it makes me smile..

This is one of my favorite sketches. this one I actually did for my dad....

I like the bright colors

this cross is so much fun to make (real barbed wire)

My first attempt at water color! (not too bad...at least you can tell what it is)

Does the noise in my head bother you?

Ok, so I have come to the realization that I was created to draw. Charcoal was made for my hand. I feel like part of me is missing when I look at my hands and and there's no charcoal dust in the cracks and crevices of my fingers. My brain hurts when I can't sketch out what I see inside the closets of my mind. How sad the world is when we get so caught up in doing life that we can't take a moment to enjoy it, to just play with a pencil...to feel the wood between your fingers...to watch your drawing take shape as your pencil glides across the rough paper. Who cares if it doesn't look like anything!

It's the process of drawing that's so exciting, not the finished piece. The journey of the pencil is what's important. That's what's fun.

And How much more exciting is it when you get to add the color! A whole new piece emerges! You created! Your fingers traced her frame...each line put in it's place. They don't talk back, they don't argue or complain. Each line works so beautiful with the next. Each line is important. Each line has a job to do, and performs so exquisitely.

My heart is elated at the thought of doing it all over again!

What you are about to read is true....

No names have been changed to protect the innocent. Nothing has been altered or fabricated despite the incredible nature of what transpired the second weekend of May, 2009.....

Early Saturday morning, shortly after 8, I 

was conversing with my little brother using my dependable blackberry phone.

I hadn't talked to him in a while so I was very much enjoying the phone call...

But just like a whinny child, I hear Charlie in the living room 

demanding attention in the form of water in his water bowl....

So I pick up his dish...Still talking to my brother...carry it

 to the sink, fill it up. BUT on my trek back to the living room, my little brother slipped off my shoulder and fell right into Charlie's dish!

There I stood, for what seemed like 2 seconds, completely horrified that I had just drowned my little brother in Charlie's dish..."What an awful sister!"

But thinking quickly, I said, "Josh! I'm so sorry!"

Thinking a little slower, I realized I had already drowned him, and therefore, he could not hear me...Shortly before 9am, my blackberry 8110 passed away.

After dismantling the phone, I realized that I had lost everything...numbers, addresses, my calendar, everything....gone. What a tragic beginning to my weekend.

I had to borrow a phone and call my mother and apologize for drowning her only son in Charlie's water dish....No child should have to do that!

Halfway thru my saturday, someone told me to stick my phone in a bowl of rice, and that would suck out all the moisture...desperate, I tried it...

Well Sunday morning, I get home after church and put my phone back together...and sure enough...IT LIVES!!! IT'S A MIRACLE!

Thru this whole experience, I have learned three things.

 1. Blackberry phones have a stubborn will to live, 

2. multi-tasking is not always smart, and

3. rice rocks!

What you have just read is a true. No names have been changed to protect the innocent. Nothing has been altered or fabricated despite the incredible nature of what transpired the second weekend of May, 2009.....

She works hard for her money...so hard for it honey

ok, so...last week i received a little package in the mail. upon opening it i discovered a long letter and 2 usps money orders, each for $850.

Realizing that this could quite possibly be too good to be true, I read the letter. It kept referencing emails that I had supposedly already received. well, I couldn't find any in my email, but I did find 4 emails in my spam. They were telling me that I had been hired as their new bookkeeper and that I was to deposit the whole $1700 in my account and then the next day, withdraw 90% of it and western union it to some guy in China. 

So now, it becomes incredibly obvious that this is not real. I was just gunna thro it away but my mother called and she just went on and on about the Nigerian scam. She was convinced that I was involved in it. So, listening to my mother, I took the package, the money orders, and the emails to the post office. 

To be honest, I felt kinda dumb walking into the post office and saying "I got these in the mail and I dont think they're real". But before I could say anything, the lady behind the counter went hysterical! She started thanking me for bringing it in, and she showed me how it was a forgery. She was saying that the usps just changed their money order forms a month ago. She was shocked people were already try to scam with it. Well, she took all my info and said they would be calling me. 

So I get phone calls from the main office asking me all sorts of questions and and telling me that they were starting an investigation. They told me that they might need to see my computer.

Holy cow, you guys! I didn't do anything! Those people found me! I just got their stuff and turned it in! haha!

Well anyway, I was checking my email monday and I get this lovely letter from the "scammers" telling me that I've had their money too long and if I don't send them their money, they will get in touch with the FBI. You guys, every part of me wanted to email them back and say, "oh, I already talked to the FBI, don't worry about it!"

But I didn't, I was a good girl...I went thru the right channels :-)

Anyway, all that to say...I just get so tickled at how dumb other people (scammers) think we are. And the sad thing is, alot of times, we prove them right!

Moral of the story:

If it's too good to be true, call the FBI!

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine....

Ok, ok, ok....

Have you ever wondered what God's thinking? 

These past few months the only question I seem to be able to ask God is "huh?" 

