mexico

fyi...

for anyone who still checks this site...i am no longer updating it for many reasons. you can now go to joannrenee.blogspot.com for updates and other random sillinesses. that is all...oh! and i'm sitting outside of Bellatazza listening to a local musician "jam" in an alley behind me while the 9th moped pulled up in front of me (two of them have side-cars and one of the side-cars is built specially for a wheelchair). it is thoroughly inspiring...i think jane austen would approve of my reading mansfield park sitting here in this moment...but i guess i can't be sure...now that is really all.

Currently Reading The Problem of Pain By C. S. Lewis see related

A Sunday spent in Sisters

Just when it appeared that winter might land and settle in Central Oregon for a little while, I woke this morning to beautiful sunny skies and 60-ish degree weather. Definitely capri-donning weather. While my heart is a bit sad that we may be done with snow before we've really gotten any--it's hard to be too sad when sunny skies abound and the prospect of live jazz music after church at Be-Bop-Biscotti awaits me this evening.

The main purpose of this post is that I finally have some pictures to update my site with (thanks to Lindsay)--someday maybe I'll have a digital camera and then I'll be able to update more frequently--I guess I've lost interest in film picture taking since my budget got so tight and the lack of dark rooms kept me from being tempted to spend entire days engulfed in developing chemicals.

So last Sunday after chuch, I met up with 5 friends at an amazing coffee shop in Sisters (20 miles from Bend)--it is Christian owned, two stories, fireplace, piano, lodge looking-feeling-and smelling. It was really great to get out of town for a while--so needed. I think I'll go back tomorrow to do homework for a while. There's nothing more inspiring to get homework done then the smell of coffee and a recently stoked fire place and the knowledge that you are 20 miles away from any normal distractions/interruptions.

This first picture is of Casey--the youth pastor at my church--it's also his 25th birthday--so you can see what occurs when one turns 25 (I only have until September 30th--yikes!):

And here is an old western reminiscent picture (Nicolette, Casey, me, Adam, Seth--Lindsay behind the camera):

Currently Listening Brother, Bring the Sun By Dave Barnes Your Love Will Never Change see related

Dwelling Place

It seems I get asked alot "what's next?" "Are you going to live in Bend forever?" "Are there any special guys you have your eye on?" "Boyfriend yet?" "Are you going to work at the church for the rest of your life?" "Where are you going to live after CLC?" et cetera.

My response is generally to shrug & respond with some noncommital answer. Not because I don't care, or because I haven't been thinking about it...alot.  But because I truly do not know (except for if I have a boyfriend...that I know for sure...it's nice to have something solid & unchangeable besides God).

I've been reading through the Old Testament and am currently in the middle of Numbers (where the spies go out to spy Canaan), so Moses has been on my mind a lot. Do you realize how many times it says God was going to destroy all of the Israelites and Moses stood between God and the people & interceded for them? There were three times in the three chapters that I read today. Numbers 16:48 says "And he stood between the dead and the living, and the plague was stopped" (this is actually referring to Aaron, who Moses sent to make atonement for the people).

This is the type of availability I want to have for God to work through me. I don't want to scratch the enemies car--I want to make a huge dent. I don't want to be part of the congregation that is nearly consumed with God's wrath--I want to be the person who not only stands between the living and the dead, but also be the person that converses with God face to face (Numbers 12:6-8).

What does all this have to do with my intro paragraph? Moses was a wanderer--leading aimless people who had immensely tiny memories & big whine-y mouths. He was also a poet. He wrote Psalm 90 which starts out "Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations." That sentence is my simple, yet truthful answer to all of the aforementioned questions--not just for you, but for me too.

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On a sillier note, Numbers 15:21 says, "Some of the first of your dough you shall give to the Lord as a contribution throughout all your generations." Funny. This verse literally means dough. But it sounds like slang. Either way (God speaking slang: "Yo, bring me your dough!") or literally bringing dough to put in the offering plate (just picture it--so much funniness)--humorous.

Currently Listening Upstairs By Shane & Shane see related

The Departure of Christmas and Beginning of 2007

This Christmas was a particularly fun one for me this year.  There were several reasons for this, the top reason being that I got to spend three glorious days with my one year old nephew, Jack Twist.  Living so far away, I haven't really gotten to spend very much time with him, but this Christmas we got to bond a bit. Which is wonderful...except that it makes me want to go to Sandy, OR everytime I see one of his pictures on my computer. 

I also got to go on a little adventure to Waldport (on the OR coast) to hang out with my old college friend and princess companion, Sarah, and her friend from Ireland.  We went to the aquarium. We saw big crabs. We saw a film called "From Sea to Plate".  We played Balderdash. And the next day I drove 5 hours back to Bend on the "Over the River and Through the Woods" pass--which was gorgeous, despite the fact that I wasn't going to my grandmother's house, but my own--and I am not a grandmother, or even a mother. However, I am a proud aunt (as mentioned earlier).

I was hoping to add some pictures of me with the aforementioned Jack, and some of my family from Christmas, but I'll have to wait for my sister Beth to email them to me. But here are some pictures from the Christmas party that I went to a few weeks ago for the volunteer staff for the junior high, high school, and college groups at my church.

That's Ashley and me (she's another 2nd year in CLC).

First, is Ryan (another 2nd year) the "Jenga nazi" (seriously, you should have heard him threaten anyone who would spill the tower into his chocolate cake). The next is poor Lindsay (a CLC graduate and roommate from this past summer) with Jenga in her coffee and on her dessert.  Yes, I am the one who made it fall over.  But if I had done it on purpose, Ryan would be the one with Jenga on his dessert:).