Prayer Request

Wow it's been a long time since I've updated. I haven't forgotten you guys, I promise. :-)

Life has been pretty hectic for my husband and myself over the past month or so. Let me give you a little update about our lives before I hit into the real reason for my post today.

Around the beginning of August, I started having really bad pains in the lower left part of my stomach. My doctor blew it off as an inflamed colon and said it would take care of itself and I didn't need to worry about it. However, when the pain didn't go away, he sent me in for an ultrasound to see if there was something else there that might be causing the pain. We found out from the ultrasound that I did indeed have a cyst on my ovary which is what my doctor was thinking, but it was on the right side of my body, and not the left where my pain was. So that left us thinking it's either a kidney stone or a UTI. He put me on an antibiotic to clear up any kind of infection I might have and I started drinking lots of juice in case it was a kidney stone.

Meanwhile, since I have a cyst on my ovary, he recommended I let my gynecologist know and he told me that the hospital recommended I go back for another ultrasound in six weeks to make sure the cyst went away. I did a little reading about cysts and discovered that they do typically go away on their own, but if they get to be in the neighborhood of 5 cm or so, they usually do surgery to remove them. I found out from my gyno that my cyst is 2.9 cm long but she's not that concerned about it. I'm actually going to have another ultrasound in a couple of weeks to make sure it goes away and she switched the meds that I'm taking to see if that helps keep cysts out of my body.

And in case you're wondering, the pain has indeed gone away, so we're thinking whatever I had was an infection of some kind. So yay for no more pain. :-)

Then last week, my husband and I went on vacation with my parents to the beach. We had a great time. A little bit of an emotional rollar coaster because of a few things, but overall, we were able to relax and I really enjoyed spending time with my mom and dad.

However, nothing is ever perfect and the day before we were supposed to leave, my husband wakes up sick at his stomach and discovered he has a kidney stone. Yippee! Thankfully, he was only really sick on Saturday, and was feeling well enough to be able to ride in the car on Sunday for our drive home. He's had a rough couple of days at work, but he's feeling a lot better now and is pretty sure he's passed the stone. So good news there. :-)

As far as the guild goes...well, what can I say. I really don't want to go into details, as I've put the anger and the hurt behind me for the most part, so I'll just say we've had a few people leave while I was on vacation and I'm at the point where I'm having to restructure how things are going to be handled. I've already started working on a game plan for the guild and what I want from it. This next week is definitely going to be testing the waters to see how the guildies I have react and the desires they have and committments they're willing to make. I have a lot of work ahead of me, but I'm hopeful and I know we can bounce back from this.

Now, onto the real reason for my post. I'm going to turn things a little more personal here and ask that those of you who share my faith, pray for me. I mentioned several posts ago that I have a desire on my heart and here, several months later, the desire is still very strong. Strong to the point where I'm actually reading, researching, and finding out more information about this desire. However, my husband still needs some convincing. I've been praying for several weeks now that God would either take the desire from me if it's not His will for my life OR change my husband's heart for it.

I was listening to a podcast this morning about this desire that I have, and something they said made me realize, I'm expecting so much of my husband. I expect him to fully embrace this and jump into it with me, but he's shared a desire of his with me and I'm totally against the idea. God and I are going to talk a little more about that one as I'm still very much against the idea, but I realize now I need to be more open and accepting of my husband's dreams and desires if I expect him to be open to mine. Two way street Tab, two way street.

In any case, please keep us in your prayers for my unspoken prayer request and that a decision can be made one way or another before I go crazy. :-)

And...one last thing I want to talk about before I end my book. hehe Check out this awesome video I found today. I hope it touches your heart as much as it touched mine.

Not just a Toon

DISCLAIMER: This post is not calling one individual out. There have been several guilty of the rant that follows. If this post is NOT directed at you...then a big huge freaking THANK YOU!!!!!!

So I want to throw this out there to all you non-raid/guild leaders. The person behind the toon...yea, they're a person. Like a real life, living breathing person. And that person...male or female...totally has feelings.

I'm not a prick. I'm really not. I'm a nice person, and especially in WOW. I bend over backwards for people, I give up my time for others, I sacrifice a lot of things to do for my guild. I'm probably a lot better person in wow than I am in real life. And I really do enjoy it. I enjoy giving of myself to better someone else or even just make life a little bit easier for them. It makes me feel good. Makes me feel accomplished. And it really does make me put forth more of an effort in real life.

But I tell ya what. When I'm disrespected...it really pisses me off. When people don't show up for raids, when people show up late for raids with no reason or excuse, when people blow me off or go against the rules we set for the raid and the guild...yea, that really pisses me off. And whether you think it is or not, it's disrespectful. It's a complete lack of respect for the person that put the raid together.

Not everyone has been a raid leader or a guild leader, I get that. But give me a break. Do you have any clue how much of my time outside of wow I sink into getting our raids together each week? A lot. A whole lot. What we do for a couple of hours three times a week, I spend three times that much time putting together assignments, groupings, looking for tips and tricks to make me a better leader, studying our dps to see how to split groups, watching to see what's being upgraded and what's not, putting together gear maps for people, etc. I put a lot of stinking time into doing it. And when you don't show up for a raid you signed up for...or better yet, show up late...yea, that's disrespectful. That shows me that your time is more important than mine. And guess what...it's not. My time is just as valuable as yours. I don't care if you have kids, pets, family you have to take care of, friends, or whatever. My time is the same as yours. We are all equal.

Stop disrespecting me. Stop...now. Or I'm really going to be someone you don't want me to. I was extremely close last night to chewing a few people out, but I held my tongue. And you're really luck I did too because I know I would have hurt some feelings last night. Part of it was because I've lost some sleep and I'm a little grumpy anyway, but I'm getting to the point where I've had enough. Steeper punishment will be coming if it continues, and I don't care who you are.

Get your acts together, get to raids on time, and if you're NOT going to be there, then freaking tell me ahead of time. You have a ton of ways to let me know. If you need my e-mail or my phone # then freaking tell me so I can get it to you. It's not a big deal...it really isn't. But when we get to this point where I'm upset and you're not only disrespecting my time but 24 other people's time...then we have a problem. And you are not going to like me when it's all said and done if the pattern continues. Get your crap together and let's do this. Seriously.

Reminder

Hey...all you male types out there. Here's a little memo. We females...yea, we totally have feelings.

Try not to forget that.

Seriously, I don't know what it is, but here lately the guys I work with seem to have forgotten that I'm a female and I'm a little more emotional than they are.

So here's a tip. Get your head out of your gludious maximus and treat me with a little respect please. That's all I want. I don't belittle you and treat you like a jerk, so you wanna umm...I don't know...do the same freaking thing for me?

What's amazing is I don't even bite your head off when I get upset like you do me. I actually go cool off first or put in my headset. But here lately I seriously feel like I have to walk on eggshells around some of these guys to keep from setting them off. It's seriously unnerving and a totally uncool environment to walk into every day.

So the next time you get upset at a woman, please try to remember she's a little more emotional than you are and if you're going to talk to her, at least treat her with respect and don't be a prick. She'll thank you for it later...I promise.

And one of these days I'm going to grow some and make these guys that tick me off...yea, I'm going make life hell for them until they learn that. One of these days...

Another one of those

So I've really been bragging about my guild a lot lately...and now I'm going to do it again!

Last night, I had more than enough people on to fill a 25 man raid. I actually had to ask if anyone would be willing to sit out so someone else could come in. I can't tell you the last time I've had to do that...oh wait...that would be never! So while that's a really cool thing in my eyes, it's also a pain. I hate having to ask anyone to take a seat on the bleachers to allow for someone else to come in and play. I'd rather do it myself. But Kroff kinda coached me before the raid last night and he felt it was really important that I stay in and be the actual raid leader instead of the coach from the sides. So I stayed. And in the end it worked out. Someone had to leave early so I got to get the person that volunteered to stay out back in the raid and we actually only had one person that's normally with us not in the raid.

So we charged in last night as the beginning of our first week in shortening our 25 man runs to two nights instead of three. My goal was to get at least two wings down and maybe a couple of bosses from another wing. That was my goal. It wasn't too lofty as we've cleared three wings in a single night before.

My goal...yea...they far EXCEEDED my goal last night. 10 bosses...that's right...10. 10 bosses killed in a single night. That's more than half of Naxx. 10. Amazing. Utterly amazing. We downed Spider, Plauge, Military, and Patch. I finally had to call it after Patch before people were going to have to leave before of work and such. But I swear we made awesome time last night!

And...get this...to make the night even better...I had like five or six people get enchants from me after the raid. That's more than doubled from the one or two that would want something. That tells me two things. 1. People are getting upgrades. 2. People care enough about their dps/heals/tanks to make sure they are gemmed and enchanted to the best of their ability so they do the best job possible.

/proud Honestly...I can't get much prouder. The push for content, the push for improving, the flat out FUN we had. I mean, it was just an amazing night.

I'm super excited for Sunday now. We have three bosses in Construct to murder and then the last two guys. My goal...yea my goal is to get all five of those bosses down and go kill another 25 man raid. Exceed my goal again guys...I know you can!

