This is just a quickie.  while in Paris I discovered something awesomely awesome...Nutella.  I had seen Nutella on the shelf at the grocery store lots before, but I simply thought it was jicky...like Mentos the Freshmaker or something like that.  

 I had a "chocolate" crepe one day in Paris that was totally mouthwatering, only to discover later that it was actually a Nutella crepe.  So today I bought myself a jar of the stuff at United and I will learn to make crepes if it kills me!  

Barcelona

FOR MY BLOG POST I AM COPYING AN EMAIL I SENT HOME DETAILING OUR TRIP.  THIS WILL BORE 99% OF YOU.  FOR THE OTHER 1% READ AWAY...

We are on a plane headed to Paris as I type.  I wanted to share with you the highlights of the trip thus far...and hopefully I won't bore you silly.

1.  ate dinner in a restaurant directly on the Mediterranean Sea.  Looked like any body of water, really, but to picture myself on a map was crazy.

2.  apparently the Spanish version of water is the Sangria.  They are constantly bringing you one/constantly refilling your glass.  

3.  the city is gorgeous...far prettier than I imagined. We took a day tour of the Gothic quarter and touched walls that were constructed in the 13th century by the Roman's who founded Barcelona.  There are stones in these walls with linear divots in them where the military sharpened their swords. one word two words: WOW and old

4.  In the oldest part of the city, the streets are uber-narrow...maybe 10 feet wide, and the there are rows and rows of homes that look a bit like brownstones, but much older. 

It looks like a movie set or Disneyland (could I be more American?).

We went down one street and a lady said something in Spanish while looking straight into our eyes, drops her pants and begins to pee in a bucket...ew.

5.  We ate lunch at a place called 4 Cats.  It was opened in the late 1800s and was a haunt for local artists, including a 17 year old Pablo Picasso.  The venue was where he showed his work for the first time ever (I actually liked these paintings...they weren't the "mangled Mr. Potato Head look" that he's more famous for)

6.  saw a HUGE cathedral designed by Guadi.  It has been under construction for over 120 years and is still going with a "projected" finish date of 2030 (and I thought the Sparks brothers were slow when they remodeled our bathrooms). Totally funded the entire time by private donations.

The architect (Gaudi) was only able to complete one side of four in his lifetime but he's known to have said.  "my boss (God) is in no hurry."  There may be some wisdom in that, huh?

7.  Barcelona is the land of tapas.  It's like they live off of finger foods.  Some were tasty, and some were, uh, gross.  It's just not the same as pizza rolls and taquitos.

8.  we brought electrical adapters and converters with us, but even so, our travel steamer is toast (literally) and my flat iron is like a weapon...hot as all get out and slowly frying my hair to a slow painful death.

9.  the people here are beautiful!  light eyes and hair a lot of times and very exotic.  I have seen more designer jeans on men than I could ever imagine, as well as crop pants and "man-bags" (which apparently heterosexual European males rock the way American guys wear Under Armour)

10.  the time change is tough.  We call the boys at 10:30 pm our time, and catch them right after their school day.  The two very brief phone calls we have made cost us $75...I am considering learning Morse Code...all I need to learn to tap out is "we love you and miss you"---right?  Couldn't be that difficult. :)

That's it in a nutshell.  I REALLY loved Barcelona.  I hadn't given it the props it deserved, mostly out of ignorance.  NOw we head to Paris for the last leg of the trip.  I am really trying to roll with things and get into the culture.  You'd be proud...I hugged our tour guide goodbye yesterday and we did the cheek kiss thing...granted it was only unilateral, but I still felt very and cultured!

Love to you all...Mindy 

Paris

FOR MY BLOG POST I AM COPYING THE EMAIL I SENT HOME DETAILING MY TRIP.  MAY BORE THE HECK OUT OF 99% OF PEOPLE, BUT IN CASE YOU WANTED TO HEAR ABOUT IT...

hello friends...

on the plane home from paris...tired but happy with a pocketful of memories.  we were so jet setters for the past few days.  up early and going all day until 11 or 12.  wanted to share a few fun memories in an email.  be thankful i'm not inviting you over for a slide show because we took a kajillion photos (mostly of things we don't know the name to if i'm being honest).

