who i am

We drove up Pike's Peak today - it was beautiful. Cold, but beautiful. We brilliant Floridiots Floridians wore, of course, shorts, t-shirts, and flip-flops. It was not only 41 degrees up there, it was windy and kinda rainy (we even saw some hail). Brr.

{As I'm writing this, I'm watching the Olympics. Watching the fastest man in the world and his ego. Do you know how many times I've heard Usain Bolt call himself a legend? Did you see how he didn't congratulate anyone else? Do you know how many times you can hear the pronouns "I" and "me" coming out of his mouth? Boy, is it hard to love someone with that attitude. Jesus, help me love my 'enemies'...and help me remember that our fight is not one of flesh and blood, but one against "against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." --Ephesians 10:12}

Driving back, we were listening to music in the car. And a verse in one particular song hit me...sadly, I cannot remember that particular song (I think it was Newsboys...?). Oh, the imperfection of the human brain.

Anyway. I do, thankfully, remember what I was hit with...and it was so simple, but something I needed to be reminded of. And it was so clear.

My struggle with sin does not define me. Really, it doesn't. Yeah, being a perfectionist, trying to do it on my own, being a "good girl"...those are all struggles of mine. But they don't make up who I am....you wanna know who I am?

"Yet to all who received Him, to those who believed in His Name, He gave the right to become children of God — children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God."

--John 1:12-13

I'm a child of God. Not by anything I've done...but because of His love.

That is who I am. That is what defines me. Not anything of myself, but Christ in me, the hope of glory.

Who are you? What do you let define you?

p.s. this was the highlight of the Olympics so far for me :)

awarding fun

Today I was awarded the Liebster Blog award by the amazing Ireland from A Pearl of Great Price!! Thank you, Ireland!

First of all, of course, the rules:

1. You must post 11 facts about yourself
2. You must also answer the 11 questions that the awarder has given you, and create 11 questions for your awardees to answer in turn.
3. Tag 11 fellow bloggers.
4. Notify them that they’ve awarded them.
5. No tagging back.
6. The 11 blogs that you tag must have less than 200 followers.

So, 11 facts about myself - here we go!

1. I am a triplet!

2. My family is exactly 7 weeks into a 9-week RV trip that we're on, mostly around the Western United States - starting from Florida and traveling along the southern coast to California, up the California coast to Washington, eastward to South Dakota, down to Colorado (where we are right now), and then heading back through Arkansas and such to Florida again. :)

3. I hiked up a 10,000 foot mountain with my family yesterday, 6 miles round trip, 1,000+ feet up...and I had only had about 6 hours of sleep the night before, give or take an hour. :P Ah, well - we had fun!

4. I am the only girl of four kids.

5. I, oddly enough, am looking forward to this upcoming school year. :) I have a lot of courses I'm excited about - I'm homeschooled, so I'm doing some curriculum simply at home with my brothers, some on Florida Virtual School, and some out-of-the-house classes with (mostly) other homeschoolers.

6. I don't like eating bananas just by themselves...but I like them in smoothies, in pudding, etc. I know, I'm weird.

7. Speaking of, I just made a smoothie for lunch with half of a (large) banana, most of a peach, most of a mango, about 20 frozen blueberries (we don't have any straw berries :( boo-hoo), and, of course, ice - it is delicious!! I wish I could give you some...but I just drank the last sip. ;)

8. I haven't watched any of the Olympics this year!! :( We haven't had TV reception at the campsites that we've been staying at while the Olympics have been going...maybe tomorrow we'll get reception at our new campground that we're going to? I hope so!

9. Um...ah...er...let me think...oh! I don't need braces. :)

10. Hmmm...well, my parents went out on a date last night, so my brothers and I watched Mars Needs Moms while they were gone. I have to say, I actually think it was quite good. It didn't have the unnecessary things that many movies, even animated, kids' movies, have - the only small, two things I could think of were that the main character wanted to watch a movie about zombies or something (not shown), and the female Martians' suits were kind of tight, but only around their hips and such. It had great morals of conviction, healing, redemption, consequences to our actions, sacrifice, and showed how important a loving parent is to a child and vice-versa.

