Michelle Update

It has been a while since I have posted. Just wanted to let everyone know I made it successfully through surgery and I am on my way to a good recovery! My Mom was in town for 10 days to take care of me! WHOOP for that! And my friend Amanda said it best if blogs were anonymous this would be the perfect time to tell A LOT of funny stories. (surgery can be very humbling and funny!) But this is not anonymous thus those stories stay off the world wide web!

But other than my Mom being the super Rock Star she is! (I think that's the first time I have given out the super rock star title, saw the fun blog Amanda and would approve you giving your sister Rock Star status...) I have had many friends in the area help and come and keep me company through the recovery! Mad props to my friend Kell for flying my Mom out! Mad props to the Weatherton Fam for letting Mom and I crash at the lake house to recover... even though I slept about 90% of the time, it was good for Mom! And all the friends who have changed their schedules to bring me dinner, drive me around, or just come and sit and hang out with me! And not to mention all the folks who sent flowers and e-mails to show support and love! I truly do have some of the best friends in the world!!! Will post more pics when I can but until then love y'all!

One Last Hoorah

So some of you know and many of you do not but this week I am going in to have surgery to fix back problems that have been with me almost all my life. While I am very excited to get this done a major down side is I am going to be laid up for at minimum two weeks and then I will not be able to work out or do most good activities for another couple of months! So this past weekend was very crammed with a lot of stuff to make it one good last hoorah for a while!

Well earlier in the week I was able to go to dinner with one of my favorite crazy libs Deb O! Deb and I moved to DC about the same time and were the two youngsters in our bible study. We were in bible study together for a few years and then our group split off. Well she is headed back to Cali to work in San Fran so a few of us got together to say good bye at Cheesecake Factory! It was a blast lots of fun stories and things to catch up on! Congrats Jenn on being Prego! Can not wait to see little baby B! And best of luck Deb O as you head off to the left coast!

Then on Friday Jodi had the unfortunate experience in wrecking her car while she was waving to her brother she randomly saw on the road, so Friday night I drove her and her Brother and his wife Katie down to the lake house for a birthday dinner in honor of Rock Star Katie! It was a lot of fun and with the four of us in Harry we were able to take the HOV and save a lot of time and have a sweet time or worship in the car once we hit the back roads. It was good because Jodi and Andrew are both good singers so they totally drowned me out. Then Jodi and I stayed up late chatting with Mrs. W about all sorts of girl stuff, and getting ready for my surgery, because Mrs. W will be taking care of me afterwards and they are letting me recover at the lake house. My mom will be there as well so I am going to be totally gushed over!

Due to some dead lock traffic and a later than planned departure from the lake house we missed a great event and I was actually very sad to miss. Sorry Linds! But we did arrive in Northern VA around 8 pm and headed to go see some friends of mine perform in a little show. Everyone has a handful of friends they can totally be themselves around and let down all guards. Sadly a majority of those friends for me live in the great state of Texas. But the wonderful tour buses brought in three of them on Saturday and Jodi and I went and hung out with Rex, Willie and Mica and got to watch the new show! Mica had an amazing solo during the show and it was fun to watch her work the crowd. Then we all just laid low sat around and caught up only to end the night with a late night dance party on the bus… it was very humorous! We also had to park far off so at the end of the night the guys thought it would be good to get a golf cart to take us back to the car, well since there was no one around they just jumped on and off we went… it was a matter of moments when we realized there were two golf carts chasing us down and they followed us all the way to my car. I was just waiting for the sky news chopper to come in and cover the late night low speed chase. Um yeah I would like to emphasize low speed. Sunday brought some more hang out time with Jodi, then off to church and a benefit for the Gathering which I think brought in some good dough!

So now I have a couple of days to get everything set before I go under the knife… so I may be missing for a while but I will let you all know I am doing A- Okay when I am through

Me, Jenn, Deb O and Amanda

Mrs. W participating in some late night Girl Talk

The Band Performing!

Mica's Solo

Jodi and I at the Concert

Willie, Me, and Mica

Jodi and I and all the Guys getting ready for Dance Party!

Rex and Willie stealing the Golf Cart concentrating on their low speed chase

Me and the Fugitives!

I Dig Jesus!

