An extra hour!!!

So...this morning is daylight savings time! Probably one of everyone's very favorite days of the whole year! It feels like you're cheating the system or something...you get an extra hour. Just for free. Where does it really come from? I don't know but I love it. I feel like I need to take advantage of it but where to start?? I think about that list of "to do's" I have...all those things that aren't urgent but you want to do and you write them down so if you ever just have some time laying around, you can do one or two of them...(or maybe this is just me!) But i DO have a list like that (I LOVE LISTS!!)...and I find myself this morning wondering what I want to cross off! I started thinking...if I had a free extra hour everyday, what would I do with it? What would you do with it??

Here's a few of my thoughts.

With a FREE, EXTRA HOUR everyday....i would....

- Meet a friend for coffee...pumpkin spice latte anyone!??! and Christmas cups at Starbucks! Oh its the most wonderful time of the year!

- Read a new book: a few on my list...finishing "Chasing the Dragon", Jane Austen ANYTHING, Cutting for Stone, The Glass Castle, Shelter Me, The Normal Christian Life, Irresistible Revolution

- Read the past 2 Real Simple Magazines that are still sitting next to my coffee maker!

- Write a letter. I love writing letters to people. Who doesn't love getting letters!?!

- Take a long, hot bath. With bubbles. And a book.

- Simply linger...slow down...notice more

- Wander around Border's--that place can suck you in!

- Go get my hair cut (anyone who knows me knows this is my very favorite guilty pleasure!)

- Go get my car washed- inside and out (my second favorite guilty pleasure)

- Watch my DVR-ed shows! (top 5: Greys, Parenthood, Modern Family, Top Chef, and Oprah!)

- Bake some banana bread or pumpkin muffins ('tis the season!)

- Call an out of town friend or 2

- Go on a long run

- Go on a long drive...windows down, heat blasting

- Listen to a good podcast: a few of my favs...Donald Miller, 2 Rivers church, John Piper

- Update my blog! ha!

- Drink coffee --flavored with my new fav. coffeemate flavor: Sugar and Spice! You totally need to check it out!!-- in the kitchen with my mom while watching the TODAY show!

Looks like for this year, the last 2 win out! I feel good about that. But if only I had an extra hour everyday...if only...!

What's been goin on...

Sorry to all my loyal bloggees...i have fallen behind!! I wanted to take a minute and just catch you up on "What's been goin on" lately...so here are a few of the highlights!!!

It's certainly been a FULL fall! Abundant, rich, and full of life and laughter! Complete with...

-A first annual "Harvest Party" at the Neely's (one of my favorite families in the world!) that consisted of good friends, hot dogs, candy corn mix, smores, a back yard fire, and great friends. (Picture below) I hope this tradition continues!

- Bill Haslam winning the governor's race. I know no more upstanding man and no more respectable family than the Haslam's. I have known them for the past 8 years (since little Leigh was the first girl I met--and hugged!--at the Webb School! ha!) and I would consider them my second family. There is no one I would trust more to lead my state. I am thankful for GOOD people who are willing to serve us in public office!

-And a whole lot of small life giving things: meals with dear friends, going back to leadership for the first time since I've gone off staff, going back to club for the first time as well, my small group, football saturdays, new soup recipes!, celebrating birthdays, Halloween, and a few hours of studying mixed in there! =) I am grateful. So so very grateful.

And finally...introducing my new friends! These are the girls that get me through long days, exhausting tests, overwhelming study guides, and hours and hours of studying. I came into school hoping to find a friend or 2 like me, I feel so lucky to have found a whole group of them who I seriously LOVE spending time with. They're awesome! Here we are right before thanksgiving...we had a potluck dinner of all our favorite fall foods complete with soup, cornbread, and delicious pumpkin desserts! Then we carved pumpkins!

These are 2 of my very favs: Jamie and Jen. We were scoopin out the guts like crrazy. Thats totally the best part!

And here's the whole group! From left to right: Kelsey, me, Jamie, Jen, Stephanie, Chelsey, Talley (Amanda completes our circle of 8 but was out of town. I'll have to do a personal head shot of her sometime!)

Thanks for reading... Here's to the fall!

Every Day...

"Teach me to number my days, that I may present to you a heart of wisdom" -Psalm 90:12

"Our days are numbered...the legacy we leave is...the quality of our lives." -Billy Graham

"What you do EVERY DAY matters more than what you do every once in a while..."