11. I'm turning 15 this year (already?!) on November 16th, and I'm hoping to get my permit around then!

Now, here are my answers to Ireland's questions:

1. On average how often do you blog? Not often enough. ;) Probably somewhere around a week or a week and a half on average, I'm not sure. It's pretty amazing that I'm posting again so "soon" after my last post, which was 5 days ago.

2. How many siblings do you have? I have three brothers.

3. Are your siblings younger or older? Well, like I mentioned earlier, I'm a triplet, so I have a brother who is a minute older (Nathan), a brother who is a minute younger (Noah), and a brother who is a year and a half younger, to the very day (Nicholas).

4. Do you like to swim? Yeah, I do like to swim, but most of the time I'd rather do something else.

5. What is your favorite season of the year? Autumn, most definitely...maybe spring, but even in spring it gets so hot so quickly in Florida.

6. Favorite holiday? Hmm, I don't know...Easter? Christmas? Thanksgiving? One of those three, I suppose.

7. Favorite band/singer? Oh my, there are so many that I love to listen to! Singers...I really like Kari Jobe, Jason Gray, Britt Nicole, and Francesca Battistelli. For bands, I like Tenth Avenue North, tobyMac, Newsboys, and Casting Crowns.

8. Do you have any pen-pals? If so how many? Well, not by letter, but I have been emailing, IMing, etc. with two girls who I "met" through a blog - one of them I actually got to meet earlier this summer on our trip!

9. How long have you been blogging? I've been blogging for a little over two years if you count my old blog (which I started on July 18, 2010 on Weebly), but I don't post on that one anymore; I've been posting on this blog since December 26, 2011, ah...7 months, 1 week.

10. What is your favorite thing to do outside? Ooh, good question...probably just simply taking a walk with friends/family.

11. What is your favorite thing to do inside? It depends, but I definitely enjoy reading, playing games with my family, and going on the computer (email & blogs for the most part).

Well, that was fun! :) OK, about awarding people...because I want to get off my laptop and it's a beautiful day outside and I can see the mountains from where I'm sitting and the cool breeze is wafting into our RV through the open windows and I just got a bunch of good novels this morning that I might possibly crack open...because of all this, I'm going to be lazy and simply tag anyone who wants to do this award! Really, go ahead and do it - I know you want to. :)


Have a wonderful Saturday evening, everyone! I'm planning on eating a delicious dinner outside in the cool air with my family and sitting around a dancing, smoking campfire and getting my fingers sticky with s'mores and going out driving with my family to look for elk...what about you? What have you done or are going to do today?


p.s. does anyone know what liebster means? :)

Pictures/Slideshows!

Since we are finally at another campground which has free Wi-Fi (the last two or something didn't), I can finally post pictures! We try not to upload pictures using our Verizon Mi-Fi hotspot thingy, because it uses a ton of data (which means we can't watch YouTube videos either :( phooey), so that's why I had to wait until now.

But now means now, and so I proudly present you with two slideshows I created, with helpful input from my family, of course - one video is of our time traveling in the month of June, and the other of our time in the Grand Canyon! Enjoy!

Sorry about the weird thumbnail in that video^^ :P - YouTube is being annoying and won't let me pick my own thumbnail (it only gives you 3 choices, and it's taking a while to load the one that I want, so for now it's stuck on this one, cut halfway between two pictures of my dad and my brother in the pool)...the thumbnail on the video below, however, worked out great! I was happy about that. :D

These slideshows were a lot of fun to make! We went to the Grand Canyon three different times (which is why there are so many pictures): the first day we went in the late afternoon and stayed there for the sunset. We went back the next day and spent most of the day there, hiking around the rim and having fun. We rode on a bus for about a half an hour out to almost the furthest point of the rim, and had some very interesting conversations with some very interesting people while we were driving out there. ;) And the last time we went was the next morning, at roughly 5:00am. Yeah. I know. We all got up at about 4:30ish to go and watch the sunrise...and it was freezing!! It being so windy didn't help either. :P That's why we all have jackets tightly wrapped around us in one or two of the pictures towards the end of the slideshow.