1.  first nite there we went on a Seine river cruise.  literally had cocktails atop a boat at sunset. apparently the tradition is to toast and take a drink under every bridge (and there were a LOT of bridges).  I mostly faked it b/c you all know how i do with just one glass of wine.  on either side of the river is almost every site/monument you picture in your head when you think of paris.  it was astounding---the city is BEAUTIFUL and i felt like i was in a dream (or in the least, on a movie set).  then we had dinner and later a "dance off" where Mark did the worm---this probably doesn't surprise most of you 

2.  we got to eat lunch on the first level of the Eiffel Tower.  they said the room where we ate has a 3 month waiting list...fancy schmancy.  then Mark and I went off on a 7 hour walking/metro exploration of the city (Notre Dame Cathedral, Latin Quarter, Montmartre, Champs de Elysee, etc., etc. etc.).  spent a lot of time in the narrow streets lined with little shops and food vendors.  felt very Parisian.  on our way home we walked 5 miles, so i can only guess that day we probably did 10 or so total.  (which is why in a city where people scarf bread and cheese and drink wine pretty much all day, you rarely see anyone who is overweight.)  this was also our "sore thumb" day (see pic).  Parisians wear muted colors...lots of brown, gray and black.  mark and i had on red and hot pink.  so as we held up our map and scratched our heads in wonder, we couldn't have looked more touristy. 

 Just a side note....my hubs has mad skills in navigating the metro (but not such mad skills in navigating the streets :).  i was proud of him, and thankful b/c i was literally like a child just following and trusting

3. we did go to the Louvre but we didn't stay long.  saw the Mona Lisa (smaller than I thought) and Venus de Milo and a few other things, but

 I think it honestly would've been better if we'd gotten the headphones that give you a guided tour OR if I knew the first thing about art (i'm hearing the theme of beverly hillbilly's in my head as I type).  

4.  another side note...about the people there.  i only had to pull out my bon qui qui "rude" a few times.  they weren't stereotypically awful to us, but i felt "tolerated" for the most part.  A ALOT of them smoke and a tour guide we had told us we (americans) were to thank for that, as the GIs introduced cigarettes to the french during WW2.  a lot of them also ride vespas at ridiculously fast speeds.  if a pedestrian is in the way, they honk and maybe swerve if you're lucky.   

5.  on to the gala.  it was at a gorgeous pavilion and it was the only time we mixed with all the other countries represented.  so it was fun to see everyone dressed in their culture's version of cocktail dress---which apparently to some cultures was polyester pants and 

their favorite cardigan  (ok, so that was mean of me).  there was this music playing that was SO euro (think Mike Meyers on SNL..."I'm Deter, this is the time we dance).  and these people on stilts and in crazy costumes walked around as we mingled during cocktail hour (see pics b/c words can't express).

 

 then at dinner we had several courses and everytime a course was about to come out, "weird stilt people" would come out in a white outfit with balls all over it??? for a grand entrance.  just all so european.  it was a fun nite and believe it or not, my first time in real heels (AKA razor blades).  there were about 650 people there (320 sales reps plus guest).  have to give a shout out to the hubs... 100, 000 people work for the company world wide, and only 320 won this trip...don't tell him i bragged about him---won't sit well with him

6.  so we saved the best for last.  for those of you who don't know my hubs and i love learning about WW2 (esp. hubs).  we decided to deviate from the rest of our group and take a train from paris to visit the sites of D-DAy in Normandy.    this ended up being our favorite part of the trip.  even though mark and i booked this on our own, we ended up taking 2 new friends we met with us (who were also slightly obsessed with WW2).  rode the train 2 hours to get there and saw the french countryside...picturesque.  we had our own tour guide who was a walking wikipedia of all things normandy.  he took us to the usual attractions but also to some off the beaten path sites that weren't as well known.  we saw Utah and Omaha Beach, Bayeax, Carentan, and the cemetary.  at every stop he would hold up a photo taken in 1944 during the war and tell us the relevance and context and we'd look up and realize we were in the very spot the photo was taken.  WOW.  learned so much.  laughed.  cried.  truly amazing.

so that's it in a nutshell, a very small nutshell.  it was one of those things where words fail you.  

we missed all of you a lot and will be glad to be home and back in the swing.  can't wait to see you all!!!