Goals

A lot of the blogs I've been reading lately, the gm's and raid leaders set goals for their group and strive the group to work toward them. So I've been thinking about doing that with our group. Question is, what do I want from them? Obviously I want everyone to learn their toon. I want people to not just coming into a raid and press 1 repeatedly til the boss dies; I want them to understand their rotations, their gear, how the boss encounters work, how to make the most out of their toon and their class. I want them to understand what exactly they bring to the raid. I'm pushing for that right now. And believe you me, I know every single person in our guild is capable of that. Yea, there are some who aren't catching on like I'd like them to, but I know everyone can be that amazing character that other guilds are envious of. Now don't get me wrong, I don't want to push people for this so I can show them off. Heaven knows I could care less about having the best of the best in my guild. I want them to reach their full potential because in the end, THEY are the ones who are proud of themselves. I've seen it happen before. You pull someone up out of a spot, maybe they've never raided before, maybe they've never known x about their class, or what have you. You go over a few things with them, you take them raiding, explaining as you go, and bam! totally new person at the end of the day. Seeing the excitement, yea, it's awesome. There's no better feeling than that.

Anyway, kind of got off on a tangent there. So below I've set some realistic goals for my group. Goals that I know we can obtain and goals I'm giving us about a month and a half to reach.

1. I want all dps pushing 3k. Now I know some of this comes from gear or lack there of in some cases, but I really believe some is partly due to spec choices and gear choices. Having these classes classes is helping in this goal, but I'm really going to push my guys to do this. I want everyone carrying their weight in raids and right now some of my higher ups are definitely carrying the lower dps. And right now, that's not too bad, but it's not going to cut it in Ulduar and later dungeons.

2. I want to cut my healers overhealing down to less than 30%. First I want to concentrate on dps so we can beat enrage timers, but overhealing has been bad lately. The last combat log we did, overhealing was 50% across the board. That's awful. I know a lot of it has to do with the paladins and their lack of dots. I'm no expert on healing, but I'd think there must be something we can do for that. Hopefully when we have the paly class, our teacher has some ideas for us.

3. I want to be in Ulduar 25 by the beginning of September. As I said before, I really want to push my guys. I want them in Ulduar 25 by the beginning of September. That gives us a little over a month to push our way to farm on Naxx 25 and start learning the fights in Ulduar 10. We're already behind in Ulduar (not to other guilds but to beating the next patch). I want to get us in there and going so we're better prepared when the next dungeon comes out.

4. I want everyone to learn what 'on time and prepared' means. Right now I have a few people who are sitting at the stone half an hour ahead of raid ready to go. Then I have some guys who are consistently late or never show. Punishments aren't too heavy right now. Sometimes they get left out, sometimes they get lucky and there's a spot open. But I really want my guys to learn dedication. I know real life happens, and we've always been full supporters that real life comes first, but I know people can learn to respect the 24 others that are waiting on them by being on time and ready to go.

I really think giving my guys those four goals to shoot for, we'll see the raids significatly improve. I've already seen them improve since we first started out. A lot of it has to do with me getting my act together and being a better raid leader. I strive very hard to be a positive, influencial leader and I'm getting there. I've still got some work to do though. :-)

Kel Kill

My guild, the awesome bunch that they are, killed Kel last night for the first time!!!!!!!!!!! I'm so proud of them. :-) We've been waiting for a while for this and last night we did it. I'm totally confident that we can down him again and again and again now. My goal is to fine tune our two nights that we've been going and be able to do a full clear in two nights of raiding. We're starting ten man Ulduar next week so I want to be able to get Naxx on farm the other two nights we're raiding 25 mans. As soon as Kel's on farm status, into Ulduar 25 we go! I'm completely excited about what lies ahead.

I really think after last night's kill that the morale boosted 100% in the guild. Now they've seen they can kill him. I've been telling them that for weeks, but now they know they can do it so things will be a lot better from here on out. :-)

That's really all there is from me today. I'm totally proud of my guildies and their accomplishment. :-) Way to go guys!

Summer

It's one of those days today. I feel pulled in a thousand different directions...but not in a bad way. I've definitely got a lot on my mind, but I don't really feel stressed.

A friend is going to hit 80 today and Kroff and I have plans to go dungeon romping with him tonight. I'm excited for that. Not really the dungeon romping per say, but the spending time with friends and not worrying about hitting some sort of goal or keeping up with everyone.

Work hasn't been too bad today. It's been busy enough to keep me off the internet, and I have plenty to do come Monday. No cranky customers, and no rude co-workers thus far.

Tomorrow is our company summer party and everyone's excited about that. I myself am looking forward to it. It'll be nice to get out of the house after spending so much time at home this week.

A co-worker gave me a lot of her old clothes, some that have never been worn before, to go through and see if I like anything. I think I'm going to call up Jules and see if she's interested in going through them with me and seeing if she likes anything. There's a ton there and I know I won't want to keep it all. :-P

I'm also excited about the raid Sunday. Wednesday night was a good run. Little bit of drama, but other than that I think there was a good time had by all. We only got one wing down, but I have high hopes for Sunday's run. There's already 21 people on the calendar and it's just Friday. That's a good sign. :-)

I feel a lot better after kinda confessing some things to the raid Wednesday too. I'm coming at this whole raid leading thing from a different approach this time. I'm going to try to engage everyone in conversation and get them talking and sharing ideas. If we can do that without biting each others heads off, hopefully the runs will go a lot smoother and our time in Ulduar will be better spent learning the fights instead of learning each other.

All in all, I'm excited about the next few days. It's going to be good times all around. :-)

Blogs, Blogs and More Blogs

I have been reading BBB for quite some time now. I find him to be funny, entertaining, and incredibly informative on all things Bear. For the past couple of months, I found a little treasure that is a noob that I've come to enjoy. BBB linked to him one day and I've been hooked since.

Yesterday I stumbled a cross a couple of other little treasures that I will slip into my daily reading. One is after my own heart. Casual Raid Leader is definitely a blog I'll be reading for advice and comfort when I'm at my wit's end over my guild.

And another fun blog I ran upon yesterday: No Stock UI. This is something to check from time to time for updates on awesome addons.

There are many others out there but those are the ones I check most often. I highly recommend looking for blogs about your class. I tend to gravitate toward bear blogs because...well...I are one. I also tend to gravitate towards gm/raid leader blogs...because I are one of those too. And if you put them both together...well that's just perfect for me!

So get out there and look for blogs for your class. I promise you there are tons of them. It may take you a while to find good ones, people that update often, and/or good, solid advice and information, but when you do, keep up with them. These are the kind of people that have the motivation I lack to keep good information coming your alls way.

Honestly, I don't have time to study and learn the inner works of each and every class. Heck, I don't even know about resto druids or boomkins and I know very little about kitty. But I can tell you anything and everything you want to know about bear tanks because I put my all into being the best tank I can be and knowing is half the battle.

Good luck in your blogging hunt!

Yes I know

I'm a terrible updater. :-P I've been reminded.

Okay so today's blog is going to start out with a link to another blog. This is how I feel. That's it in a nutshell.

I feel like my raid is burned. Attendance has dropped. Content that should be on farm isn't. And morale is low.

And me...well...I have no clue what to do to fix it.

I know real life happens. I know work schedules change, husbands and wives have kids to attend to, dogs need to be let out, food needs to be eaten at dinner time, and crap just happens.

But seriously...for the past couple of weeks I've had to pug every single raid. What happened?

My guild tells me they want in Ulduar. I want in Ulduar and I want to get us there as a guild. But we can't even get Naxx on farm status. Correction...we won't get Naxx on farm status. We can...I know without a shadow of a doubt that we can. The problem is just doing it.

Last night we got to Kel and consistently got him to 20% or so with 5 pugs in the raid...FIVE pugs. That's incredible. And did I mention a lot of our guys were melee? Yea...we did freaking awesome!

Now why can't we do that every week?

I'm at a complete loss as what I need to do to get my guys fired up again. Do I take another week off again? Sometimes that helps and sometimes it doesn't. Do we have a guild meeting to try and raise morale? I just had one of those a couple weeks ago and it didn't really help too much. Do I implement a dkp system to reward attendance and consistent good runs? I hate dkp...like, with a passion.

So what do I do? Maybe I should call raiding altogether. Maybe if the guild didn't run anything we could get back to being a family again and just enjoy one another. But I'm afraid I'll lose people if I do that.

/sigh

Remeber When...

So yea, a while back I promised you guys a Druid PVP post...well today I'm going to attempt to write that one! :-)

Keep in mind, I'm not a PVPer. I've only recently begun PVPing just a little again and taken an interest in arenas. Mainly it's achievements pushing me towards this, but I do enjoy it every once in a blue moon.

So I've picked up the entire Hateful Gladiator set except the helm. I do have a PVP helm, but it's the blue one. I put off upgrading it til last so I can work on getting the off pieces.

With the pieces I have, I'm currently sitting at a whopping 358 resilience. But I only have two pieces gemmed and enchanted and I'm missing all of my off pieces.

Here's what I'm sporting as of right now (minus the helm of course):



The base resilience on these pieces will give me 306 with the set bonus included.

We've got three red gems that we'll throw a [item]Fractured Scarlet Ruby[/item] in to get our Armor Penetration up. Or if we're still struggling on resilience we can put in a [item]Lucent Monarch Topaz[/item] bringing our resilience up 24 points.

