Easy Fall Dinner

I had a craving for tomato soup a few weeks ago. I thought about opening a can and spicing it up a bit. But there were plenty of fresh juicy tomatoes overflowing from the garden.

I decided I would try to make some homemade cream of tomato soup. I loosely used this recipe from thepioneerwoman. http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/02/sherried_tomato_soup/

Except I skipped the sherry and I used all fresh tomatoes. It was divine. I can't wait to make it again.

Although the soup would have been plenty hearty enough by itself, I decided to make thepioneerwoman's olive cheese bread to go along with it. I have been dying to try this recipe since oh forever, or at least since her cookbook came out. I suggest you make this ASAP. You will not regret making this recipe. You may however regret eating half a loaf yourself. Here's the recipe. http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/06/olive_cheese_br/

Demurely Hardcore

It was two years ago that I visited Madrid, Spain on a mission trip.

Madrid made me fall in love with its busy streets and the broken city stole my heart.

The dirty streets, the bright nightlife, the high-heeled prostitutes, the lovely siestas, the homeless....

.....the memories will never escape.

Near the end of our trip, I decided to get my ear pierced.

I can't quite explain why I got the idea, I just thought of it and for once in my life, acted on impulse.

I wanted my piercing to be a reminder of Madrid, the memories to be relived, and to be a call to prayer. A reminder to pray for the homeless, the young girls caught up in the sex trade industry, and the missionaries showing Jesus's love to the sinful city.

I must admit, I do not pray for Madrid as much as I should. I am glad to have a reminder pierced through my skin, because it does help me not to forget.

Just a couple weeks ago, I was at a concert where the illegal sex trade and red light districts were mentioned. My fingers fiddled with the metal bar as I closed my eyes and walked right down the red light district in my mind.

Needless to say my piercing is attached to my heartstrings. Not only does it mean so much to me, but it is a great conversation starter. Not many people get to say they got pierced in another country and have a real story behind it. I get to share how amazing Madrid is and why I want to remember to pray for the city.

So my co-worker said the other night, "Sarah, I thought you were hardcore when I saw your piercing. As I've gotten to actually know you, I've realized that's not the case at all. You're actually very demure."

I just kinda chuckled and said that I was indeed hardcore. A weak attempt to protect my lack of hardcore.

But in all honestly, I am both hardcore and demure.

I am hardcore when it comes to the things I love and that I am madly passionate about.

I am demure. I am modest and I am reserved when need be. It's an active choice of maturity I believe.

Therefore, I am demurely hardcore.

p.s. That is me and Jess being hardcore and standing next to an AWESOME car in Madrid.

I never met my grandparents. Not a single one of the 4 of them.
It's something that breaks my heart quite frequently.
I feel I know them from the stories I've been told, from the things they made that I can hold in my hands.

I wish I could have sat on the porch with them and heard them tell stories I've never heard.
I would have loved to have sit by my grandmothers' sides as they canned or quilted or spun or wove.
I would have loved to seen my Grandpa McConnell laying brick with precision and skill, and to see him creating instruments by hand.
I would have loved to have heard all the war and bootlegging stories from my other grandpa.

In all honestly I would love to have any memory with them, but alas I do not.
What I do have are scraps of them, scraps of who they were and what they did.
I have pictures. I have quilt pieces. I have a banjo. I have so many little scraps.

I feel it in my heart to take these scraps, that have been scattered near and far, that have been abused and ignored, and to piece them into the complete story of their legacy.

I want to be able to tell my kids and their kids about who my grandparents were. I may not have memories to share with them, but I will be able to share those scraps pieced together into a beautiful legacy that will last for generations to come.

