Things you do not want to find in your bathroom sink when you wash your hands at midnight…

A small, see-through gecko climbing the sink walls, trying to attack you. Seeing lizard guts through see-through lizard skin. In your sink. Where you brush your teeth.

No, he was not selling car insurance.

No, he did not speak with a British accent.

Yes, he did take a trip down the drain.

Yes, I feel bad. Sort of. Not really. Maybe…

Gross.

That is all.

Signs you’re a shopaholic…

You fill four garbage bags with clothes that you no longer wear for one reason or other. Your closet is still packed as tightly as a can of sardines.

I loves me a good clothes bargain. There have been lots this year.

That is all.

I’m forgiven because You were forsaken,
I’m accepted, You were condemned.
I am alive and well, Your spirit is within me,
Because You died and rose again.

Amazing love,
How can it be
That You, my King, should die for me?
Amazing love,
I know it’s true.
It is my joy to honor You,
In all I do, I honor You.

~Chris Tomlin

My parents, Dustin, and I drove out to a cemetery in Rockport yesterday because we heard it was full of wildflowers. And it was. A beautiful sea of yellows and blues. I took around 600 photos! When we were about to leave, I saw two wooden crosses and walked around to the largest one to get a good photo. Then I saw the heart-shaped headstone nearby. Wow. What a perfect photo op for this weekend. God is good and His love is amazing indeed.

Have a happy and blessed Easter!

Spring has sprung! Flowers are blooming! Birds are singing! (And eating the oranges off of my mandarin tree!)

I wore shorts yesterday for the first time in a long time. Oh, how I missed them.

A little spring cleaning has been going on in our house. We’re working on getting the garage/studio cleaned and organized. It was scary in there, y’all. Scaaarrrrryyyyy. We’re getting close though!

What does spring bring to mind for you? Spring makes me think of gardens and flowers and wind and bunnies. I screwed up, bluggy buds. I had the opportunity to get a bunny last year. After 9 years of saying “no way, jose”, my husband finally agreed to let me have a bunny. And what did I do? I decided to be stupidly responsible and turn him down because “now is not a good time… bunnies and babies and doggies and businesses, oh my!”. Boo, Crystal. BOO! Still want bunny.

I guess the sugary chickadee goodness will have to do…

Happy spring!

Not from me though.

Nope, from my fellow metalsmith Jaime, of Bella-Bijou Jewelry. Jaime is a fabulous artist and really sweet too! Head on over to her blog to check out her lovely pieces and enter the contest.

http://bellabijoujewellery.blogspot.com/2010/03/something-special-for-you-giveaway-time.html

Good luck!

I’ve found I’m obsessed with orange lately. And pink. I used to hate pink and orange, but these days they make me happy.

So what do I do? Combine my new color obsession with my long standing flower, rock, and metal obsessions.

This is what happened:

Isn’t it just delish? Like orange soda on a hot summer day.

I confess. It laid around my house for nearly three months before I decided to list it in the shop. I don’t sell my happiness very easily. I hope it sells and goes to a lovely home that will love it as much as I do. I have other orange (and pink!) stones to keep me happy.

But if it doesn’t? You won’t see me crying.

To the ring from hell (you know who you are):

After three entirely too late nights of trying to perfect you, I’ve decided that I seriously hate you. However, you shall not defeat me. In fact, you best stop trying. Or I will rip you apart and send you to the refiners.

You’ve been warned.

That is all.

I read this quote on a blog today:

“Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day, I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return.”

It spoke to me deeply, as it is so applicable to my life at the moment. For the past couple days, I’ve been really wanting to learn to savor each and every day for the good it brings. Life is so fleeting. Years go by all too quickly. I look back at my nearly-30 years and wonder to myself… what have I accomplished? Have I truly appreciated each moment?

So I ask you… what do you do to make sure you savor each day as though it is the gift it truly is? And looking back… what in your life would you change, given the chance?

Signs you’re a metalsmith:

You visit the bathroom. Out of the corner of your eye you catch the glint of a shiny thing. You bend down to get a closer look at the mystery item. You wonder how that 3/4″ piece of 16 gauge sterling silver wire ended up behind the toilet.

The world may never know.

That is all.

November 2008 is when our home study was completed and we were put into our agency’s pool of families waiting to adopt. If you would have asked us then, we would have told you that we would surely be parents by now. We were naive. Even though they told us to go into it expecting a two year wait, we had no idea WE would actually have to wait this long. No way. Not us. We’re great! People will love us! How could they not? Dustin is incredible, and I’m not too bad. Who wouldn’t pick us?

A lot of people, apparently. There have been several placements in our agency since then. We’ve been in the top three favorites for some, but never the #1. It’s a little hard to not take that personally. I won’t lie… the past 15.5 months have been so much harder than I ever could have imagined. When we finally decided to adopt and signed on with our agency, I was stupid enough to think that the hardest part was over. The pain of infertility and trying to conceive yet failing, and the uncertainty of it all… I naively thought that was the hardest part. Surely it would get easier, knowing that this path has a definite end that will make us happy. Right?

Not so much.

It turns out that there is a whole new set of feelings with this leg of the journey. It’s incredibly hard to keep the faith and not start to doubt the path God put us on. It’s horribly difficult to not question the decisions we’ve made. It’s painfully tough to hold back the anger that wants to creep up towards the One that could put a stop to it all with just a blink or a sigh. But here I am, 15.5 months later… still alive. Still trusting (though barely, at times). Still knowing that there is a happy ending to this story…. someday.

The other families in our group are wonderful too. Just as wonderful if not more so than we are. We all have something wonderful to offer, and each birth mother’s reason for her choice is so individual and so personal and so different. I can’t imagine the gravity of that kind of choice. Where would you even start? But it still hurts, and it still sucks, and it has definitely aided in stripping me of the innocence I once had.

But as hard as the journey is, something amazing has happened along the way. Even though not being chosen hurts, the more time that passes, the more confident I become. A few years ago, I was terrified to be a mom. I had zero confidence in my ability to parent. Now I’m still scared and know I’ll be far from perfect, but I believe in myself and I believe in Dustin. I know we’ll be great parents. Something else has happened too. The more time that passes, the more I realize how much more I’ll enjoy parenthood now than I would have almost 5 years ago when we started this whole ordeal. I don’t think I’ll be able to take one day for granted… not even the bad ones.

Almost 5 years ago, when we first started trying to become parents, I thought we were ready. Not really totally ready (because who ever is, so they say), but ready enough. Almost 5 years later… and 15.5 months into the most frustrating part of this journey, I can truly say I.Am.Ready. Not just ready, but ready. Honestly and truly and completely.

So God? You listening here? Nearly 5 years later and 15.5 months into the adoption, I’m finally really ready!

Bring it on.

*sheepishly* Please?