{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

• {worthy cause} Amazing Grace Home

Wish I could remember what this was...looks yummy!

2011

2010

Mother's Day at Macaroni Grill - Yum!

Click to Enlarge

What did you do last year on this day?

{Love from Littles} = Worth Being Late

Tonight I dashed out of work to get a 20 minute workout in (some circuit weights today), and then dashed to the bus to get there with few minutes to spare.

When I got home I threw some ground turkey with Mrs. Dash in the microwave for chili. (Not sure why I picked chili for dinner, but I had gone grocery shopping the day before and that's what sounded good when I was planning some menus.)

Anyway, while the meat was browning I jumped in the shower and before drying my hair I mixed up the chili. While the chili was simmering I dried my hair and finished getting ready. With no time to actually eat the chili, I tested it and turned off the burner before heading out to church.

Whew! I was a few minutes late to church, but I think it was worth it. As I walked in the door, I saw my foster-nephew, E, and one of his choir leaders walking down the hall from the bathroom. I was greeted with "Hi, Bekah!" in his cute-for-now-no-consonants.

I greeted him back, "Hi, E-!" and turned to go toward the auditorium. E and his leader kept on going to their classroom, but then I heard, "Hey!" So I turned around and E said, "Hey...[pause, pause]...I love you!" And before I could get out a reply, he repeated himself, "I love you!" Of course I said, "I love you!" back, and I think he said it one more time.

What a kid! It was cute to see him scrambling for something to say to me and extra cute that his go-to phrase was "I love you!"

By the way, my freezer is full of chili now. Guess I'm set for another 6 months before I need to make it again :)

Jess posted this pic on fb today - E(4), F(1), V(2)

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

2011

• {Happy Mother's Day}

What did you do last year on this day?

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

E & Jess at Morgen's Concert

2011

• {newsy notes} Part 2

What did you do last year on this day?

{Special Thanks} Cold Hands, Warm Heart

Yesterday was cold, but my heart was warmed by the 12 donors who gave to the Metro Women's Center's 4th Annual Amazing Grace Walk.

I just wanted to say Thank You to family and friends both near and far, co-workers, my boss, and my landlords.

All the donations were an encouragement to me and I know the money will be used for many good things. It's amazing what just 12 people can do!

God's doing a great work through the MWC. I'm glad I can be a part of this.

 

Thank You!

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

Me & Morgen

2011

• {newsy notes} part 1

What did you do last year on this day?

{Cold Walk} for Metro Women's Center

For just over a month I've been getting the word out about a walk I would be participating in to raise money for a WORTHY ~ CAUSE. With rain and cold in the weather predictions, it wasn't looking like it would be a good day for a walk. Thankfully it didn't rain during the walk, and we were able to add a few layers to try to stay warm -ish.

This year Morgen and Ethan joined me for the walk. They were troopers. I asked them a couple of times on the walk how they were doing, and at one point said, "You guys are slowing up. Are you doing okay?" They replied with, "No...you're slowing up!" and sprinted ahead. Yeah, that's the spirit!! :-)

From what I can see online $3,550 was raised before the event. At the event I saw many change-filled baby bottles brought in and people writing checks, so it looks to me like the event will be a success.

If you want to learn more about the Metro Women's Center and the Amazing Grace Home click here: http://metrowomenscenter.org/.

It's a tradition to take pics at the end of the walk!  

 Morgen and Ethan were troopers!

 Highlight of the event was getting your face painted!

We had to wait around for the clowns to return - they were gone when we got back from the walk - but Morgen said it was worth the wait. She got a flower and also asked them to make Ethan a sword. He wouldn't go near the clowns. At. All.

A big Thank You to those who have donated in the past and to those who donated this year! I am $25 from reaching my goal of $450, so if you were thinking about donating, please click the DONATE button on the left. 

UPDATE: I hit the publish button on this post and not 5 minutes later, I had an email from FirstGiving that a friend had made a donation which put me $50 over my goal! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!!!

If you weren't able to donate, there's always next year! But even if you can't do that, will you add Metro Women's Center to your prayer list? They do a lot of ministering to people on a daily basis and the staff and volunteers need God's strength to lift them up.

If you missed out on the event I hope you can join us next year! And if a mile is too far to walk, bring your bike! :)

God bless you!

