Same Idea?

Two of my favorite singer/songwriter guys are Andy Davis and Jason Reeves.  Well, on Facebook, I'm a Jason Reeves fan, and I saw that he had a new video out for the song "Someone Somewhere" and I was so excited.  I love that song, and when Billy and I were writing long letters every night (before we were dating and when he lived in Florida), we both used to listen to this song by Jason Reeves, and sometimes we would even send eachother the lyrics to the song.  So, needless to say, I could not wait to see the video.  I was a little disappointed, only because it was kind of weird.  I don't know if the trash in the video is supposed to be symbolic, but I thought it ruined it.  It reminded me of the Andy Davis video for his song "Brown Eyes," which I love.  The song and the video are both awesome.  Anyway, the ideas in the video seem to be the same:  boy alone, girl alone, shots of them both in the same place but still alone, and then they find each other.  Anyway, see for yourself!  You can view both videos on my Vodpod widget in the sidebar!

Time is Moving so Fast... and Slow...

It seems like it has been forever since I have sat down to write a blog.  Even now, I feel like my words are all mixed up.  I want to say "since I have satten down" and my English mind reprimands itself for being so tired.  I have had so much going on lately, and so many exciting things happening that I feel like I have had no time to write.  I will try to update on life while waiting on Billy to call (it's so late!) and hopefully I'll fit in quite a bit.

Of course there is wedding stuff.  Today, Mom and I met with Alyona, who is doing the photography.  She is amazing and definitely who I wanted to take the pictures, so we are pretty excited about that.  Looking at my planner, wedding-related events pretty much take up my free time.  Even though school ends soon, weddings pick up, and the focus will just shift, not diminish.  Speaking of weddings, I know a couple of very awesome people who have gotten engaged (I know... more?!?) and I am so excited for them.  It is so funny how you'd think that my being engaged would make me frustrated that all of these other people are as well, but it only heightens my excitement.  I feel so blessed to have found "The One" and I love when others do too!  First, on Saturday, there was Amy T. and Paul G. who will probably get married in November.  She kept crying and it was absolutely adorable.  Their story involves cheering boyscouts, which I think they will remember forever.  Also, there is a couple that I don't know extremely well, but I have talked with her a little, and Billy just LOVES them, and they got engaged tonight, which is so awesome!  Josh D., who is going to be in our wedding, proposed to Saralynn F., and I cannot wait to meet them and hear their story.  Billy told me that it was supposed to be close to a lake (because it's in LAKEland, FL), but I don't really know any details.  I just hope to meet them sometime this summer!

Besides weddings, I have been focusing on school.  I have even taken off of work to study, which is very unlike me.  I'm almost tempted to do it again this week, but I don't know if I can handle losing that many hours.  Anyway, needless to say, I am ready for this semester to be over.  I will admit, though, that I have learned so much in at least one of my classes.  I have loved having Prof. Yarbrough.  He is also my advisor, and he is so smart.  That is such a general adjective, but it's really how I feel.  When I walk out of his class, I can't believe that it is already over, and I feel like I will never reach that level of intelligence.  When he reads things, he just gets symbolism and emotion out of them that I never ever saw.  He has actually inspired me to be reading more.  I know, I know, I read all of the time, but I have been heavily convicted about what I read.  Although it's great to read entertaining stories, I should be focusing some on literary pieces that make me think.  And that is my mission for the summer:  to read at least four, hopefully more, books of true literary merit.  I have started today with my purcase of So Big by Edna Ferber, which won a Pulitzer Prize in the 1920's.  I think it looks interesting and so far I am pretty enthralled by it.  I actually can't believe I put it down for this... but I knew it had just been so long.  The poetic wording is amazing!  I am so sad that nobody ever inspired me before this to read works of this calibur.  For example, in describing a mother and child:

"As the woman looked at the child there in the warm moist spring of the Illinois prairie land... there quivered and vibrated between them and all about them an aura, a glow, that imparted to them and their surroundings a mystery, a beauty, a radience."

