Seattle

This past Friday I had the chance to head up to Seattle with three good friends, Brooke, Amit & Allen. I have to admit this trip was a little bitter sweet by the time the trip came around b/c I was suppose to go to run a 1/2 marathon, but God had other plans for me that meant I was only to be an encourager and cheerleader on this trip. We all headed up on Friday morning to Seattle - we had a great time exploring the cities famous Pike's Market and the Space Needle before meeting up with my cousin Kylie, her husband John and their son Will for an amazing dinner. Needless to say Will (who is almost 2 yrs old) provided entertainment for all of us and kept us all laughing for the entire meal.

Saturday morning started way early - 4:45am in order to get Amit & Brooke to the starting line in time for the start of their half marathon. Thankfully God had definitely changed my heart b/c while I was really sad about not running alongside them - I was also excited about my role on the sidelines and being able to cheer/encourage them on while they were running the streets of Seattle. Allen and I had a lot of fun racing around the city that neither of us knew trying to find Brooke and Amit while they were running. Amit and Brooke both did an amazing job! After the race was over Allen stayed in Seattle to hang out with his friend Tom, while I took Amit and Brooke back to rest and shower before we headed back to explore Seattle more. After everyone was somewhat rested we took the ferry back over into Seattle where we went on an Underground Tour of the city. Who knew that Seattle was a city of some much history where the city is actually built on top of the old city but yet the old city still exists just on the 1st level. I have to say it was actually a really neat tour and I learned a lot about the city of Seattle. Saturday night came to an end with dinner at a famous seafood resturant called Ivans - it was really good.

Sunday morning was another early morning as the four of us decided to head to Mars Hill Church in Seattle (a church similar to Watermark only in Seattle). Even though we had to get up really early b/c we had to take a ferry in order to get church, none of us seemed to care though b/c how often do you have to take a ferry to get to church? They really do live a completely different life up there, they are more laid back, not in so much of a hurry to get from one place to another, and not near as stressed as people in Dallas. After church we ate lunch with the guys for the last time before we went our seperate ways as Allen had to catch a late afternoon flight back to Dallas and Amit was taking him to the airport. Brooke and I caught the ferry back to Port Orchard (where my cousin's live) and met up with them for a trip to the beach. While the beach had sand it wasn't your typical beach b/c it is surrounded by mountains and the water is less than 50 degrees most of the year, but the beach was still really beautiful and we had a lot of fun and really relaxing. Will learned to fly a kite, which was so cute to watch.

Monday was another early morning as Brooke and I headed up to Victoria Canada via another ferry. I had been to Victoria about 12 years earlier with my dad but was really excited to go back. Victoria is a beautiful city where the people are really nice. Brooke and I spent most of the morning just walking around and exploring the city - mainly just relaxing and enjoying the beautiful city. We spent the afternoon on a whale watching trip - which was probably the most amazing thing I have ever done or at least in the top 5 for syre. The trip will get it's own blog to come later.

That is the Seattle trip in a nutshell - needless to say it was an amazing trip with great friends.

Week 13 & 14

So I find myself slacking once again on this whole blogging thing – sorry about that I promise to try and get back into. I wish I had some good excuse for not doing it lately but I just haven’t gotten around to it – in fact I think I have actually avoided it b/c that would mean that I would have to actually stop and think about life the past few weeks. Not that anything major good or bad has happened in life but I have kind of just stopped processing life right now – not good I know!

Anyways, let’s get to the important stuff the weekly updates.

Week 13 was a great week b/c the bear as I refer to her but my boss was on vacation in Maui. Granted she was on the crack berry 24/7 but at least she wasn’t in the office. Since she wasn’t in the office my whole entire team was in great spirits all week and we actually got to have lunch away from our desks. This week I also got the privilege to celebrate to great guy’s birthdays – my dad’s birthday was on Wednesday the 17th and his brother my Uncle Jimmy’s birthday was on Thursday the 18th. Happy Birthday Guys! The only low point in the week was that the monster felt the need to rearrange my dresser draws – really not that big of a deal just more annoying and invasion of my personal space yet again. The week definitely ended on a high note as I headed to Granbury to my family lake house on my mom’s side. We had a great time just hanging out as a family and just being in the sun.

