For Life

I've started the Body For Life challenge. I've completed two days now. Wow. Two whole days. I have 82 left! I'm determined to finish. It's a little difficult, but I sure feel a lot better about what I'm eating and how I'm taking care of myself. I'll keep updating from week to week. I want to document my progress.

a wedding shower

My cousin, Meghan, is getting married next month. My cousin, Jennifer, and our mothers and I threw her a shower last weekend. We decided on a luau theme as you can tell. It was pretty fun!


This is the food area. Jennifer put together all the food stuff. She's good!


These are my cousins. Meghan and Kyle (Bo). They are brother and sister. They're pretty much like my brother and sister. Bo leaves in August for the Air Force. I'm sad he's moving, but I'm really proud of him.


Meghan and Jason (the groom) open their presents!

The wedding is getting closer and closer! I can't believe Meg is getting married! The shower was fun, and it was fun to do it for her.

a post full of pics!

I just wanted to share a few pics today just to show what we've been doing lately...

I took the kids swimming last week. Holly is on the left, and Aaron is on the right. The girl in the middle, Macrae, is Holly's friend. Notice that Devon isn't in the picture...he likes to play by himself. We always "pool-sit" for some friends when they are out of town. That's the perks of having friends with a pool!

This is my husband. We took this at the river. He's working on an assignment for his school. I joined him for this assignment. He took his guitar (note the strap across his back), and we sang "God of This City" and prayed over Tulsa and its leaders. It was a neat experience. We took the picture to send to his professor. We also slapped lots of mosquitoes!

Sean and I went to watch the WCL Championships last weekend. We saw the WCL in February when it came to Tulsa. It's a mixed martial arts fighting league founded by Chuck Norris. Seriously. The guy in the middle of this picture in black, bending over, that is ol Chuck. He was there. It was pretty cool. We saw an actual knock-out! This guy was out cold! After Sean reassured me the guy wouldn't have any brain damage, I was fine...I wanted to see another one! When the guy fell, his head bounced off the mat! Whoa!

memories

It's strange. Memories are almost always tied to an object. Sometimes memories are tied to a person or words or even a place. I visited my home church tonight. It's no longer the building I knew growing up. Well, it's still the same structure and in the same location, but the whole inside has been completely restructured. The pews are gone. The classrooms are gone. Even the bathrooms were moved. I was baptized in that building. The baptistry has a leak in it. So, I was one of the last few to actually be baptized in it. I even taught Sunday School in a few of those old classrooms. It's just a building. Sean and I drove into the parking lot, and I tried so hard to hold back the tears. The old building that was the fellowship hall, actually the original church, and where we had youth service is now gone. The doors to the church have even been replaced. The building is so sentimental to me. I kept telling myself, "It's silly to cry over this!" But the building reminds me of so many important people and times in my life. It's hard to get used to the change.

join the quorum

Well, I've had blogs before. I like blogging. Sometimes I don't even mind if people read what I blog about. It's not so bad sharing your life! I got away from my other blogs and that silly xanga. I've decided I need to start blogging again. I need to start a record of my journey...record the things I learn. I like having something to go back and remember. I may need a good laugh one day! So, here I am getting started. Awesome.



Sean and I just got back from Foursquare convention. I've always wanted to go to convention. It was everything I expected. I got to visit with some people I hadn't seen in a while. The sessions were great. I was really challenged by the word these people spoke. Sean and I are in full-time ministry. That's our desire. We get tired of doing stuff, sure. One of the speakers called for people to receive prayer that were contemplating quitting the ministry. There were so many people that went to receive prayer. I just sat there with my mouth open. I was challenged by their boldness. By stepping out, all their peers and colleagues knew what was really in their heart. I was challenged by their honesty. It's okay to be honest and open. It's okay to ask for help. I think somewhere along the way growing up in church we were silently taught that Christians don't have problems. If they do, then something is wrong! We all have struggles. We all have problems. We all have things to work through and overcome. Christian is a term that describes us in that we know where to find help and freedom. It doesn't leave us exempt from life. Several of us at convention kept talking about this most of the week. The church just doesn't teach new Christians well. We lead someone to the Lord and then lead them to believe all their problems will go away. No one is real with them.



We have to be real and honest with people. We just have to learn and teach how to overcome hangups and struggles. We have to learn and develop our prayer with the Lord. People need to be taught better in the church. I haven't come up with a practical solution yet. Sean and I are working on that. Sean is getting me fired up about this. He's really passionate about teaching these kinds of things.



Here's a few pics from convention:

This is me by the welcome sign in the rotunda of the hotel. We stayed at the Hilton-Americas in Houston. It was pretty fancy. No one left mints on our pillows though.

This is me with the Samples. They used to pastor my homechurch when I was very small...like 6-8 years old or something. I was young. Mary used to teach the children's church. I remember her teaching us songs. It was pretty cool to see them.

This is Sean and I on the airplane. We were waiting for the plane to take off! We taxied out to the runway and sat for an hour. They had to fix some mechanical problem. Then because of a storm we got re-routed to Houston. The plane didn't have enough fuel for the new route, so we had to go back to the terminal for more fuel. So our flight that should have taken a little over an hour really took about 2 1/2 hours. No problem though...Sean and I just read and talked.