For the yellow gems we'll put a [item]Kharmaa's Grace[/item] in and bring our resilience up 40 points.

Blue will be [item]Steady Forest Emerald[/item] bringing us up another 24 points.

Now the meta gets a little trickier. I'm considering the [item]Enfulgent Skyflare Diamond[/item]. Caster's eat me up in pvp so it'd probably be a worthwhile investment. If I don't go that route I'll probably grab a [item]Enigmatic Skyflare Diamond[/item] for the stun reduction.

So there's our gems. We're up to 400 resilience rating. That's a little better...or at least we're headed in the right direction. Let's look at enchants.

For our helm we have [item]Arcanum of the Savage Gladiator[/item] bringing our resilience up 25.

Our shoulders will use [item]Inscription of Triumph[/item] adding another 15 to resil.

Cloak doesn't have a resil enchant, so I'll probably just stick to my 20 agility enchant.

Chest is a no brainer with [item]Enchant Chest - Exceptional Resilience[/item] adding 20 to resil.

For bracers you have a couple of options. Six to all stats is a good choice or major stamina, depending on if you're trying to make up some lost health. Either way, no resilience options for bracers.

Same thing with gloves. No resilience enchants, so we'll go for agility or stam depending on what you need more.

Don't forget to grab a socket adder to waist and throw a [item]Kharmaa's Grace[/item] in there to add 20 resil.

Legs will need to have a [item]Earthen Leg Armor[/item] kit on them to add 40 resil to our set.

For feet I'm probably going to stick with [item]Enchant Boots - Tuskarr's Vitality[/item] for the crit.

Since I'm an enchanter, I get to add lovely enchants to my rings. I'll probably stick with the 4 to all stats and not fiddle with the stam. But the options there if you need it.

Weapon is going to be another tricky one. Until I find better, I'll probably just stick with Mongoose.

We're up to 540 resilience now. Much, much better. :-)

Now let's look at our other pieces and see where our total will end.

For the weapon, I'm hoping to pick up [item]Deadly Gladiator's Staff[/item]. That'll add 84 to our resilience and I wont' have to use arena points to get it. :-)

There's a couple of options for neck. [item]Deadly Gladiator's Pendant of Triumph[/item] or [item]Deadly Gladiator's Pendant of Victory[/item]. One has more hit, one had more crit, but both give 34 resil.

The same is true of the cloak. One is for hit, one has crit, but both of them give us 38 resilience.

[item]Deadly Gladiator's Armwraps of Triumph[/item] give us 37 resilience.

[item]Deadly Gladiator's Belt of Triumph[/item] gives us 49 resilience as well as another blue socket to throw a [item]Steady Forest Emerald[/item] in it to add another 8 resil.

[item]Deadly Gladiator's Boots of Triumph[/item] gives us 49 resilience plus a yellow socket to put another [item]Kharmaa's Embrace[/item] in it to add another 20.

[item]Deadly Gladiator's Band of Triumph[/item] x 2 gives us 74.

For our trinkets, I'm personally going to try and pick up [item]Medallion of the Horde[/item] which won't give us resil, but is a definite must for pvp. As well as [item]Platinum Discs of Battle[/item] which gives us 95 resil.

We're at a grand total of 1028 resilience.

According to Elitist Jerks, the cap for reducing your chance to be crit has a cap of 1229.62. So we're still a little ways off, but really dog gone close. And none of that that's listed is arena gear. It's all purchaseable with badges and/or honor and Stone Keeper Shards.

Hope that helps all you PVP junkies out there. :-)

Patch Time is Upon Us

It's that time again. The glorious day of a new patch awaits us not far on the horizon. I'm really excited about this one. Usually I dread patches and they inevitably make silly changes to classes and abilities, however this one is not that bad. Druids are getting a slight nerf with some of the cat abilities, but it's not too terrible. I'd say it has a lot to do with feral druids easily hitting 5k dps in most of the raid dungeons.

I'm really excited about the new druid skins. Nothing new for Boomkins and Trees yet, but from what they say it won't be too far off. Night elves still look amazingly better than Taurens, but the new forms are a vast improvement from the old, so I'm very excited.

Along with the patch comes new dungeons, new raids, new mounts, tabards, vanity pets, and achievement's galore! Definitely a lot to look forward to. This also means I'm going to have to get my rearend in gear and get the mounts, pets, and tabards from the current tournament quests so I'm not too far behind on the new content.

I'm currently sitting at 77 of 101 possible pets. Not too bad if I do say so myself. I'd, of course, like it to be higher, but I'm getting down to only the pets I have to farm again and I'm really dreading that.

The new patch is also bring a few interface changes which could be very neat. One of the things is a in-game item comparision. If this works the way I hope, there's one last add-on I'll have to worry about updating at patch time.

Fishing's getting a new item available as a reward from the dailies. 100 gold for a grey item? Bring it on!

Cooking is getting a few nice changes. The Chef's Hat, a worthless item except for the ach before, now allows players to cook faster while wearing. That's pretty neat. At least it does something.

Mounts are now available at lower levels and a few have had their speed increased. That's definitely good news for alt lovers. They're also lowering the gold required for training and purchasing mounts as well as including mounts in faction discounts. Too bad I already rounded up all those! :-( Mounts are also down from a 3 second cast to a 1.5 second cast.

Players can now get experience from battlegrounds. Good news for PVP lovers.

They're also adding in an available 'turn off experience' for a 10 gold fee. Now this could be pretty cool, especially for those who like to raid old world content and those who like to have twinks for pvp. The way I understand it is you pay a fee to this dude, he turns off your experience, then you go on your merry way to gain no more xp. If you decide you would like to lvl some more, you go back to said dude, pay 10 gold, he turns xp back on and you go on your merry way to lvl. You will not receive anything for xp you might have missed while you were in 'no xp mode'.

Pretty neat idea. I guess we'll see how it plays out.

Also new mailboxes, ports, and flight paths. I'm definitely excited they're adding in a port to the Dark Portal. That will make me go finish out my BC reps fo' sho'.

We're also getting a new Children's week in Dal. Woo hoo! Does this mean three more years before we can own all those pets? I suspect so!

That's not everything. For a completely list check out Wow Insider's list here or visit Wow's website and check out the PTR notes.

The future looks bright friends!

So Yea

I have the most amazing group of people ever! I gotta say my guys are awesome!

I told you that we ran a ten man Naxx the other day and while a couple of people had to go, most of the group stayed the entire run, and didn't complain. Not once did they want to give up or go home. They stayed and toughed it out and we got everything but stupid Kel down. grrr we're coming for you Kel!

So last night we charged back into 25 man Naxx with a few of our out of guild friends and we got everything but Thaddius and the last two guys down. We consistently got Thad down to around 5% or so but we just couldn't finish him off before the enrage timer. We ended up going about 50 minutes past raid time because everyone wanted to keep going. Even when I called it I still had a few that wanted to keep pressing on. I'm so extremely proud of you guys. You're hard work and dedication this past week has definitely been very refreshing for your GM.

And to top it all off, one of the officers from Karaviri was very impressed with you all. He said I had an awesome group of people and he was very honored to have run with us and would gladly run again if we needed him. That makes me smile. :-) I'm very happy that you guys were impressive enough to want pugs to come join us again...and not just because we made progress, but because of our attitudes. Because you all didn't bicker and fight, you stayed positive, gave it your all, and kept going back even after the wipes. That is what raidings all about and for others to see that too, well that's awesome for me! Nothing makes a leader happier than watching her family be successful and happy in whatever they do.

You also had another outsider say that our crew was the best raid she's ever been to that not only progressed but that she was actually enjoying being in. THAT'S awesome! I don't know if you guys realize it or not, but it really is.

I can't sing enough praises of you guys. I'm thrilled that you all did so well this week. We got everything but THREE bosses down! That's awesome! We did it with pugs, which is even more amazing! AND you had an awesome attitude the entire time, even after all the wipes. I'm so proud of you all.

Keep it strong Sacred Pack!

and...I <3 you Lil....:-)

Raiding and the Like

I have to say, this past week my guild has been awesome! Wednesday night was a fantastic turn out for us and we blasted through wings of Naxx and attempted the new boss in Vault. It was a great run all in all and we only had two pugs with us. (Thanks to Twilight's Call for helping us out!)

Saturday I took ten of through Naxx10. We had a great time. A couple of people took alts and the rest took mains. We had to stop a couple of times to switch out some folks and I even healed! Crazy I know! We ran through and cleared everything but Kel. I was really impressed. We could have had him but it was getting late and we had already spent a good 6+ hours in there so I think everyone was getting exhausted. I'm thoroughly impressed that everyone wanted to keep going though. Every time we'd loose someone I'd ask if they wanted to call it or keep going and everytime everyone wanted to keep going. It's truly a remarkable thing to get 10 people together that want to keep pressing on. I'm impressed guys. :-)

Last night was another awesome night for us. We had to pug 6 people all together. (Thanks Karaviri and Family til the End for helping us out!) We downed four bosses leaving us only three left for tonight before the last two guys. We had a little bit of trouble on Four Horsemen. I'll take the blame for a lot of it. I had never done the fight the way they were wanting to so learning to lead it was a new thing. But they were patient with me and I was patient with them and we got through it and now I know how to lead a new fight and my guild knows another strat for those guys. :-)

I truly had a blast last night as I hope everyone else did as well. :-) Many thanks again for those that filled in for us. We love you guys and are happy to have you as part of our extended family. :-)

Oh and I <3 you Lil! :-P

Updates from Sacred Pack

Since I haven't posted properly for over a week now, let's have some updates!