Mindy 

Au Revoire

So my hubby left his jobs as a Tech Chemistry Lecturer/Youth Minister 8 years ago and jumped into the world of sales.  Apparently he was a natural at it and this March, after having a particularly stellar year, won the grand-daddy of Awards Trips.  Which is why he and I will be boarding a plane Sunday morning (me gripping my bags with white knuckles and armed with Ambien to handle the "over the big body of water" portion of the trip) to head to Barcelona and Paris.  It's the trip of a lifetime, and as proud as I am of my hubs for winning it, I find myself embarrassed to tell people about it.  The economy stinks, times are hard and here we are heading on a super-fancy trip---it just feels creepy, funky, and weird (to borrow my friend Adam's fav descriptors).

So my goal for the trip (besides eating alot, sleeping a lot and looking at a bunch of cool stuff) is to really receive this trip as an uber-blessing; a gift.  To see this trip as a perfect picture of what God's grace, an unmerited gift, looks like.  To suck the life out of something I don't need and don't deserve, but will never forget...

So I am officially signing off of my blog-a-liciouness until I get back.  Surely after I've visited the mecca of all things cultural and artistic, I will have some major blog-worthy material.  Who knows, maybe I'll even hop on the ol MacBook and blog a bit while I'm there.  Or not, since I'll be busy stuffing my face with croissants and adjusting my new beret to look just so.

Au Revoire ;)

With the Bad Comes the Good

I met a lady the other day at work (my nursing job) whose feet were red and slightly deformed.  She required a cane to walk, or hobble as it were, and she told me as I walked along beside her, "I have neuropathy."  

"I'm so sorry.  Does it hurt." I replied back.

"No.  That's the problem." she said in a discouraged tone.  "I can't feel my feet and they get more numb by the day.  I can barely walk now."

The conversation stuck with me throughout the day and here I am blogging about it two days later.  Why?  Because as someone who has dealt with pain issues this past year, the idea of getting to be numb is intriguing.  Wouldn't my life be SO much better if I couldn't feel anything at all in my "trick hip," as I call it.  Wouldn't that be my ultimate relief, in a perfect world?

Not so much.  As I pondered this little lady's condition, it occurred to be that numbness is a double edged sword.  Sure, she doesn't feel pain, but she also can't feel pleasure...a foot massage, cool fescue grass between her toes, playful tickling, a hot foot soak with tingly lavender and mint.  What's more, she can't detect those little signals her body sends her that say your foot is hurt, you have a wound you need to tend to, this water is too hot for you to be in, etc...  And perhaps the worst part of her state is that she is losing her freedom; something must of us take for granted daily...simply walking from point A to point B.

Chronic pain isn't just limited to the physical realm.  How many of us have endured something painful, scarring, utterly life changing (and not for the better) that we wish to NEVER think about?  How many of us have a memory so hurtful to us, we'd do anything to block it out?  We'd do anything to protect ourself from the power it holds on us?  Maybe we busy ourselves to distraction, find solace in a bottle or a little pill with a lot of punch, or lose ourselves in relationships that aren't good for us.  The "mind numb-ers" are endless, but all yield the same thing...emotional anesthesia; essentially insensitivity to pain.

Perhaps what is true of the sweet little lady I met, is true for all pain.  If we are numb to the pain, we can't feel the pleasure either...  With the bad comes the good.  With the bad comes those warnings we desperately need to heed.  With the bad comes a greater appreciation for the good.  And perhaps the most poignant thing of all (to me anyway) is that with the bad comes an increased need to seek something (or Someone, in my case) higher and bigger than us.  

I have never been so dependent on Christ as when I am in pain of any kind, so honestly how can I not embrace the pain and be thankful for what it opens me up to?  Because this is a very good thing.

proud moment-ish

My son brought this drawing of a "Foxger" home from school. Pretty good drawing I must say. 

 Perhaps the coolest thing about it is....

  It's Napoleon Dynamite-ness...

 "The Liger is pretty much my favorite animal. It's like a lion and a tiger mixed... bred for its skills in magic." 

    

Song Crush #4

looove this...

All Along - Remedy Drive

The Robe

sometimes I don't need my own words, b/c someone else's are exactly right. 

these lyrics are my relationship with Jesus...Happy Easter.

Anyone whose heart is cold and lonely
Anyone who can't believe
Anyone whose hands are worn and empty
Come as you are

Anyone whose feet are tired of walking
And even lost their will to run
There is a place of rest for your aching soul
Come as you are

For the robe is of God
That will clothe your nakedness
And the robe is His grace
It's all you need
Come as you are

Anyone who feels that they're unworthy
Anyone whose just afraid
Come sinner, come and receive His mercy
Come as you are

For the robe is of God
That will clothe your nakedness
And the robe is His grace
It's all you need
Come as you are

Wes King's "The Robe"

Childlike

 Then Jesus called for the children and said to the disciples, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children.

