Well it is about time. . .

Ok I know I know it has been sssoo long since I blogged.  Believe me I have felt it too.  My friend LeeAnn told me on thursday night while we were supposed to be doing homework "You need to blog!!"  So LeeAnn this is for you haha.  

Right now I am sitting at the in-laws house in Tyler watching some hum-drum football game on the T.V.  I am glad we were able to come this weekend, it has been a while since we were able to be up here and see everybody.  I enjoy weekends here, nice and relaxing, and just a change of scenery.  I wish we didn't have to go back so soon.  

School, oh school. . . To say I am tired of it would be an understatement.  I am just ready for this whole semester to be done with and know I have only one more to make it through until I graduate.  I can do it!!  LOL . . . we are almost into our 6th week of school, and that is just crazy!!!  And I was talking to one of my classmates who said there were only 9 weeks of school left!!  Wow, that is so quick!  For all of the things I have to be doing, and everything that is due, I need more time!  Yikes!!

This past week has been ok.  Mark and  I have both had touches of colds at points, that really didn't help my motivation factor in the slightest!!  I just didn't want to get out of bed, my head felt heavy, my nose was runny, my eyes were itchy, it just wasn't good.  Mark had an itchy throat so we were just done for.  

I got in our wedding photos, and am going to try to get a slide show on here going so yall can see them!  I am excited about having these and being able to put them up.  

Been a While

Well it has been quite a while hasn't it?  Hurricane Ike came through, and left us with no power and no internet for a couple of days.  I am happy to say it is all now back to normal.  I guess I can tell you about this past weekend though, it was eventful.

We started out on Friday night having 3 different offers to go do things!!  We had already committed to going over to our Sunday School friends' house Thursday night, and were ssoo excited about it.  We went to Philip and Nicole's on Friday evening to play games and hang out.  We ended up staying out there until 1 AM!!  We had a blast just talking, laughing, competing, and learning new games!  We enjoyed getting to see their house and dream a little bit outside our tiny one bedroom. We left Longview with Ike on its way and settled down into a good sleep. 

Saturday morning, after a late start, we got up to the beginnings of Ike.  The winds were picking up and the clouds were moving fast.  We walked outside to find out neighbors, Channin' and Brad standing outside evaluating the storm like we were.  We all decided after breakfast to go over to their house and watch a movie they had rented.  After the movie was over we played on the computers for a little while then went back home for lunch.  They also let us borrow "Sleepless in Seattle" which I have never seen, so Mark and I watched that (can you tell it was a slow lazy weekend).  By this time, the storm was really starting to pick up.  It was raining and the wind was howling!!  We stepped outside again, and decided along with our neighbors (Channin' and Brad, along with Trent, Michelle, and Jodie Trent's brother) to go outside and play in it!  This was so much fun!  We ran up to the football field where there is this steep hill, grabbed a football arm pad thing, and started racing!  It was awesome!  The boys brought a football so they got dirty doing that.  An ETBU staff member drove by and laughed at us saying "I thought married people were supposed to be more mature."  

By the time we decided to head back the wind was so strong that it was making the small rain drops sting our bodies!  When we reached our house we realized we had no power!  So what does that leave us to do, but get together and play more games.  We played Mad Gab until we couldn't see anymore, tried to go and find something open in Marshall (which there wasn't anything), and then headed out to my grandparent's house which had a generator and my family.  

Sunday morning Mark didn't have to go to work, which meant no church, because the power was out there as well.  We began hanging out with family, making breakfast, playing games, that sort of thing.  I got started on a children's book I have to make this semester, so that felt good to get one of my long term projects going.  My parents' electricity finally came back on so we all packed up and went over there until around 9 when we heard our power was back up and running!

