!!!!! Just one problem. I don't know I have the courage to go see him. It's way to late to explain now, but the last time I saw Kush, I made a fool of myself. I'll just say it involved me running down a NYC street and hiding in a corner while my friend got his autograph for me. This will take a whole lot of hyping myself up, but I don't have much time: last show is July 2. I'm a sad little girl.

AIDA

WARNING: MUSICAL TALK

After lunch with Anna yesterday, I drove past the Media Theater and nearly jumped out of my seat when I saw the marquee:

Coming this fall: ELTON JOHN'S AIDA

I love Aida. I saw it several years back with JB, and it was one of the few shows that pleasantly surprised us. The morning after the show, I asked Rachel if she had any intention of seeing it. When she said no, I proceeded to tell her the entire plot, in detail. By the end of my reenactment, Rachel was crying. We then talked about seeing it together some day. Then one day I read that Aida was closing and Adam Pascal had returned to close the role he had originated. Now Adam Pascal - you have to understand - he is the original Roger from RENT and the original Radames in Aida. I hear his voice all the time in the soundtracks, but I have never seen him in person. So, Rachel and I went up to NYC hoping we could get tickets to Aida.

It was a sad morning. Tickets were sold out or $100 for partial view. The guy at TKTS said they may have tickets on sale when the booth reopened in the afternoon. Rachel and I debated on what we should do because another possibility - a serious long shot - was to try to win lottery tickets for Wicked. I say it was a serious long shot because over 200 people try to win some 20 tickets. I had tried a couple of times but lost. Eventually I made a decision. We would try to win lottery tickets for the Wicked matinee. I just couldn't come to NYC and not try for them. If we won those tickets, we would miss our chance at buying Aida tickets and would miss our last chance to see it. However, as I told Rachel, "if we win Wicked tickets, it's because Jesus wants us to see it." If we didn't get the tickets, we'd walk the streets of NYC until the TKTS booth reopened and try for Aida. If that also failed, there was always RENT :) It was a plan.

And oh how Jesus loves us! Before the massive crowd, the lottery man screamed out "Rachel Bare!" It was one of most thrilling of my life. Rachel had just won two front row center tickets to the most popular show on Broadway for a whopping $25 a piece!! And so, without a single thought, we said goodbye to Aida. And that was fine with me. I got to have my Beatles moment with Idina Menzel, and Rachel and I got to see what we both consider one of the best, if not the best show, we have ever seen.

But we still haven't seen Aida. Of course, the first thing I did when I saw that marquee at Media Theater was leave a message for Rachel and make a date for this fall. Awesome.

I do acknowledge it can totally suck. Several years ago I saw Footloose the Musical on Broadway. That's when I met and fell in love with Kush (it's okay, Timmy, I love you more). Rachel didn't get a chance to see it but listened to my soundtrack so much that she wanted to see it too. One day I saw a commercial saying that Footloose the Musical (not with Kush) was coming to the Trump Plaza in Atlantic City. It was a sad, sad production. Truly pathetic. So, my hopes for Aida at the Media Theater aren't very high. But that won't keep me from seeing the show. When it comes to musicals, it's about the experience. Even a bad production can be a good time.

I need to talk to Rachel about exactly which day we will see the show, but if you are interested in joining us, just let me know.

Wal-Mart

After our trip to the photo license center, Timmy and I had some time to kill before our next appointment. So, we went to Wal-Mart. And as is custom, whenever I go to Wal-Mart I check out their cheap movie bin. And today I have only one word - score!

First Timmy found this one:



There was this one episode of Dawson's Creek ( I know, your thoughts of me are quickly dwindling) where Dawson, the wannabe filmmaker, was speaking to this woman. She asked him, "Favorite movie of the last couple years off the top of your head. Don't even think about it." He responded, Run Lola Run (great movie - yeah Franka). The woman replied "Liar! That's the movie you whip out to show people how cool you are! I'm not interested in cool. I'm interested in the movie that made you cry and you have no idea why. I'm interested in the movie that you're embarrassed to tell your friends you went to go see on opening night" At the end of the episode, Dawson confesses, "By the way, mine is Road House... with Patrick Swayze? I've seen it, like 37 times. Every time it's on TV, I have to watch it all the way through. I own the tape. I love it. I have no idea why." I feel your pain, Dawson. Mine is Striking Distance. It's that movie that whenever I see it on television, I just have to stop and watch it. I have no clue why. I just love this movie. And Wal-Mart had it on DVD for $5.50! Score!

