Auf Wiedersehen

I'm so emotionally drained right now with saying goodbyes, which I always hate, as well as a few other things that I don't really care to go into detail over... nothing serious, only frustrating.

While packing tonight, the zipper on my duffle bag ripped off when I was trying to fit ONE MORE item in it and close it. This happened to be the straw that broke the camels back apparently and I just started crying. After a little finagling, however, I miraculously got it back on. Then one of my favorite collage frames (it holds four 5x7) fell over face first onto my toe and glass shattered all over the floor, then I started crying again... so I new it was time to stop packing for a bit.

On a much more positive note, my beautiful, talented, and above all Lord-loving friend, Molly, wrote about being at the "in between" stage in life in her blog and used a verse that was exactly what I needed to hear. And then I thought that somebody else might need to hear it as well so I'm putting it on mine:

Jeremiah 29:11-13 (The Message)
"I know what I'm doing. I have it all planned out - plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for.
When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I'll listen. When you come looking for me, you'll find me. "

God speaks to me even when I have not done my part to search His word. Imagine what He would say if I spent the time with Him that I should!

It's a Girl!

So I've been doing a lot of babysitting recently. And I forgot how much I love children! I admit, it took me a bit to get back into the swing of communicating with toddlers and kids in general, but then I remembered how much fun they are! These last few weeks, I did childcare for a Walk to Emmaus, a women's bible study, and watched the pastor's beautiful daughters. So funny/cute stories (maybe you had to be there to appreciate them, but I'm gonna tell you anyway): The women's bible study is for my friend Barb at her sister Jess's house. At the house, I watch Barb's Jael (2?), her cousins Janessa (8) and Abby (6), Jess's Millie (short for Amelia 2ish?), Chloe (2), Riley (1.5 maybe), and Garrett (3?) while the women keep their infants (there are 3 infants and one on the way!) with them during their bible study. So Millie is adorable... but according to her mom she's also a stinker sometime. Understandably so, being in her own home and knowing mommy is in the next room, she wasn't happy the first time I was there and her cousin Jael wasn't there to (literally) slap her out of crying. So she walked up to the door and gently placed (note placed, not slapped or slammed) her little hand on the door, lowers her little head and so innocently and pathetically goes, "knock knock? Mummy?" as she cried. It was so heartbreakingly sweet and a little funny. Forward to next week: Jael's there and Millie is much happier, everything's going well and I'm feeling a lot better about babysitting. The women are thinking how quiet things are and so Jess thanks God for me and for the kids being good during their prayer to end the bible study. At that exact moment, Garrett accidentally bumps Millie over and she bursts into tears. This prompts Jael to cry too. I pick up Jael and calm her down as Jess opens the door and tells Millie that she's fine. Meanwhile, Garrett is looking terrified going, "I didn't mean to!" I go up to him cause he still looks so upset with himself and I say, "Oh it's okay Garrett. I know you didn't mean to and Millie's okay." This prompts HIM to sit down and burst into tears and whales! His mom comes in and goes "Did someone hit him?" Nuhuh. "Did he push someone?" Yes. "Oh, it's just self inflicted punishment." It was so cute.

Tonight I watched Alisha and Hanah while Joe and Luanne went to a concert featuring the talents of the Tomoka Worship Band and Beachside. I would have loved to go, but I had so much fun with the girls. We played hide-and-go-seek, Dora the Explorer Memory Game, watched Lady and the Tramp, then read a few books and went to bed (Note, this is pretty much the perfect night for me children or no children)

Sorry about all the baby talk.... OH BY THE WAY. My sister-in-law went to Odessa and got a 3D sonogram the other day. She felt really awful that Adam wouldn't be the first to know the sex of their baby so she got it and waited for him to call from Iraq before she told the rest of us that we are welcoming a baby GIRL into the Weather's family! I'm so excited about being an Aunt, I've already bought her some beautiful baby clothes, Pat the Bunny, Pat the Cat, My First Taggies Book, and some Doctor Seuss books. I already love her.

