With Two Ts

So.  Last night I had a wonderful conversation with my sister.  While I was talking, I was outside doing a little physical work (knocking dead branches out of our dogwoods — another story), so I was sweating a little.  When we were done, I hung up, wiped the phone off (ew) and went back to work.  Last night, when I went to set my alarm on my phone and plug it in for the night, I discovered that my phone no longer responds to touch (it’s an iPhone).  This, I decided quickly, is a problem.

We did everything we could think of to no avail and then pondered our doom in bed.  How could this huge expense come up right when we starting making decisions to save money in other areas of our life?  If we upgrade to the 3GS iPhone, it’ll use up 3-4 weeks in grocery savings that we think we can do.  We need to save money, not spend it!  And as we were laying there, it came out:  maybe we don’t need an iPhone.

silence.

We both use our iPhones a lot for many things everyday.  To drop the iPhone and go back to *gulp* normal cellphones that don’t have all those wonderful applications, might mean that we’d have to… well… use the computer instead.  Or get the directions ahead of time.  Or only check our email once a day.  Or entertain ourselves through reading.  Or talk to each other.  Or to our friends.  Or neighbors.

Wait.  How much would we save monthly if we didn’t have two smart phone plans?

Seventy dollars.  A month.  That’s a lot of diapers.

So, ladies and gentlemen, I am proud to announce that Mr. and Mrs. Elliott (2 ts) are now former smart phone owners.  We went out today and replaced both phones and already have an offer on Rebecca’s 3G.  (My phone is, sadly, just a bulky, pretty clock that has to be charged every night.)

It would be nice to get back into smart phones at some point. But the moral of the story is that we found a way to turn an unexpected expense into a money-saving venture.

Hope we can find more of those!

-Adam

…She said today in our new Bradley method childbirth class.  She was talking about forming habits of nutrition and exercise and relaxation in preparing for Gabriel’s first public appearance this September, but the idea has been carrying over in our minds today as we started think about ways to cut our spending.

Our plan is to put the money that I’m making as a teacher this summer into savings and then depend on my salary and savings to cover our budget from Birthday until the end of the year.  This was all well and good until the AC unit went out and the warranty company says they won’t cover the repair/replacement.  But that’s another story.  The point is that already we are finding unexpected expenses trying to thwart our well-thought-out financial plan.  So, we still need to be on the look out for things we can sell, things we don’t need to buy and things we can buy cheaper.

One major way that we intend to try to save money and eat healthier at the same time is to be more intentional with our grocery budget.  We hope to radically change the way we eat by giving us a more healthy and consistent diet of food cooked at home with as little preservatives and additives as possible.  This will require baby steps, but we hope to map it out on here.  Rebecca will be largely in charge of showing what we are doing to save financially (she’s the budget queen around the house) and we’ll both be describing our baby-step easy recipes to start moving toward cooking at home more often and what tastes good.

Our plan is to keep this updated at least weekly over the next 12 weeks.  Please be patient if we have a hard time being consistent… after all, it takes 12 weeks to form a habit.

-Adam

This was written June 22, 2009.  I don’t know why I never uploaded it.  I guess I just got too busy.  Sorry.

-Adam

So, I now have no unmarried siblings.  My only sister became Dr. Laurel Newman over the weekend.  It was so much fun to travel down to see my family and be there to celebrate with her.  The wedding took place in the wedding garden at our farm that has been in preparation for a few years now.

It actually started out with Laurel deciding (long before she met Michael), that she wanted to have a garden wedding and that it would be nice to have said garden at Green Cedars farm (that’s right, my parents have a named farm).  Dad was brought on board when he realized he would get to build a second barn for the reception.  They built the “party barn” two years ago, in time for the wedding reception we had in Pensacola about 3 weeks after Rebecca and I got married, and the wedding garden was planted before that so that all the large shrubs would be full size in time.

Mom and Dad put a lot of work into the planning and care-taking and it was fun to be a part of the preparations.  I apparently missed out on one of the most fun moments of the weekend (I was at the bachelor party), when many of my cousins went a little crazy shucking corn.

Everything was beautiful and “just so” and I think Laurel had the wedding she really wanted.

Laurel was the last in several groups we grew up in to get married.  We have 3 cousins who were born within a few years of us, and of the five she was the last to marry (although Jake got married just 2 months ago).  We also grew up with the Tyner children (although they all got married before I did).

