Mayhem!

First of all, I finished my art project from those pictures I took in Mexico a few years ago and my newly discovered life verse. Tada! Ignore the Carebear sheets that I sleep on. When I can find where I hid the picture nails it will go above my bed.

In other news, I sat down with my fall schedule today. I think I may have lost my mind. I know I always say that about my schedule. It's just that I want to do everything and I can't say no. Well, I don't want to work at the Y quite as much but I don't really have a choice. Rent and food certainly isn't free. Anyways, here's a grid of my fall schedule. I'm a nerd and the colors correspond with my weekly dry erase board calendar marker colors and my planner pen colors. Black is school, blue is church or cru, red is work, and green is crisis center. Pencil is for things that I don't know yet. Here's a picture of it. This goes from 7:30am to 9:30pm to give you some perspective. What still has to be added is running with Lauren a few times a week, a weekly 4 hr crisis center shift, hopefully still meeting with Emily every week, babysitting or hanging out with my mom friends, my online class, and doing the homework for the 19 credit hours that I am taking. There is one thing that I'm happy about schedule wise. I get so stressed out about exercising enough, and I've made so much progress this summer on that. But my schedule has exercise built right in, I teach aquacise 3 times a week, and I have ballet for sure twice a week (but hopefully 3 times a week), and Lauren and I run together a few mornings a week. That's plenty of activity and I'll be too busy to stress out about trying to do any more. But am I taking on too much?

good song

I needed some think time this afternoon, so I set off on a walk down Salisbury to the Happy Hollow trails. I was listening to Craig Aven on my Ipod. He was one of the worship guys at my old church in Cincinnati and he got a record deal in Nashville, very exciting. Anyways, I'm walking along listening to his stuff, humming this other song that we used to sing a prayer and praise.

"You said, Ask and you will receive
Whatever you need
You said, Pray and I'll hear from heaven
And I'll heal your land

You said Your glory will fill the earth
Like water the sea
You said, Lift up your eyes
The harvest is here, the kingdom is near

You said, Ask and I'll give the nations to you
O Lord, that's the cry of my heart
Distant shores and the islands will see
Your light, as it rises on us"
Shane and Shane

Such a great song. It was the only thing I could think about on my walk. How cool would it be to work in an orphanage in another country some day. In high school I wanted to be a missionary but it was strongly discouraged so I changed my mind. But I still think it would be really awesome to have an orphanage in another country. We'll just have to wait and see.

life verse

One of my goals for the summer was to find a life verse. Something that reflects my mission in life, what I'm all about. Sarah inadvertently found it for me during our talk about wanting to adopt every unwanted kid in the world.

"Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed. Yes, speak up for the poor and helpless, and see that they get justice." Proverbs 31:8-9

That's it. That reflects the heart that God's given me for orphans, abused kids, single parents, people who are being taken advantage of, etc. I found a few pictures that I have from the last time I was in Mexico. I'm going to do something with at least one of them together with this verse and make something artistic to put over my bed. I really want to go back there, I miss the kids and I want to know how they're doing....maybe next year when the RVC kids are a little older and can come along we could make a trip happen. Or maybe I'll convince the family to take another trip there together.

brain fart day

I think my brain has turned itself off today. I was so proud of myself this morning, I got up early and was out of the house dressed up for the wedding by 8:45. I went to Cafe Royal to work on reading The Lord of the Rings. (sidenote: so annoyed that my professor got me all interested in it and now I actually want to read it). I of course left my phone in the car so that I wouldn't get distracted. I got all in to my book and when I looked up at the clock it was 1:02. Heather and Calvin's wedding started at 1!!! So, I panicked, for a second thought about not going, but realized that was stupid, and got going. I walked in to the wedding at 1:19 and it was already over! I jumped in the receiving line and just pretended I was there. Then I went to put my card on the table and realized that I forgot to put the envelope on it. Dumb Mindy. Then on the way home I stopped at Payless because I have no food. I was checking out and thought it was weird that the bagboy put my diet cokes on the bottom of the cart because no one's ever done that. When I unloaded my groceries at home I realized that I had left the diet cokes on the bottom of the cart because who would think to look there! So I missed my friends wedding, forgot the envelope on their card, and left the ever precious diet cokes in the cart at the grocery store. I better pull it together before tomorrow...

save the kids

Good conversations yesterday. I hung out with Sarah for a bit, went to work, then came back to watch the kiddos for their date night. Then when Sarah and Tony got back we talked about some pretty intense stuff until it was midnight and we all realized that we had to get up early the next morning. By the time I got home, calmed down from what I got to walk in to at home, and could make my brain stop spinning around everything we talked about it was 3am. Oops.

