postgrad-part two

So I am now officially a student at germanna community college.

Yay! I'm not going to lie, Germanna is not my favorite place in the world, but it is a step in my future. It is a place to learn, and a place to meet new people, and have new experiences. Those things make me very excited. I love GPS (Grace prep, where I spent middle school and high school). It is a great school. But after going there since 7th grade, I am sort of ready for a new place to study. Grace is small, and most of the people there I have known for years. I'm ready to start something new, sort of step out of my comfort zone a little. I need a little change. Although I will miss Grace, because it has been such a big part of my life, and I am so grateful that I got to attend school there.

If you had asked me 2 months ago what my postgrad plans where, I would have said that I was planning on going to germanna for a year, then transfuring to Southeastern U in Fl for the next three years of school.

If you asked me that same question today, you would get a different answer.

I would have to answer you by saying "I'm not entirely sure." Which is one of the scariest things. To not be sure of something. But thats life. We can't always know what God has in store for us. But what we can know for sure, is that there is SOMETHING He has planned. We are not here just to wander. He has a plan, and although we may not know what it is when we need to make a decision, or take a step towards the future, we can rest assured knowing that He is there, and He will be with us every step of the way. As long as we stay close to Him, through scripture, prayer, and worship, we will be able to make the decisions we need to make to live a life that is glorifying to Him. And of course we will mess up, and make mistakes. But He never leaves us.

So I'm not entirely sure what my plan is for my life right now, but I do know my goals, and I do know my next step.

Goals: Get a college degree, go to film school, get married and have kids (if thats God's plan), travel, be joyful and try new things, take chances, meet new people, help change peoples lives, and grow stronger with God.

Next Step: attend Germanna, which will help me reach a few of my goals. It's like setting the first few stepping stones to the path that leads to my goals. The path that is my life.

We can't just sit around waiting for God to tell us, or show us, what His plan is for us. Yes, He does guide, but sometimes we have to make our own decisions. Decisions based on what the Bible says, and based on our relationship with God. And yes, sometimes we do have to be patient, be still, and remember that God is God, and He is in control. But He doesn't want us to just stop, and not do anything with our life, and just wait for Him to put it all together. We have to live our life, and He will bring us the oppertunities. He will guide us along the way, as we move forward.

Even as we move forward into the unknown.

postgrad

So summer is almost over. Where has the time gone? It seems like only a few days ago I graduated.
Graduated from high school.
It was so weird. But also so much fun. I got to stand up there with some of my closest friends, and take our diplomas and look forward to our lives. It was emotional. There where lots of tears, and laughs. Our speaker was amazing, and the fact that he had been one of our teachers for two years made it even better. It was an incredible night.

Since I've moved around my whole life-thanks to being a navy brat- I usually didn't stay in one school for very long. We always moved from one place to another every 2-3 years. And what made it worse was that we always moved during Christmas break. Which meant, I was always the new kid who came to school in the middle of the year. By then, everyone had their group of friends, and knew their way around school. I hated being new in the middle of the year. But I would eventually make friends, and they would be my friends until we moved somewhere else. Then, for a few months, we would stay in touch, but eventually our friendship would be nothing more than a childhood memory.
Now, there are a few people I am still friends with, even with all the moving, but not many. My whole life was going from one place to the next. And although it was hard, and emotional, I'm still grateful for it. I've gotten to see so many places, meet so many people, have so many experiences. It's made me who I am, and I've learned a lot.
I moved here to Virginia nearly 7 years ago, thats the loongest I've ever lived in one place. So I've had the chance to build strong, long lasting relationships with people here. I love it. I've gotten to see people grow, physically, mentally, and spiritually. This is a place I can call home. So the kids I got to graduate with, I was blessed in that I hadn't just known them a few short years, like every other school I'd attended, but I had known a lot of them since middle school. We had sort of grown-up together. So embarking on that big step of being done with high school, and moving forward to whatever, was a big thing for me.

I haven't gotten to see but a few of them since summer started, which is a shame since a lot of those kids are some of my best friends, or at least, "where" some of my best friends if we aren't as close any more as we used to be. But, even if we do lose touch, I'm still so so so so so grateful for them. Those kids where a huge blessing in my life, and I will never forget them-not to sound cheesy or anything. Now with summer being almost over, we're all going to be busy with college, for those of us who are going, or work, or other things. We may drift apart, we may become super close again. Either way, I'll always love them, and be grateful for them.
Because they made me laugh-a lot. We talked about God-a lot. We cried together at times. We talked about nearly everything. We suffered through bad grades together. We had to stay up all night doing annoying projects. We had exam study sessions. We had to deal with the embarrasing moments of graduation, like walking down the isle and emotional parents, and baby pictures.
And plus, class of 2010 is the coolest year ever. :]

Fear Itself

So, I've come to realize I get afraid. A lot. Of all sorts of things. I guess this is normal, since I am a human being. Things scare us.

