Life moves fast...

This past week we visited our home state of Florida. I'll try not to bore you with a huge recap of everything we did. But I will say it was both a fun and exhausting trip. Basically, anytime we visit Florida it's never a "vacation" in the true sense of the word. Setting my alarm every morning doesn't exactly ring "you're on vacation!" to me. But we had places to be and people to see and commitments to attend. We flew in to Orlando as usual and my mom picked us up. We headed straight to Panera Bread (oh the broccoli-cheddar soup was delcious..) before she dropped us off at Casey and Kendra's house where we would stay for the week. Upon arriving to their house, we were greeted by Casey who was holding Avery. Normally it's all hugs and hellos. This time it was some version of the following: Casey: (opens door) "Hey guys!" Amy: "Hi Casey!" (no hug, immediately enters house) Casey and Jeff: (Still standing at the door wh...

I struggle with insecurity.  I do. I wish I could brush off the fact by saying, "I can't help it." And then I realize all of those statements begin with "I". Which pretty much solves the problem for why I can't help it. Sometimes it's a battle that isn't for me to fight alone. In Exodus 14:14, it says, "The Lord will fight for you, you need only to be still." Which spoken by itself sounds great with no strings attached. A "let go and let God" kind of situation. Full of power and reassurance - which it has. But the real truth to its substance is found in the following verse when God basically tells Moses to get everyone moving. In short, Moses must also be active (do his part) in the circumstances surrounding them. I think that part of the story lends clarity when dealing with life's struggles. Making excuses never got anyone from point A to point B. Waiting for someone else to do something about anything may not produc...

[Smile...exhale of contentment...happy reflections...] I'm not sure I can accurately express how blessed I am and how blessed I feel right now. And this last weekend was a large contribution to that blessing. For my birthday, I have experienced the gifts of love and friendship and worship and identity. It has truly been the best birthday I can recall. Birthday 25... Friday I enjoyed lunch at Que Pasa in the company of Hackey and Jess - two wonderful ladies. There's nothing like "girl talk" that brings one closer to their friends. I've always appreciated how we can get together and enjoy raw conversation that does NOT include bashing our husbands, gossiping about this or that, and other trivial things. It's really an honest joy to dive deeper into my new friendships and experience growth in even just an hour's conversation. Saturday morning was spent up in the hills at Mystic Mountain (I think that's the actual location, though it's also know...

So I was thinking today: Sometimes I feel like " that girl". You know-the one who experiences odd ball moments...in public...often... Take for example my recent trips to the store to grab a snack before work. (Random thought: Publix I miss you!) I walk in, get what I want, pay...and on my way out the door-the ones that supposedly swing open automatically-I walk directly into them. Mind you, I'm not even preoccupied on my phone! I happen to be " that girl" who does not text and multitask 99% of the time. I am merely folding my receipt as I greet the tall, shiny and apparent doors before me. Furthermore, rather than taking the logical route - that would be to use the OTHER set of working doors - I proceed to pry my way out of the store with brute force, as if the doors were purposefully not going to let me pass, just...well, just because. That's what I did. Meanwhile, the people behind me were probably wondering if they should help me or just wait until I ...

I've been hearing more and more often about the adjustments and changes going on in the military. There will always be things I don't understand and I'm not claiming that I believe the government needs to answer to ME for anything. I'm just naturally a logical thinker and some stuff doesn't add up. For example, while waiting for our flight to return home back in December, Jeff and I stumbled across an article posted online about how the pull-up requirements for women during Marine Corps' boot camp is planned to change in the near future. In a different recent article written just after the first of the year, found on military.com, it stated "55 percent of women at Marine Corps Recruit Depot, Parris Island, S.C., could not perform three pull-ups...". The part that bothers me about this whole thing is the fact that the response to such research is apparently to go soft and basically make it not so hard for women. Are you kidding me??!! Women: If yo...

Tomorrow is Valentine's day. I don't really categorize myself as the Valentine's day celebrator. Personally, I'm more looking forward to the fact that tomorrow is Friday! Not that I don't like Valentine's day. It's just that I eat chocolate (often) year round and do fun stuff with Jeff/date whenever we want. He even buys me flowers occasionally! So, Valentine's day is more or less just another day - only everything in the world has been temporarily colored some bright shade of pink or red.  Honestly though, the only reason I'm a little bummed is because I actually thought of a brilliant V-day gift for Jeff! Mind you, this rarely happens because he so difficult to find that "just the right something" for. Yet, I did find something he and I could do together that he'd really enjoy that isn't the typical dinner and movie date. There's this indoor shooting range here called Smoking Guns and I wanted to go shoot with ...

Goodness. We have been so busy lately I think we've legitimately forgotten what day it is multiple times this week! But I started out with "goodness" for a reason. Because most everything taking up our time, apart from minor frustrations at work, is all really good stuff. We're really enjoying this new semester of LifeGroup while we read through the books Captivating and Wild at Heart. It's offered such great conversation and the ability to connect with others who can identify with the this's and that's of life.  Jeff is soldiering on through the end of this quarter with his school work. He's doing well in my opinion but sometimes he's hard on himself when he realizes he needed/should have more time devoted to homework and stuff. In any case, I'm proud of him and we're thankful there's only a couple more weeks left until his break. If everything works out, I'll be able to start school in the Spring as well. We've planned it to...