Phone

To help prepare for Trinity being a full-time student, and going on one paycheck for a year, we are cutting bills, and the phone/internet/cable TV bundle had to go. We have switched to just internet, which means no home phone number anymore. Hopefully anyone who needs to call us already has our mobile numbers, but if you don't, just drop us a note here, or email, or somewhere else in the cyberspace. There are still plenty of ways to track us down!

This also means we are going without TV, at all. Right now we don't have one of those digital converters either, and a pretty old TV, so it is just going to be DVDs for a while. Maybe we'll even keep it that way, who knows. Notice this news is coming AFTER the Lost finale. There was no way I was cutting the TV off during Lost!! Now, I am moving on.

Support Access to Local, Healthy Food in Kansas City

Last week, the Planning and Zoning Committee held their second hearing on our proposed Urban Agriculture codes for the City of Kansas City, MO. They looked at two different proposed amendments, and heard testimony. The ordinance discussion and testimonies will continue:

Planning and Zoning Committee Hearing on Urban Ag

Wednesday, May 12, 1:30 pm

414 E. 12^th Street, either in the Council Chambers on the 10^th floor or in the Hearing Room on the 26^th floor (ask at the Info Desk when you get there)

We have heard and are recommending changes to the ordinance based on some very legitimate concerns, but what we see, on the ground, in Kansas City neighborhoods makes the option of on-site sales and green businesses/jobs a healthy, community building choice for the city.

Did you know that in Jackson County:

· There are nearly 37,000 low-income people who don’t have a car and for whom the nearest grocery store is more than a mile away?

· That more than 63% of adults in the metro area are overweight or obese?

· That 14% of preschoolers are already overweight?

There are too many neighborhoods in Kansas City where:

· Liquor stores and fast food joints are easier to find than a fresh carrot, head of lettuce, or home-grown tomato.

· The people who suffer disproportionately from diabetes, hypertension, and other diet-related diseases can’t easily follow the doctor’s orders to “eat more fruits and vegetables.”

In communities like these, the city ordinance that we have proposed which would allow a home gardener or someone running a garden micro-enterprise to sell fresh-grown produce to their neighbors could be an effective strategy to help people get access to healthy food.

If you think that Kansas City, MO needs to support this small step to increasing access to healthy foods, please:

1. Show up at the Planning & Zoning Committee Hearing on Wednesday, 1:30pm, at City Hall, 414. E 12^th Street. The hearing will be either on the 10^th floor in City Council Chambers, or on the 26^th floor, in the Hearing Room. (Stop in at the info desk in the lobby to ask.)

2. Email city_council@kcmo.org and tell them that you want them to support the ordinance because our city needs to support neighborhood-based access to healthy foods!

Kansas City needs to support healthy, lively communities where residents can grow food and feed their neighbors-

DHBC

Our friends at DHBC have been in the national news lately. I just wanted to take some space and say good work and godspeed. Keep up the good and important work I read about weekly in the email updates - the real work of ministry - rather than getting caught up in denominational politics like those throwing stones at you. Thanks for remembering that God has given us more important things to do than "defellowshipping" and excluding. There is enough of that in the world without churches doing it too.

I am especially glad to hear that Mimi will be attending the meeting at which you all are defellowshipped, saying: "I don't think it will change their minds, but hopefully it might inspire some women who are struggling in Southern Baptist churches." Thanks for being a pioneer Mimi, and thanks to our DHBC family for always supporting your ministry staff so courageously, past and present. Trinity and I are with you in spirit.

For our other blog readers, if you want to know what I'm talking about here are some of the news links:

ABC News National
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/baptists-planning-disown-church-female-pastor/story?id=10252735

Atlanta Journal and Constitution
http://www.ajc.com/news/atlanta/southern-baptists-may-cut-414925.html?cxtype=rss_news_81963

Fox 5 Atlanta
http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/dpp/news/woman-pastor-causes-stir-with-convention-032910

WSBTV ABC local
http://www.wsbtv.com/news/22992013/detail.html

Associated Baptist Press
http://www.abpnews.com/content/view/4954/53/

Baptist Today
http://www.johndpierce.com/2010/03/fundamentalism-continues-and-continues.html

Harvest Hill Community Garden at WJC

Announcing the Harvest Hill Community Garden at William Jewell College! Many folks here at Jewell along with some dedicated Liberty community partners have been working hard to organize the garden and applications are now being accepted. Find out more at http://harvesthill.ning.com/

Andy and I are planning our CJS plot - if your in the Liberty area, we hope you'll come to the Hill and join in the fun!

