Birthday Fun

Sunday was a fabulous day, especially since it was Amanda's birthday. I went to church with my mom and cousin in the morning, went to lunch with them afterwards and then said goodbye since they would be leaving later that night. The rest of the day turned into a fabulously fun girls day as I joined up with my roommates to get our nails done for Amanda's birthday. We all got manicures and pedicures and then spent the rest of the afternoon shopping. In the evening we went to the 6:00 service at Bethel Church and then got dressed up a bit and went out for a late dinner for Amanda's birthday with the boys at Applebee's. Afterwards we wanted to go stargazing so the guys took us to a really gorgeous lookout within Redding where a path dead ends at a cliff that drops off at the river that runs through the city. You could see the mountains in the distance and to the left were the lights of the city. We hung out there talking for a while and looking at the stars; and in the midst of one of my conversations I saw the largest shooting star I've ever seen in my life that shot across half the sky!

Today started my third week here and when I woke up this morning my body felt like I had hit a wall, which probably had something to do with the fact that I stayed up until 3:00 AM last night talking to my roommate - but it was worth it. I haven't had a whole lot of personal processing time in between all of the teaching and socializing that's been going on, but I trust that God is still depositing things in my heart that I will be sorting out through the coming months. The part of this that has been slightly disappointing is that I had wanted to be blogging about all the amazing things I knew God was going to be doing with me while I am here, but I feel as though I haven't even been able to process them in my own mind, much less articulate them in writing. I hope it's been fun to read about what I've been doing regardless.

For both of our sakes, let's see if I can come up with a short list of ways God has been working in and around me since I've been here. I'll just start with one for now:

1. I had no idea I was going to be blessed with so much incredible fellowship while I was here. I don't know what I had expected exactly, but I was so used to spending so much time by myself when I was abroad and loving it that I expected it to be similar during this month - but boy was I wrong. There is rarely a moment when I'm not around other people, whether that's one or ten - both are just as likely. God has been so strategic in encouraging me via the friendships that I've made and people I've met; I feel as though I've been living with these girls (my roommates) for months and it's only been two weeks. I never expected to be making such impacting and lasting friendships in one month; and yet I feel as though I know and trust these girls more than some people I've known for years at school, so I know this is totally God.