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This week I made an awesome discovery, well really Cristine made it for me, but I greatly enjoyed it. I have heard about Mac people using iChat for video chat and what not, but never really thought it was applicable to me or really thought much about it. I don’t know why I’ve been in the dark ages for so long! Its amazing. As someone who has had the odd fortune of having most of my closest friends living super far away, (i.e. Washington, Hawaii and NorCal…) this is a welcome treat!
Here’s a fun shot of some of us roommates catching up with Ms. Vo. Right before we gave her a tour of some new additions to our house and gave her her very own “leaping onto Steph’s bed from the hallway” show – a real specialty of ours.
Really looking forward to more of these in the future, so thankful for this little treat!
Even though Thanksgiving weekend is going to be over in a few hours, I still think its appropriate to take a moment to share some of the things I have been very thankful for over the past year.
1. God, His grace, and His ability to continually blow my mind.
Every time I think back on where I’ve come from, whether years or minutes ago, I am so humbled that God loves and desires me. Its crazy, but I feel as though the more I open myself up to opportunities to learn more about my Creator, the more I realize that I pretty much know nothing and I love it. I spent some time at the beginning of the year in my first Bible study class (on Romans) and was so overwhelmed by who God reveals himself to be through Christ in that book. I’ve also been fortunate to be constantly surrounded by people who challenge me to think about things I’ve never thought about before and every time I leave completely blown away by how much there is to know and learn still.
2. My parents.
Seriously. These two people love me so much I can’t even understand it. They are a clear representation of God’s blessings, no way around it.
3. My Riverside family.
I came to Riverside for college (because at the time I wanted to go to med school – ha!) and here I am, 7 years later, living with and sharing my life with people who are so perfect for me. I am surrounded by sisters, brothers, parents and armor bearers who are part of the continuous process of shaping me into the woman I was meant to be. I feel so at home here and its because of them.
4. Sandals Church
I have this Riverside family because of the church I call home. I am so blessed to be a part of this place and I can’t wait to see where God is about to take us in 6 months.
5. My Job.
Yes, we’ve had our differences.
Yes, I’ve wanted to throw in the towel.
Yes, I have cried in the parking lot on more than one occasion.
But when it comes down to it, this is where I need to be. I am not only blessed to be employed, but I am blessed to work somewhere that challenges me to do my best – and accepts nothing less. I am surrounded by people who work hard and support each other. And I am lead by people I trust.
Yes, I am thankful.
I hope you have had a good Thanksgiving, and have gotten to take a chance to BE THANKFUL.
3I thank my God every time I remember you. 4In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy 5because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, 6being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. Philippians 1:3-5
So the great part about my best friend having a blog, is that I get to keep up with her life. Downside? She’s really good about lovingly nagging me to actually use mine. (Becca also lovingly informed me that she is also quite tired of reading my Coldplay post from July) So here goes…
The nice thing about my life is that for the most part, I can go a good couple months and no major life-changing developments tend to occur. Some may call this boring (and sometimes those “some” include me) but I love it. I’m in a season of learning who I am and how I work and I’m very thankful that I have an amazing support system and nice home base for that to happen in. So here’s a quick update of things I have found entertaining over the last couple months, enjoy!
Fun times playing like real grown-ups in the pool…
Seattle with Mom, Caitlin and Doris.
Seriously, love this place.
Fun times with these ladies 
Oak Glen!
Annual cider making. And Tyler doing his best “I’m holding up a beer!” pose. His name for it, not ours…
More awesome Wednesday and Thursday nights learning to be women of God with these ladies. I am so blessed by them! Two weeks ago we sent off another D-unit alumnae before her wedding. Congrats to Stevie and Brady!
Wedding night with Kellie and our date, Mr. Titus “T-Bear” Pardee. This little guy makes my heart so happy. Thanks for letting us steal him for a dance Lindy!
Now I’m enjoying a great night watching Elf with Mom and the pups. About to go make some pies. My love for pie has grown exponentially over the last couple of years, thankfully so has my love for running or I’d be in bad shape.
And, I have discovered, so does pretty much everyone else I know. That makes me happy. I’ve always been a mediocre fan, putting them on the iPod when I want something mellow, swooning every time The Scientist comes on, you know the usual. But when Viva La Vida came out, I realized that I pretty much LOVE these guys. And knew I had to see them live. Surprisingly, every person I talked to had the same feeling, even my company’s CEO.
After a totally legit Grammy’s performance, I checked out their website. Alas! They were on tour and coming to LA! Kellie and I bought tickets to their LA show back in January or February and we finally got to go to the show last night! It was awesome. We ditched our cheap seats sometime in the beginning of the first opening band’s set (Kitty, Daisy and Lewis – really fun!) and went wandering. We found a great place to stand and watch the show and thankfully never got kicked out!
I should have taken a shot from our real seats, but just know that they were far away. And kind of high. Here’s where we relocated to:
That’s during Amadou and Mariam, the awesome second opening act that pretty much made me want to become an African back-up dancer. Seriously.
I don’t have a cool camera that takes good concert pictures, but go with me here. This is during Yellow, they released a TON of giant yellow balloons. It was fun.
Lots more awesome concert stuff happened with giant crowd singing time, Coldplay taking a trip to the back of the stadium to play a cute little set (that included a rendering of Billie Jean), and lots of dancing on the part of Kellie and I.
