Disneyland!

Disneyland really is the happiest place on Earth! Or at least it's tied with Disney World! It was a perfect day for Disney yesterday and we weren't the only ones who thought so. The place was packed with people spending their spring break in this magical place. The crowds were a little much but they offered a lot in the way of people watching. We saw some interesting people.

The day started off in line for Space Mountain. It was a good move on our part because the wait was less than an hour but we were in front of a really obnoxious family. They kept yelling and bumping into us. Space Mountain was fun and a lot like Space Mountain in Disney World. Next stop was lunch. But only after taking a few picture of the castle. The castle in Disneyland is a lot smaller. I noticed on the map (We didn't actually have a map until the day was more than half way over) that it was sleeping beauty's castle while I think the one is Disney World is Cinderella's castle. We had lunch and then were off to find more rides to ride. We tried Pirates of the Caribbean but when we couldn't even find the end of the line we abandoned that idea for the time. We got in line for Splash Mountain. It was suppose to be a 2 hour wait but it think it would have been more like a 3 hour wait. During this wait we saw lots of intresting people. Starting with this lady in front of us wearing a leather jacket. Now I don't think it was a real leather jacket but it was hot out. It was around 85 degrees and we spent a good part of the line directly in the sun. She was not dressed apropriately for a water ride or a day at Disneyland. We also saw a lot of people wearing rompers. I'm not really sure why these are the style this season. The are a one piece short and shirt outfit and not attractive on anyone. At one point I saw a whole family sporting the look. A mom, and her 2 daughters all three wearing the romper. The line was long but had some entertainment. Luckily, about an hour and half into it, this lady stopped and asked if we wanted their fast passes. We weren't saying no to that so we hopped in the fast pass line and got on the ride much quicker. We were lucky enough to be in the front and I was in the very front of the log flume. I was soaked. I picked my purse up just in time before it got soaked like my right foot. I was so wet, I'm afraid you could see my underwear through my shorts. The next important stop was for Mickey Mouse ice cream. It was delish too.

One of the things I was really looking forward to on this trip to Disneyland was a picture with a character. I was a little disappointed because not many characters were to be found. When we first got there, we saw Mickey and Goofy. I know I should have wanted my picture with Mickey but come on. I wanted a princess. Then while in line for Space Mountain we saw Buzz Lightyear. I would've definitely gone for a pic with him. In Critter Corner we saw Pooh and Tigger but they've never been my favorites either. I left a little disappointed when no character could be found for my picture.

Next stop was the Haunted Mansion. The wait wasn't bad. It was a little scary at first when you seemed locked in a room that's moving and has a body suspended above you. Then you get on a carriage type ride and go through the house looking a ghosts and ghouls. I wasn't scared but there were a lot of crying children in there. I'm not sure what the point in taking your child on a scary ride is but there were plenty of parents there that didn't feel the same way. The Pirates of Caribbean ride line had finally calmed down and the wait was only about 15 minutes. I had been on the one in Disney World before the movies came out. This one was redone to feature Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow. I'm not going to lie there were a couple of times I tried to get Katie to stop the boat so I could jump ship for some gold and Johnny.

It was time for a pick me up in the way of a churro and a diet coke. Now here is where Disneyland has Disney World beat. The churro. I'm fairly certain there are not churro stands all over the park in Disney World like there were in Disneyland. Katie got our churros and I got a fastpass for Thunder Mountain. The churro was soooo good. Cinnamon and crunchy and soft all at the same time. I'm pretty sure that's the only churro I've ever had that didn't come from Taco Bell. While waiting to be able to ride Thunder Mountain, we wandered into fantasyland through the castle. I tried to get someone to take our picture in front of the castle but had no luck. I kept my eyes open for a princess to get my picture made with but had no luck. I did convince Katie to ride the teacups and they were just as fun as I had remembered. There's something about spinning around faster and faster at the Mad Hatter's Tea Party.

I really wanted to ride the Dumbo ride but the line was crazy long so I settled for the Matterhorn rollercoaster. It was a good one but kind of jerky. Our last ride for the day was Thunder Mountain. Now there is one of these at Disney World. I think that the only time we tried to ride it, it got shut down for some reason. It was definitely a good rollercoaster. It might've been my favorite one all day.

