after watching all the news and twitter feeds about connecticut, i started kind of having a panic attack/feeling clausterphobic, so I decided I needed some pretty scenery and a nice run.

maybe just because I was focusing on them, but there were kids EVERYONE. kid's happy that they got early release on the last day of school before Christmas break. Kids talking about their Christmas lists. Kids loud and screaming ALL over the park. All I could think about was the 20 sets of parents across the country that would give anything to hear their babies screaming and running around the park.

i was just so sad. i was pretty much alone on the tree-lined trail and I came around the corner and saw this random little tree decorated.

i burst into blubbery tears and literally was sobbing so loud and hard that I couldn't see out of my tear stained eyes. It was what my heart needed. It was like in ALLLLLL the forest-y trees, someone knew we needed a shining light right here.

it's the simple things. it really is.
god is good, all the time.
all the time, god is good.

i feel like i was chanting this all day in my head.

hug your babies a little tighter today, and take a few extra seconds to soak in the REAL beauty of christmas. whether its the sound of the red bell ringer at the grocery store or the tinsel covered fir tree on the boulevard trail.

i'm sad

i'm sad.

the tv is on sports a lotttt in this household and that means when I get sick of watching sports my eyes go to the little ticker that goes across the bottom with "breaking" sports news.

just this week,

a 25 year old Kansas City Chiefs player killed his girlfriend and then committed suicide at the football stadium, leaving behind his 3 month old baby girl.

then on Saturday it was a Dallas Cowboy who has been charged with intoxicated manslaughter. He was driving drunk when his Mercedes crashed and his teammate was killed. His same teammate that he also played college football with.

Sometimes we get to watch non-sports related things and I get to see non-sports related news.

the story about the nurse that was at the receiving end of that prank phone call about Princess Kate and her pregnancy? She committed suicide. You guys. A radio station prank called the hospital and pretended to be the King and Queen and asked to talk to their granddaughter Kate. The mother of two nurse put them through to a triage nurse who gave them details.

Heck, while I was in the bathroom at the tennis club this weekend before our match started I heard a pre-teen girl (probably about ten) talking to her mom about how some other girls in her PE class told everything that they saw her the extra large tag on her t-shirt in her locker and they went and told all the boys.

break.my.heart.

it's so easy in this time of reality tv, athletes being paid INSANE amounts of money to throw around a ball, and when famous celebrities weddings cost more than I will make in my lifetime. (cough, cough Justin Timberlake + Jessica Biel. :) i get caught up in it too. Well that kicker for that football team deserves to be ridiculed, his ONLY job is to kick field goals and get paid millions of dollars. how dare he miss. and i also am not advocating drunk driving and being reckless. I think actually that is the problem. Too many of us think we are just too invincible.

i guess my heart is just sad. sad for the pranks that get taken just a smidge too far. sad for the young lives SO full of potential that end too short. Sad that is what our news has to be about.

i probably should have been nicer to that 12 year old girl from the locker room when she cut me in line for the water fountain. I guess I shouldn't be so envious of football players younger than me with bank accounts full to the tens of millions. we all have battles that we deal with, and I just wanna learn to approach everyone with love. i think the world really needs that right now.

life lately

i feel like the last few years, i was spoiled in the sense of not having to do "chores". (don't act shocked.) :)

I worked, lived with my parents, dated drew and worked out. 

i didn't worry about my laundry, about grocery-shopping about making sure the leaves aren't clogging the drain in the front yard, about just who exactly does vacuum up all the pine needles that fall from the christmas tree. 

i had time to write cards, to bake new recipes, make crafts and pin awesome things on pinterest. 

but i think that also left a lot of time for me to think about things. think about life. which is GOOD, but at the same time, I think a lot of my anxiety, depression came from just having to much time to ponder things. 

i have been feeling SO much better the last year or so, and I think a big part of that is due to the fact that I am BUSY. When you have laundry to do and beds to make, there isn't as much time for my brain to worry about "silly" impractical things. i have been so busy with happy life things. I love when life is like that :)

as of lately:

last week while I was in Seattle for the GRE I got to go see one day old baby Jonah Grey. I love him. He is perfect. and his momma did such a fabulous job. so did daddy and big sister :)

and newborn baby presents? is there anything cuter? i think not.

drew and i played in the Holiday Open tennis tournament this weekend. we won our first match and then lost our next one in a CLOSE third set. :( Drew braided my hair before our match on Friday night so I could have a "tennis player braid." not too shabby drewski :) hahaha

we also have been busy bees getting the house ready for CHRISTMAS. picking out a CHristmas tree was quite the event in our house growing up. perhaps because my dad is a PERFECTIONIST and it took quiiite awhilel to find the "perfect" tree. 

thus, I have HIGH expectations for my christmas tree. i don't think poor Drew knew what he was getting himself into.

we found a tree and then let me tell ya. Drew got into decorating. He was looking at the tree from every angle making sure we didn't need to clip any more branches. He almost was worse than my dad. I created a monster :)

"When we  ask our children 'What do you want for Christmas?', we are asking a question that breeds selfishness.  

In order to develop selflessness we should be asking 'What are you going to give?'  

Christmas is the celebration of God's great gift- giving -" 

~robert flatt

gre

i took the GRE this morning.