And then if Striking Distance wasn't enough excitement, Timmy found this one too:



Ah man. My mother is the queen of cheesy movies. That's why when topics like Chuck Norris, Van Damne, even Shirley Temple and Howard the Duck come up, I get all excited. These are the movies of my childhood. These are the movies I watch at least once a year. These movies are the reason I make Timmy keep a VCR in our apartment. Mami has a closet full of VHS movies. Literally, it's a closet. And Best of the Best is one of my favorites. And it is one of those movies I borrow at least once a year. At least up to this year. Wal-Mart. $5.50. Double Score!

It was a very exciting trip to Wal-Mart. And as is usually the case, we didn't leave without spending much more than we expected. But it's cool: Striking Distance and Best of the Best. Awesome.

Long Saturday

Hey all. That's me. Sorry the picture is a little dark. Timmy and I were up bright and early Saturday morning - 7am - ew - to meet his dad, mom, and grandmom. It was the day of the Annual Antique Truck Show in Macungie sponsored by The Antique Truck Club of America. The Kaiser men have two antique fire trucks: one is from 1948 and one is from 1970. Cool trucks. Unfortunately, I didn't think to take pictures of the actual trucks. I was just excited to be riding in one. Note: the excitement quickly faded once I experienced a few minutes of riding in the truck. An hour and a half ride was painful. Next year, I follow them in my car :) But it was exciting for those first few minutes. So I took a picture of myself. And then I took a picture of Timmy.



George, Timmy's dad, asked him to drive one of the trucks up to Macungie while George drove the other one. I know, he looks hot behind the wheel. But he always looks hot...caliente!

Like I said, I forgot to take pictures of the trucks, but I do have this one picture.



I took it while we were following George; he was driving the older of the two trucks. That's him in the drivers seat. Mary and Grandmom were hanging out in the backseats.

Timmy and I made it to the show in one piece, although we weren't without our discomforts. We enjoyed a day of cheese fries and funnel cake, heads up poker and mancala, a shady tree and a blue sheet. Had to end the day early to head back for my nephew's graduation party.

Jacob Rolon
North Penn Class of 2006
West Chester Class of 2010

Wow, my stomach just dropped in a not good way. I'll be 30 when Jacob graduates from college. Timmy will be turning 33 - ugh. Man, we're old.

Strawberry Picking

As Timmy noted in a previous blog, we went strawberry picking this afternoon.



I went on my first hay ride. It was much softer than I expected.



The fields were so full and so fragrant.



At least I thought it smelled wonderful. Timmy just thought it smelled like manure.



Aren't they beautiful? They smell so good and taste so good too. Can't wait to head to the store and buy some cool whip and pound cake - mmm mmm mmm.

Slacker

Timmy says that I have been slacking with my blogging. Well, then, here are a lot of pictures. Enjoy!!

A few weeks ago, Timmy and I tried to play some tennis. It was way too windy, so instead, we went miniature golfing.



Unfortunately, I was slightly off my game this particular week. Timmy won by one stroke.



Current record: Missy 2 wins. Timmy 1.

Afterward, we went into the game room. First up, air hockey.



Again it was a close game but I lost; Timmy scored at the buzzer, 6-5.

Next up: some DDR. That would be "Dance, Dance, Revolution."



It was the first time for each of us. We look good, right?



Looks can be deceiving. We both suck.

Other arcade antics:



Timmy shooting some pedestrians. I think they were bad guys.



And Timmy playing some Sponge Bob game.

-----

A few weeks ago Tito and Matt came over to hang out and check out the new apartment. We ate dinner and played some poker. The boys also partook in some cigars. Matt tried one of the Iguana cigars. Those cigars are huge, and so Timmy told him that if he smoked the whole thing, he would get a t-shirt. Does any boy turn down a challenge?



Matt with an unlit Iguana cigar in his mouth, his smoked cigar in his hand, and wearing the tshirt that Timmy created just for this conquered challenge.



Close up of the front of Timmy's masterpiece.



Close up of the back of the t-shirt.



My goodness, those boys.

