Monday, November 19, 2007

Sad News

While it has been a real joy keeping everyone up to date on my personal life via this blog. Through a lot of prayer I just think with my current job situation this blog might not be the best thing right now. So it is with a sad heart I inform you I will be removing it completely by the end of the week. Now I will go back to sending more regular updates on all the fun things here to my friends via e-mail. So if for some reason I don't have your e-mail or if you are an old friend that has been keeping up with me via this blog I do want to keep you up just not so the whole world will be kept up too. So leave me a comment with your e-mail and any other contact info you want to pass on and I will add you to my list. I will not approve the comment so it will never post and everyone else can grab your e-mail too! ;)

Sorry to have to change this guys! It really has been fun finding random folks via this blog but it is for the best. I will continue to check in on those of you who have a blog so you will still get stalked from me that way!!! ;) And if you are one of my blog friends I have linked please make sure I have your e-mail so I can keep up with you and keep you in the loop!

Love y'all!

Friday, November 9, 2007

Surprises!

So last night we had a surprise baby shower for one of the ladies in my bible study Jenn. It was a blast of a night hanging out catching up and talking babies. There was lots of food and laughs to go around and watching all these women in my living room I just sat there and thought how blessed I was by each of them.

See you have to understand my study formed in the Fall of 2003 with 15 girls all single and working in the city. We were the renegade study as we deemed ourselves because we formed it outside of our church but we all attended together. We met the first night at a cute Italian place in DuPont circle and me being the ever on schedule girl began to get anxious as no one was arriving. I was already settled I was not happy with this study and I missed my girls in Texas. Soon Suzy came around the corner and greeted me with one of the warmest smiles and apologies for being late, within minutes ladies started pouring in and we were seated at a long table trying to meet everyone. I ended up on the end with the other youngin at the table Deb O. We had a great night of fellowship and I soon learned these ladies would be a life saver for me. Since Deb O and I were the babies in the group the ladies were very quick to take us under their wings and care for us. Many times when I could not afford to eat one would take me out to dinner, or swing by lunch to me at work. I had a standing invitation to just about all of their homes for meals whenever I needed it and a place to crash if I ever got stuck with long hours in the city.

These ladies sacrificed to make me feel at home. They let me spend holidays with them. I was able to attend special occasions with their families, and then they started to get married. It was joyous how our group started with only one married gal and one gal dating someone and now over half are married and have kids! One specific thing I remember so clearly is at one point in my job I had a week where I was SO crazy I literally wore holes in the bottom of my shoes from the amount of walking I did. I had told Jenn about this when she called me one day in the office to check in on me. Next thing I new they had dropped off new shoes to me so that I could keep working and not get my feet soaked since it was raining outside. There are SO many stories I could tell of praise to these women this is just one.

I can remember specifically the times ladies would enter our group for prayer request and start to talk seriously or not so seriously about a boy, and the next thing I knew we were attending their weddings. As our lives changed so did our group slowly some ladies slipped out and we added new ones in, and did life together with them. So last night we honored Jenn, (she and I are the final two from the original group) she is having a little girl in just a few months and we gathered together all the ladies we could from the bible study over the years that lived here in town. And as we were sitting there talking I just looked around the room at the ladies who have shaped my life here in DC. They have prayed for me, rallied around me, encouraged me and supported me through some of the hardest times in my life. I know if I even need something these ladies are the ones I will call. They took me as a scared gal straight out of college intimidated by the city and everything it held and turned me into a Godly woman who can live out her faith in the work place. I owe a lot to these ladies and they may never know how much they mean to me. Each one holds a very dear space in my heart and I am so blessed to know them and so excited to see where God will take us all in the future.

Diaper Cake Candice made... (all week I thought it was going to be something edible)

Jenn comes in very surprised!

Gals from the original group! Jenn, Me, Jess, and Amanda

Ladies in the Current Study
(Jeanie, Beth, Jodi, Michelle, Jenn, Me, Kelli, Suzanne)

Tuesday, November 6, 2007

VOTE!!!

In case you did not know today is election day people! It is one of my favorite days of the year as I get to exercise a civic duty that has been given to me by the sacrifice of so many soldiers! And they are fighting right now for others to also be able to vote! In the last Iraqi election many folks who decided to go to the polls did so at the expense of their safety in that many attacks took place on people heading there not to mention the women alone!

So I promise you that extra stop in your day, the almost no line to get to the polls is nothing compared to what so many had to go through to allow you to go vote. So go and vote! There may not be any BIG folks on the ballot this November but your local Judges, School Boards, State legislatures and many more all need your support! So go exercise your freedom today and VOTE!

