Long weekend woot woot

It has been quite the busy week full of work,rehearsals and running from here to there,but the weekend is finally here and it's a nice long 3 day weekend YIPPEE! It is officially time to celebrate the beginning of SUMMER! I have been waiting for this time of year for what seems like forever! haha, but now its here and I intend to take full advantage of this long weekend.

We are supposed to have some great weather this weekend which works out perfectly with my plan to visit the beach and the pool as many times as possible between now and Tuesday of next week.

I went to the beach for the first time this season last Sunday and it was wonderful and I am hoping to make it my new Sunday thing- beach after church.

To start off my holiday weekend I went to dinner with some friends form church tonight after work. It was a great time of fellowship and together-ness. We had a blast eating and talking and just being in the company of one another.If tonight was any indication of how my long holiday weekend is going to be then I am ready for it!

I hope that you all have a fantastic Holiday weekend and even though I am not able to be with my family this weekend I will be with church family and friends and they are most definitely the next best thing to my actual family and I am sure to have a great weekend!

Chicago in the flesh, but Ann Arbor in the heart

This weeks show us your life over at Kelly's Korner is: Show us your hometown. This was hard for me because I currently live in Chicago, IL but I am from Ann Arbor, MI and I LOVE both of these places so I am gonna show ya both :)

I have lived in Chicago for about 6 1/2 years now. I came to Chicago to go to college and loved it so much I stayed. There is always something to do and I am gonna show you some of my favorite things to do and some of my favorite places to go



One of my favorite places to go is millennium park,there is something to do there all year round. There are concerts there in the summer almost daily and I love to sit and watch all the kids play in the fun fountain (that spits at you haha)





I also love to go ice skating there in the winter. Millennium park is just a blast!



And I cant go a summer without going to the beach! I love going to the beach on the Michigan side and Chicago side of lake Michigan





I love to eat and Chicago is a great place to do this ha. We have sooooo many great restaurants and whole neighborhoods devoted to great yummy cuisine. Some of my favorite places to go are Greek town for some yummy Greek food and delicious sangria, Little Italy. need I say more ha, China Town,and Devon st. for yummy Indian food!!! We also have a whole festival devoted to the many different kinds of cuisine offered here in Chicago, the taste of Chicago is one of my most favorite summer festivals/events.



If I want to enjoy a mostly social sporting event I head up to the North side to take in a Cubs game haha dont hate me cub's fans but its true but if I really want to watch a good baseball game I head down to the south side for a white sox game. And I try to get to the United Center every once in a while to see my home town boys the Detroit Pistons take on the Chicago Bulls.

Well that's just a little peak into Chicago, so lets head over to Ann Arbor the hometown I love so much!




This is easily my favorite place in Ann Arbor.



Oh how I LOVE the BIG HOUSE!!!! Many happy times spent here!! There is a great place called Kerrytown in Ann Arbor that has a great farmers market that my mom,sister and I went to all the time and is also where one of my most favorite places to eat is
Zingermans deli mmmmmmm haha. I told you I LOVE to eat haha I don't know how I am not 1,000 pounds HA.





For a good concert,live theater show or the yearly trip to see the nutcracker we head over the the power center. and Ann Arbor would not be complete without the Art Fair or 'the top of the park' which are not necessarily places more like festivals/events but are essential to Ann Arbor and one of the many reasons why I love it sooo much!





Thanks for coming along with me to two of my most favorite places,I hope that you enjoyed it and hope you go visit someday! :)

The weekend

I hope that everyone had a wonderful weekend. Mine was busy but super fun. Friday was a lazy night I had dinner with a wonderful family that I have known for about
4 1/2 years and then I came home and watched my recorded shows for the week and went to bed early. Saturday was great I got to sleep in, I slept in a bit longer than I was supposed to though haha so I ended up being late to the pancake breakfast that I was supposed to be helping out with for a good friend of mine and her church (oopsie haha)I made it just in time for clean up duty so I stayed and helped clean and she talked me into buying a "s'mores wizard" cause it was only a dollar. So now I have this little s'more thingy that actually lets you roast the marshmallows. so maybe this summer I can have friends over and we can make yummy s'mores on my back porch.ha.

