Dateable

I am reading this book called Dateable: Are you? Are they? by Justin Lookadoo and Hayley Morgan and it is really good...REALLY good. I have not finished it but no more than I have read I would advise anyone to read this no matter if you are in a relationship, about to be, or completely single. It has some serious stuff that could help save people a lot of heartache. So this brings me to this post. I have been in some relationships before and who knows how many I will or will not be in later down the road. So I am starting over starting with this...this is proof.

This book is all about relationships and starts off by talking about how to approach your relationships. The first thing is that you should look at each relationship as if it IS going to end eventually...until you get to the years where marriage is a serious possibility then things change. That way you can appreciate your time with that person and yet not devote your whole life to it. The point is by realizing that and acting accordingly each person can succeed and live with excitement and passion (not romantic passion, but a passion for life). I am gonna start by answering some questions about the relationships I will have in the future.

How do I want to be remembered? When he thinks of me I want him to remember me as a great girlfriend. I want him to know that I am precious and valuable. When it ends, he will not know everything about me. He will not have seen or experienced all that I am. He will leave wanting more.

How will I act to get him to feel that way? I am going to be mysterious. I am going to pace my secret sharing. I am not going to give in sexually. He will not just come in and get what he wants from me. I will protect myself so there will be so much of me he hasn't seen., doesn't know, and hasn't touched. I am going to be cool, fun, and exciting. I will keep doing stuff with my friends. I will try new things. I will not be timid, but I will be confident in who I am. I will most importantly remain true to God and myself.

In closing, I have made lots of mistakes in life in general and with relationships, but I am going at it in a totally different way this time. It will take time and I am going to have to completely trust God, but that's how it should be and as the book says, "The great romancer wants to romance you. He wants to show you the sunsets and give you the falling stars. He wants to give you your dreams, your desires, your destiny." I want to keep my focus on the right person and HIS plan for my life.

When it Rains it Pours

You have heard the saying when it rains it pours and after the past few days I definitely agree with it. We were on our way to visit some family in Florida and our van (my family has a big conversion van) was making some strange pop noise every so often. Well we are on our way, have just gotten gas from a place and are pulling out where there is a very loud pop noise and a terrible squealing sound that followed it. So we pull over since the van would no longer run over 20 mph and decide it is the transmission that has come out.

No fear though we are AAA Gold members so we call them up...but the thing is not only is our van huge but we have a trailer attached as well. So the people say they will come and get us but they wanted to charge us $350 to haul our trailer (which is almost more than we had paid for the trailer to start with!) and the wrecker can only hold two people (there are four of us in our family). So we called the relatives that we we going to go and visit and they came down to get us. To make a REALLY long story short - we waited for the wrecker for 3 hours and yesterday we found out it was the transmission on the van and it is going to cost us.

The thing is this though: God is faithful. He will provide and although the past few days I have been struggling with trusting all of this in His hands. But it is amazing because not only will He take care of us but last night He just gave me such a peace about everything through His word. I will put the verses up here when I get to the hotel. Here are the verses:

Psalms 112:7 He will have no fear of bad news, his heart is steadfast trusting in the Lord.

Proverbs 29:25 Fear of man will prove to be a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.

Psalms 56:3-4 When I am afraid I will trust in you. In God whose word I praise, in God I trust, I will not be afraid. What can mortal man do to me?

Today we are going to Orlando to stay at the Gaylord Palms for my sister's acting conference. This is such a big opportunity for her and I am super excited for her. This is her calling and I am hoping that she does well and that God blesses her through this. Prayers are welcomed!

So when it rains it pours, but friends are the umbrellas in life's storms. Ultimately we are children of the maker of the universe and he will protect us. :)

Happy New Year!

After reading something one of my friends wrote I was inspired to not make any "new year resolutions" but to instead make some New Year Commitments, thus implying that I am serious about these things and plan to follow through with them. With that said here I go...

2010 New Year Commitments

1. To develop and maintain a healthy and stronger relationship with my heavenly Father and to "Be like the moon and reflect the Son."

2. To put 100% into the things I do, because anything worth doing is worth doing well.

3. To be more encouraging and kind to others, to show the same grace and forgiveness to them that I wish to receive.

4. To not only work at the rec center but to get in shape and to be healthy.

5. To pursue my dreams and passions and not be fearful of anything "Fear not for I am with you, I am the Lord your God." -Isiah 41:10

God Lover

Inspiration: the act of inspiring; quality or state of being inspired.

Lately that is what I feel - inspired. I am not sure when it all came about but now that it has I can't shake it...not that I want to though. The thing is that I felt conviction about how last semester and how I handled it. I am a very driven person and have always been extremely conscious of my grades. So last semester that's what I was focusing on, and while grades are important and I should apply myself, they are not what is ultimately important. So you might wonder what is. What is my purpose in life. Many people ask themselves them and some never get the answer. My purpose in life: to glorify God.

So what does all that mean? Well it means that things are going to change next semester. I want them to change and am going to strive for that. I want to have my priorities in order: God FIRST. He will take care of everything else in my life. I trust that. I would love to have a sort of Bible study within my group of friends on campus. That we would all do a devotional series that has each of us daily in the word, spending time with God, and helping us grow. Then once a week would could all have lunch or dinner together and talk about where we are and what God is revealing to us individually in our lives, so, "as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another."

To have a time of fellowship for "God lovers." This is a term that I have stolen from a series that completely changed my life and the way I think about God. The series I am referring to is on by Robin Jones Gunn, there is the Christy Miller Series, the Sierra Jensen Series, Christy and Tod: The College Years, and the Katie Weldon Series (they go in that order too.) If you have not read these PLEASE READ THEM! They will change your life! I recommend them to everyone they are geared more towards girls but they give a great example for guys of how to act too.

