Cheese

This picture was taken at Thanksgiving this year. It is me and my brother and sis-in-law with our grandparents. Notice our funny smiles? Well you see, whenever my Papa is asked to smile for a picture he does not really smile but just kind of gapes his mouth open. We are doing the Papa smile. I think this picture is so funny and just had to share it. I am sure it is a "guess you had to be there" kind of thing but you never know. At least my grandma has a pretty smile!

Thankful Monday

I know everyone does Thankful Thursday but today is Monday and I am feeling thankful so here we go!

I am thankful for:

• morning coffee

• worship time with my mission team

• the Psalms

• beautiful "winter" weather

• all my fun friends that let me hang out with them this weekend

• my teammates allowing me play disc golf with them even though I am bad

• funny movies

• the chance to serve

• my wonderful church at Hope

• having friends visit my church

• my neighbor who continues to humble himself and knock on our door when in need

• the chance to study Spanish

• the Cowboys loosing

• encouragement from other missionaries

• Gilmore Girls

• leg soreness from exercise

I had a blessed weekend and am looking forward to this new week.

Back in the Swing of Things

It is nearing the end of my first full week back in Abilene and things are going well. I was afraid I might be bored or not have enough to do but that will not be the case. Thanks to Google Calendar and sticky-note to-do lists I have plenty to be working on and I am excited about it all.

One of the highlights of this week has been Spanish class! Yea!!! It has been a while since I have had any form of Spanish training to this was an exciting step. Wes, Ellen and I are in one class and Chad and Reid are in another class and it is...interesting.

The professor is stern but quirky and he makes me laugh. He speaks very clearly and I can usually understand what he is saying which is a relief. I hope that I am a good auditor and really spend time studying and taking the class seriously. I know most auditors tend to drop off throughout the semester but this is really important to me and I want to learn as much Spanish as possible now.

Hola, me llamo Dee. Soy de Texas. Me gusta ir al cine, comiendo helado y mirando futbol Americano. Tengo muchos gran amigos y un gran familia.

The rest of my weeks are going to be spent working for Worldwide Witness, studying Spanish, researching Chile, meeting with my teammates, working on our visions and dreams and plan of action for our work. I also am looking at various places around town that I can volunteer and finding as many was as possible to be involved and serving at church.

This is going to be an interesting semester and it is going to take some time to get used to but I am really looking forward to it. Many people think this is just a goof-off semester for me and as fun as some of it may be, I am also taking it and the support from A&M very seriously. This is a crucial time for our team's formation and I hope to take every moment as a blessing from God.

Grad school took a lot out of me and I am relieved to be moving on and getting to do what I really want to do: pour my life into the lives of others and love them as much as I can.

I've Lost That Blogging Feeling

It has been forever since I have blogged and I must say I have not missed it too much. Every once in a while I thought "hmm, I should write a blog" but I never had much to say except school school school. Now all I can say is that I am thankful the semester is over and I am moving on!

I have been at my parents house for much of the Christmas holiday and it has been wonderfully relaxing and refueling. I am thankful for a peaceful, fun home to come to. These are some of the things I have done:

Put up Christmas lights
Watched Northern Exposure that I got for Christmas- so cute
Gone to Yoga with my mom- I love it
Hung out with my grandparents
Put Depends together for my grandparents- doesn't get more fun than that
Cleaned the gutters
Spent a weekend with my mission team
Watched The Abyss- I cannot say I would recommend it
Went to see Invictus
Saw many long time friends at church
Finished reading Three Cups of Tea (awesome) and beginning Watership Down
Baked Peanutbutter balls, fudge, apple pie
Helping my mom with her Spanish and learning some myself
Visited Discovery Green in downtown Houston

Things I am still looking forward to:

Christmas exchange with Lauren
Wedding weekend in Austin with Ruth and Lauren
Seeing The Blind Side
Continuing to watch Northern Exposure
Learning to drive a stick shift
Making kitchen towel hangy things with my mom- hopefully pictures to come
Texans game!!!
Seeing Matthew and Shannon
Trying recipes from my new cookbook The Pioneer Woman Cooks

I think that is enough for now. I hope everyone is enjoying their holidays!

Finally Fall

It finally feels like fall around here. November has been such a warm month for us and even though the leaves have still been falling (I think it is just because they are tired of hanging on, not because of cool weather) it has not felt very fall-ish until today. Last night it cooled off and although it is still not cold it is nice a crisp today with the sun shining. I love it! As one of my friends will probably tell me tonight in class, today is one of my kind of days, cool and sunny!

An interesting fact that I must share and then get back to studying. For weather website I use I have Abilene as my homepage but on the side I have a few favorites that I can see their weather as well. These favorites include Conroe, Fort Worth and Oklahoma City- these are probably the 3 cities I visit the most.

I also have on there Concepcion, Chile. For a while now I have been waiting for it to be warmer there than it is here and today it finally happened. If you notice, they are in the Southern Hemisphere and so it is spring time there, heading summer. I know that Conce will never get as warm as Abilene (or as cold) but I need it to warm up some so I have been paying attention and was excited to see that we have switched. It is still a small difference, right now here it is 53 and there it is 59 (it was 61 earlier), but it is still a difference. That makes me happy. :)

College Station Part 2

So I don't have a lot of time to blog because really I should be writing on my research paper. But, I just had to post these pictures from our team's second weekend in College Station with the A&M Church.

Mer and Ellen getting some sun

They were so good to us while we were there. They treated us with Aggie football tickets and T-shirts, I could not go to a game without a shirt. We had a blast at the game watching all the crazy people, trying to understand the traditions, baking in the sun and whooping! The Aggies won the game which was very exciting and like the band nerd that I will always be, I enjoyed the marching band as well.

Aggie band

We spent the evening with the Davidsons, Traci and her mom having yummy food, great conversation and a special time of worship on their back porch. They have a great porch.

Whoop!

Sunday was another great day. I made it late to class and that was nice to meet some other people. My parents came for service and that was real fun for them to be there, see everything and meet some of the people supporting us.

During service the brought the past two teams up on video on the big screen, one team being in Thailand (at midnight) and the other team in Peru. It was fun to see them, see how they are doing and hear how the support we are to receive blessed them during their time of training. I think it was good for the church too, to remember why they are doing this and what it is leading to. These teams are both on the field now and doing great.

I snuck a picture during church of the teams on the screen

After church we had another wonderful meal with a family from church and then headed back to Abilene. It was another super fast weekend but I was super blessed. I cannot wait to continue the relationship with this church that has such a heart for missions and is not afraid to try new things. Thank you church and thank you Traci and family for the nice bed to sleep in!

Conce Team Video

This is the video my good friend Donald made for our team for specifically for the A&M Church but also to be used for the fund raising search and just for general information for anyone interested. My team is so great. I just love the ending. Thanks Donald!

PS- I'm quite proud I even got this online. :)