Ahtabat is one away from her Fawn. And her 75 pet achievement. :-) I'll receive my first tournament pet not today, but tomorrow probably so that'll finish me off. I'm very excited! :-)

Battle Bots are now live. Go here and pick yours up if you haven't already. The only thing that disappoints me about them so far is you have to redeem a new case of battle fuel every day. I want an unlimited supply dang it!

Nakar is a proud new daddy and Akarra is a proud new grandma. Congrats to both of you!!!

Zara and Teacc should be expecting their little bundle of joy in the coming weeks. :-)

Kroff and I are still NOT pregnant nor do we plan on becoming pregnant for a while. :-P

Sacred Pack has it's 25 mans up and running again and I gotta say, I'm impressed. We've done well in what we've done thus far. We're tearing Naxx apart and I'm hoping to have it cleared by Sunday and us back into Uldar on Monday.

I'm very grateful to our friends at Twilight's Call for filling in the spots we have open. You guys are awesome and we love having you as honorary family members. :-)

Oh and Liliann is awesome and I <3 her. There ya go Lil :-)

New Boss!

So my head is killing me this morning so if some of this is kinda random, that's why.

Last night Kroff threw together a ten man Uldar and in we went. We downed FL, Razorscale, and XT in one shot each and decided to skip over Ignis and charge on to new things. We hit up Kologarn and killed him one shot and went onto Auriaya. I wasn't in the group that worked on her last week, but I picked up what to do and we charged in and tried her. She actually wasn't that bad. It's a little bit of movement, but the main aspect is having enough damage...and enough aoe damage to take down the adds as they come in. Tanking her wasn't any big deal...except I died right before she fell over.

That seemed to happen a lot last night. I felt squishy for the first time in ages and I don't know why. I'd like to caulk it up to it being a new dungeon and a tougher dungeon, but I may need to re-evaluate Aht's gear, gem, and enchant choices.

In any case, we downed Auriaya and moved onto Hodir.

Here's a fun fight.

Hodir himself isn't too bad. What makes or breaks this fight is the movement. None of us had done this fight before and none of us had read up or watched videos on it. Del got online real quick and read us a strat and we tried him out.

Let me attempt to describe a little bit everything that's going on.

Okay, first off you have Hodir himself who must be kited around. Reason for kiting is ice shards that fall from the ceiling and squish/knock back anyone beneath them. Your warning is a little blue circle on the ground where they are going to fall. So I had to kite him around so I wouldn't be death to falling icycles.

While I'm kiting him around I'm having to constantly bounce so I'm not standing still. Reason for continual bounceage is because he works a lot like the last boss in Nexus where you get a staking debuff on you if you stand still. I imagine this was a lot harder for the healers than for me to continually bounce around like an idiot. (Haha)

While I'm doing all this, the dps is having to break four NPC's out of a block of ice so they can help kill Hodir. One of the NPC's cast's a beam of light that gives 100% haste buff if you stand in it. So while I'm avoiding falling ice and bouncing around, I'm trying to move into the beams of light or at least move Hodir close to the beams of light so the melee can stand in them.

After a little while, Hodir decideds to freeze the entire ground. At this point, he knocks two huge ice crystals to the ground while he's casting his nine second freeze. After the crystal's fall, everyone has to run over and stand on it because it creates a snow mounds that frees the player from getting frozen. The crystals that fall here look exactly like the others, except there bigger. It took us a couple of wipes to realize this.

Alright, so after the freeze, the dumb NPC's are frozen again and the dps has to break them out so they can help again. While this is going on, Hodir switches attacks and the offtank, wearing frost resist, has to taunt him off the main tank so the main tank doesn't get one shotted. Yay Del! This part actually wasn't too bad with our add ons. Once I saw what to look for I could do more than just wait for Del to call it out to re taunt.

So there's the fight. It doesn't sound too complicated until you start doing it. And honestly, it wasn't that bad of a fight when you get the movement's down. It's just learning it that's the fun part. We had him under half way last night when we had to call it and I'm confident that we can get him down with another week.

Excitement!

I mentioned a while back I'm completely addicted to the Twilight series. I've read all four books, own the soundtrack, own the first movie and I'm totally stoked about the second one.

There was only one concern I had about the entire thing. They introduce the werewolves in the second book and you see them 'transform'. This kinda bothered me because even though the entertainment industry has a huge potential for CGI and special effects, they also manage to screw stuff up a lot.

I fear no longer!

Check it out.



I think I just peed myself a little.

Achievement Whore

So here's what I've been doing...achievementing!

43

That's right! I'm 43 out of...however many are on our server. hehe

It started last weekend. I sat at the fountain at Dal and tried to get my last three coins I needed. And an hour or so later...ching ching! Three achievements one right after the other. I also managed to get the Strand Crawler from the fishing daily which put me three away from getting my fawn. /cry

Monday was Memorial Day so we spent most of the day on WOW goofing off. I was doing dailies and Kroff wanted to do something with me so we grabbed a couple of people and went and pwned the BC dungeons for the achievements. I finished off my Outland Dungeon Hero with the seven + dungeons we ran and racked up a ton of points.

Then on Wednesday I hit the 500 daily quests done. Woot woot! Honestly, I'm surprised at myself. I HATE dailies. Despise them with a passion. But, I've really buckled down and started doing them. Not every day, but pretty dog gone close. I gave 1000 gold to a guildie to get his cold weather flying and I've been broke since. So dailies it is! And I'm loving it. Not the dailies, but the gold I've been collecting as a reward for doing said dailies.

Thursday I went and played around in Caverns of Time and finished off my Keepers of Time rep to get the last one I needed for both 25 Exaulted Reps and The Burning Crusader.

Friday we took time off from WOW and went and saw Star Trek. OMG awesome...please go see it. I'm not a huge Trekie but I like the Sci-Fi movies. My dad is the Trekie so I've seen all the movies. I don't know that I would have gone to see this one except my husband got an iching to go see it so we went with a couple from work. Definitely worth it. It was really good even for those who aren't huge trekies.

Saturday was another day off from WOW since we had company over that evening.

Sunday I was able to play a while and finished off one the groups for the Argent Tournament. /sigh It's going to take me forever to finish those. *keep eyes on goal* Pets and Mounts and Tabards galore!

I also was able to get the To All the Squirrel's Who've Shared My Life and Pest Control achievements yesterday.

That was fun!

I'm going to play around with the cooking one's one of these days. It's one of those things I just need to sit down and do. I'm also going to attempt to get some guildies and go pwn all the classic raid dungeons to get those ach's out of the way. If I keep plundering away at the Tournament dailies I'll soon have enough to get my pets. :-)

Achievement whore out.

For the Horde!

For all of you pet lovers....click below to get a free in-game pet!

It's been a week since I updated. I'm surprised I haven't heard about it yet. :-P

Today's probably not the best of days for me to be updating. My mind is far from one single thing, and the thing I most want to talk about, I won't. Makes a lot of sense right?

So instead I'll update you about what Aht's doing and maybe a few other things. :-)

Ahtabat is going to give Restro a whirl. She only needs four or five pieces to complete her resto set and she's going to attempt to heal Naxx 10 this weekend. I've got to get crackin on finishing her set out before then, but I'll admit, I've been side-tracked.

Kroff and I have been working on our alts for the past little bit. Neeuq is my hunter. She's now 74, halfway to 75 and made the switch from BM to Survival. I'm honestly a bit disappointed. I know my gear is far from anything to brag about and I definitely don't have the best arrows or pet to be putting out major dps. But with the switch, I only saw my dps go up about 50 points. I was kinda hoping for a little bit...well...more.

However! Since I've been playing Neeuq a little more these days, you can expect to see a full hunter breakdown of stats and gear and such in the upcoming future...right after that pvp druid breakdown. :-)

In other news, the guild has been having a little bit of trouble raiding as of lately. I really just thing spirits are down. I wasn't privy to the raid last night as Kroff and I had to attend our niece's graduation, but I heard they did really well! I was excited...am excited! :-) They didn't get Kel down, but this is the second week in a row we've made it to Sapp so that's good.

I'm taking a few to try Uldar and learn the first fight Thursday in hopes that we might be able to try him 25 man in one of the upcoming weeks. If it doesn't happen this week, then I'll be able to rotate a few more people in and let them learn the fight so hopefully we can go 25 man next week. We'll see what they're up for.

In any case my plan is to let them see Uldar, see what they need to work for, and hope that raises some spirits. If the subtle way doesn't help then it'll be time to break out another Ahtabat pep talk. :-0 I know everyone just loves those! hehe

A little deeper into the Bear

I mainly use this blog to focus on my life in wow. My guild, my friends, and my toons. I try to bring you information about Druid's as I find out about it because that is what I play...most of the time. Occasionally I touch on other aspects of my life and recently I delved a little into my personal beliefs.