Monday, November 5, 2007

H-Town and College Station Pics!

Weekend started off with a little Lupe Tortilla in H-Town

Steph and I

Crazy Cristina and I

Morgan Family and I

Grace and Kristi

Yell Practice Gang

Jamie Lee and I

Future Yell Leaders!

Joe and I doing the push ups

Let the Kiddos Invade!

Sabrina, Victoria and Savannah!

Lee Family... Not sure why they look so scared!

Waverly, and Whitney and I

Boone Family

My Best Friend from High School Emily and her boys

My Gals! Renee JUST got engaged! Was a sweet surprise to see them!

The new extended Family! Congrats Renee and Justin!

My Bro and the Boys at the Game

Rachael at her first College Football Game! WHOOP!

Heather and I

Tristie and I

Kerri and I (Thanks for letting us invade your home!)
Did not get a one on one pic with Jared but thanks J-Rod for driving us around!

MIA!

Okay I am sorry for being so MIA recently but it was all for good! I have recently accepted a new job!!! I am VERY excited and looking forward to the new challenge. I will stay in DC and not head to a new city but you just never know where I may turn up next, what is that a Big Apple in the distance or is it just getting Windy in here!

So on top of all the interviews and grueling process of the new job I also got to travel back home and hang with a lot of good friends and a lot of new babies!!! One of my favorite things in life is that while it is very weird and peculiar to me to think of babies, I DO love my nieces and nephews and just because there is no blood there does not mean my good friends little ones are not related to me… scary I know but I love being an Aunt! You get them all hopped up on sugar you are the hero and then you send them home! What is wrong with this plan! While in Texas I got to travel back with my good friend Rachael and Jodi was to come but a very sad sequence of events and two missed planes and she was stuck in DC.

After some good time in College Station catching up with friends and some good Aggie football even if we did not win… I headed to New Orleans for some business. We worked our tails off and to be honest it was one of the BEST business trips I have gone on. Our team to work with was awesome and gelled just right. So despite all the crazy antics and lack of info we pulled of a few great events! Whoop! Then I got the chance to head over to a special project Emeril Lagasse is helping with and taste a lot of his famous food and hang out with him for a while. It was awesome the food was good and that guy can hug I will tell you what!

Once back in DC after some plane fiascos myself, I slept for 9 straight hours it was AMAZING! And then headed to an 80’s party with my college students only to have to leave early to attend my roomies 30th birthday! It has been a FULL last week and a half and I will post pics up as soon as I can!

Thursday, October 18, 2007

The Chao

Oh my… well I have just experienced one of the best meals I may have ever had in my entire life! I am so overcome with food I can not work and had to write this post. My boys and I here at the office have been talking about going to Fogo De Chao ever since Dave went there in the spring. But things always came up and we kept putting it off. Today Dave surprised us and said we are going today… What! Are you kidding me! I have not prepared! I planned to fast before hand, have a serious work out in the morning… wear stretchy pants! Here I am in my normal suit with no room to breathe and have had breakfast and dinner last night and you want me to go today! Well to be honest despite my lack of preparation it was not hard to convince me.

Once we arrived it was all I had prayed it would be. They are working on the outside area and thus it does not look like a gem from the outside but once you grace the doors you see the goodness that is the Chao. The atmosphere is awesome, not too stuffy but still nice. The waiters are dressed in traditional Brazilian garb and are some of the best in all of DC. The whole idea of the Chao is meat on swords! Basically is kinda like Tres Amigos with the little flags you raise when you are ready for food. Except a bit classier. There is a salad station that is amazing with all sorts of salads, cheeses, vegetables, spreads and breads and well you get the picture. Then they bring you wonderful warm cheese bread, fried bananas, crispy hot polenta and seasoned mashed potatoes and they keep refilling these if needed. So if you go with two big boys who played college ball like me you don’t have to worry about loosing all your food. Then come the servers…

It's so glorious, Dave was a bit sad we were seated near the kitchen but I thought it was the best, you could see the waiters come rushing out of the kitchen swords of meat in hand. It was quite a sight, they come out in droves ready to serve and rush to your side to ask if you want one of the 15 cuts of beef, pork, chicken, and lamb that they have. They then slice it right there onto your plate and the next sword walks up. When you have enough on your plate you simply turn over your disk to signal you are good for now. My plan of attack I left mine up till I saw each of the 15 meats and chose a small to lets be honest medium selection of each. Whew! It was intense and amazing! The meats are awesome and mouth watering. The waiters were gentleman and ladies, and took care of your every need. Its how a restaurant should be run. If you can go to the Chao I HIGHLY recommend it as there are many there in Texas! Okay I am going back to my food coma…….

