weekends: are they relaxing or tiring?

sometimes, i feel like i'm more exhausted after the weekend than before...

when i'm not busy socializing,

Sunday after church - lunch & a walk at beautiful Santa Monica

glo got treated to some delicious crab @ Redondo Beach after niners, mandy, and i all lost a bet

i've been spending some time volunteering:

my freakishly strong small group member and i joined my friend's church for some manual labor in TJ (yes, those are overalls...from the 90's. i pulled them out of the back of my closet just for this. being a packrat can sometimes be useful!)

at the start of the day, the roads looked like this (all the sewage and run-off was ending at the parking lot of a church)

after 5 hours, we managed to fill in all the unruly cracks and create a ditch down 2 steep hills, thereby diverting all the unwanted water away from the church parking lot

i use the term "we" lightly b/c this is where i was by 4pm - see me in the background? that's me sitting...totally pooped & not helpful. i over-exerted myself at the beginning and also realized that 5 years does a lot to the body. the last time i was in TJ (helping to build a house), i had much more stamina.

on another Saturday, glo & I went to help at Westside Pregnancy Resource Center. i know i'm crazy for saying this, but i LOVE organizing so rearraging their donated items into a useable set-up was very rewarding. Also, while there, we got to listen to some of the stories of the center (an alternative to Planned Parenthood) - the women who work there deal with bigger triumphs than i ever see on a daily basis but also deeper disappointments too. though the joys are great, the grace they must be ready to give is amazing. unending. what love.

so though i'm thoroughly exhausted after my weekends, it's worth it. they're full. full of friends, full of service... wonder-full. =)

some recent highlights:
-an airport visit to welcome a friend back from China
-lunch with a long-distance friend (i miss you, watermel!)
-the CHURROS at the border coming back from TJ - wow, yummmmmy!
-a heart-warming phone call to the philippines
-my presentation at church about my china trip... i got so many encouraging remarks AND some people want to go with me this summer to work at the orphan camp!!! how exciting is that??

i can't believe i'm still alive...

the science fair was this week. what happened?
well, i learned a lot for next year:
- tell kids to label all project boards and props before bringing it to school
- tell kids to drop off everything in one location so that i don't have to be in 2 places at once. this year, i was *running* back and forth - i didn't sit or breathe till early evening!
- set up tables before the day of the event so that the burden is on the kids (and not me) to place things in the correct location
- tell kids: "NO MODEL VOLCANO PROJECTS!!"
- take a sick day after it's all over - what am i doing at work today?? i'm so exhausted...

seriously, if 5 angelic moms hadn't serendipitously shown up the afternoon before the event, i think i would've died. props to these women - mothers are fantastic... they were wearing high-end fashion and heels but took no issue to hauling tables all over the room, putting up the boards and props, and labeling everything.

we transformed the room from:
to this in 3 hours:

over 100 projects, organized by grade level... & the room looked even better that evening when it was packed with >250 happy people

there were some neat things that came out of the whole thing:
- a bunch of compliments about the success of the event
- parents who were impressed that kids are actually doing science (experiments w/ variables, data tables, etc)
- the joy of watching kids run around excitedly showing each other their favorite projects
- random new knowledge - like i didn't know that you can grow bacterial cultures on jello, did you?

this girl tested the cleanliness of the saliva in dogs, kids, and adults - she grew the cultures for a month and the results were nasty! =)

the aftermath...
- kids who had a lot of fun & felt good about themselves... & oddly, the cheesy certificates i gave out meant something to them - enough that 2 little girls came back to my room and lied about having worked with their brothers just so they could get a certificate
- me being proud of myself for pulling off such a large event. but boy, if i ever get married - can someone else plan the wedding??
- hours spent cleaning up the mess from those DARN MODEL VOLCANOS!!

one little boy's project almost got ruined by the red concoction of baking soda + vinegar that spilled out of the neighboring project onto his sprouts. his teacher, not knowing that the lump of wet dirt held living plants (she thought it was a rock), didn't give him permission to rinse out the contaminated water. he walked over to me and on the verge of tears, told me this was the worst science fair ever.

i took him and his sprouts to the water fountain and explained the misunderstanding - once he could tell that someone cared about him (and his plants), his voice stopped shaking. there was a moment there that could've squelched his interest in science because the things that were important to him were not important to others... and it was an incredible moment when i realized that i made a difference (he told me afterwards that he still loved science).

it was one of the first times all year that i was able to successfully resolve the conflict - what a great feeling!

in january, i said that this (conflict resolution) is an area of desired growth. recently, God seems to be trying to answer my request by letting me practice at it first hand (i.e. bringing more conflict into my life). i've learned some things:
- my first tactic is to avoid conflict (way more than i realized)
- and even when in the middle of it, i tend to walk away for a short time - i didn't realize how much space i needed to process things
- b/c my tendancy is to take all the blame onto myself, i'm actually learning little by little to articulate a more well-rounded picture of what i think happened

i hate conflict, but in some ways this is very good. how else am i to learn how to mediate the conflicts of others if i can't even address my own? so even in this, thank you, God. =)

Reediculous:

-i still have coughing fits from a virus that hit me 2 weeks ago! blah!

-i'm walking around like an old lady b/c my lower back HURTS - and the only explanation? did i cough so much/hard that i threw out my back? i think that might be it... arg! (hopefully it'll get better SOON b/c i'm doing labor-intensive volunteering the next 2 Saturdays!)

-while cleaning out my closet, i found a whole box of bags - an entire file folder box of plastic bags from target, gap, barnes... yes, i'm a packrat - but sometimes i surprise/disgust even myself! i threw the whole thing away...well, not the box and...okay, i kept a handful of bags for i don't know what reason but i just couldn't throw them all away. sheesh...

-speaking of which, i own and still wear underwear that i purchased in high school - is that too long? but i promise, no holes!

-i received a book this week (a gift) with this title: Getting Serious About Getting Married... eeeeek!

-why do i create so much work for myself? i made the 4th & 6th grade science fair projects mandatory - sooo not only do i have more to grade, i have to figure out how to fit ~100 projects into our multi-purpose room. why? oh dear... next week's going to be stressful

-i just finished listening to The Fellowship of the Ring in its entirety...15 tapes!

-the amount of energy needed to be a Wiggle is crazy. i sat through an entire live concert on dvd while babysitting tonight and i got tired just watching. i've always wanted to be a back-up dancer but maybe not for the wiggles.

-speaking of which (part 2), my mom *almost* reprimanded for babysitting on a Friday night instead of going on a date. haha...

-i still haven't planned my spring break yet! most likely, i'll just go home. but i have this beautiful $200 United voucher (b/c the movie during the flight to korea wasn't working properly - i know, pretty generous, eh?)...so where should i go w/ it?

thankful:

-i'm surrounded by wise girlfriends

-i love my co-workers (current and ex)

speaking of which (part 3), i feel very lucky that my co-workers share their lives w/ me. some have been quite open and vulnerable. part of the reason, i think, is that i'm extremely open. b/c i tend to be so vulnerable, they don't get the sense that i'd judge them (even knowing that i'm evangelical christian). and no matter what any of them have told me, i can't judge them b/c i've experienced failures too - different failures...& yet the same. but i definitely hurt for them and hope that God can use me to encourage them. and perhaps, just perhaps, they can meet Him too.