Just Because I Wanted You to See My New Blog Design...

I wish I had one solid thing to write about.  But I don't.  I wish these random things I am about to say would make your life better.  But they won't.  I wish I could say that I am not just writing all this so that you can see my new blog design.  But I am.  So, without further adieu, here are the random things I want to journal about which may or may not mean anything to you.  I hope you at least like my blog's new background.*

1.  My favorite part about my job is quite possibly catching up on all the latest 3rd grade relationship drama.  So stinking adorable and intensely entertaining.  But I'm done trying to give advice.  I almost died when Ashlyn said, "You've never had a boyfriend, and I have and I am only 9...so..." Ha!  Before I could tell her that since I am twice her age I may just be able to help anyways, she said "Well, we only dated for an hour, then for some reason we broke up."  Yeah.  Maybe I could offer some wisdom, after all.  In case you are curious, her two best friends are dating, and she is currently mediating between the two of them to find out if they still like each other.  And you'll never believe what Katie did during the movie last week...she tried to hold Paxton's hand. Can you see why I love my job?

2.  I had a breakthrough last night.  If you don't have those big yellow "dish-washing" gloves, doctor's gloves will work just fine.  Don't have a random box of latex gloves in your home?  I can help with that.

3.  I would like to share the three reasons I have no right to judge anyone: a) I have a collection of construction nails from walking in my neighborhood.  I have to stop dancing or running to pick them up, but I'm rescuing cars from flat tires.  A pretty noble cause, I think. b) I have a towel in my car to lay out on the sidewalk when I get to Ashlyn's bus stop early.  The other day a woman stopped, rolled down her car window, and said, "You should go ahead and get your sun bathing suit on." Nope.  I draw the line there.  c) I was walking alone the other day and when a creepy truck drove by I had a fake conversation with a fake person on my iPod.  Because if I am on a fake phone they wouldn't take me, right?

4.  Speaking of talking to people, I am so sad that I am traveling alone tomorrow.  I LOVE to travel, but alone?  Who in Sam's hill am I going to talk to?  I can't listen to my iPod because I'll be temped to dance.  I can't talk to the person next to me on the plane, because I get annoyed when others talk to me on planes.  I guess I will just have to be quiet until the flight attendant asks me what I want to drink.

5.  And finally, let me tell you about my new love: Strong's Bible Concordance.  It allows me to look up the Hebrew or Greek definition for specific words in specific verses.  I'll share the one Jesus has powerfully been ministering to my heart with.

Jeremiah 17:7 (HCSB)
Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence indeed is the LORD.


The Hebrew word for confidence here is mibtach (there is supposed to be a little ^ above the "a", but I have no idea how to do that...).  It means refuge, security, assurance, confidence, trust, and hope.  It speaks of the act of confiding, the object of confidence, and the state of confidence/security.  I was in love with this verse before I knew the Hebrew behind "confidence" and now I just love it even more!  Here is how I now read it:


Blessed am I when I trust the LORD, when HE is the object of my confidence.


No one else.  Nothing else.  Oh, Lord, would you teach us to let You alone be the object of our confidence.  




(*Special thanks to Becky Hatfield for telling me about ShabbyBlogs.com!)

He Knows

When I taped my trapezoidal prism to the dash board of my car, I knew there would come a time that I would be required to explain myself.  Well, tonight was that night.  Two girlfriends and I headed to Chipotle to grab some deliciousness together.  (I'm thinking now would be the perfect time to interject that I was SO delighted when the cashier said to me, "yeah, you come here a lot, don't you?" "Yes, sir, almost every weekend, and sometimes during the week with my sister, if I'm lucky.") Ok, back to the geometric solid.  Before my friends even had the chance to ask me if I was loosing it, I told them why I loved that six sided shape so much.  

It all started in math class.  My teacher gave us each a different net.  In case you are confused like my sweet mother was, I'm talking about a math-ish net, not like a fishing net.  You know, the kind you cut out, fold up, and glue together to get your shape? Yes, that kind of net.   

Anyways,  I hated my net.  When I got it, I told the ladies at my table that there was no way that the two trapezoids and four different sized rectangles that constituted my net could possibly make a shape.  Doubtfully I cut out my little paper, annoyed that I could not understand how the finished product was going to fit together.  

With my net cut out and carefully folded I saw that, lo and behold, it DID made a shape!  And a pretty dang cool one at that.  Showing my math friends I told them, "I did not like that because I couldn't see how it was going to turn out."

I know I am not the only one with different aspects of my life that could seemingly never fit together.  Surely there are others who, like me, do not like what is going on because there is no way to determine what things are going to end up looking like. But Jesus has turned my heart toward hope with the truth that He knows.  He knows what the finished product looks like.  He is not worried by the "trapezoids" and "rectangles" that I cannot understand.  


Psalm 73:16 (HCSB)
"When I tried to understand all this, it seemed hopeless until I entered God's sanctuary."


Instead of trying to understand "all this" which results in hopelessness, let's enter His sanctuary.  Let's run to the One who already has it all figured out.  He knows that these pieces will fit together beautifully, and He just wants us to trust Him as He works.  


I love that He can already see the finished product.  And I have a feeling its even cooler than my trapezoidal prism.

April Thus Far

We are only 11 days into April but I am loving it already.  On Saturday I picked up two Starbucks drinks and headed to a friend's house to chat with her while her precious baby napped.  I was so amused that the straw that came with her coffee frappuccino said "not recommended for use with hot drinks".  I suppose that warning would be beneficial to the coffee consumer.  In the same way this warning may be beneficial to you:  I have no plan for this post other than to share exciting moments from these past 11 days.  If rambling and randomness bother you, read no further.

