Painting of a Rainy Night

This past week I got to have a really fun night with my friend Leigh.  We went to a place called Painting With a Twist.  Everyone in the place paints the same thing as they walk you from blank canvas to finished product.  We started off with a plate of paints, 3 brushes and a blank canvas.

The first thing we were told to do was to put a dot on the canvas and then draw the lines that would create the street, side walks, buildings and sky.

Below you can see Leigh's sky and the lines that create each part.  And my very intense face as I paint my sky.

The lady behind me is the instructor.  Secretly inside I wanted her to comment on mine. But she never did.  

We got so consumed in our painting that we missed some of the other stages... but here are both of our canvases with main buildings, street and sky.  The sidewalk and street are to look like it has been raining.

Then we painted on the skyline.  This was hard for me.  In the end I was pretty pleased with them.  Leigh's skyline follows mine.

Then we added in the street lights. And if you look close you can see our choices of treats while we painted!

This is the night that it was major rain, hail and tornado warnings.  We had to all gather in the back room at one point because there was a tornado at Love Field.  Very fitting that our picture was rainy :)

And the finished products.  It was a very fun night.  It was also fin to see all the different perspectives around the room.

Here's mine up close.  It has been sitting on my couch this week and I keep finding things really wrong with it. I just don't let things go very easily!  But a VERY FUN night and I am glad I got the chance to go.  

Thanks Nat!

Hold You!

I was thinking this week about God being Father and what a comfort it is to know that the God of the Universe is who I can run to.  That He is always there and that we can call Him Abba.  And while at staff prayer we were singing and I went to raise my hands and thought about kids when they hold up there hands and say... "hold you!" And was drawn into the fact that we can call out to God at any time and say... "hold you" and He is right there to lift us up.  What an amazing comforting gift!
Have you run to Him lately and let Him HOLD YOU?

Romans 8: 14-16
For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. So you have not received a spirit that makes you fearful slaves. Instead, you received God’s Spirit when he adopted you as his own children. Now we call him, “Abba, Father.” For his Spirit joins with our spirit to affirm that we are God’s children.

"Wasted Time?"

(This is what the pic at the top of my blog started out as!)

I love making things... but I also love things to be perfect, at least in my opinion!  At times this is great.  When I want to make sure things are lined up, spacing is right, or colors match.  Other times, this can lead to lots and lots of hours wasted trying to create something that is exactly what I want.  Now I realize that creating something takes time.  Just about everything we see that was created by someone took way more hours than we could guess.  And sometimes all those hours create something even greater than was originally sought after.  

So why am I writing about this?  It's about the internal struggle that takes place for me.  You see... when I go to create something I am not always sure when to just stop and let it be.  I want to keep going and going until I am happy with what I have.  And yet, there are times that I look up and lots of time has ticked off the clock and I feel guilty.  I feel like it has been wasted time.  And then I wonder why I chose to spend all that time on one project. The hard balance in that for me is that I LOVE doing creative things.  I love getting lost in the creation and just going and going and seeing where I end up.  Take for instance my blog design.  I like changing it, I like playing with the pictures, I like thinking about all the different options... AND THERE ARE A LOT OF OPTIONS!  In the end, it was fun.  But am I OK if I am the only one that sees it and the only one that cares.  (Now I realize I just set myself up for insecurity because many of you may look at the blog and wonder what I was thinking anyway! But that is beside the point I am making here.) And the truth is, I'm sometimes OK when I spend time just playing and creating.  And other times I think there are probably more productive things I could have been doing.  

What are the answers?  I don't know.  I know there is a balance in here somewhere of not always having to be extremely productive on things that matter and of being sure that I am not wasting my life on things that don't matter.  So... wasted time? Sometimes!  But not ALWAYS!!

What do you like to "waste time" doing?

