Silence again

My how easy it can be to get lost in silence in my world. Oh, I'm not talking about the kids actually being silent so I can put two thoughts together. I'm talking about loosing my voice and finding it hard to write...here specifically.

I all of the sudden have great sympathy of those who may have suffered from writer's block at any point. I may not be trying to write the next best seller, but it can be so frustrating to loose your voice (writing voice that is).

I have been lost in my own thoughts these past weeks. There has been busyness around me and things that need my attention, but when given a moment, just one solitude moment, I am lost in thought.

One of my closest friends is walking into a wonderful time in her life. She is uplifting to hear. She is excited, on fire and willing for whatever God is bringing her. Her heart is open. Her mind is bubbling over with joy. She is absolutely a fantastic person to be near. She is a light shining with God's love and promises. I thank God I get to walk next to her as she finds everything God has in store, revels in His blessings and shares His plan for her.

It certainly is what my soul needed. As I told her the other day, I don't believe I'm no longer walking forward in my "calling", I just happen to be on a plateau. At this moment, I'm not heading up the mountain but I'm still moving. It just seems like it has been too long on this plateau. In fact, while I stand here, I can honestly say it certainly isn't where I thought I would be right now...and that my friends, is super frustrating.

I was loosing the vision. It felt dark in my world. My "calling" felt shut down and turned off. I have been tired of moving forward without feeling like I was making progress.

Change in perspective. 

That was my friend's words for her story. I heard them. It resonated. Then I heard them again and again and again.

My "calling" is not what I expected it would be. Hmmm. Think just for one moment and let me write that again. It is not what I expected. Yep...I heard that God. I got it. Your plan is perfect for me. You have it under control. My expectations are just that...mine. What you have in store is so much better.

So today, as I am lost in thought, I will think on this, "Change in perspective." I'm not sure what my friend's story will bring. I know God has some awesome things in store for her and I will pray over her as she walks in this. But for today, she has certainly already affected me. I am changed. I am changing my perspective. It's not my plan for my calling in which I am walking but His plan. That was the perspective change I needed today.

Thanks as always for listening. I hope I will find my words again soon, so I can elaborate what I mean by all of this...

Disconnect

This week past week was rough on my town. Waldo Canyon Fire created havoc in our town. Many were left homeless and still many are not back home. 346 homes were destroyed in our town in one evening. With that said, 14,000 homes were miraculously saved by our wonderful firefighters.

All of this has caused our town to grieve. We have pulled together but there has been an acknowledgement that we are a town in crisis. We are all experiencing this together. There have been references to what we learned from 9/11. We don't let our kids sit in front of the TV for hours on end hearing every last update on the fire. We realize we are all in shock and hurting. We realize this has hit too many families. There have been many that have come out in force to help.

Disconnect.

I am sitting in disconnect right now.

My life has not been forever changed by a fire ravaging my home. My things are safe. My family is safe. My friends are safe.

I woke up this morning and realized calm has come over our city again. People are relaxing. Fire isn't the only thing about which we all talk.

There are countless stories raising from the ashes that warm the heart and bring thanks to God. There are people going above and beyond to help. Somehow...that all feels so distant.

We have given what we can to the relief organizations. My kids and I have cleaned out closets for clothing donations. We, as a family, sacrificed time with my hubby so he could work late nights to help evacuees with their cars. We prepared our home for evacuees but it was not needed.

It is starting to already feel like a distant smoky memory on the mountain. I can see it...but it is in the distance.

I have started to go back to "normal" life and prepare for vacation. I can't wait to spend an entire week in the mountains with my family, extended family, friends and family friends. It's certainly what my soul needs. No electricity. No running water. No cell phones or electronics. A cabin. My family. Coolers and gear. Simple.

The strangeness that came over this city with the fire is still here. It will be here for a while. There is a bit of disconnect knowing that this has happened but yet not really being in the thick of it. My community will be forever changed.