Today all I can think about is how much I want to adopt lots of kids or have a big giant foster house. As Sarah put it yesterday, we want to save and take in all the unwanted or needy children in the whole world. As much as I appreciated Tony's suggestion of marrying a rich guy or do it as a single woman and get on Oprah so that I'll get some money, that's not realistic. It's hard to wait on your dreams. It's just not possible right now, and I have to wait. I can do what I can in my current life situation and wait for the bigger stuff. Every once in a while the patience fades and I get online and start investigating adoption agencies and the Indiana foster care system. I could apply to go through the foster parent process now, you don't have to be married yet. At one point I tried really hard to convince myself that I could have like one or two infants at a time at the apartment, I would just bunk my bed and put the crib underneath it and keep all the baby stuff in my 9x9 bedroom. My other 3 roommates would never even know they were there. I obviously lose touch with reality sometimes. I just need to be patient and let God develop my passion for saving all the lost and unwanted kids more until I'm ready.

One more week

One week left until summer semester is over. Thank goodness. I do not like my lit class, in fact I have begun to boycott it by reading books that I want to read, not the ones that are assigned. I'm still doing well in the class, every paper I write gets the comment that I am obviously engaged in the text (which I am not) so I'm getting by. I just really want to get back to my child development and family classes. And then graduate and get a job.

I'm really struggling with my schedule right now. Usually I could tell you exactly what I am doing and when 6 weeks from now. I can't even tell you what I'm doing tomorrow, I just don't know. I'm struggling to keep my work schedule straight because there is such a language barrier. Most of my kids are Asian and their parents speak very little English. And I have lots of people who want to take lessons from me, I'm building up a pretty good reputation, but there are more kids than I have lesson slots and parents just don't understand that. And lots of the aquacise classes that need new teachers have asked for me because I give a good workout. I want to make everyone happy and say yes to everything, I just can't. I want to enjoy my last semester of school. I just need to take it one day at a time until my schedule makes more sense.

good morning

Church was interesting today. Everyone who I usually sit with and talk with is out of town or their sick and their kids are sick. I felt so disoriented. There weren't kids to talk to and play with, and I just didn't know where to sit or who to talk to. It was good, stretched me out of my comfort zone. I even sat right up front in the middle instead of hiding in the back. The sermon was on Mark 10:13-16

"One day some parents brought their children to Jesus so he could touch and bless them. But the disciples scolded the parents for bothering him. When Jesus saw what was happening, he was angry with his disciples. He said to them, “Let the children come to me. Don’t stop them! For the Kingdom of God belongs to those who are like these children. I tell you the truth, anyone who doesn’t receive the Kingdom of God like a child will never enter it.” Then he took the children in his arms and placed his hands on their heads and blessed them."

One of my favorite passages. Tony told some great stories about the kids in RVCkids and explained kind of what goes on back there. I love that we have church back there, I think it's really important that they get the exact same quality of stuff we do in big church, just aimed at a kids level. I got all teary hearing what the kids said to their parents about what they learned and knowing that they do understand what we're teaching them about. It was good to think about why I feel called to work with kids and why it's so important. I thought a lot about how much I've learned working with the kids. I think it's funny that I can pray no problem with the kids and I don't even think twice about it, but with adults can't do it. I don't know what that's about, other than sometimes I feel a lot more comfortable with the kids than people my own age. I know that is where I'm called to be, I just don't know what it looks like yet. I'm really battling with whether or not I want to work in a place that's not faith based because you can't really talk about Jesus with them. There are so many laws that you have to be careful of working in social services or in schools. But they need to be loved on and prayed for and have good role models in their life. I just don't know. Something I really need to pray about and since I'm a big verbal processor need to spend some time chatting this up with someone who will be really honest with me.

Emily's married! I can't believe it, she's my first real friend to get married and it's weird to wrap my mind around the fact that she's married now. Last night was also the first wedding I've ever been to, SO FUN! I love that there are people like Emily who pay so much attention to detail, it makes me happy because I do too. The ribbons around the bottom of the vases in the bathroom was my favorite. So Emily, no one else would think of that.