Whitney & I

Kim, Trey & Tucker

Natalie, Whitney, Me & Mom

Week 14 – I know week 14 isn’t technically over yet, but the remainder of the week will get it’s own post as I am heading to Seattle tomorrow morning with Brooke, Amit and Allen, so that Amit and Brooke can run the Seattle half marathon. This was the race that I was training for prior to getting hurt in Brazil. So while I am extremely excited about the trip I must admit that it is a little bitter sweet b/c I am going but I am not going to be able to run. Enough about that for now. So far this week has been an amazing week – I have had the chance to celebrate two great friends’ birthdays – Happy Birthday Anne and Kristen! I am so thankful for these two girls as they have been apart of my community for a little over two years now – crazy to think it has been two years already in some ways but in other ways it seems like we have been friends for a lot longer than just two years. The other highlight of the week was being able to have a wonderful dinner full of laughter with 6 of my Brazil girls. I truly love those girls and am so thankful that they have become apart of my life – I keep secretly thinking (I guess it’s not such a secret now that I am writing it on here) that they are going to wake up and realize what I goof I really am and say we are done with you. I know that is just my own insecurity but part of me is afraid of it nonetheless. Only time will tell, even though I think I know the answer already.

Happy B-day Anne

Happy B-day Kristen & Anne - Amy & I celebrating with them

Celebrating Anne & Kristen

Mindy, Me, Anne & Kristen

(Small Group minus Maresa)

Vicky enjoying the cake at Brazil Girls dinner.

See I really don’t have that exciting of a life after all.

Stillness

“Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth.” Psalms 46:10

This is one of the many verses I have been clinging to lately in life as I have been forced to slow down literally with the boot and all on my foot. I wish I could say that I have embraced this time in my life, but I have fought it the whole way and probably in some ways still am. However, I have to admit that I am very thankful for this time in my life – okay you can all pick yourself up off the floor now. While I would much rather not be in a boot and being forced to slow down right now – last night threw the course of a couple of amazing conversations and a friends CR inventory I realized that if I hadn’t been forced to slow down I probably wouldn’t have realized how much I’ve changed and grown for the better in the past two years. I know I defiantly needed to see that right now in order to continue to grow because I have felt a lot lately like I am still struggling with the same temptations and stuck in the same old patterns that I can never seem to get out of, which is so frustrating! While I still have the same old insecurities – it has been neat to have the time to be able to reflect on how I am not that same person anymore. Now I realize I still am a “work in progress” it was neat to be able to see how God has really changed my heart and how He is still continuing to change my heart even today. Needless to say I am learning a lot right now – I am interested to see what the rest of my slowed down time while in my boot has in store for me. I think I might try and stop fighting having to slow down so hard and just go along for the ride and see what is in store, since I don't really have a choice anyways.

Week 12

This week was pretty uneventful as far as life with the rents go b/c they went out of town on Tuesday morning, which made for a nice stress free week for me. Now granted I was left with a list of chores I was suppose to complete every day – needless to say that didn’t happen – more so b/c my dad told me just to ignore the list that Marsha left for me.

I did happen to receive my new “fashion” accessory this week though – the boot. So now I am sporting a black boot in hopes that it will allow my foot/ankle to heal correctly and quickly. I have to admit the boot isn’t that bad, it could be much worse. I think the biggest challenge with the boot was just learning to walk in it – silly I know but true and trying to find things I can wear with the boot – so far I have just managed to be able to sport dresses and skirts b/c I don’t have any pants that will go over the boot. Oh well looks like a good excuse to get a few cute new dresses.

My dad’s house did manage to loose power on Thursday morning early during the storms, so I had to get ready for work without power – let me tell you that made for an interesting morning but somehow I managed to make it to work, thanks to Stephanie who picked me up for work since no power means my car was stuck in the garage. Sadly my dad’s house was one of the many houses that didn’t get power again until over the weekend. Thankfully I have great friends who let me crash at their place – Hotel Vistadale as I am calling it these days. I actually really enjoyed getting to hang out with Laura and Kristie and just being able to catch up not to mention it was nice just to have people around b/c even though I enjoy it when dad and Marsha travel the big house does get pretty lonely.

The week ended with a fun trip out to Marisa’s uncle’s lake house with the girls and a Rangers game on Saturday night. I am excited that summer fun is finally here, even though I can’t participate in all the normal summer fun, thanks to the boot – I am not going to allow the boot to keep me down.

Here are a few fun pics from the weekend…

Week 8 - 11

So I realize I have been really bad about blogging lately especially about my weekly updates on living with the rents. So I am going to try and recap the past few weeks in one post and then jump back into regular post this week.

Week 8 was easy when it comes to living with the rents b/c I was in Brazil - which was a completely amazing week. Brazil will get it's own post sometime soon as I am still processing the trip.

