a ketchup blog. or catch-up. same same, right?
Wow, it's been a while since I've posted anything on here! (Apparently October is slacker-month for me in the blog-writing category!) It's not that I haven't had a lot of time to write, it's just that I have had a hard time coming up with the words to say. I've also been doing a lot of "just chilling out" at my apartment, and while I'm enjoying it, there's hardly been anything blog-worthy coming out of that. So instead of trying to come up with some super-spiritual blog about all the things I'm learning, I'm just going to give a brief run-down of my last few weeks (since moving down to Georgia) since they've been pretty jam-packed.
1: The Awakening conference (happened at the AIM base). Worship with Jonathan & Melissa Helser and their crew, great teaching by Michael Hindes and Anthony Chapman, fellowship and bonding with other WR staff and alumni, and all kinds of goodness. Loved it, and love this community that I get to be a part of.
2: Wicked. ohmygoodness I love that show. And so when a new friend who was visiting invited me to go along, of course I said yes. And when she told me she'd buy me a ticket I said "no way, jose!" (but she insisted, so I gave in. I mean, who doesn't want to go see a broadway show for free?!) Went with two of my roommates, my India team leader, and a few (new to me) other friends. And loved it. And have maybe been listening to the soundtrack for the last 4 weeks straight (I was getting laughed at during training camp this last week because I could tell you which song was which track on the CD and could sing most of the words…maybe I'm obsessed?)
3: Atlanta half-marathon. NO, I didn't run it (though I am planning on running one sometime before we move to India.) But my roommate and a whole group of people from AIM did run, so I headed down there to cheer them on and such! So much fun. Even if it was FREEZING cold!
(picture is of all the runners in the atlanta half from the AIM community)
4: Michigan. "Wait, didn't you just move to Georgia?" you say. Well, yes. But I had already made plans to head up to Michigan for a little while for some family stuff (which I'll get to in a minute), so I took a nice little two-day, fourteen-hour total drive. Stopped in Cincinnati on the way up with my team leader (and got to meet portions of her family), then stopped in Ft. Wayne for lunch the next day by my sister's place (brother-in-law was working…silly kid!). Hung out with my family for a week, drove around to look at pretty fall colors, drove out to Lake Michigan to watch the huge waves roll in, and stuffed & sent out 120 support letters. Whew, I'm exhausted just typing that!
(waves hitting the pier. holland, michigan.)
(muskegon river. somewhere a little south of big rapids, michigan.)
5: Grand Rapids Marathon. My brother Tim ran his first sanctioned race EVER, and just happened to pick a marathon for that honor. I think he's crazy, but it's maybe kind-of my fault he started training in the first place. See, one day last spring (shortly after I came home from the middle east) we were talking about the marathon, and I said "I bet we could do that." Then I quit training at the end of June because I was hurting really badly (and because I came down to GA for training camp and didn't really have anywhere/time to run). But he kept going. And ran his first marathon in 4:37:17. I'm impressed.
(almost finished!)
6: Lisa's wedding shower. My sister is getting married in January, and one of my aunts was going to be in town for a weekend and really wanted to have the shower then so she could come. It happened to be the same weekend as Tim's marathon, which worked great for me! So we sat around & talked, played games, and I tried to contain my jealousy as she unwrapped gift after gift of cute things for the home. Seriously, if I don't get married sometime in the next 20 years, I'm going to just create a registry for myself and throw myself a party so I can get fun things!
7: Last, but certainly not least, I drove back from Michigan and went straight into helping with training camp for the January 2012 World Race. (actually "raceS" since there are 3 squads leaving then). C, D, and E squads. Man, that makes me feel old, knowing I was on the "first-generation" D squad…and now they're all the way back around to it already! Had a lot of fun cooking massive amounts of food (and got to make special treats like brownies one afternoon to bless the racers), got in some great times of worship with Jonathan David Helser, and got to sit in on a couple sessions and take part in ministry afterwards.
So there you have it. That's been my life the past 5 weeks – crazy how fast time is flying! Our whole team will be living in Gainesville as of Thursday night, and we start training/working in the office on Monday the 31st! Please keep us all in your prayers as we set out on this new adventure, as we continue to raise up support systems (prayer & financial!), and as we get to know each-other as a team! Thanks.
