Words that changed my evening...

and possibly my life.

Michelle, "Can you afford it?"
Me, "Yes."
Michelle, "Can you live without it?"
Me, with hesitation and groan, "Yes."

What I did on vacation...a picture review.

Went to Lisa Birocci's wedding with my sister. Former roommate. She looked absolutely beautiful and happy.Did not get together with my Dad's side of the family. This actually happened two Sundays. The first planned get together was cancelled due to illness the second to weather. Boo.
Enjoyed watching my sister learn, through experience, that confectioner's sugar is powdered sugar not granulated. "This frosting looks grainy." Oh man, I still laugh when I think about it.Ate lunch with my grandparents at Legends after getting my hair cut (see previous post for hair cut pics). Saw this great sign and took a picture, sorry no pictures of the grandparents. This beer is for you Rachel.
Bowling with my sister and her friend Whitney. Good times had by all. They did not have any lanes when we arrived so we also played some pool and darts.

Spent time with friends in the great town of Iowa City. I am just getting used to carrying a camera along with me, so please forgive me for not having more photos.

I met Andy's bird Mugger. I still don't like birds, but this one is ok.

Oh, just chillin. And I mean that literally. We went to Andy's after eating at the Vine to say good bye to Angie. I was wearing my coat, Andy's socks and covering myself with a blanket by the end of the evening. It was great to see the ladies at ICRC. I love the pregnant Sarah! So excited.
Jenny, what is so mellow about mellow yellow?
It is about time that someone took revenge on Suzie and took a picture while SHE was eating.

It was so nice to get to see good friends in Iowa City. The only thing I would change would be to see more people and spend more time with the people that I did get to see. I spent a good amount of time with my family, my sister especially. I think that she will be glad that I put this picture of her up.This is the gate where I ran into someone from high school that I had not seen since high school. That was pretty fun.

I have to say, Iowa did a good job of making me remember why I left her. Check out this crazy snow. You can't tell, but it was still snowing when I took that picture. And negative seven wind chill factor. You can't tell the wind chill from the picture. It was darn cold. And I didn't get to go sledding. What good is snow without sledding?

It was great to be there, but it is good to be back.

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Welcome Home!

To say the least, getting back to Iowa was an adventure. And the travel part was not the only adventurous part.

I thought that my trip back home was going to be the long haul (I have a 7 hour lay over on Monday to get back to Phoenix). However, getting to Des Moines seemed to be no easy feat. My lovely roommate dropped me off at the airport on Friday morning. I have this bad habit of waiting until the last moment to pack for a trip and this time was no exception. I am quite thankful for living so close to the airport.

The flight to Salt Lake City was uneventful. I listened to my iPod and enjoyed having the seat next to me empty. As we descended I realized that I had missed a lot of what was probably a beautiful flight to watch out the window. I was in awe of the white mountains and the icy bodies of water. It was so pretty I decided right then and there that sometime I would have to take a trip to Salt Lake City, something I never even thought of before.

I had three pushing on four hours to spend in the airport, so I took my time getting to my next gate. On the way there I discovered the ever present Starbucks. After finding my gate I returned to the Starbucks. I sat next to a woman reading Cultivating by John Eldridge. I knew once I took out my Bible that she would say something. Having a Bible in front of you must be body language for "talk to me."

The lady had been delayed on her first flight and that had caused her to miss her original flight in Salt Lake City. She was a lady that looked to be about my parent's age and she shared with me that she had children around my age. One of her daughters had encouraged her to read the book she had with her. She asked what I was reading and I explained that i was spending the afternoon catching up on the Bible in a year program that I was almost finished with. A few years back, she used the same program and shared some of the ways that she was encouraged by it.

After she left I put in my head phones. Bible may say, "talk to me," but head phones are American for "do NOT talk to me."

Not long after the other lady left, a woman about my age sat down. She asked me if I could look after her stuff for a minute. I know this is a big airport no, no. But I was pretty sure she looked at my Bible and decided I would be an ok person for that. And seeing as she ignored my head phones and had an accent I knew she was not American.

When she came back she shared with me that she is from Israel and that she was in America for the Urbana Missions conference. This woman was amazing. She is the leader of the department for Hebrew speaking students at the school she works at. It was definitely a Divine encounter. She shared with me from Song of Songs some things that she was learning and the Hebrew meaning of some of the passages. It was amazing. It was like God put a face and a voice on the words He wanted me to hear. Wow.

So then the travel part of the adventure started. My flight got delayed and the flight attendant lady told us that we might have to land in Cedar Rapids instead of Des Moines due to possible weather. After we boarded the plane the pilot said that the weather was perfect in Des Moines and he foresaw no reason that we would not land there. That was good, but then he informed us that there was a part on our plane that needed to be replaced. That is never something that you really want to hear.

Finally after all that we took off about the same time we were supposed to land.

Ah, you have to love traveling.

New Hair

Before. Long (for me!) New length, a little bit different color.
Super straight and from the side so you can see the angle.
Tucked behind the ears and a little curly.
Same as above, from the back.

So...what do ya think?