I have been thinking a lot about a day. The power it holds. The promise it holds. Every morning on his radio show that accompanies me to school, Hallerin Hill starts his broadcast saying, "Today is a new day. This day has never been lived before...what will you do with it?" And its true...that is question...every single day that I get to open my eyes and do another day, it is new. It has never been lived before. What will that matter? I want it to matter. Every day. I am finding that my "goal-oriented", "future oriented" self needs to take a back seat and live every day. It continues with my theme of simplicity, of gratitude, of back to the basics that God has been bringing me back to.

I want to notice more in days. I want to "leave it all on the field" EVERY day. Not just on "big" days. I want to really LIVE every single day. Whatever that might mean for that day. I want to FIND the meaning. I want to passionately be present in moments...grateful for each opportunity. Whether eating with a friend, listening to a lecture, writing an email, driving to a destination. I want to BE THERE. FULLY. ENGAGED. And live it.

I love the quote I wrote above about how what you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while. It makes sense, but I live so differently than that. I think the "once in a while, big things" are always more important. But really, when you add up all the "normal" days they stack higher by a landslide! So, i want to think about my "everydays" , my routines, my comings and goings, my commitments, etc... and I want my every days, my "littles" to matter. I want them to stack up to something that Billy Graham speaks of when he said that our legacy is the QUALITY of the life we led. I want to leave something of great quality.

Here's to praying I would learn to number my days...

And that they would be good to the last drop!

Week 2

So...a great weekend and then...slammed in the face with week 2 of school. It got hard. Really hard. The work is hard. The material is hard. The hours are hard. The self-discipline is hard. The loneliness is hard. The sacrifice is hard. But it is good. It is right. It is worth it.

I really love school. I really do. I love the material we are learning. I love what it is preparing me to do. I love the people I am with there. But if I am honest, I really miss my life. I really miss my friends. I have not figured out how to balance life with school and 2 weeks in, that is already hard. Uh oh! For someone who is so founded on relationships and who loves being with people and has spent the past however many years pursuing people, it is really hard to not even have time to return text messages. Sometimes I wonder if I am going to come out of this with my only friend being the Lord because He seems to be the only person I have time to talk to consistently--and that's just because he lives IN me for gosh sakes! ha!

Currently, I have 2 thoughts on this predicament...

1. I want to try to start allowing myself to still live a little bit. Sounds ridiculous doesn't it? But I literally don't have time to do that when I look at all that I have to do every day...however, the way I figure it....I literally don't have time NOT to. Or I might go insane.

2. I also want to remember that this is part of my sacrifice right now. It is costly to follow the Lord. I am just not used to it being costly relationally. But I want to trust in his word that says things like "My God shall supply ALL your needs according to His glorious riches in Christ Jesus." There are so many verses about working hard for the Lord-- Ecclesiastes 9:10, Colossians 3:23-24, 1 Corinthians 9:24-27. I want to work hard for HIM. That his purposes might endure in me.

So, as I do walk through this time, please don't give up on me. I need you all. Keep calling me. Keep texting me. Stop by and say hey if I ignore your calls =) I am really trying to learn how to do my new life...bear with me. I'm doing the best I know how...

I read this the other morning and it reminded me it is truly all about perspective:

"Both the child and the cynic walk through the valley of the shadow of death. The cynic focuses on the darkness; the child focuses on the shepherd."

And the shepherd is good. Very good. He knows where he's going...I'm with him.

The Lord is my shepherd....I have all that I need.

A Great Life...A Great Weekend

"Taste and see that the Lord is good!" - Psalm 34:8

Michelle's fall break was last weekend so she and her friends, Effy and Lauren, came in for a few days. We had the greatest time! Laying around, eating chili, taking them to see Knoxville, grilling out, playing cards, laughing and just being together. Clifford came in for the weekend and it was the first time our whole family has been together in a while. Mom and I both had a moment of tears of joy in the kitchen (I would like to chalk some of that up to my exhaustion from school! so as to not sound totally unstable!) But it was such a sweet weekend. Nice to walk in to a house full of hustle and bustle...the smell of good food, the sound of laughter and the feel of deep love. I love my family. I have a great life. =)

What about you? What things recently have made you pause and think...I have a great life? It might be fun if people "commented" with those...always encouraging to hear the little things that are reminding us of the goodness of God.

