MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!

i would just like to say how absolutely STOKED i am that God loves me!!! and you!!! yes, i am. it's so totally GREAT...amazing and unfathomable. i mean, he wakes me up early in the morning so we can spend time together. i love it.

so i hope you all have a wonderful christmas and celebrate the amazing mystery of emmanuel..."God with us". it's so, SOOOOO awesome.

good morning!!!

yeah-it's almost christmas and we get to go to California soon!!! I CANT WAIT. i so love california. in fact, when i lived in ohio for 3 years of pure agony (ok, it wasnt THAT bad, but i do remember asking God why, when i grew up in paradise-santa barbara-did he send me to live in HELL?!?, at one point), anyways, i was obnoxious in ohio, raving on and on about CA and how great it was and the food so good and on and on and on. im sure we lost friends because of it-ah well, if they only knew!

i just read a blog by Christy B., (which is funny, btw) in which she complains about homeschoolers and spelling mistakes in chats, and i SWEAR i want to misspell this whole blog! have i told you how when i first started emailing people, i would often almost type in "busty" instead of "busy"? like "dang, we're so BUSTY right now, we cant keep up", or "my dh is so BUSTY and his students are driving him crazy"or, "im so BUSTY" and so on. it would always crack me up...i laugh at myself a lot-and at other people too, actually. like when my dh was telling me yesterday how he flipped over the handlebars of his bike, then when he came in, holding his hands and threw off his helmet, i was like "STOP JOKING...this is lame..." and he was really HURT! oops...but, i do wish i couldve seen it and am glad he wasnt hurt too badly. in fact, i laugh as i write this.

ok, we got a new baby my dh is going to pick up in Colorado this week...here's a pic (i hope)
so...we're really excited and looking forward to some great camping!!! plus, i can paint plein air, which i really want to do, and dont have time to do, cuz im blogging and goofing around online! HELLO.

ive not read any REALLY great, thought provoking books lately, though i am learning a TON from Julie Morgensterns "time managment from the inside out". I HIGHLY recommend this. it's not intimidating and she does a nice job of offering different options to get what ever it is youre doing to work for YOU...not for miss hyper organized...or not for miss super sloppy (comeon, raise your hand-here's mine!). it's really good. ive learned a lot. how blogging fits in to my time management skills?!? good question-one i wont answer.

bye.

oh, and one more thing about my BAD MOUTHED DD!!!!

she was writing some words today, and got "fan" and "duck" mixed up as she wrote...well, you can guess what came up! what are we teaching her!?!? i had a hard time of it not to crack up, again....just erased it and asked her to write the RIGHT word...LOL

man, as if it's not bad enough she's not reading well, she says and writes "bad" words!!!!

i have to say that one our nicest Ohio friends is SO great to keep calling us after we flake out on them years ago for thanksgiving and also are REALLY bad about calling back! if you read this, you know who you are! and congrats on the new house-send pics.

well...i must go read-why am i wasting time on this machine? i cant get away....Heeeeeelllllppppp....

btw, i can tell people are nervous with the fact that we arent going to church anywhere yet and it's been MONTHS! i used to so be like that...so worried and slightly judgemental...and sometimes not so slightly. im not sure what the next months/years hold for us, but we're trusting God to be clear. sometimes ive thought of him as some capricious one, who is like "ok, here's a little sign, now YOU figure out what's next...hee hee hee" but ive since been made aware that he really wants us to KNOW him and what he's thinking and will be clear. cool. so, we wait. we wait, and we love each other. i think we've grown to love each other even more since we arent going to that church, anyways...and are uninvolved with certain people who shall remain nameless. that's been good, and hard, and good, and hard. i hope i am learning to "set boundries" earlier on in relationships (such psychobabble) so i wont have to do anything drastic like we did, again. dang!!! bleh.

so...that's it.

Shalom

IM IN A GALLERY!!!!

yup. i am. im so TOTALLY stoked about it. WHooo-Hooooo.

so. that's cool. and as if someone might read this, my website again is...

www.summerjbarry.com

coolio

ok. so-is anyone reading these? all i get for comments-all 3 of them-are like-"cool blog-check out this ad". argh. what about me?!? comment on what im saying!!! whoa-a little anymosity?!? doh. so, it's that bad? no one likes me? im dumb??? you dont agree and are afraid to tell me?!? *sigh*

im having a little pity-party over here, obviously. so...it' s been beautiful here in Saint George! the BEST fall we've had since we've lived here, seriously. im LOVING it. thanks, God. i needed. i was DREADING more of that blisteringly hot, evil, sun, burning down on me maliciously. so, this weather-overcast some days, even raining!, and a couple days of sun, then back to cloudy. i LOVE it.

my folks are coming for a surprise visit this week-YEAH. my kids dont know-so dont tell. they are in Brigham City, UT, (whereever that is!) for a pastor's retreat-they're vineyard pastors-and will come down here for a couple of days. speaking of them-they are doing an awesome job with "church"...facilitating a community of believers (and some unbelievers) and really loving people. i hold their efforts in my heart as a hope of what we may someday be involved in doing...and as an antidote towards what sort of churchy/religion thing ive seen here (and im not talking about the LDS church, btw).

i SO dont think Jesus had our western churches in mind when he died on the cross for us, do you? my favorite verse in the bible is Galatians 5:1..."Christ set us free for FREEDOM'S SAKE-dont let yourselves be bound by the yoke of slavery again". YES!!! exactly. my other favorite section of the new testament is the story of jesus at the well with the samaritan woman. it's SO cool-i love how he is constantly breaking the social norms...YEH JESUS!!! my main goal in life is to be like him...

