A Wonderful Birthday

Well, yesterday was my birthday and Tim made sure that it was a very special day!

As soon as we woke up, he brought my present into me.  For any one who knows me, I just love presents... I had begged to open them all before the day, but he made me wait. And I am glad that I did!  

After that, we went to Panera to have breakfast together (I had gotten a giftcard :o)

We spent time reading our Bibles and praying together. It was such a blessing!

Then we went home and for about 4 hours I worked on school work for HFLS (exams are monday) And then... the REAL fun began :o)

Over the Christmas holiday, we had received two large gift certificates to use in Chicago. One was a GC to Lawry's Prime Rib, from Jon and Rach.  The other was a set of tickets to go see the "Blue Man Group" from my brother Tim and his wife Shannon.

Well, enough talking, here are some pictures of the lovely night we had!

The chef carved our prime rib right in front of us!

The brought out a mini- trifle for my birthday!

Creme Brule

They didn't allow us to take pictures inside the theatre, but here are a few outside. 

They show was hilarious and exciting. So many unexpected things happened!d

Going Deeper

Well, I officially started graduate school at Trinity International University. Last night was my first class, "Foundations of Education". If you have you have been following my blog for sometime, you will remember that I have almost started grad. school several times. But for various reasons (money, time etc) I have not been able to follow through with that dream of mine. Well, it has worked out for me to get about 50% off my tuition because Tim is a full time student! Plus I have a scholarship through CLEF
(A Lutheran Educational foundation).
Because I work at a Lutheran school, I am able to get one class paid for a sememster. So all in all it's a pretty good deal. Praise the Lord for that!

I have to admit, I was a little nervous about my first class. I had stayed up late the night before finishing assignments, so I was very tired. The class is from 6pm - 10pm. So I was terribly afraid that I would be bored out of my mind and fall asleep! But I was pleasantly surpised when at 8pm we hit our first break and I didn't even notice that 2 hours had gone by already! The professor, Dr. Carol Kennet is an amazing teacher! She is a scholar and an orator and she wants us to leave the class being the same. I left last night ready to come into my classroom today. Boy did I need that breath of fresh inspirtation!

Chicago at Christmas

When we came home from PA, my brother and sister in law came with  us and stayed for a few days in chicago.  We went to a nice lunch at the Grand Lux Cafe on Michigan Ave. and then went to the 96th floor of the Hancock building for dessert.  It was amazing!

A Bit Overboard!

This is a house nearby where we live...

Christmas Day with the Baylors

Here is the opening of presents with all of the kids running around... it was crazy, but fun too .

A Family HUG 

Preparing for our Christmas meal

Andy playing with Will and his new toys

The guys playing video games

I LOVE this photo of Tim holding our new niece: Sadie Baylor

Jordan Family Christmas 2007

Tim and I went home to PA this Christmas. We spent the first half of Christmas day with my family and the second half with his family. We had a wonderful time with both the Jordan and the Baylor families. Here are some pictures of Christmas with my family.  The Baylor family Christmas will follow in an upcoming post.

"Christmas Past" - 2006 Christmas party

Here you all are a year later!

"Christmas Past" - 2005 Christmas party

Tim and I were talking the other day about how we had such a fun time with all of our friends in VA Beach at our annual Christmas party.  Just wanted to take a minute and say Merry Christmas to all of our friends in VA.  We miss you and love you so much!  Hey maybe next year you can all come out to Chicago... there is sure it be SNOW :O

Remember the Persecuted Church

A few Sundays ago, I attended a "Christmas Card Writing Party" for the Persecuted church. I went thinking that I was just going to go, eat some cookies, write some cards and leave, but that was not exactly the case. As I read Prisoner Profile after Prisoner Profile, my heart became broken for these believers in all parts of the world who are persecuted for their faith.

Here is one such profile:

Prisoner Name: Y Wo Nie
Location: Vietnam
Arrested: August 2004

Pastor YWo Nie was arrested August 18, 2004 for leading a demonstration demanding more religious freedom and the release of property confiscated by the Vietnamese government. He received a nine - year sentence. His family has not been able to visit him.

My heart could not shake the fact that I complain because we cannot go out to dinner more often or buy more things around the holidays, when these believers are in a cold, dark, lonely prison cell because of their faith in Jesus Christ!

Let's pray, write, and support the persecuted church - not only this holiday season, but throughout the year!

To find more information about these prisoners and their situations, go to PrisonerAlert.com

Update on Katie

For the latest update on Katie, click here to go to her blog and read her latest post. Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. You are a blessing!

Need Some Jewelry for Christmas?

