Secret Word

It's time for this month's...Favorite Things game!!!

This game is called, "Secret Word" and this is how it's going to play out:

Each week, I'm going to write a post on a certain topic. There will be a secret word that you'll have to include in a sentence in your comment. Every person who successfully includes the secret word in their comment will be added to a drawing. At the end of four weeks (end of May), I'll draw a winner! Each person is allowed one comment per secret word post, but you can write as much as you want in that comment! Does this make sense?

Here's an example...

My post:

I remember as a little girl, going to the Purdue Christmas Show with my grandparents. One of the best parts of the night was going to Bruno's Pizza. It was great! You can watch him toss the pizza in the window. I loved all different toppings and still don't have a favorite 'cause they're all yummy! I wish we had a place around here like that...but maybe that's what made Bruno's so special because it was treat.

So now, you would leave a comment in response to this post and try to guess what the secret word is. By reading my post, you may think the word is singing, music, Christmas concert, family, food, pepperoni, or mushrooms.

So, your comment could look something like this:

I have great Christmas memories too...singing Christmas carols in nursing homes, or Christmas music in general. I've never been to a Christmas concert before, but my family had other traditions with food, and that includes pizza too! My favorite toppings are pepperoni and mushrooms.

Guess what?! You would have been one of the winners because the secret word was pepperoni!You can say whatever you want in your comment as it does not have to be true...just whatever you need to say to include what you think is the secret word.

So, I hope that makes sense! I'll post the first one next Wednesday! :)

We Have A Winner!

Rebekah K. is the winner of "25 Questions" by guessing...

Swedish Fish!!!

Awesome job, Bek...and to everyone that guessed!!!! I can't believe you guys didn't need a hint!

(The picture is my attempt at creating a Swedish Fisherman :) )

Anyway, I thought it was only appropriate to start off with Swedish fish, since...you guessed it, it's one of my favorite things!!! So, Rebekah will be getting:
a bag of Swedish fish
along with
an ISU t-shirt
...'cause as a lot of you know, I'm a big fan of my school
(Jonathan, I already know what you're thinking, so you don't have to say it 'cause I still loved going to school there)!

Thanks for playing!!!

Quick Answers

Is it a package of oreos? No
Or is it one individual oreo? No
Hershey Chocolate Bar? No
A piece of Dove chocolate? No
Is it an Advil capsule? No
Is it a Pink Lady? No
Is it an apple? No

Great guesses!!! Megan asked if you can make multiple guesses...yes, you can!

It's Here!!!

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Happy April Fool's Day!!! It's a good day 'cause it's the start to "My Favorite Things"...and no, I'm not pulling a trick on you. Actually, I thought about acting like I wasn't going to do it anymore as my April Fool's joke...and decided against it since I thought that would be fun for...well, no one. :)

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So, let's get started!!! I'm going to begin by introducing a "game" that is going to go all year round...it's called, "Character Counts". Let me just say here that I'm not going to announce what my favorite thing for the month is until we have a winner...but I'll let you know that I believe good character and great examples should receive the best prizes...so with that said, the prize for "Character Counts" will be the best prize of them all...

A. because there will only be one winner for a contest that goes for an entire year and

B. because I love acknowledging great character!!!

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Presenting...

Character Counts

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What: Each month, I'm going to introduce a character quality. During that month, you can nominate a person who has demonstrated that character quality to be entered for a chance to win the prize at the end of the year.

Where: You can nominate someone on any post during that month.

When: You can only nominate 1 nominee per month and only for the character quality of the month in which you're nominating.

How to nominate: Tell us their name (don't give the last name for safety reasons with this being an open blog), and how the character quality was demonstrated.

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April's Character Quality:

Dependability vs. Inconsistency

"Fulfilling what I consented to do, even if it means unexpected sacrifice"

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_______________________

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April's "My Favorite Things" game: 25 Questions

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For those of you who have been with this blog for a while, you may remember playing this game! It's been one of my favorite "Silly Nothings" games played...so I thought it was only appropriate to have it be the first one.

