White Flag

Ugh, blogger isn't letting me add pictures. I don't know how to fix it! Chris Tomlin's Song, "White Flag" has been ringing in my head for a while now and especially over the past two weeks. You see, at New Years when I was at the Re:Turn conference, the Spirit of God was there and together we worshipped in freedom. We joined together as a generation saying, "We raise our white flag, we surrender all to you Jesus!" And I stood there with my flag waving as a way to declare this is what I was doing. Even now, I am saying those words. I am anticipating the start of a new job in less than a week. I start teaching grade 5 on Monday January 21st at Abby Christian and this is a new endeavour for me. All I can say is "I surrender all to You." There has been much anticipation because I accepted the position back in November. That makes for 2 months of waiting for me. It has been a good couple of months, but honestly, I'm not a fan of having something that you look forward to being planned so far in advance. For me it just creates too much anticipation and I'm kind of a girl who would rather have shorter notice and just take things as they come!  I remember when I was traveling with the girls and they would always be planning our next destination. When they'd run their ideas by me, I'd say, "Sure, sounds great!" Then, I'd leave it at that. I wouldn't really research beforehand, I'd just take it all in when I got there! I think it's more fun that way. If I had researched beforehand, it would have taken away any sense of newness. So here I am in a similar situation, where I could be doing lots of research for what is to come, but that's not my style. My style is to embrace it when it comes. I admit though, that again, sometimes in this regard I compare myself to others and think, "oh no, I need to plan more. I need to do stuff now" but that freaks me out. That creates more stress inside of me. In order to minimize stress, I wait and figure it out as I need to. Now for some that is opposite to their approach. They would rather figure things out way in advance, to reduce stress. For whatever reason that just makes me restless, anxious, and more stressed out. Please pray for me as I begin teaching this awesome group of grade 5s. Pray that as a class we would transition well. Pray that I would embrace it. Pray that we would laugh together, learn together, celebrate milestones together, encourage one another and dream together. Pray that I would model for them integrity and that I would lift Jesus up.

~this freedom song is marching on. ~ your love has come. ~ your love has won. ~ all for You. ~

Snowshoeing Sunday!

Last Sunday I went showshoeing at Manning Park. It was the perfect day. The temperature was -9 and there was not a cloud in the sky. Blue sky and Beatuiful British Columbia= perfect. What a spectacular way to worship. We had a good group of people and thanks to Cheryl, I had a pair of snowshoes to use. It was fun to meet new people and enjoy the great outdoors. The entire day was worship. I speak on behalf of the group and say that we delighted in God's creation. I really enjoyed getting out there with a group of people that I didn't really know before either. We even got to share some of our lunch with the birds. We held out our hands, full of trail mix and the birdies swooped down to grab some munchies. That was cool! After coming home, we ate dinner and then were invited to Ryan's to go in the hot tub and then enjoy some cinnamon buns. Again, perfect! We had a great discussion about work, rest, delighting in God and being fully alive- some of my favourite topics! One thought was about how God spent day 7 resting. We talked about how he didn't have to do that, afterall he is God and could probably just keep going. We talked about how God always reflected on His creation when he said that it was good. This reinforced my stance on just how vital and enriching it is for us to pause and consider where we've been and to process and reflect on the journey. Reflection encourages growth. Reflection allows us to gain perspective and see things more accurately. It reminded me of why I blog!

 

We talked about how good it is to take the time to delight in beautiful things.

Home Christmas

Hi Friends,

I was so excited about spending time with my family this Christmas. After being away last Christmas, it was pretty special for me to gather with loved ones once again. We hosted a Christmas Eve dinner at our house. Unfortunately my mom had a terrible stomach flu on Christmas eve. She wasn't able to join us for the Christmas Eve service or dinner, but she did make her way downstairs in her pajamas to capture a few pictures of our dinner. Although it was rather small this year and didn't include any of our cousins, I was happy for those who could be there. Thanks to Grandma, Grandpa and Mekayla for putting a lot into the dinner and making it happen.

 

Here are a few pictures from Christmas Eve.

 

We had some pretty exciting news. My brother Brayden and his girlfriend Nichelle got engaged on Christmas Day! They are planning a summer 2014 wedding. Us kids had fun making Christmas Morning brunch. Here are some pictures from Christmas morning. Mekayla and I had to go to Rempel's Meat shop on Christmas eve, right when they opened to pick up some farmer sausage because they had sold out a couple days prior. Everyone got spoiled for Christmas, that's for sure!

 

 

 

 

 

I had a delightful Christmas!

Something sweet for Sinterklaas

A few weeks ago I was invited for "Sinterklaas"- Dutch Christmas. After thinking about what treat to bring to the event I finally settled on Caramel Popcorn! I must say that caramel corn is the

*perfect treat.* Why? It's just so easy to make. It's great to snack on. It satisfies my sweet tooth.

And I had the the perfect bowl to put it in. An easy hit for a group event.