It's the First of the Beginning

So I'm moving... I've been living in a blessing for the past two years. It's a great story but it's not this story. This condo has at one point had five girls living in it, it was awesome but crazy. I was the first to arrive here and I'm the last to leave. It's a little stressful but it's been nice reflecting. Lizzie left yesterday and I'm doing some major getting rid of things. I don't have any boxes to pack up everything and the most I can do is put everything into piles. I have a throw away pile, a keep pile, and a give away pile. Putting all of my stuff into a pile is kind of stressing me out, just looking at it it looks overwhelming. If I just had the boxes to put them all into. Then I said this statement outloud, "I guess when you first start organizing it appears to look a little messy." Isn't that true about life? When we try to organize our life things pile up. Everything comes at once. It seems overwhelming but it's just the beginning of order. God is a God of order and what comes acrossed to us as messy and disorganized is really just the beginning of something beautiful.

eary ewn

So 2011 is coming to a close. A lot has happened that when thinking about it day to day doesn't seem like a whole lot but sitting down coming up with words turns into a whole year. I don't want to take advantage of my experiences. I learned a lot and a lot of new opportunities have been presented to me this past year. In 2012 a lot will change from this past year. I got to go home twice, I got a new car, I went to North Carolina, Tampa, Indiana, Chicago (which doesn't follow the pattern of stating states) Atlanta (this doesn't either) Michigan, Louisana, and Alabama. My sister came to visit and go to Shine. I was at the church more than I wansn't. I found a better sense of my calling. I went to a lot of five dollar movie days in the Summer. I met a lot of new people. People who knew my face know my name now. I found out that O+. I baked a lot this year as well as home made a lot of my meals. I got three dreads. I still work at Panera but picked up a second job at a local coffee shop by my house. I paid off my first credit card. I became addicted to word games and pumpkin spiced chai's. I joined a spin class for the summer. I got a twitter account in hopes to contact Conan O'brien but I couldn't keep up with updating twitter. I got to see Tom after two years of snail mailing. I got to see Casey one of my room friends leave for Ireland. I was able to couchsurf :) I cried a lot. and I laughed a whole lot. Here's some pictures from 2011 :) My Room Friends.. They're awesome

My mommy :) I luvz her Fleet Foxes live for the first time

I made my own toothpaste.
Catalyst Conference in Atlanta. I learned a lot.

I was a dinosaur for Halloween

We had many Brinner nights.

I met Jared and he took me on a lot of adventures.

I got to see Tom after two years of writing eachother back in forth from Indiana, Florida, California, South Korea, and Africa.

I finally got my face painted.

I saw Sarena and we ran through fountains.

I got a combover during the summer.

Ah Listen and I drove to Tampa but unplanned to camp out along the way.

I went and served at ARC in Baton Rouge and became a twinsie

I got a really old film camera and this is a shot from it.

I skyped with Sarena lots while she was finishing school :)

I went to the Seer's tower and stood above the Earth.

I got to see Chloe and eat Noodles and get threatened to get kicked out of a bar with her. I'm hardcore.

I built a sandcastle and some random guy stopped by asked us if we needed a shovel and I thought he was joking but he pulled a shovel out of his backpack and helped us build it.

Don't Tell My Mom

I'll update this blog in a day and tell the story behind it...

Awake My Soul

Medium, On Cold, Gentle Cycle

From Psalm 51

Soak me in your laundry and I'll come out clean

Is My Life About to Change

There's this song I listen to sometimes and more than sometimes I sing loudly along with it. There's a line in the song and the guy sings, "Is my life about to change?" And I've been thinking about it for awhile and consider that my life is getting ready to change. I've decided there are certain things in my life that make me a little too comfortable. Even though I can get discouraged I still have a lot of materialistic things to rely on. I'm getting ready to step into some change. I'm getting ready to move into some areas where I can position myself to totally rely on Jesus. I want to get into being uncomfortable again. I want to be in the unknown now matter how much it might make me cry. I want to be able to look to Jesus for comfort FIRST not third or fifth. So be prepared for some more sappy blog entries. :)

My First Turkey

Someone gave me this turkey so that was nice to have a free turkey. I let him thaw out for three days. Some websites says not to rinse the bird due to a high risk of cross contamination but I was careful and I felt better if I could just rinse it. Plus there were a couple of feathers left or like the tips of feathers left in it. It was uh gross but I got through it. I took the neck, gizzards, and liver out and simmered them in a pot to the side for four hours with the ends of my celery, the parts of onions I wouldn't eat, two whole cloves of garlic, and I had a lot of basil left over from the week so that was my turkey stock. I used the turkey stock for my stuffing and my gravy.

I rubbed the inside down with cracked pepper and salt, half of a lemon for it's juice, quartered a sweet yellow onion, tops and bottoms of celery, two whole garlic cloves, a mixture of sage rosemary and basil, and I put a half a stick of butter inside of it. The outside I coated it with lemon juice, salt, cracked pepper, covered that thing with butter, and rosemary.

This is half way through the cooking process. We started it out on 425 for half an hour, 350 for two hours, and 255 for and hour and a half. I read a lot of website that said if we roasted it breast side down all the juices would go there so we did it that way. I put it on a double broiler so I could use the drippings for my gravy. I put foil on the bottom so it'd be easy for me to pour the oil into another pan. I tied the legs and the wings in (I feel like that's a given but just in case.) After the first half hour I realized I should have covered it with foil to maybe keep the juices in so I ended up covering it with foil half way through. I don't know if that made a difference

Ta-Da! My first turkey and it turned out awesome!

Can you tell I ended up switching to a better camera? ha