life's going pretty well this week. homework is annoying--but when is it not? oh well. it's not the end of my life if i don't do my homework as perfectly as possible, i suppose. still, it's kind of hard to let go of perfectionism. but i'll get through it.
anywho, like i said, life is swell. so far. it's been a good two days--nice and busy, lol. but i can't complain. not too much anyway. i guess that's all there is to say tonight. except that i'm grateful for the people in my life--seriously, you all rock my face off. i don't think i could even begin to express my gratitude.
so....in short...life's goin well, i'm grateful for the people in my life.....oh, and i'm tired. but hey, that's life, my friends! everyone have a wondermous night!

here's the answer to your question, brent:

i had realized that i was kind of ignoring God during everyday life--my thoughts generally consisted of stupid things like boys or looks. and that affected how i lived. so what i learned was how badly i needed God--in fact, i had been praying for a while that God would give me a desire for Him. and when i was in "crisis", or whatever you want to call it, i ran to Him and realized my need for Him. i learned that i can't just do the whole life thing without Him as a central part of it all. basically i learned what God has been trying to teach me for a long, long time--i discovered the extent of my insufficiencies. God reminded me--again--that He really will give us rest when we come to Him. and i still do struggle with letting go of my worries. but the fact that i'm staying in the word (on my own time, not only at church) helps me remember how much better it is to let go of them.
God is also using some of the people in the youth group to sharpen me. i had kind of strayed away from hanging out with the group for a short while, and when i came back i remembered how much i needed that fellowship. since i got back into the swing of things i have thanked God so many times for the people in my life. i'm so blessed to have these people around me that really do want to see me grow.

i hope that answer is sufficient!! lol, have a good night all, i'm off to bed!! and i hope you all had a fantabulous thanksgiving and ate some gigantimous amounts of turkey. cause i sure did.

so this week has been crazy. monday-wednesday i was having a great week......then thursday sucked, friday wasn't much better. but i've come out on the other side of something that will eventually not seem at all like the big deal that i thought it was....and i've come closer to God through it. like i said on thursday...i had some prayers answered, and i finally realized that i need God in a big way. and since thursday, i've had the most amazing couple of days with my walk. i got the hunger for God that I had been praying He would give me. i've been praising Him, and giving Him my worries.....and like i said it's been the most amazing past couple of days. i've gotten out my bible for what i thought would be 5 minutes and looked at the clock to find out i'd been reading for hours. i've been writing again....mostly songs, some poetry, and some random thoughts about God and life. I don't know that i'm actually any good at writing. but it is just so freeing to let my thoughts out on paper, and in music. since thursday i've written one song in particular, for which i only lack the guitar part--which might be hard since i'm not exactly very good at guitar. i've been messing around with it on the piano but that's not the sound i want it to have. anywho......in short, God is amazing, and this has been the best week i've had in a long time. now i'm off to go write some more........

"Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out His love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom He has given us."
--Romans 5:1-5

"Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God."
--Psalm 42:11

"Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from Him. He alone is my rock and my salvation; He is my fortress, I will not be shaken."
--Psalm 62:5-6

don't you just hate when you 're having a semi-marvelous week and then something happens to just spoil it all? that's what my week has been. fortunately, as upset as i've gotten over it, it's actually good, because it was an answer to a prayer. God is using this situation to bring me closer to Him. and i'm thankful for that. it's just like... i'm still upset about what happened...but the fact that it's a part of God's plan to help me grow in Him is reassuring and gives me more of a peace about it. so praise God for that, and please pray that i will continue to depend on Him while i'm going through this.

quotes of my week:

"To what will you look for help if you will not look to that which is stronger than yourself?"
--C.S. Lewis

" God wants us to worship Him. He doesn't need us, for He couldn't be a self-sufficient God and need anything or anybody, but He wants us. When Adam sinned it was not he who cried, 'God, where art thou?' It was God who cried 'Adam, where art thou?' "
--A.W. Tozer