Our last stop for the day was of course the World of Disney gift shop for souvenirs for all my loved ones. Including Sophie, my unborn neice. She's definitely on her way to being spoiled already. I bought her two presents and had a I seen the books they had I might have bought her another. But every girl needs Minnie Mouse ears with her name on it.
All in all, it was a very magical day.
Disneyland where all your dreams come true!

California, California, Here I come!

I'm finally in California for spring break. I feel like I've been planning this trip forever and can't believe it's actually here. Of course I've only been here for maybe an hour and a half. I'm waiting at Katie's apartment for her to get home from class. Then I'll feel like my trip has really started.
My adventure started off with a bang this morning. or maybe I should say a shout. I was waiting in line to check in with the airline and get my boarding pass. They were forming two lines depending on where you were going: Denver or Chicago. Apparently this older man in front of me didn't realize that. He finally got up to the kiosk and started raising quite the fuss. He was yelling that these people who got there 30 minutes after him had already checked in and he was quite upset about it. The man assisting him tried to calm him down but it was not successful. Meanwhile, he was scaring this lady who had never flown before. She didn't want to get on teh plane with him. So the lady assissting her, started telling the older man he was going to be known as the mean old man and no one would want to fly with him. This didn't seem to calm him down either. But he went on his merry way with his boarding pass and we were all on the plane together later. Then when I was going to board the plane I got flagged for what I thought was extra security. I was taken behind this wall to what reminded me of a cubicle. I thought they were going to search my purse and backpack but no they just swabbed my hands for explosive residue. So I guess I look like I make bombs or something. It was weird.
Then the guy sitting next to me was some kind of special agent who had papers where he was escorting a prisoner. Now I never saw the prisoner. I'm just nosy and saw the note he had from teh pilot and the official documents. My nosiness also led me to read this email or text he had on his blackberry. The font was huge it was just inviting me to take a look. He was broken up with over email or text right before the flight attendants told him he had to put all electronic devices up. He was a very nervous guy after that. He played with his phone the rest of the time even though I think they were suppose to be off. Then when we landed he was on it so fast trying to get in contact with the woman. Or at least that's what I'm thinking he was doing.
My day was off to an adventurous start! Sunny California, I'm here and ready for some fun!

Spring Break is almost here!

I have three and a half days until I am on spring break. But I'm not counting or anything. I really hope I make it until then. My kids have spring fever big time and they are driving me crazy. The weather has not been conducive to taking them outside but it's looking better for the rest of the week. They are wild and crazy savages instead of sweet funny kindergartners. They've stopped listening and they've stopped doing what I tell them to do. It's enough to make a grown woman cry. But thankfully, a week from today I'll be on my way to sunny California to see my soulmate. I can't wait. I can't wait to spend the whole week with her and I can't wait for the sunshine and warm weather. I'm looking forward to some time at the pool laying in the sun reading books. I'm also very excited about going to a winery and Disneyland.
On Thursday I'll know if I am going to have a niece or a nephew and of course am going to buy them a present from Disneyland. I have a feeling this is just the beginning of the souvenirs I'll buy for my niece or nephew on my travels. I can't wait. Being an aunt is going to be awesome. Friday I had a girls night with the high school girls and we tie dyed. I bought onesies and everyone got to tie dye one for the baby. They turned out so cute and the girl thought of the baby as part of their family too. It was really cute and sweet. I love those girls. It's funny that they have become like my family. It is so hard to make friends as you get older but I'm lucky enough to get to hang out with a great group of youth every week.

Spirtual Vitamins

I have been feeling the winter blahs here lately. All the snow and gloom has made me feel down. Supposedly when we lack sunshine, we can develop a vitamin D deficiency that can affect our moods. I think I have been lacking vitamin D. I usually feel it when I have forgotten to take my vitamin or my eating habits have been lacking. I feel tired and cranky. My hair stops growing and all my nails break. I can tell I’m vitamin deficient. But what about our spiritual vitamins? Do we know when we are lacking in our relationship with God? Do we feel different when we aren’t reading and studying our Bible or talking to God on a regular basis?

