R2C2: The Greatest Pitching Rotation in the Galaxy

We are half way through our amazing rotation and I would have given my right arm to be at the Phils game tonight where Cliff Lee pretty much got a constant standing ovation from the sounds of it. My day was as follows.

Went to grocery store in sweats to buy food for the week. Listened to last night's season opener while cleaning my room and doing laundry. I have a floor again and light bulbs so I can see in my bedroom. Take a nap (unfortunately not successful). Wake up in time for the tonight's game and listened while I made dinner and did more laundry.

On tomorrow's agenda?

Church
More baseball
More Laundry
Main cooking for the week.

I ♥ baseball. Life is good.

My new pot...

Is not actually a pot.

So, it had been a goal of mine during Lent to start making my meals again. I'm only just getting around to it due to some circumstances, but I realized that when I was in college a main staple of my diet was rice. I love rice. But a few months ago I ruined my only pot attempting to cook brown rice, and that was when my plan to cook for myself was pretty thoroughly derailed. I have remedied that by buying a rice cooker. (Someday I will by a new pot I suppose). I am just finishing my first batch and am excited. My crockpot often makes too much for one person and I get tired of leftovers so I hope this will help.

On a related note here are my meals for the week.

Grilled Chicken with rice and asparagus
Italian Chicken and rice and asparagus (the above with pasta sauce and Italian seasoning)
Chicken Cesar Salad
Egg salad and crackers

My rice cooker also has a steamer so I steamed asparagus during the last half of the rice cooking. I love asparagus too but the bunches are big. Maybe I'll add asparagus to my egg salad. Apparently, you can also hard boil eggs in a rice cooker so I am going to try that too.

The rice just finished as I was writing this and it tastes delicious!

What Would Otherwise Be Ordinary...

Just a quick quote from this Sunday's sermon which was talking about what it looks like to abide in Jesus and having Him abide in us from Jn. 15. In the three years I have been here, I have heard a lot of good wisdom about vocation and it is still something I struggle to balance against my life and with my faith. In all my balancing and line drawing, this is what I want to remember and Rev. Bill Haley said it beautifully yesterday morning. He is painting an ideal picture of a day in the life of a woman who abides in Jesus and vice versa. (Transcribed from the audio, mistakes and emphasis mine)

And as she works and she works hard and well, not because she has to, but more importantly because she is putting forth her best effort toward what God has called her to do, like an offering. Like a priest raises a cup of wine and a plate of bread, taking what is ordinary and making it sacred.

Food for thought for the rest of the week: How do you take what is ordinary and make it sacred?

Jump Off Again!

Prayer is the only power which the powerless posses.-John Stott

Well, I'm restarting this blog in hopes of getting back into journaling and sharing this crazy ride I call life with others. So I am just going to jump right in.

I've been mulling over the sermon I heard this past Sunday. One of the readings is my favorite gospel passage in Jn. 9 where Jesus tells the crowds that a blind man was not born blind because of someone's sin, but so that the glory of God could be revealed in that moment in his healing. The other reading was from Acts 12 about the miraculous rescue of Peter from prison. The sermon was the final in a series that was designed to help us as a church prepare for the outcome of our lawsuit with the Episcopal Church, whatever it may be.

The main points I got from it is that we do not know what God will do, in our lawsuit or in our lives, but we do know that it will be for our good (Rom 8:38), and we also know that we are not to be passive about it. It is a battle and if we are not active we can't be fighting. I don't mean that it is a battle for the church property, because it's not really that. Instead it is a spiritual battle for souls and for the message of Christ.

We need to be praying. The young church in Jerusalem was getting the stuffing beat out of them. James was beheaded, (Think about how John, of all people must have felt!), Peter was in prison, and Herod wanted blood. Yet, they met in a room and prayed earnestly for Peter (v.5). Funnily enough they didn't believe that their prayers had been answered at first (v.15), but still even with little faith, their prayers had been answered. In the end Herod was dead, Peter was free, and the Gospel was spreading. Amazing!