Macedonia's power was not back up and running, so as I got up at 7:30 to get ready for class, my husband got to stay in the bed and sleep away the day!  He got the day off that day and was able to spend it running, working out, doing laundry, things of that sort.  I love it when he gets days off, they are just good to have every once in a while.  That night I got invited over to LeeAnn's room to watch a movie around 10.  Adam had just come over and all, but when I told Mark he was like "Kristen go, you are still in college go and have fun."  He was still up waiting on me when I got back!  Isn't that romantic?  Tuesday there was still no power which meant he was home again!  One great thing was that I was home all day as well!  We just got to hang out and sleep in, work out together, have a picnic, just fun stuff!  

That now brings us to today!  I am not feeling so hot as of right now.  I was kept up for most of the night with a hurting stomach!  I concealed my discomfort from Mark until he woke me up this morning before he left to tell me goodbye.  If I remember right I rolled over and went "I'm sick."  He asked me what hurt and I told him my belly did.  He was genuinely concerned and said he was sorry.  He then rubbed my belly until I fell back asleep!  Isn't he just the best man ever!  So caring, loving, compassionate!  I couldn't ask for more, I have far more than I deserve.  I am now going to work on the homework I didn't get done yesterday because he was here.  I think I will be able to have everything done though!  Tomorrow I take the practice Generalist test, a test preparing me for the one I have to pass to get my certification.  Hopefully all goes well!  Congratulations if you made it all the way through without getting board, sorry if this was long and not really entertaining lol.

Almost there

Well we are almost there, almost to the weekend!  I am so happy that Wednesday has now come and gone! This semester is flying by in a flash and I am struggling to keep up with it and keep my head above water.  I am teaching my first of two lessons tomorrow at Harleton in Mrs. Brown's third grade class.  We will be learning subjects and predicates and I am PRAYING  I do ok, I really don't want to screw these kids up for life!  I don't think I can do that much damage, but I really do want to do well.  Pray all my activities work like they are supposed to and the children are receptive to what I have to say. 

I am in the bed right now blogging before I go to sleep because as I have said before this is a release to me of sorts.  Even if I have nothing to say I feel as if I should write something down, if for no reason than just to get the itch out of my system.  Mark is turned away from me snoring away, Wednesdays are LONG days for him and he comes home around 9 exhausted!  He had a throbbing headache when he got home, so he went to sleep earlier today.  I am not tired yet, so this is my something to do.

I always feel so guilty when I write these things though.  I don't know if my friend LeeAnn, who is also in my unit group feels the same way, but I always think I could be doing something more productive for school.  In a way, I am right, but then again not.  It is like I told some friends the other night when they asked if I had any homework I needed to be doing.  I told them "Sadly, there is ALWAYS something I can be working on at any given moment" and it stands completely true.  I should always be doing more lessons, writing more reviews or reflections, doing my technical writing that I have yet to complete, writing lessons for a dumb unit, heck even thinking about lessons for the thing lol.  However, I have come to learn that sometimes you need to just put those things aside (even if just for the 20 minutes it takes to blog) and not think about them at all.  I find that the more I dwell on those things that I have to do that are due later on in the semester the more nervous and stressed I become (duh).  So yeah, sometimes I just have to make that choice.  

Just in case you're wondering, Mark and I are doing well, still loving being married and getting to know each other the longer we are together.  It is so fun to just become accustomed to another completely new person.  There is something to laugh about everyday.  That is what I tell him off and on "I never thought I would laugh with you this much!"  It is such a joy to find joy in one another and it makes me sad to think that some couples don't anymore.  I want to always laugh together, at each other, because of something on the T.V., just laugh.  By the way, Mark is still loving his job at Macedonia Baptist being the assistant (or associate, I never can remember the correct term) worship pastor there.  He has relaxed some about the whole find a job thing, which I really think he needed to do, even if only for a little while.  He loves the kids and enjoys his co-workers so we are blessed.  The latest thing he really wants is a motorcycle!  I am certainly not to keen on the idea, and mind you he wont get one anytime soon, but that is the latest development here.    