Week 1...

This is me on the first day of school =) I cannot count how many of these pictures from childhood we have over the years! Crazy to be taking a "first day" picture again!

Meant to have my backpack on and my lunchbox in my hand...oh well!

So...here's the good news...I survived the first week!

How was it? People keep asking.

And I keep saying I'm not sure the adjective to pick.

Wonderful...energizing...exhausting...terrifying...hard as crap...confirming...overwhelming.

It's been a lot of things. But the best word I have found is "tension."

Tension: the act of being stretched or strained, discomfort

I have found myself feeling a lot of tension between all kinds of things:

Tension of my new life: For example, the Young Life banquet was on Tuesday. So was a "Welcome Dinner" for our PA class from the older class at Bearden Banquet Hall. I knew that's where I should be. Even though every part of me wanted to be at the YL Banquet. But it's time to start choosing my "new world" right now...that's hard sometimes.

Tension with new relationships: I really really love the people in my program. Esp. a group of about 8 girls who I feel like I have known alot longer than I have! (Probably because we spend every waking second together it seems!) We sit together, stress together, laugh together, and even have formed a study group. I really love spending time with them. But I also have all my "people" that I had before...all of YOU. My friends, my family, my encouragers, the ones who have travelled with me and gone the distance. I feel like I live in 2 worlds relationally right now and that creates some pull.

Tension with time: Well I have none. Seriously. None. Ha! But the few windows I do have, it is so hard to know how to best use them. Take a nap? Run a few overdue errands? Clean my room for the love!??! Spend time with people I've had to neglect? And at that...Who?? Write a letter? Read a book? Study some more? Go on a walk? Lay on the couch and watch Oprah?!?! I am really praying to know how to be a good manager of my time. To know what the best and wise thing is to do each day. I literally need the Lord directing my steps at all times. He has certainly been gracious.

So, there's a few of the highlights of where I am feeling the tension. I feel stretched and strained. But I think that's good. I'm having to trust. I'm having to be dependent and find my rest in the Lord. One of the definitions of tension is "discomfort" and I would say it is by no coincidence that I find myself here... I know that one of my biggest "idols" is comfort...wanting everything to be safe. controlled. comfortable. feel good. It tends to be my chief aim in life. To stay in the comfortable. Well...so much for that! I think God is totally stripping me of that little issue...that's good for me.

Yesterday I was reading about Jesus feeding the 5,000 and I have found that to be a good prayer...that God would take my measley bread and fish...what little I have to offer to Him and to those around me right now and multiply it. Multiply me. my time. my energy. my efforts. my joy. my dependence. my gratitude. He's done it before...he can do it again! And in the mean time...may I be grateful for the tension and let the stretching and straining grow me to be more like Christ.

One week down...9 to go! (in this quarter!)

Happy Sabbath.

Last week of Freedom!

Peeps! Sorry for my tardiness in posting! It has been a whirlwind since I started school on Monday! I am going to be better about being consistent on here...promise! Bear with me for a few weeks til I figure out life! Ha! So, what's been up the past 2 weeks?!?! Let me tell ya...

For my last week of "freedom" before school started, my parents, myself, and my 2nd little sister, Meghan, headed to Hilton Head (maybe my favorite place on earth). It was one of my favorite weeks all year! We biked, kayaked, layed out, read, took walks, drank pina coladas, ate great food, saw a great movie, played cards, laughed ALOT and lived it up for our last week of "summer!" I was so thankful for that trip then, and even more thankful now after my first week of school. I am telling you, people, it was a rude awakening to go from this... to a class room 8 hours a day! ha! Anyways...here are a few of my favorite pics from the week:

Here was my view a week ago... literally 5 minutes after arriving on the island!

From our porch...every morning. Wow.

Talk about the Heavens declaring the glory of God!

This was my Psalm for the week...

Psalm 24: 1-2 "The earth is the Lord's and everything in it, the world and all who live in it; For he founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters."

Appropriate? I'd say!

At our favorite restaurant rooftop for dinner...Santa Fe! 2 of my favorite girls in the world...

Mom and I in front of our yacht! (One day...!)

The "fam" before our kayaking trip...and yes, we got within 3 feet of 2 dolphin! It was AMAZING!

How cute are they?!?!

It was a great week! Always hard to come home!