I'm looking forward to this week, last week was so crazy and I'm worn out. I had to sub for a group lesson instructor at the pool this morning and it didn't go great. I'm so used to teaching private lessons and it's been 2 months since I stopped teaching group lessons. I quickly remembered the importance of class control. I had several kids sitting out for various things. Then with 5 minutes left in one of the classes this one kid kicked me so hard right on my knee cap and I screamed so loud. It felt like my incisions had been ripped open. My knee was already really sore from last night, and this so did not help. I ended that lesson early and taught the next one on the side with lots of ice. Oh the pool....

so you think you can dance

I have gotten totally in to the summer show "so you think you can dance". It's the dance version of american idol. And in the interest of showing you all how much of a loser I truly am, every week on Thursday when people are voted off I cry for a good half hour. I'm not a huge fan of the ballroom stuff that they do, but the contemporary, hip hop, Broadway, and jazz stuff they do is incredible. None of you knew me when this was my life, when I wanted to be on Broadway and I lived for singing and dancing. My acting was ok, but that wasn't what I loved. I loved to dance and I loved to sing and I was good at them. I realize that I can't really sing anymore. A few serious bouts of mono and bad life choices killed that. And I was always heavy and the wrong body type for ballet but I still loved it and since I didn't want to be a serious ballet dancer it was ok. I loved the hip hop class I took in high school. We did an awesome routine junior year called Monkey Gumbo that I will never forget. Anyways, I miss my former life on stage. For hours a day I got to pretend to be someone else, got to sing until nothing else mattered, and dance every emotion in my body. The rush of being on stage with those lights blinding you is unreal. The make up, the costumes, the late night rehearsals when we just slept in the theater at school instead of going home for a few hours to sleep before class in the morning. I get to take an intro ballet class to graduate this fall and I'm excited. It should be pretty easy since it's the intro class, but good since it's been 2 yrs since I danced. I really want to keep dancing, I miss it so much. There are a few places in town with adult ballet classes and I'm hoping to be able to take one. We'll see, I did end up chatting with my physical therapist about how I have at least 3 "jobs" besides school and soon to be 4. (in case you were wondering, YWCA, crisis center, babysitting, and probably soon to be helping out in the church office). I think I forget that I'm still a student, or maybe I just have senioritis. Graduation is only 149 days away and then I get to be a big girl!

Lifegroup icebreaker

Our icebreaker tonight at lifegroup was "what is something you need help with". My response was that I need help asking for help. I'm incredibly stubborn and had be self sufficient really young and found all kinds of pride and identity in the fact that I don't need help. That really isn't true, I do need help, I need lots of help. There are lots of things I can't do on my own and I have to learn that it's ok to sometimes say that I need help. On my deep soul searching 10 minute drive home I realized that I have never once asked someone to pray for me, I'm completely terrified of it and I kind of feel like that if I am still not able to pray out loud for someone then I have no right asking someone to pray for me. It's stupid, I know, but that's just how things are right now. I just need to chat it out and then grow up.

On a slightly happier note, I got to watch Lillie and Raya this afternoon and we made the hand prints after all. I found a recipe online that's just 1 cup of water, 1 cup of salt, and 2 cups of flour. You can add food coloring if you want, I choose not to, and you roll it up and cut whatever shape you want, press in the hand print, and bake at 200 for 2 hours. It was so funny trying to explain to Lillie how it was mom's birthday and when we can show people we love them by giving them a birthday present. Apparently when you're 2 that means that mom should have a birthday party that you can go to, and no you don't get a present on someone else's birthday. Both girls however were very convinced that we were making cookies. All in all, a lot of fun and pretty successful, although I didn't take them off the parchment paper while they were warm so it kind of melted on to the back. Oops!

Why I'm not an English Lit major

Random side note: the rest of the who I am in Christ stuff will continue next week, I don't have time this week for the extra reading.

Here's why I'm not an English lit person. We discuss the problems of all the characters and the authors of the stories we read, and all I can think about is their childhood. What was their attachment style as an infant, their temperament as a toddler, who was their primary care giver and what was their style, how did they transition through adolescence, what important relationships did they have as adults, that kind of stuff. I am totally a youth, adult, and family services person through and through. My YAFS professors would be proud. But English people don't care about that, they want to look at symbolism and motifs. Boring.

Today I'm not feeling so great about kids. Just one of those days where I babysat for a few hours this afternoon and it was rough. Fussy babies who only sleep when they're nursed are not easy when they're tired and you certainly can't nurse them and mom won't be home for 3 hours. Crackers and a sippy cup are just not the same. And the only swim lesson I had today kept kicking my knee and wouldn't do anything I asked. We spent lots of time sitting on the stairs talking about why we have to obey teachers. My fix for a rough afternoon of kids was to get coffee ice cream and hot fudge at Payless and sit in our parking lot with Amy laughing about funny kid stuff. One of the kids in her preschool class today grabbed her chest and said that she must drink a lot of milk to get boobs like that. Kids are just funny. Tomorrow will be a redeeming kid day, I get to watch Lillie and Raya for the afternoon, and have one of my favorite swim lessons after that. Time to crash in bed and get up early since I was too tired tonight to do my homework.

