People look at me strange when I tell them that my expactations in life are ever changing. I love to plan 5 steps ahead and I try to plan for every possible outcome. Might seem crazy, but I like to know what every decision I make, could mean for me in the long run.
Well, my plans changed.
I grew up wanting to go on all sorts of adventures, travel to all sorts of new places, meet all sorts of people and just live the dream. Needless to say I'm 23 and that hasn't happened yet, and I no longer think that it will. I'm not giving up on the dreams I had (at least I don't feel like I am) but rather I'm forging new dreams everyday.
Remember that guy I mentioned over a year ago in one of my last posts? Well he turned out to be the one for me and we are getting married in the summer. As big and grand as childhood me's adventures seemed, they're nothing compared to planning my life with this man.
I used to think that marrying a guy meant dinner dates, going out to all sorts of events together and tearing up the town showing him off. But that's not how it works.
Let me tell you about our time together this last week alone. Most of our hang out time has consisted of snuggling on a couch beside a fireplace either taking a nap (today) or watching Spongebob on Netflix with his youngest sibling (all week).
It sounds silly but as I looked around today at the situation I realized just how domestic we really are. And I love it!
I never would have imagined that taking a nap on a couch with someone or watching cartoons, would ever give me such a boost of joy. It feels like a more satisfying adventure than anything else I've ever dreamed of. It's such a small thing but it fills my heart with unbelievable warmth.
I love my litrle adventure, and I look forward to the many more to come.
Well my first week of working Chamberfest has been absolutely incredible! So many incredible things. Some I could talk about, others I can't talk about, but all of them absolutely wonderful! When I was first given this job, I had so many people wishing me good luck and telling me that I was brave for taking this job, needless to say I became slightly concerned that I was in over my head. While I've had some very frustrating moments, none lasted very long and for the most part this has been the most incredible experience yet! I'm getting the opportunity to make some very wonderful friends and meet some absolutely amazing musicians! It's been quite the experience!
It took me a few days to get my staff pass (so that people didn't look at me funny when I tried walking into a concert without a ticket), and I only found my office today (I've just been setting up shop in the church kitchen to do my work before now). And I've finally gotten the hang of how to get from one festival venue to the next even with all the construction downtown and the one way streets (things that a country girl should never be forced to worry about!) I've also figured out all the restaurants and coffee shops in the area. It only took a week but I think I've got it now.
There are concerts and talks and events going on at all hours of the day and night, it's amazing! Over 100 concerts in 2 weeks! Seriously, calculate that, it's a lot!
So while this festival has been one massive joy ride, that's not the only thing that's turning my life upside down. I'm also not living at home for the duration of this festival. I'm also not in a house where there are parents at all. I'm staying at a friends house while his parents are away in Sweden. I'm also not the only one staying there, another friend of ours is also living in the house for a few days. Suddenly we're living in a 2 story, 5 bedroom house with a huge backyard and an in-ground pool and we are the adults. It's like a bunch of university students getting a luxury apartment together! It's been pretty neat. Some night's we'll have friends over to swim or play video games and cards, and it's really nice.
Also, there are times where we've started running the house like we're a family. Today one of the boys who lives at the house (16 years old) had an appointment that he needed to go to, and his brother was gone to work. The other friend of ours living in the house and myself started comparing schedules and figuring out who would bring him to his appointment, we started figuring out when everyone will be home for dinner tonight, and just altogether started sounding like a married couple with a 16 year old kid. It was sad but absolutely hilarious!
I even forgot my pass for work today and this friend drove downtown to bring it to me. My boss thought it was pretty funny too.
Needless to say, just everything about this week is becoming quite the experience. It's interesting to see what it would be like to live away from home and have a daily job with long hours. I'm not sure I'm ready for this to be my everyday life just yet, but I like being able to see in this short span of time that I can make it on my own and start getting a feeling for what it would be like.
As my last post said, DS and I celebrated one month together this past weekend. I know that doesn't seem like a big deal to some people but to get this far in a relationship and still care for this man is a huge step forward for me! 3 days from now this will be the longest relationship I will have ever been in.
For our anniversary we knew that we didn't want to buy each other gifts, we wanted to spend time with each other instead. So DS suggested that we go back to the same restaurant that we had our first date at! Brilliant idea! I think we spent just as long there this time around as we did the first time, maybe longer, but we were there for over 4 hours together!
I was house sitting/baby sitting in the city at the time so for a complete change, instead of me driving into the city to pick him up, he came by and picked me up for our date! It made me feel so awesome and girlie! (Yes, sometimes it is that easy to make me happy!) I got to be the girl who waits on the front steps for her man!
Being able to spend 3 days in a row with my amazing gift from God was the best way to spend the weekend. I feel like I got to know him a little more, and I got to talk to him about some of the things I want him to know about myself.
To make him even more incredible, I think he's one of those super understanding guys when it comes to being busy with work. I know I'm stressing out about work the next two weeks, lets hope he can handle me when I'm like that. God give him strength, he might just need it.
That's right our one month anniversary is upon us and I can already tell this will be the longest relationship I will have had. We have our priorities directed in the right way and I have faith that this is meant to be something special.
Tonight my boyfriend DS and I went to adoration together. My uncle was out of town for the weekend and asked if I could do his hour at the adoration chapel, which I had no problem doing. I decided to invite DS along.
It was nice to pray, and read on our own, but then it was nice to pick up the book of intentions and begin praying together out loud for the intentions people wrote down in the book. When we were finished we held hands and we prayed for our relationship together, that God help us to keep Him at the center of all we do and to draw us closer to Him with everything we do together as a couple.
I've always been told "A family that prays together, stays together" and while DS and I aren't family, if this is ever meant to be something permanent, well I can't think of a better way to ring in our first anniversary together than spending it praying together.