If you had asked me five years ago where I saw my life going, this is not the destination I would’ve imagined for myself. Five years ago I was living in Nashville and I was just beginning to find my way on my spiritual journey again. I was teaching third grade and thought that was the grade level for me. Now, I’m living back in Gatlinburg teaching Kindergarten and very involved in church. It’s been quite a journey to get here. I usually tell people that I moved back to Gatlinburg because I wanted to be close to my family and I really felt like that was where I was suppose to be. But honestly I was running away. My uncle had been diagnosed with ALS two years before and his health was detoriating. The relationships in my family had been suffering as we watched his health decline. It was too much for me to handle anymore and I ran four hours away from all this pain. Right before school started, my uncle passed away. Even though I knew it was coming, it was still shocking and devasting. I proceeded to close myself off from all reminders of my life before. I began to really believe love was like other four letter words. I started to think that everyone you love leaves at some point. That loving means that you get hurt. So I closed myself off to all possibilities of love. Not just boy girl love but any kind of love. I had a hard time relating to my students. They noticed that I didn’t smile enough and thought that meant I didn’t love them. I didn’t return phone calls from my friends from college or my life in Nashville. I wasn’t in contact with my extended family either. I buried myself in church. I started volunteering with the youth and children ministries hoping that I could forget about my own pain when I was helping others. But even as I was burying myself in church I wasn’t getting my spiritual vitamins. With all the walls I had put up, I was shutting God out as well. I wasn’t developing a real relationship with God because I didn’t trust him fully. It took a mission trip with the high school youth for me to realize this.

It was on this trip that I started to see the walls I had put up. This group didn’t let me keep my walls up. Even though I didn’t know many of the youth well, they forced me to see some things about myself. By seeing how they were interacting with each other and expected me to interact with them, I had to make some changes. It happened in a very interesting way. During a very heated game of catchphrase, boys against girls, I got angry. The buzzer had gone off me at least two times in a row and the third time was the final straw. I slammed the game down and stormed out. Real mature, I know. But I came right back in and kept playing. I realized that being upset about a game and showing it was ok. The kids like to refer to this as the time Kerri hulked out. They had never seen that much emotion from me. After I got home from this trip, I felt like a different person. I realized that I had been going through the motions of being a Christian and that was all. I was blah in my Christianity and my spiritual vitamins had been lacking.

In John 15:1-8, Jesus talks about this difference in our lives when we have our spiritual vitamins.

“I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. ² He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. ³ You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. ⁴ Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me.

⁵ “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. ⁷ But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! ⁸ When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father.

I was a branch severed from the vine and unable to produce fruit. Even though I considered myself a Christian and was attending church, I wasn’t trusting that I was a branch in God. There are still times that I am away from God and lacking in my spiritual vitamins, but I am more aware of it now. I know that to bear fruit, I need to be in relationship with God. I need to be reading my Bible regularly and talking to God everyday. I need to be spending time with the youth who help keep in check with my spiritual vitamins.

To really be a branch, I have to constantly be stretching myself and forcing myself out of my comfort zone. I can not be complacent and go through the motions. I was telling one of the girls in the youth that I was going to be speaking here this morning. She asked me if this was something I wanted to do. Honestly, speaking in front of people is not where I want to be. But I felt like I had no choice that I had to do this. By speaking here, I had to examine my own Christian journey. We can have life away from Jesus and God, but we have much more full and abundant lives though him. We produce much fruit when we are walking with God.

Are your spiritual vitamins depleted? Are you going through the motions but not really feeling it? Find where God is calling you and you’ll find your spiritual vitamins. For me, I feel strongly that I’m called to be a support person, to help with youth and work with girls. These are the places where I get challenged the most and find myself having to trust more in God.

Yesterday was the first day of spring. The sun has been shining and we can get our vitamin D from the sun if we get out it. In the same way we can get our spiritual vitamins from the son, Jesus. Just like you have to make an effort to get vitamin d, you have to make the effort to get your spiritual vitamins. Spend some time in the son today.