The Miracle of Life

Angela and I have been friends for the last 8 years.  She is like a sister to me and pretty much everywhere we go people assume we are and are shocked when we tell them we aren't related by blood.
Ang and I have been through a LOT of things together... some really hard stuff and mostly amazing joy & fun filled memories. We worked side by side for many years, lived together, vacationed together, and were in community together!  So when she found out she was pregnant and made a comment about me being in the room with her...  I of course said YES!!!
So on April 20th at 8am I headed to the hospital with Ang's parents, Mom and Dad C to me.  I thought we would be in for a really long day of waiting around, entertaining each other and we wouldn't get to meet the "unknown sex" little one until way later.  But... Ang received pitocin at 7am, had her water broken, received an epidural, labored down for 30 minutes, pushed for 20 and had a baby boy at 1:15pm... can you say FAST!
So on the same day I found out that the calcification was benign, I got the wonderful privilege of watching my little nephew being brought into this world.  I had my camera with me and asked Ang and Zac what all they wanted me to take pictures of and they said... whatever, we can always delete.  So I took a FEW pics in the very short time of delivery.  Keeping them all G rated... here is Harper Samuel Ladd's birthday!

 The Mommy and Daddy waiting to meet their little one.

 Zac in amazement at his little boy!

 Harper hanging out with the doctor getting all checked out.

 The delivery team!

 Uncle "Thunder" Matt and Grandma Peggy "Maggie"!

 Grandpa C holding his first grandson!

 I just like this pic!

And here are a few more after his birthday...

Ok so maybe we played a little dress up!

It was such a privilege for me to get to be there to see life entering into the world.  And for the gift of getting a small understanding of something I might not ever get to do.  For sure it brought mixed emotions... but mostly... Amazement and joy for the miracle life really is!

Thanks Ang and Zac for letting me be a part of Harper's birthday!

Percentages

About a month ago I went in for my yearly mammogram.  My mom had breast cancer and so my doctors started me on my yearly "check-ups" about 4 years ago.  This year again they found a spot they were concerned about.  So I had to go back for a follow-up.  Mammograms are not comfortable, nor would I choose them often, but they are not as awful as some comics have described (at least for me.)

Any way... I digress :)

After my follow-up they determined that they needed to do a biopsy to determine if the mass they were seeing was cancer or not.  As I processed going through this procedure again, and knowing that there was a chance it was cancer, I came to an interesting truth.  When the doctor was telling me what she had seen and why she needed to go in to check on it, she told me that 15% of the time calcifications are caused by cancer cells.  I started pondering this percentage and realized something.  If cancer is part of my story... then there is a 100% chance this calcification is cancer. If cancer is not part of my story... then there's a 0% chance it is.  It all came back to trusting God with the story He has written for my life.  So often I want to get caught up in fear, what-ifs and really start worrying before I even know what the story is.  And so, as I went in for the biopsy, I was at peace, knowing that God was in control and sovereign over any result I would receive.

The doctor had warned me when she told me she wanted to do the biopsy that there was a very SMALL percentage chance that she would be able to get to it.  The mass is located way back by my rib cage and she just wasn't sure.  The day before the biopsy I sent out a prayer request asking people to pray for three things... 1) that I would trust God no matter which side of the percentages the results fell on 2) that the needle biopsy would work 3) that God would be glorified in the process!

The day of the procedure I walked into the room and the technician was anything but encouraging.  She told me that it was very unlikely that they would be able to get to the mass because of where it is located.  Everything in their demeanor told me that this was probably going to be painful, long and futile!  I even asked, "If this is so unlikely to work, why am I going to pay so much money for it.  Should we just go another route?" To which she explained, if it doesn't work, you don't pay.  And I was slightly comforted!

After the 2nd attempt (I'll save you all the crazy details) to get a picture that would tell them exactly where it was ... they told me to hold still because they had gotten everything in the right place for the procedure.  And you could hear the shock in their voices.  I was able to tell them that lots of people were praying that they would be able to get what they needed.  So thankful that once again... God was not bound by percentages.

