The Oscars: Our Super Bowl

My wife loves sports. She really does. She loves to play sports. She likes to see sports played by others live. What she does not love, or even like, is watching sports on t.v., listening to sports talk on the radio, and tracking statistics, magic numbers, and trade deadlines. So, we don't share the same enthusiasm for sports events like the Super Bowl.

Amy and I are movie people. Oscar night is our Super Bowl. The day the nominations come out we always say we have to see all these movies before the award show. We never get to all of them. I didn't see any of the best pictures noms this year. Amy saw a couple. Hello, 3 small children. I did see all the best animated noms. I saw Bolt 3 times. Don't ask.

This year was not the most rewarding of shows. We didn't realize until yesterday, that the show was today. We had a long day with church and visiting relatives and when we did watch the show, it was online while I finished our tax refund on the same computer. Amy is already in bed, and there are at least 5 major awards, a life time achievement award and my favorite, the "hey, look who died montage."

Amy, let's plan ahead next year and go to a Academy Award party or something. Cause watching the Academy Awards without you is as pleasing as watching the Super Bowl without commercials.

Next Time: A Poem,They Drive me Crazy Sometimes

Crazy Dave's Give-a-ways: A final word about encouraging words.

We are midway through my first give-a-way at Crazy Dave's Give-a-ways. Click here to see my original post. Review the sidebar for "official" rules.

I am giving away a copy of Ken Sutterfield's book, The Power of an Encouraging Word. I wanted to post today mainly to remind everyone that my give away ends next Saturday. But also to share another story of when I felt the power of encouraging words.

July 2008. Amy and I were in our first months of attending our new church home in Lake Zurich, Illinois. I had just lost my job days before that. This was the second job I had lost in two years time. Amy and I were contemplating the move which would give me my moniker (aka, "Home School Dad.") She had applied for a job as a School Psychologist, and we were considering, if she was offered the job, her accepting, and me home schooling the kids.

The elders of our church are available to talk to/pray with at the end of each service. We planned to pray with one of the elders once the service was concluded. During worship we are often given a minute or two to greet those around us. We still did not know very many people at the church at the time, so Iwas surprised to turn around and see someone I knew very well.

It was Liz, someone I had worked with at the job I had lost two years prior. She had moved out of state while I still worked there, but was visiting her mother for the weekend, and her mother and I "just happened" to attend the same church.

After service we spent a few minutes catching up. I told her how we were going to pray with the elders about the job situation. Liz then spent the next few minutes telling Amy what a fantastic job I had done when I worked with her. About how I always had a good attitude and I would do the things that no one else would do. As a guy just out of work, I was planning on taking Liz to my next interview. I knew that in all the jobs I have been given, that I have always attempted to do my best for the Lord. The praise of others was not what motivated me. But on that day in July, God saw fit to use those words of encouragement to sustain me and to motivate me for the new job ahead of me: educating my children.

So, my encouragement to you today is twofold: 1) Always look for an opportunity to encourage others. You never know how much additional meaning it will have on their lives. 2) If anyone is ever giving away a book about encouragement, enter for an opportunity to win it.

If you comment on this post you will receive another chance to win the book. All entries are due by 11:00 P.M CST February 28th.

Click here to see other give-a-ways at Around the Blogosphere.

Next Time: The Oscars, our Super Bowl

Eliminate Recurring Charges

It's been a fortnight since my first Friday of frugality (Say that with a cookie in your mouth. To follow the frequency of F's make it a fig bar.)

Last time I was here, I said that a key to frugality is to know when to spend and when not to. Today's post is all about when not to. First, I must say that none that follows is meant to be judgemental or prideful. If you came into my house, and followed how we spend our money, you would see many ways that we either spend or money unwisely, or spend money in a way that you never would. What I am talking about today is about the major ways we save money. These tips are certainly not for everyone.