Sunday was by far the best day of my weekend. I went to church and we had a great message I think I have mentioned before that we are doing a sermon series on the book of James and our message this Sunday was on faith without works, and basically James is saying yea you can say that you have Faith in the one true God but what are you going to do about it how are you going to show that faith to others. It was a great and challenging message. After church my friend Sara and I were supposed to go to a concert but her dad called her late Saturday night and said that him and her mom were heading to Niles Michigan (which it about 2 hour drive east of Chicago.) to celebrate her youngest sister Julia's birthday so she asked me if I would like to go and of course I said yes. It gave me a great excuse to get out of the city and to take in a bit of my home state :) I even have some ties to Niles as my home church has a summer camp just outside of Niles in Cassopolis Michigan,but any who we drove out to Niles for the day after church and had a great time Julia and her husband Matt have a cute little ranch out there on a great deal of land so we got to go out and get a little "hike" in out on their property and just sit outside and take in the beauty of nature actual trees and grass, and breath "fresh air" haha none of that icky Chicago air ha.

We got back from Niles around 10:30 and I got to bed so I could be up and at em Monday morning. So now its back to the work week,back to classes and rehearsals for my show and helping to launch a theater company and so on...haha oh my life is a crazy one but so far its a good one hehe.

Books galore

For this weeks show us your life at kelly's korner the topic is favorite books or children's books. Oh do I have oodles of books that I love both adult titles and children's books.In the 'adult' category ever since I was about 12 years old I have loved:



I also love:



and...



and more recently I have been reading a lot of Karen Kingsbury books. So far I have loved them all!

there are so many books that I love that I cant even remember them all nor do I have the space to put them all so instead I will move on to some of my favorite children's books ha ha.

This one is an all time favorite of mine since childhood.Its also a favorite of all my youngest little thespians we love acting this one out in our drama class "warm-up" in my 4 and 5 year old class



this one is also a favorite to act out in drama class:




and these ones have been favorites since I was a child as well:






These were some of my favorite series growing up:







Reading was always happening when I was a child I loved it then and I love it now :)Have a great weekend and take a little time to enjoy a great book :)

Beth Moore is.... I have no words

Praise the Lord it's Friday!!! Even though it's been a good week I am still glad that Friday has come ha. I have bible study on Thursdays and yesterday was no different. Currently for my Thursday bible study we are doing Beth Moore's study on the life of Jesus called 'Jesus the one and only.'Those of you who have taken a Beth Moore study know that there is a video teaching to go along with each weekly lesson So yesterday was the point where we reached the last supper and Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.This is one of those things that you of course hear read all the time obviously when ever you take communion the last supper in regards to the bread and the wine are read before you take each but last night When Beth was teaching in the video she went through and explained a traditional passover celebration and she talked about the 4 cups that are usually taken during a passover what they represent, they are the 4 I will's of God (that we read about way back in exodus 6:6-7): I will bring you out. I will deliver you from their bondage. I will Redeem you w/an outstretched arm. I will take you as my own people.

Now this is already quite interesting as I have never been to a passover and never heard this before but then she points out something that just blows me away. All of these cups are the life of Christ he is conducting this passover meal and at the same time teaching his disciples through these cups what he was sent here to do and what is to come and the cup that we hear about every time we take communion
(Mark 14:23-24) is the 3rd I will of God,I will redeem you w/an outstretched arm.

Now at that point in Bible study I am just in awe of how the whole thing is fitting together and then Beth takes it even further and goes on to talk about when Jesus went to the garden to pray after the last supper. First of all she points out something that I have NEVER noticed when ever I have read this portion of scripture when Jesus prays the son of God Kneels!!!! This just blows me away Jesus Christ the son of the Most High God kneels in total submission! whoa! The second thing she says is this: When Jesus is praying to God to take this "cup" from him he is speaking of that third cup the cup of redemption,the journey that he will take to the cross to redeem us, but after he has prayed and spent time with the Father he has made up his mind he indeed will take that cup, we are in fact worth it!

Oh I was just without words... of course I knew that Jesus died for me to save me but this whole lesson was out of control (in a good way haha) my heart was overwhelmed and I was able to grasp just a small bit of how much God the Father and God the Son LOVE me. Of course I know that God loves me but this whole lesson really helped me put into perspective at least a little bit just how immeasurable His love is for us! I mean I still don't even have the words, or the right words to express how amazing that 'aha' moment was and how full my heart is getting a small glimpse at how much I am loved by the father!

I hope that you all have a wonderful weekend and that you will remember that Jesus LOVES you and he felt that you were worth it to take on that 'cup' of redemption

feeling like myself

Ahhh finally I am feeling back to myself. This weekend was a major bummer I was not feeling well at all this weekend. It started Thursday at work I had the worst stomach pains and had the worst nausea ever. It was one of those things like I didn't really want to throw up but I felt like maybe if I did I would feel better. Well I felt like that Thursday, Friday and half of Saturday. finally Saturday night I started to feel like I was getting back to me :) Sunday was even better I was completely back to normal.

