Words Aren't Enough...

Words aren’t enough to describe the wonderful days John & I spent in Italy! I have posted only a few pictures here, but several more are on both myspace and facebook. I will keep this short because there is just too much to really go into, but Venice and Rome were my favorite cities. Venice is completely unique and I completely felt like I was going back in time, it was beautiful. I also learned so much, I had no idea the rich history that Venice has, it retains one of the longest records of a republic in history, from 500-1600 AD. And Rome, all roads lead to Rome and for good reason. Rome has everything, it was simply breath taking! Here are pictures.

Arrivederci!

Arrivederci! Tomorrow by the time that your alarm goes off John & I will be on our first flight to Italy! I am almost completely packed and still cannot not fathom that this trip is actually happening. It has been five years in the making, and in the saving. We have been so blessed to have both family and the church celebrate this trip with John and I through gifts. Both of which will make this trip even more wonderful.




I am most excited to experience a new country with John and spend time together celebrating the last five years of our marriage, and preparing for what God holds in our next five years of marriage! Below is a concise version of our itinerary; I will post pictures shortly after we return on the 24th of March.

• Thursday, Day 1- New York City, tour the city, the Broadway show Guys & Dolls.
• Day 2- Depart USA
• Day 3- Arrive in Venice, meet tour guide for dinner and explore Venice.
• Day 4- Venice, Pisa, Florence.
• Tuesday, Day 5- Tour Florence. Michelangelo’s David, the Duomo, Ponte Vecchio.
• Day 6- Florence, Assisi, Rome. Sun Route, Basillica of St. Francis.
• Day 7 & 8- Rome. Tour Vatican Museum and Ancient Rome, the Colosseum, Roman Forum, and Arch of Constantine.
• Day 9- Rome, Pompeii, Sorrento. Mount Vesuvius, ruins of Pompeii, and the Forum.
• Day 10- Sorrento. A day at the beach in southern Italy.
• Day 11- Naples to Depart for USA.
• Day 12- New York, USA to Dallas.

Reasons to Celebrate!

I am not going to apologize for not posting in the past three months, everyone takes a while to post at some point and I am just lagging behind.

Anyway, two huge reasons to celebrate among all of the wonderful things that have happened in the last three months…our offices at the church are finished! We moved into them last Tuesday and needless to say I had my office set up that same day. And then this Tuesday John & I were so over productive that we cleaned out and set up all of the general office supplies. It is so wonderful to be in the place that will be permanent! And I have a window; if you ever need to know what the weather is like in Dallas just give me a call.

Secondly, this past Friday (January 9th) John & I celebrated our 5th Wedding Anniversary by planning and booking our trip to ITALY!!!!!!!!!!!! We are finally going; March 13, 2009 we will spend 11 days touring throughout Italy! Sadly though we will have to fly out of JFK and the travel agencies recommended that we arrive in NYC the day before just to make sure we have plenty of time for an international flight, so we will be adding in a trip to NYC also! It’s a rough trip but we’ll make due. We have friends that were so excited we are going to NYC too that one has offered to buy us Broadway tickets and another has offered to buy us tickets for a boat tour around the city. Any other offers? Well I bet that is all the excitement you can handle for today; I don’t want to overwhelm you. I will post again soon!

These pictures are from the Youth Specialties Convention in Pittsburg back in November 2008, but I thought you would like to some type of pictures.

When It's Not Working

Well I am running low on energy and the ability to concentrate today, so I will try hard not to just ramble. I got up at 5:20am this morning to take a friend to the airport and now John and I are watching their three kids while they are out of town for a couple of days. But the kids are great; it’s the lack of sleep that is affecting my ability to focus on anything.

The pictures up are from my grandmother’s 90th Surprise Birthday Party. John & I provided the church building and the excuse for her to come see us, and all of her sons (my dad & uncles) provided the resources for the party. It was wonderful, truly a blessing to celebrate my grandmother, Fannie Lucinda with all of our family and friends. John & I were also able to make an Imovie of all of her old pictures and the whole family growing up, it was so special and fun to see our families go through the growth over time.