confusion was sort of the theme of my day. i haven't been getting much sleep lately, due to many things, mainly homework. so since i haven't been sleeping enough i'm kind of in weird moods...today's mood was confused. utterly perplexed. at least for most of the day anyway. but it's like the later i stay up the more awake i am. weird. and then i was reading Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis today and i got into a really pensive mood and i didn't really feel like talking much. then i went to physics class where of course i still have yet to get my test grades back and we did a lab and reviewed for our test tomorrow which i'm kind of scared about. anywho, i was really excited tonight bc the past several weeks i have only had b/w 3-5 girls from my small group showing up for mid-school discipleship, but today i had TEN!!! i was so happy. the only downside is that, since they're in sixth grade, as cool as it is that ten of them came, the more there are, the noisier they become. also, tonight rachel wasn't there, which was unfortunate considering the amount of girls there were. so unfortunately i didn't get all the way through the lesson that i had prepared, but i got to hit the key points of it...i just hope they learned. i think at least some of them did. ooh and then after mid-school discipleship we went to starbucks, like we always do, and bailey couldn't stop singing that song from "An American Tail" where all the mice are singing, "i want to be in america, i want to be in america....". we all laughed and we kept switching back b/w that and "Feliz Navidad...". it was great. well anywho, i'm gonna go get some rest before today becomes tomorrow!! see y'all on the flipside!!!

long weekend.....

friday i went to the airport to welcome home the haiti team.

saturday i went to uil from 6:30 in the am to 5:30 pm. then i went to see keila and bailey in "And Then They Came For Me" which was really good because the acting was awesome and it was a reminder of what happened in the holocaust. and it was also overwhelming and heartbreaking b/c it was a reminder of what happened, and i've heard first-hand accounts of the holocaust, and it just really hits a nerve.

after the play i hung out with lisa and courtney at courtney's house and we watched a couple of movies....then i crashed and apparently was asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow.

woke up 7:20 sunday morning to go be on the panel for mid-schoolers at 9:00. went to big church, went to lunch with grandparents and cousin Kourtney, went to team training....started to fall asleep and had too much homework so i came home before sunday school, which i'm really sad i missed but i don't think i could have stayed awake.

woke up kinda late this morning and went to school, then stayed after for beauty and the beast rehearsal till 5:30ish, then went home, then went back to the school for a meeting for beauty and the beast stuff. got home after 9:00.

all day today i've been very pensive.....and i have a lot of things i want to say but won't put here bc i'm getting too tired to write anymore and this blog is getting kinda long. sort of. maybe i'll put down some of my thoughts tomorrow when i can actually focus on something other than getting to bed early. goodnight all!!

okay....honestly.....does anyone else think it's utterly ridiculous to have to wait for AN HOUR for a dr. appt. that only takes THREE MINUTES?!?!?!?! i, in any case, find it quite....irksome. grrr.

it's been a really good weekend. i had region choir, which was awesome. i'm sad i couldn't sing with the mixed choir, but i still had so much fun being there with the treble choir. i think both choirs did very well at the concert, considering we learned three new songs over friday night and saturday morning, then performed them plus two other ones we already knew on saturday afternoon. the concert was really cool. by the way, the mixed choir did awesome, they sounded great. on one of the songs i just kind of sat back and closed my eyes to listen to it, it was so beautiful. and it all sounded even better since we sang in the Murchison, which has brilliant acoustics. anywho, it was a fantabulous experience. but i'm also kind of sad cause i missed out on nathan and kim's wedding.
today was also a great day. i got to hang out with some cool people that i haven't talked to at length for a while, so i was really glad about that. it's nice when you finally talk to people and find out they're going through the same stuff you are. it gives me someone to relate to. and i've got this song that i've been writing...i don't know that anyone else would like it, but it's cool writing it......it's a nice way of getting my thoughts down on paper. and then the melody kind of gets stuck in my head, and i'll be singing the part that i've got so far all day, and sometimes i'll think of new parts and cool harmonies......it's fun.
anywho, that's all for today. laters.

i've had a fairly good couple of days. halloween was fun...i worked on homework, then spent the latter part of the evening passing out candy to trick-or-treaters. there were some really adorable little kids, and there was one little girl who was probably no more than 3 or 4 years old who walked up and couldn't get the candy in her hands. she was in a bee costume, and her mom was behind her whispering, "say trick or treat!" while she tried to grab as much candy as possible. she didn't say anything until she was walking away up our steps with her mom, and she looked up at her mom and yelled, "trick or treat!" as loud as she could. it was adorable.

and then i was so happy when it started to rain, cause i love rainstorms. so i sat out on my porch for a while reading and watching the lightning. then when i went to bed i got to fall asleep to the sound of the rain. it was awesome. i need one of those days where you wake up to thunder at 5 o'clock in the morning and you just kind of lay there listening to the soothing sounds of the storm until the alarm goes off. those are the best mornings, i think. anywho, gtg, laters!!