The next day I received a call that the mass was benign.  

We Are NOT Alone!

Have you ever felt alone?  Like God had forgotten about you? Like He was missing what was going on around you or TO you? Like He was far away? Maybe even abandoned or forgotten?
This morning I was reading in Psalm 22 and was caught by how much the text sounded like words that Christ spoke during His crucifixion.

David... Psalm 22:1...
My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?
 Why are you so far away when I groan for help?


Christ... Mark 15:34...
Then at three o’clock Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Eloi, Eloi, lema sabachthani?” which means “My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?”

Yet it appears as though David is feeling these same feelings in Psalm 22.  So I decided to jump onto soniclight.com to check out Dr. Constable's notes on Psalm 22. I loved this quote from James May in regard to the correlation of the two verses...

'He (Jesus) joins the multitudinous company of the afflicted and becomes one with them in their suffering.'

I just love this.  Jesus "quotes" David and this picture of Him saying... I know, I get it, I am feeling the things that you feel and will feel, people of this world.

What a sweet and precious picture and gift. Our Savior, the one that died in our place, paid our penalty, chose death to redeem us... He gets us, He understand us... We are NOT alone.
I need this reminder a lot of times.  When I am in the midst of questions of why, or when will this end, or do I really have to walk this road... I am comforted by this truth in Hebrews 4:14-16...

So then, since we have a great High Priest who has entered heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe. This High Priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for he faced all of the same testings we do, yet he did not sin. So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.


And I was also reminded that the disciples, on "this weekend" that we celebrate this gift of having a High Priest that knows, they were in the midst of grief this day.  Wondering what happened to the one they loved and followed.  Believing that it was all over.  Believing they had been abandoned and forgotten.
I pray that when we feel like... David, Jesus and the disciples... like it's all over, like it's TOO MUCH, that we will trust Him to give us mercy and grace to endure so that He will be glorified. That we will say.... "Not my will but yours be done!" (Luke 22:42)

Warrior Dash 2011 COMPLETE... with a small confession...

Remember when I told y'all that I had given into "peep pressure" and signed up for the Warrior Dash?
Well the day arrived last Saturday to torture myself and know there was a great possibility I might not come out alive.  Ok, maybe that is a little over exaggerating, but I was nervous.
17 of us sign up to participate and we lost 4 to varying things so 13 of us end up dashing!
Here is the play by play...

Our crew all geared up and ready to go... it was pretty cool when we all got there,

 but turned out to be the perfect sunny cool weather!

Rode bus to race site and picked up our packets... Robbi and I are getting excited!!!

Putting on our numbers...

Another warrior pose before we start...

Jordan, Penick, and Robbi dancin' in line... too much energy...

So Robbi shared some of her energy with Paula...

And of course we do some stretching!!!

First up... walk through a muddy river... a little CHILLY...

Then over some cars...

And through some tires...

Then over and under...

Climb up a wall...

Walk a balance beam bridge...

Get tangled in a spider web...

Under a really low tent area... knees a little scraped up...

Over a cargo net bride...

Up and over some hay bails...

Up a cargo net...

Through a muddy river... beware of losing your shoes...

Over some logs...

Run through fire...

See Watermark peeps... and get the crowd fired up..

Crawl under barbed wire and through the mud pit...

Muddy Warrior Pose...

Mom and Dad came to support and take pictures... but wouldn't hug me at the end :)

And then off for a GREAT post-race meal at Babe's!  Can you say fried chicken and mashed potatoes!!!

Love doing this race with peeps I work with and our "extended family".  

And for my small confession... when we hit the hay bails and I new we were almost done... 

I was...

SAD IT WAS OVER!!!

It was such a blast.  So fun.  So thankful for the faster. stronger ones that were willing to hang back and experience it as a team.  No one had to drag me or carry me!

And maybe just maybe... Warrior Dash 2012 is already on the calendar!!!