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Who: You

What: I have a person, place, or thing in my mind and everyone can ask questions. I'll take up to 25 questions and whoever is the first to guess, will win! If 3 people think a hint is needed, I'll give one, but there can only be 2 hints given so that's why there have to be at least 3 people asking for one

Where: You can ask the question on any post until a winner is announced...I recommend posting your question/guess in the most recent post or I may not see it.

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It's a THING.

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So there you have it! Let the games begin...25 Questions and Character Counts!

Valentine's Day Giveaway!!!

Sarah recently had a contest on her blog where the winners won the movie,

FIREPROOF

and the book

Love Dare

(a 40 day challenge as featured in the movie).

Now, I'm not married...obviously,

but I'm a huge fan of strong marriages and anything that promotes them! So, for Valentine's Day...

I'll be giving away:

1 FIREPROOF DVD

and

2 copies of The Love Dare

*You do not need to be married or in the USA to enter (that's for you, Janet, Kasey, or anyone else that may read this blog that I don't know about)!

Here's what you do:

Leave a comment relating to Valentines' Day, a verse, a good quote, something about someone special, good memory, tradition, etc...anything to do relating to the holiday!

I'll be drawing the winners

next Thursday night (12th) at midnight!

Let's Play: "Thanks for That!"

Okay, here's the game. All you need to do is tell us of someone who has done some small good deed. It can be something that may have appeared to have gone unnoticed. :) You can submit up to 3 people...I'll put their names in a bowl and draw a name. The name drawn will get a gift card from me, and I'll let them know that you nominated them for the "Thanks for That!" Award.

CLUE

Just a reminder to Heidi that she still hasn't made her guess for Clue. I realize this game has not quite had the excitement to it that my other games have had, but I'm kind of stubborn and am insisting that we finish out this game before we start another. So, Heidi, it's your guess!

The next riddle:

A guy needs to get his hair cut and there are 2 barbers in town. He goes to the first one on one end of town. The place is a disaster, dirty, and the barber's hair is in dissaray, and messed up. The guy goes to the second barber and the place is beautiful, clean, his hair nice and neat. The guy walks out of the barber shop and goes to the dirty one. Why?

Riddle for Clue

This can be wet and dry at the same time. It can sing like a bird and croak like a frog.

Clue

I need some help...you see, there's been a tragic death. It seems that my dear robot-sweeper-friend, Chester has been killed. I've tried contacting Detective Monk, but apparently, with Chester no longer sweeping my floors, Mr. Monk thinks the house too unsanitary to come solve the mystery for me. He gave me some guidelines that if we follow, he will solve the mystery for us.

So here's how it's going to go:

I'm going to post a riddle...the first person to solve it gets the chance at guessing a combination of the person, weapon, and room of the crime (Monk will let us know whether that was right or wrong, but he can't tell us which one of the three was right or wrong...just how many were correct) OR they can ask if one of the people, rooms, or weapons was involved (Example, "Is Dave, the painter guilty?"). Just be careful 'cause everyone else is readint this too! At that time, I'll post another riddle, and so forth until the mystery is solved.

Of course, there's a reward to anyone who can solve the mystery of poor little Chester's death.

List of Suspects:
Dave, the painter
Sam, the piano tuner
Ed, the assistant
Cindy, the neighbor
William, the grandson
Tami, the housekeeper

Possible weapons located:
Pipe
Rolling Pin
Hammer
2x4
Candlestick
Knife

Rooms:
Listening Room
Master Bedroom
Hall Bathroom
Study
Conservatory
Kitchen
Living Room
Tami's Bedroom
Pool Deck

Riddle:

Ten pears hanging high, Ten men come passing by. Each took a pear and left nine hanging there. How could that be?

So, here goes...it's "Time to Play"!

Last Questions

#8 How Many Animals Have You Owned...and of those, how many of them were cats?

Bonus: What's the most unique animal you've owned?