UPDATE2: MWC posted some pics on facebook so I thought I'd share a few here:

click to enlarge

 

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

• {worthy cause} Amazing Grace Home

2011

Morgen, Carsten & Ethan

Click to Enlarge

2010

Eric was in the kitchen installing a new garbage disposal. Morgen & Ethan were playing kitchen in the next room. Carsten kept bringing Morgen tools after Eric would use them. Funny!

Click to Enlarge

What did you do last year on this day?

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

• After weekend parenting with Jess while Luke was in Boston for a wedding, I think I'm coming down with something. I went into work not feeling well. Told myself I would go in and work until I  processed the mail. Boss1 was out so there wasn't much going on except a mailing that I've been working on since last week. I left at 12:30, stopped for Jimmy Johns, came home and slept 3 hours. Took some cold medicine for my headache and stuffiness, but I think my nap helped for the general yucky feeling. 

2011

Hanging with Morgen

2010

2009

2008

• i know i haven't blogged in a few days

What did you do last year on this day?

{A BMW and Bears, Oh My!} Day Trip to Spooner

On Saturday I headed to Spooner for the day with two sisters and a niece. We went for a ladies luncheon at Mom and Dad's church.

The four hour drive to/from Spooner is not usually very exciting, but since Morgen got sick on the way we thought we had our share of adventure for the day.

Turns out there were quite a few sites worth mentioning. I was the driver, so I didn't get any pics and it would have been hard to anyway as we didn't really stop to enjoy the sites. Read through to the end - worth it!

• First up is the BMW we saw on the ice on a lake with a sign "Dunk the BMW"- apparently a contest...maybe guess the date it sinks...?

• A dozen or more bear statutes carved out of tree trunks also caught our attention. Must be a tourist gimmick. Tell me, who really needs a bear statute?!

• Oh, the bear cub crossing the highway definitely topped the bear statutes. The cub was cute and made it safely across. I can still hear myself exclaiming, "Bear! ...Bear! ...Bear!" as I was pointing him out on the side of the road. As we drove past I saw him in the rear view mirror get onto the highway and miss getting hit by any cars.

• And the stretch limo heading east. Wonder who was enjoying the ride?!

• A herd of deer in a field. Didn't know we were on a Midwestern safari!

• A jet streaking the clear skies made a big X.

• Then there was helicopter hovering above I-35.

• And lastly, the roof top of the fore mentioned BMW. Yep, by the time we were on our way home, it had sunk!

I don't recall such a site-filled trip to or from little ol' Spooner before. This was one for the books - or at least a blog post!  :-)

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{simply Write 20thirteen} Project Busy

 

One of my goals for the past few years has been to blog, or write, more. With that goal in mind I've come up with a theme for this year: Simply Write 20Thirteen. In honor of that theme, I'm attempting to have some writing sessions where I just write for a set time. I hope to share some of these sessions with you here on the ol' blog.

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4/24/13 9:30pm

I feel like most of my journal entries start out, "work was busy today" and I guess it's true, work is usually busy. I had a good day of work today - I was getting tasks accomplished and made progress on the client transition project. Progress, that is, until I found 8 households that weren't included on the original list. When I found those, I panicked and thought there could be more that I wasn't aware of. I bee-lined it to Boss1's office to tell him of my discovery and was met with laughter and "oh, yeah, I did move some households to [Advisor2] last year, but it wasn't very organized and didn't work like I planned, so I stopped." 

Just minutes before my discovery, I had faxed off about 10 change of rep forms each with lists of accounts to be changed. These forms had been created last week and had been waiting for me to finish putting the final touches to the lists. 

Now I would have to go through each of the discovered households, launch workflows, add each household's accounts to my master list, recreate forms, and then fax to however many companies that represented. I was a little blindsided and thrown off my game.

Fortunately, I was able to get it done before leaving after 6 tonight - no workout :(. Um, yeah, hadn't planned on working until 6, but once I get into something, I don't like to leave things half baked with crumbs all over my desk for the next day. 

(This project would usually be something I like, but it seems like there's a roller coaster drop at every turn that makes it seem endless. I'm trying to think positive so...at least I'm further along than I was at this point last week. I've had the project for maybe a month, but it took awhile to have time to ramp up and get it going. There were a lot of little pieces to pull together and I really wanted to get it right the first time since the last project like this turned ugly and is still not done. 

