beautiful

Most mornings when I drive to work the sun is rising. It has just down gotten to where the sun is coming up and staying up until after I get home. The days are getting longer. I love it.

My drive to work however is away from the sunrise. At first I was sad because I love to see the sunrise and feel like that is the Lord telling me He loves me. Then one day I glanced in my mirrors and realized the sun was at my back. It was such a nice surprise. I know that sounds silly but it made me so happy. It’s funny how often I get surprised by glancing in my mirrors in the morning and seeing the beautiful sunrise. I think I appreciate it more. God probably knew that when he decided that I should live where I live and work where I work.

What are those little surprises in your life that the Lord so graciously grants you?

 

encouraged.

If you saw my last post, you know that I am training to run a half marathon in April. There have been days when I definitely did not want to do anything but did it anyway and it was wonderful.

At the beginning of this whole thing, after I realized that it was slightly becoming a big deal to a lot of people, I prayed that somehow God would be glorified through it.  It is just running so I wasn’t quite sure how that would happen.  He has already answered me in many ways.

On the way home from school the other day, the Lord gently revealed something to me about the many aspects of training.

• I’ve been more disciplined with this training than I have been about anything in a long time.
• I’ve been more encouraged by people and encouraged more people than I have in a long time.
• I’ve been more excited about the whole process than I have been about many things in life.

Why am I not this disciplined with my spiritual life? Why is it so easy for me to make myself get up at 5 on Thursday, go to the gym, go teach all day, come home and eat, and then go run, yet so hard for me to consistently have a reationship with my Creator and Savior? The God who provides everything for me and loves me unconditionally. Why is it so easy for me to encourage my roommate and friend miles away to run and keep training? Why do I not encourage them this way in their spiritual lives?

So many questions and thoughts swirled through my mind. It was a wonderful few minutes. I’m learning and the Lord is teaching.

 

1/2?

I’ve always dreamed that one day I would be really athletic and go do something great with that athleticism. Unfortunately my sister and brother seemed to get the star athlete genes of the family. Don’t get me wrong, I love sports and love to play them. I’m decent at what I do play but I was never the star of the show.

All that to say…I enjoy running. I’ve always thought it was nice to get away from the world and run somewhere. I was visiting my brother in Tennessee when a friend of mine told us about a marathon and 1/2 marathon in Nashville in April. At first I just thought ‘oh that would be fun,’ but the thought wouldn’t go away. I finally decided why not!? I know that some of you may think I’m nuts but I am really excited. I convinced my roommate to run it with me.

We found a schedule online and began training this week. I think Laura was more excited to make the schedule than the actual running part! We have a pretty big sunroom where we keep our bikes and extra things. We put it up on the wall (that’s what the picture is). It has been really fun so far. Hopefully the excitement will continue for 15 more weeks. And hopefully I will be good at this whole running thing.

 

Tree

I realized that I never showed you the final product in our apartment. My roommates and I decided to get up early, go to Cracker Barrell and then go buy a real Christmas tree! It was such a funny experience from picking it out to getting it home and trying to put it in the stand. Here is our beautiful tree.

 

Christmas questions?

Recently I was trying to type out the words to a certain Christmas song that I could not remember. My roommate started singing it and the words came. The funny part though, is the ridiculousness of the words in the song. I guess I have never really analyzed Christmas songs but just sang them joyfully, mostly in a very loud manner.

The song? Have a Holly Jolly Christmas

The lyrics that made us laugh? The line that says “I don’t know if there will be snow, so have a cup of cheer.”

First, let me preface this by saying that we are both country girls. But we are also both teachers and very particular about everything. We started singing and realized that we say “there’ll be snow” with our country accents. We discussed if this is a real word for about 30 minutes, laughing and making all kinds of other words up. I finally just decided to type “there will be snow” and gave up.

**It’s about 30 minutes later and we finally decided to google it and it is actually a contraction! haha

What are some words that you have said that do not sound like real words but in fact are words in our lovely English language.

 

Decor

So I know it is a little early for christmas but my roommate and I went to the dollar store today and bought some decorations. I am super excited!
This is my first Christmas not at home with my parents and not in college. I’ve never had my own place to decorate and it makes me really happy. So far we have some garland hanging and some stockings.

 

22

It is my 22nd birthday. It is a weird age. I actually do feel older.

I had tons of fun yesterday (the day before my birthday) and even today has been quite enjoyable so far.

If you don’t know…I absolutely LOVE my birthday. I make a big deal out of it every year and I think everyone should with their as well. My friends and parents made it special as they have so graciously learned to do for my sake.

Don’t worry, I will have pictures to follow.

 

9 weeks

Tomorrow will officially be 9 weeks of teaching.

I can’t believe it.

First of all, I can’t believe I’ve been at school for 9 weeks.

I can’t believe that I’ve survived the craziness of my kids.

I can’t believe that I’ve gotten up for 9 weeks and gone to school everyday…some days crying and some days really excited.

It’s been a crazy time and yet it still continues for 3 more 9 weeks.

 

Erin

My friend from college, Erin, has just arrived in Lyon, France to begin her first year of teaching.  She is an amazing girl and I know she is going to love it over there.

Check out her blog to see how it’s going for her.

www.learninginlyon.wordpress.com

 

lately

-School is getting better every week. I still have a lot to do but I’m learning how to balance it all.

-I joined a gym here in the area and won 4 free personal trainer sessions. I have had 2 so far and I love them. We’ll see if I pay to keep going with a trainer though .

-I am going to visit my brother, sister-in-law, and niece this weekend and am really excited. She got a Carolina outfit that is really cute.  That is a huge deal with my brother and his wife’s family because she comes from a long line of Tennessee Volunteers.

-This 3 day weekend was glorious. I got caught up on a lot of things that needed to be done and got to rest a lot.

-Laura and I and our friend Meghan rode in a bike ride call The Tour de LaFrance! How cool is that? …it left from an elementary school named LaFrance.  It was 13.7 miles and it was a lot of fun.  My dad came from Spartanburg and rode with us and my friend Kevin D came from Clemson. We had a big group which made it even better.  We ended up riding back to our apartment so total we rode about 19 miles. I never thought I would be able to say that I rode that much on a bike but I have!  I’m ready to ride in some more rides now.

-I know I’m a bit behind but I just got the new NeedtoBreathe cd and it’s awesome. Go check it out if you haven’t heard it. I’m ready for them to be here in October.

-I got to see my good friend Seth this weekend. He was my AP at camp my last summer and I miss him a ton. He is so full of energy and I don’t think I ever quit laughing when we were hanging out.

Laura, Meghan, and Me