These are 2 artists I’d love to see, however realizing they will likely not be as prominent as the local churches featured and such…

9/24/10 ($25-40+) – Jonathan Butler at 560 Music Center at Wash. U.
http://stljazznotes.blogspot.com/2010/07/jonathan-butler-to-play-friday.html
(I’ve seen this guy perform at the Bottle Neck Blues Bar with Rick Braun and Richard Elliot and he was fantastic! He’s a guitar master and great gospel singer. No snoozing at one of these…)

I know little of C.S. Lewis and the Screwtape Letters, however I’ve heard good things, so we’ll likely be checking this out.
9/25/10 ($38, $48, $59) – http://www.touhill.org/default.asp?touhill=51&objId=593

Don’t forget about Wash U. I gotta check this out more often:
http://ucollege.wustl.edu/jazz/

And as always Dean’s blog and calendar are a great resource:
http://stljazznotes.blogspot.com/

I hope this helps! Jam on, and let me know if you’re showing up for anything…

Oh, and the Kettle Moraine Jazz Festival in WI was SWEET last weekend!
http://kmjazz.com/enter.htm
Great lineup and we saw them all. My hearing has almost fully returned. =)

If you like high energy, Richard Elliot is fantastic on the sax, however he’ll be at the venue from hell (The Padgett – nice looking but bad acoustics). I really wish St. Louis and the stations would use some other venues. I’m sure it’s all who you know. Oh well… =)

http://stljazznotes.blogspot.com/2010/07/stljn-saturday-video-showcase-rnr-with.html

For the first time we caught Jonathan Butler at the Bottle Neck Blues Bar a while back and I’d love to see this guy again! He’s back:

http://stljazznotes.blogspot.com/2010/07/jonathan-butler-to-play-friday.html

If the schedule permits, I’m there. I sure wish I knew what Bronze, Gold and VIP were, etc… Not very clear on metrotix.
(Note from Sonia: I loved seeing Jonathan Butler live! He’s awesome!!!)

The Kettle Moraine Jazz Festival in Milwaukee looks like it’ll be a good one if you don’t mind a flight or hopping in the car for a bit:

http://kmjazz.com/enter.htm

We’ve done this in the past with our buddy, Dan, who’s also awesome on the keys. It was pretty neat. The cooler weather helps a bit too! =)

Just an FYI. Enjoy the music and let us know if you know of any great concerts.

I’m adding some photos for you check it out. Also, if you have an iPhone 4, let us know. Brett hasn’t had a chance to try out the new Video call feature yet.

My favorite line: “No… I want the haircut and the highlights, but I only want to pay for the haircut…”

To live.

Last year on Nov. 20, 2008, I was admitted to the hospital with 6 blood clots – 4 in my leg and 1 in each lung.

Now that I know how serious it was, I know God saved me. At that time, I had been wrestling with intense fear. Mom had died young earlier that year, and I kept waking up with strange feelings that caused me to fear for my life. I thought it was foolish, so I kept it to myself. But the night before I was diagnosed, I wrote a prayer to God with tears. At the end, I wrote to God, “I know you won’t let me die.”

Little did I know that my hurting leg had deadly clots forming that could have killed me.

But I’m alive!!!

So today, I’d like to celebrate this milestone. The best thing about a second chance is that you have a chance to reevaluate your purpose and destiny. Sometimes we need a bit of adjustment, humility, hope, and determined joy.

Every year when this week before Thanksgiving rolls around, I’m going to thank God for life and for a second chance to run the race He has set before me.

I hope you’ll think about how precious every day is and act accordingly. (Be nice to the people who work at Wal-Mart!)

Things we did to simply our to-do list:

• I bought David Allen’s Getting Things Done book a number of years ago and read it.
• I changed the way I was doing many things, including completely redoing all of my file cabinets (making them all alpha and no more hanging folder groupings).
• Brett and I went on a lengthy search for the best online tool or software program that would help us to track all of our todos and next actions. We selected RemembertheMilk.com (RTM), although in truth, I am the only one who still uses it. Brett doesn’t really enjoy spending time planning. So I do most of it, and we work his to-dos into the list.
• Another thing we did that really helped was buy a Dymo Laser Labelmaker (actual model name: Dymo Labelwriter 400 Turbo); it’s a bit of an investment but I love it!
• Lastly, we also bought a Fujitsu ScanSnap S510M, which makes scanning documents into PDFs easy!

With these tools, you just have to take the time to process your projects and determine the next actions to move each project along. But the cool thing is that this system still works if you want to just make piles. You just have to process the information in your life. I wanted to share this chart from the Costco Connection magazaine because it really makes the process clear in a user-friendly way.

GTD Chart

-Agatha Christie

(Special thanks to Peggy for passing this excellent quote along to me!)

I saw one of the coolest visuals ever last night in the snow. Brett and I were driving home from my dad’s house after midnight. The snowflakes were clumped together. It was snowing steadily.

Suddenly, it looked like a familar scene from a science fiction movie. We were going warp speed. The snowflakes looked like stars coming at us at a downward curve. We flew into the vortex.

I was mesmerized. I half expected to hear the voices of our favorite characters from Red Dwarf. It looked we traveling into the snowflakes; it was so cool.

It was only later that it dawned on me that I should have taken a video of it. Sometimes I am so captivated by a moment that I only photograph it with my eyes.

I am so glad to feel the sunshine on my face and the warm breeze through my hair. There’s an optimism to spring that overpowers me with a smile and peaceful thoughts.

I love to walk around outside and see the small green shoots of flowers appearing out of the ground. Some days they seem to grow inches… and I thank God for life that is all around us.