Top 5

For those of you who don't know or haven't heard, my beloved and wonderful wife has gotten the job she has been laboring and sweating to get. It is for a communications consulting firm that goes into businesses and teaches them how to communicate effectively in an intra- and extra-office manner. Karen is stoked because this is a field she would really like to break into and this job gets a very large portion of her foot in the door. So, in celebration of my magnificent wife's achievement I have composed a top 5 reasons as to why she is so great Mind you, these are not in order and there are not only 5 reasons, but using only five will keep your from getting bored and thinking me an incredible sap.

5) Karen is driven. When she sets her mind to a goal, she WILL achieve it. She can very easily become an efficient, singleminded workhorse who is able to achieve any goal set before her.

4) Karen is ambitious. This goes hand in hand with the driven characteristic. She saw an opportunity and was ambitious enough to strive for the job even though any logical person would have said that she wasn't necessarily qualified.

3) Karen is so talented. She is one of the most effective communicators I have seen. She can make her feelings known so well and convey an important message to anyone. She could make a brick wall feel joy or sorrow, and a stubborn husband happiness or frustration (yikes!). She is such a gifted person. It really is uncanny.

2) Karen speaks, works, and lives from her heart. Karen always shows her emotions because she can't but show her heart. I think this to be one of the reasons she got this new job. She simply spoke from her heart about her passion in this career field and the higher-ups saw that and knew she was the one. Also, Karen has amazing passion. Whether she is happy, sad, excited, or mad, she doesn't it with all of her being. I love her heart. It is the most beautiful thing about her.

1) Karen loves the Lord and is more concerned with following him than any other thing. She faithfully prayed about going to get a master's degree. She was faithful to pray for new employment. She was faithful to pray for each interview that she went to. Also importantly, she puts her faith into practice daily. This new job is, yet again, a great example. She not only prayed about it, but studied hard for the grammar test she needed to take. She wrote writing samples. She worked out interview questions and answers. Karen was able to follow the Lord's will for her life by being faithful to follow His lead, but also to walk in the peace and understanding that He was in charge of her path. It is amazing to have a wife that can do that so boldly.

So, yes ladies and gents, my wife is pretty great. I am so proud of her and if you are family or a close friend who has had any hand in her life, you should be too. We are naught but the product of those who have had a hand in our lives and what we choose to do with the knowledge we gain from them. Thanks for reading my rambling.

update!

Well...here is what has happened in the Norvell realm of the woods since our last update....

I have had two very good, yet very sobering, interviews at Booher Consultants (booher.com) for a sales and marketing support position. This company is the type that I strive to work in someday,and that I hope to get a masters degree that will make me marketable to them in the future, so any position within their company now would be a fantastic opportunity. I go in again on Thursday and they should be able to make their decision after that. It would be a huge job change and so much to learn, but it is a challenge that I am up to.

Dave has his last Task Testing with his students today. The past few weeks he has been tutoring his children after school who need extra help. Last week he was given an AMC gift card as an appreciation gift from one of the parents, which allowed us to see Ice Age II, complete with movie snacks, for no out of pocket cost. Once again, I am so thankful for his school district.

We had a wonderful Easter weekend. We spent time with the other Norvells in Ft. Worth....Dave and Jon playing Warhammer of course, and Lydia and I doing some much needed girly shopping time. Sunday Mom came over to our apartment after church for Easter lunch. I outdid myself in the kitchen if I do say so myself! What was on the menu you might ask? Roasted pork loin, mashed potatoes, spinach and rice casserole, salad and bread. Needless to say, Dave and I took a long Easter nap after mom left.

I have set a date to take my GRE.....May 27th. This will give me something to work for and a good way to steadily prepare for the test also. It already makes me anxious thinking about it.

Hope everyone is doing well out there in the world. We miss and love you!

One month festivities!

Dave and I celebrated our one month anniversary yesterday! We had quite the fun day and to commemorate the occassion, we went and bought rollerblades! Instead of spending money on an expensive dinner, we decided to spend the money on something that would last a long time and that we can enjoy together. After a fun dinner of leftovers from the first few nights before (Dave gave me the night off from the kitchen) we took to the trail behind our complex along the canal. It took me a while to get my "sea legs". After all,it had been 10 years or so since I outfitted my feet with a pair of moving shoes, but 10 minutes or so and I was good to go. And for those of you wondering, yes, Dave did leave me in his dust. Several times. I am convinced that there is nothing that man can't do. Anyone reading, I challenge you to find something he couldn't at least do average at. He is bad at nothing.