The City

I'd like to make one thing clear: I hate the city. It's true.

We tried to go to the zoo this morning. It was a sort of overcast day, Monday, June 12th... seems like a day when not too many other people would choose to go to the zoo. (Either because of the weather or because the kids aren't done school yet.) But no, as we pulled off the expressway there was literally a line stretching out the gates of the place. The first parking lot? Full. Hoards of people pushing strollers and dragging little kids were streaming down the sidewalks. Snarl. Maybe we'll try plan "B".

Back onto the Schuykill and the traffic is stop and go. Of course it is! I mean, why not? It is 11:45am, after all. People are probably headed home from... breakfast? What the heck.

The decision was then made to try hitting the Franklin Institute. So we took the Vine, then got off and were driving around the city. I hate the city. People crossing the street at any given point, people crossing on red, cars changing lanes suddenly and without warning... glorious. Finally we got to the right street and.... thenFranklin Institute lot is full. Great. The lot attendant (who supposedly spoke English) told me about somewhere else I could park, but I decided not to. I wanted out of dodge.

Next thought: oooh, maybe that Muenter Museum place at Penn? Yeah, not exactly someplace they advertise with big signs. "Turn here to see a two headed baby with hooves in a jar of formaldehyde!!!" We drove around University City... until I got bored of it. Stopped briefly and walked around the block, just to make it seem like we tried. Still nothing.

We then, inexplicably, headed back towards the zoo to see if maybe things had cleared up a bit. No, now the second parking lot is full too. (We found this out after driving down a street where the west bound lanes were just completely shut for construction but no detour had been established, so both lanes of traffic were more or less travelling in one lane. Awesome.)

With that, we left the city. Back to suburbia to have some lunch and, as it turned out, pick some strawberries at Linvilla Orchards. Much more my speed, for sure. We might try the city again sometime in the future, but there will be no driving involved. Public transportation, take me away. Does anybody know if the city will be closed any time soon so we could go on that day?

I hate the city.

Return of the King

Really really good. Really really long. 250 minutes = 4 hours and 10 minutes. But this one didn't feel very long. It was long and I could tell it was long, but I didnt' feel like it was dragging. This one made me say dito so many times. Not even have way through the movie I turned to Timmy and I said "I've said 'dito' more in half this movie than I did for the first two movies together." And it made me cry. Not just tears gathered in my eyes, not like Timmy's man tears. No, tears that ran down the sides of my face. When Sam said, "I can't carry your burden, but I can carry you." Dito. Que emocion.

Well, now I can say that I have seen The Lord of the Rings, and I can say that I liked them. However, now that I have seen The Lord of the Rings and I have seen the Harry Potter movies, I'm not sure what series to watch now. Any suggestions?

Two Towers

Good. Really good. Long. Really long. Those last few minutes felt like forever. May have been the full bladder. But it was exciting and touching. Made me say "dito" a few times. Made me cover my eyes a couple of times. Made me even cry. Onto Return of the King...

K of G

A few years back I read The Gospel of the Kingdom by George Eldon Ladd as part of the VLI curriculum. I remember when I finished reading it that I thought "I should read this book every six months." Well, I didn't do that. However, I am just about done rereading it for the second time, as Timmy and I prepare for an upcoming series on the Kingdom of God. And again I'm thinking, "I should read this book every six months or at least once a year." I love this book. I find it so motivating. It reminds me of the bigger picture and how incredibly exciting that big picture is. And even more so, how exciting it is that I am part of it.

The first time I read the chapter entitled "The Kindgom is Today," I wrote in the margins, "I feel like I have been missing out on something." And I did. Months before I started VLI, Patrick lead our small group in a series on the Kingdom of God, and I was really confused. I didn't get it. It made no sense to me, but Ladd made sense of it. Although I had been a Christian for years, I felt like I was just beginning to really understand something that my heart longed for.

I want to see his kingdom. I want to see his power. I want to see the lame walk, the blind see. I want to see the dead people rise. I hate that Satan continues to have influence; he continues to bind people in sin and pain. I know that Christ defeated him, but I also know that Satan continues to wreck havoc on this earth until his final destruction. But we can be a part of knocking down Satan's kingdom. Bit by bit. One healing at a time. One soul at a time. The kingdom of God is here. Now. It moves in power and in glory. It is changing lives. It is setting people free. And God has called us, called me, to be a part of his kingdom and do this work.

