It's Raining, It's Pouring

It's raining, it's pouring, the old man is snoring...

I'm doing better already thanks to the antibiotics but now Jeremy's pretty sure he's coming down with the same and Helena is acting like she's not feeling well and complaining of her ears hurting and we're pretty sure her left one has a ruptured ear drum. They are both headed to the doctor this afternoon. When it rains, it pours. And that's not just figuratively. Those of you in Houston know that we've had a wet couple of days with full fledged thunder storms and flooding. So here we are, one sick little family with three of us down for the count but Ophelia and Lavinia are doing great but stuck inside with the invalids. Seriously not cool.

So updates... we're looking at moving for several reasons. Jeremy and I are both working and teaching in the same neighborhood and with the price of gas and the frustration of trying to get everywhere we need to with one car we want to move closer to work and church. We also need to cut down on our expenses as we prepare to go to France in the next year or so... oh wait, I don't think I've said anything about that yet... oh well, you'll have to wait for another update to hear the news on that one. So we're asking God for the impossible, a lower rent for the same size living place in a more expensive part of town! There are already several possibilities but we want to make sure we move at the right time to the right place. We promise to keep you all informed when we do move via e-mail.

A Holiday?

Today is Memorial Day and all 5 of us have the day off together, which would be really nice. Except it's not. Because I have Strep throat. I feel like I'm dying every time I swallow and I sound like my throat is stuffed full of cotton. About once a year I end up with strep and a round of antibiotics. Last year it happened over a long weekend and I wasn't able to get treatment until 5 days into it and ended up with rheumatic fever, it took three different antibiotics to finally beat it out of my system. I wasn't about to let that terrible experience repeat its self so I had Jeremy call a doctor friend of mine from a church I consulted and he prescribed me some kick-butt antibiotics. Yeah, I know, it's not good to take antibiotics for Strep without a throat culture, but seriously, I've had Strep and viral sore throats enough times to be able to tell the difference and I wasn't about to go down the road I did last year. So today I've been laying on the couch, sleeping, drinking the coldest drinks I can find, and complaining about feeling terrible. The girls and Jeremy have been taking care of me and cleaning house. I'm actually writing a complaining blog post! Sorry. Not exactly the fun filled Memorial Day we had planned. Oh well! Hope your long weekend was better than ours and I pray that you were able to take a little time to remember our veterans.

New Job

(Warning: this is a long post and there is another new post under neath it.)

My desk is white washed from the bright sunlight streaming in from my office window, a giant day lily from a beautiful arrangement of flowers looks over my lap top while I type and my original coffee mug that I made two weeks ago at church sits next to me full of my favorite fair-trade Guatemalan coffee. To the right of my desk is a keyboard that I simply have to swivel my chair to reach. Just right of the keyboard is a moderately complex set-up with MIDI, a G5 PowerMac (with a sweet 24 in. flat screen), head phones on hooks, and few instrument, MIDI, and microphone cables, and a few other boxes and gizmos for recording. I find myself amazed that I sit in the chair that I do for the past 2 and a half weeks as the Director of Music Development for a small children’s book publishing company. In my first week I wrote three original songs and within the first week and a half they were recorded and used in an important client pitch. And I didn’t even know I could write children’s music. It is very possibly the coolest job I’ve had. The story of how I found this job is, as most of my employment stories are, rather odd. I’ll simplify it by saying God provided and I met my boss in Taft Street Coffee on the night of an opening reception at the gallery and she offered me a job as her assistant but when I went to interview I had to admit that even I wouldn’t hire me as an assistant- I’m aware of my limitations. The next thing I knew she was asking me about what title I would like on my business card: Music Director (she thought it sounded too churchy- you know, I’ve never had that title!) or Director of Music Development. As far as I can remember, she had never heard me play, sing, or share any of my compositions with her and when I politely asked her if maybe she should she told me she didn’t need to, she knew it was right. I’ve been trying to decide if that’s faith, discernment or just plan crazy. All the same, I’m grateful and so far, she doesn’t seem disappointed.

Some of the surprising aspects of my job (actually, everything about this job is surprising!) include working two blocks from Taft Street Coffee/church/gallery where Jeremy works, a boss that encourages artistic development beyond what we do for the company putting time, money and resources into her staff, praying before our big meetings, fresh flower arrangements whenever we have an important client come in (which has been every week so far), the opportunity to publish my own children’s book (more on that later), flexible scheduling, meeting clients worship consulting clients (my boss brings them to me), recording our original music, the girls are singing on a children’s CD coming out in September that is mostly my original music, Jeremy is hired on contract for recordings and music presentations in the schools, I can teach from my office (which is beautiful and furnished with mostly antiques), I’m encouraged in my writing, and today I’m going to South Texas and Mexico to do a one person show of one of our books for a schools there. Some of the not-so-surprising but really cool perks including learning software that I’ve wanted to learn but couldn’t afford (Finale, Final Cut Pro, Soundtrack Pro, Pro tools, Reason, and a few others), loads of children’s books, music, videos and games available, toys in the office area (the girls love coming to work with me and they are always welcomed!), free coffee on the company’s credit at Taft Street Coffee, really cool grown-up toys (my computer is amazing, I have a professional recording mic in my office at my disposal, Lots of fun toys and new things to learn, I’m having a blast. This job is an answer to prayer and a great fit.

Things to Update List

Sometimes I'm a great blogger and others, terrible! Lately I've been on a terrible blogging streak with no post in over a month. For those of you that check and want to know what's going on in our lives, sorry. I can't cover everything that happened in the last month because it really has been full, but here's a list of updates I need to blog about to fill you in:

• Job situation
• France
• Colorado
• Talent Show
• School
• Move
• Mother's Day
• Misc.

Not a fancy well written list to pique your interest but I don't have a lot of time, I'm headed out of town in a couple of hours and need to finish packing. I'll catch up soon!