25 Random Facts About Me- Part 1

1. I'm crazy passionate about the things I love
2. Every time I sit and observe nature, I fall more in love with our Creator.
3. I have a fondness for mountains that is unexplainable.
4. Every day I learn more and more why my parents are my heroes.
5. I usually feel inadequate.
6. I dream of being a chef one day. (I've already designed my whole restaurant concept)
7. Family is my lifeblood.
8. I wonder if my grandparents would be happy with my obsession of their heritage or if they'd tell me to quit dreaming of a past I never knew.
9. The older I get the less I listen to "popular music" and the more I appreciate the true artists.
10. I'm the biggest romantic you'll ever meet that hasn't been in love.
11. I love to observe human interactions.
12. I have the memory of an 80 year old on the verge of getting Alzheimer's.
13. I can't wait to be a mom someday.
14. Cooking is pure bliss. I wish I had the time and money to whip something new up each day.
15. Patience is one of my best qualities.
16. I'm a fan of mixed cds. Every now and again I'll find some old ones and they will transport me back to that part of my life. "Love Songs" that was made in 9th or 10th grade just cracks me up now.
17. When I was a kid (3-5 years old) I would wish that I could stay a kid forever because I didn't want to deal with the real world where bad things happened and people died.
18. I miss the person I transformed into when I performed in guard.
19. I want to learn to play the banjo my Grandpa McConnell made more than anything.
20. Some of my favorite places on Earth are: Iona Beach, Scotland, Douglas Lake, the once open field by the family cemetery, the old fish pond, the "farm", and amusement parks.
21. I embrace being an Appalachian.
22. I have attended 5 institutions of higher education, and I'm still graduating college in 4 years with a double major and a minor.
23. I like movies that are so "real" that they make me cry. (i.e. Life as a House, Crash, Two Weeks, etc.)
24. I don't just believe in a Mighty God because of how I was raised, but also because of observing examples of true Jesus followers, my intellectual exploration, and life experiences.
25. I adore shortbread cookies.

Super Mario Bros. just for my bro's special day!

So, it wasn't very long after my brother had proposed to his girlfriend that I decided I wanted to make his Groom's cake.

I planned the thing for months.

I researched how to use fondant and gum paste and coloring and just about everything else under the sun having to do with cake decorating.

I just wanted something really special that was just for him on a day that wasn't going to have much to offer him but awkward families and neck ties that seemed to get tighter by the minute.

I kinda love him that much, even though he doesn't know it.

I spent hours on my research and prep of this silly cake, and it didn't turn out as good as I wanted it to. I had pretty high expectations, I guess.

The bottom layer is an artistic rendition of the first level of the original Super Mario Bros. game. The second layer is obviously the green pipe. The top of the pipe on up is fondant covered Styrofoam. Oh and EVERYBODY knew it was Styrofoam too because my 6 year old cousin felt the need to tell anybody and everybody.

I was going to buy plastic Mario and Princess Peach figurines but I couldn't find any that were larger than 2-3 inches, and I knew I wanted bigger. The week before the wedding, I pretended to have some kind of artistic ability and make Mario and Princess Peach. Well, let's just say they got the point across and that was enough for me at that point in the game.

My favorite part about this cake would have to be the Goombas. I think they actually looked just like the little life shrinking monsters from the game ;)

It's pretty sad that I have no close ups of the Goombas and other smaller details. Me, the person who loves to takes pictures, and even moreso loves to take pictures of my food creations, did not get a single picture of the cake for myself.

So get mad at me if you want, but I kinda had a busy day going on...ya know I was curling my hair and trying to be super nice and not falling in my heels and smiling at the hottie of a groomsman that walked me down the isle. :D

Kinda a busy day for macro shots of a cake.

I'll have to hunt up the actual recipe I used for the cake. I tried a couple before I decided on what I nicknamed Death by Chocolate, with a chocolate cake, chocolate ganache filling, and a chocolate buttercream frosting.

Yeah, it tasted even better than it looked.

Sustainable Economies in Appalachia

How are we to preserve what is worth saving about Appalachian culture?

Maybe that isn't the proper question, maybe it should be "how can we showcase or share true Appalachian culture in the essence of all that it is (people, place, way of life, art, craft, food--both past and current)"?

I think we have to find a way to form sustainable economies that showcase "Appalachia" in order for any culturally accurate views of Appalachia to reach the U.S. as a whole, and especially for the following generations.

Is setting up partially accurate historical tourism going to get us there, full of stereotyping to fill in the gaps? Absolutely not.

Is adventure tourism going to be the big money maker? Maybe so, but without proper handling our mountains can get shorthanded in the deal. Pollution. Noise. Erosion. No thanks.

I could go on about how so many different concepts will not be entirely successful while still being protective of Appalachian culture, but I won't.

What I will say is that we as Appalachians need to highlight what is unique, what is natural, what is worth sharing with the world. We as Appalachians need to stop selling out and using our treasures as a money making scheme. We as Appalachians need to support the local businesses that are in it because they love what they are doing and want to be in Appalachia doing it. They are using the economy to help bring more value into the area, not using the area to bring more money into their pockets like many we have seen.