Josh and I have had over 100 pets...19 of them were cats. Josh has owned 1 fish which he and I got on his 4th birthday outing...he appropriately name it 'Joe' after his cousin. He found him "sleepig" on his back a few days later...very dissapointing.
Now, about 70 of our pets were fish, and yes, I'm counting the individual fish because I HATE fish and disliked looking at each one. Although, we had about 10 salt water fish, which I actually liked. My most unusual pet was actually my first pet...It was a chipmunk and her name was Teresa.

Now, I'm asking the cat question, because cats came up on Sarah's blog and I just have to say that I've had a love-hate (mostly hate) relationship with them. When we had first moved, my sisters convinced my mom to let them get this little black kitten from the Kiesers (yes, Sarah, Sharon, Denise, and Diann Kieser). I don't know why, but I couldn't stand the kitten...I thought it was ugly and I just didn't like it. Well, it spent 1 day with us only to be killed by the neighbor's German Shepard (trained by the K-9 cops!), Sheena. I don't know why, but as soon as I saw the dead kitten, I just sobbed like I had lost my best friend. Bi-polar, yes. The three of us went out to the nearby field to bury the kitten and I prayed that the Lord would resurrect this kitten. I had such the faith of Abraham that I convinced my sisters not to pack the dirt around it too tight and leave the head above ground so it could breath as it pawed its way out once the Lord brought it back to life.

When my parents heard of what we were asking of God and had wiped buckets of tears...they knew something must be done. We went and picked up 2 kittens that my mom's coworker was trying to get rid of. This began 3 generations of cats in our home. By the end, they were so inter-'married', that they became very mentally unstable as they would hide in the the bushes, waiting for us to walk out, and then they would attack. It was truly frightening! To this day, I dislike cats because of this. The end to this long line of insanity came when I dropped something in front of our lawnmower, which our psycho cat was standing on. When I bent down to pick it up, the cat lunged at me scratching me pretty badly.

My mom was so upset that she decided to do what any normal person would...put the cat in a tupperware container and drop it off at a Subway dumpster for "some nice college student to adopt". There were a lot of things wrong with that last sentence, but nonetheless...true.

So there you have it...my history with cats.

It's Got Me Thinkin'...

On Sunday, Denny Kaufmann preached on the story of the prodigal son. I rememberd a conversation with Jeff Leman while I was in India and he was saying how so many times we forget why Jesus even told that story. Jeff was saying that the story was directed towards the Pharasees and the point of the story isn't necessarily the son who left, but the son who stayed home...and this got me thinking.
As much as I hate to admit it...I relate to that oldest son. I became a Christian when I was 10, and even though I went through a period of my life when I strayed from Him...for the most part, I've done what was right. I find myself wondering if God has forgotten about me or if He's just chosen to pass me by...whether it be life circumstances, career, or friendships. Sometimes I want to say, "I've stayed here with You all this time. But you've never killed the fatted calf for me, put a ring on my finger, or thrown some big party for me". I wonder why He chooses to give, what I consider to be the good gifts, to so many others but somehow seems to forget that I'm sweating out in the field.
But then I read His response, "And He said to him, 'Son, you have always been with me, and all that is mine is yours. 'But we had to celebrate and rejoice, for this brother of yours was dead and has begun to live, and was lost and has been found.'"
He didn't say, "All that is mine will be yours"...He said it IS mine. I lose sight of what's right around me and start wishing for the party...when He's wanting me to accept all that He has...His character, life perspective, wisdom, and just the very pleasure of being with Him and working with Him.
I'm sure He just wants to say, "Oh Tami...if only you'd take your eyes off wanting the world and look up to see that I've given you heaven".

On a different note: Question #6
How many cavities have you and your partner had?
Josh and I have had 2...both me, I'm afraid.

Bonus Points: Honorary Team Alissa and Duane would have gotten the bonus points on the coffee/pop question since Alissa likes to drink her drinks just like I do...but she says they're not playing...so here's an honorable mention to Team Kieser!

Question #5

How many cups/cans of coffee and pop do you and your partner drink in a week?...added question for you coffee drinkers, how do you like your coffee? Black or with cream and sugar? For the pop drinkers, do you like a lot of ice? No ice?