Monday, October 15, 2007

Cierra Video

Please go check this out on Johns Blog... it is awesome! I am so proud of our students!

Volleyball and Early Morning Movin

Well I would like to start off with the great news that this morning was my first morning back in the gym and it was glorious! Everyone was asking how I was and excited to have me back. It was a great work out for what I can do right now and I am SO EXCITED about getting back into the routine!

But that is not what this blog is about. This weekend was very eventful and except for the Aggies and Cowboy’s losses it was an awesome weekend! Friday night a crew of Gathering folks rallied to go and support our good friend Cinnamon in her return to the AU Volleyball court! It was a great game and the ladies killed Lafayette quickly!

Saturday morning we were up bright and early and headed out to serve Cierra’s family and help in the moving process. It was awesome watching the students rally around this family and serve them in ways that truly went above and beyond! I am constantly amazed at the heart of service these students have! They are some of the best Rock Stars I know!!!


The Gathering Cheering Section!

Cinnamon and I

The Country Car Waiting for Direction

Tymon making Jeff carry the load

Jeff and Tymon

The Gals Movin Boxes

The guys moving the TV... not sure what Jeff is doing?

Aaron trying to make Cierra do all the raking!

Tired from moving and ready for lunch!

Alessandra and Sarah with a pizza pile as big as her!

The whole Gathering Moving Team (minus Phillipe and James) with Cierra and her Mom

Little bit crazy...

The ladies who set everything up... Alessandra and Sarah with Cierra

No words... Jeff and Aaron being awkward...

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

WOW

I really don't know what else to say but WOW! I sat last night speechless at the faithfulness of God. Not that I ever doubted Him to be faithful to our prayers because I knew He would provide exactly what we asked for. But even when you know God is going to take care of it, the moment He does is still amazing and leaves you awe struck. I know I say that often about a Tuesday night but there is something about watching these students coming together and worshiping and serving their campus that always gets me choked up. I love these students and care for them more than I can ever express and do realize that they are the Lords and He is just allowing me to watch them for a while.

Our students have partnered with an organization called the Sparrow Club to sponsor a child by the name of Cierra who has been battling cystic fibrosis her whole life. They are working to provide her family with basic needs and assistance and watching them rally around this little girl last night was amazing. The worship was what I think a glimpse of what heaven will be like. It was as if the students could not sing loud enough to express their love for the Lord, and then as Mike began to talk I started my Tuesday ritual of counting to see where we are. Now please hear me when I say it is NEVER about numbers for us but it something we love to see Gods faithfulness in. If we were back with just three students or one for that matter I would be just as happy to be there. But my prayer for this semester was to break that 100 mark. And last night as I began to count I thought I miscounted and started again because as I finished just one side I was already well into the 50's. We ended the night with 101 souls in that room and I was in awe of the Lord. Because these 101 souls were there to worship God and see Him move. They did not come because we were giving out free burritos or anything else they were there to meet with the God in heaven and He brought them there so He could meet them face to face.

Standing in the back of the Kay center last night and seeing all that God has done over these short years not only on our campus but the fact we are on 5 was amazing! John and I were speaking to two potential volunteers and they asked how many more campuses we thought the Gathering would spread to. And we both just said we had no idea God was going to spread us to 5! So who knows! its awesome when you see the Lord bless a ministry this way, and I love that our volunteers and John always give Him the praise never trying to take any of the credit. I am blessed immensely to serve in this capacity and I am so excited to see where God has us going! Who knows but one thing I do know, He is going to continue to show up in a major way and I can not wait to see what He does next Tuesday!

Oh other cool thing, on our churches prayer guide for the month of October, the entire church was praying for The Gathering as a whole yesterday! So we were extra blessed that it fell on the day of our service! PTL!


I would be lying if I said these images were from last night, sadly I took no pictures but did get some video... but these are from a couple of Tuesday's ago. Still gives you a glimpse of what amazing students I get to hang out with!






Tuesday, October 9, 2007

Line by Lines and Babies?

Friday night I was able to have a fun night out with some old co-workers. It was my friend Allie’s 30th Birthday and it quickly became a work reunion! I was so pumped as I saw so many shining faces coming through the door. We grabbed a table in the back and started in on a long night of catching up and laughing at so many old stories! Some how the conversation turned to our home towns. One fellow lost Texan was there and we began to talk about how weird it was to us that all of our friends were mothers. Some twice over and even a handful 3 times over. Not that we are not happy for our friends because believe you me I love my friends kiddos! They are the cutest! But to us in this stage of our life it just seemed weird.