How can you not be totally sucked into a story with that in its opening chapter?  I should read that to my Music Appreciation professor (who thinks he knows everything, and has snobbily critiqued my 5-page paper for him on analyzing MOVEMENTS of a peice - as if I, an English major, know anything about Musical analysis) and say, "See?!? The extra words and adjectives and descriptions really are necessary."  Not that I am bitter or anything...

Alright, I know that was long.  Last thing:  my new MacBook.  I have had to buy a new one because I somehow damaged my old one beyond repair (or practically paying to buy a new one) and so I have one that is almost exactly like the old.  I love Mac and Apple, and I would never go back now, so I had to do something.  Not to mention, it is exam week, and I desperately need to be able to study on this thing.

Ok!  Done!!  I'm off to read, and I'm still waiting on that gorgeous fiance of mine to give me a call!

PS - I have once again realized that I have the best parents in the world.

Every Day

This semester, I have been so blessed to be able to lead a small group of some really awesome girls, and they have taught me so much.  We've been going over the book Crazy Love by Francis Chan.  We have been talking about some pretty radical goals that we have concerning our walk and relationships with God.  The question that keeps coming up, pretty much every week is, "That sounds so good, and I want to be like that, but how do I get from where I am to where I want to be?"

I would love to be able to say that we have found that it takes a one time, radical life change where you realize what needs to be done, do it, and it becomes easy from there on out.  But that is definitely not what we've come to.  The biggest thing that we have realized is that it starts with the heart.  We can make a commitment to work on all of the things that we want to see in our lives (kindness, servanthood, unconditional love, forgiveness, sacrifice, consistency, and many more...) but we are going to either consistently fail, get overwhelmed, or forget why we are trying so hard to become something that is so unnatural to us.  But, if we have our heart in the right place (seeking to please God and be intimate with Him) then all of those other things are so much easier and can even start to become natural to us.  The next thing that we realized is that it takes every day to get to where we desire to be with God.  On Monday nights, at small group, we can all get our hearts right with God and confess our desire for Him and know that we only want to serve Him... but on Thursday, it's reallly obvious that the commitment we made on Monday definitely does not last us forever.  We have to come to God every day and have fellowship with Him so that we can be familiar with His ways and refreshed by His spirit.

I know that this is basic stuff, but I know that it is something that I forget all of the time.  God wants to be with us, and He wants us to take His word seriously.  We have focused so much on realising that God means what He says and He desires for us to live like we believe it.

I can't believe that small group ends so soon.  I feel so blessed to get to be a part of the lives of these girls, and I feel like our discussions get better every week.  I am so encouraged that they really want to do some outreach stuff this summer, and they are being proactive in their planning and getting ideas together for what is on their OWN hearts, which is exactly what I've prayed for!  We've had awesome ideas already from all of the girls... For example, so far, we are planning on going and holding terminally ill babies, having nights to come together and bring money and just go out as a group to minister to others.  My girls are so awesome!

Double Booked?!

Today when Mom and Katie and I were at Busy B's Wholesale Flowers, we got a call from Jessica at Seacoast (she's the one helping with the ceremony).  She had bad news... For some reason, they double booked our wedding date and time!  She said that the other couple had had it booked for longer, so we were going to have to move ours.  At first, I was really worried and nervous because it was a change and frankly, I am a control freak.  But, after about 2.3 minutes of needless worry, I found something really positive about this!  Even though I am going to have to bump my wedding time up to 4 o'clock pm, I am going to get something I really wanted and thought wouldn't happen!  Because Billy and I will be leaving the reception later than planned (we were going to have the wedding at 1 pm), it will be dark outside.... which means... drumroll.............. SPARKLERS!  I so badly wanted sparklers when we left the reception, because I think that they look beautiful in pictures and plus they're so fun!  It might seem like something small, but it totally made me excited, and I had to find something good about switching the wedding time to 3 hours later!

Oh, and something really funny... we had to special-request to have our Rehearsal Dinner on Thursday, October 15... The Richards wouldn't dare do anything to interrupt Friday night High School Football, not even for a wedding.  I guess that's what we get for having a close-knit family that has its roots in Texas and South Carolina.  Football is our Trump Card!  But don't get me wrong... I love it!