Luke 18:16 (New Living Translation)

I have glossed over that chunk of Scripture at least a hundred times in the past 18 years since I began reading the Bible.  And what's worse, is that a mental image always comes to mind as I read it...I see the drawing of Christ laughing with children on his lap (you know that drawing-no matter your religious background you've probably seen it too).  And there's nothing particularly wrong with that picture, accept that for me it waters down the "punch" this Scripture packs.

Yet in all my glossing over I have completely missed the punch and point of that part of God's Word...which ultimately means I've missed a peek into the heart of my Savior.  

First of all, I think in recent years having become a parent myself I actually now get what it means to be childlike... Children are spontaneous, completely in-the moment, unpretentious, honest to a fault, receptive, accepting, and eager for one-on-one undivided attention.  Second, I learned that in that days of Christ's earthly ministry, culturally speaking kids were the lowest of low...sort of in the ranks of slaves and servants.  

So just in having more clarity about those two things, what Jesus was saying in that verse has way more relevance to me than it ever has before.  

If I may be so bold as to paraphrase, maybe the essence of His words was something like this...when we posture ourselves before God as a child: with no standing; emptied of all worldly trappings and prestige.  When we come to Him utterly raw and real.  That is when we connect with Jesus and really grasp the gospel message as our own. 

At least that's what it means to me.  But what do I know?  I'm just an adult hoping to become everyday more of a child (at heart anyway)...

Song Crush #3

so this is another song crush, but it's more than that.  it's sort of a "this is the cry of my heart right now."  enjoy...

"Quiet My Heart"

Brooke Barrettsmith

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed-HFBt-cZc

A Mountaintop Moment

I got an all access pass I never expected to receive.  My 18 year old nephew gave me the okay to be around for his Senior Prom "send-off."  Meaning he trusted his Aunt Mindy to be cool enough and not embarrass him in front of his date and his friends.  I was shocked to be invited, but honestly the kid probably knew I'd pout and mope if I wasn't included, and he just decided to opt for the path of least resistance.  Smart kid I must say.

Anyway as I watched him get pics taken with his super cute date and a whole horde of kids, my heart ached.  Here I am watching my "little" nephew (who stands head and shoulders above me and outweighs me by a hundred pounds) embark on one of life's iconic moments.  I wondered how it could be possible?  Wasn't it just yesterday that I sat in an El Paso hospital with my MHS sweatshirt on, sporting teased bangs that defied gravity; waiting to hear that my first nephew had safely arrived?  How is it possible that he is now the age I was then???  Ouch.  

Time has flown by and over the years he has grown into a kind hearted guy who consistently makes good choices.  He is comfortable in his own skin and doesn't seem to worry much about what the crowd thinks.  I know I am a biased aunt, but I simply couldn't be prouder of him.  I really couldn't.

As I watched him enjoy his night, I found myself thinking about what lies ahead for him, and for all those kids.  They are venturing into the college years which are some of the funnest times in life...  But they are also toeing the line of adulthood.  And with that comes responsibility, independence, choices (and the consequences of those choices experienced like never before).

With all the fun that's ahead there will be an equal amount of disappointment.  For every time he laughs so hard his sides hurt, there will be a time he wants to punch a hole in the wall.  For each moment his heart feels whole, there will be a moment when he feels uncertain and alone.  And as his aunt who still sees him as five year old, I battle this instinct to pray that he won't have to endure the inevitable "other side of the coin."   

But I know in my bones that it's in the living of both the goods and bads that we become who we are.  That he will transform into the man he's meant to be only by living on the mountaintop and in the valley.  It's a hard truth to swallow, but we can all vouch for it's validity simply by looking at our own journey. 

So as we said a quick goodbye to him as he prepared to head to a fancy pre-Prom dinner, we were pointedly yet kindly dismissed ("mom, yall can go now." Which is code for "leave, leave, leave").  As we drove away leaving a mass of bright faces and excited chatter behind, I silently wished them all the ability to understand that right there, in that very moment of time, they were on a "mountaintop." 

Song Crush #2

Love, love, love this...NeedtoBreath  "Washed by the Water"

I've attached an acoustic version below that is even more stellar than the radio version.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYGhMGYPQYQ

by the way, totally LOVE how the band's name has no spaces in it.

kthxbye...

mmp