vacay and butta...

well this last week has been great. last saturday i got to hang out with some of my old pine cove buds. ashley and lydia and i met up at kerbey lane. i love these girls. we had some fun times when we worked at the towers back in the day. we caught up on life, played with ashley's adorable son hudson, and laughed about old times. i only wish my visits with them were more frequent.

i took some time off on monday and tuesday to recover from vbs, well more like recover from the week before vbs. i layed out by the pool, got a massage, played some softball, and hung out with my non working teacher roommates, rachel and cassie. rach and i took some of our favorite kiddos to see kung fu panda on tuesday. taking kids is always a great excuse to see a kid movie. it was good, but i expected nothing less from jack black.

on tuesday afternoon i got a very exciting call. i was told that the leadership at the church wanted us to rest and i was being forced to take the rest of the week off until next tuesday, including sunday!!! i didn't know what to do with myself. i was so excited. i did have to work a bit wednesday just to get things ready for my awesome volunteers who were covering for me on sunday.

thursday i headed down to houston for a good friend's wedding. casey and staci were coming too so we decided to make a girls weekend out of it. our weekend plans included laying out, eating, visiting cvs multiple times in order to have uv protection and sustenance, doing staci's bootcamp workout, and going to caleb and lindy jo's wedding. becki kuhl was also there with her oh so cute boy bryce!! bryce, hammin it up for the camera at lunch!! he is soooooo cute!!


just strikin a pose by the stairs. (from the left: casey, me, becki, staci)3 buds! we have been able to get together 3 times already this year. that is the best we have been able to do since college!

it was great to catch up and relax with my college buds and even reminisce on our flag football days. we won the regional championship in nebraska and placed in the national flag football tourney you know. look for oklahoma baptist under the women's collegiate division. we were ranked 3rd in the nation before the tournament. crazy huh. who knew there was such a thing. read more about it here if you want. life is butta dream.
right after we won in nebraska.
us with our regional champs shirts on. i think whit even got mvp of the tourney. okay back to reality...

anyway, this last week has been very relaxing and boy did i need it. i had no idea how tired i was, physically and spiritually. while i have been laying out, i have been reading, same kind of different as me by ron hall and denver moore. it is an incredible true story. it was incredibly challenging and convicting. i love stories of hwo God uses people to love on others and draw them unto himself. i also love the power of relationships. ron and denver's friendship is so deep. but more than that, i love the example that deborah sets. oh how i desire to be a woman like that!! so, if you have not read it you should.

vbs...

this week was vbs. it was awesome!! i loved it for so many reasons.

1) it reminded me of being at camp. we had about 260+ kids each day. i taught them some stand by cheers like "okay" and "announcements." We of course did the cheer flea and i taught them the soldiers dance from pine cove. it was really fun. Tyson (our minister to students) and i got to kind of play up our competition for the funniest. we had fun!!

2) i got to know so many more kids and families in the church. they also got to see me interact with the kids. i have never had so many preschool kids just come up and hug my legs. i left with many more friends and connections this week. it definitely felt good to know more of the people in our church, more of my church family.

3) it was so encouraging to watch the Lord bring people out of the wood work to serve. and they rocked it!! it was also cool to watch people step and lead, even though it may not have been comfortable.

4) i got to see and hear kids talk about serving others around them. lights were beginning to come on in many of these kids heads about who Jesus is.

5) i was referred to as the movie theater lady by a little girl.

bradley wrote some hilarious skits and we had a great crew to perform them. here is a video excerpt from the week. i may post some pics to follow if i feel adventurous.

summer nights...

i love summer nights. i have forgotten how relaxing they are, since i have not had many free summer nights the last 7 years, i am soaking these up. tonight as i drove home i opened my sunroof, rolled down my windows, and sang at the top of my lungs. it was so freeing, not to mention it made my hair look awesome. i just wanted to stay outside. i have had to read lots lately and my favorite new reading spot is my balcony. i just sit out there with a glass of tea and my fan and i could read for hours. there is an annoying bug that sounds like a locust, but i have become used to its noise. softball is also another one of my fun ventures outside these summer nights. we are not good, but vance refrigeration will rise to the top.

this week has been a crazy one as we prepare for vbs. next week is my first vbs with the stone and i am eagerly anticipating it!! i can't wait to get it started. hopefully i will have some pics and lots to blog about after this week.

fun lately...

Went to my first Round Rock Express game with some new Austin Buds(wendy on my left, rachel on my right). It was no Ranger's game but it was still fun, they won, and they had fireworks after. Friends, baseball, hotdogs, and outside, what more could I ask for...We had a cookout and party one night in the park for our friend Janelle. Here I am being pious and teaching my friend Rachel how to pray. She has awesome facial expression.