Canton finds!

This past weekend I had the amazing experience of First Mondays at Canton! For those of you who don't know (cause I sure didn't),First Monday's at Canton is the largest flea market probablly in the country. Starting over 100 years ago I learned from one of the regular vendors at Canton, First Mondays was originally a trade depot set up for farmers to trade and exchange, open only the first Monday of every month. Now,however, First Monday's extends every first Wednesday through Monday, and hosts over 300 vendors, some of which bring simple garage sale items, and others that make and design amazing crafts and home decor. I went with my Sunday School class women's group for a day of fun filled shopping and great food, and came back with a few great finds for our apartment.



This cute little sign I found and it completed the arrangement that goes on the wall above the bed in our Master Bedroom. The sign reads "Forever, for always and no matter what". I thought that was appropriate for newlyweds.

This set of floor candelabra's is something I have been wanting for a long time. They are a little too big for our mini sized fireplace, but if we ever move into a house, they will fit perfectly!


















This rusty N may not look like anything right now, but with a little elbow grease, I plan on turning it into a perfect symbol of my new name!







These dips were amazing! I got to sample them at this festive booth decorated like a barn. All you do is add sour cream and mayo and you have gourmet dipping sauces for your next party. Hopefully you will all get to sample them!

Hail, the semi-victorious warrior!

It has been brought to my attention that as head of the newest "Norvells" (the s being the key there, I have been a Norvell for a while. I have just never been a Norvells until now.)I need to post every now and then, thus lightening the blogging burden of my most wonderful wife. I find this to be a wonderful task, but I seem to genuinely suffer from an odd case of writer's block most of the time. I am either very critical of my writing or don't find it to have enough creative flair for my taste, but this blog is titled the Norvell News. I don't have to be creative, just report the Norvell News. I can do this. Probably even do it well and maintain a perfectly monotone typing style while doing it.




What you are now looking at is a picture of me. The second is also of me being held aloft on the shield of my ancestors as I march to battle. Now before you think I have gone completely mad, understand that this is the theoretical me because I am neither a dwarf or am I 2 inches tall. This is the model that represents the general of my dwarf army (me) in my hobby. For those of you who haven't talked to me about my latest and greatest hobby passion or have not read any of my posts on my other blog, I take pleasure in painting little plastic and pewter miniatures of fantasy creatures and then combining them with other models to form an army and play a strategy game of epic proportions called Warhammer. It is quite a nerdy hobby. To give you an idea of how nerdy, in fact, it is, I would have to mention terms like Dungeons and Dragons, black clothing, Star Trek, Star Wars, and comic book more times than is worth mentioning in this blog. Suffice it to say that it is an interesting hobby which I find terribly entertaining.


To continue my somewhat verbose story, I have just created and have been playing primarily with an army made of dwarves. This weekend I had the opportunity to play in a tournament with my army. It was a day of pure fantastic and strategic delight. I got to play three large games (which consist of about 2 hours of gameplay each). I lost two of those games, but only by a narrow margin, but the crowning achievement of the tournament for me was to play a guy who had won his previous two games, and summarily wipe him off the table. He came into the game with an air of cockiness and I with an attitude of wariness and humility (mostly due to being beaten twice in a row). I quickly found holes in his strategy and capitalized on his weaknesses using my strengths (funny how that works which consisted of my keen intellect, cunning strategic mind, and lots of armored, hairy, little men. All in all, it was a great day. I got to spend the entirety of it with my brother and that was fun. I like to think of this hobby as what has brought my brother and me together. We don't really have much in common, but our desire to slay massive hoards of fantasy creatures has led us to bound a little more than we normally would have. So, at the end of a day of bloody battles and long journeys (primarily from Lewisville to Killeen, Texas) I arrived home to a beautiful wife whom I love more than anything and I realized, With such a wonderful wife, a great hobby, and a comfy bed after a long day, what more does a guy need!