Making a list, checking it twice

Jamie and I have begun to create our guest list for the wedding. We have to go through all the people we know and decide if we can put them on the list. You would think that this would be fairly simple. Now I know how Santa Claus must feel every Christmas creating his list. It's not easy. We just don't have room to invite everyone. It would be much easier if we could just do a Naughty or Nice list.

The rest of the wedding stuff is progressing smoothly. We have a great place picked out for the ceremony. It's on a grassy hill right by a lake. Jamie is working on picking out colors for the wedding, trying to decide on her father-daughter dance song, picking out a wedding dress and all the hundreds of other things she does and right now my only job is to pick out the groomsmen. I'm a little overwhelmed by that.

I have RA dutying to do, passing out fliers, confronting people with issues, discussing alcohol, you know, the usual. But afterward I will get back to the really hard stuff of picking the guests. Santa, if you're reading this, keep up the hard work. I feel your anguish big guy.

Troubles in River City

For some reason I am unable to publish my latest post. That's why there hasn't been anything today so far. As soon as I can, I will have today's post up and readible. Until then, enjoy this little link. Have a great rest of the day.

Why do I have to be the bad cop?

I had to write up my first guy yesterday. That's the one thing I don't like about being an RA. I don't like policing the hall. I don't like the confrontation and I don't like the hurt feeling and I definitely don't like to see people get in trouble. But it had to be done. It was really disappointing. It was a guy I really like and it was hard for me to do, but it was alcohol related and I have to take a strong stand against that. My RD is gone for the weekend which means, in some sense, that I'm alone in this until he comes back (Res Life has been very supportive and so has my brother RA, but Ronnie is the one I would go to for advice on how to handle the situation). So I'm left to blaze my own trail on this one. I think I'm going to go talk to him today and tell him that what he did was wrong and very disappointing, but also remind him that I still love him and will continue to pray for him. Pray for God to give me wisdom as I deal with this situation. I have no idea what I'm doing.

(Just a little side note, I love that the cop on the right can barely keep the smile off of his face...)

The beginning of the beginning of the rest of our lives

Okay, so here's how the engagement thing went down. On Saturday, October 15th, Jamie and I went back home to visit our folks. We stopped at her house first and talked with her mom for a while before heading over to my house. Same thing. We hung out and talked to my folks for a little while. Around 3:30, I dropped Jame back off at her house and then I went back home to get started with the set up.

When my grandma arrived, we took everything over to the school and began to haul everything up the roof. This was very difficult. Most of the stuff was pretty heavy and the only way up was a tall ladder. We got everything up on the roof around 5 and then we left for AJ's to pick up some food. After we got the food, we brought that up to the roof too and then I left my mum and grandma to finish setting everything up while I went and got Jamie.

The whole afternoon my heart had been constantly racing, and it only got faster as I drove to her house. It's amazing she didn't know anything was up. We got back to my house around 6:30 and I suggested that we take a little walk. The sun had just gone down, so there was still some light left in sky. When I suggested that we go up to the roof of the school to look at the night sky, she quickly agreed. It took all of my effort to not run over there but to rather walk calmly and patiently.

When we got to the school, we found one of the gates open (imagine that) and then started to make our way over to the cafeteria. We saw a light on in the cafeteria so we paused to see if anybody was there. Just then, we saw my grandma through the window. Since Jame thought we were sneaking in, I pretended that we needed to leave because we didn't want anyone to know we were there. I made some comment about how it seemed weird that my grandma would be working so late on a Saturday night (My grandma does indeed work at the school so it wasn't too weird to see her working, it was just that it was late). I suggested that we keep walking around the neighborhood a little more and then come back and try again. Maybe my grandma was about to leave.

When we came back the second time, the lights were off and Grandma was gone. So we crept through the darkness to the cafeteria door, which had also been conveniently left unlocked. Once inside, we made our way to the ladder up to the roof and climbed up...

(More to come later on today I hope, but maybe tomorrow)

Rainy Tuesday

For those of you who live in Phoenix, enjoy a beautiful rainy day. Everyone else, well, you can have a good day too.

Jamie has got some new bling

In case you haven't heard yet, I asked Jamie to marry me on Saturday night. The proposal went perfectly thanks to tons of help from my mum, my grandma and Phatty. She said yes, praise God, so that made everything even better. The date has been set for May 13th, 2006. Wahoo. Maybe on Wednesday I'll write out the story of how it all happened. I've posted this pic before, but here's a pic of us, the future Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Ihms.

Button mashing, inconsiderate, no good jerk

So yeah. I decided not to talk about God's faithfulness in my life today. Don't be mad though. I haven't cancelled that post, I just thought it would fit better on Monday. If you disagree, wait 'till Monday's post and then leave a comment about how wrong I was to delay talking about how good God is to me.

Anyway, today's post has to do with being a good roommate. Sometimes I'm not. You see, last night my roommate came home from Campus Crusade over at ASU and waltzed into my room. Being the wonderful roommate that I am, I continued to mash buttons as I played a video game on my XBOX. I did manage a "Hey. How was it?" But for some odd reason, I was truly more interested in that video game than in my relationship with my roommate. Kinda pathetic. Jon sat down next to me and started to tell me about his night. I responded with the appropriate grunts and nods, but I wasn't really listening. It wasn't until later, as I lay in bed thinking, that I remembered some of the stuff he said. Whoah nelly. He and I are going to have a talk later today. I can tell you that. (It's a good talk. Don't worry). So anyway, Jon, if you ever read this, I'm sorry. I'm a jerk.


And on that happy note, have a great Thursday everyone.