What do John, Hillary, and Obama have in common?

Messiah College. Our school has been chosen to host a Compassion Forum on April 13 and all three presidential candidates have been invited to share their views on subjects like AIDS, abortion, genocide, and poverty. For the complete details you can check http://www.messiah.edu/compassion_forum/.%20 It is quite an undertaking for our school, but very exciting. It will present Messiah to a National audience, now what Marketing and PR office doesn't want that? Many hours of preparation are ahead of so many people here at Messiah and many details are still being confirmed. I do know I can't get you a ticket or an autograph, my connections aren't that good. I'm sure more details will be coming. So check back often.

Easter

After enjoying a wonderful Easter service at church that truly was a celebration, we had a fabulous dinner at my mom and dad's house. My mom really is a "martha" wanna be too, even though she won't admit it. I love that she still likes to set a formal table with a beautiful centerpiece and make it special. Just look at these pictures, she goes all out. She's pretty cute.

I did have another one of "those" moments today though. I have always made little Easter baskets for the kids and hide them, they really don't appreciate that too much anymore. Garret has never really liked this tradition from the nursery school Easter egg hunt days. He used to just stand there a cry, he doesn't see the point of running to get an egg, it's just not worth it to him. So I think I'll wait until I have grandkids someday to revive this tradition. I hope you all had a blessed Easter.

Spring Things

I love Spring and all things Easter. After enjoying a wonderful Palm Sunday service at church and focusing on what this week means I feel excited that there are signs of new life everywhere. I saw 3 little blossoms on the forsythia bush at our house but I don't think my family was as excited as I was. I also made hot cross buns for the first time in my life. I was so proud of me. Growing up in a family of bakers and being the one that the gene has skipped, I think they turned out pretty good. My new goal is to try things that I haven't done before. So, since we always had these when I was growing up and feeling like they are just part of Easter, I said "Shoot, I can make these." ( But it's much better when my friend Rachel, who grew up in Amish country, says if in her ghetto voice, way funny!) I also made these adorable chick cupcakes compliments of Martha Stewart. You know how I am with chickens, so it only seemed right that I make these. I think they will be a new Easter tradition at my house too. I'm not sure I can eat them though, anything with eyes looking at me I have a hard time eating. But that's just me.

Fear of not having enough olives

I must have this. I was making dinner tonight and when I looked in my pantry, I saw 5 cans of black olives. I've been known to have more than that in my pantry. I do the same thing with chicken broth. I googled to see if there is some sort of phobia related to this, but couldn't find any. Guess that's a good thing. I did look up the definition, did you know about 4 and 5? I think they are just weird. I do know I do not wish to have the adjective of olive.

olive >noun 1 a small oval fruit with a hard stone and bitter flesh, green when unripe and bluish black when ripe. 2 the small evergreen tree which yields this fruit. 3 (also olive green) a grayish-green color like that of an unripe olive. 4 a slice of beef or veal made into a roll with stuffing inside and stewed. 5 a metal ring or fitting tightened under a threaded nut to form a seal. >adjective (of a person's complexion) yellowish brown; sallow. -ORIGIN Latin oliva, from Greek elaion 'oil'.

U2 can wear these

Ok, if you can get to an IMAX theater you have to go see U2 3D. Rich and I went yesterday and it was possibly the best $13 we've spent in a long time. You are literally right there for their concert. It's hard to describe, so go if you can. Rich decided he has missed his calling and should have been a rock star. Yeah, Bono is pretty cool, and I think he should run for president, I'd vote for him, and The Edge, his guitarist, could be vice president. I'm having a hard time deciding who to vote for, so I want to start a campaign for Bono. We also decided we need to get out more since we spent 20 minutes afterwards trying to find our car in the parking garage because we didn't bother to notice what level we parked on when we got there. Must have been too excited.

One final thing that occupied my day was Rich stating periodically that is was actually an hour later than it was since we had to turn the clocks forward for daylight saving time. Since we've been married, in the spring and fall he spends the day before day light saving time begins or ends either saying it's really and hour earlier or later.... sometimes it's kind of cute, sometimes not so much. Yesterday it was kind of cute.

Bulls Eye on a Bulls Eye

Look at this picture closely, Garret loves to practice bow hunting and has gotten really accurate and he is so accurate that he managed to shoot a second arrow into the first arrow that was in his target. I don't know about you, but I could never do that! I love the way my kids do this really out of the ordinary stuff and are so casual about it. I usually find out days after something has happened.

Garret leaves for baseball team camp at Wake Forest University in N.C. on Wednesday for 5 days of exciting scrimmages, Wake Forest baseball and basketball games, and fun with his team mates. What a great opportunity for the team.