I want to do that again...but a little deeper this time.

As I said before, I'm a Christian. There's a song that describes how I feel in my Christianity; "deep water faith in the shallow end". When I was younger I had a heart for Christ. I stayed in church, practically lived there in high school. I poured myself into activities: missions both home and away, teaching, learning, singing (even playing guitar in our praise band), VBS...well you get the idea. I never really had much of a deeper relationship at home. I prayed, but never like I should and I studied rarely on my own. I deeply regret those things now as I feel that's, in part, why I feel the way I do now.

I have been struggling with my faith, or lack thereof, off and on for a long time now. Going on three years I suppose...actually probably longer than that. I stayed mad at God for a long time. I never denied Him, but I didn't want to go out of my way to be that that I claimed to be. I didn't go to church and I never studied or prayed on my own. I even stopped reading Christian books and listening to Christian music. I faded further and further from who I am. I even tried to be someone else for a while. I never tried alcohol, drugs, or other addictions to fill the gap that I was blocking out of my life...but I might as well have. I slipped further and further from the God I call Daddy...the one Father that I have never been without. I drifted into a dark hole and while I've never been tested or treated for it, I know I have some form of depression. To what extent it would be "diagnosed" I dunno.

Please understand I'm not proud of what I've done or who I've become. I'm extremly blessed that I'm still alive and that I'm married to a wonderful, Godly man who loves me more than I deserve. I have a wonderful house, a good job, and beautiful babies (two dogs, a rabbit, and a fish). I have a good life. I write to get this off my chest and hopefully out of my head.

I won't go into detail (save that for another post :-P) but there are so many things I've been wrestling with lately. My past, my job, my morals, my goals, my dreams, my thought process, my priorities. Basically if you can think it I have been and it's definitely a little overload on my brain. I have a lot to work through.

I have a dream of one day becoming a woman worthy of calling herself a child of God...I dream of becoming this woman...

A Wife of Noble Character

¹⁰ ^b]">[b]Who can find a virtuous and capable wife?
She is more precious than rubies.
¹¹ Her husband can trust her,
and she will greatly enrich his life.
¹² She brings him good, not harm,
all the days of her life.

¹³ She finds wool and flax
and busily spins it.
¹⁴ She is like a merchant’s ship,
bringing her food from afar.
¹⁵ She gets up before dawn to prepare breakfast for her household
and plan the day’s work for her servant girls.

¹⁶ She goes to inspect a field and buys it;
with her earnings she plants a vineyard.
¹⁷ She is energetic and strong,
a hard worker.
¹⁸ She makes sure her dealings are profitable;
her lamp burns late into the night.

¹⁹ Her hands are busy spinning thread,
her fingers twisting fiber.
²⁰ She extends a helping hand to the poor
and opens her arms to the needy.
²¹ She has no fear of winter for her household,
for everyone has warm^c]">[c] clothes.

²² She makes her own bedspreads.
She dresses in fine linen and purple gowns.
²³ Her husband is well known at the city gates,
where he sits with the other civic leaders.
²⁴ She makes belted linen garments
and sashes to sell to the merchants.

²⁵ She is clothed with strength and dignity,
and she laughs without fear of the future.
²⁶ When she speaks, her words are wise,
and she gives instructions with kindness.
²⁷ She carefully watches everything in her household
and suffers nothing from laziness.

²⁸ Her children stand and bless her.
Her husband praises her:
²⁹ “There are many virtuous and capable women in the world,
but you surpass them all!”

³⁰ Charm is deceptive, and beauty does not last;
but a woman who fears the Lord will be greatly praised.
³¹ Reward her for all she has done.
Let her deeds publicly declare her praise.

Perfect isn't she? I have a lot to work on and a long way to go...but maybe one of these days I'll be like that.

Pray for me. I need lots of it. :-)

This one's for you!

I'm being bugged to update again. hehe I know, I'm way overdo. I actually just got through telling Kroff last night that I needed to update.

I just don't know what to update about. I guess I should brag on my guys. They're doing good. :-) Wednesday night last week we cleared three wings of Naxx in one fell swoop. It was an awesome night!

We were hoping to have a repeat last night, but what with it being Mother's Day and all we had a few MIA, us included :-)

I wasn't planning on staying in KTown quite as long as we did, but we had a blast. We went to church with my family then out to eat. We hung out for a while just taking it easy and then we set up some fold out chairs and a card table on the back deck at my grandmother's house and played Rook. Man oh man did we have fun! We played three games and laughed more than I have laughed in a long time. My head was starting to hurt from laughing so much when we finally had to leave. It was a lot of fun.

Let's see...what else?

One of these days I'm going to write an article about the PVP druid. I just started PVPing some again to work on a set, but I haven't really done much reading or anything on what a feral druid should be looking at for PVPing. I will get there though. :-)

Maybe next article...

That's the way to finish it out

Last night...was awesome!

My wonderful little guild charged into Naxx and we pwned face...hardcore! We started out in the plague quarter and wiped the mat with it in record time. Then we moved onto the construct quarter and one shot everything! I was completely impressed. Then we went back to the Military quarter and worked on Four Horsemen. There was some grumbling because several of our guys just wanted to go finish the easy stuff first. I thought it was a good idea because if we happened to down them, then we'd have tomorrow (today) to work on the other new stuff and we wouldn't overload everyone's learning ability. So we voted and Four Horsemen won out. Woo boy! Here we go!

We tried it a new way this time. Instead of the dps switching, we swapped out the riders. Obviously the back couldn't do it that way since their riders don't move, but that's how the front did it. Try 1 I had just switched with J, got my back in place and fell over. Ummm...okay...

Try 2! J had just switched and boom, fell over dead. Weird...

Then the arguements broke out. Our officers quareled a little bit and I had to put my foot down. One more try this way then we'll switch things up.

Try 3...down they go. We got the two up front down first then we moved everyone to the back and...lost a lot of the raid...what the heck? I'm still not sure what we did wrong. All I know is Sir Zielek's chain lighting one shotted most of my guys. But, we had a few people left up and two healers plus one who could heal. I tried to keep hopes up and we took it slow and steady and down they went.

Then there was much rejoicing!

We passed out loot and had time to finish Anub off before we called it a night.

/sigh It was a good night.

Tonight we'll finish off the Arachnid quarter and then charge in and learn Saph and Kel. Oh boy! But I'm confident in my guys and when they learn the fights, we'll be golden. I'm hopeful that we'll see a The Fall of Naxxramas achievement in our near future. :-)

After all, it seems to be a running theme this week.

When will raiding become raiding?

So I have to admit, I'm a little aggravated. I've got a great group of people. No, we're not the best tanks, heals, or highest dps around, but we're committed and friendly. We came together so quickly it's hard to deny that there isn't a sense of family in the group.

But here's my problem. Last night we ran for two hours. Only two hours because everyone can't seem to get their crap together and get their on time. But even that didn't really bother me, last night anyway.

We started out in the Death Knight quarter and I knew it was going to be fun. I was really dreading the Four Horsemen fight. I mean, we had a tough time with Thaddius. Getting this boss down was going to include a steep learning curve to overcome. But, we charged in there and one shot Instructor Raz, two shot Gothik, and spent the rest of the night on Four Horsemen.

I gotta tell ya, the mood is what really pissed me off. Or maybe it was just the mood amoung my officers. But it felt like no one really gave a rats behind what we did or didn't do. Everyone seemed just...upset. And that really gets my goat. We downed a boss for our second time ever and then we downed a boss for the first time...but everyone's upset? How is that possible?

Maybe I'm over reacting. Maybe I'm seeing things that aren't there, or are there but not on everyone like it felt like.

Or maybe everyone's upset because we're not in Uldar yet. That's a strong possibility, and honestly I don't blame them. But seriously...our group's not ready. Our dps has a little ways to go and our healers really need to coordinate better. There always seems to be confusion amoung them. Then our tanks...we've got some really good tanks, but there's competition. I dunno if it's unintentional or not, but I swear our tanks are always fighting over targets. It really frustrates me.

So when does raiding become raiding? At what point to people realize "hey it's a game, I'm supposed to be having fun" and start enjoying the place? When do my guys go "hey we could do this so much faster and better if I did this"? When do we go to go and not because of obligation? When do I have nights of not one single complaint? When can everything go smoothly and just be a nice, enjoyable night? When does that occur?

Cause I'm ready for it!

Farther than we've been

Last night was one of those nights. Jules and Del didn't have internet. Asanta had a fried computer from no power. Teacc, Nakar, and Haisk were all running late. Taaka wouldn't be able to make it. It was just one of those nights. One of the ones to dread...and normally I would have. But I was in a semi-positive mood so I tried not to let these things get the best of me and just enjoyed myself talking to everyone and getting ready for our run.