If you just look around you, there are some fantastic opportunities to discover places and ideas you never knew existed in the area.

(I will admit that my two examples are rather non-tradional for Appalachia, maybe I will get into some more traditional examples at a later time.)

Take for example a lavender farm (in Scott Co.) and a vineyard/winery (in Wise Co.)...who would ever have guessed treasures like these existed in southwest Virginia without the support and publicity of us, the locals.

Scott County Lavender

http://www.scottcountylavender.com/

-I'm unsure if the farm is still operational. I need to check on that.

MountainRose Vineyards

http://www.mountainrosevineyard.com/index.htm

- a lovely experience, even for those clueless about vino

Go search out the awesome local businesses like these (and proudly support them) so Appalachia can make money and be able to kick those crazy guys wanting to sell hillbilly and Indian memorabilia as far away from here as possible.

OK, I'll step down from my passion podium now ;)

Broken or Beautiful

It has been way too long since I've written anything at all, let alone blogged anything.
I have decided it's way past time to change that.
I want to start writing something at least once a week on here, whether it be a new recipe I've tried, creative writings, or simply rambling about life.

As time just continues to slip through the cracks of life, I want a record to remember what on earth I was thinking. This blog, my friends, will be that record...however broken or beautiful it may seem.

Exploding cocoa and overcoming fears

As I look back over the past year, words seem to fail me. And I'm not usually the kind of person who is grasping at words to explain the deeper meanings of her life and yearnings of her soul. So the best I can come up with at this moment is exploding cocoa and overcoming fears. I guess they explain my life this past year fairly accurately.

A few friendships have grown over the year, and a few have fallen to the wayside
friendships don't fit well with me, mainly because it takes forever for me to trust
and several I have grown to trust have let me down, but we're all human and I know that
I forgive and I forget, but not without learning from each experience
and all of them have been worthwhile
losing certain friends this past year has been difficult to say the least
but sometimes there are no other options
I just had to walk away for my sanity
and its crazy bittersweet to think that could have been prevented if I hadn't been so eager to fall
and its just sad that all those possible new friends are nothing more than acquaintances because I couldn't find the time

I've realized it is less and less often that I am truly myself around friends, and maybe that's simply because I'm not sure who I want to be anymore

I just feel so drained of who I am because all I've known for the past 10 months is research and thesis and class. Research, thesis, class (repeat until all you want to do is run as far away as possible) It's been a broken record that won't let me play my own song. So I haven't been dancing through life so much. Trudging is more like it.

But its so difficult to be bitter and fed up and sick of all of it, because its really such a blessing. Not for a moment do I forget that it is a blessing. I'm getting an amazing education and will be graduating without a dime of debt. I'm blessed beyond measure. I should simply stop my whining and be grateful.

This past year has been quite a lonely one. Not because of a lack of people in my life, or even lack of quality people in my life. Nope that's not why. I'm pulling away, or pushing away, or both. It's almost time to say goodbye. Goodbye's are my least favorite thing. Seriously, I have to agree with Charlie Brown when he says there are too many goodbyes in his life (or something of that nature).

With the stresses of school and anticipating goodbyes, my life feels like its about to become an exploding cup of cocoa, which is messy and majestically beautiful all at once.

And that overcoming fears part, I no longer run screaming from spiders. Now if I could just move on to overcoming that fear of growing up...
:)

P.S. My life has kinda felt like a generalization of Grey's Anatomy this season...a big awkward mess

Colors of the Wind

Not only one of my favorite songs from my childhood, but the overall mood of my day. The crisp morning air had that "Fall is finally here" chill in it. The mug with espresso warmed my hands after walking the dog. Ah, espresso. I am honestly thankful for the day I was introduced in Spain to the glorious drink known as espresso. Such lovely memories. God, send my love to Madrid until I can return someday.

As I was walking to my 8 o'clock class this morning, I couldn't erase the child-like grin off my face. I can't really explain why it was there. It just was, smacked right on my face. The first few yellow leaves were twirling about the edges of the sidewalk and I thanked God for Fall.

I'm still attempting to understand this smile that came out of nowhere. I'm guessing it has something to do with submitting independence as my friend Joel said the other day. After a tough spot in my life several months ago, I said I'd take the reigns because dependence left me hurt. I thought I'd try it my way, control what I wanted and give what I wanted still being unsure of His plans after they turned out so differently than mine that day the earth was plowed in preparation for growth. Now it is harvest time my friends, and the lessons learned and experiences gained are in abundance.