I wanted to get the word out there that I am making jewelry right now. If you are looking for a good Christmas gift for a friend, co-worker, sister or mother; jewelry just might be the best idea. I have included some pictures of what I have ready to go already. But I can always complete an order if you have a different idea. I should have no problem getting it to you before Christmas. Just contact me via e-mail. My e-mail address is juliebaylor@gmail.com. Feel free to e-mail and ask me any questions that you might have. I can even wrap it for you or send it in a gift bag.

Pray for Katie Barker

Tim and Katie came to visit this past weekend. We had a wonderful time with them. But Friday night Katie's eye started to really hurt and water alot. The pain got so extreme through the night that she went to go visit a doctor here in Chicago. They gave her drops for her eye and told her that it was an "Ulcer of the eye" The pain got better, but her eye began to swell. Tim drove them home and they immediately went to the emergency room and then to a specialist. I don't know all of the details, but I know that they are concerned about her vision. PLEASE PRAY that she will be ok and that her vision will not be affected. She then went downtown to John's Hopkins. They said there was an infection. They created an eyedrop especially for her. They are very strong adn she takes them every hour- even through the night. She has to go back for a daily follow up. Right now she can't really see anything out of that eye. She won't know anything for sure about her vision for a few weeks. There is a concern of permanant scaring.

Again please pray for strength and wisdom for Tim and Katie.
I will try to update you when I hear anything more from Tim.

Thank you for your prayers and support. I know it means a lot to them right now.

Thanksgiving at HFLS

We had a big Thanksgiving feast at school and we celebrated with Thanksgiving Bingo, A turkey craft, and "Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" It was a lot of fun!

Thanksgiving in Chicago

Well, this year we were not able to make it home to PA for Thanksgiving. So instead we did a BIG Turkey dinner with the Logans. 

It all started 2 days before the actual day, when I started the brine for the Turkey (Martha Stewart recipe).  It was a great recipe, but some of the spices were tricky to find.  I ended up finding everything (at various stores) but the juniper berries.  Any ideas where to find them? Oh well, the turkey seemed to turn out well anyways. It was very moist and tasty too.

We had a wonderful time of fellowship with Scott and Lindsay.  We are so thankful to the Lord for their friendship!

Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving too! What did everyone do this year?

Pumpkin Cranberry Bread

I decided to make small loaves of pumpkin cranberry bread for my fellow employees at HFLS this year for Thanksgiving.  It was quite the challenge, as I had to make 16 mini loaves to make.  But it really was fun. I turned on some Christmas music and started baking! About three or four hours later I was  finished.  Here is the final product!

A free date night!

Friday night there was a benefit dinner for Holy Family Lutheran School, where I work. It was a very posh event to raise money for the school. The night would have cost us $65 a person - had we been required to pay. Yup that's right! Teacher's got to go for free! There was an open and free bar for the cocktail hour from 6-7:30pm and then dinner started with this delectable salad below:


This is just a picture of the gorgeous butter flower :o)
Below is a the main course: Herb-Crusted chicken, with roasted asparagus, and garlic mashed potatoes. Absolutely amazing!
I didn't get a picture of the dessert, because I was helping with the live auction. The dessert was a fried bread pudding with brandy icecream. It usually don't like bread pudding, but it was good!

Below are some pics of the baskets that people put together for the silent auction. There was also a live auction that auctioned things off like vacation homes for a week, dinners for 8, and boat cruises.

This is the banquet hall that everything took place in. Very nice! The kids from Holy Family gave a presentation -singing, speaking, etc. They did a great job!
The benefit raised over 100,000 dollars for the school. What a blessing: especially since we are building new school that will be finished this May!

Overall, it was a fabulous night... and how can you beat FREE, right?

Pros and Cons of Living in an Apartment

Ok, so I have lived in an apartment and have also lived in a townhouse. So I have a pretty good take on each. I have decided to compile a list of pros and cons to living in each.

Pros to living in an Apartment:

1. You don't have to mow the lawn
2. You don't have to remember what day is trash day (not to mention that in our apartment we just found out that we have a garbage chute on our floor!) How awesome is that?
3. It takes about half the time to clean your place
4. No gutters to clean
5. No snow removal ( a BIG deal here in Chicago)
6. You know where EVERYTHING is
7. It's easier to speak to your significant other from room to room (only 2 of them!)

Cons to Living in an Apartment:

1. You can't always paint the walls
2. You are a little more crowded - harder to have guests
3. It's not your home- you can't do whatever you want to the space you live in.
4. You can hear your neighbors... whatever they are doing!
5. It's hard to get to know your neighbors well.
6. You can look out your window into someone else's window.
7. Smelly and dirty hallways


Do you have any to add to either of my lists?

A Fun Week in the 3rd Grade Classroom

This week was a fun week at school. As you know Wednesday was Halloween, so we decorated bags for the kids to take out trick or treating. Then I handed out candy to them in little individual pumpkin bags. They were so grateful! I also gave them each a Fall pencil. You would have thought that I had given them a sack of gold! The were so excited! It was very sweet!