The main way we save money at my house is on what we have decided to do without, not with what we spend less on. We really only have 5 monthly recurring bills. electricity, gas, home phone (which is bundled with our Internet connection) our mortgage, and our credit card bill. We are on a budget right now that would put us down to 4 monthly recurring bills by the beginning of 2010 when we hope to have our credit card paid off for good.

Now, of course, we fill our tanks and are cars tanks to keep us and them moving. Those are basically pay as you go. We don't have cable. We don't have a monthly cellular bill. We also have a bare bones phone package. We have been married nearly 11 years and in all that time we have not had call waiting, or caller i.d.. I was just at my phone company's website and the cost of those two features is 13.22 per month. That's almost $160.00 for 1 year. And what's the downside? We don't know who's calling us and sometimes people get a busy signal. We are actually not on the phone all that much, and I am pretty good at guessing who's calling by the time of day and other contextual clues. The problem with that is no one is impressed when I guess it's them, they just assume that I have caller i.d.

The one that gets most people, is the no cable. Truth be told we moved our T.V. away from the antenna about a year ago and no one in our family has complained. We watch plenty of television, it's either on DVD, videocassette or watching on the Internet. Many of the DVDs and videos are borrowed from our library at no cost to us. Don't get me wrong we love cable in moderation. Amy and I stayed in a hotel last weekend and there is nothing like watching 4 episodes of Law and Order in a 12 hour period. We just don't like paying for it.

My wife and I do not use our cell phones much. We text each other grocery lists and that sort of thing and when we compare notes with those with monthly plans what we pay averages out to never more than 1/2 of what they pay.

Again, I don't write this to be judgmental, critical, or prideful. I share it because I think, that eliminating or trimming down even one of your monthly recurring charges could make quite an impact on your personal finances. I know it has on ours. Even if we can't watch Law and Order four times a day.

Click here to see other good ideas for saving money at Frugal Friday part of Biblical Womanhood.

Next Time: A final word about encouraging words

I knew you knew it!

My wife, as many of you know, is a school psychologist. A good amount of her day is devoted to observing and testing kids. She often will just talk with the kids for a little while before she tests them. On one such occasion, one of her students informed her that he had just gotten a new bobble head of a football player. Amy asked what team they played for. Mistaking Amy for someone who followed sports, he said I'll tell you the colors and I know you'll know the team. So he told her the colors and Amy guessed the Bears. It wasn't the bears so Amy guessed the Packers. It wasn't the Packers. "Come on Mrs. Roller, you know this" said the student. Amy guessed about 10 more teams and finally guessed the one the student was thinking of. The student responded joyously: "See Mrs. Roller, I knew you knew it!"

I am constantly overwhelmed with how children are always willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. My daughter met the husband of her Awana leader recently. He's about 6'11. She was incredulous, that anyone can be taller than her dad. I'm 6'1, tops. My son thinks that I can fix or repair anything. I can't. He's always coming up with projects we can do together and he understands how to do them better than I do and he's 7.

SO what's my point, that my children are delusional? They may be, but that's not my point. My point is that our children are generally our biggest supporters. From their perspective, we can do anything. For me, it is a motivator to even at the grand old age of 44 1/2 to continue learning so I can continue to have not my children's awe but their respect.

What does this have to do with homeschooling? To me it means to branch out and step out of your comfort zone. DO an experiment that you are not sure will work. Bone up on a subject that you don't have a huge grasp on and then teach it to your kids. Because they know you know it.

To see morehome schooling posts click here to go to this week's carnival of home schooling.

Next time: Eliminating recurring charges.

Google is as Google Does

So, I googled myself recently. And, we all know how painful that can be. Here is what I found:

I get information on the Rabbi David Roller, The Reverend Dave Roller, The former professional football player Dave Roller (I would have mentioned him sooner, but he played for the Packers), and even a reference to Biker Dave's Roller Derby Blog. If I dig deep enough, there are references to this blog. What I don't see, and frankly I don't understand why not is: Dave Roller, Medicine Woman. Jane Seymour worked really hard to look like me, each week, and I am not sure why Google has forgotten this show.

