Nineteen....WHAT?!

I'M NINETEEN.

Which let's be honest, is weird. I've wanted to be nineteen since I was EIGHT, because nineteen was my favorite number and on top of that I had some very short, profound reason as to why it was the best age EVER ( that I don't remember now and probably had something to do with being on top of the teenage pyramid now...). I ALSO find it funny because aren't I supposed to be an adult now? And the first thing my best friend posts on my wall for my birthday is the scene from Lilo and Stitch where she's feeding Pudge a sandwhich and apparently it reminds her of me :D Hey. I'll take it.

But just because I CAN....in nineteen years of living, here's some of the things I've learned. About life, love, people, best friends and yeah, myself :)

Life is much more enjoyable when you live in the present, and don't let your mind wander to the future CONSTANTLY. 

Country music is perfect driving, fall weather, windows down music & ALWAYS will be :)

I don't understand why everyone says blue eyes are the prettiest. They're some of the most beautiful I've seen, but I will take a pair of warm, brown eyes that make me feel safe over a pair of baby blues ANY day of the week :) 

The beach is GORGEOUS. And peaceful and breezy and close to perfect. I don't know why I was ignorant of this fact for my first eighteen years....

You never know what tomorrow will bring. God can change your life in 2 hours, and only He knows when that's going to happen.

No matter how harsh or depressing reality seems, holding on to hope in God's plan is WORTH it, no matter what the world says. 

The value of just sitting, snuggled up in a blanket and your best friends watching a movie should NEVER be underestimated. Because it makes some of the best, most comforting moments & memories :) Especially if significant amounts of junk food are included. 

Honesty is hard. It's also worth the pain. 

God uses pain & sadness just like He uses joys and triumphs. 

Singing makes life a lil' bit better....and belting stupid songs in the car at midnight with the windows down and a handful of best friends ALWAYS makes life a LOT better :D 

Loving people is vulnerable, and uncomfortable, and sometimes hurts a lot, but I would honestly say it's worth the risk :) 

That being said...being TRULY vulnerable is one of the hardest experiences I have ever gone through.

ALWAYS journal. Someday you're going to want to look back and laugh at where you were & how far God's brought you :D

The right song can make a moment perfect. 

People come in and out of your life. They are not yours to keep, no matter how badly you want to. 

"Above all else, GUARD YOUR HEART, for it is the wellspring of life." Proverbs 4:23

You're never too old for a Disney movie! 

God gives you the strength to get up in the mornings, even when you feel like you can't. 

Running can bring MUCH needed peace, clarity, stillness, and quiet :)

Sunsets will never get old. Nor will they ever stop declaring God's glory. EVER. 

People who want to stay in your life will fight to keep their spot in it. Don't reserve a spot for someone, who no longer wants to fight to show you what you mean to them. 

Everyday may not be GOOD, but there is something incredible hidden somewhere within each day :D

There are some lessons you just have to experience to truly learn.

Memories are, and always will be treasures. They are worth holding onto, good or bad.

I'm a lil' bit camera happy :P slash Instagram happy. Ya know.

Savannah, Georgia MIGHT be one of my favorite places on earth. Besides Texas of course ;) And I'd say Charleston, but since TECHNICALLY I've never been there, I guess I can't count it. 

Roadtrips are WONDERFUL. Seriously. So very much fun :D

Good morning texts are a wonderful thing, and can CHANGE the course of someone's morning/day/mood/smile :)

No matter how much healing you think has been done, little comments can still bring back a lot of hurt.

That being said....God is bigger than my feelings. And my fears. 

I AM CLUMSY. 

People letting you down hurts, but is a testament to the faithfulness of God I do not think I will EVER fully understand. 

Bonfires & the smell of burning leaves is a huge blessing....it makes me smile :) If there was a cologne made that smelled like that, I'd be a goner in ten seconds flat. 

I was a very dramatic child....perchance I am STILL a very dramatic child. 

NOTHING is too big for my God. 

The smallest compliments have the power to make someone's day. 

No matter how bookwormish it sounds, I will always, ALWAYS love the way that books smell.

Don't underestimate how much fun you can have when you simply stop taking life so seriously for a few hours.

A childlike nature is a blessing to be around, and it is a gift from God :) 

I have problems with writing things in caps...MEANING I DO IT WAY TO MUCH. 

Watching people discover the image of God they are created in, and the identity of who they are in Christ is the most breath-taking, beautiful, emotional thing I have ever experienced. 

I have an addiction to smell-good things. Like Bath & Body hand sanitizers. and Old Spice. And coffee ;)

If you want to win a girl's heart, write her letters. About your day, about the sunset, about stupid, trivial things, and most of all about how you feel about her. Having words to re-read when the nights get long is worth a million spoken moments. 

God's promises are ours to claim. Broken pieces will once again be made whole. 