Here is something I have been struggling with the past couple of weeks. Four years ago now I started a Middle School Girls Bible Study that met once a week, the group was small (between 4-6 girls each week) but it was consistent. And those girls that I started with are now freshmen; they are changing the leadership of our youth group and are the closest group of girls in our youth group. This year I am continuing their study, which is now a High School Girls Bible Study, but I have also attempted to begin the next Middle School Girls Bible Study. This is where the struggle is coming in. At what point do I justly declare that the new Middle School study is not working out and disband it? It has been four weeks, the first week I had one student, the second week I had two students (but it was like pulling teeth to get them to talk, simply painful), the third week only one made it so we went and got ice cream, and this past week it was canceled because no one could make it. So where is the line in this ministry that I can easily draw, and say this is not accomplishing it’s goal time to stop, pray, and see what will provide they unity and growth for these girls. What are your thoughts?

2 Floods and Some New Names

I am finally taking the time to update my blog, let’s see since I last wrote we have under gone some major construction at the church, the church experienced its 5th flood, John experienced his 6th office flood, we had our annual parents’ meeting, we have begun searching for our Italy trip plans and much more. I will just cover some highlights.

The 5th flood of the church was an amazing one, not the most amazing but one to remember. You see the new building was just installed with a fire sprinkler system that will eventually also be added in the old building, well a pipe on the second floor was not capped off when the water was turned on. For about 45 minutes pressurized water flooded the east side of the second floor, flowing freely into the auditorium balcony which then created a waterfall in the auditorium (which would have been so beautiful had it been made purposely). The water also came through the floors of the second floor seeping into the first floor and cascading down the stairs. So much fun! I could only laugh as we hastily swept water out of the balcony and second floor, praising God that it was not my office.

Last week John was interrupted in his work by water flowing through his ceiling tiles, we had to quickly evacuate his office of anything that might get ruined, nothing was ruined but his office reeks of stale water now.

Right now, I need your help with something John and I must decide this week. We have to name the three new youth rooms for signage purposes. There are two classrooms and a gathering/hangout space in the between the two classrooms. Since the two classrooms are separated by the gathering space I have been rejected to simply call them classroom A and classroom B. So what should we name these three rooms? I don’t mind some funny answers; I expect nothing less from many of you- but a few helpful ones also. They don’t have to be themed just simple.

Cool Mountain to a Fiery Furnace

From the cool mountain air to a fiery furnace, meant literally and a little symbolically. A week ago John & I returned from our greatest week of camp with Preston Road in the last four years. Literally the temperatures were average about 50-60 degrees it was wonderful to wear jeans and fleeces in the middle of the summer. We were encouraged to take 20 students with us to camp this year; two years ago we went alone to fulfill our teaching responsibilities. Therefore taking 20 students was exciting, but numbers is not the most exciting part of course or the real evidence of God’s hand. Throughout the week our students worshipped with instruments (provided by our favorite worship team ever from Dave Drake, Edwin Guerra, and Aaron Collier), they worshipped accapella, they opened up to one another, and included everyone. The Preston Road Youth Group actually looked like a group of students seeking Christ together, this is a huge milestone for a youth group that is spread through 25 schools and has had no leadership from students until now. It was inspirational and one of the few times in four years that John and I have been able to SEE the difference in our group now. This week was our cool mountain air.

We came back to a literal fiery furnace; the temperatures this week will stay around 102 degrees every day. I am not a friend of the heat, I have always been sensitive to heat and the sun with headaches and sunburns, but after getting heat stroke and dehydration last year I do all that I can to stay out of the heat now. Symbolically, it was not exactly a fiery furnace but it felt a little similar. I had a confrontational meeting with someone that expressed to me I had let them down, hurt their feelings, and had missed opportunities to show Christ’s love to them. My reflex was to defend myself, find excuses- but I had nothing and I could defend nothing- this person was right. I had unintentionally failed to offer support, give encouragement, or show Christ’s love in the past year. It broke my heart to be told this and know there was truth in it. I cannot go back and change my lack of actions, but I seek God to forgive me, and to allow this to be a building step in my ministry. One that will encourage me to actively seek more people out boldly if needed to show them care and encouragement. I strive to not let this confrontation tear any part of God’s work in me down, or give hold to any doubt of what I am doing for Him.

Revelations 3:19-20, here He is knocking

New Orleans Mission

This past weekend John & I took our students to New Orleans to work with Operation Nehemiah, to help rebuild the city. We had a great trip, some lessons in patience and flexibility- but still a great trip that we believe has been instrumental in forming and connecting our students. Here are some pictures of our trip. I’m headed to Nashville in the morning to have a girls’ weekend with all of my old Dallas friends that have abandoned me (see blog titled “And then there was one”). I hope to fill you in more on our New Orleans trip when I get back.

Breaking open the crawfish was so gross at first.

But well worth the flavor!