Josh and I drink about 2 cups of coffee a week...It's that Josh, he just refuses to stop. :) Oddly enough, McDonald's coffee is one of my favorites. I always drink my coffee black. Josh thinks that pop is "hot" and doesn't like to drink it. As for pop...I think the more ice the better!

Bonus points: The Megan and Kory team got 2 bonus points for having the worst job...I can't imagine having to walk in on college kids to show apartments. That's just scary 'cause you never know what you'd walk into!

The Rebekah and Matt team got 2 bonus points for most unique job of stirring dirt samples...I think you could have also won for most boring. :)

I was going to give out points for favorite job, but honestly, I couldn't pick 'cause so many actually sounded really great!

Questions #4

I thought that I'm going to go ahead and ask the next question. If you haven't answerd #3 yet, you still can! In fact, anyone can join the game as long as it's going!

How many paid jobs have you held?

In addition...what's the craziest, least favorite, or favorite job you've had? (There could be bonus points!)

*If you have babysat, you have to count that as 1. You can't count each family as a seperate job. :) However, if you've babysat and then you were hired as a permanant nanny, you can count those as 2 different jobs.

Josh and I have had 8 paid jobs.

I haven't had any crazy jobs, but most unique would probably be my video editing. Least favorite would be the cleaning job and favorite would probably be when I was a nanny...which is crazy since I hate babysitting.

I think Josh's craziest job would probably be holding the hose while filling Grandpa's pool with water. His favorite is probably holding the hose while filling Grandpa's pool with water. His least favorite would probably letting Darci hold the hose while filling Granpa's pool with water...unfortunately, he didn't get paid for any of those.

Question #3

How many roommates have you and your partner had in life? (You have to have lived with them for at least 3 months. Yes, family members count.)

Josh and I have had 22 roommates.

Just had to say a special hey to Jacks! I think you're the newest member to sillynothings!!! It's sooo fun having you join in! :)

One more rule: If we get to the end of the game and someone hasn't answered a "negative points" question, I'll take the person with the most negative points for that answer and minus them from the team with the unanswerd question...just to keep it fair.

Also, Jon...not quite sure why you're not officially playing, but we'd love to hear to the answers to you and your make believe (?) partner! Let me know if you want me to start counting your points!

Moving on with Question #2

11 teams so far! That's exciting!!! For those who still want to play, you can always hop in!

Question #2:

A. How many traffic tickets have you and your partner gotten?

For those of you that know me...you know why I'm asking this question! 'Cause "cops love me" and little Josher-posher and I are planning on winning! Just kidding...that wouldn't really be fair.
New Rule to the points system...oh great, here I go again, complicating the points system. :) No, this will be simple. I was just going to say that your score can never go below a 0. So I wont ever give you negative points 'cause I want people to keep playing and if you have some huge negative score, that's not as fun. So, your score can drop to 0 but will never go below that!

Side note: Heidi, I'm sure Jarod would find you reading my blog a very wise use of your time! The poll I have going about popcorn is for him to prove my point...which so far, I think it is. :)
For those of you that aren't Heidi...Jarod and I were talking about popcorn and how I want to buy a stir-crazy. He was saying, "Who makes popcorn in a stircrazy anymore?" (jokingly...kind of)...and I was trying to tell him that it was better than microwave and he strongly disagrees. :)

Josh and I have had 0 tickets.

Pick Your Partner!

This game is actually kind of like the last game...even though I said I wouldn't do another one like it. I guess I lied. Anyway, I know a lot of you wanted to include your husband's experiences and I kept putting a nix to that...so this game is to make up for that!

Each player gets to pick 1 partner but you have to stick with this partner and can't switch. If you're single, you can pick a friend or whoever you want...actually, if you're married you could do that too. It's up to you.

Now don't worry, you don't have to do anything with them, so you can pick someone that lives far away from you. However, unless you know their life story really well, you may need to be calling them a lot.

