Sunday Stealing!

I'm joining up with Sunday Stealing!

1. Who is your best friend and why? What do you like to do together? I know that many of you who are married will say that your spouse is your best friend. Mark is a wonderful husband and we’ve been married almost 40 years, and we enjoy doing things together BUT we enjoy LOTS of different things. I have shared before how Mark and I are blessed to have a strong friend group and we are remarkably close with several couples. BUT I have one friend who is extra special to me. I know that I can share anything with her, and she won’t tell. If something is wrong, I know she will want to help me.

2. What is your town like? What are your favorite places to go? We live in a city – a suburb. There are over 92,000 people in our city. We have great shopping, lots of restaurants, and we live next to several other good smaller cities. I work in one of those smaller cities and there are under 30,000 people. We love to try new restaurants! Birmingham is the original “largest city” in Alabama, and we live just a short drive away and can attend concerts and plays and go to the zoo or the Museum of Art.

3. What is your favorite meal? Where and when do you eat it? I love to cook BUT I want to say that my favorite meal is one someone else cooks hahaha! Seriously though, my favorite meals are usually as much about people – who is at the table – than the food. One of my favorite meals is Thanksgiving – Turkey and dressing and gravy and all of the other sides.

4. What is your job like? What do you like about it? I am one of those rare people who loves her job. I am the assistant to the senior pastor at a United Methodist Church of 3400 +/- members. My job includes all sorts of things from scheduling appointments for him and keeping his calendar in order to scheduling baptisms and weddings and funerals. I’m also the staff member who oversees our Welcome Desk and helps with visitors and new members. I teach a large adult Sunday School class and Mark and I facilitate (and cook for) a group of young professionals every Tuesday night. One of my favorite parts of the job is probably the fact that I’ve been able to help with several group trips out of the country. My second favorite part is the people with whom I work. I sure do love them. My third favorite would be that I am able to talk with people at some major points in their lives – like those weddings, baptisms, and the loss of a loved one.

5. What is your favorite place to go on vacation? We love the Alabama gulf coast. We have white sandy beaches and gorgeous water. We’ve spent many a family (and even couple) vacations there. We came across these photos just last week and I took a picture of the picture so not great quality! I also love travelling internationally and hope to be able to do even more!

6. What country would you like to visit one day? We would love to go to Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, back to Ireland, I would like to go to Spain.

7. What bores you the most? A golf game on TV is a snoozer for me!

8. What are you looking forward to this summer? I love the longer days of sunlight! I hope to go to our neighborhood pool more often this year.

9. What is your favorite film? Film sounds fancy! Are we talking about movies? I’m horrible at favorites – I love Pretty Woman. I guess my honest answer might be my favorite movie is whatever I’m watching. I watched “It’s Complicated” last week when Mark was out of town and it was entertaining.

10. Do you sing in the shower? Rarely

11. What is the best gift you’ve ever received? The most thoughtful gift was the camera attachment to my computer YEARS ago before there was any kind of video chat like Zoom or Facetime. Mark not only bought it for me but bought the corresponding portion and sent it to my sister in Texas. Technology was not what it is today, so we didn’t use it often because there was such a delay to our voices. Turning in a different direction, I think our kids have been two of the greatest gifts in my life. As I mentioned earlier, we have such a good friend group and I feel like they are all gifts.

12. Do you prefer being indoors or outdoors? Mark would answer that before I could formulate my answer. He is an outdoor person and I’m an indoor person. Part of my reason for being an indoor person is my allergies. When you are allergic to almost every tree and grass and your ENT tells you that even though you’ve been undergoing allergy treatments since you were 23 years old and you are still having to take shots . . . .and you are one of the rare ones who will always have to take shots. . . outdoors is not always your friend. I do actually love to be outside if I’m dressed in clothes where sweat doesn’t matter!! This is Alabama. It was high in the high 80’s yesterday with high humidity.

13. When was the last time you cried, and why? I don’t like to cry especially in front of people. I did tear up during the last Frasier episode we watched a week or so ago. I also teared up at a recent funeral. I sometimes tear up but don’t actually cry much.

14. What do you keep in your bag or handbag? I keep too much crap in my purse! My grandmother called them “pocket books” – must be a southern thing?? I have a wallet and an epi pen and my phone and lipstick and an inhaler (remember those allergies I just talked about?). My purse always weighs too much and kills my shoulder. I purchase the lightest weight purses I can find because I’m going to fill it up.

15. Can you play a musical instrument? I cannot play any instrument and I wish I had learned. I took guitar lessons for a short while.