i think i'm ready to talk about it...

summer is over, it was official when i sat in a room filled uncomfortable desk and listened to and elderly brittish gentleman talk about the koine greek language.

i was sad to see it go.

summer 2009 will forever be one of my favorite summers. plenty of playing, watching people i love get married, and spending time with favorites.

as i look back on the summer the memories flood my mind and bring me great joy.

however, there is one memory that brings no joy.

it only haunts me.

truly, i am haunted.

so there i was, enjoying one of these wonderful summer days at hurricane harbor with my good friend/new roommate julie. julie and i had spent the day riding rides, catching waves (artificial of course) and generally laughing our faces off. we were just about done with the day, out of the lazy river for the last time and headed to pick up our stuff and head out the door when we saw it.

it was a sight i shall not soon forget as much as i would like to.

a girl had pooped her pants.

this was no little girl, this was a teenage girl who had pooped her pants.

this is how it went down from what i could tell. (this might not be the most accurate, it's what i could gather from the scene i observed...from a far.)

said girl was playing in the wave pool, disregarding her growing discomfort in the name of fun. her group tired of the wave pool and exited. she then pooped her swimsuit bottoms. in a desperate effort to avoid further embarrassment she took of running toward the lazy river which was about 30 yards away. about half way she was busted by a hurricane harbor employee (who i'm guessing at this point was hating his life) and forced to remain less she spread her excrement further across the water park and dangering the health of other attendants.

so there she is stuck, held captive by the employee and forced to remain in the middle of the crowds, poop down her leg and in a trail behind her.

another employee quickly brought her a disinfectant spray, paper towels and a trash can with which to clean herself and dispose of properly.

to recap:

-she pooped her pants in the middle of the water park
-is now cleaning her poop off her leg in the middle of the water park

as you can imagine at this point she is pretty angry/embarrassed. embarrassed about what happened, angry at the harbor's policy to not let her run and hide.

so this is where i come in. but what do i do? this was the question at hand. what can you do in this situation to help this poor girl.

anyone?

really, are there any suggestions? there was nothing.

nothing.

absolutely nothing we could do.

we kicked around the idea of gathering other ladies to help us and hold our towels up around her but that would have just drawn more attention. also with the trail of poop she left someone would have had to stand close to it to form a solid circle.

so we walked away. we continued in our task of leaving the park in utter shock, horror and sadness of not being able to help. as we left we knew it would be an event that took time to process and sink in.

only now is what i saw real.

that evening i called a creative friend who i thought might have had a really good idea had she been in that situation. (it should be said about this friend that she was much more compassionate than i was) anyway, after some thought she spoke...

"the only thing you could have done, was gone, stood next to the girl and poop your pants."

what a delight...

i am back from my vacation to colorado with everything you hope to come back from a vacation with:

-good quality time with our Lord

-a refreshed spirit

-cool stickers

-good time with family

i had the most wonderful time, just can't say it enough. i had a wonderful time.

wonderful

i think i will just share pictures and write as it comes to me.

first i went to visit cody and he took me hiking.

i was excited about it.

the aspens were beautiful.my brother was precious

this is cody when we got to a creek with no clear crossing point. we still had a couple of hours of hiking to do that evening so we didn't want wet socks. he was trying to decide our best choice. i went first and made it dryly (thank you, thank you) then i watched him cross, all the while chanting, "fall, fall, slip, fall." i am not as precious as he is.

so then we were hiking in these woods...

we came out of the woods to find....

it was cool to make a new friend but i didn't want him to join our hike.

this is at the top of triangle pass. it took a lot of time and effort to get here but it was entirely worth it. this is cody pointing to the pass, we were tired at the end of this day.

after my time with cody i drove a few hours north to visit my other brother luke and his wife ashley. this is luke and his dog in front of his house.

one day the three of us went to downtown ft. collins. it was a beautiful downtown area.

luke bet me a dollar i couldn't sit on the second pole.

get paid!!!

luke and his wife ashley. as you can see by these pictures...we are not very good at behaving in public. we stopped at ben and jerry's for a little afternoon ice cream. and jenga...

luke is usually too cool for school so i was grateful that he was being a good sport today.

one day while i was there luke caught 7 fish in a stream by his house so we fried them up that night and it was free dinner. then we played guitar hero.

this is on the drive from their house to estes park. it was simply amazing. when we arrived in estes park we turned around in this neighborhood while looking for a parking place and found these guys.

i liked watching my brother and his new family.

then we went to rocky mountain national park and it rocked my face off.

saw this guy.i was again, excited. the best sister-in-law ever with her colorado friends.

then we saw sheep with horns...NATURE!!

overall conclusions:

-God is good, he has made a lot of beautiful things and it is only by Him that we are beautiful.

a certain person who i am enjoying the company of a lot lately was pointing out to me one day while we were in the car together that ft. worth is kind of fake. the grass next to the highway is not natural, it was planted there because they messed up the natural foundation with the many highways. this makes this person sound cynical which he is not (ish). a little cynical and a lot wonderful..anyway back to the point.

i thought a lot about what he was saying while i was enjoying the beauty of our Father's natural creation. what He makes is beautiful. He doesn't need our help. He is good all on his own.

what a wonderful thing that why we were

ugly,

sin covered,

He chose to make us beautiful.