So this is how the game is going to work...
There's going to be about 7 questions asked. You must combine the total of you AND your partner's answer. Sometimes it will be good to have a higher number...other times it will be worse. There will be answers that will give you a positive score and other times will be negative. In the end, the team with the most points will win. Make sense?
Let's start...first question:

"How often do you get your hair cut in a year?"

(This does not count coloring)

When you answer this, first tell me who your partner is and what the combined total is. Of course, if you want to elaborate on your answer, that's always fun!!!

My partner is going to be Joshua Kaufmann. But I'm going to have to ask Rebekah about the haircuts. I would guess that he gets about 4-5 a year and I get 1.5 a year (about 3 every 2 years). So our answer is 6.5 unless Rebekah tells me differently!

So Long...Fare Well...Alveedersay Adeu Mr. Huckabee!

Kill me now. Insanity took over when I said I'd come into work at 5:00 this morning so here I am at State Farm and am blogging...guess it's not too bad to get paid to blog but I have to admit, I'd probably rather sleep since I worked until 10:00 last night. How about a "Poor Tami!" on three?! Yes, I AM the youngest child. :)

Okay, two things...first off, I've been looking at the widget of Mike Huckabee on my blog and keep thinking that I should remove it, but since I can't just discard it so easily, I'm going to put it in this post and as I post new posts, it'll go away on it's own and have a decent burial. Okay, that was a little creepy, but you know what I mean. So here's to you, Mr. Huckabee...you made us proud.

Second is I think it's time for a new game! Now granted, like I said, it's 5am and this girl has had very little sleep so this may not sound so fun in a couple hours. However, we're going to play, I HAVE TOO! This is how it's going to work...

It's the opposite of the game I Have Never, so I'm actually going to post an 'I Have!' comment about myself and if someone else has done the same thing, you get a point. Everyone who can say "I have too!" should post...it's not limited to one person. There will be a total of 10 'I Have!' comments throughout different posts (as I think of them) and at the end, whoever has the most points will win! When you post your 'I have too!', you need to give us the story (if there's one)...we can't just get an 'I have too!'. Here's a twist, you can post an 'I have' of your own and if no one else can say 'I have too!' (including me) then you get 2 bonus points! However, to be blogitically correct :), it can't be one where it would require you to be married/single or of a specific gender. Does that make sense? I'll keep a running tally of everyone's points!

So to begin...I have traveled to 8 countries outside the USA (Canada, Mexico, Japan, Ukraine, India, Austria, Tobago, and Jamaica).

Just a side note...my dream vacation is to go to Ireland and Scotland!

Let's play!

First things first...I feel like responding to the comments on the "confessions" post:

Alissa...I should have clarified, I think I picture ugly when I hear dark and muscular because I associate it with eyebrows that could scare Bert & Ernie. However, your husband is a fine looking gentleman, and he's not what conjures up images in my head of what I would consider to be "ugly". :) I know you didn't say that, but I just felt like saying all that!

Jon...I forgot that you like "In Christ Alone". I have an appreciation for that song, but it would probably be listed on my top 10 of most annoying praise songs to sing with a group...soley for the fact that the majority of people rarely know all the words which results in endless verses of no one knowing any words except for the one quiet girl who obviously learned them at home and wont sing loud enough for everyone to follow, but just loud enough that everyone knows she knows them and is straining to hear the words!

Wendy...what a relief!!! You tell your husband that I am very grateful to know that fact and will think of him the next time I sit on a public pot...wait, that doesn't sound right. Hmm, just tell him thanks! :)

Bek...I'm holding you to the nacho pie!!! I've always wanted a nacho cake for my birthday! We'll have to do that this coming October! :)

Okay...so I feel like playing a game, and yes, there will be a prize involved!!! Maybe this will be a new feature if it goes well! :) We're going to play 25 questions...So I have a person, place, or thing in my mind and everyone can ask questions. I'll take up to 25 questions and whoever is the first to guess, will win a prize! You can ask the question in the comments even if I post another post...just ask the question in the latest post! If 3 people think a hint is needed, I'll give one, but there can only be 2 hints given so that's why there have to be at least 3 people asking for one! And I promise, I wont change it...So go ahead, ask away!