Then today we had a little "Reward celebration" I promised that I would bake them brownies if they showed 10 acts of kindness. They have really been struggling with kindness and so we were trying to work towards that goal as we reviewed Ephesians 4:32 "Be Kind and Compassionate one to another. Forgiving one another, even as God forgave you in Christ." So they reached their goal yesterday. So last night I baked them brownies. Again, they thought I was the BEST for baking something (even though it came from a box)

We also took a little trip to a local park. We have no playground of our own. So this was something special! They earned this treat by getting at least a C or above as a class on 10 tests. It was hard and took a while, but they finally got there. It was so fun to reward them with those special treats today. Some may call this bribing, but i like to call it creating incentive!

God's Blessing : A New Car!

Since we have been married, we have never bought our own vehicle....that's almost 5 years! God has always given us one some way or another. Well, when we moved to Chicago, we found that I would be working an hour away in the city and Tim would be going to seminary in Deerfield. So we decided to start shopping for a car. The Lord opened up the doors for us to buy this Honday CRV for a great price. Tim drives it into school - mainly because it would probably be vandelized where I work... sadly enough. So I get to drive in it on the weekends etc. Needless to say it should be a good car to get us through for a loooong while with kids and everything. So we are thankful to the Lord for His provision.

A Day in the City with Family

Tim's dad was passing through on his way up to Northland and Maranatha to recruit teachers. So yesterday we took him all around the city. We ended the night with a sunset boat tour of the city. It was awesome! Definately something that you should do if you are ever in the city!

The Chicago Bulls!

At school on Friday, a doner brought in 4 Free Bulls tickets for whoever wanted them. I signed up right away and was able to get 2 of them! So Friday night, Tim and I spent the evening in the city. We took the train in at 6:30pm and didn't return until 1am. It was such a blast!

Turning Over a New Leaf

Well, it's that time in our lives, where Tim and I are realizing that we have gained weight and we have got to do something about it!

Our good friends, Rob and Julie, did the Beach Body P90X diet and exercise program for 90 days before summer... and they looked great! So mid September Tim and I started the program as well. With the program you have to work out about 1-1 1/2 hours six nights a week. The DVD package we bough includes 12 different workouts (weights, pull ups, push ups,crunches, yoga, plyometrics, kenpo etc.) The whole idea is muscle confusion. It's definately the hardest program that I have ever done. But I have to admit, that I am feeling great and starting to lose weight and get back into shape.

Along with the exercise program, there is a meal plan to follow. The diet is very low in fat and carbs (at least for the first month) and high in protein. So we eat a lot of fish, grilled chicken, salads, egg whites, and almonds. The good thing is that they have recipes for the dinners. So I have made most of them and we have really enjoyed them! Here are just a few of the meals.



Beef and Broccoli Stirfry

Lemon Dill Salmon with wild rice and asparagus



Mango salsa Mahi Mahi with asparagus and wild riceSword fish covered in basil pesto sauce, with sauteed squash and zucchini, tomotoes with basil and mozerella cheese.

A Day in the City

I took a day off of work this week, so that Tim and I could take a break from our respective school work and spend some time together. We decided to go into the city of Chicago for the day. We had such a great time together! We took the train in, so we could read and relax on the way in and then we wouldn't have to worry about parking. While we were waiting for the train, a parade went by. It was homecoming for our local high schools. So we got to enjoy a little taste of our local town before we went into the big city!

We visited the Art Institute and Millenium Park. We took the (EL) around "The Loop", which gave us a great view of the great architecture of the city. We stopped at a great local cafe for lunch and enjoyed hot flatbread sandwiches. We walked by the Lake side of the city and watched the boats float by. Really there is so much to see in the city, that we decided we would have to make it a goal of ours to make it in every month or two months, just to get the full experience of it.

My "Holy Family"

This past month of working at Holy Family Lutheran School has been a challenge and a blessing all wrapped into one. I am dealing with inner city kids and families, which to say the least is different than my experience at GCA. There is definately a need to be met here. But I have to admit there are days that I do not feel up to the challenge. Some days I come home discouraged and exhausted. I wonder if I am even making a difference at all! But I know that I must encourage myself with the fact that Christ's strength is made perfect through my weakness. Praise HIS name!

Relaxation

The other day I came home after a long and hard day at work. I knew Tim wouldn't be home from school for a few hours, so I stopped at Starbucks, got a tall, nonfat, pumpkin spice latte and a snickerdoodle cookie. I brought them home and snuggled on my couch under a blanket with a book , my coffee and my cookie. It was a cool night out and it was just beginning to really feel like fall. I read for about 2 hours - what a nice way to relax!

How do you like to relax when you get a chance to?