life.

I feel extremely bad I haven't updated this blog in so long. My life has been topsy-turvy for a couple of months now and I just now have about an hour that I have absolutely nothing to do, so I decided to finally update you all on what I have been up to this semester so far. In early January I started working at the nursing home I volunteered at last fall, I'm a breakfast server for the 6am shift. Waking up this early is a little bit of hell in itself for me, but I'm becoming accustomed to it. I work about 20 hours there, plus I am still working at my aunt's restaurant, the Junkyard Cafe about 15 hours a week as a waitress for one week night and weekend breakfasts and lunches. On top of working both these jobs, I've been taking 4 classes at Eternity Bible College. I'm about to finish up my 3rd week of school.

Doing all these things has really made me completely reliant upon God. There is no way I'd still have enough energy to wake up each morning without Him. This however, does not mean I haven't had countless emotional breakdowns. It has been extremely rough, but God always pulls me through and never gives me more than I can handle. I'm so grateful to have the roommates, brother, and friends that I do because they've been nothing but encouraging and helpful to me when I know I haven't been the funnest person to be around. Also, un-saved complete strangers I've met at both my jobs have turned out to be some of the biggest blessings in my life, which in all reality is a very humbling thought to see how God can use people like that to totally lift me up out of the slums. My best friend Angie was even actually able to visit me 2 weekends ago for exactly one day. Seeing her and just taking the day off--getting our noses pierced together, venting, crying, praying, singing, hugging and just laughing uncontrollably all day long was literally a gift from God at the perfect time. There was one point in the day when we walked into this piano shop that was going out of business and I got to play one of their studio pianos for about 20 minutes. I finished one of my songs and I looked up and I just had tears welling up in my eyes, realizing but never having thanked God for everything in this stage of my life right now - love, music, art, beauty, family, friends and always enough money to get by. I became so ashamed then, realizing how much I had been complaining about work when there are so many people in the world who would kill to have everything "together" like me. I've been struggling to maintain this mentality in my head, to remind myself of it everytime I find myself beginning to complain. Maybe I'll write it on the visor in my car? Basically, moral of the story is - my life is really good and I need to be more joyful about how I'm going to go about living it.

Anyway, these are just some unorganized bits and an overview of basically what's going on in my life right now. Hopefully another update will come soon - we'll just have to see though :)