So now that I have bored you with absolutely nothing, since nothing has really gone on today, I guess I will let you go.  Please pray for me tomorrow as I teach the same lesson 3 times to the third grade throughout the day!  I think I am going to need it!

  

Wonderful Weekends

I have got to say I LOVE weekends!  I cannot tell you how much I look forward to them!  I am sure I have said this in previous posts, but it is so true!!!  This past weekend was a doozy to say the least.  It started with Mark and I going back to Harleton Baptist to help with a little messy back to school bash for the youth!  It was fun, gross, messy, crazy, and everything in between.  I think the kids had a good time so that is always a good thing.  Anyways we left there maybe around ten or a little before, came back, got showered and ready for bed, and were eating a late night snack when my mom called.  

It was around 11 and she told us that Adam had flipped his truck, he was alright walking around, but they were taking him to the hospital just incase.  They had been putting new gravel on the road, and it hadn't had oil put on top of it or anything yet so it was loose.  He had set his cruise control to 55 or so and was 100 feet from the end of the loose stuff when his back tires fishtailed, he over corrected and flipped once into a ditch!!  So we left and went to the hospital where they were all there in the waiting room.  They called him back and mom came out at 1 and told us it would be a while and Adam said to just go home.  They ended up getting back around 4:30 after a CAT scan and x-rays that revealed a broken vertebra in his back (it isn't on the actual spine it is just the little wingy thing which is good).  He is so blessed that it was not worse than that.  He has no scratches or anything, just a swollen back with a strawberry on it.  God kept his hand over him for sure.  

We went out to Harleton to my parents' house Saturday to see everyone and check on bubba.  He was doing good, just sore!  We ate supper and all out there, went and saw my grandmother, uncle, and cousins.  I hadn't been out there in at least a month so it was nice to be there again.  Mark and I looked at each other and said we needed to go out there alot more than we do!  We enjoy being there and regret we doin't go out there more than we do.  I love my family, and I am so blessed to have them!

 

So happy for the weekend!

So TGIF, thank goodness it's Friday!!  I am sooo happy it is the weekend I cannot even tell you!  I woke up Wednesday thinking it was Friday and I really wished it was!!  This week was ssoo long it felt like it would never come to an end!  Alas, it has, and there is no one here that is happier than I am!  

It seems so funny that the busiest time in my life is the time I actually take to sit down and blog more.  I think I need it as a type of therapy haha!  I have really enjoyed it, I don't know how many people read this, how exciting our lives really are, or anything like that, but I guess I have figured out it is more for me anyway.  

I have been not feeling well this entire week, and let me tell ya, when I don't feel good, I let you know.  So poor Mark has been having to deal with me all week!  He has been so great though, fixing me dinner, telling me I will be ok, telling me I am pretty when I feel horrible!!  He just does sssoo much for me, I have been so blessed by him, so so blessed!

I went out to Harleton to intern again for the second time.  I was alot of fun, and I am really liking being out there for interning as opposed to Marshall.  It is so nice to be in a place were most people know you, you work with people who taught you, and it is just a much nicer and more open school to be in and around.  The kids are great and I really enjoy the third grade.  I have already planned the lesson I am going to do this coming up week, and I think I am ready to do it.  I have to get some other things in order to get it all complete, but not right now, not today I am taking it easy!  Well I feel as if I am babbling so I am going to go and get some rest!

Yours God. . .

I should be doing a slew of other things, working out, homework, cleaning the house, but I knew I had to blog about this before anything else happened.  

I hate how life gets sometimes, especially mine now that I am back in school, with a full 18 hours worth of make up classes!  I will be the very first to tell you I have the absolute worst case of senioritis known to man right now.  I am bitter about having to be in stupid classes, where I don't learn anything, feel like I am wasting my time, and doing meaningless busy work.  I am bitter about having to play catch up because of one bad advisor meeting my sophomore year.  I could probably continue, but you don't want to hear it, and I do not need to dwell on it anymore.  