So I was tagged by my good friend Amanda to list out five things I dig about Jesus! I think I was tagged because of how holy I am or that humility is my spiritual gift. Or that wisdom runs deep in my bones… well if you don’t know me obviously I am joking! But I thought with my recent circumstances this was a great way to give major props to the main man in my life Jesus! So here goes ( I did not read Amanda’s before I wrote mine because I did not want to be swayed so if I repeat Manda I am sorry)…

These are the rules:1. those tagged will share 5 things they dig about Jesus…2. those tagged will tag 5 other bloggers…3. those tagged will post a comment here with their name and a link to their “dig” Jesus list…

1) Obviously Salvation! He loves me and wants to give me the best life ever and I have to do nothing at all for it other than accept His grace and sacrifice on my behalf! (Romans 5:8) You would be surprised to know I mess up… I know crazy huh… but I have done my fair share in sinning and because of that I was totally not on the list to get into heaven. But just because Jesus loves me, He paid my debt of death for my sin (Rom 6:23) when I deserved none of it. And the best part, He doesn’t ask me to do anything in return! Seriously! I just have to accept His grace! Now I am totally on the list for heaven and of all the access lists I get to be on this is by far my favorite and most prestigious!

2) He LOVES ME! I do not want to offend my married friends here but I am just going to come out and say it. Jesus loves me so much He wants me all to himself right now! Now two things can be derived from this statement one this is a late twenties single girls excuse to be single or I am so messed up God has a lot of work to do before I can marry. Both Not True! Seriously y’all it’s a very cool thought that right now the God of the universe wants me all to Himself! Once I get married and believe me I am totally for that one day, my heart will be different I will start having a family and others in there. But right now is a sweet time I will never get again where its just me and God. And He wants it that way or I would have someone else in this life. And to be honest all the crazy things I have done and get to do in life I LOVE that He is the one I share it with! Pretty cool huh!

3) He knows every detail of my life and has orchestrated things to bring me to this moment! Y’all this is cool! All of my life God has specifically designed so that I would be just where I am today! Things in my life struggles and victories all played a major role to bring me to this point in my life. He knew I would move to DC and obtain the job I did, and he orchestrated tons of things in my past to have that come about! WHAT! I know seriously! Even His plans for history as a whole has played a key role in my life and bringing me here. So these huge events that affect everyone He also made them so they would affect me individually to bless me and develop me!

4) He works all things together for His good! (Romans 8:28) This is huge for me, because this means even when I mess up and I do wrong against God. He can still use that mistake for HIS glory! I know! Because I mess up a lot and I hate to tarnish His name but He is SO much bigger than me! And He can work ALL things to His glory no matter how much I mess up or someone else hurts me! He uses it all! And when satan thinks he can get the best of me, God is all “I don’t think so” and uses his plans to make God look better! I love that!

5) This one I am going to leave broad because seriously can anyone name just five things they love about God! So I will make my #5 be that He created it ALL! All of this is His. He spoke it into being and He will take it out when need be no matter if it is me, or my little puppy or the entire earth! Its all HIS! None of this is made by anything but God! EVERYTHING goes back to Him! There is nothing more I can say on that because its so huge, I have nothing, have done nothing, seen nothing that did not come from Him and Him alone! WOW!


So go ponder how BIG our God is! Every authority is in place because of Him! Everything is where it is because of Him! Whoa! So there is my five and now I tag… Emily, Steph, Betsy, Martha, and Whitney!

For Betsy!

When I posted all the old pics before I got in trouble with Betsy for no pics of her. We have known each other since high school thus she is my blog friend I have known the longest and I gave her no props... sorry my friend hope this makes up for it. You would enjoy I searched high and low for our posed scaffolding picture... but alas could not find it again so here is one from our fatefull trip to Taleo when my car broke down and we were stuck in that old gas station with the town locals having their morning coffee together! Lots of fun that day, and we were squished in Brad's truck the rest of the way! Many funny stories from the trip alone. So here is the pic of the three of us when we finally made it there!

Me, Brad and Betsy

The 4th Goes On Forever

And the Party Never Ends! So after leaving the lake house last Sunday night, I headed back home to endure a couple of days of work! My good friend David Dixon was in town for a few days so Tuesday night I went and retrieved him and we headed down to the lake house for a bit more fun! I will have to say out of everything that took place in that day and a half I think Dixon being beat by a 4 foot 11 inch girl in a tubing competition was my favorite part! We enjoyed a lot more food, a lot more sun, a little volleyball and some great times on the boat. Dixon and I headed back to DC on Wednesday night watching fireworks on our way up the highway, and headed to the great American time of baseball on Thursday! My sweet friends Ryan and Shari Langerhans treated David, Jodi and myself to some great seats to watch the Nationals take on the Cubs. Wish I could tell you the Nats beat the Cubs but they did not, Jodi and I have concluded it was because Ryan did not start and will be writing a stern letter to the team manager about this. After the game we met up with one of Dixon’s helicopter pilot buddies for a little Salsa dancing and fun! Lets just say I was not prepared and this white girl was wearing flip flops, but I made it look like I knew what was going on! Dixon headed back to Texas the next day and I headed back to the lake house for this past weekend.