[Yes, I am in fact planning an additional plot up here at Jewell. I plan to make Andy do most of the work ;) ]

Quotes & Phrases

"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect."
-Mark Twain

Quotes & Phrases

I have a little notebook in which I have been writing quotes and phrases that inspire, encourage, or challenge me that I have kept and added to since college. Sometimes I have added to it more than others. I was thinking I would begin putting such quotes on here instead of only writing them in my little notebook. I hope you appreciate them as I do.


Here's one that caught my attention for the first time this morning while listening to a Bob Dylan record that I've had since high school:

"Well, I try my best
To be just like I am,
But everybody wants you
To be just like them.
...
I ain't gonna work on Maggie's farm no more."

--1965, "Maggie's Farm" by Bob Dylan

Guilty pleasure

I have a confession to make. Every once in a while on my way to work I stop and get "breakfast" from QuikTrip. Contrary to all of my food values, I don't know what it's really made of, or where it came from, or how it was "raised," "grown" or processed. But in my early morning stomach growling state sometimes on the commute to work, by the time I get to Liberty I have talked myself into stopping for my guilty pleasure of a reheated sausage & egg biscuit wrapped in paper. On a really bad day I add a chorizo burrito to my order.

And then I regret it for a couple hours after I scarf it down...

Two months later...

Well, it's been 2 months since our last post. Another busy stretch... On the good side a lot of the busy-ness has been seeing friends and family that usually only get to "see" us on here!

Since Nov. and Trinity's birthday here's what we've been up to:

• Thanksgiving celebrations with our families.
• Our so-far-annual return trip to Atlanta (Congrats to the Smalls for your new small one by the way!!!).
• We made some great progress in our never-ending bathroom project, and then put it back aside for more other busy-ness.
• Finals & final papers (Trinity taking them, and Tim grading them; not each others though).
• Christmas celebrations with families and friends.
• A mystery dinner theater with friends to ring in the New Year - I was the murderer, and I almost got away with it too!
• Trinity went to Phoenix for work, and then I left for 10 days in Honduras while she was gone (I don't think I'll be blogging much about that trip, but the whole team is adding photos and informative captions here: http://picasaweb.google.com/jeffbuscher58/HondurasJan10#).
• Thanks to Kate, Chris & Steph for taking care of Trinity and the dogs while I was gone for so long!
• Trinity had a clothing exchange at our house, and painted the kitchen cabinets.
• I returned from Honduras on a Thursday night and woke up less than 12 hours later to kick off our first CJS Summit at Jewell. We got to meet and spend the weekend with two of the authors of a favorite book of ours, The Better World Handbook.
• As soon as the Summit was over, we were both back to school again, and this semester is turning out to be our most intense yet, for both of us.
• I had a flashback of 2 years ago with a major, days-long headache. It was actually almost 2 years ago to the day, and it was so eerily similar we were really freaking out. It was time for a follow up MRI anyway, so I went in for that and I am happy to say the report says there is no evidence of a return tumor. That just means my major, days-long headache was something else, like maybe stress related or something... I don't know what I have to be stressed about!? Oh wait, maybe one whole month of non-stop work...
  
• I turned 29 years old and my friends all got me new vinyl records for our collection! Records are great headache prevention, so we have made sure to get our daily dose of the turntable ;) Sunday I listened to all the new ones at least once through, some more than once - which means I had a long and wonderful stretch of more than a few hours of prevention.
  
• The final season of LOST has begun... (yes, this is significant enough to make it onto my "what we've been up to" list!)
  

See, I told you we'd been busy! I think this weekend is looking pretty calm; hopefully we can keep it that way.

A Special Song from Gavin

I asked our almost 2 1/2 year old nephew, Gavin, to sing a song. This is what came out - priceless!

Birthday Gifts

So I turn 27 on Sunday, which sounds much older than I feel. I have been so busy with work and school that it seemed to just sneak up on me a little.

I share a birthday week with our friend, Andrew, so his wife, Kristen, and Tim decided to throw a joint birthday party. We went to this wonderful place called Harry's Country Club which is nothing like a country club. It's just a laid back and fun place - perfect for the "Andrew/Trinity Birthday Celebration". This gift of time and fun that my friends gave me was the best. I am so thankful for good friends. It has been a great 27th birthday so far!

My wonderful husband also got me a new digital camera for my birthday. My digital camera broke about 6 months ago and I have been missing taking pictures. I love looking back at pictures of the past as a way to remember then and see the difference time has made. So now a gift for you - pictures on the blog!! We are headed to Atlanta in a couple of weeks and I will be ready with the new camera!

First picture on the new camera - thanks Tim!

Andrew - makes me laugh and reminds me there is reason to hope

Kristen - helps me feel less crazy, more creative and peaceful


Melissa - someone you can always count on to be there

Erin - full of energy and joy


Jayson and Eric - new friends that are very thoughtful and so much fun!


Happy Birthday Andrew!