Meet the Prices: Dad

This is Tom. He's my dad (and probably one of 6 readers of my blog). Yesterday was his birthday...he turned 55 (apparently that means he's up for some extra Senior Citizen discounts now). Happy Birthday Dad! Sorry I still haven't mailed your card...and I haven't thought of an appropriate gift. My dad is a no nonsense kind of guy. He doesn't really ask for anything and most of the time he doesn't think he needs anything.

No matter how many people I meet or how many opinions I hear, I think that my dad will always be the smartest person I know. I'm not trying to get any points, that's just how it is with dads and daughters. He's still my financial advisor and my car mechanic even though he's many miles away.

My dad has been one of the most influential people in my life. When I was seven, my dad had a radical life change which turned our whole family around. It was at the point that my dad truly began following Christ. He became involved in our church, started sharing his story, and living in a way that was totally different than what I had seen before. I would say that God used my dad to play a big part in leading me to Christ, because it was through his experience that I started asking questions and really learning what it meant to be a Christian. I accepted Christ pretty soon after that. Although that's not the only way that my dad has influenced my life, it's probably the most important.

Just wanted to say thanks Dad...and Happy Birthday (yesterday)...hopefully I'll get your card in the mail soon...and I love you!

Lessons from a Child

Last night, after what had seemed to me to be a long, hard day, I had to stop off and pick up a few things. It was raining and I had been driving in traffic for an hour. I pulled in the closest available spot which was at the end of the row and as I opened my door to step out, I sunk my entire foot and shoe into a deep puddle. I thought, that figures..."it's just been one of those days".

As I was shopping, a little girl around two or three years old caught my attention. She peeked around a corner to laugh and smile at me. I think she probably would have taken me up on a game of chase through the aisles of Target if I had played along. I laughed at her friendly innocence.

After I had made my purchases, I wandered back through the parking lot in the rainy drizzle looking for my car. (I can never remember where I park.) Finally, as I peeked around the corner and found my car, I saw the little girl again. She was splashing happily in that same puddle right next to my car.

And then it hit me...

Life isn't about our circumstances, it's all about our
attitudes.

Andrew's mom gave me a book for Christmas called, Lord, Change My Attitude: Before It's Too Late by James MacDonald. We all laughed about what she was trying to tell me by that. But seriously, from what I've read so far it's a great book (and very appropriate for me). One of the main principles I've taken away from the book is that...

We choose our attitudes.

The quote below is something that my dad has said to me for many years of my life, but I often have to be reminded of it's truth...even if it takes a child to show me.

"The remarkable thing is we have a choice everyday regarding the attitude we
will embrace for that day. We cannot change our past... we cannot change the
fact that people will act in a certain way. We cannot change the inevitable.
The only thing we can do is play on the one string we have, and that is
our attitude. I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% of how
I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes.”
-Charles R. Swindoll

I'm going to be an aunt!

In case you didn't know...about 2 months ago, I found out that I'm going to be an aunt. My brother and sis-in-law got married in October and are already working on adding to the family. He's my only sibling and I'm not married yet, so this is the first baby in the family for us. They're all going to be living in Haiti and will rarely visit the states, so this baby will probably be overwhelmed with gifts and attention whenever she comes stateside. Seriously, we just found out last week that she's a girl and I'm already wanting to load up my cart with little cuddly pink things at Target. I'm not going to try to buy her love, but I just want to be a cool aunt. I did a little google of the word "aunt" and found these images...so I'm using these images as my checklist for being a cool aunt. How do you measure up?

Nose Ring? Check!

Big Hair? Check!

Skilled with the rocking chair? Oh yeah!

Fabulous even when wearing an eye patch? No doubt.

Can cook a delicious breakfast and wears stylish scarves? Could not describe me better.

Jesus Jeans

While Andrew and I were on our lunch break today, we stopped by a Christian book store called Mardel's. This is a great store for Christian books, educational supplies, and apparently...Christian apparel.

As we walked through the store, we were talking about how cheesy most Christian T-shirts are. Exhibit A:

But then I rounded the corner and I found the Jesus Jeans (my name for them).

They're a product of the company "Not Of This World". In addition to jeans, they also manufacture Christian shoes, hats, wallets, and of course...T-shirts. NOTW has an edgier look than most Christian apparel, but seriously I'm not sure that wearing Jesus Jeans is what being "not of this world" is about.

Thoughts?

Minty Fresh

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about a desire to get serious about my financial life. I've been working on this lately and actually made a budget for myself the other night using some percentages from Dave Ramsey's book, More Than Enough. Then today I was introduced Mint.com. This website is AMAZING!



You can import all of your bank accounts, credit card accounts, investments, loans, etc. so you can keep up with all of it in one place. But...what's even better is that it helps your categorize your expeditures and let's you see where all your money is going. As you can tell, I'm pretty excited about this website and I just wanted to share my discovery. So check it out!

"Egging" it on

Let's just face it...I just have bad luck when it comes to cars and computers. Even though I love my car and have even given him a name (Hunter)...recently he's been giving me the most trouble. In the past year or so, I've experienced everything for totaling to towing with my

car(s), but recently I experienced something new...I got "egged".

The surprising thing is that it was complete strangers who decided to egg my car. I can't really explain the appeal of this random adolescent type of prank, but it did cost me $12 to get my car washed. $7 for the wash and $5 extra to scrub the egg off. As the short-statured Hispanic man held his nose while he scrubbed the side of car with a big brush, I decided it was worth the extra $5 not to have to clean it myself.

If you'd like to see and read more about my car adventures you can check out my photo album called A Tale of Two Tuscons.