I might be one of the most IMPATIENT people on the planet. But God's working on that :) 

Well. This was super long. But that's okay! 19 years is a long time to sum up, and I think I've done a pretty meh job....because every life is a story, and that story is LONG. But I have been blessed beyond what I deserve, gifted with more than I think I will EVER understand, and no matter how many times I think I've finally grasped it God CONSTANTLY blows my mind with how deep, far, consistent, faithful, steadfast, wonderful and overwhelmingly personal His love truly is :) 

I can't believe I'm 19. I can't believe I've made it through 19 years in one(ish) piece ;P I can't believe the people I've been allowed to meet, the lives I've been able to watch change through Christ, and the memories I've been able to collect...good and bad :) 

GOD IS SO GOOD.

Creativitied OUT.

Just got home from Labor Day weekend in SAVANNAH....so of course the first thing I do is blog about it before I forget anything I want to say :D Again, sorry for the mental jump around. After 2 hours and 40 minutes of driving & singing & admiring the BEAUTIFUL scenery that is South Carolina, this is just how my mind is running :)

And yes. Everytime I passed the word "Charleston" on a road sign, billboard, or advertisement I smiled and giggled like a little girl. Seriously? I might have a problem...

This weekend was the "Pinterest" weekend and we pinterested a LOT....given the I AM NOW OUT OF CREATIVITY vibe that I'm now giving off.

The verse is Micah 7:7, which says "But as for me, I watch in hope for the Lord. I wait for my God, my Savior. My God will hear me."

Also? I'd like to point out that when Pinterest says DIY! everyone thinks...."aw, easy project! Fun! Let's go!" LIES AND DECEPTION. DIY does not mean easy, but it DOES mean fun....in addition to time consuming, somewhat frustrating, paint all over your fingers.

Basically, you need vinyl letters for the project. Well, we didn't know what vinyl letters were. OR where to find them. So, we just had to hold down these little paper letters onto the page and paint over them. Sounds simple right? WRONG. The letters shifted & squiggled & wiggled all over the canvas, which meant that in the end some of my "i"s didn't have their dots and my "H"s looked a lot more like ns. BUT it was wonderfully, wonderfully fun :D

We got to watch the sunset on the beach, which is good because it feeds my beach obsession....

Aaaaaand bad because it ridiculously encourages my beach obsessions...

ALSO. I've added "Must see a shooting star" to my bucket list. Because I've never seen one. Because apparently I suffer from a curse that dictates every time a shooting star even MIGHT appear I have to be looking at something or watching something. Or blinking. For example:

"Look, a shooting star!"
"Oh, cool! You know, I've never seen one..."
"WEll, did you see that one?"
"No, I was rolling over to lay on my back."
FIVE MINUTES LATER.

"Look, there's another one!...Did you see that one?"
"Nope. I was looking at my phone to see what time it was."
TEN minutes later....

"You MUST have seen that one...."
"NOPE. I BLINKED."

It's ridiculous really. So now that's on my bucket list. I apparently ALSO suffer from a curse that most would probably just call BULL in the CHINA CLOSET, because in the space of one weekend I broke (or re-broke) the Gibbs blinds in Alan's room, spilled my drink at dinner & got handed a sippie cup, knocked an entire WRACK of surfboards off the shelf at Walmart, which then became the running reference of family AND extended family for the entire weekend.

Of course, I was also adopted as the 3rd niece and daughter, so I guess it wasn't too bad of a tradeoff :)

I love these girls a lot, and am SO thankful they live so very, very close. 

So that was my weekend! Countless hours spent at the beach, one of which I basically talked for and they had the patience to listen :) 

Also? God answered a really cool prayer request this weekend, which meant He brought a friend back into my life that I've been praying might be able to happen for a while. So....I really don't have any words for that OTHER than the fact it was really, really awesome :) Hence the Micah 7:7 "God hears my prayer" pinterest craft. 

NOW BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD! Aka school :D Week 3, here I come. 

Warning: Excited.

Well, the title should have been warning enough, but for those still brave enough to read on just know that this is coming from a mind that is EXCITED and HYPER and a little bit exhausted, and has got a very, very thrilling week/weekEND ahead of her :D So I apologize for the randomness of this post, the hopping around, and the fact that it might not make much sense. But hey! There's pictures!

I've been at CIU for about...ten days now. Which is crazy because it feels like SO much longer!

YEP. These are the skies and sunsets I now get to experience. IT'S CRAZY. 

I also got to tour downtown! Mostly because we were doing a scavenger hunt along with the rest of the Connect:CIUers, but hey, it was still fun. I also met my first boy from Massachusetts, which I felt like was quite the accomplishment, maybe? That would be us making a pyramid on top of the capital building...

I went to a worship night which was held HERE, brought by courtesy of the roommate's church NEWSPRING (all in caps for reasons I don't know...) and that was wonderful and exciting and brought me back downtown with fun children my age, so it made for a pretty good night all in all :D

There is a PURPLE. STREAK in my hair, and for those of you who can't see it (because some have claimed) I promise it's there. This is also exciting because it brings the crossing off of BUCKETLIST ITEM #3 which is very, very exciting to me. Almost as exciting as having a strip of purple in my hair. And if this is the craziest that I get in college (which, let's be honest, it will be...I SLEPT my entire first weekend here) then I'll be a pretty happy girl :)

We had our FIRST collegiate soccer game (WHICH WE WON! courtesy of Daniel Mallard and his headbutt) and the girl with me is Alicia Watanabe (whose last name must be said in a samurai accent) and she's basically just awesome and puts up with me which is sometimes a miracle in and of itself ;) We're excited. She's ALSO my FLT, which is an added bonus sometimes, and mainly just means her room is located conveniently right across the hall :) But for serials. We like her a lot.