I'm not sure what or why I'm writing this. This isn't what I set out to write but these are the words that came. I hope to be apart of the rebuilding of our community in any way I can. I pray over the many that are in the thick of it. I pray we continue to stand together as we have so far. I pray for things word cannot express right now but in all of it, I pray for God's will.

Bummer of a birthday...can you help me?

So today is my birthday. I am once again turning 28 years young...and will always be 28! My 28th birthday was possibly my best birthday and turned into one of the most defining years of my life thus far. Since then, birthdays have just come and gone. I am not a big birthday person. I do love a party and seeing friends and family but birthdays are just a marker to pass time in my life.

This year, I made absolutely no plans for this special day. I was thinking I might have a special dinner with my hubby and the girls and that's it. Then the week before this birthday was a doozy to say the least.

First, earlier last week, our best friend was in a motorcycle accident. He's okay now but he did have major surgery to fix a broken left femur and broken collar bone. I spent a lot of time at the hospital with his fiancé one of my best friends. She had sat with me years before in the hospital with my late husband. It brought back a lot of memories...some good and some sad. It was a rough week. He is out of the hospital and I just got off the phone with him. I know they have a long trek but he's on the mend. Please pray for them if you think of it. They have months of recovery ahead and hope to have him walking down the aisle to marry his beautiful bride in just under 2 months.

Then Saturday hit and the Waldo Canyon fire was endangering our city. I watched the smoke roll in as I sat at the hospital visiting on Saturday. Obviously a lot has changed since Saturday. It was a forest fire and turned on our city. Many loved ones are evacuated or on pre-evacuation status. Some have lost homes. Some we not able to get to their homes in time and all their possessions and some animals were left behind. Life looked gloomy on Tuesday.

BUT, I just want to say how proud I am of my community. We have joined together and everyone is giving a lot! It's amazing.

This morning, however, I woke up and allowed myself to cry for the first time since the fire happened. If you know me, you know I don't like to cry a lot. I am the strong one. You may also know that I will, in a quiet moment, give into that pain and take time to just let it out. Strange that the day I got there was the morning of my birthday. All I could think is how can I make this a good day.

This is what I want...

I want to donate my birthday to the Waldo Canyon Fire. 

Here's how:

I would love to hear stories from everyone about ways they are helping this community. If you are doing something, have done something or want to do something, will you consider sharing your story with me for my birthday?

I want to hear stories about all types of things. Such as:

• Financial give to Care & Share or The Red Cross
• This is a great way for my out of town friends and family to help this community
• Donating items or time to charities
• Goodwill is taking donations
• Care & Share is taking food at their location as well as the World Arena & Walgreens locations
• Praying in a city wide gathering joining with the community
• Many local churches are hosting pray meetings around town
• Taking in evacuees
• I have heard about some going as far as Littleton and Pueblo
• Preparing to take in evacuees
• Helping local evacuation efforts at the 4 Shelters in town
• Catholic Charities was looking for breakfast items to feed people at Cheyenne Mountain HS as well as volunteers.
• Give some relief to families of the firefighters you may know
• Take a meal
• Make a play date for kids
• Just don't show up at the fire station to donate (that doesn't help them)
• Be creative and find little ways to help in any way you can!
• Have fun and share your stories!

Take pictures and share with me all your stories. I would love a day or week full of stories about how people are reaching out to this amazing community.

You can email me at morrisonmail999@gmail.com or share on my FB page or in a private FB message. You can comment on this page (just know that comments are moderated by me so they don't appear right away).

I would love to compile stories and share a blog in the future of all the ways people have giving to this amazing community. 

Please join me and celebrating my birthday by finding a way to give back! It would be the most amazing gift and might just turn this bummer of a birthday into the best birthday ever!

Wildfire in my hometown: Info & Evacuation Checklist

Information on the Waldo Canyon Fire in Colorado Springs...

I have had many people contact me to see if we're okay, so I just want to start this blog with: WE ARE OKAY!