It was nice to be so much a part of something.  Most weddings that I have attended, aside from my own, have just required me to find a nice seat and maybe stand in the back of some picture.  I enjoyed having some responsibilities and being able to help out.  It was also nice to have my wife sing a song at my sister’s wedding.  I love that girl.  We had two arduous 9-hour drives over the weekend and I fell more in love with her.  Maybe it was the book she was reading to me.

It’s snowing outside and Rebecca’s napping. We got up early today for her to play and sing and for me to do powerpoint at the East End campus of Sojourn, our church. It’s not a typical way to spend Valentine’s, but things are not typical for us right now.

I suppose that’s not quite true, but typical has changed since we’ve been expecting this new family member. Rebecca’s sense of romanticism is no different than it was before, and today she’s just trying to nap away the nausea. The first trimester is ending, so hopefully she won’t feel as ill so often.

While she was napping I watched “The Seventh Seal” on Netflix. It was directed by Ingmar Bergman and had Max Von Sydow in it. I must say, I’ve never watched a film in Swedish before.

I probably shouldn’t have watched so deep and heavy a movie as this in the middle of the afternoon and by myself, but I really don’t get the chance to watch too many “arthouse” films these days as a first-year teacher and I just decided to take the opportunity as it presented itself.

The story is about a medieval knight returning from the crusades who challenges Death to a game of chess in order to win his life back. He and most everyone in the film is somewhat grim. The squire is witty and comical, but in a much darker way than I expected. His character professes a disbelief in any kind of higher being as the knight and several around him think about death. Other characters get involved and lighten the knight’s mood even as the black plague is all around them. Here, there be spoilers. In the end, the knight, as must we all, loses to Death and just barely makes it to his home to see his wife when Death comes to visit him and all of his guests. They all look Death in the eye and respond in different ways. The Knight is still praying to God for mercy, while the squire says to forget praying to nothing and enjoy the last seconds of life. A girl with them looks almost admiringly at Death, as if she’s been hoping he’d come soon.

We all do look at death differently. In some way, we’re all a little afraid, as we would be of anything so uncertain as death. Aside from what we believe about God, and the occasional acquaintance whose heart stopped for a few seconds and may have actually seen a white light, we’ve not met anyone who has died and returned, and that’s as it should be. Any idea we may have of what death or the afterlife will be like is a guess, even if it is based on Scripture or the experiences of others.

I’m the kind of person who likes surprises and I have always enjoyed starting out on a new journey. In some way, I’ve made my peace with death as a young person. On the other hand, I’ve never had as much to live for as I do now. I have a wife and a coming child to take care of and provide for. I’ve never been much of a risk-taker; I’ve always played it safe –for example: I’ve never had any interest in sky-diving or bungee jumping, and recently I’ve been offered the opportunity to sky dive with a friend at his bachelor party, an offer to which I’ve given plenty of thought since -”hey, why not? I’ve never really had an opportunity to do it before, why not now?” – except I then remembered that I’m going to be a father a few months after that, and as safe as I’m sure the sky diving industry is, I don’t really want to put myself in the way of anything that would keep me from being able to raise my child. I guess there’s no point in keeping it a secret that I would like to live long enough to see my grandchildren marry. In the end, I only have so much control over how long I live — even making wise decisions doesn’t assure me any extra time.

Lord, come for me when You’re ready for me, but please don’t make it soon.

-Adam

So, a lot has happened since I last wrote… My apologies. However, I now have a really good excuse to keep updated.

A couple of Sundays ago, we found out that we’re pregnant! We are due sometime around the 3rd of September.

Given the fact that there are a lot of family members that don’t live in our immediate vicinity, I am going to try and keep up with this alot better than I have, especially given the fact that there are kids involved now. Heh.

To begin with, here is the link to our first ultrasound pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=142595&id=504708282

My next appointment is on the 12th of February, and we should find out if it’s a boy or girl sometime in April.

We’re excited, if a little nervous, and we can’t wait to meet the little one!

More to come as I think of it…

Rebecca

Apparently, no matter what I do, I *cannot* keep a blog regularly updated.

Well, I’m out to change that. I’m not setting any kind of schedule, or standard, or anything like that, but I have a blog, dang it, and I’m gonna use it!

At any rate.

A lot has happened since the last post.

Adam has a job teaching Spanish 1 at North Bullit Co. High School. He likes it so far, though there have been some stressful moments. We are definitely thankful for the Lord’s provision. It’s not that far away, and apparently there aren’t very many really bad kids.

I’m still teaching piano and driving my medical courier route. I’ve been writing more lately, and hope to record a CD within 6-8 months.

We’re leading a community group again this year, and that’s been a lot of fun.