I remember this time last year. I was the closest I had ever been to God. I'm not sure why, other than continually seeking Him. I look back on the past year with some regret because I didn't get any closer, and at times I even wandered further away. I love consistency and despise change (or at least I used to). And since God never changes in this equation of a supernatural relationship, I'm the one left counting the coins I made. So I'm horrible at consistency, yet desire it madly. There is no other area of my life that I want consistency than in my relationship with God. It is something I am earnestly working on, and hopefully I'm making some progress. Ask me about it sometime.

The need to depend on God is ever increasing as the future is looming ahead, just mere months until I graduate from college. But I'd rather delay those thought processes as long as possible, so we will just think of how brilliant my favorite season is.

After freezing at the lab, I decided to go to the store and obtain in my cart at the expense of my shallow bank account the following: tortilla chips, processed cheese & salsa dip, Hormel turkey chili, and a butternut squash [among the other fall-themed things that just so happened to jump into my cart ;)]. So for lunch I entertained my senses with chili cheese nachos. Can we say football game??? Later on I decided to get all fancy with that weird looking gourd I bought. Ginger spiced butternut squash soup, all thick and creamy. Cumin, Garlic, Onions, Coriander, Cinnamon, Butter. It was my first attempt at squash converted into soup ever, and I must say it will not be my last. Sadly enough my camera is permanently broken and I couldn't share at least the gorgeous bowl that beckoned the crisp wind to keep twirling the first colored levels that have fallen.

Wildest dreams, reality, synonyms right?

I've recently looked back upon the past few years of my life, only to realize that I'm living an amazing life that I never could have dreamed of. When I think of what I have learned and accomplished, I'm just flabbergasted. When I think of all the opportunities that have been put in my path, I can barely stop to thoughts of gratefulness.

I've been to 3 countries, I'm doing research, I've been on not just one but two mission trips, I have such an amazing family, and some pretty awesome friends if I may say so myself. And that's just the tip of the iceberg really.

I don't believe anybody deserves this kind of happiness in life, but that God has graciously provided me with some very blessed times recently. My life wouldn't be what it is without "Him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us"

Family Ties

If anybody knows me at all, they know that my family means the world to me. I’m one of those weird people that actually look forward to family reunions. Family is such a perplexing concept I’ve discovered by observing. Some people spend their whole lives running from their family, the only ones that really provide comfort and support. Some think life is better if family is involved at a bare minimum. I just don’t understand why so many people take their families for granted. Maybe I’m just lucky that I have the family I do, but I believe that I truly enjoy my family because I have chosen to make them an important part of my life. Everyone talks about breaking ties as you grow up, but I am running around attempting to form bonds at every moment possible. There is so much to learn from my almost innumerable family members. I don’t want to run from what I hold so dear, even if that makes people look at me weird or call me “one of those people.”

Dreaming with a Broken Heart

"When you're dreaming with a broken heart, waking up is the hardest part"

I've been through the denial that I'm not hurt. That stage hurt me worse than the actuality of it all. Now I'm healing; I'm in repair. Not so much healing from losing what meant so much to me (and so little to somebody else), but healing from the simple breaking of a porcelain heart I always thought I had toughened to the strength of steel. I've never been the one with the broken heart, but I've always been the one breaking others (not that there are a great deal of those either). My heart hasn't been broken before this because I never let anybody in. I never trusted enough. I never loved enough.

But this time I trusted and I loved, and consequently the porcelain shattered.
Surprisingly it glues back together quite nicely. But memories still chip away at it every once in awhile. Like the same words spoken from a different mouth in the same old house it all began, that hurt way more than I ever thought it would.

I once said I wasn't sure if it was better to have loved and lost than to never have loved at all. I wanted to say it wouldn't be worth it at the time because I didn't want to give anybody the power to break my heart. On the other side of things I do believe its worth it, even if my love was never returned. I was the lucky one because I learned how to let somebody in, I learned how to let my steel barriers down and be open to love. Not everyone is that lucky. Not everyone is that brave.

I've learned a lot. I've gained a lot. Without losing much more than an amazing friend (and maybe I'll find that again one day).

"But when my loneliness is through, I'm gonna find another you..."
and learn from our mistakes in the meantime.

Fighting like mad to dance in the rain.

The rain came pouring down today, but metaphorically speaking its been raining cats and dogs and bad days for quite some time now.