Saturday a wildfire started in the Colorado Springs area. That day, the wind moved the smoke thickly into the city and breathing conditions were not good. We could see flames in the mountains for many days. For many days, there were not structures lost. Yesterday (Tuesday) the fire rapidly moved into the city requiring 32,000 people to be evacuated. Many structures were lost and the evacuation looked like those "end of the world" movie scenes. Traffic was stopped in all directions. People had their vehicles filled with their essentials. The air was thick with smoke.

This picture is all over FB...I hope that guy is evacuating.

Currently we live outside the evacuation zone and safely outside of the evacuation zone. The fire is in the Northwest side of town. We live in the Northeast side of town. There are three major north/south roads between us and the fire: I-25, N. Academy, and N. Union.

With that said, the fire is relatively close. The evacuation zone is currently 5.6 miles from our home. Ryan works one block outside the evacuation zone. The fire (by road) is 8 miles from our home.

Woodmen Road is at the NE of the map. We are 5.6 miles from that point.

The major concern for our family is the smoke, as it is for all residents of Colorado Springs. Haley and I do have asthma. Until this week, I general only use my inhaler once every other month. I have finished one inhaler, have a back up inhaler and currently trying to fill my prescription. There seems to be a shortage being this has brought on breathing issues for many. Haley & Megan were out of town until yesterday so as of yet, Haley is breathing good.

The recommendation from the health department is to stay indoors, do not exercise outside, close windows & doors, use air conditioners and recirculate the air in vehicles. If you do not have AC, they suggest finding refuge in Malls, Libraries or a friend's home. Many do not have AC in Colorado Springs. We do have AC, but it does not work well. We have record high temperatures which do not help the fire either. Our plan is to find refuge with family that does have working AC today.

To the local Colorado Springs Friends:

Our home is available to evacuees. We have many beds to share. If you need to park a camper or trailer in front of our home you are welcome to do so.

To prepare for pre-evacuation:

 Last night we discussed our evacuation plan. I thought I would share it. Please feel free to comment on other things that could be helpful in this time.

Our family has a meeting point. During the evacuation yesterday, phone lines were jammed and text messages were not getting through. We have plan A, B, C. The first meet up place is our closest family's home, but because they are so close, they could be apart of the same evacuation zone. The second place is the next closest family's home. The third is a church far enough east that there will not likely be in a evacuation zone. During the evacuation they do not want people using cell phones unless it is an emergency so having a meeting point is crucial.

Prioritize Evacuation Checklist:

It is recommended that these items be kept inside the home. Do not load your car being you run the risk of it being broken into.

• Register your cell phone with reverse 911 at http://www.elpasoteller911.org/
• Photograph or Video the home. 
• Open cupboards and draws and move things to photograph as many things as possible. 
• Bookshelves, hutches and storage benches, tool boxes, and medicine cabinets.
• Don't forget storage rooms, items under beds and closets. 
• TAKE CAMERA WITH YOU
• Think about uploading your photos or video to an online, secure storage such as photobucket or youtube. You can post a video on youtube or photos online with a password as a private file.
• Inventory & photograph high value items:
• Sterling Silverware
• China
• Jewelry
• Tool
• Guns
• Furs
• Pack Photos & Legacy items and recipes that CANNOT be replace by insurance.
• Important family documents:
• Insurance documents
• Car Titles, Mariage Certificate, Birth Certificates, SS Cards, Passports, Banking & Investment statements (with value & account information)
• Wills, estate documents, Power of Attorney, Custodial paperwork
• Laptop and/or CPU (User IDs & Passwords for different website)
• Back up all computers before moving anything
• Pack:
• Cell phones & chargers
• Medicine (don't forget over-the-counter meds)
• Pet supplies (collar, leash, muzzle, ID, food, carrier, bowls, bed & even a toy)
• Clothing (3 days worth)
• Comfortable Shoes
• Children's comfort items
• Games/activities for kids (a few movies to play on laptops)
• Have all car & house keys near the front door
• Jewelry
• Guns & Ammo

*If you have evacuated, please register with Red Cross that you are safe & well at: https://safeandwell.communityos.org/cms/index.php

To our family and friends...

