New Direction

When I first started this blog, the purpose was mainly for my family and my supporters; basically a place for me to update you on all the things that I couldn't write in my newsletter. And for a while, I did a pretty good job of keeping up with it.

Of course, those were the days of kids constantly coming in and out of my house, lots of changes and new things happening in my life and in my ministry; basically things that I wanted to write about so that I could remember them years later. It wasn't difficult for me to sit down and write about Linda and Bonita or recount fun times at the beach or my excitement over the new challenges ahead.

But, life is different for me now. I am living in a home I plan to stay in for a long time (thank you Jesus!!) with two adult roommates and no plans to have kids living here any time soon (with Lindsay living in my 3rd bedroom, there is no room for foster children for the time being. I have always had the mentality that the extra rooms in my house are available for whoever the Lord brings into my home. For now, that is Lindsay and Ashley... and I love that). :) I am pretty settled in my jobs and the things I face day to day are not things that I am motivated to blog about.

At Cornerstone I am spending the majority of my time discipling youth, teaching kids, training leaders and, well honestly, cleaning and organizing rooms within the church. (I'm serious... for the last few months I have worked on cleaning out and organizing the church office, my Kids Club closet, several Sunday School classrooms and I am working on plans for more. I have no idea where this came from, other than possibly the desire to work on a project that not only benefits the church, but also has tangible results; I'm not used to tangible results!).

At CASA I spend my time advocating for kids that face some of the most difficult challenges I have ever seen. It is incredibly challenging, rewarding, and I love every second of it. But, I can't really blog about it.

I am really enjoying life in general and feel fulfilled (not sure if that is the right word, but it's all that is coming to mind right now) in all that I am doing. I truly love all (okay, well almost all, haha) that I am doing. But, it's not really much to blog about. It's just really life.

Because of this, I considered closing down my blog. But, I realized that I still do have something to say. See, as I live my daily life, I am constantly changing; changing because I am learning. I am learning about myself, God, ministry, the world, the Bible, kids and teens... I am learning so much about so much . Sometimes I even learn something, only to learn something else that changes what I thought I learned the day before (does that statement even make sense??).

For a long time, I shied away from sharing too much about my personal walk with Christ because of fear. Fear of making a fool of myself, fear of being wrong... fear of upsetting someone. And there is something to be said for just staying quiet rather than being an idiot on the Internet (Proverbs 17:27-28). However, that doesn't mean that I need to stay silent. I am not afraid to be wrong, never have been. In fact, I want to know when I am wrong so that it can be corrected. And, at almost 31 years old, I don't really care a whole lot about offending people. Not that I want to purposely piss someone off, that is not Godly at all. However, I also can't watch everything I ever say for fear that it might upset someone.

So, I am refocusing my mindset as I think about this blog. I AM going to share more about some of what I am learning. I promise I will not seek to offend anyone and will pray that every word that I type honors the Lord; even in my questions and frustrations. If I ever stray from that, I do have incredible people in my life that will challenge me in that, and if this blog ever becomes simply a place to vent frustrations, I will immediately end it. I want everything in my life to be honoring to the Lord, including the words that I type. However, I can't promise that I won't say something that you disagree with or that may even offend you. In fact, it's likely that I will say something that will make you think twice. Actually, that's kind of what I want. Not to offend, but maybe to challenge as well as encourage. I just want you to be prepared, if you choose to read my blog, to not always love (and maybe even occasionally hate) what you read.

Of course, you will also get occasional updates on life. I still do some fun and interesting things, I like writing about them. :)

Some posts will be serious, and if I know myself (and I think I do, haha), some will just be silly. I am going to take what I say seriously, while also trying not to take myself too seriously (this is going to be an interesting journey!).

I have no idea where this is going to go. As I write this, I have absolutely no idea what to write about. I might post this and then go silent for a while. I am not going to try and write anything, I am simply going to write as I feel that I have something to share.