So Kroff postponed our run for half an hour so we all wouldn't be sitting around twiddling our thumbs while we waited for enough people to show. When we finally got started, Poncho and Mar stepped up to the plate and brought the toons that we needed. They were really sweet and I'm really glad they decided to go last night. Skylarr volunteered her husband if we need extra dps so we grabbed him and off we went. We charged in with 23 to start working on Thaddius. Teacc and Haisk eventually showed up and about that time Goy logged on. So I gave Goy my spot for the extra dps and dropped raid. The other officers and Mar and Poncho both fussed at me, but I didn't mind. Besides it was better for the raid that we did it that way. They needed the dps more than they needed me and I would still be watching over Kroff's shoulder. So in they plunged. A couple of tries on him to no avail. Everyone seemed to be pretty discouraged. Poncho whispered me and told me he only had time for one more try before he had to jet so I could take his place when he left. They didn't get him down, so he dropped group and they got me back in there. At this point in time I had a couple of people threatening to leave and everyone was dead quiet.

So I got on, still positive and told everyone we could do this and hang in there. Kroff was trying to be encouraging as well and told everyone to not give up yet, that we could do this. We charged into Thaddius's room and off we went. Add's down, we hopped over, only losing one person on the way. Thaddius activated, Grayshun picked him up and we were off! We lost one person on the first switch and I let her stay down. We lost another person on the third or fourth switch and I let him stay down. We were under half now and we lost another dps and a healer. I battle rezed the healer and warned him not to take it yet so he wouldn't kill half the raid when he popped. He stayed down but didn't hear me when I told him to take it. At this point we were almost there but the enrage timer was almost upon us. I started talking in vent 'Don't give up. Keep pushing it. We're almost there.'

He enraged and our tank dropped. Del told me to pick him up but at this point he had already turned and one shot me. I was hovered over his health and watched people drop like flies. We could have this though.

Keep going! Don't quit!

He dropped! OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOOO HOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had to jump up I was so excited. I had a couple whispers telling me it was all because of me and that I was back. Haha, I highly doubt that. I was thrilled we got him down though.

After that we charged back to the DK quarter to take on Raz. We didn't have much time left so we really had to hump it to get there. It was 7 server right as we finished the last of the trash. Del explained the fight and we gave him a spot.

We one shot him.

No way! We just one shot him. This is the fight we've all been stressing about? OMG he was cake. We didn't even lose anyone...

Unbelieveable.

I swear if we'd had more time I would have loved to keep charging. Morale was definitely higher after that. We were charged and ready to go. But we had too many that had to call it a night, myself included to keep going.

We're going to start in the DK quarter next raid though and fly through there. I'm not worried at all about Gothick, but I am worried about the Four Horsemen. That's going to be a tricky one. I see us spending quite a bit of time learning the fight for it. But once we get it...it's all downhill from there.

I'm proud of my guys. :-) I wish they could have seen how proud I was of them last night. I know my face was beaming. Everyone had stuck with us, even if they didn't want to and we had overcome the odds together. It was a wonderful feeling of accomplishment. And definitely pride.

I must be the luckiest guild leader in the whole world. :-)

Addicted

Okay, so I have no clue what it is, but I'm addicted. Totally engrossed. Like, would spend all day in this activity.

I'm addicted to the Twilight books.

*Hangs head in shame* Yes, I know. I'm such a romantic sap.

Here's the thing though. I really, honestly, do not have any clue what is so alluring to me about them. The story is good. It's a totally different approach on things that most American's would consider horror. The tale is totally romantic. And heaven knows I'm a romantic sap. The plot line is intense...for me at least. Once I start reading, it's really, really hard for me to put the book down. I get absorbed by the story. I can actually see it being played out in my head. Which, true, isn't really hard for me to do if it's a good book. It's why I enjoy reading so much.

But there's something else. Something I can't quite put my finger on. I think it's because I can relate myself to Bella. Not completely, but there are small parts there that remind me of me.

For example:

*disclaimer* I'm going to put details here so please don't read this if you want to be surprised. *end disclaimer*

In the second book, Edward leaves Bella. Her one true love. The man....err...vampire, she wants to spend the rest of her life...wait, eternity with. Okay, this is going to be harder than I thought. Boy leaves girl. There we go.

So when boy leaves, girl breaks down. Not just a "omg it's the end of the world how will I ever go on without him" breakdown. She stops functioning. For the first week or so, she can't eat or sleep or really live. She's totally...well, broken. The one person that completed her has abandoned her and left her in pieces. Emotional pieces that take it's toll on her outside.

I was like that once. Sometimes...I still feel like that. Broken. I spent most of my young adult life feeling like that. Shattered from the inside out. Feeling abandoned, worthless, and not wanting to live. Not just because of a boy either. That came later... My problems before him were closer to home.

In any case, that may be why I enjoy the book so much. I can relate.

I'm on book four now. Not very far in but I'm at the point where Bella and Edward get married. It brings back so many memories. She's so enthralled with the love of her...existence...haha...that she completely forgets everything and everyone around her. She's locked into his eyes, his face, his very being. It's how I was at our wedding. Nothing else mattered. I was focused on the love of my life. I had a hard time looking at him a couple of times because I wanted to burst into tears. I felt so loved...so unworthy of his love...and so very blessed.

It's been over a year now and I'm still married to the love of my life. The one person in this world I can't imagine being without. I would have no future if it weren't for him. He's kept me happy, settled, and sane...well somewhat. I pray that I never look at him in any other way than the unconditional love I feel for him. I pray that my eyes continue to light up when I see his face or hear his voice. I pray my heart continues to flutter a little every time I see an e-mail or text from him, no matter what it says.

I never had to make a choice the way the heroine of our story does, but I can relate to her. I do feel the way she feels about Edward about my Jeremy. I love him.

So my small following has been after me to update...so I'm updating. :-P

Now what to write about?

It seems that here lately, it's getting harder and harder for me to write what I actual think. Words on the screen just can't really express how I feel, what I feel. Heck, I can't even SAY what I'm actually thinking. My husband and I went to bed extraordinarily early, well for us anyway, last night and just laid in bed. We talked for a while, but I had a billion things I wanted to say. Questions, thoughts, ramblings...but every time I started to say something, I didn't. I dunno why either. I mean, I trust him...love him with all my heart, the thought of saying somethings out loud though...

So I'm lost in thought...in the most literal sense of the word possible.

When all else fails...write about life! So here goes...

As you all are aware, Kroff and I went to Las Vegas last week. It was a rather short trip, but we had fun nonetheless. I worked 8+ hours a day each day, but at night we went out and explored and saw a lot of marvelous things. The fountains of Bellagio were...amazing. The effiel tower at Paris. Ceasar's Palace. Beautiful places...many beautiful places.

Don't get me wrong...there's no way in Hades I would ever live there. The hooker trading cards, the soft porn everywhere advertising women, the bars and club life every night...yea no thank you. I enjoy my small town life thank you very much.

But it was nice to visit. Nice to see once and maybe I'll be ready to go again someday and finish seeing the stuff we didn't get to see the first go round.

When we got back from Las Vegas...I caught a nice little...whatever you call this. I don't think it's a cold, I think it's just my sinus's, but it's driving me nuts that's for sure. My head's been pouding most of the week, my nose is like a fountain, I've developed a nice cough that's down in my chest now, and Monday I had myself a nice little fever complete with the shakes. Yea, it's been just dandy since we got back.

I am feeling better today though. I've been trying very hard to take care of myself and make sure my body get's back to feeling better before too long.

And honestly, that's probably why I feel the way I feel, or part of it anyway.

I've been reading the Twilight books lately. I know, I'm behind. But these are the first books I've picked up and read in a very long time. I've told my husband I'm a reader and that when I get into a book, I can't put it down. But he's never seen me do that before...until now. I read book one in three days and book two in two. We're going to try to find book three and four at lunch today so I can charge into them.

It feels good to read again. I get so lost in the book. Book two was incredibly sad for me and I sat and cried for a long time as I read it yesterday. (I'm sure part of that was due to my miserable state of being yesterday as well.) I was so entralled by the picture, the movie, my mind was creating as I read. I almost forgot what it was like.

I have read some in the past few years, but I've not really read...I've not been captured by a book. I was thinking about it this morning, and it's probably because what I had read most recently were all non-fiction and biographies. I haven't read a good fiction book in a long time. And actually thinking about it, I think the last set of books I read that I was so lost in like this was the Han Solo trilogy...yes I know, I'm a nerd. But I really can't remember getting lost in a book since then. Well, maybe John Grisham's Testament. I can't remember if that was before or after Han Solo.

It doesn't really matter though. It's been a long time...too long since I've read like that. So I made myself a promise this morning. I'm going to the library and getting a library card soon. Sooner depending on how I feel. And I'm going to read again. A lot. I like being lost in a story like that. I like the fact that my mind is actively throwing pictures up and putting itself in the shoes of the main character. I love catching the little details and noticing the patterns and unique qualities that make up these people. Ugh, I can't explain it...or explain it well.

I think...more than anything...it makes me want to write. I miss writing. I've said it time and time again, but I really do. I miss sitting at my keyboard and just letting the words come. I love being lost in my own creativity.

But it's been so long. I don't even know where to start. I'm empty.

So I'm going to read. I'm going to read until something hits me. I'm going to read until my creativity is sparked again. I'm going to read until I can write again.

A Different Approach

For those of you who don't know me personally, my life is more than just WOW and leading a guild. I'm a 23 year old young woman. I started college and never finished. I have about two years under my belt and while I really want to finish, my laziness has been getting in the way. That and the fact that I still have no clue what I want to do for a living. Right now I work as an Administrative Assistant for an architecture firm. I'm grateful for my job in this crumbling financial world right now, and also because that's where I met my wonderful husband.