-another conclusion:

it is good for humans to sit in front of big things God has made and remember that we are small.

we think we are important, deserving and it is simply not true.

we don't deserve anything but hell.

i wish i could really get this through my head. this is the kind of truth that if i could truly understand it gratefulness would be produced in an amount that might change the way i live.

help me Lord.

but simply, it's good for us to remember we are small.

i'm in...crested butte, colorado

and it's beautiful.

this is a view from my drive yesterday...

after church on sunday i took off and made it to amarillo where i crashed for the night. on monday i drove the rest of the way to meet my brother cody in gunnison, co. (his summer home).

last night i slept in my car at the ranch where cody works (it did not go well).

I am currently waiting for him to get off work today so we can start our hike. we are going to hike tonight, camp out and finish up the hike tomorrow. i am pretty excited about it and it's wonderful to be in the mountains and breathing fresh air. if i wasn't missing him, it would be perfect.

check back soon, i plan on taking a lot of pics on our hike.

meet daniel and laura...

last night i went to a delightful party to meet my friend laura's new fiance, daniel. daniel and laura met while serving overseas, fell in love, got engaged and now we all get to meet him.







the party was hosted by caroline and was just a treat to attend. we ate bbq outside, sipped on pink lemonade and enjoyed some homemade ice cream and brownies. it was all so delicious and it was a great time to spend with people i really love and just don't get to see as much as i would like.



caroline prayed for daniel and laura before we ate and it was such a sweet prayer. as tears came to her eyes caroline thanked the Lord for what He has done in the life of our friend and for the gift He has given her. caroline asked that we would celebrate the working of the Lord in the lives of daniel and laura.



i loved it. we should celebrate. and not just this one occasion. the Lord is good and we should be in constant celebration...or at least enjoying a lot more of it.



after the party i was thinking of a prayer gathering i went to for laura before she left for her time overseas. we prayed that the Lord would have His way in her and glorify Himself in her life. I don't think at the time we planned on Him doing it the way He did but grateful that He has nonetheless. He is just exciting like that.


so does everyone love daniel?



of course, he is wonderful. as he and laura shared their story of falling in love on foreign soil with an extra set of rules i looked around the party at those listening. they laughed at daniel when he made a joke, responded with the occasional appropriate, "ahhh" when he said sweet things about our friend and i could tell the entire party was falling in love with daniel.



the moment when i knew he loved my friend and was good enough for her came earlier that evening. while passing through the food line laura accidentally dropped a piece of sausage on the ground in the kitchen. when she told daniel he, without hesitation, bent down, picked up the sausage and ate it.



when a man does that for you, it means he is really in love.



congrats my friends. i love you and look forward to watching you become one.

too much it seems

lately life has been kind of crazy. it feels like everything happening is so heavy. events and activities are not simply happening but leaving their residue on me. that is the best way i can think to explain it.

i feel drenched in the residue of the events of my life.

this weekend i sat at a wedding of two people i dearly love and it was just one of the best weddings i have ever been to. adam crawford administered and he made sure the focus stayed on the love of Jesus Christ and what a gift marriage is and that its purpose, while it does make us happy, is not to make us happy but to glorify God by being a picture of how Christ loved the church and gave Himself for her and how the church should submit to Christ. it was wonderful and a truly worshipful wedding.

the reception was a blast, a room filled with people i love. some i hadn't seen in years, some i love but live in korea and some i had seen earlier that day but was grateful just the same for time with them.

in the same weekend i attended a funeral of a young man who chose to end his life. i watched his family walk in the church and sit down and the expressions of confusion and glimpses of anger were all too evident on their faces.

i begged the Lord to help me trust Him, to help me cling to the promises He gives and believe them in my heart and know in my head that they are true and that He is good. and He did. i sat there singing praises to my Lord and the weight of His presence seemed to find its residing place on my chest and was heavy there. amazingly enough, it did not feel the slightest bit burdensome in its heaviness, it felt the opposite.

extremely freeing.

like i could walk up to the balcony, jump off and fly home.

all the way home.

i told Him he was the only one that could do that. take this horrible tragedy and make it good, give it purpose and provide comfort. i asked Him to do that for the family. when i finished telling Him that he was the only one that could do that he responded by telling me...

He is the only one that could do that.

and that makes Him good, trustworthy and Jesus.

doing things only He could do.

i don't know how to explain it any better than this. its just been a couple of those weeks back to back where it seems like life is happening an extra amount and right in front of my face.

the fact that it is real, painful and joyful at the same time and happening at this very moment. and mostly it is happening with a purpose and my aim is to make it matter for that purpose.

for the sake of GLORY to the ONE who is WORTHY.

that's unfortunate

just for grins...

some unfortunate tattoo spelling mistakes:

this is the season that is "hott"

your "tomorrow" doesn't look bright

maybe he couldn't afford the apostrophe and the "e."

some unfortunate names for the chosen profession:

how do you heckle this guy with any cleverness because it just seems too easy

it's like free advertising



it's his name and what he does!

unfortunate sign failure:

"wait, i came here for fun?"

hope you enjoyed

i feel sick...

i am just sick over this:

as believers we are called to care for orphans.

It is a beautiful picture of what God has done for us when people who have no reason to care for a child adopt it, bring it into their home and love it unconditionally.

and it is a tragedy when in an attempt to make money a company like Warner Bros. would appeal to the fear in people.

Heather (who i don't know but whose blog i read daily) said it much better than me. please rerad what she wrote. also spread the word, don't go see the movie and pray with me about whether or not we should protest this movie at a selected theater.

it's just gross and it's one of those things that makes me cry out to the Lord and beg Him for a quick return and thank Him for His mercy but also ask for much, much more. because this is what we are without Him.

sad, greedy people.

also when believers adopt, it's quite amazing. just ask Aaron and Charity. if you think there might be any truth to this stupid movie please read their blog and see what adoption is really about.