A Weekend of Laughs and Snorts.

Well, It's Sunday night and I knew this time would come to an end.
I'm sitting tonight reflecting on the weekend and am overwhelmed at how good God is.
Hilary and I had two amazing women come and visit us. I don't even know where to start to tell you how much they mean to me and the impact that they have had on my life...and the years that have been added to my life from laughter!
It was such a great weekend of laughing, being challenged, encouraged, loved. They have amazing hearts.

Our weekend started with AJ coming in on Wednesday morning!
I took a long lunch and came and picked her up from the airport and we ended up running late for me to get back to work and so we grabbed sandwiches from the store and ate them in the back of my truck! Welcome to Texas!
Denise was gracious to let us borrow Holland's Dora the Explorer blow up bed! We had fun blowing it up...there were LOTS of laughs...and video...that will NOT be posted!
But here is a couple of pictures!
It even had a blow up headboard!
This is the "Foot Pump" approach...but I preferred the "CPR" approach! (not pictured)
Thursday night we went to the Stephen's kids program at their elementary school! It was GREAT! Connor had a solo and did AWESOME! He has a great voice. Soren didn't have a solo, (because he overacted the part!) but he was definitely entertaining still!!
It was fun! It was about Texas, Cowboys and Indians. Soren was an Indian and Connor was a Cowboy.
Christy was supposed to arrive Thursday night but missed her flight. We can laugh about it now...How can you miss a flight when you are sitting at the gate!?! Ask Mich...she'll tell you!
I LOVE her!
Here we are talking to her on the phone that night, it was an emotional night, as we all just wanted to be together. (notice the phone on the peanut butter)
We encouraged her and loved her and awaited her arrival on Friday instead.
She mentioned that as her dad came back to get her at the airport they were riding home and the song, "Leaving, on a jet plane...don't know when I'll be back again." Her and her dad looked at each other and just busted out laughing..."But I'm not on that plane!" Hilarious!
So that night AJ and I went to the airport to get her luggage!
We felt a little scandalous getting luggage that wasn't ours.
I'm sure we didn't look suspicious at all!
Hilary was in a race on Saturday night, so we went to cheer her on! She did great!
AJ and Mich (Christy, we call her Mich because her last name is Michnowski which is the coolest last name EVER!)
Our last night together we went to Z Tejas. It is a GREAT restaurant with really good food. AJ found a Rhino and pulled out her bull riding skills!
We closed the place that night! There were lots of laughing, girly talks, serious talks, and even snorts! We were talking and something happened that was really funny and I started laughing and in the middle of my laughter I let out the biggest snort in the world. It was SO funny. It was seriously the biggest snort, I felt it from deep inside and it was so long. We laughed so hard.
Luckily since we closed the place down, there weren't very many people around.
Today we went to church and then went to County Line BBQ. Again, lots of laughter.
I love getting caught up in these girls and not caring about anyone around us! Mich even got up from the table to do a demonstration of AJ "high stepping" through the tall grass when she was about to wipe out on her roller blades! It was the funniest thing!!! I love the goofiness that comes out of us when we are together!
They are precious and I feel like part of me is missing now that they are gone. As Hilary and I drove away from the airport my eyes filled with tears as my heart was already missing them. They bring joy to my life. I am so thankful for Hilary and that we are together here. As Hilary and I prayed for them and as we talked about the blessings of friendship we were drawn more and more to each other and desiring for us to not take our friendship for granted and to really be intentional with each other as friends, as roommates, and as sisters in Christ.
I'm already looking forward to our next weekend together. New York?!?!
There is something about girlfriends that's amazing. When you can come together and laugh until you pee your pants...or snort...when you can eat off of each others plates...share each others clothes...sleep in each others beds...share deep parts of your heart...cry about real things, or cry about silly things...When you can sing Christmas songs as loud as you possibly can and as obnoxiously out of tune as possible...when you can do funny walks and funny dances...and no matter what...they love you.
Hilary...AJ...Mich...Love you girls! "snort"

My Conversation with Noah

In response to a previous post about how Noah was praying for me to come and visit him on Tuesday--
I didn't make it.
I did call him though.
Here is how the conversation went:

Me: Hey Noah how are you?!
Noah: Good
Me: What are you doing?
Noah: Playing with Lily.
Me: What are you playing?
Noah: Well, we have a ball and I throw it and then we see who gets it first. Sometimes Lily just walks off.
Me: giggling Oh! Yeah, sometimes Lily just walks off doesn't she?! So, what's new? How is school?
Noah: Good.
Me: Did you do anything fun today?
Noah: No
Me: Oh...okay.
Noah: Do you want to talk to Mom?
Me: No! I called to talk to you!
Noah: Oh.
Me: So, how's life?! Are you excited for Christmas?
Noah: Yeah...hold on a second.
Me: giggling
"Noah": ROOOOOOOOOAAARRRR! ( in a big monstrous sound)
Me: Whoah! What was that!? Was that Cookie?! (see previous post on Thanksgiving and check out the picture of "Cookie". Clearly it was not Cookie!)
Noah: No! Did that scare you?
Me: Yes! It was very scary!
Noah: Hold on a second...
Me: giggling
Noah: ROOOOOOOAAAARRRRRR!
Me: AHHHH!! Stop scaring me!!!! Is that you?!
Noah: Yes! I think I scared you!
Me: Yes you scared me!
Noah: Do you want to talk to mom?
Me: Sure! I love you!

