Some Christmas Pics
Hope everyone had an AWESOME Christmas!
These PICS are from Christmas Day, taken with Erin's new Digital Camra she got for Christmas!!! She opened it and I was like, "Oh, yea! WE got a digital camra!!!" She looked at me like, "yeah, RIIIIGHT!" :)

You Know You Are a Snowboard Freak IF:
Posted these in Josh's comments in response to his email/post about snowboarding but thought I would post them here.

10. you stand on your board in your bedroom and close your eyes and pretend you are going down a mountain.

9. if you say 'dude' alot and use lingo to describe snow conditions like 'dust on crust'

8. Your homepage is set at your favorite ski resort and you just click REFRESH to check snow conditions.

7. You know all the snowboarding reps at the local stores by name.

6. You dream of wild adventure where they take you up in a plane and drop you off in random wild terrane so that you can snow board for weeks on end before getting to civilization.

5. If all your vocabulary is preceeded by the word 'snow'

4. If you start to drool when you see pictures in magazines of extreme snowboarding

3. If you go to work, just so you can have money to board

2. If your ears have a radar on them that zones in on the words 'snow' or 'boarding' anywhere within a 3 mile radius

For the #1 Reason you will have to go read his weblog (Josh, that's some free promo for your Blog! LOL!)

Thank You Thank You Thank You!
These go out to some of the people that have blessed me this week!!!

My Secret Santa: Who sent me TONS of encouraging notes and cards and an ecertificate to the store of my choice!!! That put a smile on my face when I saw it in my email. That was very sweet and thoughtful.

To Those That Came To the Party Last Night: Thanks so much guys for coming and for bringing all that yummy food! I know that some of you were like, Make a casserole? YIKES! Thanks for going outside of your COMFORT ZONE! The food was AWESOME! And thanks for just being great friends. I love that we can hang out doing EVERYTHING or NOTHING and have a BLAST no matter what! Thanks for those of you that helped clean up, wash dishes, and put things away! That was a blessing knowing I wouldn't wake up to it this morning! You guys are awesome!

Oh, Random side note: Who wants to make a guess on how many rubberbands I will find around my house today?

Ben: *shoots a rubber band*

Trusting God's Goodness
This post is not about me, not that I don't go through trials and hard times, b/c I do, and this is definately applicable to them, but I read this and thought of so many people that I have known, do know, will know, and have read about that have faced pain and heartache and praise God through that and in it. That has been the biggest testimony to me. An example for me to look to when I face hard times. God is good, not because everything is good around us, but because HE IS. Looking at circumstances through the lense of God's goodness produces the photograph of hope. It's a very different picture than we, in and of ourselves, take.

From Ruthless Trust by Brennan Manning
Gerald May writes, "I know that God is loving and that God's loving is trustworthy. I know this directly, through the experience of my life. There have been plenty of times of doubt, especially when I used to believe that trusting God's goodness meant I would not be hurt. But having been hurt quite a bit, I know God's goodness goes deeper than all pleasure and pain; it embraces them both.

Job 13:15
In the midst of immense trials and sufferings Job states, Even though he slay me, yet will I trust him.

Your glory, I Seek
Glory, glory
To my God and King
Glory, glory
In my suffering

Glory, glory
To my God and King
Glory, glory
In everything

This trial is more precious than anything
Than this world offers
Though the fire burn down deep
It's Your glory that I seek.

Countdown
Less than 4 Days till Christmas!!! :)

Extended
Last night I got together with a bunch of friends and watched the Extended Version of Fellowship of the Rings! Oh my, It made so much MORE sense now that I've seen all three. It was all that I could do to keep my mouth shut about the third movie since many of them hadn't seen it yet!