Oh, and I'm entering this picture of the sunset in the Grand Canyon in KayleeBeth's photo challenge:

It was a hard pick, because there were a few others that I really liked as well...my brother and my dad liked another pic better than this one (you could see the Canyon better), but I loved the sun rays in this one, and I just had to use it. :) The sunset was absolutely gorgeous!

Annnnnd...that's all for now! We're heading today from, uh, somewhere in California (about an hour outside of LA) to Yosemite National Park! I can't wait! :) Hope everyone has had a wonderful week so far!

some thoughts about life and death

the two times i have come closest to death happened two days in a row.

not death happening to me, personally. but to others around me.

yesterday, my dad was driving early in the morning to find coffee and signal. for his phone, that is. as he was driving, a police car...a fire truck...an ambulance sped past him. later he saw them, crowded around where a car had driven off the road...and down the drop-off, several feet below. they loaded the person, loved and precious in the eyes of our Lord, into the ambulance.

that evening, as we drove by, merrily coming home from our day trip in San Diego, we quickly sobered when we saw flowers and a sign where the accident had happened.

life is so fragile.

today, a dear friend of mine, whom i've met only once, but who is a sweet sister in Christ...their very, very close family friend passed away today. she has... had been in the hospital for many weeks, for several things going on in her body. her husband, my friend said, was given peace by our loving Father, but i ask all of you reading this to please pray for him and for my friend and her family, as this is obviously so painful. i praise the Lord that this precious lady is now rejoicing in heaven with our Lord Jesus, but i weep for those here on earth who will miss her.

life is so fragile.

why? why must it be so? if i look at it in anger and pain and despair, it looks as if God is mocking us, mercilessly reminding us of our frailty, of our weakness, in contrast with His Almighty strength.

but i know that is not truth.

what is truth is that our Savior loves us. i know, as surely as the sun rises, as the Psalmist says, that our Lord and King is a loving God, and that while He is rejoicing in heaven, He is weeping with His beloved ones here in this fractured, broken world. the ones who miss their dear friends and family members, who have lost loved ones in combat...in the womb...at the end of an alley...in a hospital...

although i'm not quite sure what the point of this post is, other than to let out some of the thoughts tumbling around in my mind, my soul, begging to be heard...maybe, out of all that, this is one lesson learned:

how precious life is. how dear, sweet, and precious life is.

may we not forget that. may we always bless each day, grateful for the life given us by our Savior.

bullet lists are wonderful things

There's so much I want to say.


I was thinking, before I even started this post, about what I wanted to write...I started to count how many different topics I wanted to blog about. The number was somewhere around 7, I believe, and is rapidly increasing as I think of more things I want to just get out there.


Now, I think you all will agree with me that if I go ahead and pour out my heart about all those topics and events, you will never reach the end of this post (neither will I, for that matter) and I will have merely accomplished a way-too-long-I'm-so-tired-of-reading-this-my-eyelids-are-about-to-glue-shut post that will bore you all to death.


So. The normal solution would be to pick out one or two things for this post and either forget about the rest or save some for later. However, I am not normal, if you haven't noticed. Thus, I am going to condense several of these topics to just a couple of sentences, throw 'em all (including some other things I think of) on a couple of bullets, and hope it all works out. ;) Here we go...