Why?

I don't understand a lot right now. I'm feeling really angry at the world and the bad things that happen. A friend of the family died Friday in a car accident. His mother in law died 3 months ago in a car wreck, and his wife and 2 daughters were at her house closing things up, and he left work Friday night to make the 8 hour drive. He made it to the town at 3am, and had a car accident on the same road that his mother in law just had an accident and died on. He was killed, as well as both of the passengers in the other car. It's not right, those girls grandma just died, and now their dad too. His poor wife just lost her mom and husband. It's wrong, that kind of thing shouldn't happen.

I also realized in the past 2 months that it's taken our life group to go through lifetimony's that I have some pretty intense feelings about life situations. I just get so angry hearing about miscarriages, abuse, and abandonment. I'm becoming consumed with being sad and angry about the bad things that happen to people. But I really don't know how to deal with it. I am really grateful that I have the gift of compassion and that I have deep feelings for the situations that people are in. But what do you do when it's too much? I can't listen to people's life stories and cry uncontrollably because I'm so overwhelmed with sadness and anger that this happened to them. No one ever showed me what to do with this and I can't figure it out. Is it ok to be angry about it? I just really don't know.

Belated Day 6

Day 6: I Have Been Bought With a Price, I Belong To God

"Don’t you realize that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, who lives in you and was given to you by God? You do not belong to yourself, for God bought you with a high price. So you must honor God with your body." 1 Cor 6:19-20 (see also 1 Cor 7:23)

Man do I struggle with this. My biggest struggles stem from not honoring God with my body. And today I'm feeling really frustrated with my body. I dream of having a day where I am not in pain, but it never comes, and today's a really hard day. It's hard to be 22 and have some problems that you usually don't see in anyone who can't collect social security. And it mostly comes back to decisions I made a long time ago to not honor my body.

One of my favorite parts of this chapter was about how as one who belongs to God we have freedom in three ways: freedom from the law, from the past, and from sins. I don't really have any particular thoughts, I just like it.

Physical therapy is no fun

I'm no longer in couch prison! It's more like on couch parole. My stitches are out, the incisions look great, the infection that I had been fighting is completely gone and my white blood cell count is back to where it should be. I saw the surgeon again and he said that once he was inside my knee it was blatantly obvious that I had a medial plica and that's what was causing the problem. It's gone, with a 70% chance of complete recovery. He said the rest of my knee looks fantastic, so that's good news. I started physical therapy too. Last time it was more fun, not really painful. Yesterday I was in tears most of the hour and screamed once. Right now all we're working on is range of motion, because I'm around 30% on my own, and 60% if I use a towel to force it. They made me lay down, put my foot up on this block, then pressed down on my knee to force it straight, which was when I screamed. But you have to do it. My home exercises I have to do twice a day, and it takes like 40 minutes each times. It's basically making my knee straight, and using a towel to force it to bend back. It's gonna be a tough road. Now I know why my pain meds had 2 refills on them, I'm gonna need it all. And tomorrow I can head to the pool and start swimming some laps for exercise. Since I still have a lot of swelling I need to ice 6x's a day and try to have my knee above my heart for at least 2 hours during the day. That's why I'm on couch parole. But it's a whole lot better. And I'm in much better spirits now. Friday night I watched Raya for a few hours and had so much fun, we colored and played in her kiddie pool and had fun taking a bath with those letters that stick on the side of the tub. And she went to bed so easy which wasn't really expected. Tony and Sarah got home at like 10:30, and Sarah and I sat on the couch talking and laughing till midnight when I realized I had to be at work at 7:30 this morning. It was such a great night. I hadn't laughed in like 2 weeks, and I got plenty of it last night.

Oh, and here's the link to my recipezaar page, my goal is to add one recipe a week.
http://www.recipezaar.com/member/533101 I just
made a light version of peanut butter blossoms that I am going to put up today. They are super yummy. And Ann, don't worry, my devotion comments will return tonight, I kind of misplaced my book and it took a few days to find.

last day on the couch

Hopefully today is my last day on the couch. I see my surgeon tomorrow to take the stitches out and he can check my progress. The past few days I've been having some pretty intense swelling, my knee resembles a basketball right now, so hopefully he'll write me a prescription for some stronger anti-inflamatories. And I'll start physical therapy tomorrow. I'm strangely excited. I get to work with the same people who helped me rehab last summer from my broken foot. Beth is so great and understands that running is important to me. They were all so great, and they can hopefully help loosen up my muscles so that my leg stops cramping up.