I'm also a mother of two boys. One of the Boxer persuasion and the other a mixed breed, Schnauzer and Carine Terrier to be exact. And a male rabbit if you want to count him. :-) I'm a daughter, grand-daughter, sister-in-law, daughter-in-law, and aunt.

I love my life. It's nothing extraordinary, but it's mine. I consider myself very blessed to be where I am, have what I have, and have the wonderful family I do. Blessed indeed.

Which brings me to where I was going with this.

Part of my description also includes the word Christian. I'm a Christian. A daughter of the Almighty God. I believe there's only one way to Heaven and that's through the saving power of Jesus Christ, the only Son of God who came to earth to die a horrible death and save us from our sins. I believe He was dead and buried for three days and on the third day, what we now celebrate as Easter, He rose from the dead and now sits at the right hand of His Father God.

I believe my life has a purpose, but I don't know what that is yet. I've been struggling with it a lot lately. I've really been fighting depression about it. And it's been affecting everything I do and say. Not something I'm particularly proud of, but it's been occurring nonetheless. I know part of it has to do with the fact that I don't have a church home where I am. And part of it has to do with the fact that I was...am, I'm not really sure...angry at God.

Back in January they did a lot of layoffs for the second time around at work and something inside me snapped. I got really angry. And to this day, I don't think I've gotten over it. One of the many hurdles I have to overcome.

There's something on my heart. Something that's been there for a few days now. I try not to concentrate too much on it because the husband and I have already talked and we don't see eye to eye on the subject, but I can't shake the desire. I don't want to share what exactly it is, but if you read this, will you pray for me?

I have a lot of work to do in my life and I have a hard time believe that these feelings are from God because of how pathetic of a Christian I have been lately. But these thoughts...the desire...it's there, and it's strong. If this is something God wants of me and for me, we have a lot of work to do. And first things first, He's got to do some change of heart in my husband. I prayed about it the other day and I told Him, I'll go with it and go for it, but He's got to show me it's what I'm supposed to do first. And I can't think of a bigger "Tab do this" sign than my husband going for it.

So if you'll pray that, if this is what God wants from me and of me, He gives my husband a change of heart. And secondly, if it's not His will for my life, then take these desires from me. I know it's hard to pray for something you don't know the details of, but He knows. I don't doubt that for one second and neither should you.

Naxx 25

Last night we charged back into Naxx 25 to work on some of the wings we didn't get to on Sunday. We definitely had a lack of Sacred Pack folks, but we got a few friends and pugged a couple and went in anyway. It went really well! Even with as many "out of the norm" people that we had, we downed a few bosses and walked away with no de'ed items. Success in my book!

We've been talking about possibly cutting out organized ten mans all together, but that's still up in the air. I'm kind of on the fence about what I want to do in that respect. I love the ten mans and the intimate setting they provide. There's potential for a lot of fun to be had. But I am starting to agree with my husband that we're running out of time before Uldar hits. Heck fire, it could hit today for all we know. Although Wow Insider is pretty sure no patch today. I'm personally glad. I don't feel we're ready as a guild.

There's still problems that need to be worked on. I feel we have a couple of people who still have big heads and think they're da bomb. And I think at the opposite end of the spectrum we have some folks who haven't unlocked their full potential. I also think our leadership needs some bonding time. We disagree, which is to be expected, but when we talk on the forums, I feel like some people hold back. Now I don't mean they want to bite everyone elses heads off or whatever, but I don't think they let out everything they want to say. I myself am guilty of this. I worry constantly about hurting someone's feelings rather than saying what needs to be said. I think my worry of that really hurts my leadership potential at times. Just one of those things to work on. :-)

All in all though, I am a lot more relaxed with the whole guild situation. I don't think we're as close as we could/should be. But that comes in time. I think we have an awesome group of people and I'm excited about our future. :-)

A Weekend to Remember

Well it was a really nice weekend for Kroff and myself. I surprised him with a trip to the lake where I had rented a small lakehouse for us and the boys. We left out Friday after work and stayed up there a couple of nights. It was a nice place. Small, but nice. It was big enough for the two of us plus two dogs so I can't complain.

I packed a cooler to make all our meals all weekend so we never had to leave the cabin. We took the boys for walks, watched the sunset, and watched movies all day Saturday. We ended up taking a mid-day nap which was awesome! I can't tell you the last time I had a nap. And since the boys decided to get us both up at 7:30 each morning...it was very welcome. :-)

For our actual anniversary we checked out of the cabin, got breakfast on the way home, got home and unpacked and took it easy for a while. I did some laundry while Jeremy played with the boys outside and did some things around the yard. A little after lunch time we took showers, got ready and went out for a little bit. We went by Lowes and got some new blinds for the game room, had pizza at Metros, and did some shopping at Wally World. We got home a little before our scheduled raid so we played Mario Kart for a little while and took it easy before the raid. I popped on about half an hour before start time and chatted it up with everyone.

Jules popped on not long after I did and we talked about what we didn't have and what we did have for the raid. We were short a healer and a couple dps. I checked everyone I knew to no avail so I just sat back and waited for us to start. After searching for a while, they still couldn't find anyone so Del said we were gonna go with the 23 we had and just do the best we could. So in we charged to OS.

It went surprisingly smooth. I was very impressed with how well our guys did. We lost a few here and there and the Sartharion fight was anything but pretty, but we got him down. Everyone cheered and we raised the dead and distributed loot. Nothing was de'ed so it was a good night.

After OS we picked up another dps and charged into Naxx. The spider wing up first, we one shot Anub and then wiped on Grand Widow. I have to say, it wasn't a bad wipe. The tanks weren't all in sync and our shadow priest is brand new to shadow and still working on mcing. We talked about what went wrong and charged back in for attempt number 2. And it was perfect. I think we lost one person and only had to dispel two of the frenzies. How awesome!

We finished off the spider wing and went onto the plague wing. Maexnna was a one shot but we wiped on Noth. Again, it wasn't a bad wipe. The reason for our wipe was because curses weren't coming off fast enough. We only had one mage and I think the first go round she was the only one decursing. The second round, we had more decursing and we finished Noth off with only a couple of deaths. Not bad at all. Loot out, on to Heigan!

Oh now there's a fun fight with 25 people! I have to say, my head wasn't in this fight either. We had two people dc'ing because of bad weather and one of them was texting me. I was trying to write him back when my mom called. It's almost the end of raid time so I was trying to talk to mom and do the DDR dance and it just wasn't happening. I didn't make it through the first dance. Totally my fault, I know, but what can you do?

So we lost people along the dances, but I must say, watching the fight, most of our guys did really well. I know a few people had never done Heigan before so it was definitely a learning experience for some. I'm confident we'll wipe the floor with his face tonight!

All in all, a VERY awesome night for our crew. It was relaxed...mostly, and everyone seemed pretty happy and excited to be there. There was no arguing over loot, which let me tell you, was awesome! And we blasted through some content. I'm excited about going back in tonight. :-)

Cake, of the Birthday and Anniversary Kind

I've been gone for a bit, I apologize. Nakar has reminded me of that a couple of times this week. :-P

So here's what I've been doing. :-)

Last weekend my husband and I went to my home town. I haven't seen my family since Christmas so it was a long overdue visit. The occasion was my birthday and it was nice. We stayed two nights with my grandparents. I went shopping with my grandmother on Saturday. A good friend of mine also came over and hung out with us. We had my favorite Italian place in Kingsport for lunch, hamburgers for dinner and Cheddars for lunch on Sunday. Mmmmm, Cheddars....

So all in all it was a good weekend. It was extremely nice to get away from the pressures of work and the pressures I've been feeling in WOW lately. Plus I got the added benefit of seeing my family. :-) Good times!

So now that we're back, we've had some changes in the guild. Most of Coyote Moon has decided to leave us. Honestly, I saw it coming. After the words that were said, I figured someone would get their feelings hurt and there would be a huge exodus. And there was....at 4 in the morning when no one was around. Oh well...not my problem anymore.

Three of those guys decided to stay with us and I can honestly say I'm stoked! Sejje, Drozz, and Akashin we thank you for keeping Sacred Pack your home and we hope you are more at home here than you have been anywhere else. I'm glad you guys decided to stay. I know Drozz and Aka pretty well, I've talked to them quite a bit anyway. But Sejje I didn't know that well. I got the pleasure of running with him and talking to him last night. I gotta say, I'm impressed. A very nice person all around. Very nice to talk to and the enthusiasm he showed last night for the guild and for the game in general was very refreshing to me. I haven't met someone that excited to be doing things in a while. It's definitely a needed reminder that we are just playing a game and it's not our job, even if it does feel like it at times.

So with all that going down, we've dropped our raids to two again and plan on keeping it that way. I held a small guild meeting last night and explained everything going on and reasured everyone that no one was kicked and they left of their own accord. We're not mad at anyone as a guild and we're going to keep trugging along at the ten and 25 man content. We've got the bodies and the desire so I'll do everything in my power to keep us going. :-)

I have to say, I'm honestly relieved that things are done now. I wish it had happened differently, as in, more than one person who left had the courtesy to at least e-mail me and tell me what the hell was going on. But whatever. Immaturity can't be hid for long.

