Brazos Bend

     Camping. Not something I do very often, but when I do I prefer it to involve running water and an air mattress. So my friends and I went on a little camping trip this past weekend to Brazos Bend State Park. It didn't exactly live up to my preferences, but we did have running water!
     I had such a blast, I arrived late Friday afternoon (some had been there a while already and some arrived after me) and we immediately took off on a short hike. This short hike ended up being probably my favorite of the weekend, and definitely the most exquisite. While we were hiking around one of the large lakes in the park the sunset began, and the colors painted across the sky were vibrant and beautiful, and their reflection in the lake was just as amazing. Plus on this hike I saw my first ever alligator in the wild! It was in the water with just the top of his head sticking out, but I saw him nonetheless.
     After the hike we returned to our campsite to cook and eat hamburgers and hotdogs. Then we sang worship songs and had a time of prayer, after which we enjoyed s'mores and hot chocolate. Naturally a chubby bunny competition ensued - for those unfamiliar with the game of chubby bunny it is a challenge to fit as many marshmallows in your mouth as possible while still being able to clearly say "chubby bunny" - the funnier part of this however was when the park ranger stopped by to remind us it was quiet time. The two gentlemen doing chubby bunny had about 9 marshmallows in each of their mouths, and everyone was trying so hard not to laugh. The winner made it to 12 (after the ranger left of course).
     Later in the evening we took a night hike, it was a lot of fun to walk around the trails without lights, the moon was surprisingly bright. We even saw an owl spying on us from a branch over the path. We got back to our tents around 1am and were all fast asleep. My friend Faith and I woke up at 6:30 and went back to the big lake to hike around while the sun rose. Unfortunately it was quite cloudy that morning so not near as pretty as the sunset had been the night before.
     Upon our return we made and ate a delicious breakfast - funny how all food tastes better when you're starving at a campsite - of breakfast tacos. In all seriousness though the food was great because it was all prepared by my friend Daniel who left the following Monday for his new job as head chef at a camp in Colorado. Then we cleaned up and played card games until time to leave.

Here are a few pictures from the trip, 

some are more like photography, but some are just for fun.

Sunset Hike:

CHUBBY BUNNY!

Night Hike:

Sunrise Hike:

 

Group Shots:

 

 Quote of the Day:

"Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, let your mind dwell on these things."               Philippians 4:8

Lets face it, our minds are prone to wander from all that is holy, but when we do, recall this verse. We are called to dwell on excellent and praiseworthy things - the things of our most high God.

Exercise Note of the Day:

 After an MRI it was determined that I have an inflamed tendon in my ankle which is causing all of the pain while I run. I am on two weeks of doctors ordered rest, then I will attempt to resume training. Praising God that is wasn't anything serious!

We came, we saw, we conquered

We came:

This past weekend was a first for several of my friends and I. A first visit to the city of New Orleans that is. We actually went for a soccer tournament, but many of us had never been so we of course explored the fun that the first weekend of Mardi Gras had to offer too. The drive on Friday was a bit worrisome because the first 4 hours were straight through a rain storm, but thankfully the rain subsided for a pretty yet extremely cold weekend.

We saw:

We didn't have a whole lot of daylight hours free (pretty much none in fact) due to the soccer tournament, but we saw what we could at night. We enjoyed the first weekend of Mardi Gras parades near bourbon street, plus some other bourbon street festivities. I even rode a mechanical bull for the first time. I can certainly check that off my bucket list - ouch! Not recommended for people without thick pants or jeans on I ended up with tons of bruises on my inner legs from clinging on for dear life!

We conquered:

We played 5 soccer games in 2 days.
Day 1-
Game 1: against a team in all black, and let me tell you did they look rough and they played about as rough as they looked. We ended up winning 4-1 and I scored one of our goals.

Game 2: against a team that had matching everything, and let's face it in an adult women's league that's a little odd so we were nervous that they were "legit." They were actually the worst team we played, we won 3-1 and I scored all 3 of our goals! (let's face it that doesn't usually happen for me.)

Day 2-
Game 3: against a team from Austin and I actually used to play with one of the girls on it (about 3 years ago). The soccer world is smaller than I thought. There are many probable causes for our poor performance, but I'm sure a big one is that everyone had gone down to bourbon street the night before for the parades and such. Anyways, we lost 2-1.

When that game ended we were all exhausted. We walked over to the boards and watched them post the scores, top 4 moved on to the semi-finals. Seed 1 would play seed 4 and seed 2 would play seed 3. We ended up being the third seed so we played seed 2 for the semi-finals. Seed 2 ended up being the same team we played in game 2. On top of that, our semi-finals game was literally 10 minutes after our last game had ended.

Semi-finals: game 4:
We won 2-0 and I scored one of the goals.

Finals: (45 minutes later) we unfortunately lost 3-0, but second place is good in my book.

Photos of the Day:

In honor of Valentine's Day I have been taking pictures of all the hearts I see around me.

Quote of the Day:

I have been meditating on Psalm 33 for a while now, and the words are touching me in a profound way. I won't put the whole thing on here, but I will put several of the verses which I feel God has directing me towards recently:

4: For the word of the Lord is right and true; he is faithful in all he does.

5: The Lord loves righteousness and justice; the earth is full of his unfailing love.

18: But the eyes of the Lord are on those who fear him, on those whose hope is in his unfailing love.

20-22: We wait in hope for the Lord; he is our help and our shield.
In him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in his holy name.
May your unfailing love rest upon us, O Lord, even as we put our hope in you.

God is faithful in ALL he does. How could I possible doubt any situation he puts in my life when I have this assurance in black and white? He is FAITHFUL. The earth is full of God's love - God's perfect, unfailing, unchanging love. God has his eyes on those who fear(respect) him. He sees you.

Exercise Note of the Day:

After New Orleans I am sore from the soccer and quite bruised from soccer and bull riding, but I'm working on breaking in my new running shoes, slowly but surely. 1.75 miles yesterday morning - slow and steady wins the race.

Rained Out

Well my first 5k was supposed to be approximately 24 hours ago. I did not go. Despite some slight disappointment - I'm okay with what has occurred. I think it is becoming easier and easier for me to see God's hand in this ---> for instance me being sick for the past week, sleeping wrong on Tuesday and getting a crick in my neck that still hasn't gone away, and lastly (because I was still planning on going) hitting the Texas coast with a massive storm. God is great, and He has a plan for everything, and His plan is better than anything we can come up with for ourselves.

Photos of the Day:

One of my favorite things to do now is to stop and take pictures of things I see. 

Sometimes I almost feel them call out to me, whether it's a "Little Chapel in the Woods,"

A flag pole caught in the orange glow of a sunset,

the sun peaking through some carefully placed clouds, 

 flags hung on a crane,

or a flower in a field. 

 

Even better is following a little butterfly around until he lands long enough to snap this shot.

There are so many joys that photography brings to my life;

I'm so glad that God has given me such beautiful surroundings.

Quotes of the Day:

"Being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you 

will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus."

Philippians 1:6

This verse makes me want to shout for joy! God will complete the work He has started, in you, in me, and in the world. What a marvelous truth to hold fast to. And I love what Spurgeon has to say about it:

"The work of grace has its root in the divine goodness of the Father, it is planted by the self denying goodness of the Son, and it is daily watered by the goodness of the Holy Spirit; it springs from good, and leads to good, and so is altogether good."