I've been afraid of big horrid things. Like, being eaten by a shark or burning in fire. Those fears, of course, come from movies I have watched. Same with others.

Then there are the things that are close to me. like the fear of losing a family member, or something big and upsetting happening in the family or to one of my friends.

And there are the silly fears. I'm a paranoid person. I have a wild imagination.

Example #1- when my family and I went on a cruise through Alaska, I was sure we would hit an ice burg. When we had the emergency drill the first day, I was shaking.

Example #2- We lived in Nebraska for a while. I was excited to go there, but ever since I saw the movie "Twister" on a plane as a little girl, I was terrified of tornadoes. Of course, I found out Nebraska was in the center of tornado ally...joyful. I was so sure we where gonna be cought in a huge twister, that when the small town we lived in had a monthly tornado drill, I was like a drill sargent telling my parents to hussle to the basement and to get the dog and make sure we had flashlights. I even borrowed tons of books from the local library on weather so that I was able to "detect" a tornado when it was coming.

God has a fun sense of humor. We didn't have one tornado while we lived in Nebraska. But since we have lived here in a non-tornado ally state, we have had quite a few of them. Haha.

I do have a point to this blog, I promise :]

There are a lot of things I have been afraid of, but also certain things I haven't been. Plus, as I've grown and matured, and gotten stronger in my relationship with God, I've realized I don't need to be so afraid. Of anything. God did not intend us to be fearful beings. Unless its to fear God Himself.

"For God did not give us a spirit of fear, but of power and love and self-control." -2 Tim. 1:7

obviously, it is only through God that we can achieve this. And even I still find myself having fears at times. But I am learning more and more each day to NOT be afraid. God is always in control. He has my life in His hands. No matter the outcome, no matter if its what I want or what I don't want, what I had planned or didn't have planned, its all in God's hands.

And is there any better hands than God's to have our lives in?

ummm. No. Absolutely not.

let it snow let it snow

It ahs been waaayy too long since I last blogged.
And so much has happened! Now that I have a laptop, I reallyreally need to get better at keeping track of all this.

There has been A LOT of snow lately. Which makes be seriously happy :]]]
I love snow. And although it can get annoying and old after awhile, I still like it. I think its awesome that God created something thats so beautiful when it lays on the earth, but also so much fun to play in! Like snow forts, and snow men, and snow angels, and sledding. Lovvvin it.
With all this snow, I haven't gone to school in what seems like ages. I didn't go all last week, and I didn't go this monday, and am not going tomorrow either. Honestly, I don't mind at all. I had only been back into school for 3 weeks, and I was already feeling stressed, overwhelmed, exhausted. I felt like I just had so much school work, and had to do it so well to keep up my grades, yet that I didn't have enough time to do it. I just had no motivation it seemed like. Which is aweful.
But with this mini break I have been able to relax. And I mean REALLY relax. It's been so nice.
There is one thing I don't understand though...the roads aren't very safe, and they are cancelling school so much, and there is beautiful snow outside, but I have seen so many people out driving in my neighborhood to go places. Now, I understand DC doesn't slow down. People have to go to work. But I mean, people are just going out to shop, or for fun, or whatever...and it just makes me wonder if people ever slow down? Why do we have to be in a rush all the time? I know society is pretty much a big part of it. Its just the way life is today. But why can't people just stay home for A DAY? And enjoy their famalies, neighbors, the wonderful snow God gave us to enjoy.

I used to live in Nebraska. Not for very long, only 10 months and then we moved here. But for those of you that know your geography, Nebraska is in the part of the US where they get LOTSLOTSLOTS of snow. We had a total of 20ft the winter we lived there. That was easily the longest winter of my life. But a important one nonetheless. Thats when I really learned how to trust God for everything He is.
We lived in the tiny town Nebraska City. It was in the eastern corner of the state, only 10 minutes from both Missouri, and Iowa, and then 30 minutes away from kansas. The town was so teeny, they didn't even have a wal-mart. The nearest one was in Omaha an hour away. Not cool.