April began gloriously with a short but sweet visit from the Burgin family.  Nobody makes me laugh like those three beautiful girls do.  Sami Joy-your name fits you perfectly...most of the time (grin).  Mallory-way to rescue that ball from the muddy pit of despair.  I would have left it.  Brooke-I love when you text me from your Ipod.  I even broke my "no texting while driving" rule so that I could respond quickly.    

Here we are laying on the pavement so we can get a picture together.  I love how they co-operate with me.  The candy bars may have helped. 

This photo captures the essence of our cousin-ship.  

It would not be a legitimate cousin get-together if Sami, Andy, and I didn't take some ridiculously dramatic pictures in downtown Knoxville.

In case you were wanting a little window into my life, that right there is as daring as I get.  Top of the parking garage, baby.  Speaking of parking garages...well actually I have so much to say about them, I better save that for another post.  

This photo captures my inner feelings about elevators.  Come to think of it, pretty much covers parking garages too.

This is why I love them:

Oh and this too.  I mean look at those poses. 

I have been promising my cousins since I the age of 10 that as soon as I got my license, I would bring them to Chuck-E-Cheese.  I have had my license for 2 years now and the "littles" asked me to please come through on my promise.  Long story short: I did. And I hid in the corner of the booth the WHOLE time.  I even made one of them refill my Diet Coke.  

Although I was scared for my life and the lives of all the children in that terrifying restaurant, I enjoyed being with these beloved ones:

This is sort of cheating because I think this photo was taken in March, but I think I'm gonna post it anyway.  Here is Ben dressed and ready for his Math Olympics competition.  I  adore him. 

He was pretending to feel nerdy for being one of the 6 students chosen to attend this Math competition, but deep down I know he loved it. 

Mom asked Andrew and I to go back to the top of the parking garage to get some Knoxville pictures with Flat Stanley for a Wisconsin friend.  Andrew?  Parking garage? Pictures?  Of course I was game.

Andrew likes to pretend like he can't wait until I go away to college, but deep down I know he will miss me...I hope...because I will miss him.  

If the way he was playing with Flat Stanley is any indication of how he will be with his own kids, he is a natural.

I would like to introduce you to Ted, Tad, and Todd.  These are Andrew's tadpoles.  He found the eggs in a pond behind our house and is feeding them and raising them with love (as you can tell from the fact that they have names.)  

Every April we get to celebrate Ben and Andrew.  Andrew turned 15 on the 6th and is now driving!  On the 8th we ate at Famous Dave's to celebrate this not-so-little 11 year old child:

We went around the table per my request to tell our favorite things about Benjamin.  About half way through he said, "Um, I just want you guys to know this makes me feel really uncomfortable."  Ha!  Sorry buddy, just know you are loved. 


I'm not really sure why, but I asked Andrew what the worst thing about me was.  He quickly replied, "You take too many pictures."  He doesn't look too upset to me:

Here is my inspiration for this blog post.  We found the following note taped to Ben's door.  It reads: "if anyone puts or moves anything in my room without My permission it or the person will be Badly punished!!!"

And I think I am going to leave it at that.  April has been good to me so far.  I have a feeling the second half will be pretty splendid as well.  That is, as long as I don't move anything in Ben's room.  

Stupendous Questions

The past couple of weeks the kids I tutor have been nailing me with stupendous questions.  Can I just pause and say I love that word.  Stupendous.  A good substitute for the much too frequently used "awesome".  Anyways, back to the questions.  Some of them make me buckle over in laughter and others leave me asking the Lord for a better answer than I gave.


Ashlyn, who is in 3rd grade, has been learning about writing "friendly letters".  She had the greeting finished and was ready to move on to the body.  After a little bit of confusion and frustration over the importance of indenting the first word of her paragraph she asked, 


"What if it's not a friendly letter?  What if it's a death threat?"


*pause*


Ok, so are you asking me if you should indent the first line of a death threat?  Well, sweet Ashlyn, I know you may be surprised to know this, but I've never actually written a death threat.  I am sorry, but you are going to have to ask someone else, OR you could just stick to friendly letters. Just sayin'.  


I had an easier time answering her next question: "Is the past tense of bring "brang" or "brought"?  Although "brang" sounds much cooler (almost as cool as stupendous) the correct answer is brought.  I may just start using "brang" though.  And for anyone who wants to know, this common grammar mistake among children in middle childhood is called "overregularization".  If I have to memorize that for a test, I might as well stick it on my blog, right?


By far my favorite question from this sweet one was after a conversation about faith.  She was wondering if the story that her friend told her about Jesus walking on the water was true.  After telling her that, yes, Jesus did indeed walk on water and adding in the part about Peter joining Him she asked me, "What if you have a little bit of faith, but also, a little bit of fear?"


I cannot tell you how challenged I was by her question.  I gave a vague answer and we went inside to begin her work.  I don't think I was a very productive tutor that afternoon because I was so busy searching for the answer to her beautifully convicting question.


I have faith.  I believe God is who He says He is, and I believe He can do what He says He can do.  So why am I allowing feelings of stress and anxiety over my future to have a place in my heart?  What would Jesus say about my little bit of faith mixed with a little bit of fear?  Is that really faith at all?  Here is what I believe He would say:


Hebrews 10:35-36 (HCSB)
"So don't throw away your confidence, which has a great reward.  For you need endurance, so that after you have done God's will, you may receive what was promised."  


Let's not throw away our confidence in Him by letting fear rear its unbelieving head in our hearts, rather, let's endure so that we may receive all the good things He has for us.  


When that little bit of fear and doubt starts making an appearance in our hearts let's go to the only One who can strengthen our faith and cry out:


Mark 9:24 (NIV)
"I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!"


Jesus, you are the only one worthy of our full confidence.  Strengthen us as we believe you.  We adore you.