Then came the trek to the parking lot. Kellie and I were feeling rebellious and not wanting to walk in the long line of people. Through the grass we went. Great idea, until we got to the middle somewhere and discovered it had been watered recently – and abundantly. We attempted to run to the nearest sidewalk as we felt our feet get deeper by the second. My shoes brought back some souvenirs for me:
I’ve had quite the eventful summer so far. I love this time of year because its full of excuses to do awesome stuff. Here’s the laundry list so far.
Took a day off and went home to spend some quality time with my parents, the pups and the pool. Being in Apple Valley always feels like I’m back on summer break again, I love it. Wish the trips could be longer these days, but I guess I value them more now than when I was “stuck” up there during college.
The beautiful sunset after my dinner date with Dad.
Poolside with the pups
That same long weekend, the roommates and I spent our second year (Kellie’s first) celebrating 4th of July in San Clemente. This year Jamie and some of the family went down the night before to score us a sweet spot on the grass, both to have a nice place to relax during the day, and to have the best view of the fireworks. Except maybe the surfers who watched from the water, I may see about finding a way to be out there some year…
I enjoy this picture of Vo, and it seems appropriate to post as the rest of these pictures are hers… And because I miss her. Moving is no bueno.
We had the great idea to play football (or mostly just throw footballs at each other) on the main sidewalk, next to the busy street, with children. We are all going to make great parents some day…
Here’s our awesome view of the beach and the pier for the fireworks. Totally worth leaving Riverside at 6am… Especially because we also had prime beach property for napping.
See what I mean?
And lastly, the CASA picture. Yes, Jamie’s cousin Bricyn managed to sleep through the entire fireworks show – including the finale that had us all thinking we may have been experiencing live artillery fire…
Since this is the closest I’ll get to being a proud parent for several more years, I’m going to take this opportunity to tell you about my very own superstar!
Maximus Keen is my 2-year old Golden Retriever who lives with my parents. He’s basically theirs now, but I still like to note that I am his official owner. Since he has lived up there, my mom has gotten very into agility training with him and it is definitely paying off!
For his first ever competitiona few weeks ago, mom and Max tried their hand at Splashdog. While not actually an agility trial, it was a great opportunity to let Max do what he does best – jump after balls into the pool. Needless to say, this dog is a natural.
See, Mom and Dad love him. I refuse to comment on whether or not its more than me… Also, check out the team colors of the dog after them – classic.
Here’s the jump!
Lastly, the classic shake-off. I’m pretty sure this is the only dog event with a Splash Zone.
More to come of his agility exploits very soon!
I write this post as a survivor! My roommate Kellie, former co-worker Kerry and I recently conquered the Camp Pendleton mud run and it was quite the experience! This was my third mud run so far and I definitely feel the best about my performance this time around. Not as many crazy obstacles requiring more than my T-rex arms can handle (i.e. Volkslauf) and unlike my last failed attempt, the weather was perfect! My recent “love” for hill workouts really paid off. I’m already (kind of) looking forward to next year.
Before:
Note my very nervous face…
Unfortunately, this run didn’t have a posse of photographers focused solely on us, but you can check out some real gems of me mid-race here:
http://www.brightroom.com/view_user_event.asp?EVENTID=53896&PWD=&BIB=5530
After the mud:
And finally, after the “showers”
Be sure to catch us next year, we’ll be sure to come in costume!
Over the last couple years, I have been getting progressively more into running. Now this is a big deal considering up until halfway through college, the farthest I had ever run without a walk-break was a lap around a track – and that was a major accomplishment. I had always wanted to be a “jogger,” I liked the idea of just throwing on some shoes and running down the road.
Today I reached a new level in my running career – 6.6 miles! The run was an hour and 20 minutes without stopping and still seems unreal to me. I think my ability to let my runs get progressively longer has been coming from the crazy peace I feel when I’m out there, I crave it and want it to stick around for as long as possible. I connect with God in new ways, whether through the worship songs that come through my earbuds every now and then, seeing beautiful sights along the way, or just pushing my flesh to new levels beyond what I think is possible.
So far my favorite place to run on Saturday mornings is the orange groves area in Riverside above Victoria. It looks nothing like the Riverside I’m used to and there are lots of long, tree-lined roads to enjoy. Here is today’s route:
Driving home with Kellie last night I heard the most beautiful thing, Christmas carols on the radio! Normally I’d be totally annoyed by that but this year I’m pumped! I think its because Cristine reminded me that because Thanksgiving is so late this year, the normal time allotted for the official Holiday Season is shorter than usual. We can’t have that!
I have yet to even think about decorating or, goodness gracious, Christmas shopping, but I’m just excited for the feeling of the holidays and can’t wait for the festivities to begin!
I was quite fortunate to get to spend Friday night at home with 20-30 of some of my favorite girls. SCU had a Girls Night In and we spent the evening sharing stories, baking and eating cupcakes, and playing games. I learned all sorts of new things about friends old and new – such as the fact my own roommate has a thing for being upside down. No joke! We love her anyway
One of my favorite moments of the night though was after most of the girls had gone home and we started up a game of catchphrase that moved to the trampoline out back. Yes, 4 college graduates live in a house with a trampoline. It is awesome. And 50% of the reason why I’m so sore today. (The other 50% has to do with a heated Wii Boxing match). On the way out back the girls discovered that the sprinklers had run, and rather than grab shoes they made a “bridge.” I am so proud.