All thru my childhood, I knew what I wanted, I knew the direction my life was supposed to be heading, it was so clear to me. I had dove's eyes, I was focused. There was no changing my mind. I went to college just like I had planned. I was on my way to my destination. With out realizing it, I was fighting God the whole time. God's plan for me was ministry, my plan for me was forensics...they don't really go together. I was having trouble staying focused in school, but I was stubborn. God had to kick me out twice before I realized He didn't want me there, He had other plans. He had better plans. God opened door after door, and all I had to do was walk thru...one step right after the other. It's strange how He only gives us a few steps at a time. 

Sometimes I wonder "what's He thinking?!?"..."Is this mess I'm sitting in really worth it?"..."I hope He knows what He's doing?"..."Does He know what He's doing?!?"..."Has He forgotten me?"... I know James 1 says "consider it pure joy my brothers, whenever you face trials of any kind, for you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance, and perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything." We're told throughout the bible to "be perfect as our Heavenly Father is perfect".... Perseverance is the road to one-ness with God, I get that. But I've been here for a few months, I can't even see the next step. I'm at a loss....and I can't seem to find the next door. I get so frustrated, mostly at myself. Up to this point, I knew I was walking in God's footprints. But now I feel like I'm stuck in the fog. And as my knees hit the dirt and I reach my hands out searching for His feet, my heart aches and I feel so distant. The only thing in my head was "huh?" I felt so beat down.

Last night, I was sitting at the park with my pastels drawing the sun as it was setting. I thought, "how beautiful" and so often I miss this moment. And this is a moment that God paints every day...and a good artist puts so much of himself in his work, and I was right there in the middle of it. I got so caught up in finding my next step that I forgot where I was. I was searching for His feet and the whole time I was in His arms. My eyes had lost His eyes. I had looked out, trying to figure out what He was thinking, and the whole time all He was really thinking about was me.....

I looked in the window to see you clearer but my breath fogged up the glass so I drew a new face and I laughed....

OK, so I haven't blogged in a while....If I didn't know any better, I would think myself lazy! See, it's like this, I've been busy...doing things...stuff....OK, OK, I have no excuse! I guess sometimes, one goes thru phases in their life; Some days you are overwhelmed with words and there isn't enough time in one day to write it all down, and yet other days there seems to be no words sufficient enough to express the jumbled mess of thoughts you keep up in your head, and all you can really do when that happens is sit there with a blank look on your face...OK, so this week-ish, I've felt like I've had a blank look on my face. My mom says that men are waffles and women are spaghetti. Men think in compartments, one compartment at a time and women thinks about many things all at once....I think my bowl of spaghetti is empty :-( blah, blah, blah...All that to say, "I was listening to this song by Todd Agnew the other day." This was cool because I felt like as I was listening, Mr. Agnew was putting some spaghetti back in my bowl. As I was listening to the words, I felt like God was whispering in my ear (my good ear of course). It makes me smile to think of my beautiful saviour singing to me. This song is entitled "a martyr's song" but it wasnt just written to those who were put to death because of their faith. "martyr" means "witness". Anyone who knows Christ personally and intimately is a witness. And what's really cool is that Jesus is longing to sing these words to you...to me...

I've been waiting to dance with you
In fields full of colors you've never seen
I've been waiting to show you beauty
You never dreamed that's always been in you
I've been waiting to see you tremble as you're embraced
By a world saturated with my love
I've been waiting for the day when at last I get to say
My child you are finally home

I've been waiting to watch you realize
What all your longing was for
I've been waiting to show you the thread of grace
That ran through all your pain
I've been waiting to let you drink the water of which
Your greatest joy on earth was just a taste
I've been waiting for the day when at last I get to say
My child you are finally home

Every tear you cried dried in the palm of my hand
Every lonely hour was by my side
every loved one lost, every river crossed
Every moment, every hour was pointing to this day
I've been longing for this day
My child, you are finally home

I would if I had a cookie.....

So, this weekend I went with my family on a road trip up to the Cincinnati area...I didn't realize that we hadn't gone on a family trip in almost 7 years (we had some catching up to do) 

We went to the "Creation Museum." 

We actually got to walk with the animals in the "garden of eden"...

Ride the dinosaurs.....

Take a stroll thru outer space...

We even went dinosaur spotting!

I got to spend time with my sisters...

My sisters got to spend time with a camel....

And my brother did tricks with a t-rex...

It was super fun...

It was nice to take a break from the chaos of the normal day and just kinda play for a while...

I learned so many things whilst away on this trip...I learned that camel's lips do not feel like horse's lips. I learned that the bottom of doors CAN slice your foot open. I learned that pluto and one of its moons orbit each other. AND I learned that the people in Kentucky are quite fascinating and very much informative, they have signs for everything....We went by a tattoo place that advertised "tattoos while you wait" (how convenient), and in one field we drove by, there was a sign that read "USED COWS FOR SALE"....(that sign had me super tickled!)

All that to say, "I had a great weekend"...I very much enjoyed my road trip!