• Last week we had some very, very good family friends come down from North Carolina and stay with us for a couple of days. We had such a great time with them!! I wish I could tell you every detail...but I can't. :)
• Also, last Friday evening and all day Saturday (excluding Fri. night), I was with my friend's youth group (which I've been attending for over a year now) at Acquire the Fire!! We had such a great time. The worship band, the speakers, the drama, the concerts - they were all amazing. Christ was certainly present, and many people gave their life to Him!
• I am currently loving this song - heard it on the radio, looked it up - never heard of the guy, but, wow, his voice is amazing! Yeah, he's unique, but I think he's really great. ;) Here's a link to the lyrics, btw (you might need 'em).
• Oh, and this song. :) {click here for lyrics}
• My friend, her family, most of her youth group, and several college kids that her older brother knows (and I know most of them, too, incidentally - they are homeschoolers, you know) are all taking part in the Justice Revolution. The JR is a book that her dad and another guy (I believe) wrote, a kind of daily devo containing a 21-day challenge to raise awareness about several injustices in this world - poverty, abortion, human sex trafficking, child soldiers, etc. {Yes, slavery is definitely still present in this world, and more so than ever...it's heartbreaking.} You can check out some of the teens' videos on YouTube here and here.
• Mom and I spent some time together yesterday afternoon, one-on-one, and had so much fun!! :) We got ice cream at Coldstone and painted our nails at the park!
• We, my family and I, are most definitely planning to take a road trip this summer, for about two and a half months or so...and I'm so excited!!! :D Unless God tells us that this His not His Plan for us, right now we believe it is, and we spent some time last night as a family planning it out - we've already got almost the first week down! (Google Maps is an amazing thing.) My mom and dad already planned out the whole
  (tentative) route, but last night we just started from the beginning in more detail.

Sooo...that wasn't too long, right? :) Just bits and pieces of my life lately...


Hey, and thanks to the girls who said they were praying for Nicholas!! Trinka, Tess, and Emma - I showed my post and your comments to him yesterday, and he loved it. ;) He was allowed to play in the last basketball game for a couple of minutes, and he did great - speaking of basketball, both our JV and varsity teams get to play in the first round of the tournament this Monday (woot-woot!), so please pray that everything goes well and no one gets hurt!! We had one of our best varsity players fracture his wrist two games ago. :( Prayers for him would be great, too!


Love and blessings,
Nicole <3 John 5:24

quick post & prayer request

Hello, all! (speaking of 'hello', i have that song by Shonlock stuck in my head...who, by the way, i got to see in concert on Saturday! more on that later)

So sorry I haven't posted! I have been SO busy, but having so much fun! :) I'm kinda tired - haven't gotten enough sleep for the last, ah, several days - and I'm not sure that a decent blog post right now would be the greatest idea ever (i'm not completely functioning, i don't think..just enough to stay awake). :P Plus, I burned my tongue hours ago with hot (HOT) chocolate, and it still hurts. Still.

But I just wanted to check in and ask you guys girls people (tho my few readers are prob mostly girls) if you could be praying for my brother, Nicholas. He got hit in the head with a baseball bat earlier this afternoon, so my mom went to an after hours clinic or something with him. They're still gone, but she called to let me know that he's doing OK and that he got three stitches on the small yet deep cut on the outer edge of his eyebrow (a first among us kids! the stitches, i mean). Anyway, here's a pic of my little bro (at Busch Gardens):

isn't he cute?
{he's going to kill me for saying that}

So, yes, your prayers would be greatly appreciated! And, hey, if - when you read this, if you could just drop a quick note saying, "Praying for you, Nicholas!" or "You're the most adorable ahem, handsome thing ever," or something, I'm sure he'd love that. ;) (JK about the latter. He would also kill me for that. :) Anyone else have younger siblings they love to tease?? Gotta love 'em...they bring so much joy, do they not?)

Anyway...the water for the spaghetti is about to boil over (I can hear it...it's coming...). Noah's electronic chess thing is beeping constantly, and quite annoyingly (beep, beep...beep...beep, beep, beep). I'm tired. I'm hungry (*rumble, rumble, growl*...right on cue). I'm getting a headache from the beeping. And did I mention I'm tired?

....Don't you just love life? :D I sure do. How's your life?


**Update from 4/24 -- Nicholas is doing great and loving the attention from the stitches (thanks for the comment, Trinka!!). ;) I just took some pics of him (below).


And, hey, I know that y'all have time to say you'll pray for him! I mean, don't say it if you don't mean it, obviously, but I thought it'd be really great to surprise him with a whole list of people who are praying for him in a couple of days or so. :) A little help, please? Thanks, and love and blessings to you all!

sorry about the poor picture quality :P i just have to say, tho 

- i don't know, however, if you can tell too well in this picture - 

but our family all pretty much agrees that he got all the good genes -
my mom's beautiful, tanned skin tone as well as the gorgeous brown eyes,
long eyelashes, slim, athletic build, etc. :)
the hair here could use a little work...
;) not that he cares

...and the puppy face
(he's about to burst into laughter)
;D

childlike

via Google Images

Sometimes I just want to be a kid again.