Last year I started processing change of rep for Phase 1 clients of a retiring advisor. While most of the changes are now done, I had to start the Phase 2 list before Phase 1 was complete. This really bugged my project senses. We are currently down to a handful of policies and accounts to be changed, but there's not clear direction on how to get the stragglers cleaned up. I've been trying to meet with Boss1 for several months and it's just never worked out. I have been chipping away at the list, but I don't feel confident in how it went down and would really like to not replicate the pattern in this new client transition project that I'm now in the middle of. I guess another positive is that I have some experience to draw from and hopefully can spot potential hazards before they become out of control.)

I do feel like I overreacted to the additional households I discovered, and I'd like to blame it on the long day/s I had/have had lately. Poor excuse.

What projects are you working on? Do you have any project management tips for me?


This has taken me over an hour to write and proof. I hope I get faster at this!

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

2011

• 25 Random Things
• God in My Life

2010

Sunday morning on my way to church.

2009

2008

My co-worker got married...I decorated her cube!

What did you do last year on this day?

{simply Write 20thirteen} 3500 Pennies

 

One of my goals for the past few years has been to blog, or write, more. With that goal in mind I've come up with a theme for this year: Simply Write 20Thirteen. In honor of that theme, I'm attempting to have some writing sessions where I just write for a set time. I hope to share some of these sessions with you here on the ol' blog.

NOTE: This happens to be a personal topic, but I think I need to record this for my own sake, and with humility I hope my sharing will be of some benefit to others.

4/3/13 @ 6:40 pm

Ever get the sinking feeling that you over-extended your checkbook? You know – the pit in your stomach when you realized you weren't going to make it to your next paycheck. And now that you're on guard, and reality is hitting, your thoughts go back about a week or more a month ago when you must have stopped subtracting and just threw caution to the wind.

You’re spend, spend, spend- attitude of days gone by was back. Why didn't you take stock last week or the week before?! Where was the line? You crossed it so far back, you are now grasping backwards – you know, when you reach so far back that you pull you’re your neck muscle…oh, it hurts so bad you know you’re going to feel it for a couple of hours, or days…

Well, this pulled neck muscle, is your bank account. That pit in your stomach? It’s not going away for another 12 days – until payday.

Last weekend I scheduled my last few student loan payments and was feeling pretty good about myself. I started this week off kind of bad though. I took a few minutes to review my accounts and got slammed with the reality of having spent almost the last penny in my checkbook. At this point there are still 3,500 pennies, but if I hadn't caught it when I did, there would have been more like negative 13,500 pennies.

This is where I’m thankful that I have two checking accounts plus three savings accounts. Now before you get all “ooh…she has multiple savings accounts…” on me...

My main checking account where my paychecks are deposited is where most of my bill paying occurs.

My second checking account is through INGDirect and is also where I set up my initial savings account. They have this cool feature where you can add accounts to use for designated funds. My designated savings accounts have changed names a couple of times in the past year (mostly because I took a couple of trips and purchased a car). The current names are Emergency Fund (I hope to start to grow this when I finish paying off my student loan and move it to a Roth IRA), Travel Fund, and Unplanned Expenses.

Thankfully, I had some funds at ING. Unfortunately the funds weren't as high as I would have preferred. With a little shuffling around to cover scheduled billpay items and no additional spending, I figured I would survive until my next paycheck.

4/3/2013 @ 9:33pm

I've been thinking about this since I stepped away for a couple of hours, and I know what happened last month. I got busy and my focus got a little skewed. This affected my decisions to not spend. Yes, some day-after-day-after-day decisions to just drive to work and pay for parking was costly: two and a half times my monthly budget for bus riding.

These decisions of convenience led to other convenience decisions. Can I blame the lack of focus on my busy-ness at work? I don’t think so.

Bottom line is that I had a plan, but I didn’t work the plan.

The next two weeks I will be on a strict, budget freeze. You could call it my personal sequester...


- - - - - - - UPDATE - - - - - - -


I realized today that I never posted this. Probably because it was my own mini-crisis and I didn't want to tell anyone, but you should know I survived to payday. I should not be so impressed with myself, but my non-use of a credit card during this time was a victory. I hope to remember this lesson for many, many months in the future.

Putting back the funds into my savings accounts is going to take some time. Oh, and that sinking feeling? yeah, that lasted right up until payday. I'm thankful to be working the plan once again.


