June 14

June 14 was my 23 birthday. Wow! I'm starting to get really old. Blake came to visit me for the week! He took me to lunch at this really cool cafe in downtown Georgetown called Wild Fire. My family also had a little dinner party for me. Here are some fun pictures...




I had such an amazing week! Blake and I had a lot of fun exploring Austin together. We found an awesome sushi restaurant downtown, went to Amy's icecream, saw Ocean's 13, shopped at the Domain (an outdoor mall), saw the bats under the Congress bridge, shopped at the outlet mall, and had some really fun times hanging out with my family. I am so blessed!

It's not about ME?

Taking care of other people will teach you that it's not about you quicker than anything. Sometimes I get bummed cause I feel like people just don't understand how important I am. Gosh, I mean, don't they get it...

Apparently they already know what I have yet to learn...and that it is not about ME.

Living at home over the last couple weeks has taught me some very important lessons. I have never felt unappreciated. Just sometimes I feel like the "events" in my life get pushed to the back burner. When I realize how selfish I am I get so mad! Dealing with cancer is bigger than anthing going on in my life right now. I know that... but it's still so easy to get hung up on myself.

I'm realizing what a huge lesson this is to learn. It's so foundational to serving in minstry within the church. Praise God that He is rooting out a lot of the hindrances I have to serving Him.

Romans 10:10

"For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved."

As I think about grace and faith - so much does not make sense about these foundational elements of our faith. They are entirely invisable. UNTIL I believe they are truth because God said so and walk in grace and faith, they will remain invisable. The - walking in it - is when it becomes "real."

Believing the truth is walking in it. Because I have not allowed myself to walk in it, I have limited its power in my life. When I step out on the limb of believing something I do not understand, it takes on its full power and authority in my life.

This all seems rather juvenile, but I'm glad I am coming to terms with it now. I am learning to embrace the full mysticism of the faith. And it feels pretty scary, but pretty radical at the same time. It's what the Christian faith is all about: believing BEYOND yourself. Besides, who wants God to fit in their own finite mind anyway.

KINSEY

As many of you know, I have a 16 year old sister named Kinsey. She is really fun and pretty hot. Anyway, went to the salon (is that what we call it nowadays?) to get her hair cut. She was sitting in the chair with the drape on and she whispers to me, "i feel like a volcano." Okay so i thought it was pretty hilarious. Here are her volcano pictures. She is going to kill me for this:










Anyway, here is the finished product. This is the drive through for McDonalds - that's why our dog Mini is a little preoccupied.

My summer dwelling

I really don't have it bad off here in Texas. In fact, I like having my own room again... (not to say I don't incredibly miss all my roomates KATIE, COLLEEN, and most recently LAUREN BEST.) So here are some pics of my room. I got to pick out a new bed when I moved into the house. For some reason, black in the color I picked. I like it though.


I also got a new bookshelf from IKEA. I couldn't fit all my books on it. But, that's ok. It still looks cool.

I hope you all have strong stomachs...

I've been getting out to see the town more. We live in Georgetown, a small town about 20 minutes outside Austin. The town square is a really cute, quaint place with boutique's, antique shops, and small restaurants. I also got to drive around downtown Austin a few days ago. I'm looking forward to going to some of the live music venue's. Austin is the Live Music Capital of the nation right now.

So the other day I went to a spa with my mom. (Thank you Nana for the pamper money!!) She wanted a little relaxation outside of the house. I accompanied her and decided to get a manicure. Why not? But, when I got there, I realized they offered this amazing thing:
Aqua Detox Foot Spa.
"The revolutionary way to detoxify, re-balance and re-energize your body." For those of you who have past experience with my "other detox methods" this is nothing like that! So you soak your feet in nice warm salt water while electromagnetic pulses pull all the impurities out of your body through the 2000 pores in each soul of your foot! Incredible and painless...

I'm sure you can imagine the water changes colors...
yellow - kidneys
orange - joints
green- gall bladder
black - liver
cheesy chunks - yeast
black flecks - hard metals

Okay...so here is a picture of my water after the 30 minute treatment... I went from yellow to black. I guess my insides were that dirty! I will be doing this again...