I was sitting in my car about to get out after a long day of classes and dreading how it hasn't ended yet and everything else I had to do that day.  Then I tuned into what was on my radio at the moment and heard the voice of Steven Curtis Chapman singing the chorus to his song "Yours".  He is saying over and over again "Its all Yours God, Yours God, everything is Yours.  From the stars in the sky to the depths of the ocean floor.  Its all Yours God, Yours God, everything is Yours.  You're the Maker and Keeper, Father and Ruler of everything."  And although the actual song has nothing to do with my tired worn out academic mind and body, it spoke to me.  I realized that no matter what was going on, marriage, how many mountains of homework, tests, clothes, and everything else that is happening in my life right now, none of it is mine.  All my circumstances belong to Him, why am I worried?  

It also sorta echoed what I looked at in my quiet time today too.  It was 1 John 2:28- 3:3.  3:1a says "See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God and so we are."  What a huge blessing that is, and I have been guilty of not abiding in it!  How silly of me to do something like that!  No matter how stressed out I get, or busy, or crazy, or anything, it is all His and I am His child, a gift like nothing else.

Sorry I wasn't meaning to preach at yall, I just had this revelation, and had to document it and get it all out!  

September Already!

Yep, it is already September! Where has time gone? Seriously, the year seems to be just flying by so fast!! I am afraid this semester is going to do the same thing! I was telling one of my classmates last week that there seems to be so much work that is due during the semester that it is making it seem shorter than it really is. I am afraid I am not going to be able to accomplish it all! I think that every semester it seems like, and somehow I always end up pulling through, but still it is scary at the beginning.

Today is labor day, a day when everyone should be off of work and out of school, but no, ETBU is gay and classes are happening! Right now I am in the library because Mark and Matt are at my house enjoying their day off playing nintendo! So jealous! I just cannot believe that we have to be here! I'm a little bitter about it if you can't tell! Anyways, so any plans for the holiday went right out the window. However, I am so blessed by an amazing husband, who between the time I left and came back from class (roughly an hour) he had put ALL the laundry in the wash, was hung up our shower rod, and was hanging the closet rod for the rest of our clothes! Talk about being excited, I was sssoo happy!

Yesterday was a great day. We didn't have to be at the church at 8 AM, nor did we have church that night, so we didn't have to be abck at 3:30! We took a LONG nap which was SSSOOO GOOD, at were just lazy for a few hours. When then headed to Longview to a Sunday School get together at Nicole and Phillip's house. We had a blast at our first married Sunday School thing. Mark was talking about it this morning and how this is something we will be doing for the rest of our lives, being at married socials, and how it was a blast!

Saturday we had a great day too! I cannot tell you how much I look forward to the weekends! Seriously they are like gold to me. We woke up late, went over to eat breakfast at Matt and Sarah's, came back and just layed around I think, then got ready to go to Jefferson. We went with Matt and Sarah, and had a great time. I never really think about Jefferson being a tourist town or whatever since I have lived around here all my life, but it really is. I was excited to tell them all about it, what little I knew, and just go and have fun! I got a flat wallet, something I had been wanting for a while, so that was a nice little treat! I will try to remember to posts some pictures later today of the outing! We then ended the day by watching our wedding (my idea of course) and reliving that wonderful day! It was so neat to go back and look and see some of the things we missed!

The looming storms from Gustav are heading our way. ETBU is housing evacuees in one of its gyms, ones that have medical needs. There was also a family of five move in right beside us Saturday night. It made me realized how blessed we are to live where we do. I also got scared and was like "Mark what would we do, what would we take, what would we leave?" I cannot imagine loading up in my car with as much stuff as I could and leaving everything else! I guess I have more of an awarness about it now than I did with Katrina, because I am on my own and older. Sorta one of those, I just now realized I have sorta grown up moments.

Anyways, well chapel hour is almost up and I probably should print out my homework and head to class! Please pray for all those misplaced by the hurricane, especially as it hits today!