So I guess I am starting with my New Year's resolutions early, this being my biggest and most important one (not to mention the only one I have at this point - more to come on those later). God sent his ONLY son to die on a cross for my sins, if that isn't love then I don't know what is. He is the ultimate perfect example and what I long to imitate. I want to fall so in love with him that I just can't stand it. For him to be my everything.

A New Start

So the last time I was on here it was over a year ago. The weird thing was that my family and I were about to go to the beach and now as I am writing you we are on our way to the beach. We are going down to our house to spend the Christmas and New Years holidays.

Don't you love Christmas? Family getting together and catching up, everything seems so close to perfect. Even as we are driving down the interstate there is hardly any traffic which makes it seem pretty great.

Isn't it amazing how one minute your whole world can seem like it is falling apart and then the next God sends you an angel to help you hold on a little longer. Eventually things start to get better, it all looks better in the light of a new morning. God has been sending plenty of "angels" my way lately and they are greatly appreciated.

As Christmas is rapidly approaching (less than 24 hours now) I am reminded that during this time we are supposed to be remembering the birth of our Saviour not how much money we can spend or receive. People lose sight of what is important so easily. Now days you don't even hear anything but "Happy Holidays" and "Seasons Greetings," everyone is so worried about being 'politically correct' - I am tired of all that nonsense! We have forgotten the REAL meaning of this holiday we celebrate! JESUS CHRIST WAS BORN! It was a pretty big deal and it is about time that we recognize it for what it is and was. All I have left to say on the matter is MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Long Time - No See

So I know it has been a while and that is pretty much because I forgot...about all of this until Maranda reminded me. So here I am again with nothing more to say than the normal things that are going on in my life right now. Where to start...? Fist off I am super glad to be done with school and going into summer. My family and I leave for the beach this Sunday which should be interesting since I am supposed to drive atleast half of the way if not more...

What else? Well there is a bunch of stuff going on in my personal life right now. Like one of my good friends is leaving for boot camp (for the marines) on the 16th. Last night was the last time I will get to see him for who knows how long. It is a lot harder that I thought it would be... Also several people I know are not currently speaking to me for some various reason and most of them is because they are participating in some stuff that isn't exactly acceptable and they don't want me to ask and then find out. Then there is this summer which I am so looking forward to!

My little sister's 14th birthday is this Saturday and I am very happy for her! She has no idea but tomorrow night we are throwing her a surprise birthday party. I hope she will have a blast!

I have a lot to think about and some decisions to make that keep nagging at my mind all the time....well I am gonna go finish cleaning my room! 

Spring Break Day 2

Well my sister is doing school work right now and I am pretty bored waiting for people to show up to hang out with. I haven't even heard back from one person who was supposed to call back last night...so I don't know what is going to happen with that. I was going to do some school too while I was waiting but my teachers didn't give me that much school (de to spring break) so I am kinda like ok what should I do next. The other group of friends won't be up until after noon because they have a class they had to do. So yeah that is pretty much what I am doing right now. It is pretty cold right about now since the sun hasn't come out yet hapefully it will soon though.

Spring Break Day 1

Well today was school and then I was able to get out of Spanish an hour early to head off to head off to Gatlinburg for Spring Break! We stopped at a Sonic for happy hour. lol I got my favorite a watermelon slush! Then when we got here and went out to dinner and stuff. Now we are in the hotel room watching tv and chilling out. Tommorrow we are having some friends come up to spend the day with us.

Happiness!!!

Well yesterday Winter Jam was cancelled because all of the bands got stuck in Arizona due to the snow. But we carried on with out plans to go to the wool class and then we drove to a Jr. Naturalist program. At the program we were able to see different animals and I got to hold a corn snake. So that was fun...after that my family and i went shopping at a JoAnne's Fabric and bought some new sewing patterns for some upcoming projects and then we went out to eat. I recieved an unexpected and very sweet phone call from one of my friends who was out of town... and that pretty much made my night and possible my week as well! ;)

Today I got up for church and it was pretty bad because we had to "spring forward" so it was really early for me. Then church was really good today. Tonight I have to study for a history test and pack (because we are going out of town for SPRING BREAK!!!). Yay! I hope this week is a blast!

Yay for Saturday!

This morning I woke up and it was SNOWING!!! I was so happy! The first reason I was happy was because I didn't have to go out in the freezing cold and do the local egg hunt. The second reason I was so happy is because when some friends of mine and I went up to Gaitlinburg a few weeks ago they said that would be all the snow I got. So waking up was a good thing this morning.

Last night bowling was fun...it was really awkward at first but then it was kinda fun. None of the kids talked to me except this one girl and I think the only reason she did was because of my mom. I really hated our last church because everyone was a bunch of hypocrites and our preacher didn't practice (or even try to) what he preached. But it was nice knowing all the kids and not always feeling let out. I don't know what God has planned for our family with these church things but I know everything will work out in the end...

Today at one o'clock my family and some friends are going to the Blount Mansion to see something about facric dying with natural dyes. Then we are going to go shopping and later we will go to Winter Jam! I am pretty excited about it all...my dad actually OFFERED to take us. That is a BIG thing for my dad who really hates a lot of contemporary music much less when it is cranked up to a deafening level. So I am really happy about today.

My dad and I just got back from delivering eggs and when we got to our driveway he got out of the car and was like here, you drive. So I unwillingly got in on thr driver's side and scooted my seat up. The problem isn't that I can't drive...I can and I love driving an AUTOMATIC, but as you may be able to guess the car we were in was a STICK SHIFT. So lets just put it this way...the drive up the driveway was way longer than usual and when we got home I felt like I should apologize to the poor car. :) Well I really need to get ready and work on my paper...so I am going to have to get off of here.