Being stuck on the couch for 10 days has been really hard. Exercise is the only thing that's really ever controlled my depression, so the fact that I haven't been able to do any form of exercise for that long is taking it's toll. Any motivation to do my homework is gone, the random and unstoppable crying started Sunday night, and the grumpiness and snapping at people who care about you reared it's ugly head last night after lifegroup. This morning was the first time since February that it took me over an hour to crawl out of bed. Saturday morning I'll be able to start swimming again, which is good. My brain is desperate for some serotonin and dopamine right now, and the endorphin boost won't hurt.

cooking monster

My mom created a cooking monster in me. My mom is an incredible chef, when I was in elementary school she would enter cooking contests and won several statewide contests, as well as a national Kraft foods contest. Well, so far this week I've made beer bread, broccoli salad, sweet and sour overnight salad, and today a great peach cobbler. I need to remember that when my roommates are all gone, stop cooking the full size! My mom is a member on recipezaar.com, and I made an account for myself on there. It's my favorite recipe sight ever because the calculate the nutrition facts for every recipe, and there are a ton of recipe's on there. Like when I searched for peach cobbler I got like 85 different recipes to choose from. So I'm having fun adapting all kinds of recipes to make them healthier. I'm trying out the peach cobbler I made on lifegroup tonight, hopefully it's good. I lost track of time while I was chatting with my mom on the phone about blanching veggies, so it's a little overcooked, and I spilled a little bit of water on it too. I tasted a little corner and that was ok, so I hope the rest is.

OH! And this is fun, remember how my fortune cookie yesterday said that I would get some good news from far away?! I got a postcard in the mail today from Lauren in Paris! WooHoo!

Day 5

Day 5: I Am United With the Lord and One With Him in Spirit

"But the person who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with him." 1 Cor 6:17 (see also Rom 8:11, Gal 2:20, 1 John 4:13)

I felt studious today and looked up the actual meaning of the word united just because it gives it some more power. United: combined into a single entity, being in harmony, to join or act together in a common pursuit or endeavor. Pretty sweet that we are united with the Lord and that we have the Spirit in us. This chapter focused a lot on what we do with our physical body.
"So you also should consider yourselves to be dead to the power of sin and alive to God through Christ Jesus. Do not let sin control the way you live; do not give in to sinful desires. Do not let any part of your body become an instrument of evil to serve sin. Instead, give yourselves completely to God, for you were dead, but now you have new life. So use your whole body as an instrument to do what is right for the glory of God." Rom 6:11-13
I'm thinking about lots of things I've been struggling with for the past year. Not at all honoring to my body, more like blatant dishonor. It makes me sad. I'm combined into a single entity with the Lord and do lots of things that don't make him so happy. Good thing I learned yesterday that I have already been justified.

Random other things from the day: I can't say in this apartment any longer, I enjoy the time off of working but I don't like being by myself this much, I get way too depressed. So I disobeyed the rules I was given yesterday by the doctor to stop trying to do things that mean standing up for more than 15 minutes. I went to Target and walked all around thinking of cute ideas for my future house and looking at all the cute kid stuff, then I went to the mall in search of a cute new dress, and went in every single store that would have a cute dress and found nothing. That comes up to about 3 hours of walking around. I'm paying the price with lots of swelling and a healthy dose of my pain meds, but it was worth it for the desperately needed emotional pick me up. Then because I was sad that I didn't find anything I ordered some super cute brown flats that I've been eyeing at Old Navy because they went on sale. And I got chinese for dinner, yum yum! My fortune cookie said that I would get good news from someone far away. I'm hoping that means I'll hear from Lauren again soon!