Please don't expect much from this new direction. Sometimes I feel like I have something important to say, but more often than not I just have rambling thoughts. This new direction of my blog might (and actually will likely) be an epic failure. We'll see. But, for the first time in my life, I am not letting the fear of failure or the fear of others keep me from trying something new. If nothings else, I will at least be able to say I tried. :)

Wait, I have a blog?!?

Yeah... it's been a while. I long while. A really long while. If this blog was public and more than just my dad read it on a regular basis (my mom can never remember my blog address, so she just asks for updates from my dad. Seriously, haha), I would have lost all my readers. I do have a "mid-year" resolution regarding my blog, but I will tell you about that later. For now, here is a short (and abridged... leaving out a ton but hopefully hitting the highlights) update on life.

Wow, 2 months... I actually need to look at a calendar to remember what's been going on! Of course, it's basically been a whole lot of nothing. Well, not nothing; just nothing to really blog about. Mostly, I have been working. I now work 30 hours a week with CASA and I am still loving it. I have also been working hard to prepare for summer ministry at Cornerstone (we have 5 VBS groups this summer!).

In April, I did get to spend a fun weekend in Indianapolis with my friends April and Catherine. I do have a picture from the weekend, but it's not a pretty one, lol. We ran a a half marathon together, and unfortunately I didn't train well for it. So, it was a struggle to finish it but we did!! And we did have a lot of fun together. It was a really great weekend to get away from the city and to be around people that have known me for most of my life. I will never get over how incredible it is for us to still be close, after 18+ years. God is too good to me! :)

I also gained a new roommate! I am SO SO excited to have LINDSAY living with us! She is here until she goes off to college (which will be in about 6 months to a year), and we are loving it!

Just a few days after Lindsay moved in, we got to celebrate her 19th birthday! We decided to go to the Phillies game to celebrate, and it turned out to be quite a night. The Phillies DID win the game... though it took them 19 innings. Yup, the first time we decide to go to a game turns out to be the longest game in major league baseball all year. The game didn't end until almost 2 a.m.! It was long but a ton of fun; and we thought it was really cool that on Lindsay's 19th birthday, the Phillies won their game in 19 innings. :) (We will NOT be going to the Phillies game to celebrate her 20th birthday, haha).



Also, this past weekend Ashley and I traveled to NC for a wedding, and it was wonderful! About 5 years ago, Brooke and Ashley (and another friend, Jenna) lived with me and Brooke served as my intern at Cornerstone. It was a really great summer and Brooke, Ashley and I have all stayed close since then. Brooke lives in Illinois and we haven't seen each other much, but we try to talk/facebook as often as possible!

So, when Ashley and I were invited to Brooke's wedding we jumped at the chance to go! Plus, another friend (Kirsten) lives only about an hour from where the wedding was, so we had a free place to stay and a great excuse to go see Kirsten! At the last minute we decided to invite Melissa along, and it turned out to be a really awesome weekend. Well, other than me missing a crucial turn on the drive down to NC, which took us about 3 hours to correct; making the 9 hour trip into a 12 hour one. Whoops. We still had a really fun car ride!

Ashley, Melissa and I had a really great time catching up with Kirsten; seeing her school and apartment and even getting to meet some of her awesome friends. And of course, the wedding was beautiful. It was very small (only about 40 guests), which made us feel SO honored that we were on the guest list! Brooke even asked me to read scripture during the ceremony, and I only messed up once. (Word of Christ, when said too fast, can easily be misspoken as 'word of Cwiste, lol).

The only real negative over the last few months happened today when I woke up with a cold. It's not horrible, but I have been spending most of the day in bed. Although, now that I think about it, if I wasn't in bed all day I probably would have never found the time to finally update my blog. So, maybe it's not such a bad thing after all!

Well, now I feel like I need to take some medicine again and maybe make a cup of hot chai. (Yes, I am aware that it is 90 degrees outside; tell that to my throat! Of course, I have my air conditioner set at 65, so I think it will be okay, haha). I will blog again later tonight about my new resolution regarding my blog. (I have a sneaking suspicion that I am setting myself up for failure with this, but I am going to try anyway!).

Talk to you again soon!