With all that said, we are well outside the evacuation zone. We, however, are being prepared and understand that with the hot temperatures around 100° F and humidity below 15%, this fire has the potential of being very dangerous and move very quickly.

If anything changes with our status, I will update FB and hopefully be able to blog.

How to Pray...

Pray for:

• RAIN
• Safety of our firefighters and forest workers
• More reinforcements for other cities and states to provide relief for our firefighters 
• Police reinforcements for evacuated areas as well as help for possible future evacuating
• All locals being breathing conditions are so poor
• Evacuees that they find safe refuge for themselves and their pets

Planes dropping slurry on the fire.

How to Help...

Locals: please remember DO NOT DONATE at the fire command or at the evacuation centers. Public safety concerns prevent those locations from taking donation.

RED CROSS:

To contact the local Red Cross, call 719.632.3563. Monetary donation can be made online at: httpL//www.redcross.org

CARE AND SHARE:

Monetary donations can also be made to Care and Share at: http://careandshare.org/. Food donation will be taken at Care and Share at their facility at 2605 Preamble Point until Friday, June 29 from 7 am - 6 pm then on July 2nd donation can be made from 8 am - 4 pm. Walgreens is partnering and are also taking donations. Care and share is also looking for volunteers, please contact Isaac Ring, Volunteer Manager at 719.528.1247 x4604. They are inundated with calls and they stated their VM box is full. Be patient and call again later. DO NOT just show up.

GOODWILL:

Donations can be taken to all locations.

Offering Assistance:

Those wanting to offer assistance can visit: http://www.helpcoloradonow.org, http://www.redcross.org or http://www.tsacs.org/registertoring

Sun burned baby

Yesterday, the girls and I spend the afternoon in the pool. I found a nice shady spot to set my chair and the girls jumped in the pool. Every hour, (10 minutes to the hour), the life guards blow the whistle for adult swim. During this time, the girls eat a snack, get some water, go the bathroom and usually put on more sun screen.

Well, Haley didn't put on sun screen when her sisters did. She had beautiful olive skin like mine and until yesterday, had never had a sun burn. At 11 years old, she got her very first sunburn. She was pink on her arms and cheeks. She didn't want to eat dinner last night. She sighed and moaned a thousand times while we watched TV. She says last night to her sisters (who have lived through their fair share of burns), "I don't know how you do this."

Her sisters have had worse burns but this is pretty bad for the 1st burn in your life.

This one shows the burn a bit better.

Poor thing...and oh to the poor mama that has to listen to her whine all day. I hope this is a LESSON LEARNED. I think she'll be putting sun screen on EVERY time the whistle blows all summer long!

I'm still here

So I know back in May I posted that I was signing off of Facebook and saying goodbye. I was being forced to have Timeline and was not a fan.

Well...if you haven't looked, I didn't deactivate. I really just did nothing about it. I took another break from being on Facebook and reevaluated the situation. There are several reasons why I was going to deactivate. My Facebook is more than just my closest friends and family. I really have used it as a social network and have friends, family, friends of family, and those people I knew once upon a time as well as business and school acquaintances and church networks. The truth is it is just impossible to be close with 509 "friends".

I tossed around opening a new Facebook account that was blank. I thought about going through and hiding old posts (I made it through 2008 & most of 2009 and gave up on that venture). I thought about just being done with Facebook.

In the end, my husband (who by the way is not a fan of Facebook at all) and my best friend (who deserted me to move to Texas...I love you Beth), changed my mind. They decided to point out all the pros and discredit all my cons.

In the end, I decided that I have always approached my blog and Facebook the same way. I have always been transparent on both. I do not post inappropriate status messages or pictures. I do not blog about inappropriate things. I have always just been me and let the world see it. With that in mind, I really had nothing of which to be ashamed so no need to "hide" my past from the world.

