I was actually productive today. I almost finished Christmas shopping. I found shoes for tomorrow night, so that's one less thing I have to stress over. It still does NOT feel like Christmas. 63 degrees is not Christmas weather. That's October weather. It needs to get cold at least for Christmas. It can get warm after that, but at least for Christmas day it should be cold. 

I finally got all my grades for the first semester. All As. That made the day a little better.

It's really weird to think I don't have to go back to Lee in the next couple days. I think 5 days is the most I've been home before now, and it's already been over a week since I got back. I'm not going to complain though. It's been great so far, and I still have quite a few people to catch up with and a couple more to spend some more time with, before I go back. One of my friends is supposed to be coming home on leave from the Marines today so that's exciting. Maybe today I'll get out and do something productive with my life like finish Christmas shopping or something. Probably not, but it sounds good to say so.

I'm realizing more and more how good it is to be home. It was so nice being back in church this morning. And tonight was great. I was supposed to have plans tomorrow, but sadly it looks like I don't. I'm free all week except Wednesday night. If someone wants to hang out let me know. I definetely don't have anything to do.

Bored...that's one thing I forgot about Murfreesboro. It's boring. At least without friends or somethin going on. So I'm sitting here, been reading a book forever b/c I can't sleep. Church in the morning....

 I'm so glad to be back. I didn't realize how much I'd missed it. And so far things have been really really good. It's so great to realize I get to be here for another 3 or so weeks. I'm just afraid I won't want to go back.

 On another note, I made an A in my Special Education class. All that work finally feels worth it

Today was a very good day!

finishing my last project, studying for my last final, and packing! I come home tomorrow!!!!

Things are really starting to get better. I've only got 2 exams left. One of which I'm not worried about at all. By Friday after my math exam I'll be stress free. Found out my schedule's gonna work so I can go home on Monday instead of Tuesday or Wednesday like I'd expected. Stayed up until 4 this morning writing a paper and discussing the Little Mermaid very indepth w/Jackie. Amazing the things that'll come out of someone's mouth when they're sleep deprived. No classes tomorrow. I have some observation work to do, but that's actually really enjoyable. Then about 3 hours of Apples to Apples. I got sleep today!! More than 3 hours!! That's pretty great considering that's all I'd had in 3 days.  Spent some good time w/some girls in my hall. Due to all the decorating last week I'm starting to build some new friendships with some of them which is pretty cool. Just got back from Midnight Breakfast with them. Pretty sure our RA took our hall toilet from decorations to breakfast w/us. Good, good times.

I've been working on this crazy big project for my Children w/Exceptionalities class for about 2 months now. It was one of those kind of projects where you thought it was almost done, and then you'd discover something else you still had to add to it. I spent about 16 hours on it Saturday and then started on it again about 1 yesterday. Finally at 7 this morning, after lots of coffee and stress and working on it in the lounge with Jackie so I didn't fall asleep, I finally finished it! It was such a good feeling to turn that silly thing in this morning and not have to worry about it anymore. Tonight I've got a paper to do and an exam to study for but after today it's pretty easy from here on out. I'm looking foward to next week when I finally get to come home and know there's nothing left to stress over for a while!

However, I don't know who that person is. We all went out to Chattanooga tonight and while we were gone someone hit the side of my car. They left a dent and took some of the paint off. Of course they drove away leaving no information or anything of that nature. So now I get to deal with that...

So after hours and hours of work we finally pulled it all together to make the best Christmas Hall ever! We all had characters and made our hall interactive for the judging.  It was SO fun!! The end of the hall I live on was pretty traditional Christmas. We had all the doors wrapped in wrapped paper. Santa's toy shop. Some reindeer and snow. A sleigh. Penguins. A nativity and little kids being read the story of Jesus. And then you got to the lounge......

The home of Ricky Bobby (which I got voted into being) and his wife (Vanessa). We did a short, cleaner version of the scene of his prayer and argument with his wife about how he would pray to Baby Jesus if he wanted....

From there you entered the other half of the hall. Polk County TN Redneck Christmas. A toliet filled w/ice and rootbeer was the first thing you got to see. Jessica cleaned her gun as she told you all about everyone and then you got to walk thru an awful mess of Christmas. And the amazing Christmas tree was at the end.

It was SO fun, and despite all the stress and work I LOVED it. It was nice to take a break from all the work of the week and just really enjoy something.

I ended up decorating until about 4 AM. I had every thought of going to bed at 1:30 but then I got caught up in uprooting a bush, duct taping it back together, decorating it w/fishing lures and cheese scented fake worms and stringing pork rinds among other things. Even after hours of work we still have most of one hallway and the lounge left to do.  I got up around 8 and finished my english paper, went to class for 10 mins to turn it in and now I'm back at here. In a few minutes I get the lovely job of going to Hobby Lobby to argue w/someone about how they didn't give us a bag of stuff we paid for, and then I get to pick up final things we forgot from Big Lots. Once I get back here more decorating until Andrea gets out of class so we can head off to the junk yard. These are the fun things I get to do since I don't have classes....I really just wanna go back to bed!