So we are called to prayer. I have begun to pray the prayer of St. Francis in my classroom in the morning, to ground myself and prepare for the day. Our Rector has asked that we be praying for the church at noon if we can (I'll have to do it at 12:30), because we know there is power in earnest corporate prayer. It is also the beginning of Lent this week and so thinking about what to fast, be it food or something else, was good.

Regardless of the outcome at the end of our church's long road, I am excited about the doors and possibilities that will be opened up due to our diligence and growth in this time of testing and uncertainty.

Just Finished :Terminal 9

Hopefully I will have a real update over the winter break, but for now enjoy another book review.

Terminal 9 by Patricia H. Rushford


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I was really pleasantly surprised by this book. I picked it up at my local Christian bookstore and I was expecting your normal all tied up happy ending and resolution. What I got was a gritty mostly gripping mystery with real characters and real questions. Not all of the characters were Christians who had their lives together, nor were the Christian characters having pages long conversations about why their non Christian counterparts needed God, which was a nice change from the evangelical heavy novels I usually read of this type.. In fact this was the middle of the series and I have a suspicion that this book is a bit low on the God factor due to characters and storylines being what they are. That's okay because the references to God didn't feel forced.

And a fun fact is that I thought I recognized the author's name and it turns out I did, I read a series for kids that she wrote and liked it a lot for many of the same reasons that I like this one even if I couldn't articulate it at the time. I am excited to find the rest of the series.

View all my reviews >>

What's Cooking: Applesauce Chicken

One of the things about being on your own is you have to cook for yourself. It's not a chore I dislike, but it is one I find time consuming especially with my commute. Fortunately, since there is only one of me I can make a lot and eat the same thing for a week or so. I also like using my crock pot so I can do other things while it cooks. I get most of my recipes from here.

Here is today's recipe:

Ingredients:
--4 frozen chicken breast halves or thighs
--1 1/2 cups of applesauce
--1 T dried onion flakes, or 1 yellow onion, chopped finely
--1 T apple cider vinegar
--1/4 tsp cinnamon
--1/2 tsp black pepper
--2 cloves garlic, minced
--1/4 tsp red pepper flakes (optional, I used them, and added more to the adult servings)

The Directions.

A 3 or 4 quart crockpot is the best size for this.


Put the frozen chicken pieces into your crockpot. Add the onion (if you are using the dried onion, wait and add it to the applesauce). In a bowl, mix the applesauce, vinegar, garlic, and spices together. Pour on top of the the chicken.

Cover and cook on low for 5-7 hours, or on high for 3-4.

Mishaps etc.

I didn't feel like buying a whole sleeve of Garlic which was all my store had and I didn't think of substitutions until I was already home again. Also forgot the onion flakes--whoops!

The Survey Says:

It's pretty good. I used thighs and I think this would be better with white meat because thighs already have a strong flavor. Also after cooking there was basically fat and apple scented water in my crock pot and it smelled bad even if the chicken tastes good so that is just a heads up.

Bittersweet News

I gathered the information slowly. Facebook updates with in minutes of eachother all Camp Sonshine counselors. I messaged a friend. Then I found the memorial group.

I am not a city girl though I plan on being here for the foreseeble future, I had friends die in high school, but it was in car accidents and from cancer. Never because they were shot. I didn't know Aaron as well as some other staff but he was always a laugh and always a friend and some how you can't work 12 hour a day summers without becoming close. There is something about doing everything with one another from scrubbing toilets to making 150 peanut butter sandwhiches that just brings you together.

And there is of course our God which makes us brother and sister. And that is why this is bittersweet. Becaus I will see Aaron again, I am convinced of it, but I will miss him until I do, his smile and his way with kids, and everthing else We lost a good man with loving heart, God gained the presence of one of His children.

See you on the other side brother.