real life

i read The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. they are fantastic. i was on edge, i cried, i literally gasped from time to time...they are ridiculously good. so good, in fact, i am much less frustrated with one of my 4th block students who would not stop reading them in my class no matter how many times i asked him to pay attention. these books stirred up so many thoughts, some of which i'm sure were intended by the author and some of which are uniquely suited to the timing of my reading. i'm still processing the books and all the questions rustled up, but i thought i'd begin to formulate them here as well.

1. we don't get it. the united states has no idea what it's really like to be at war. our country has never been ravaged by full-blown invasion (except of course when we did it to ourselves). yes, we have experienced very tragic attacks, and i don't want to in any way cast those aside as trivial. but can you imagine loss like pearl harbor or the twin towers happening over and over and over and over again? because it happens. but it hasn't happened to us. i am overwhelmed by how i have no idea what so much of the world experiences daily. and it's not just warfare. there is so much pain and suffering that i will (most likely) never understand. i do not understand starvation. i do not understand corrupt government (we have NO IDEA what it's like to really be living under a truly corrupt government. no. earthly. idea.). i do not understand oppression. such great mercy has cloaked us here. and we don't deserve any it. we didn't earn it. God is gracious. i don't know exactly know what this should mean for me in the daily life. i know it isn't supposed to be about feeling guilty or feeling like i have to do something to balance the scales.
2. why do i get so incredibly wrapped up in books and stories like these, but have struggled to have a habit of being the Word the past couple of months?  
3. sort of connected to the last thought, i haven't exactly savored real life recently. i've been feeling very eager to move beyond this season, beyond the student loans, beyond the waiting for direction, beyond the necessity of waiting to have kids...all of it. but what awaits me beyond this season? plenty of real life that if i'm not careful, i will be eager to to move beyond as well. i don't do well living in the real moment of everyday life. 

that's about all i have to process through at the moment. i'm sure there will be more to come, but for now i will leave you with a trailer of what is sure to be a fantastic film...

flowered crocheted scarf

I'm not going to at this point try to write a tutorial for making this scarf. I don't even know how to read crochet patterns so I'm going to need to try to figure those out before writing a tutorial, I think. Thanks to my dear high school friend who taught me how to crochet during our production of The Miracle Worker. Here are some pictures of my latest craft endeavor.

commmunity's glee

i think my favorite part of this episode are the "hums" in between each scene which are so characteristic of every glee episode. well done, community. well done.

this week's post

remember when i had 4 or 5 recipes i wanted to try in one week? well that didn't happen. i think i accomplished two of them. and there probably aren't going to be terribly many more this week because:

a. my first plays at berea high perform on friday
b. i'm starting a new unit in all my classes
c. i'm auditioning for a play and hope to have callbacks as well
d. my cat decided to fully reach puberty this week so we're having to...take care of some things...
e. there are only two weeks left til christmas break so my students are going insane
f. i may have agreed to have my classes perform a scene at the winter band/chorus concert sometime next week (and no, i have no idea what they will perform)
g. i had to get up in the middle of the "f" bullet point because i could not stop sneezing
h. i know there are things i am forgetting

i am writing this because i had committed to myself that i would blog at least once a week because i felt like it gave me a creative outlet, which was keeping me sane. so here is my blog post for this week. enjoy :)

p.s. are you as excited as i am that christmas music is playing? now i need to get back to my lesson planning with my brownie and english breakfast tea. yum :)