Christal quickly realized that once we moved back to the homeland it would probably not be too long till we started families of our own. We both paused at the thought of being the oldest ladies in Mothers Day Out. And what our play groups would look like. Then we decided the only way to fix this problem was we would all have to live close by to each other again and have babies at the same time so we would have each other. This then became a somewhat scary thought for our children realizing we would probably set up time with line by lines. (These are to the minute detailed schedules) That we would provide briefing papers for all the mothers in our group on our chosen play destination such as the rate of accidents, how far it would be to the nearest hospital, and any info on big projects and play days the location had done in the past and their success rate. Maybe a few bios and resumes of the Gymboree Instructers. You know the norm info you get before going some where.

This was beginning to look much like my good friend Bonny Kate’s wedding. Now you know I have been in something like 17 weddings and all have their own unique flare. But the best thing about BK’s wedding was the schedule and material she sent to all of us before hand. I had my line by line in hand and knew to the minute where I needed to be thus allowing me to schedule time to see others. I had all my briefing materials as to where I would stay, the distance from the Marshal home to the church and such. It made my wedding experience go much smoother and BK’s as well. So I feel that her wedding in Texas is a small glimpse of what ours may look like and then what our wonderful playgroups will look like.

I laugh now, but I think my kiddos may either hate it or love it (which can be scary on their own.) But I will say there is a lot of good in a detailed line by line and a lot more in a detailed briefing paper. It stops all those pesky surprises and you know what you are walking into. So all that to say I am looking forward to continuing to do life with these ladies, I think it is rare to find this many fun women in the environment we live in and I am glad I have each one of them with me. They are driven, organized, prepared, professional and then on the off time very crazy and a good time. I have to run now to begin the briefing papers on our potential future husbands so we can begin the interview process asap our time here is running up!

Friday, October 5, 2007

He Does Exsist

We had heard rumors of this man lurking around the city, not just in our TVs. Many friends had stated they had sited him but none had proof... then lo-and-behold there I was sitting and enjoying some nice jazz with some friends when he starts casually walking by us. Two of my college students were sitting with me, Candace was prepared and had her camera. so we jumped and asked for a picture from the guy who swears he can get you all the governments money!


Candace, Matthew Leskow (Question Mark Guy), Me, and Sabrina

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Here we go Again!

So I feel like recently I have just been posting catch up posts, and here is yet another. I am sitting here with a VERY Venti Mocha and trying to get myself awake to write this and then dive into the pile in front of me of work. So I am procrastinating! And I will put another side note in there. I LOVE my folks at the Starbees by my office. They are a great team and are always having fun and encouraging. But not in a over bearing I want to kill you this early in the morning kinda way. I was in Philly this past week for work and the Starbees there had a staff that looked like they were just as asleep as I was and not happy to have to serve me coffee... No fun!

But I digress so here is some pics of things going on... a couple of weekends ago my good friend Jared came up to visit and we headed to Annapolis to tour the Naval Academy with one of his hometown friends, and then go to the navy vs. Duke game. While this was a HUGE change from my Kyle Field days it was an amazing campus and the game atmosphere was fun! The we headed down to the harbour to have some good seafood, and then to the city for a little dessert! It was good times by all


The Group out for Dinner at Cactus Cantina!


Jared's friend John toured us around the Academy! Its amazing everyone should go see it! Especially the chapel!


Jared, Me, Cristina and Matt at the Game



We hung out with one of my former students Des for dinner


Then my good friend Shari and I got together to tour the monuments as she and her husband have headed back to Texas and there was still some sight seeing to be done. The fun part was one of my campers from when I was a camp counselor in Texas moved up here and contacted me so we had dinner and hung out as well!



Shari, Me, J'aime and President Lincoln


Then I headed to Philly for some work and was able to have dinner and a relaxing girls night with my good friend Kate!


Then it was off to our churches Fall Retreat! 500 + singles drove down to a Young Life camp in South West Virginia for a weekend away of great teaching and some of the best worship I have ever taken part in!


Our little group getting ready to head into a talk

John Speaking at Retreat
Me and the Gathering Gal leaders from George Mason


Old Friends are the best friends Beau, Me, Amanda and Jerry after breakfast one morning


Me and the guys before the last session


My good friend Dan and I


Me, Beau and Lauren late one night