I can’t think of anything else at the moment, so I’m going to sign off. Hopefully it won’t be too long until I write again.

~R

I’m done teaching piano for today, and I decided it was about time for another post.

This will be a long week. Adam will be closing at Starbucks tonight, and Thursday through Saturday nights, as well as finishing up his long term substituting job at Johnson Elementary, and starting classes at UofL for his grad program in teaching Spanish. We’ll see each other Wednesday night and Saturday/Sunday mornings, but the rest of the week, I’ll definitely have a lot of time on my hands.

I’m planning on using the time to write and get some songs finished, and catch up with some friends I haven’t gotten to spend as much time with lately as I’d like. Tonight I’m meeting a friend for a walk in Cherokee park, and then a movie night with Noel and some girls from CG and their various and sundry beaux, I think.

I’ll miss Adam this week, but it’s only one week, and it’ll give me a chance to catch up on some things. And we’ll have Wednesday night!

God is good to us, I’m really excited about the things on the horizon; it’s a good season, and I’m expecting some awesome things are going to happen this summer/fall. We’ll definitely keep y’all posted!

Rebecca

This is my first real blog entry on our new blog. With two of us updating here, instead of just one, it should be much easier to stay regular (regular… har har). From the looks of it (see post below, titled “Celibacy“), it seem as though Adam will be more intellectual and I will be more circumstantial in our posting topics. Also, for the record, I think it’s hysterical that this is our family blog about being married and living together and keeping house, etc., etc., and his first post is called “Celibacy“.

At any rate, what’s new with us…?

• Adam is working at a long term Spanish substitute job through the end of the year, and it’s his first big teaching assignment where he gets to make up the lesson plans and administer tests and so on and so forth. It’s been really good experience for him, especially as he hopes to have a full time job teaching high school Spanish next year. Once the school year ends, he’ll work more hours at Starbucks, and do a lot of classes in his graduate program over the summer, and then hopefully start work in August.
• I am working a lot. I drive four days a week, and teach piano the other day. I’ve been playing a lot at Sojourn lately, as well as working on my solo stuff. I’m planning on recording a new album this year, if all goes well, and I’ve been slowly getting momentum with writing and am looking forward to seeing more of what comes out of me creatively.
• Adam and I are going to be attending and serving at the new St Matthews Sojourn site, and it’s been really good to go and get to know some people and worship with them. It’s been exciting to find people that live close to our neighborhood! We are looking forward to spending time getting to know new friends and be more involved in reaching out to our neighborhood.
• We planted some tomatoes! Last year, we didn’t do much with our yard, and this year it’s been fun to get things situated and looking more “kept”. Adam did a lot of work laying down weed paper and mulch, and the front yard landscaping looks really great. We’ve got a lot of hostas and a couple of really big azalea bushes, and two white dogwood trees. In the back, we have a row of evergreens, and we planted some tomatoes in a little plot right next to them: our first garden. I’m excited. We waited a little longer to put them in the ground than we should have because of time constraints, so two of them are almost certainly not going to make it, but I’ll replace those two once I’m sure that they’re dead.

I think that’s about it for now. For pictures of us, check out our Flickr page. We just got a new camera, and we’re planning on being a lot more diligent in taking pictures and posting them here

That’s all for now, it’s getting late and I’m going to bed. ‘Night folks!

So, I was listening to NPR today and they were having a discussion about celibacy among priests in the Catholic Church. As someone who aligns himself with a Protestant denomination, I clearly am in favor of church leaders being free to marry if they feel so led. I do however see the wisdom of the Catholic Church in allowing married men to become priests, but not allowing unmarried priests to get married. It seems that the logical and traditional way of raising up leaders in the church from the first days was not placing 25-year-old seminary graduates as leaders of a church that they have never visited before. Leaders should be raised up from within. There’s nothing wrong with missionaries who leave their hometown to start churches in new places or even sending those who feel called to lead off to seminary, but it seems that those who desire to be leaders should be trained by those who are the leaders in the church that they are a part of.

Also, if priests are taking a vow of celibacy, this isn’t something that they are merely doing for church leaders, but a vow they are making before God. If they confess to be church leaders who believe in God and they make a vow to Him, then they should stick to it.

In the end, however, it is not up to me to judge a man’s conscience. And I definitely don’t get to judge the Roman Catholic Church. But I hope that whatever comes of this happens because it is the right decision and not because it is the most convenient option.

So, we’re just getting started with this. Check back for a real blog post soon! In the mean time, check out the links over to the side.