Day 4

Day 4: I Have Been Justified

"Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ" Romans 5:1 (see also Acts 18:39, Rom 3:28, Rom 5:9-11)

I this this is one of the most amazing promises, but one of the hardest to understand and live by. Justification is one of those words that I think Christians throw around but don't really understand. I have a general idea of what it is, but I sure don't understand it well. I got some insight from the dictionary, which says to be justified is to free a human of the guilt and penalty attached to grievous sin. My book explains the Greek verb and that it clearly means that we have already been justified before the Father, and Jesus has already paid the penalty for our sins. I think the has already part is pretty important. We can't do anything about something that's already been done. As a child of God we're freed from the bondage of sin, and we just get to be thankful for that. It's a kind of thankful that I can't think of a way to express. I really can't wait to be in Heaven where I can actually make some kind of attempt at expressing my gratitude. Nothing right now seems adequate. Just a really awesome promise to think about. Pretty excited for tomorrow's reading, I am united with the Lord and one with him in spirit. I think it's gonna be good.

silly afternoon

Someone needs to remind me that I am not having a baby any time soon. I spent the afternoon looking up meanings, origins, and popularity of baby names and reading about child development. Favorite baby names for now are Isabella, Madison, Alexis, and the one boy name Brandon. But it doesn't matter, it will be years till I need to pick out a baby name. However, I can easily disguise my reading about child development, since I'm in the child development and family studies department. I'll pretend that I was reading about it simply for scholastic knowledge, not for being excited about the fun things coming up for the kids at church, or laying on the couch daydreaming about having lots of kids running around my dream house (2 story, yellow with white trim and a big wrap around porch if you were wondering). I realize that in my daydreaming mind I kind of skipped getting married, don't worry, I'll do that first, and I'm excited to do that someday too. Clearly, I need to get up and do something besides daydream. Probably read Sir Thomas Malory's Morte Darthur since it's like a 500 pg book that's supposed to be finished by Wednesday. I haven't started. I'm too busy daydreaming about what life will be like hopefully in like 5 yrs or so. Oops, time to focus.

Day 3

Day 3: I Am Christ's Friend

"This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. This is my command: Love each other." John 15:12-17


Today I thought a lot about my best friend Lauren and how much I miss talking to her even though she's only been in Switzerland for 3 weeks. I miss hearing about her job, her fiance, her wedding. And you can tell your best friend anything, the really big life changing things and the little things that no one else would care about. I like having someone to talk to when I find a great new recipe or when the kids at church are super cute or I just made a really good cup of coffee. I am a friend of Christ, he cares about this stuff too. Harmony remembers to thank God for her princess birthday cake and pray for every scrape to be healed and I love that. When I ran I would talk to God about all kinds of things, and since I've been out of commission for a while I've switched to here are the big things, fix them, thanks, goodnight. I really want to make more of an effort to have a conversation with God throughout the day. He's my friend, I'm his friend, we should chat more.

After some inspiration and heart searching after reading about Ann's giving up the 6 C's of food, I am giving up my own 6 C's slightly modified. Whenever I'm sad, stressed, bored, or congratulating myself I turn to food. It's not healthy, I need to take my out of control emotions to God and do something more worthwhile with my time than eat. My 6 C's are candy, chocolate, cake, cookies, chips, and crackers. I don't need to eat any of these things, my body will be much healthier without them. And I'll be spending lots of time in prayer keeping this from being about food and body image issues and more about living a healthy life.

Day 2 reflections

I just had one of those moments where everything seems crystal clear. I came home from the Ranvestel's, watched the episode of Friends where Rachel has her baby, then came in to get ready for bed and hit play on my itunes. How deep the father's love for us came on. This has got to be one of my favorite hymns of all time. And so fitting for today's lesson on being a child of God. "how deep the father's love for us, how vast beyond all measure." I just keep thinking about how much I love the kids at church, and I'm not even their parents. Like tonight when Raya wanted me to sing and pray with her before bed, even if she was just stalling. Or seeing that Brooks is scooting around and will be crawling really soon. When Lillie wants me to pick her up or sit in my lap for a story, when Isabelle spits up on me and then smiles and probably falls asleep or giggles, when Henry wants to tell me all kinds of awesome things about God, when Harmony remembers all the little things to pray for. I really do love them all so much, and I know there parents love them way more than I do. I can't wait to spend more time with the 1 yr old boy clan and get to love them too. I love these kids a lot, I worry about them, pray for them, miss them if I don't see them for a few days, get so excited to see them that I wake up early on Sundays and feel sad when I have to leave after church. How much more does God love me as his child? I just got to have one of those glimpses tonight when I see just a small sliver of the love that God has for me, and it's amazing. How great is our God.

Day 2

Day 2: I Am God's Child

"But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. They are reborn—not with a physical birth resulting from human passion or plan, but a birth that comes from God." John 1:12,13 (also see 1 John 3:1-3, Gal 3:26, Rom 8:14,16,19)

This chapter was about God as your heavenly father and how we are related by blood and nothing can take that away; but if you aren't obedient, you won't live in harmony with God. I kept thinking of the preschoolers at church. Parents who love their kids so much and nothing can change that, but they have to discipline their kids when they learn how to say no or hit their friend. I just love parents who really love their kids and do everything in their power to raise them as awesome Christ following little people. It's a little, imperfect but great glimpse of what our relationship with God is like as his child.