Today has been a super crazy day. I went to classes. Then went and got Jackie and  we went to Big Lots, Dollar Tree, Walmart, and Hobby Lobby. Pretty sure we bought everything from UGLY shiny plaid fabric to fishing lures to christmas lights to stuffed creature poinsetta things. And then we get back to the dorm to find that Andrea had gone and bought the one thing we wanted most, a toliet.  Then dinner and then the Christmas Hall decorating started. Our hall is doing one end Traditonal Christmas, our lounge as Ricky Bobby's house, and then after the curve in the hall Redneck Christmas. We did that from about 7:30 to 1:00 and then just as everyone was ready to go take a shower and go to bed...Surprise! The water stops working completely. So about 15 us walk across campus to Nora Chambers so we can brush our teeth and then walk back. We've now given up on decorating and I'm attempting to finish a poetry analysis paper. Tomorrow should be fun. Andrea and I are goin to the junkyard to find toliet seats and hood ornaments. And I have no classes. Ok, well now apparently I'm off to help steal campus property...I mean, what? we're simply going to get a bush and gravel and fake poinsettas and wreath from Jessica's car!

So I've been back at school for not even 5 hours and I'm already about ready to fling myself off the top of my dorm. Sadly, I don't think it'd do much good considering it's only 3 stories. Who knows...maybe the Humanities building would be good..or the PCSU. Stress is already setting in. 3 papers due tomorrow. 11 observation hours and 2 notebooks due by Friday. Can you tell I'm a little worried?

Thankgiving Break has been pretty good. There's been a couple of not so great moments, but overall it's been good. Tuesday I hung out w/Carol. Wednesday and Thursday I spent with my family. Today I slept until forever, went out to eat w/Katie and then we walked around the square and went shopping. I got amazing shoes so that was cool! Tomorrow I'm not sure what the morning will bring, but I get to spend most of the night at the Millers' house watching Christmas movies and hanging out w/the youth group! So yea....it's been good and hopefully will only get better. I'm really not lookin foward to goin back to classes and enormous amounts of work on Monday...

So I was sitting up, reading about questioning God, purpose in life, etc. I really like the way Rob Bell puts it in Velvet Elvis.

"Questions are not scary.

What is scary is when people don't have them.

What is tragic is faith that has no room for them......

And this is why questions are so central to faith. A question by its very nature acknowledges that the person asking the question does not have all the answers. And because the person does not have all of the answers, they are looking outside themselves for guidance........

David says this to God in Psalms 13: "How long, Lord? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? How long must I wrestle with my thoughts and day after day have sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy triumph over me? Look on me and answer"

Questions. Questions. Questions.

Central to the Christian experience is the art of questioning God. Not belligerent, arrogant questions that have no respect for our maker, but naked, honest, vulnerable, raw questsion arising in the awe that comes from engaging the living God.

This type of questioning frees us. Frees us from having to have it all figured out. Frees us from having answers to everything. Frees us from always having to be right. It allows us to have moments when we come to the end of our ability to comprehend. Moments when the silence is enough.

The Christian faith is mysterious to the core. It is about things and beings that ultimately cannot be put into words. Language fails. And if we do definitively put God into words, we have at that very moment made God something God is not."

I like that he views questioning God, something I do a lot of, as something essential and necessary, rather than something taboo and wrong. And he even makes it clear that even if you do get an answer, there will always be another question. The questions never stop simply because God is more than we can see, feel, imagine, or understand. We serve someone so powerful He is beyond comprehension.

Later in the book Rob Bell points out we all think that we don't do enough with our lives. That we're always missing something. Not good enough. Not our ideal perfect. Life isn't what we want it to be. But he points out that along the way people tend to pick up an ideal of how they should be...

"They have this image they picked up over the years of how they are supposed to act and look and work and play and talk, and it's like a voice that never stops shouting in their ear."

He says, as he was told, that the only way to overcome that is "to kill your superwhatever" and go about life doing simply the only thing we were created to do..."Your job is the relentless pursuit of who God made you to be"

Both of those passages spoke quite a bit to me about various things going on in life right now and I just thought I'd share them.

for a current situation.

 I cry out loudly to God, loudly I plead with God for mercy.
   I spill out all my complaints before him,
      and spell out my troubles in detail: 
"As I sink in despair, my spirit ebbing away,
      you know how I'm feeling,
   Know the danger I'm in,
      the traps hidden in my path.
   Look right, look left—
      there's not a soul who cares what happens!
   I'm up against it, with no exit—
      bereft, left alone.
   I cry out, God, call out:
      'You're my last chance, my only hope for life!'
   Oh listen, please listen;
      I've never been this low.
   Rescue me from those who are hunting me down;
      I'm no match for them.
   Get me out of this dungeon
      so I can thank you in public.
   Your people will form a circle around me
      and you'll bring me showers of blessing!"   (Psalm 142, Message)

Home tomorrow. Thank goodness. Although I will have the feeling there will be times of complete boredom, so give me a call or somethin if you wanna hang out.

So the weekend turned out to be a pretty good. One of the best I've had in a while. Now I get to do way too much work today, and then come home tomorrow for about 5 days or so. Hopefully that'll go well. And besides, I found out last night my favorite person in the entire world is home from the Marines, so I can't wait to get back to see him.

So far this weekend has been pretty good. Yesterday I got to go to Stuart Elementary to get in some of my observation hours in a CDC classroom. There were 7 kids, all with different disorders, some with mulitple disorders, and I loved it there. I miss being in the classroom every day getting to work w/special ed. But I spent about 3 hours there and then went to Chattanooga to meet the youth group for convention. It was decent I guess. It just kinda seems like every year that convention lacks more and more. But it was good to be with the youth group, and the weekend has been interesting to say the least.