Week 9 was a harder week. As if coming back to the US - Dallas from Brazil isn't hard enough on it's own. I decided that 5 days after returning to the US I needed to get on another flight to head to Las Vegas to meet up with my family to celebrate my younger sister, Whitney's, 21st birthday. Not to mention I was doing all of this on crutches - did I tell you I don't like crutches? I have to admit though Vegas ended up being fun after I blocked out all the craziness that is Vegas it was a good time to just hang out and be around my family, even in Vegas. I also was able to get to see Whitney and Rob, her boyfriend, interact more - which was fun to see and get to know him a little better. Somehow I was even able to cook one meal this week - I think it had a lot to do with the fact that my dad felt sorry for me b/c I was on crutches and he could tell I missed Brazil terribly even if he didn't understand why I missed it - so he made Marsha leave me alone when I came home one day and said I just wanted to cook a meal. I can say that I would not have made it threw this week had it not been for all the people I went to Brazil with - just our little conversations really helped make this week bearable.

Week 10 - WOW! If I thought week 9 was tough I hadn't really understood tough and hard until I survived this week - I did survive somehow, it wasn't on my own strength that is for sure. Monday was super easy - I really just slept a lot and laid by the pool. However, Tuesday morning I woke up with this feeling that I just didn't want to go to work but thankfully a couple of friends told me that I had to go - I now know when I have those feeling there is usually a reason and may-be I should just stay home. By 9am I was so frustrated with my boss and just our systems and my job that I thought I would lose it - I probably would have quit if Tim hadn't given our Brazil team the stupid two week rule. Short version of the week was that everything that I had done for the past 2-3months was going to be erased b/c of a system issue and needed to be redone in lesson than a week - seriously yikes!!! On top of work drama the monster showed her face again this week - in stupid little ways that I did my best to ignore. I think the final blow for this week came on Thursday when I went to physical therapy where they told me that something was seriously wrong with my foot/ankle and that I had to get an MRI ASAP! I think up until this point I had held a hope that I might actually be able to run Seattle at the end of the month - needless to say I was wrong. God really humbled me in that moment in lots of ways - 1st being I realized I had once again put running ahead of Him and 2ndly I was being super prideful. All in all a super tough, convicting week, but probably a week I will look back at some point and be thankful for all the lessons I learned.

Week 11 started off great b/c I got to hang out with my 7th grade girls and celebrate their completion of 7th grade with a pool party - oh so much fun. And then I was able to reunite with my Brazil team and Brazil team 2 over dinner and just laugh and hang out and even farkle a little bit. Poor Ricky lost the farkle and had to "kiss" Larissa's dog. Unfortunately some of week 10's work drama spilled over into week 11 but there wasn't much I could do about it - somehow I managed to pull of a small miracle and get almost everything reset up in the system before the deadline - I didn't get it all done but I got enough done. The other random high and low lights from week 11 are not having an air conditioner - the air went out upstairs at the house - seriously right as it gets into the upper 90's the air goes out, so I didn't have AC for a good part of the week. Thankfully Laura let me stay at Hotel Vistadale for a night to help get me out of my misery. I also was finally able to get an MRI this week and get the results, which showed a hairline fracture in my foot. So it was a good news bad news sort of deal....I finally knew what exactly was wrong with my foot but it wasn't the best news but considering the fall I took it could have been so much worse - so I am learning to take it and use whatever good comes from it.

Sorry for such a long post....but I will work on being more consistent.

I created a monster

Some of you have had the privilege of meeting my puppy aka my pride and joy - Maverick and for those of you who haven't well this is Maverick. He was born in Germany but he got to Texas as soon as he could and has lived here for the past five years. While he is actually really big, he thinks he is a lap puppy and he is scared of his own tail - actually really funny to watch. The first summer we had Maverick I was eating Blue Bell Ice Cream (for all you none Texas people, Blue Bell is a Texas Ice Cream that is amazing - if you ever come to Texas you have to try it) and he was just being his typical nosey self, so I decided to let him lick the bowl and have a little taste of ice cream. It was love at first taste for him, needless to say he was hooked. He soon learned that if he waited patiently he could have a little taste of Blue Bell. Once we realized he loved it so much we started giving it to him on his birthday and for Christmas - basically we put a little extra in our bowls and allowed him to eat it out of the bowl. Well, somewhere along the way he became a smart puppy and learned that any time a certain type of bowl came out of the cabinet that it meant someone was going to be having Blue Bell, so he would sit around, watch and wait for his turn because he knew no one would refuse him. So I have to admit I created a monster with one little simple taste of Blue Bell. However, I must admit he has even gotten worse. My dad bought the first thing of Blue Bell for the summer over Memorial Day weekend and Maverick was laying in the other room and heard the tub of Blue Bell come out of the freezer and came running from clear across the house - he immediately sat right beside the counter and just stared wondering if this would be the time that some might actually give him his own entire bowl.....I will let the pictures speak for themselves. Needless to say I have a Blue Bell Monster on my hands.