I successfully was able to get up and ski behind the boat. Now the silly part on this is Mr. Weatherton has been patient in trying to teach me to ski and I have been using a pair of skis that were purchased for a tall guy so they are a tad big and I am so awkward with them in the water. So Friday night I attempted and got up for a small moment then BAM! Hit the water hard many times. So Saturday morning when we were loading into the boats, Mr. Weatherton said let me grab these other skis they will help. I thought nothing of it till Jodi jumped in the boat and said aren’t those the skis you taught me to ski on Dad? I was all then why haven’t we been using them all along, and Jodi laughed and said its because she used those when she was 5! WHAT! I was skiing on BABY SKIS! Well I shoved my foot in there and wouldn’t you know it on the first time I got up! WHAT WHAT! And skied behind the boat for a while. I am now a believer in the Baby Ski! The rest of the weekend was much of the same of the rest of the week, boats, water, laying out in the sun, and oh yeah lots of good food! Jodi and her mom made my two favorite desserts that I love, Mrs. Weatherton’s famous Chocolate Chip Cheese Cake! And Jodi’s famous peanut butter chocolate chip cookies! Then on the drive back we picked up a little Sonic, I ordered a large drink not remembering that large at Sonic can sometimes mean enormous, but non-the-less I was happy and delighted to have my fabulous fluid! I have enjoyed my week long celebration of this great nation and I am looking forward to the next 4th of July!

Courtney Schooling Dixon on the Tubes!

She took in him out 4 out of 5 times!

Dixon and I

Shari, Jodi, Myself and Dixon at the game

Jodi, Me, and Rachael enjoying Smores and Worship

Jodi's Mad wake boarding Skills!

Jodi, Me and Tiff with Baby Skis!

Jodi and I on the Boat

Our Trusty Boat Driver!

Me Skiing!!! WHOOP!

Tiff, Jodi, Bri Anne and I on the Dock

Me and my Favorite Weatherton Desserts!

Jodi mocking my Big Sonic Drink!

The Begining of the 4th of July Party!

So lets be honest we all know I LOVE a little celebration, or to be truly honest a lot of celebration! I will take any small event and make it a reason to through a good shin dig! So 4th of July, our nations birth! Of course we should have a party! But thank the Lord it falls in the middle of the week this year which allows the party to last a tad longer than I can usually over extend it!

This year is the first time in 5 years I have not spent my fourth in the city in my usual way. The 4th is Jodi’s favorite holiday and that is because her family throws the best 4th of July party at their lake house. It has been a tradition in their family since before Jodi could walk, and thus has grown to a lot of folks and a lot of fun. So this year the party stretches from this past weekend till next.

So I headed down to Lake Anna late on Friday night to experience my first ever Weatherton 4th of July extravaganza. The team of Mom’s that had assembled were awesome, I am talking breakfast, lunch and dinner made for you and it was amazing! The Dads ran the boats and took us out tubing since the water was so choppy and there were so many boats skiing was not really an option. Tubing was a blast; I think Jodi may be a professional tuber and never told me. I did not think there could be an art to the tube, but lo and behold she proved me wrong. Watching her and her brother or friend Joel out there put any of my crossing the wake and catching an inch of air to shame.

We laid out in tubes by the dock and chatted, I may or may not have fallen asleep on the dock while I was intending just to dry off from being in the water, and became as red as a lobster on my chest. I got the meanest splinter in my life in my left foot and still carry some of it in there even now as after over an hour of “surgery” the whole thing could not be removed without putting me under general anesthesia. We also went out in the boats on the lake for the fire work show on Saturday night. The folks on the pontoon thought they had it good and we were stuck in the little ski boat, but then when theirs died in the water and we had to tow them back in, in the dark we were glad to be on the ski boat! It was humorous to watch the whole processes but Mr. Weatherton is a pro and got everyone in safely!

I included some pics below of the fun, and will post more later this week. Heading back down there Tuesday night with my friend David who is in town for the week! And some other friends, and then back the next weekend! Lots of fun and time at the Lake! WHOOP!

Bri Anne, Melissa Tiffany, Me and Jodi

Tiffany not happy to be in the tube but still truckin through!

Jodi and I getting ready to tube

The Girls on the Boat

Jodi and Joel planning and intense tubing move

Joel out!

The Wonderful Mom's that cooked for us all weekend!

Heading out to see the fire works

Hard to see but this is us towing in the pontoon, with a ski rope as we had nothing else to use!