I also like being able to network and keep up on those I have known, do know and want to know better. If you really don't know me that well, know this...I hate phones! I really am not good at phone calls. I keep up with a few close to me, but other than that, I don't keep up with people on phones. I like personal contact, face to face meetings and one on one time. Facebook gives me the ability to make contact (not on the phone) to invite people to lunch or coffee. Facebook also gives me the ability to keep people up to date without making a million phone calls.

Okay...lots of blah, blah, blah to say I still have a Facebook account. I'm still here. I just took a little break. I really do care about ALL of the people on my Facebook. I know that's hard to believe, but I do. Thanks so much to the many, many people who have encouraged me while I was making this decision and to the dozens who keep encouraging me to blog. The writer's heart that my mom instilled in me at a young age is still here and believe me, I'm going to keep on writing (even if no one reads a single word).

He called me to do what?

That's how I felt about this time last year. I just wanted to have a direct phone call with God. All I kept thinking is "He called me to do what?"

Just about a year ago, God clearly called our family away from the church we had been attending for almost 8 years. It was the only church my girls knew. I was the church I landed in as a "grown up". I was the church all my friends attend. I was all I really knew as well.

As God prepared us for this move, He started to pull me out of all the things in which I was involved. He started quieting my time. In that quiet, I heard Him clearly. I watched how those changes affected my life. As I stopped being as involved, I started feeling some distance with friends.

My heart broke when we realized that was what was happening. If you don't know me really well, I'll just tell you that I don't like change (not that most people do). The other part here is that I have social anxiety. Making friends is very difficult for me and meeting people is even more difficult.

I think I was at my church for a year before I really allowed myself to talk to anyone. To be fair, I did come to that church very wounded and cried through every service for the first year. I don't think it's very much fun to go introduce myself to someone new with blood shot eyes and a running nose. Just as God planned, doors started opening for me to get involved at church. I started making friends and then meeting their friends and the next thing I knew, all my friends were from church or through church friends. I could literally trace all my friends back to church.

Nice and comfortable with all my friends, God spoke clearly into our lives in a moment of a family loss and asked us to leave. "Where?" we asked and there seemed to be no answer right away. At first, all we knew was where we were not to go. We went here and there....and after several months of feeling lost, God brought us to our current church this past summer.

We love our church but there are a few things that scared me right away about our church. First, I knew I wouldn't be going to church with any of my friends. Even though I had friends that happened to leave our church, I knew they wouldn't end up at the church we were. Second, this church was much smaller. This would seem like it would be easier to meet people, but that hasn't been the case. I met people at my last church through events and volunteering. Smaller church means less events and actually I need a break from volunteering for a bit. Lastly, our church is full of strangers. Every Sunday I go to church in a full on panic attack. I'm completely uncomfortable before and after church. When people approach me, I really want to die and somehow because I have the look of fear on my face, I'm pretty sure it keeps most anyone from approaching me anyhow.

The thing that has been the hardest about this move has been my friends. I used to count on seeing them at least once a week and chatting for at least a moment here and there. I seem to never see my friends anymore. I have a handful with whom I am good a keep in touch...the masses are gone. I don't get invited to events anymore from people I thought were my friends. I don't blame them...out of sight out of mind. They don't see me so they don't think to invite me to things. It's hard though, when the few with whom I do keep up, tell me the stories of this or that they did with such and so.

I used to have a calendar full of events related to church and events for friends. Now my calendar is my family busyness and that's it. I haven't made many new friends at my new church. I pray often that God will give me courage to talk to people and I have talked with a few here and there. I actually know several people at church already and that helps....but I miss my friends. I miss standing around after church talking about kids and husbands and life. I miss talking on the phone the next week about the sermon. I miss the impromptu trip to eat out together. I miss them.

I know our family is where we are called to be. I know God has a purpose for this move. I know we are apart of a mission not yet defined. I know this is right. My kids are excited to go to church. I look forward to every service. I love the worship and the sermons. I love the attitude of worship and I agree with the church's missions.

I just miss my friends.