I'm not sure how much sense that made. I find that no matter how much this topic excites me, it can still be a bit much to wrap my mind around it. It's hard to put into words and hard to explain. I'm nervous about the upcoming series with our kinship. There will be no Crawfords and no Stevenses to help answer those difficult questions. They'll be the Kaisers - two people who are just beginning to learn about the kingdom of God. I'm concerned about those questions the group may have. I want to hear them. I don't want them to just nod their head and pretend like it all makes sense to them. I guess that I just don't want them not to be effected. I want them to understand and be empowered and be transformed.


_ _ _ _ _



Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.

"When we pray, 'Thy kingdom come,' are we praying for heaven to come to earth? In a sense we are praying for this; but heaven is an object of desire only because the reign of God is to be more perfectly realized then it is now. Apart from the reign of God, heaven is meaningless. Therefore, what we pray for is, 'Thy kingdom come; thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.' This prayer is a petition for God to reign, to manifest His kingly sovereignty and power, to put to flight every enemy of righteousness and of His divine rule, that God alone may be King over all the world."

Amen.

The Cheesecake Factory

Today's lunch was leftovers from yesterday's visit to The Cheesecake Factory. It had been a couple of years, at least, since Katrina and I had been to the factory. Once again, I got the bistro shrimp pasta: sauteed shrimp, fresh mushrooms, fresh tomato and arugula tossed with spaghettini and a delicious basil-garlic-lemon cream sauce. I love this dish. I would prefer that the shrimp wasn't breaded. Also, the meal is on the oily side but still so good. I just can't eat it all in one sitting. In fact, the factory is notorious for huge portions. This "lunch portion" will serve three meals for me. Katrina also enjoyed her meal: fettucini with chicken and sun-dried tomatoes with a garlic-parmesan cream sauce. That sounds really tasty too. The sad part of the whole meal was that we was so full from bread and pasta that we didn't have dessert. I was at the cheesecake factory and I didn't eat cheesecake. Something really wrong about that.

Makes Me Very Uncomfortable

Read Here

The Fellowship of the Ring

I finally saw the first Lord of the Rings. And even though it was 3 hours 28 minutes, it didn't feel very long. Timmy said that the first one wasn't as exciting as the other two, so I expected it to be slow. I found it exciting and very interesting. I did get confused a bit, especially in the beginning. Good thing I waited to watch it with Timmy.

Another reason I had a hard time following was because I could hardly hear it at times. Sometimes the movie was loud and then they would be whispering. It was quite annoying. Also, it seemed that our neighbors were having a gathering of some sort. They were really, really loud, and even though I had the volume way up, I still had a hard time hearing the movie. It probably didn't help that it was raining and thundering outside very loudly. Also, the fans were blowing in my ears.

When Timmy went to bed, I decided I would finish the movie with the subtitles on. But a minute after turning on the subtitles, something horrible happened. I turned the laptop on to check my email. When I turned my head back to the screen, there were credits. Closing credits. The movie was over. What??? What kind of ending was that? It just stopped. It didn't even feel like a proper cliffhanger. And true, I have the other two movies here. I can watch it right away. I could watch it right now, but still I'm kind of annoyed by it.

But other than my disappointment with the ending, I enjoyed the movie. I liked it more than I expected. I said dito a couple of times. I squeezed Timmy's hand a few times. And there wasn't anything I found too creepy to scare me tonight. It was cool. Onto Two Towers...but not tonight.

Not That Anyone Else Cares....

I realize that there are probably no people reading our blog that care anything about hockey, but the Carolina Hurricanes just earned their ticket to the Stanley Cup final by beating the Buffalo Sabres 4 - 2 in game seven of their best of seven series. This is good.

What makes it even better is that the game winning goal was scored by former Flyer Rod Brind'amour and then the fourth goal - the one that sealed the deal - was scored by another former Flyer (and perhaps my favorite player) Justin Williams. All of this, of course, confirms what most people already know - the Flyers make some of the worst personnel decisions ever.

But hey, I got my 'Canes cap at the Charlotte Airport back in March, so I'm good to go. Now if only RCN would carry OLN so I could watch the games at home. Snarl.