Mich and AJ!!!! Coming soon!

In just a few days AJ and Mich will arrive in Austin!!! YEAH!! I'm so excited! It will be our first visitors, aside from Hilary's parents when they brought our stuff. AJ is coming in from New York and Mich is coming in from Chicago. They are such sweet sisters and am so thankful for them. Here is a couple of pictures from several years ago when we went to Colorado for a service project. We worked on this house together....
I liked the nail gun...
This is what happened the last time the four of us got together!
There will be lots of laughter and goofiness.
There will be a lot to post about after their visit. Look forward to that in the future.
I can't wait!!! I'm so excited!!!

A Special Visit to Iowa on Tuesday?

Laura called me tonight and said that my nephew Noah has been praying the last couple of nights this prayer,
"God, I pray that Emily would come and visit me on Tuesday."
Laura was pretty sure that there wasn't anything going on, on Tuesday. I guess he thought it would just be a good day for me to come and visit him.
I don't think I'm going to make it.
How great would that be if I somehow showed up!
He will just have to settle for a phone call.
How precious is he?!?

Hawkeyes VS Longhorns

So the Hawkeyes are playing the Longhorns in the Alamo Bowl.
Iowa vs. Texas
My hometown vs. My new town.
Should be interesting.

Heart of Worship

This morning at church something happened that was amazing. A young man in a wheel chair was sitting a few seats down from me on the end of the row. I am guessing that he has cerebral palsy. We were asked to stand and worship. He of course could not stand, but sat in his chair. The music started playing and people started clapping along to the music and then we started singing. From the end of the row I heard him sing...not just sing, but shout! His condition allowed him to sing out the words, but a little slower than everyone else, and louder than everyone else!
"Glorious, over us, You shall reign Glorious!"
"There is a place we long to be, yes face to face we long to see, You Lord"
I couldn't help but to be moved so much by his passion to sing out to Jesus. My eyes filled with tears as I worshiped God and thought about the day when this man will worship Jesus in heaven with a new body, complete and perfect.
"O Praise Him, O Praise Him, He is Holy, He is Holy"
He was not waiting until that day, to wait for that new body that could sing on pitch and could sing with the tempo. He belted it out as if he was by himself in the privacy of his own home, where no one would look at him, or wonder where the noise was coming from. He didn't care. It was him and Jesus, that's all that mattered and he was going to worship in a way that was full of love and devotion. And he did! At the end of the songs, he would shout AMEN! It was so beautiful. It was such a sweet picture to me of a heart of worship. I can't imagine the daily struggles that he has, maybe even wondering and questioning God, WHY? Why did he create him like that? But it was clear that he had a trust in God that He was still good and worthy to be praised.
"Our God, You reign forever! Our hope, our strong deliverer!
You are the everlasting God! You do not faint You won't grow weary! You're the defender of the weak, You comfort those who need! You lift us up on wings like eagles!"
It seemed that the words of these songs we sang had a different feel to them, as I heard them through his voice.
It was absolutely precious. He taught me a lot this morning. I am thankful for that.

Amena Brown

I wanted to share this with y'all. If you have never heard of Amena Brown, she is a writer, poet and a spoken word artist. She has written some amazing pieces. I was just watching my Matt Redman Facedown DVD and she does a piece called "In Your Pure Light".
Here are the words...

A cry.
A cry lies within us in the depth of a place which we cannot touch.
Waiting to escape the enclosed gates of our expression.
Something is happening inside of us, beyond what we can articulate.
So we respond.
We respond to YOU.
We respond to YOU Jesus.
In YOUR pure light I have come out of the shadows of darkness.
YOU alone are the one that can satisfy.
Seeping into every vacant space inside of me.
Reality...in YOU...in me in YOU.
I try to imagine forever.
And at a certain point my brain stops. But that's YOU.
Forever being, forever existing, forever knowing...YOU.
Before there was anyone...anything...YOU and after everything there was...is no more...YOU.
My thoughts can't even fully comprehend YOU.
So whatever praise my thoughts begin...my spirit has to complete.
And every time I take a breath I discover YOU.
That the same breath that I am breathing originated inside of YOU.
So I breathe YOU in because YOU take me in.
Jesus, in YOUR pure light I have come out of the shadows of darkness.
YOU alone satisfy.
Seeping into every vacant space inside of me.
Try to imagine forever.
That's YOU.
Forever being, forever existing, forever knowing...YOU.
Before there was anyone...anything...YOU.
And after everything that was...is no more...YOU.
And every time I take in a breath...every time I take in a breath...I discover YOU.
I breathe YOU in , because YOU take me in.
We breathe YOU in, because YOU take us in.
To be still...and to breathe...that YOU...are God.