Since the town was more than used to lots of snow, they where always prepaired for it. The roads would get plowed right away. But what was so neat about the town was that, if the roads didn't get plowed, it wouldn't have mattered. First, because like I said these people where used to it, so they had car gear for such weather. Second, people got all the grocery shopping they would need done earlier. And third, because the people there weren't always in a hurry. They took the time to be with those they loved, and to relax and play with their kids in the snow. Or to have nice dinners since people are always so busy to have them during the week. They would go caroling, and walk around to see the pretty snow cover the teeny tiny town. We lived in downtown, smack dab in the middle. So I was blessed and got to see all of this.

So here when I see people not stopping for anything, it just kida of took me by suprise. I understand there are things like work and important situations in which people need to go out. But I guess I just wish sometimes people would slow down, and take this crazy weather as a blessing :]

Follow You

So just last weekend, me and my girlfriends Katie, Crissie, and Jolee headed off to Liberty University for cfaw (college for a weekened). We have some friends that are students there, and wanted to visit.
One of the fun activites me and Crissie and Katie went to, was a Leeland concert :]]]]
They where with Brandon Heath and Francesca Battistelli on what they called teh "Follow You" tour.
At one point, they took some time to talk about a charity group called Food For The Hungry. They work with the poor, and those who cannot take care of themselves, and those who are hungry. It's a great organization. And they teach the word of God, which makes it even better. They are a christian based charity.
They have a lot of different ways you can help, but me and Crissie came up with this idea of sponcering a child through them. And now we're getting Katie and two other friends involved to share the sponcership and split the money. We're also going to have a jar at school for kids to donate. We're pretty excited about it :]
We're going to do things like make t-shirts to help with the money, and sell them at some school functions. Or maybe jsut simple things like bake sales.
All 5 of us just felt like its something God wanted us to do and be involved in. We have so much, and we should be giving and helping others who don't have the simple things we have.
One of the main reasons why I like this charity, is that they don't just give the people food. They don't just hand them everything. They teach them. They give them chicken coops, so the people can raise chickens, have eggs, and maybe even sell them at local markets. They give them seeds to have food gardens. They give them tractors, so they can learn how to farm. They teach them how to have hope, and how to grow, and how to be self sufficient. And they bring the love of God with them.

"To walk with churches, leaders and familiesin overcoming all forms of human povertyby living in healthy relationship with God and His creation."

I've also read a lot of passages in the Bible that talk about helping others, the needy, they poor.
I'm really excited to be a part of this, and so are my friends. Please pray that it all works out :]

you can also watch this inspiring video :] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ajIFfSaEzE

A huge Orange Moon

So today I was blessed with getting to see some very old friends. The Prays. Their oldest, a girl my age, I have known since I was 2. Which was forever ago, so we know eachother inside and out. And then there is her 4 youger brothers, one of which is my brothers close friend, and the little ones just adore him. And of course our parents are seriously close. They live about an hour and a half away from us now. It's amazing, because since we are both military families, we have both moved all over the country, and we just happened to retire near eachother. God is amazing.

So the four of us girls (me, Arianna, my mom and hers) went out shopping. It was retail therepy as we called it. It was also just such a beautiful day. We saw a wonderful sunset above the woods and a feild. And then on the way home, while it was dark, we got a little lost. But we made it an adventure:] With the windows roled down, driving on a back rode surrounded by corn feilds and a huge orange moon. And of course Celine Dion music blasting. I loved every minute of it.

It makes me think who even though life is filled with great, suprising, ginormous moments, it is also filled with small, sweet, simple moments. Both types make me happy, but in different ways. One is exciting, while the other is satisfying. Or, I guess they both can be exciting and satisfying.
I thank God for them all :]

Science

So as a senior in High School, it's a requirment to take Anatomy and Physiology for science. I was a little nervous about it. You see, I took Biology Freshmen year, which is normally a 10th grade course. I found it interesting, but I had a teacher who made is hard and did not like me at all. I had so much trouble, even though over all I did like the subject. So I was nervous this year because of how hard it had been for me years ago.
But I'm really really liking it :]
I find it so interesting. Everywhere it screams "GOD" to me. Right now we are learning about the cell...my third time, haha. It's just so amazing how it works. Every part of it has a purpose. I don't see how scientists look at this stuff and think there is no way God can exist. It doesn't make sense to me how people say "I believe in science", and not God. I don't get how this makes people turn away from the idea of a creator. For me, it does the exact opposite. It's making my belief in God stronger, and it just makes me feel more astounded by His power. How everything works together, for a certain purpose. Even the littlest things, such as a cell. Or the plasma membrane.
The class isn't easy. I have a lot of memorizing to do, and since I didn't do well the first time when it was just bio, I know it will make it a little harder for me. But I'm enjoying it, and learning so much.
It makes me excited :]