Sunday was a great day even though it was mother's day and I was missing my mommy :) I got to talk to her for a good while on Sunday morning. after talking to my momma and getting myself ready I headed out to church. I had a great time at church and as always our pastor preached a great message on the power of a woman.

Monday was back to the weekly routine working and all that. So far its been a good week pretty light. Bible study tomorrow Those are the days that get me through the week,the days that I get to go to bible study and just bask it the greatness and Glory of My Father!!!!

sick day

It's been quite a busy week, I have been running around all week long and will be super duper busy all weekend long, but today I am confined to my bed cause I am not feeling well :( So I have been laying in bed all day watching movies and tv. that's the only good part about being sick is the laying in bed and watching movies and tv.

Well regardless of if I feel better or not tomorrow its back to the real world although it would be much better if I was feeling back to my normal self by tomorrow. Two days is more than enough, and I wasn't even home resting yesterday at the peak of my sickness I was working. It was the worst I had a class full of four and five year olds and I was just in a haze. good thing my principal didn't come into the class yesterday lol.

Well I hope everyone has a great weekend!!

makes me wanna smile, I'm free I'm free !

Yesterday was a full day of working but thankfully in all hub-bub I found some time to treat myself to a yummy lunch at chipotle. It was pretty crowded as it was lunch time so I sat at a table next to someone, now the table was super close to the other obviously intended for a group but since there were no other non grouped tables I sat next to this woman. As I started eating she started chatting and I just listened. as she talked I found out that she was spending her lunch hour going over her many medical bills as she was not feeling well and went in to get a aeries of tests done. She just went on and on and when it was appropriate to talk I did but mostly I just listened. When she had finished eating her lunch she got up and got herself ready to go and before she left she turned smiled at me and said "Thank you so much for listening most people wouldn't have."
That just made me feel so good inside to be able to have that woman share her life her troubles with me a complete stranger that she felt comfortable to do so and that I was able to help her just a little bit by listening to her!

In other news on Monday I had a crazy dog experience, so my box spring has this netting on the underside of it and it is on its last leg, my dog likes to sleep under my bed for some reason even though he has a wonderful and most comfortable doggie bed and Monday he got himself caught in the many pieces of netting that are hanging down. I had to craftily cut him free it was successful in the since that I got him free but un-successful in the since that b/c I couldn't see how to cut him free I was just feeling around blindly and sliced my finger w/the scissors haha.
But he's freed and I'm healing and its time to get a new box spring lol.



phew I'm free,thanks mom



I hope that everyone is having a great week!

A relaxing weekend to a manic Monday

The weekend was so nice and relaxing Friday was my girls night and then Saturday I just stayed close to home it was a pretty nice day but half way through the day it got cloudy and cooled down a bit so just hung out and it was great to be able to eat dinner out on the deck and just enjoy being outside. Sunday I went to church. Currently we are doing a sermon series on the book of James. It has been so powerful and so uncomfortable all at the same time. Its one of those series that pushes you to go further, to really reach out show the world that you indeed bear his name and you want to love and serve a broken world. Often my pastor challenges us to really love and serve people.

Often times here in Chicago it is so hard to do that. there are soooo many homeless people in the city and often times I want to help them so I will stop by a McDonald's or something and get them a little meal and I cant tell you how many times my little McDonald's meals have been turned down by so many homeless people b/c they don't eat chicken or burgers upset their stomach or some other reason. I try not to give them money cause 90% of the time they will spend it on alcohol instead of food but I just feel bad for leaving them and not attending to their hunger. sometimes though when a person is honestly asking for food (which is really hard to tell) the amount of gratitude they show is overwhelming.

Now that I have rambled on and on about that lets get back to what this post was supposed to be about lol, my Monday... Oh Monday was a crazy day I worked all day and then I went straight from work to a rehearsal for a show that I am working on. It was our first read through last night. It went well.

I love theater, doing theater in any capacity makes me happy.I fell in love with live theater when I was 11 years old it opened up a whole new world for me and I want other children to be able to experience that to be able to feel the wonder that theater holds! I am praying to be able to start my own Christian performing arts company for youth that will allow them to explore different areas in the arts from dance, theater,creative writing,music and so on but in a christian environment. Because it has been hard for me as a christian in the theater community there is so much that I don't agree with and so many things that compromise what I believe in and I want kids and teens to be able to explore the arts without facing that and to know that you can do this and not compromise who you are!