Her words are so powerful and they speak truth that resonates deeply.

I also read a clip that she wrote on her 26th birthday, where she wrote 26 things she had learned in her 26 years of life. I will share a few that I really liked...
--Take the time to be alone and take the time to be quiet
--Listen and ask good questions.
--Discover something that inspires you and don't go too long without experiencing it.
--Routine is the enemy of creativity and innovation.
--Keep a theme song for every season of life.
--Let God be God. Don't let anyone or anything take that place.
--No matter how many iPods, CD's and downloads there are...there is nothing like experiencing good live music.
--It takes selflessness and time to really love.
--Being overcomitted weighs you down.
--Intelligence is sexy.
--I don't belong in a cubicle.
--It's important to find your own sense of style and work it!
--Becoming comfortable with myself is a lifelong journey.
--Put yourself in situations where you will be stretched and pushed beyond your comfort zone.
--Great friends come in all packages...even better when their perspective is different from yours.

Just thought I would share that with you. Hope it was encouraging!

The Blog World is CRAZY!

Mike and Christine met for the first time in person and they are engaged! YEAH! See their story here!

Thanksgiving Posts....FINALLY!!!

Okay...so I 'm finally sitting down to do my "Thanksgiving Post". Every time that I have tried to do this I have gotten overwhelmed...
#1 because I took 233 photos
#2 I had a GREAT weekend and am not really sure where to start.

I will start off by saying that it was SO good to be home!! My mom and sisters picked me up from the airport and brought me home. There was a lot of goofiness in the car ride home and lots of Christmas singing. 96.5...all Christmas music...all the time, starting Thanksgiving day. So since it was 12:00am on Thanksgiving day when we were driving back from the airport we got in on the fun. I pulled out my lounge singer voice on Let it Snow...Jill pulled out her vocal instruments (for some reason she knows all of the little instrumental parts) and Mom and Laura pulled out their Spanish on Feliz Navidad. It was GREAT!
And, of course, it was wonderful to see all my precious kids!
Here is a precious picture of me and my nephews and niece.
From left to right starting on the top...Will-7; Jack 10; (bottom left)Sam 3; Lily Margaret 1; and Noah 5. They are all wonderful! It was so good to see them, they all looked big to me!

I brought the boys back geckos!!! Not real ones, although they wanted me to bring back a real one. But no way! They had to settle for stretchy fake ones. They thought it was really fun to swing them around by the tail and let them go so that they went flying through the air and got stuck on the ceiling...







It was pretty funny!

We of course had lots of food and I didn't stop eating the entire time I was home! I got a picture with my buns and pickles (that sounds kind of bad!)
See a previous post to learn of my love for buns and pickles at a young age.





















My brother - in - law Joe is usually the "Cup" guy. He is in charge of writing everyone's names on their cups. He usually comes up with creative names for all of us.






Joe usually gives me a hard time when I wear my "worn" looking jeans that have holes in them. He usually makes comments like, "Oh, no! What happened!?"
So this was my cup...


Funny isn't he!?








Here is a picture of me and my sisters, Laura and Jill



And here is my precious mom!!!
It was so good to see my family!!










Here are some more fun pictures!

We found Lily in Sam's room by herself sitting in the rocking chair reading a book! I think she might be saying, "Weee0oo", as she is rocking!

The famous "Kids Table"

A major pile-up on the couch! Notice Sam's lips are very chocolatey!

Back massages and me whistling a song! random.

Sweet Lily Margaret...she is a cheese monkey...hmmm I wonder where she got that!?!?

My bros-in-law Damon and Joe. LOVE them!
This is sweet Lucy! I LOVE her!! She is such a sweet dog! She is very nice.
Then there is Cookie. Yes, this is a dog. She is a spaz and couldn't really hold still long enough for me to take a picture! There is nothing really else to say.
Cute pic with the kiddos!
So with Lily being the only girl we have a tendency to go overly girly. So we had fun with bows!
Will posing for a picture! That smile! LOVE it!
Jack usually likes to try and tackle me to the ground...lately...he's been successful.
He is so strong!
Lily likes playing with light sabors!
Jack and I being goofy.

Lily and her precious pigtails!!!

Noah flying through the air...
Sam flying through the air...
Noah and Sam showing their muscles...strong guys!
Will likes to wear his pants high!

My Lovely...
Mom and Don...
Another cheese monkey picture...
okay so I could go on and on with pictures, but if you want to look at all of them, actually the ones that I narrowed down you can look at my web album here.