I'll be home for Christmas...wait, I am home for Christmas

It's good to be home! I must start this long overdue post by saying that I love my family, and it is so good to be home! At school I have Ryan and all my friends who I am missing dearly, but there is no substitute, really, for your family. I'm glad that Ryan and I can be with our family's this Christmas because this is the last single Christmas we have.

Speaking of being single no more, wedding plans are coming along swimmingly if anyone was interested in knowing. I had been so busy this semester that I had hardly any time to plan. I felt like I should be getting things done, but I also felt I had too much to do to devote a great deal of time to it. As a result I got stressed out over it, which is crazy, because it is seriously one of my favorite things to do. I haven't planned an actual wedding yet, but I do plan at least one everytime I get a new wedding magzine. I love weddings! In addition to being busy, I was very overwhelmed with all the choices I had before me. I love so many different colors schemes or flowers, or foods that I found it hard to narrow it down to just one. But yesterday I was helping my Mom do some Christmas baking, and I felt like a fog lifted. I could see clearly a lot of things that I was hazy about before. (I know, I'm singing the song too..."I can see clearly now the rain is gone, I can see all obstacles in my way") Alot of the things I decided on were things I had been thinking about for awhile, but I had to mull over all my options before I could come back to them and be sure. (I'm so bad at decision making sometimes). So, I feel good about that, it's only 143 days away if you can believe it, and I want this semester to go really fast, (but still have lots of time to plan), because I am so looking forward to being married to the man of my dreams.

Well, that's enough wedding talk I guess. Although it is one of my favorite subjects these days :) Onward to how things have been since I got home. Things have been going well. I have really enjoyed spending time with my family, and getting ready for Christmas, including lots of yummy Christmas treats, some of which I mentioned before. My new favorite cookie this year Mom has nicknamed haystacks. I know we have the real name somewhere, but I don't know where. They are a combination of Chinese Chow mein noodles and peanuts in milk chocolate, and they are really good. It may sound like an odd combination, but they are quite tasty. I like the crunch of the noodles and the peanuts and the smoothness of the milk chocolate. They are a hearty cookie too, and I like that. Plus, they're not too rich. I went to the eye doctors today and got my eyes checked. Not much has changed which is good, but I'm getting new glasses anyway because I have had my current ones since 1999. That's 6 years! That's a long time I think. They have started to get worn out, plus, they are really not in style any more. They have served me well, but I am happy to see them go. I am also going to go back to contacts a bit. I used to wear them years ago, but I stopped for no particular reason other than I think I ran out and didn't refill them. Isn't that crazy? Anyway, I have always said that I don't want to wear glasses on my wedding day. No offense to anyone who has or will, but I just don't like the look of it. I would prefer contacts. So, I have a sample pair to try and see how I like them, and if I do, I will get more. I'm not sure I'll wear them every day, but I do want to get used to myself in them, and give others a chance to get used to me in them too. I don't want to wear glasses the whole time up to the wedding, and then suddenly switch to contacts and have it look wierd to people because they're not used to seeing me in them. Along with my check up I also had a dialation procedure done. I had never even heard of it until the other day at school when Jess Tot said she had just had it done. Ryan said he also gets it done because there is the danger of his retina's detaching, and that's what the procedure checks for. It was neat, because when he started talking about it, I understood what he was saying, because I had just been talking about it with them. I guess if you're really near-sighted, and I am, there is the danger that something can happen to your retinas, so they do this procedure to check for that. I was fine thank goodness, and I didn't even get many side effects from it. First they give you these drops that dialate your pupils. I didn't know it was happening really, except that my vision was getting a little burry, but not bad, then I asked my Mom when it was going to happen, and she said it already had, and couldn't I tell. I said not really, and she told me to go look in the mirror, that my pupils were "wildly dialated" as she put it. So, I looked and sure enough they were. It looked really funny. I just looked in the mirror and they have gone down a lot which is good. The worst part of the whole thing was having a very bright light shone in my eye while it was fully dialated. Not very fun. But it was over quick so that was good. I came home and didn't have that much blurring, and the light wasn't bothering my eyes that much really, so that was good too. That has been my excitement for the day.

Well, this post has gone on long enough, and you are proabably bored already, so I will end it. I should try doing smaller posts more often, instead of big posts with lots of time in between. I will try to be more diligent in this. To all who read this blog, I hope you have a very Merry Christmas if I do not blog or talk to you before then.

Maybe some good can come from Church History

Many of you know the struggle I had with my recent Church History paper. I left it to the last minute, (no surprise there) and ran out of time. My 3,000 word paper ended up being 1,800 words, and it was not the most refined paper shall we say. I was sad about this for a number of reasons:
1. I do not like to do assignments poorly, especially when I know I am capable of doing them well, and I know, had I had more time, I could have done very well on this one.
2. I didn't think about asking for an extention because by the time I clued in that I could use one, I thought it would be too late. This is only to have someone tell me that they asked for an extention the day of! and got one. I'm happy for them, really I am. I just feel sick, because it makes me think that had I been smart enough to ask, I could have gotten one too. (I had just as much of a case for one as they did). I guess I just wasn't following the "Ask and ye shall recieve" policy, and I take full responsibility for that. It's just too bad is all.
3. I really enjoyed my topic. Ryan actually suggested it; although he only did that because he thought it would be cool if I got someone to re-enact the deaths. But when I got to the library to actually pick a topic, I thought, "Why couldn't I do martyrs? They would be interesting (minus the death scenes of course). And so it was. I did end up finding a wealth of interesting stories about people who endured such horrible things, yet managed to continue to serve and praise God through it all. I was brought to tears by some of the accounts I read, and I longed to delve in further. To hear more of the people who made the ultimate sacrifice. It blessed, and at the same time convicted me. It is so easy to neglect praising God, and I have it good. These people could praise him through the worse of circumstances. I was humbled. I've been struggling lately with giving God my all, and consciously living for him every day. I have to ask myself, "If I won't give up my will, would I really give up my life?" The quotes in one of the books I had (Jesus Freaks: dc Talk and The Voice of the Martyrs) were particularly powerful. Here's one that really challenged me:

"My dear Jesus, my Savior, is so deeply written in my heart, that I feel confident, that if my heart was to be cut open and chopped to pieces, the name of Jesus would be written on every piece." ~ Ignatius. A student under John. Devoured by wild animals in Rome. 111AD

I almost don't know how to respond to that. I feel lacking when I read that statement. Lacking in my passion, lacking in my commitment. I need to change something. I said that this assignment was going to be a wake up call to me that I can no longer procrastinate the way I have been and expect to do well. I have decided to change. And I think this should be a wake up call for me spiritually as well. I can't keep living the way I have been. I need to change. Maybe some good can come from Church History.