Who I Am In Christ day 1

I'm revisiting a book I went through last summer. Who I Am In Christ by Neil Anderson. It takes you through 36 different identities that you have as a Christian. I've lost sight of who I am as a child of the King, as I realized hard last night laying in bed reading my running magazine sobbing because I can't run. So much of who I see myself as is tied to worldly things that don't really matter in the end.

Day 1: I am accepted in Christ
"Therefore, accept each other just as Christ has accepted you so that God will be given glory." Rom 15:7

"We cannot do anything to qualify for unconditional and voluntary love. We labor under the false assumption that if we live perfectly everybody will accept us, while there was One who lived His life perfectly, and everybody rejected Him." (pg 20)

What a good reminder. Jesus was the only person who lived a perfect life, and he was rejected by just about everyone. As much as I want everybody to accept and like me, if I'm living my life so that people of the world like me and are impressed by me, I'm missing something and need a huge lesson in humility. The life we're called to as Christians is controversial, it's not popular with everyone, and it certainly doesn't line up with worldly views. Just about everyone struggles with rejection and people pleasing from time to time, both within the church family and outside of it. In the spring, Lauren had a video for her action group about the Bema seat, or judgement seat of Christ that was amazing, I wish everyone could see it. That was such a powerful reminder that all I should be concerned with is doing things on earth that are pleasing God and bringing glory to Him, and if I'm doing that amazing things will happen. (ps, every time I think about that video I cry because I am just so excited)

I guess my take away message for the day is that I can't earn Christ's acceptance. He loves me as his child and nothing can take that away. No amount of Sunday's serving at church or number of prayers said can make Him like me more. Living the life that I have been called to won't make me "popular" with the world, but that's ok because I'm popular with God which is a hundred times better. And as Amy would say, I need to stop being a "Judgy McJudgerson" and love on people (all people, not just the ones that I deem appropriate) as a reflection of how much God loves me.

better spirits

I'm feeling much better tonight, I took two 10 minute walks around the block with just one crutch and felt pretty good. Karissa is here visiting for the day from her internship in South Carolina, and it was so fun to catch up with all she's doing at work. It's so funny how much of a family our apartment has become, I feel like such a proud momma seeing all the amazing things she's done for Nestle and just in awe of how smart she is. She's going to do some great things for industrial engineers, I just know it. Sarah gave me a project to do for RVC for setting up a system for childcare for RVCtv and the next step classes. I'm excited about it, I really want to do more and be more involved in the RVCkids program, I just don't really know how or what so I'm glad to have something to do. I can't wait for Sunday to get to be in with the pre-k/kindergartners again. I love those kids so much, it's so fun to see them learning about Jesus. I can't wait to see what awesome things we're going to do with the kids when we split to two services in the fall, I'm really pretty excited about it. Even if it means extra work, I'm pretty stoked.

day 2 post op

Thanks for all the posted and emailed prayer, and bringing me dinner, it was really appreciated. Yesterday was a tough one. I started running a fever around noon and it didn't break till this morning. It was just a grumpy day. The only people I saw or spoke to the entire day were the Milks for a few minutes when they brought me a yummy yummy dinner. My knee is really stiff, I have probably like 30% range of motion right now. The muscles in my leg are cramping up a lot but I can't stretch them out since I can't completely straighten my leg or bend it back very far. I'm walking up and down the hallway without my crutches forwards, backwards, and sideways, and I plan to start some therapy exercises I already know on Monday to build up those stabilizing muscles in my knee so it won't feel so wobbly. Thankfully Karissa is visiting from SC today so I'll have someone to talk to and something to do besides watch food network all day. And I can make her drive me to the store. I'm going to go to my lit class today, I walked up and down the street with my crutches yesterday and it felt ok, so I think I can make the trek to campus. Hopefully the fever stays away for good, my stitches will stop hurting, leg stop cramping, and I won't be stuck in my apartment by myself very much more. Good news is tonight I can take a shower! No more sink baths for me :-)