Nerves

So this Sunday I'm "preaching" at a small church. I say "preaching" as opposed to preaching because I do not consider myself a preacher. I don't even consider myself a speaker. I'm just trying this out. I feel strongly that I need to do things that stretch myself and challenge myself. Speaking in front of people about God is one of those things. I'm so nervous about it though. I feel like whatever I have to say is stupid and my ideas are not coherent. I've asked several friends to help me with it but in the end it's something I have to rely on God to help me through. And I think that is part of the challenge. I don't like to do things I'm not good at and I don't like to be bad at things I'm doing. But I'm not a great speaker. I teach Kindergarten and get tongue tied doing that sometimes. I like talking to small kids and that's about it. But I know this is something God is calling me to try out. So I'll try it out on Sunday and try not to throw up in the process.

Random Friday

I think my experience on match.com has come full circle. I received an email yesterday from the first guy that I talked to on match.com. He was the one who asked if I was interested in taking a lover. He then emailed me to see if I wanted to get together in which I very nicely responded "no, i think we're interested in different things." Apparently, he thinks I might have changed my mind. Or if I haven't changed my mind a second email will do the trick. The email said "still looking yor hot". No punctuation or correct spelling. I definitely haven't changed my mind. Still not looking to take a lover and a second email with bad grammar and punctuation will not change my mind. I am emailing a new guy who manages some shoe store in the mall. I'm trying to be open minded because he's used to when he means too repeatedly in his emails. I'm trying to not let that be a deal breaker, but it's difficult for this teacher to overlook.
I'm pretty excited about girls' night tonight. I have a fantastic meal planned. Two different homemade pizzas and homemade ice cream sandwiches. The first pizza is going to be a chicken bacon ranch with ranch dressing instead of tomato sauce. The second is going to be a mexican pizza with salsa instead of tomato sauce. Then thin chocolate wafer cookies with either coffee ice cream or chocolate ice cream in between them. I'm looking forward to it. I'm trying out fasting for lent on Fridays. I can't fast completely but I've had only liquids so far today. I'm fasting until sundown and then I can eat. So I'm going to enjoy the pizza and dessert big time. I'm also excited about tonight because we haven't met in a long time and there are going to be some new friends and old friends there. It should be a good night.
Tomorrow my mom, sister and I are going to shop for maternity clothes for my sister. I'm very excited. She's so cute as she's getting into her second trimester.
Lots of randomness today. :)

Glitter

I have this girls ministry that I've started at our church. Some of the youth girls and I get together about once a month to just hang out and have fun. We eat, watch a movie, usually do a devotion and then a craft. The idea has developed over the past year into something really great. I love to be crafty and just planned a craft as an after thought the first time. Since then, the craft is a must. I think it might be the best part. The craft usually ties into the devotion somehow and it is a great opportunity to be creative. A lot of our crafts have involved sparkly things. We decorated boxes in the summer with words and other things. Mine was all blinged out. I'm fairly certain I said something along the lines of as I get older, I like sparkles more and more. As soon as I said it, I told the girls to forget that I ever said that. Of course they haven't. They remind me of it all the time. In fact one of the girls saved a quote for me. "Glitter is the herpes of the arts and crafts world." I loved it and it is so true. Friday is the February girls night. We haven't had one since December so I'm really looking forward to it. Plus we're starting a new series on relationships, dating, and sex. So it should be interesting. Hopefully we can all be open and honest and really learn something. I learn stuff from them all the time. They are great reminder of what kind of woman I want to be. We are also doing a really cool craft, mosaics. I began the idea with wanting to do a real tile mosaic. But the more I got into the idea, I realized it was time consuming and expensive. I'm hoping that this summer at our retreat we can do a real tile mosaic because I'm really into the idea. Of course, I'm always looking for new ways to express my creativity. I'll have to settle this week with paper mosaics. I did an example and it turned out pretty good. So I'm excited to see what the girls do with it. They always come up with creative ways to carry out the idea that I have. That's what I love about these times. It gives everyone an outlet for whatever they are feeling. Being creative is great way to show what's going on inside you and to express your relationship with God. Sometimes finding the words is hard, but through arts and crafts we can always express ourselves.

¹⁶ Give glory to the LORD your God
before he brings the darkness,
before your feet stumble
on the darkening hills.
You hope for light,
but he will turn it to thick darkness
and change it to deep gloom.

Jeremiah 13:16