I'm not the kind of person that admits that things in my life are hard or to whine about the things that go wrong. I put on a happy face moreso to keep peoples' questions and "need to help" tendencies to rest more than I do it to convince myself that I'm ok.

I want to deal with the rain myself.
And sometimes that is a bad thing.

I'm caught in this downpour.
Some of it still coming from previous storms and then sometimes it lets up a bit.
Every once in awhile it starts to pick up more.
Sometimes because of life altering things and sometimes its just the trivial crap of life.

There is no sense in trying to run away from the rain or really even to put on a happy face.
I need to look up, get splashed straight in the face with cold, fat raindrops.
Let it hurt.
Stop pretending I'm not drenched.
Soak it in.
I need to realize there is a reason for the rain.
And more importantly trust that the sun will eventually come back out.

So if you ask me how I am, I'm not going to put on a happy face.
I'm not going to deny the rainclouds.
I'm stressed, I'm hurting, I'm worried.
Your prayers won't dry up the rain.

But maybe if I let you join me in the midst of my downpour, it might just get easier to dance in the rain.

A project for break

I have to admit there is one project that I have fallen short on: The Why? Project.

I put a lot of thought into what I was going to study at the beginning of the semester. After a few weeks I decided on studying the Apocrypha. I am a Christian and I have never really read any historical and religiously significant texts that go along with my religion besides the Bible. Sure it is included in some special Bibles, but I have never really been exposed to it. I did not even know these other texts existed until a few years ago. I do not know much at all about them, therefore I felt it would be beneficial to research them more throughly this semester.

However, time really got away from me and I didn't get to immerse myself in studying the Apocrypha. I did enjoy a nice discussion on the Apocrypha during a Bible study early on in the year. In my World Literature class we briefly touched on the Apocrypha and other texts from the same time period. So I did learn little tidbits of information about my why project, but not enough to satisfy my curiosity.

Therefore, I will be studying the Apocrypha over Christmas break since I will have more time to focus on it.

What MOTIVATES me?

Think about your life.

Think about the greatest thing you have ever done, and think about

the worst thing you have ever done. Try to remember what motivated you to

do the former, and try to remember what motivated you to do the latter.

How similar are these two motives?

Chuck Klosterman, IV

I believe the greatest thing I have ever done is realized that I have a higher purpose than just being a human living however I choose on this planet. With this realization, comes more concrete action on my part. If I was not created for this world, but yet I do have a purpose here?!? It is such a confusing concept. I feel that my purpose on earth is to further the Kingdom of God. I feel that furthering God's Kingdom and ultimately bringing God glory should be the motivation behind every single action in my life.

Therefore, I must disagree with Klosterman here. He feels that what motivated you to do your best or your worst have something in common. If my motivation for doing my best is glorifying God, I do not see how that could have anything in common with being my worst. If you had to define what motivates me at my worst moments, I believe it would be selfishness though, it would simply be the absence of living to glorify God.

I know what I have spoken about here is not very concrete, but what "motivations" in life are truly concrete?

Impacting the World: Additional Information

I forgot to add that the Bethshean Mexico Mission has a current running website that has information about all their work, including the medical missions.

Here is the link for the the hospital/clinic project:
http://www.bethsheanmexicomission.org/index_files/Page540.htm

Impacting the World

I have formalized my impacting the world project since I last blogged about it.

Project Running Title: Fundraising Effort for Bethshean Mexico Mission Clinic/Hospital

Official Dates: Spring Semester (January-May)

Purpose: To raise money in helping to build clinic/hospital in rural Mexico.

Why: Because there is a great need for medical care in this rural area, with people having to travel several hours to go to the nearest hospitals.

Who: The main project is that of Bethshean Mexico Mission, under Cris Garcia. A local doctor, Freddy Martin is also very involved in medical missions in the area and being outspoken about the importance of building this facility. FAME has partnered with Bethshean Mexico Mission, promising $50,000 of the needed $250,000.

For my fundraising project, Katie Coppinger and Alissa Rockney will be working together. We are partnering with the Christian Student Fellowship, who has been to work with Cris Garcia in this area of Mexico multiple times in the past few years.

How: We will be setting up a booth in the culp center at least once where people can purchase "bundles of bricks" for $5 of donate money.

The second possibility is speaking to the clubs associated with the medical field.

A third possibility is to speak at a colloquium, or host a fundraising gig in the Great Room.