(the GRE is not to be confused with the GED. no offense to GED recipients, but when a couple people have asked me what I have been studying for and I say the GRE, they think I am saying the GED. what do i say to that? no, actually. it's a test to get into graduate school, not a high school diploma. anyway you say that phrase you just come out sounding snobby. but really. they are't the same test :)

regardless, i took that darn test. 

there are only two places in WA state that offer the test and one happened to be RIGHT down the street from where my sister leaves. She so kindly took me in for the evening. Things were going fabulous until I took a shower in the morning at the crack of dawn and realized UMM... I FORGOT TO PACK PANTS! hahaha. i don't know why, it just seemed so funny to me. I had been so engrossed in cramming my brain with vocabulary words and math equations I had forgotten to pack any pants. nothing some good work khakis from the day before can't fix. 

after i solved the pants dilemma, i worked my way to my sisters kitchen where she had so kindly gotten me my favorite oatmeal cup (purple lid! try it!) for a power breakfast. You are supposed to microwave it for 50 seconds but when I pushed the 5 button, it went to five minutes. I thought okay. I'll just watch it for 50 seconds and we'll be good...

three minutes later. 

oatmeal ALLL over the microwave and lovely toasted oats :(

i get to the testing center and after having to empty out all my pockets, take off my shoes and be run through a metal detector, I was ready to take that flipping test. 

oh yeah. they also allowed you TWO tissues. 

as in I have a runny nose and I was allowed to bring in TWO tissues for the four hour test. and yes, they counted the tissues.

you get your scores right after the test so two numbers pop up on the screen. I run into the car, get out my phone and start goggling my scores. 

i first read something that talks about how 170 was a perfect score. 

umm.. i wasn't that far off from that. HOLLLLLA.

a little more research? one number signals like a 10% percentile change. haha. so three points? oh just a change of close to 30%. hahaha. so maybe I didn't do quite so hot. 

more research.

i find a blog thread about someone lamenting their awful scores and how they will NEVER get into their program. (same scores as me and I start to feel a little defeated.)

I read one and see they are applying to Duke school of Engineering. so okay. perhaps I wouldn't get into that program. 

the more I research, the more I realized I did fine. 

not EXCELLENT, but above average. :)

and for someone who forgot to pack pants and who exploded oatmeal in the microwave, i'll take it :)

P.S. "bonhomie" means good-natured, easy friendliness. definitely got that one wrong. :) whoooops :)

last year, my friend Jill from work and I made these and had them on our desks for the month of December. the goal? to remind us of our challenge. To not buy anything for ourselves from 12-1 to Christmas. 

i mean, yes. I can buy lunch and the occasional latte, but it more relates to clothes, makeup etc. stuff I really can do without. yes, I know lattes fit into that catergory as well, but that's not the way we set up our little challenge. and it's my challenge so i can choose :)

i had completely forgotten about this until Jill texted me Saturday asking if we were doing it again. 

i tried to think of excuses. 

there are none. 

i can do it.

here goes :) 

decisions, decisions!

well. i watched our wedding video again tonight. and i really love it. and miss jessica paige who comes home on tuesday for christmas break. :)

you should watch it again, too :)

while the wedding video highlights the beautiful essence of the wedding, looking at all the little details brought me back to (cringe) ALL THOSE DARN DECISIONS.

what stencil should I get to paint the direction signs? i probably went to 4 different crafts stores debating which stencils to use. ( i really don't like italic fonts. and allll the stencils seemed to be italics. get with it, people :)

these feelings may or may not also be stirring up because of my lovely sister's upcoming nuptials (they picked a date, by the way!) and my incessant searching for the perfect bridesmaid dress :)

it happens to me ALL the time.

silly, silly SILLY things. and i mean, yes, i think it is normal to shop around and want to find exactly what you are looking for.

but mine gets a liiiiitle out of control.  difficult choice.

but then this weekend my little trip to the mall where the rugs were HALF off caused a near-panic attack. 

this was the first round, where I think I sat on an ottoman for at LEAST twenty minutes deciding between patterned and solid. 

i started to get really sweaty, kinda shaking and my sister, drew and my mom weren't responding to my picture texts for input. 

i decided i needed some air. I walked back to Target, got my car and then drove around the mall to where the rug's were.

then I found these, and "narrowed" down the decision? 

yep, i had taken over two aisles and the beginning of the bath towel section. and yep, people got the evil eye when they walked over the rugs. 

i felt paralyzed. i could not for the LIFE of me make a decision. Normally when this happens, I get so scared of making the wrong decision and having buyer's regret that I usually just leave and don't get anything. I started walking away when I got sidetracked by Marc Anthony's new clothesline for me. march anthony??? i was thinking to myself, "what would Drew do if I brought him home his silky button up and said it was designed by Marc Anthony?" 

after that mild distraction, I realized I was going to suck it up and go pick out a gosh darn rug for drew's little "man cave" room.

I almost eenie-miney minnie-moed which one and off I ran to the checkstand before I could change my mind. 

that night, I read the chapter in Angie Smith's newest book called "mended" about choice. 

Angie, like me and LOTS of other women I know, have a hard time deciding between the 56 flavors of   grape jelly in the grocery store, or the smells of the zillion different hair deep conditioners. 

"we are tempted to believe that we are one step away from the thing that will make everything else go away. If we can smell every bottle of cheap shampoo we can get our hands on, we might find the one that makes him love us more. If we buy the right Barbie, then she won't remember the times I've not been patient.

I don't need a thousand choices in this life, I need Him"

this could be pertain to lots of different choices. right and wrong choices. moral choices and unhealthy choices. but i also think it means that I am giving "first world" problems and insignificant decisions way too much power and room in my life. 

when i let those pesky things bother me and put me in a tizzy, I need to remember to take deep breaths like my psychologist says and think really the only choice I need to make. day in and day out. 

and p.s.

drew liked the rug. in fact, he got home from his work trip and I found him in the "man cave," video game on, headset on, MICROPHONE down so he can talk to people while he plays??!?! and frozen peas down this pants because he hurt his hip at tennis and was icing his leg. ahahaha. i was dying. 

i asked him if he liked the new rug, and he said, "huh? that's new? yeah, it's nice."

:)

"it always comes down to choosing Him. In a world overrun with choices, He is our choice."