I signed on last night and was greeted with "Taaabbbbsss" and "OMG TAB!" It was nice. Not just because I was missed, but because people were talking. Guild chat was alive and active last night and it was awesome! I had a lot of fun last night just chatting it up and hanging out with my buddies. That's what WOW is all about.

Ooooo as a side note. I received a mail from Dero yesterday... Yea, tell me about it. WAY out in left field for me. But, he apologized for his actions and what happened between us, told us he missed talking to us, and hoped we could forgive him. I talked to him quite a while last night and I gotta tell ya, it was nice. Definitely wouldn't have expected it in a million years, but I'm glad he's talking to us again. I hate tension and walls between people, no matter what has gone down in the past. It was a heavy burden gone when he apologized.

So things are improving and I'm actually feeling pretty peaceful. My job is picking up and that definitely takes the edge off at work some. This weekend is my one year anniversary and I'm excited! I can't believe it's been a year since we were married. We're not the newly weds anymore after this weekend hehe. Oh, which reminds me.

Nakar...baby room pictures...post on the forums...go.

Kinda out in left field for everyone else, but Nakar's one year anniversary is NEXT weekend so it made me think he still hasn't put pics up haha.

Well I guess that's it. Back to work!

Keeping with the Positiveness!

Tomorrow's my birthday. Yay! I don't really care about my birthday and getting older, but I am excited. I'm going home to see my family this weekend. I haven't seen them since Christmas, and I'm definitely ready for a visit. I really do need to go home more, but the hubby and I are already struggling as is with our finances so we've limited our visits to special times and holidays. I don't want to add the expense of more gas than we need to plus our food and such while we're up there to our already hurting wallets. Hopefully things will improve before summer hits and I can go visit more. I really want to take Kroff up there for Funfest and go see the dog show! Yea, I know, I'm a dork. So sue me! :-P

So in any case, Kingsport tomorrow. Excited. :-) It sucks cause it's supposed to thunderstorm tomorrow but it could turn out to be a good thing. Mom said if the weather's too bad then her and dad won't have to work. Yay! So here's hoping!

I'm also hoping I get to see some old friends of mine. I really need to catch up with everyone. It's been too long.

You know what else I think I really am in need of?

A vacation. A real vacation. Time away from work, our home, and this place. There's been waaaaayyyy too many stresses over the past three months and I really think I just need to escape for a while.

I'm hoping our trek to visit my family will provide a little bit of a break for me, but I'd really like to get away for a week. We haven't talked about it because we're still waiting to see if either of us or both of us stay employeed but I'm hoping that maybe this summer we can take a week and go somewhere...anywhere to just get away.

Maybe I can make it til summer without totally losing my mind! hehe

Last One! I promise!

I watched this some time ago and I happened to remember it this afternoon as I was thinking about a lot of things going on right now. It's a great inspiration for all of you who feel pretty discouraged like I do right now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YU0aNAHXP0

Something Fun

So as a result of being upset today, I'm bored to tears at work. I swear I can't concentrate on anything long enough to do any good to save my life today. I'm just sitting here waiting for Nakar, Ize, or Jules to write me back...haha, what a day huh?

In any case, to take my mind of crappy things that have happened in the past few hours, I'm going to write about something positive! Something different and something not WOW related.

I'm going to write about the movie Twilight.

Oh boy! A movie review...well kinda.

Over the weekend Jules and her cousin came over to my house, we kicked Kroff out, and we ate dinner talked and watched Twilight. Now keep in mind they have both read the books and I haven't...yet. But I'm sure as heck going to now!

The movie, in my opinion, was freaking awesome! I'm sure my husband's going to watch it with me and go "omg that sucked" but I don't care. It was definitely one of those movies that I got sucked into. And that for me is a rare occurrence. I think the last movie I was this crazy about was A Walk to Remember. I read the book and was hooked, so when the movie came out, I saw it twice in theaters and bought it the day it came out. Yea...I love that movie.

So Twilight's probably going to be my next A Walk to Remember.

For those of you who don't know, it's a movie about a girl who moves to Washington from Phoenix to live with her dad when her mom and her step-dad go on the road. When she moves to Forks, she meets a strange boy at her new HS who ends up being her lab partner. When he disappears several days after she first starts, she realizes there's something different about him. Then the day he comes back, she demands answers out of him. He refuses to give any, but keeps asking about her and her life. She's telling him when she notices his eyes are a different color. She asks him if he got contacts and he said no it's the lights and walks away. He leaves her standing at her locker a little shocked. She's getting ready to leave school when one of her buddies comes flying around the corner in a van and can't stop. He's headed straight for her when out of no where, the mysterious guy jumps in front of the van and stops it from crushing her with his hands. He takes off before anyone else sees him and again, she's left standing there with no answers.

Other events take place and we finally figure out that this boy is a vampire. And he has fallen head over heels in love with this girl...a human.

Weird! Right? Definitely a different approach to a love story. But I'll tell ya, I'm a sucker for 'em and this one is right up my alley. There is a little bit of over acting in my opinion, but then again, we're dealing with young adults...it's to be expected. But overall, I loved it.

And I've been trying to figure out why I love it so much. Why does this movie spark something inside of me? I mean, I'm already married. I've found the love of my life so it's not like I'm sitting here thinking "I wish I could find a love like that."

But you know what I think it is? I think it's the very core of my femininity showing. I think it's the desire that all women feel to be protected coming out. There's part of my inner being that desires for a male figure to watch over me. And before I met my husband, I longed to have an older brother, or a male that would act as my older brother. I wanted someone like that to watch out for me and always be there to protect me. Then I met my husband and that desire for an older brother faded as I knew I now had a husband to fill that role for me. I have a man who loves me so much he would rather die than see any harm come to me. And really that was the essence of the movie. A man who loved this woman so much, he would do anything for her. Completely melting away the image of his maleness and the fact that he's a human killing monster. It was just a very cool way of showing the special bond between a man and a woman.

Now I just gotta get my husband to sit down and watch it with me so he can understand why I have been so clingy to him the past few days. :-)

Don't get me wrong

It was pointed out to me a couple of days ago that all I really write about on here is guild stuff and lately it's all been very negative. That's true, I guess I do use this blog as an outlet. I really feel like I have no one in my real life that I can lay everything on. I know there are people, but I really don't want to fuss every time I get upset about something. I know it wears on them as much as it does on me, especially my husband. So I come here and rant and rave and get it all out of my system and move on. :-) Something I've been doing a lot better at lately. Use to things would get stuck in my mind and on my heart and bother me and bother me and bother me. Now I get it off my chest and I can go on with my day.

There are sometimes that things get me down more than they should, or at least, more than I should let them, but over all I'm doing much better.

Case in point. Last night one of my husbands friends really disappointed him, well not only him, but me as well. There were two raids he was signed up to go on this week and he was a no show for both of them. Both of them. Can we say...jerk? Honestly, I expect that from people I don't know that well, people in my guild or on the server that I run into but don't know personally. Yea, those are the kind of buttfaces I expect to do that crap. But not my friends.

So yea, that was great fun last night.

And then...oh wait...it gets better!

And then I had a raid member...in the raid...in the middle of the zone...just leave. Just leave. We thought he was DCed but Kroff talked to his wife and she said no, he wasn't feeling good.

Time out.

I understand if things come up. I understand if you're puking your guts out and you don't feel like playing. I understand if a kid is hollaring "Dad I need you!" I even understand if you're so pissed off at someone you need to walk away before you start yelling profanities over vent. Dude, it's cool. But please for the love of all that is good in this world...TELL SOMEONE. Just say "hey, not feeling it, please replace me, I need to get off." That's all it takes. That's all. No big deal. I got it taken care of.

But do NOT just up and leave and not say anything. It's rude, it's disrespectful, and it really make me angry. And I expect better of you. I expect a lot better of you than that.

And then there's another kicker...dude that fussed at me the other day struck again last night! Started fussing about my second raid leader swapping out her priest for her druid. Both healers and both performing the same function in the raid. But he was pissed about it. Told her she couldn't roll on loot and she had no business being in Naxx. Umm...nooooo. I told her, last time I checked you're the raid leader. So she told him we'd sit down and talk after that raid.

He immediately logged.

How mature right? So here's yet ANOTHER guy showing his butt in front of the guild and my leaders. No respect, no nothing. Just being a prick because he feels like it.

Or maybe it's me. I mean is it me? Am I really that awful of a guild leader that I attact all the pricks in the guild? Do all of these jerks just migrate toward me? Do I have a sticker on my head that says "PLEASE COME TO SACRED PACK IF YOU ARE RUDE, IMMATURE, AND DON'T GIVE A FLYING FLIP ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE'S FEELINGS."

Hellfire, I know at least three people who should be in my guild then. HA! (Come on, I know you laughed a little :-P)

I don't know. It's just frustrating. I just want to go home, log on WOW and be welomed by what I consider my second family. I don't want to log on and get grief and rude jerks hounding me and my officers. It's a game people. We play it for fun. But you will be respectful if you're going to run with this Pack. End of story.