I'm so thankful for such a fun day/night. I really needed it. Leah left Thursday for Missouri and she comes back after I'm gone so I won't see her until August. And I hate having to get ready to leave. I have so many exciting things to look forward to this summer, but I love all the people here so much, it's like I don't want to miss anything. I'm like a sheep dog... I need everyone together... seriously, I want to herd everyone into the same room. Anyway, God is so awesome and I am so so so thankful for blessing me with this amazing church and these people!

He has taught me so much since I've been here, mostly about how much I fall short and how big His grace is. He has definitely been revealing to me how selfish I am and we all know what a battle that is! I desire that kind of knowledge so that I can allow Him to refine me and make me look more like Jesus, but of course when God reveals something to you, Satan always seems to be there to try to keep you from growing. And I'm in that time in my life where everything is so uncertain. Maybe it never becomes certain, but it just seems like it's more so right now. This is the first time in my life where I don't know exactly what's coming next, i.e. highschool-->college. The question of career, location, and FAMILY are just a few of the things that can so easily send me into a minor panic attack. And all of those things are entirely out of my control, which is frightening. I guess that's the point, having to rely solely on God to meet your needs, and he always does. Read about Elijah in 1Kings. God sends a famine on the land, tells him the ravens will feed him and he'll drink from the brook which Elijah does for a long time. Then God dries up the brook and sends Elijah to the last place he wants to go and has a widow take care of him. It's not easy listening and obeying, and He can change your plans suddenly, but the rewards for obedience are worth it. Now, I KNOW this to be true, but turning that knowledge into a realization is a bit more difficult. But God is Good All the Time and I can't help but be excited (amidst my terror) to see what He's planning for my life :)

Ball Games and Chicken Nuggets

We had a double header tonight in Church League Softball and I had SO MUCH FUN. I played last week too, and was really nervous. When we were warming up, I overthrew to Leah and nailed this little boy right in his elbow (NOT a good start). Rob (the coach) asked me what position I wanted to play and I told him that I didn't care. Then he said, "Look, I'm not your boyfriend, we're not on a date, I'm not asking you where you want to go for dinner or what movie you want to see, WHAT POSITION DO YOU WANT TO PLAY?" I'm not afflicted with false modesty okay, when I say I don't care, I really don't. So I told him that I played 3rd base and left field when I was in high school to which he said no to because that's where most of the balls are gonna go.... SO I didn't even get the position that I suggested and now I was more nervous!!! Then my first up to bat, I pulled a muscle. Not only did it hurt, but the team of men gave me a hard time about it. But my last hit was AWESOME, which was definitely a confidence booster. SO tonight, I wasn't nearly as nervous and I could just focus on having fun, which I did. I love softball and the fact that we got to play two games was even better. We won the first and lost the second. The second team we played was really good... and they showed a little better sportsmanship than we did, only a little, but I really enjoyed playing them and it was a close game.

After the long night of softball, I was hungry, so I headed to Chick-fil-a in GREAT anticipation of a delicious dinner. I went through the drive through and pulled up to the window and the guy looked really confused and he says, "number 5 with sweet tea and a small icedream in a cup?" and I was like, "....yeah." and he goes, "woah, that's the exact same order as the last 3 cars and I was like am I crazy?" and I was like, "wow." Then he told me that I would have to wait on the chicken nuggets (obviously with the mass order of nuggets and the fact that it was 20 minutes till closing, they were running low) which I didn't mind because that only meant I got fresh nuggets. So I'm sitting there and I can see in my rearview mirror that the woman and her son behind me are getting impatient... really impatient... impatient enough for her son to get out of the car to help her back up enough to go around me and DRIVE AWAY. How ridiculous! It certainly wasn't that long of a wait and WHERE on earth are you in a hurry to be going at 9:45pm?! I got my bag right before they pulled away so I moved forward and I could tell that she was YELLING AT THE Chick-fil-a guy! If I had of known how it was gonna go down, I would have paid for their meal, pulled forward, then gotten out of my car and nicely told them that they should really practice a little patience with people who are SERVING them. It's not some great conspiracy to make you wait a little bit for your food. It really hacks me off when people treat others that way... maybe it means I should look at myself and practice more patience with people around me, hmmmm.

Alirght, I'm gonna be in bed BEFORE 11 tonight... I have 11 minutes! Good night all and loads of love!