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“A budget tells us what we can't afford, but it doesn't keep us from buying it.” –William Feather

{Spring Snow} or Be Gone Winter

We've been getting a snow storm each week for the past 3 weeks. Most Minnesotans are tired of the snow and begging for some real spring weather. I think we're going to get our wish this weekend, but first here are a few pics from my drive to the park 'n ride this morning.

 



When I got down town and hit the skyways, there were plenty of beautiful sites. This next one is my favorite.

 

Back to the drive to the park 'n ride...I had to back my in car in to one of the last open spaces which was right next to a snow pile.

 

After work I found my car a little cleaner: the snow had melted! I'm thinking there's hope for spring after all!!

 

 

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history.

2012

• Busy Monday at work, but manageable. Lindsay texted that she was making dinner and her mom was coming. I got home around 6:30 but Cheryl didn't get there until 7:45. I had time to shower, wash dishes and veg for a bit. Enjoyed Pierogis with spinach and feta inside and bacon and sour cream on top, green beans on the side. 

2011

If the barn needs paintin'

Click to Enlarge

2010

• open house

What did you do last year on this day?

{Deo Cantamus} YouTube Channel

If you missed our Spring concert, be sure to checkout the Deo Cantamus YouTube channel to see videos from this concert as well as past concerts.

2013 - Dad's in the front row, left.  Jen's in the front row, center. I'm in the 2nd row, right.

Here's one of my favorites - How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds - by Josh Bauder (from our church):



Here's the theme song - Our God is God - by Joseph Martin:

 

{7 Things to Know}

This week’s edition of 7 Things to Know...

1. I survived tax day. The end.
2. Jen, Jess, and I are singing with my mom at Spooner Baptist's Ladies Luncheon on Saturday, April 28th.
3. This past Thursday brought another April snow. I was grateful to get to leave work early and get a jump start on a long weekend. This snow was worse than the previous week. Everyone here is ready for winter to end.
4. I enjoyed a day off on Friday! Still shoveled my car off, but didn't have to go anywhere too early. Morgen and Ethan came over for lunch and we watched most of "Lady and the Tramp".  
5. As you know, I'm participating in the Metro Women's Center's 4th Annual Amazing Grace Home Walk on Saturday, May 4th. This is my 4th year to participate. Will you join me in supporting this great cause by donating $5, $10, $25, or even $100? Click the DONATE button to the left. T H A N K  Y O U ! If you want to follow my fundraising efforts go to http://www.firstgiving.com/fundraiser/bekah-flaming/4th-annual-amazing-grace-walkbike.
6. The big news of the week was the locating and killing/capturing of the two responsible for the Boston Marathon bombing. Since I was home on Friday I spent a good bit of time watching the news reporters speculate on the police activity of the day. It was interesting to see the events unfold before my eyes. I'm thankful that they were able to get the bad guys. Tough to hear about all the victims. Prayers continue for those families effected by this tragic event.
7. Yesterday I started and finished reading Karen Kingsbury's "The Chance". I wrote a mini-review at Good Reads.

Read and Returned! "The Chance" by Karen Kingsbury

Friday morning workout - snow shoveling.

All cleaned off! Now melt snow, melt!

 

Don't forget to DONATE! to Metro Women's Center's Amazing Grace Home

Make it a great week!

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history, plus pictures that I may not ever have posted.

2012

Plan for the week

2011

Selfie

2010

2009

Carsten :)

2008

• i know mistakes

What did you do last year on this day?

{A Year Ago} on Not the Last to Know

This day in {my} history, plus pictures that I may not ever have posted.

2012

Some new art arrived for the office.

2011

Disturbing ad on bus I followed into town - "We're really in love but not ready for a baby just yet."

Click to Enlarge

2010

• family fun
• weekend road trip

"Driving along in my automobile..."

2009

Shopping with Carsten

What did you do last year on this day?

{worthy cause} Amazing Grace Home

Donations are starting to come in! Thank you for donating!! 

4th Annual Amazing Grace Walk/Bike

Saturday, May 4th, 9 am

Clifton E. French Park

If you can walk, come join us! 

If you can donate, please click the DONATE button on the left.

Thank YOU!

Carsten, Ethan, & me at 2012 Amazing Grace Home Walk

See you at the park!