7 Quick Takes Friday

**1**

Well, I finally finished reading the second Twilight book, New Moon, last night, and I gotta be honest, I just don't get the hype. I did like New Moon a little better than Twilight, but really, I don't think I am a new obsessed fan. I am torn, I want to find out what happens (really, I just want to know if Bella becomes a vampire, that's pretty much all I'm caring about at this point) and the youth group girls are all obsessed with the books, so I feel like I should keep reading. But there is part of me that is thinking, "really? Another 1000 pages or so of this??" We'll see. The other two books are on my new lists of books I'm determined to read this year, so I'll make it through them eventually but I am taking a quick break to read something else in the mean time! The new book on my list this week is The Wednesday Sisters by Meg Waite Clayton, which is the story of 5 women who meet at a park with their kids on Wednesday mornings and begin to write, sharing their love of books, words, storytelling and life. A novel about friendship, books, and writing? Definitely looks like a Sarah-book!

**2**

The only TV show I really watch regularly is Brothers & Sisters, which premieres for it's 4th season this Sunday night--VERY excited to see what is in store for the Walker family this fall!

**3**

One of the highlights for both my husband and I this week was the chance we had to spend almost an hour with one of our favorite professors, Chap Clark. Chap's the youth ministry prof I've been working for for the last couple years and will continue working for this coming year. We picked his brain about the discernment process, marriage, serving in ministry together, and told him a little bit about the vision we have for a future job we might want to do together to see his reaction (he loved it, he just told us it won't be handed to us, we'll have to work for it). He's a busy guy, and so to get so much of his time was great, he was very encouraging and gave us a lot to think about at the same time.

**4**

I have a confession. I think I might be in love with my new day planner. Which I know to some of you sounds ridiculous, but for someone who loves books, paper, writing, space for thoughts, well, I am kind of in love with it. I stumbled across it in Starbucks of all places, it's their 2009-2010 planner and I adore it. The color, the space layout, the extra pages for lists of things to do, favorite quotes, movies to see, books to read, people to remember to thank etc--yup, it had my name written all over it!
**5**

I gotta take just a minute to brag about my dear dad. About 2 years ago, he left his 25+ year career in the corporate world and decided, at the age of 53, to renew his nursing license that he hadn't used since 1981. He loved nursing and I think had always wanted to go back to the world of medicine. After landing a job as an ER nurse a year and a few months ago, he applied to a Nurse Practitioner program in Minneapolis and was accepted. So this fall he just started a full time NP program to earn that credential while still working almost full time as an ER nurse. Dad just celebrated his 55th birthday and is starting a second career essentially. Chuck and I think that's just phenomenal and so encouraging to see someone choose to do something amazing with the second half of their life. So after YEARS of hearing him tell Megan and I that he's proud of us and the learning we're doing, it's our turn to say--way to use the brain, skills, passions, and life God has given you to the full dad, we're proud of you!

**6**

Tonight at our church we're having a coffee house and concert to kick off the 125th anniversary weekend of the church. I was trained last night in how to run the espresso machines and make mochas, lattes, and all kinds of drinks. We're pretty excited, the group did a great job decorating last night and we're expecting a good crowd to turn out tonight!

**7**

I'm working on my application to work part time at a very cool bookstore/coffee house here in Pasadena, so I'll keep you posted on that front!