And yes. Perchance I am just a little bit excited (and obsessed) that I'm now located in Gamecock country ;) BUT, I'm not the only one! There are many, many, MANY people that have already promised Saturday night game parties and if we're lucky (FINGERS CROSSED) a group of us might ACTUALLY get down to watch a game this semester :D Lucky. If we're lucky.

YEP! Another reason I'm excited is that directly after I make it through this lovely week of classes and psychology and MATH (ugh, ugh, ugh) I will be making a beautiful drive down to Savannah to spend the weekend ; the LONG weekend; with 2 of my bestest friends and their wonderful family :D And we're going to be creative and make lots of nomnommy things of Pinterest, and maybe come back with a craft or 2. ISH EXCITING. Also, my iPhone has now FINALLY learned how I talk, so it's began correcting all my IT'S to ISH'es. Well done iPhone. Well done ;)

And spiritually? Because yeah, I'm still growing. Basically what God has been teaching me can be summed up in the sentance:

Hope is not found in the results God can bring about, but instead in the belief that He has the power to bring around those results

Lil' bit cryptic, but I could write an entire blog post on why that's my lesson and I'm still not sure it would cover it. But THAT'S what God's been teaching me and it's been awesome, and brought peace, and brought the mindset of "It's Monday. God has given me the grace to go through Monday. Not Monday and Tuesday and three weeks of Wednesdays. MONDAY." Living one day at a time :) Simple to type, but it's taken my forEVER to learn, and I'm not done yet. 

THAT'S CIU LADIES AND GENTS. I'm incredibly psyched, incredibly excited, and can't WAIT to go see my best friends this weekend :D 

4 Days. 15 Hours. 22 Minutes. and 25 Seconds.

(Not that i'm counting. Except well....I am) 

Romans 4.

"In hope he [Abraham] believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told, "So shall your offspring be." He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead - he was about 100 years old - or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb. No distrust made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what He had promised." 

- Romans 4: 18-21 

This MIGHT be one of my favorite verses...and granted I have a lot :P But I love this passage, just because of the hope and faith that it speaks about. I can't IMAGINE the faith it must have taken Abraham to believe that God would give him a son, when even his own body said it was impossible. By anyone's and all accounts, it WAS impossible! "Against all hope...no distrust made him waver...he grew STRONG in his faith..." I have SO many doubts, and granted God's never appeared to me and directly spoken, but He has written down His promises in a book that I have the opportunity to read daily...and I STILL have doubts!

But as I was reading this, something stuck out that hasn't before.

"...fully convinced God was ABLE to do what He had promised." 

Not was going to, not was absolutely positive God would carry it out....he had faith God was ABLE to. Another version says, "..being fully persuaded that God had power to do what He had promised."

I think this goes back to finding joy in the Creator, and not in the things created. In wanting fulfillment from the creator HIMSELF, and not allowing ourselves to be filled with the gifts FROM Him. Even though God was promising Abraham (directly and IN PERSON) something that Abraham and Sarah had longed for SO long....Abraham still didn't allow himself to find hope in the direct result, but instead in the simple fact that God was ABLE and POWERFUL enough and BIG enough to bring about directly what He had promised. He found hope in GOD, and not in what God was able to do for him.

Maybe I'm not explaining this clearly, but this blows my mind. A DIRECT. PROMISE. and Abraham still chose to hope in God's power to fulfill His promise instead of the promise itself. AH.

College & Summer

So, THIS was my summer. I guess to a lot of people it looks silly and lazy and not all of the jokes make much sense...(and yeah, sometimes a little immature ;) But these are the memories, people and times that I treasure, and they're a gift from God...sometimes I think just to make sure all the bad days and long nights don't consume me.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Yt3oHIPZtY&feature=youtu.be

^ Click on that...

I've been at CIU for almost a week, and it's been the most unexpected experience of my life. In the time I've been here, I've...

1. Retaken the StrengthsFinder
2. Redone the TrueFaced module
3. Sang 10,000 Reasons in worship
4. Watched cardboard testimonies
5. Gone on late night adventures that involved sugar & good (new) friends...AND...
6. Been a part of a community of Christ so much bigger than myself.

I thought I'd never find another community of friends and teachers SO dedicated to equipping young people to live, own, and love their faith and relationship with the Lord when I left Impact....and while it hasn't been EXACTLY the same (and at times is JUST enough the same to make me ache with how much I miss it) it's been an incredible blessing, and so much more than I was expecting. 

BUT, classes still haven't even started yet (technically ;P) so there's still plenty of room for some UGH's and BLEH's and "WHY am I doing this to myself?!"'s ;)