Rachel is one of the friends I hang out with the most (aside from the fact that I make her serve in KidStuff all the time). I am blessed to have her as a friend for sure.


I made Whitney take this with me because I like her headband. and I like her.

i also just celebrated my first memorial day weekend in like 7 years. it is a great holiday that i had forgotten about. i have always been being trained or training our summer staff at pine cove. this year i got to relax at a lake house. still no 3 day weekend, don't think too crazy. i still got to work on sunday, but boy was it nice to have monday off!

just pray...

God has also been faithful to remind me of His ability to take care of even the seemingly impossible. I was reading in 2 Chronicles 32:1-22. Israel and Judah are still divided and Israel has fallen way off the wagon, but King Hezekiah, the king of Judah, has lead his nation well and saved them from destruction (so far). Judah was attacked Sennacherib, king of Assyria, and his plan to attack and plunder them for his own gain. Hezekiah saw that King Sennacherib was coming and he and his men took what steps they could to protect and defend themselves. He spoke to the people and said,

“Be strong and courageous, do not fear or be dismayed because of the king of Assyria nor because of the horde that is with him; for the one with us is greater than the one with him. With him is only an arm of flesh, but with us is the LORD out God to help us and to fight our battles.” (verses 7-8)

Sennacherib comes at them and claims that no god can deliver them from his hands and he tries to tell them that Hezekiah is deceiving them. Then verse 20 starts the cool part,

“But King Hezekiah and Isaiah the prophet, the son of Amoz, prayed about this and cried out to heaven. And the Lord sent an angel who destroyed every mighty warrior, commander and officer in the camp of the king of Assyria. So he returned in shame to his own land. …So the LORD saved Hezekiah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem form the hand of Sennacherib the king of Assyria and from the hand of all other and guided them on every side.”

Did you catch that? There was no cool military strategy, no extra army, no reinforcements. They just prayed. Hezekiah knew that his God was stronger than all others and that he was more than capable. He trusted in God.

This convicted me of two major things.

1)Why do I not trust the power and plan of God? Why do I worry and fret and scramble?

2) Why do I think that praying is not enough? Why do I pray so little and strategize so much?

No matter what is going on in your life, what seems stressful, what you are waiting on, what you are worried about, remember that God is MORE than capable of doing it. His plan is guaranteed!! He could send an angel to do it. He could stop the sun if he wanted. I LOVE that Hezekiah did not even have to fight a battle, he just prayed. The Lord literally took care of it. I know for me, I forget that God could do that if He wanted. I don’t think I trust him enough to just sit back and pray when he calls me to. I wonder if Hezekiah while he was praying, ever thought about getting up and getting his people ready? I wonder if he ever started coming up with a plan? Or if he trusted God enough to know his dependence on him and he just kept praying, knowing without the Lord he stood no chance?

This has been a good reminder for me this week. My lack of trust in what the Lord can do can keep me from waiting on him and waiting for what he has. I’d rather just go and try to be resourceful than wait for what he has. Now that does not mean that if we are patient that we never do anything, there are definitely times when trusting in the Lord will require us to move and move quickly. But what I am talking about are those times in your life when we have to wait to see what the Lord is going to do and how he is going to show up. Do I really believe that he is greater than all other gods? Even the god of my own pride?

In Isaiah over and over again, God declares that He is God, and there is no other. Or He is God and there is none beside him. That statement has been ringing in my mind for the last several weeks. It brings me so much comfort. I have been claiming it as doubt or worry creeps into my life. As I wonder at what will happen or I look at the uncertainty of life, I have hope because the God I trust in is far above all other gods!!

Pray and trust. The two go hand in hand. As I spend time getting to know my Lord and listening to Him, I trust Him more and more. As I spend time before Him, I realize my frailty and I see my need for Him, so I have no choice but to trust the One that is above all else.

old friends...

I have been blessed to catch up with some old pine cove friends the last weeks. It has been so fun to laugh about old times and catch up on new times. It was definitely encouraging for me. Lauren came in for the weekend on the way to her next rotation. I have missed my time with Pidge!

I went to Atlanta for a conference and got to see a dear friend! We had a sweet impromptu picnic at Moe's. I love that our lives still intersect. I hope that the Lord allows us to be life long friends.

new hair...

i took a new vitamin that causes your body to use the left over nutrients in your hair. it works great, i feel energized! the downside is that it causes your hair to shrink. i apparently was malnourished.
ya i have ringlets. and yes i feel like shirley temple.