I do have a few more thoughts on Google and some other things, so let's get right to them, shall we?

If you are doing a Google search on Clint Eastwood, don't you feel obligated to use the I'm feeling Lucky button?

Would Macgyver still impress us, with his compendium of seemingly useless, but life saving information, if google had been available to him?

I live in Illinois, and I must say that I am glad that they have taken the Rod Blagojevich Governor signs off the toll roads so quickly. However, there is another sign I'd like them to remove. Under our emergency stopping signs on the highway, there is a sign that says two hours only. SO, you are driving on the expressway and your daughter says "Stop the car, Dad I have an emergency!" You then have to say, "Well gee honey, how long do you think this emergency will take? Cause here, we have a 2 hour limit."

Along those same lines, I was at my local park district recently, and they wanted me to update my emergency contact information. So, I am filling out the paperwork and they asked for my emergency contact's address.

Could you imagine if sometime in the near future my Dad received this letter:

Dear Mr. Roller,

We wanted to inform you that your son, daughter in law and grandchildren were all involved in what we are officially calling a kick ball avalanche. You were listed as their emergency contact, please advise how you would like us to proceed. We are enclosing A SASE and eagerly await your reply.

Love,

The Locality Removed to Avoid Possible Libel Charges Park District

Well, that's about all I have for tonight. You've been a terrific readership. Drive safely.

Next Time: I knew you knew it!

WFMW

I was saving this post for next month. But today I learned that Shannon, at Rocks in My Dryer, is taking a break from the feature she originated some 3 years ago. Instead of shutting it down entirely, she is letting another blogger (Kristen from We Are That Family) continue her tradition. According to Shannon's post explaining the transfer, she recently received so much positive feedback about WFMW, she changed her mind about cancelling it altogether. So today, I would like to tell you all why Works For Me Wednesday works for me.

As a stay at home, home school dad, a few credits shy of his Home Ec. degree, WFMW gives me the first clue on topics I know nothing about, and the next step in areas that I am growing in.

WFMW is also, one of the best formats for me to do my writing. I like sharing what things my family has done that make our life more productive and enjoyable. I love seeing the comments on my blog that there are others who can find them helpful as well.

Here is my WFMW routine:

1) I keep a list in my notebook of future WFMW posts. My goal is to have at least 4 post ideas written down at the beginning of each month, so I am not scrambling at the last minute for an idea. As of today, I have post ideas from now until 4/15/2009.

2) Sometime Monday evening or Tuesday morning I write my post for that week and save it as a draft. This morning when I began to write about gloves, I noticed Shannon's above referenced post and took this idea, which was 3 weeks away from my notebook.

3) When I come home from my Tuesday night home group, I publish my post and wait for Shannon to post hers. My goal is to be one of the first 25 posts on the list. My secret ambition, is to be in the top 10 every week. My dream, is to be the first one on the board. My dream that is so special you don't say it out loud (I am only writing this, NOT saying it out loud), to be asked to headline and be a guest blogger on WFMW.

That's not gonna happen. But, I was #10 two weeks ago. Shannon tricked me last week, I was all ready to link my wife's post when I saw Shannon's post about locating states. I got so into doing that, that I didn't get my post linked until the second 25.

4) After WFMW is posted and I am linked to it, the real fun begins. I read all the posts linked before mine. I always try to leave a comment where appropriate. As a man, I would feel very silly commenting on posts about make-up.

5) When I get to mine, I will sometimes read a few more before retiring for the day. On Wednesday morning, I check my post for comments. I will then read those posts, If I have not already. I spend the rest of the day between school and home stuff checking out as many posts as I can.

6) I am always looking for one idea that I can implement immediately. I don't want to say what last week's was. Let's just say I now have a sink that shines without any dishes in it.

So, that's why WFMW works for me and why I am so glad that Shannon started this tradition that Kristen is continuing. Blessings to you both. If you still don't know how to get to Rocks In My Dryer for Shannon's final pre-sabbatical WFMW, click here.

Next Time: Google is as Google does.