funny post surgery things

Today's a funny day. My knee doesn't really hurt, it just feels like there's a lot of pressure on it. The three stitches hurt though, go figure. But I can't get my stitches wet till Thursday afternoon, so today I attempted a bath in the sink. In the end, I was clean and my stitches dry, but most of the bathroom was wet. And I learned why the doctor said to keep your leg elevated. If you don't, your foot will swell up like a balloon, it looks pretty funny. I was supposed to keep the dressings and ace bandage on till Thursday, but the ace bandage got taken off a few hours ago, and I've unwrapped the gauze twice to check out my stitches. Check out how great my knee looks though, barely any swelling and bruising. I'm such a bad patient! It's only 1:30 of day one and I'm already out of stuff to do and bored stiff. I've read, showered, watched a movie, and did as much of my scrapbook as I could before I ran out of pictures that I already had developed. I just want to drive somewhere and do something! I want to get more scrapbook stuff and pictures to catch up on my scrapbook, I need to get some thank you presents for some people, a birthday present, anything but stare at this apartment more. I But I'm supposed to wait 9 more days till I can drive. I don't think that will happen, I'll wait a few more days till I can move my knee better, but 9 days is just ridiculous. Time to hunt down that ice pack again...

feelin good

Knee surgery was great! It was so much easier than I thought it would be. Big big giant thank you to Emily for sacrificing a very important afternoon to go with me. Anyways, I got there at 1:15, and was on the way home by 5. I did great with the anesthesia, woke up pretty nauseous but they pushed something through my IV and it went away. My knee's not really swollen from what I can see, the only pain I have is at the incision sites that are closed with one stitch each, and I can walk around the apartment with just a small limp because my knee doesn't bend that much right now. I do have crutches that I'll use for a few days if I'm going to be on my leg for more than a few minutes. They gave me prescription pain pills but I haven't needed them yet. I took one before I went to bed just in case, and it has worn off by now and it doesn't really hurt. The worse part of the whole thing was not eating for 18 hours, and the antibiotic that they pushed through my IV that made my whole arm burn. I'm taking it easy till tomorrow when I can take the ace bandage and dressings off, but I'm not released to go back to work, drive, or resume more strenuous activity till next Friday. That's ok, a week and a half off work is a welcome break! Moving it to the couch for the day to watch movies, but I can guarantee by noon I'll be bored stiff. Hopefully I can do something tonight with either Amy, the Milks, or the Ranvestels. I'm going to wait and see how my knee feels later since they said today it should get sore.

frustrated + nerves = unhappy tummy

I'm feeling frustrated right now. The surgical nurse called to pre-register me for tomorrow, and they moved me up 45 minutes, which is nice except I'd already been working on rides to and from. Then she wanted to know who was coming with me. I explained that one friend was dropping me off, and another would pick me up. Apparently you need to have the same someone with you for the whole procedure. Panic! I'm still waiting to hear back from Sarah and Emily, hopefully one of them can come with me. Then she asked who was staying with me for 24 hours. I didn't know that I had to have someone with me for 24 hours afterwards. I should be home by 5, and Ashley doesn't come home from work till 9. Grr. I wish the doctor had told me all of these things earlier. And my mom freaked me out about being put to sleep. I guess I had a bad reaction to anesthesia when I had my tonsils out as a kid. So now I'm frustrated and getting important information late, stressed that I won't be able to find someone to go with me, and nervous about the anesthesia. My tummy is making lots of noise in protest. I'm trying to relax and eat some fresh pineapple (it reduces swelling). Time to finish cleaning, take a shower, sleep early, wake up at 11:45 to eat a snack, then back to bed.

knee surgery

Knee surgery is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon at 3. I have to be there at 2 so they can put me to sleep, then in surgery from 3-3:45, and then should be able to go home around 5. It's arthroscopic, there will just be 3 small incisions that they'll close with a stitch or 2. The bummer about doing it in the afternoon is that I still can't eat anything after midnight. Oh well, not really a big deal. The best part is that I can't be in the water for 7-10 days, so I get to take time off work! I only have to take it easy for a few days, and most likely will be able to walk out of surgery on my own. I'm a little nervous about the anesthesia, I tend to get a little sick, but that's not a big deal. I'm just excited that they could schedule it so soon. Now I just need to find a ride to and from surgery.....

impatient

We sang the patience song in RVCkids this morning, and I chuckled to myself again. I love how much I always learn in there with the kiddos. I have been so impatient all weekend waiting to see the surgeon on Monday. I just want to do the surgery this week, really I need to do it this week with my schedule. One of my classes is cancelled for the second half of the week, and I have permission for my other class to miss a few days. I'm not nervous or scared, I just want to get this done and get back to life. I hate not being active, but if I do any kind of physical activity my knee hurts. I just need to be patient. In a few weeks I'll hopefully be back to normal. Patience waiting for the surgery, and even worse will be patience afterwards trying to get back too fast.