well, my kids are doing a chicken mummy tommorrow. im not really looking forward to it, but a friend of ours is doing it with her kids, so i thought i'd participate. ew...my kids are loving the thought, though i dont think it'll be as gross as they're hoping! ah well. the friend we're doing this with lives part time in San Diego, and i must say im extremely jealous about it! im just not stoked about saint george. waaaa...sorry for all the whining.

i'd also like to say that my 10yo dd is a GENIUS. bragging? yes-but...it's true. she DOES have a "mind like a steel trap". im proud. and im glad she's not in public school dealing with crap. i realized she doesnt love Little House on the Prairie like my dh and i did as kids cuz her life is SO DANG GOOD!!! laura's life seems not as good. my life and my dh's life was so not good (generally), that LHONP was like nirvana! 2 parents who consistently LOVED their kids and listened to them and did stuff with them?!? what-impossible. ok, our moms did love us-but...well...it was tough, to sum it up. oops-more waaa? nah-just realism.

anyways-i babble on! ive already written 4 pages in my journal-isnt that enough?!?!

Bloggers, forgive me, it's been one month since my last blog (almost)...

enough with the funny business-the really cool thing is...i've got my website back up!!! YEAH!!! it is...

www.summerjbarry.com

...and has a lot of my coolest paintings! just a little ad here, so...hope y'all dont mind!

on another note-homeschooling is going well! my dd daughter is getting better and better at reading every day...the funniest thing she's read? She was supposed to read "They also got a locker full of silver coins." but she read "They also got a locker full of...shit." needless to say, i BUSTED up laughing-in fact, im laughing as i type this!!! SOOOOO funny to me. what a bargain for those pirates! LOL a whole locker full. so, she got all offended, poor girl, and ran off crying-bad mommy. it was just too funny....i apologized and explained what sh-- was and why i thought it was funny. she was still not amused. ah well...the twisted mind of an adult, what can i say?

so...im still going through a lot of emotional turmoil. wondering when/if the wringer will end. i read a great quote by someone in TAW...

"In a dark time, the eye begins to see."---Roethke

so true, im finding.

and i found another COOL site for women... http://another.girlatplay.com it's cool-women living their creative dreams, which i what im hoping to do! scary, really, esp. with all the NO NO NO, YOU CANT DO IT crap ive got going on in my mind, but...i WILL press on! so there.

well, that's all. shalom

Hey there! Did you miss me?

Ok, realistically, I'm guessing not, but that's ok. Ive been thinking a lot about encouragement and what does it really mean? Not in the Webster sense, but in real life. I was watching Extreme Home Makeover the other night at a friends house and a commercial came on for healthy living or something....they had some check list for 5 or 6 healthy choices one could make to be healthier. Every time someone in the commercial made a healthy choice, everyone around them applauded and hugged them and clapped them on the back and other such tokens of encouragement. It made us laugh, it was so cheesy, and yet...IS it cheesy? We're generally so encouraging with babies-all the focus on the first step and how even one little step and we all go wild, etc., but somehow we stop being encouraging at some point, even with our younger children on up, and get more and more discouraging...and with adults-WHEW...really bad! I myself can be and am "helpfully" discouraging more often than not. I dont like that about myself...or in others. So, my thought is, let's encourage the HECK out of each other-like every dumb little thing. not fakely, of course, but...pick up on any little good thing and really compliment the other person, whether kid, grandpa/grandma, self even! that's what im trying to do-not easy for a generally cynical/critical person...but, I WILL change.

so...that's my thought for the day/week/month.

btw...ive decided to back through The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron...i went through it once-SO awesome. I was the most focused artistically ever in my whole life! but, that was months ago...so here i am, lagging-freaked out by approaching a gallery with my work/portfolio...totally stalled out! my goal is to get my "studio" put back together and then GET PAINTING and selling. If youve never heard/seen the book, check it out. It's a 12 week program for recovering artists! LOL that me. :)

School's going well, generally, with the girls. TWTM isnt killing us this year, and im glad. My 7 1/2 yo dd is still not reading well, but getting better every day. And my 10yo dd is summarizing paragraphs for history without flipping-a real accomplishment!

Ciao!

Stuff

Ok, im tired and im trying to get ready for this garage sale tomorrow that im having with a friend...and all my stuff is overwhelming me, like some giant wave at the beach-i can see it, but cant run away fast enough before it crashes down on my head! *sigh* ive too much stuff, and that's a fact. my mom died at 43 (10 years ago), and she had a boat-load of stuff, and being and only child from her, i got all the stuff, and since im emotional about my mom, im emotional about her stuff, which makes it hard to let go of, even if i never use it and it just sits in a box, waiting for something. i think if she'd lived til a good ol' age, it'd be easier on me-well, certainly it would, cuz i wouldnt have all this stuff-she still would! but, when she did go, i could be ok with letting go of things, rather than keep them cuz they're all ive got of my mom.

so-that's it on stuff-nothing exciting-just some whining, really.

it's been sort of a weird week. homeschooling is wearing me out. i want to do a good job and help my kids learn, but---it's not really my natural gifting, and so it's a struggle for me. i also had some interaction with a homeschool group we used to go to, until they got all weirdy, and that was uncomfortable. plus the ongoing saga of "breaking up" with those people we've known for a long time (i feel horrible about it, btw). plus going through all the STUFF. aaackkkk. so. im pathetic! LOL

ok-this is the dumbest thing ever. im done.