While we are both still at the super shy stages together, I hope that there will be many more opportunities in our future for us to just sit down together and pray for each other, for our relationships to God and each other, and to pray for others in our lives, but doing so together.
I like the foot that this relationship is starting out on.
I know it has been a while since I have updated my blog, I guess it goes without saying (especially to anyone that knows me) that I am keeping myself beyond busy this summer. Balancing many jobs, friends, family, and even a new relationship!
God has truly blessed me this past year with all that he has sent my way. The most incredible job opportunities that have the possibility of setting my future in the music industry onto the right path. He gave me the strength to discover who I am, who I want to be, and to identify where I am on that journey and what steps I need to take to get where I am called to go.
But the most incredible blessing I have is the wonderful man that God has allowed to enter my life.
All of the years of finding faults in guys, and honing my skills in identifying what I want and need in a partner and future spouse seem to pay off. When this lovely lad came into my life there wasn't a moment in my mind that I didn't think he was something special. Little did I know that to him, I was apparently just as special!
If anyone knows anything about me, they know that I don't have a history of having super long lasting relationships. Usually about a month give or take a few days. Well I am in that one month time window now, and as our first anniversary approaches, all I can think of is to keep thanking God for the wonderful blessing he has given me.
I'm telling you guys, God knows what he's doing, that's for sure!
The past few days have been something truly spectacular to me, I've learned another way that I want to grow in my life. I know I'm always talking on here about growing, and learning where I'm supposed to be, and each time they've been right on the button! This time I'm growing in my femininity, the way that God desires.
For the past month or so, I've been taking part in Christopher West's DVD series on Theology of the Body, called Freedom To Love. It's been quite eye opening and has made me look at things I had never thought about in my life. In fact, many of the things that I believed growing up were targeted in this series as being the wrong way to look at things. I've slowly begun to change the way that I view my faith, it's been absolutely spectacular! Here's a very small clip from one of the lectures that I would like to share with you:
This past week, we looked at part 4 of 5 in this series, and something hit me. The talk was about morality, and something that he said broke me, he said that almost every woman, by nature, has an overwhelming fear of being abandoned in life. Wow! I felt the wind knocked out of me! That was me! That's been me in every single aspect in my life for as long as I can remember. I broke down and I cried. I was shaking and I was crying and something began working within me.
After the 50 minute video lecture was finished, our young adults group discussed what the talk had been about together, like we always did. This particular week it was myself, a gentleman that I have known for years from church, and our young seminarian. Our discussions went on to point out different things that stood out to us, and allowed us to expand on the topics that spoke to each of us.
Our seminarian pointed out to me a few books that are along the lines of what I wanted. What spoke to me was about the importance of true gender roles in life, how men can be men, and women can be women. Under this topic two books were recommended to me, both written by a husband and wife team, John and Stasi Eldredge. One of them is about the true nature of a man's heart and desires called "Wild at Heart" and the other is about a woman's heart, desires and nature called "Captivating". Another important topic to me was how we need both parental roles in our lives to fully develop the way we were meant to, and so we also discussed books that are for our healing from hurts in life, and how to learn to be a well rounded person with only having one parent. Needless to say my reading list for the summer now consists of 13 new books.
Last night I bought "Wild at Heart" and "Captivating". It's apparently good to read both to not only understand how your own mind works, but also to try and help you understand how the other gender things as well. I've started to read "Captivating" already, and I'm having to force myself to read it slow so that I can reflect on it as I'm going and to try and get as much out of it as I can. I'm only in Chapter 1 right now, but there was something written in the introduction that I want to share with you:
"The mystery of a feminine heart was meant to be a good thing. By the way. A source of joy. Yet it has become a source of shame - women almost universally feel that they are 'too much' and 'not enough.' At the same time. (Which is crazy making.) And men tend to pull away from the deeper waters of a woman's soul, unsure of what they will find there or how to handle it. And so we have missed the treasure that is the heart of a woman, missed the richness femininity was meant to bring to our lives, missed the way it speaks to us of the heart of God." - Stasi
I don't know why, all my life I have desired to be delicate, to be a lady, I wanted to rebel against feminism. Yet society is telling me to be otherwise, they're telling me to be macho and tough like a man. This isn't what I want for myself! God created men to be the stern ones, and women to be the kind and compassionate ones and this is what I want for my life. Not a helpless women who can't do anything for herself, but soft in spirit. I want Mary, the mother of Jesus, to be my example! I want to be like her.
This book is going to be quite the journey for me and I know that I won't come out the other side as the same person I am now. The way I'm thinking is going to change pretty drastically, and I welcome that with open arms!
This week has been pretty crazy, both good and bad. Classes are winding down and coming to an end an assignments are racking up and all being due at the same time. To add to that stress I have a lot of co-op hours to complete before the end of the month.
That being said, I've been spending a lot of hours working my co-op job, and loving every minute of it! Needless to say there's some pretty drastic construction going on right out front of the building that has stopped all traffic from passing on that road and the detour goes blocks around the area.
Well I have to get from co-op to campus somehow so I figure I would walk down the road to the next bus stop. I just missed the bus. So out of frustration, and not wanting to wait half an hour for the next one, I decided to walk. 3.5km from co-op to campus! It's the biggest walk I've ever taken actually in one stretch.
That was my Monday, then I did it again yesterday (Wednesday) and then today I made the walk both ways, from co-op to campus, and then back from campus to co-op!
My legs feel absolutely on fire right now but it also feels so absolutely incredible to know I can accomplish that and each day I've done it, it hurts less and I get there faster! I feel like a champ!
I guess this will be a new thing that I plan to keep up now! What's not to love about it!
