We need your two cents !!

Help us pick out a new dining table!!

Justin and I are in need of a new dining table. I have been on the look out to find the perfect table. I recently found three tables, I showed them to Justin. He liked all three. This is the reason for the post. Below are the three tables that we both like. Please vote and tell us which one you like the best. Thanks for your help.

Table One:


Table Two:
Table Three:
Please help us pick out new dining room table!!

There is something wrong with the poll. If you would like to leave a comment please do. I am working on finding another poll.

Thanks

Early Morning Visitor

This is going to be a short post, but I just had to tell my blog followers what our cute Jack did yesterday morning. Every morning, we let Jack out in the backyard so he can play and take care of his business. We don't really worry about him when he is back there because normally the door is open for him to come back in. Well, yesterday Justin let him out like we do everyday and went about our business. While Justin was getting ready, he heard a scratch at the FRONT door. When he opened the door Jack was just sitting there. One of the side gates in the backyard was open and Jack got out. We are very glad that Jack decided to come to the front door instead of running off which is what he does when we let him out in the front yard. When Justin told me what he did I knew I had to share this with others. Look how cute he is just waiting for us to let him back into the house.

We made him stay outside so we could get a picture.

Walking In Memphis!!

Last week was Spring Break at MC. We still had to come to work, but it was a very slow week without the students. I was able to get a lot of work done! Since we still had to work during Spring Break the college was so kind and gave us Friday off.

So Friday Justin and I went to Memphis with my parents for a day trip. My mom really wanted to go eat lunch at Neely's BBQ. I am not the biggest fan of BBQ but I thought it would be cool to eat at a restaurant that was owned by Food Network stars. I have to say that the food was not the best and the place was not at all what I thought or hoped it would be. But at least I can now say that I have eaten at Neely's BBQ.

After lunch we did a little shopping. My mom and I love shopping but Justin and my dad are not the biggest fans so we only went to Pottery Barn and William Sonoma outlets. I could have spent hours and lot of money at both of those stores. Once the guys had had enough shopping time, we went downtown. When in Memphis, you must go see the ducks at the Peabody Hotel. Yes, I know that it is not the coolest thing to see but it is just fun to hear the story about the ducks and watch them swim around the fountain. I was shocked at the crowd of people that gather to watch the ducks. I tried to get close to get some good pictures but I didn't have much luck.


We had a good time walking around Memphis and seeing the mighty Mississippi River. We were heading to the car getting ready to leave when my mom saw a carriage and wanted to take a ride. So all four of us piled into the carriage lead by "Prince" the horse. Our driver was very knowledgeable about Memphis. It was a fun to ride the street in a carriage. I think that was my first carriage ride.

We had a great time in Memphis. Next time we go back to Memphis I would like to go to Graceland. I am not a big fan of Elvis but I really want to tour Graceland. So next time that is where I will be going.

Shine 2010

Two weeks ago our small group participated in a service day for the city of Jackson. At first our group was assigned to pick up trash. The street was fairly clean so our great leader got us assigned to another another street. As we started walking down this street we came upon a empty lot. This lot was full of trash, mostly empty bottles and car parts. We fill up about 8 trash bags of bottles. During this time one of our small group members fell victim to a thorn bush, taking a scratch or two to the forehead. This little mishap would have stopped most people, but not Beth. She just wiped it off and keep going.

After we cleaned out the empty lot we moved on to walk the street and pick up trash. We found much more trash on this street than we did on the first street. Once we finished with the second street, we all went to get some lunch together and rested before we set out on our third assignment, which was helping at an local elementary school.

The guys really liked this!!

At this site we shoveled piles of dirt into wheelbarrows that was then dumped into tire ruts along the road. Our group got working as soon as we got there. Some of us shoveled, other transported the dirt to the ruts, while others smoothed out the dirt over the ruts. It was a great team effort.


We all had a great time serving the Lord and the people of Jackson.

An Epiphany

This is Justin (I have to say that because normally Sally writes on here).

So, I used to have this blog - thedoulosproject.org - where I would post all kinds of thoughts about all kinds of things (typically spiritual things). I did a good job of actually posting pretty regularly...at least once every other day or so, probably for almost a year. Then it kinda faded away and I got out of the habit.

Well, I don't necessarily have any intentions of getting back in the habit, but there was something I thought about earlier today that I wanted to post here, not just to tell everyone who visits this site, but to remind myself. So, here goes...

I'm not really sure how I thought about this (what train of thought led me to it, that is), so there's not really any sort of introduction to this. What I thought about was this: the less you tangibly experience God in your daily life, the more you will be distanced from Him. I don't necessarily have any sort of scripture from which that though was derived, but I still do think that it is Biblical in a sense. If you are not partaking in the work of God regularly, then you will find yourself further and further from Him.

Let me define two phrases I have already used to avoid confusion. First, by "work of God", I mean doing the actual Biblical things that he has told us to do. Serve others, be kind towards other, share the good news about Jesus, love your enemies. Now, there are a lot of things that many of us might consider to be the work of God, but it isn't really. For instance, I play guitar at my church in the worship band. Yes, that is spiritual and yes, it is a good thing. But I don't really believe it is the work of God that He has explicitly called us to do. By that I do not mean that He did not call me to do it, but if you read the Bible you will find a bunch of verses about the previous things I mentioned and little to none about standing up in front of a few people once a week strumming an instrument. I don't say that to belittle that task of leading worship. I love it and totally enjoy it. I just think that there are many other things that he has explicitly called us to in Scripture that probably have a much bigger impact on his kingdom.

Definition two: when I say "distancing yourself from God", I obviously don't mean literally distancing yourself. Not even really spiritually distancing yourself. It's more of a figurative distance. And what I mean is that your relationship with Him will not be fresh, active, vibrant, and full of life. It will feel as though God is more of a thought, an idea, or something abstract because, in actuality, that is what He is in your mind when He is not active in your life.

I say all of this mostly because I am speaking to myself. I find myself in danger of letting God become more of an idea or theory than a person. It may even be a powerful, glorious, beautiful idea, but it's still an idea. And that is useless. We (I) must actively seek to join in the work that He is doing all around us by speaking of Him and doing what He has told us to do.

I could probably write a whole lot more on this right now, but it's late (yes, 10:15 is late for me these days) and I'm pretty tired. Maybe there will be a part two one day.

Oh, and forgive any grammatical errors. I usually make them, and I don't really feel like proofreading this now.