The fourth and most promising possibility is going around and speaking to each of the ministries on campus about the hospital and its need.

We will most likely show the video that Freddy Martin has made for the project because it shows people receiving medical care as well as specific blueprints of the hospital. It would even be ideal to get Freddy to speak at our main fundraising event.

The" Who am I?" question

Earlier in the semester, I wrote about "who I am." I know I probably shouldn't have started answering that question from my current perspective, but I guess I will just work backwards through my life in looking at who I was, and how those versions of me are similar, different, or alien-like to the current me.

Since I already talked about my current definition of who am I, I will reverse until entering college 2.5 years ago.

I am a startlingly different person at this time in my life. I am scared to death, with a side of excitement, regarding the big world that stands before me waiting to be experienced. I'm deathly afraid of going away to college, but I know that if I don't I will never become the person I really wish to become. I've never stepped too far outside my comfort zone when it comes to anything in life. When I look back on this person I was just 2.5 years ago, I thank God that He gave me the courage to go away and learn how to live my life to its fullest. And maybe studying in my dorm, with only emerging for Bible study and food, now seems like such a tragic first year of college. But it was that first year that I learned how I wanted to spend my time. I realized that enjoying things outside of academia and actually building more concrete relationships would be something I would earnestly seek in the future. Over the past year, I did just that. As bad as it may sound that I didn't always make school my number one priority (and my grades even showed it with A-'s that could have been A's if I had just stayed home that night), I feel it has been worth it. So it isn't that I like the me of 2.5 years ago, I revel in the fact that who I was 2.5 years ago brought me to ETSU and enabled concrete relationships that God had in store for me.

Hmm, next we should go back to the "me" of my high school days. What can I say about the me of high school. Several events that defined who am I occurred during high school. I was an overachiever who just had to have the highest GPA, but only because I never thought I would make it that high. I had always believed I was average until high school. I will never forget how much I actually loved to go to class and learn. I wish I still had that great of a passion for putting everything into learning. Although I still have that passion, I don't think it will ever be as great as it was then. Well maybe it really wasn't a passion for learning then, it was more of a great desire to impress people disguised as a love of learning. Now I honestly don't care so much about impressing others as I have learned that if I don't strive for excellence for personal reasons, it isn't worth achieving. Some of my best and worst memories come from my experiences with colorguard/winterguard in high school. The work ethic I learned from practicing over and over again because I was never a natural is something I brought away from the experience. I absolutely loved performing, becoming somebody else out on the field/floor. If I could go back to any me for a moment, I would go back to this me and perform once more. I guess all good things must come to an end eventually, or at least God had bigger plans. The hardest lesson of my life was also learned through my experience with colorguard. I respected an instructor, saw him as an older brother, even idolized him to an extent. It came crashing down, and I realized that I could put no faith in man because he would always disappoint me. Every since that day I have strove to always put my faith in the Lord and look to no human as "perfect." Even though I was not directly affected by what happened, the indirect affects truly changed me forever. [I do apologize for the vagueness here, but the details are better left unsaid].

I really don't know any "me" that is worth discussing through middle school, or even primary school. When I look back at who I was then, what I remember is what I learned from my favorite teachers. Mrs. Nunley was my first teacher that was forthcoming about being a Christian within students; I still remember her inspiring me by praying every morning during our moment of silence. Mr. Reynolds taught me that you really could have a blast while learning. Mrs. Rigg taught me to love writing with a passion. Ms. Kilgore gave me the desire to go out and see the world. As little as the things these teachers once portrayed to me, as purposeful or insignificant as they saw them, they did affect the person that I now am.

The last "me" I will look back on with be a carefree 5 year old. The summer before I started Kindergarten, I remember swinging on the swing set all the time. I would look at the creek flowing in front of me, as the shadows of the holly tree danced on the ripples. I remember looking up to the clouds and not wanting to ever grow up. I thought the world was going to be such a scary place full of bad things that I never wanted to experience. I just wanted to stay on that swing set forever. So I used to think I was a wise kid, being that I already understood like wasn't going to be perfect and all fun growing up. Just in the past few years have I come to hate that 5 year old me. What was I thinking? Why on earth would I want to miss out on living my life?!?!

Well that is a brief glimpse back to who I was, why I was who I was, and how I changed through the past 21 years to become who I am today.

can I just say God is awesome, and I'm truly in awe of Him right now.

Can I just say I really miss Scotland...

:(