A little girl, who doesn't feel the need to tell her brother not to put a dripping wet cutting board into the cabinet as "clean", who hasn't yet learned to default to directing her brothers around carelessly. A little lady who is not yet desensitized to the ways of this world, who is utterly repulsed at the irreverent misuse of God's holy Name. A young child who enjoys running around outside in the sun with her little friends, who isn't worried about that guy who just tagged her to be 'it' - isn't worried about what he thinks of her, her clothes or her hair.

Who loves life. Who worships God in surrender, with abandon.

Does anyone else here long for that? Long to be childlike, as Jesus commanded? Wouldn't that be amazing? Don't you love it when you just laugh with your siblings, family, friends - just being enthralled with the joy of pure life?

I love life, this forgiven, free live He has given me. I hope I can learn again to enjoy it as much as Jesus does.

^"And he said: “I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven."

--Mathew 18:3-4

p.s. A big, huge thanks to Emma Margaret, who designed the current theme for the blog! :) You can visit her blog here or order a blog design from her here. Thanks, Emma!

life...take two

"Take hold of the life that really is life."

--1 Timothy 6:19

As some of you people out there might know, in the blogger world...it can be quite pressured. Stressful, even. There's SO many things you "need to do!!" as a successful blogger - for example, is photography in? Then I need to take a photography class (which, I gotta admit, I was already wanting to do...this just gave me an excuse ;) haha). Inspiring posts are necessary for acquiring many followers? Check! A post every two days, with maybe a 'wordless Wednesday' or something like that? Gotta get that down! Etsy shop needed? Umm...I'll think about it. Vintage is the thing? Well...that's cute...maybe I can find some vintage-y pics that I like...OK, sorry, I'm just not a vintage girl. :) But seriously, it's like every other part of the world - there's always something you can conform to.


But what if I don't want to conform? What if I step back and think, "Seriously? This is where I put my time and effort? Do I enjoy this, this competition, this facade of who I really am?"


Ummm...no.


So...that's kinda how this verse hit me, and I just wanted to share. My blog is not my life. My schoolwork is not my life. Books are not my life (gasp!). I am who I am, and I am in Christ - He is my life.


And, OK, I started this post last night. And afterwards, I could not go to sleep for quite a bit of time. Why? I was so excited about blogging! Now that I've realized that I can be posting for me, not for them, (whoever "they" are) a whole new world of opportunities opened up for me! (And that sounded so totally cliche it was wonderful.) I "get it" now, why I didn't want to post on my blog. I was so stressed over what other people would think of it, whether it was inspiring or not.


Well, who cares if it's inspiring or not? Yes, I want my blog posts to point towards Jesus Christ. (But, well, to steal Jocee's words in her comment here, if the rest of the blogger world doesn't like that, then screw them! {don't take that too literally, please}) I don't really care if no one is reading my blog (OK, I kinda do...). But really, this is my outlet for creative writing, what I enjoy doing! And I have the freedom to do that! Right now, it doesn't really matter what another person thinks about it. Here, I can write out my thoughts, I can dream, I can pray, I can share my heart...


Oh, darn it, I need to go make breakfast. Within one minute. Oops (I'm gonna be late :P). ;)


Love and blessings,
Nicole <3 John 5:24

life

singing....

Remind Me Who I Am by Jason Gray

God Girl by Jamie Grace

Stay Close by Fireflight

enjoying.... {taking crummy pictures and not caring at all} ;)

dipping carrots in dad-made guacamole...mmmm....

watching the guys play ping-pong at sunset
(i spy...a flying round object!)

a new skirt and old toe-nail polish :) actually, this is the
first time i've had a skirt in....i can't remember :P
(btw...i love it)

the budding flowers out front....a lovely spring welcome

and...life. sorry, no picture for that. :) love and blessings.... <3


p.s. thanks, Brooke and Lindsey Madison, for following...love your names, btw ;)