Vanity.

In lieu of doing homework this afternoon I painted my nails. Well, I did do homework, but I took less than necessary breaks (more specifically, vanity breaks).

It was fun.

Mmm!

Columbia is beautiful in the Spring! I love it. It is like NW summer weather with the most luscious vegetation and blue skies.

Foreverandever etc

(David Crowder Band)

Love so incredible to know
It's never gonna go, never gonna go
Love too impossible and true
For anyone but You, for anyone but You

I think I'm on the brink of something large
Maybe like the breaking of the dawn
Maybe like a match being lit
Or the sinking of a ship, letting go gives a better grip

I'm finding everything I'll ever need
By giving up gaining everything
Falling for You for eternity
Right here at Your feet
Where I wanna be
I am Yours

Love so indelible to know
You're never gonna go, you're never gonna go
Love too unthinkable and true
For anyone but You, for anyone but You

Maybe like a match being lit
Or the sinking of a ship, letting go gives a better grip

I'm finding everything I'll ever need
By giving up gaining everything
Falling for You for eternity
Right here at Your feet
Where I wanna be

I am Yours

Forever and ever and ever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
and ever and ever and ever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
and ever and ever and ever and ever
and ever

Walk the World (Charlie Hall)

God as we walk this world,
We want to be a sign
Our prayers flow into love,
Giving your life

Broken but singing
Our hearts keep shining

Let my life shine, come and let my heart shine
We’re going to walk the world and lift the bread and wine
Like the stars shine, come and let our hearts shine
In a dark world, we lift the bread and wine

And we were born for this
Born for this day and time
Our prayers flow into love
Giving our lives

Marvelous Light (Charlie Hall)

I once was fatherless,
a stranger with no hope;
Your kindness wakened me,
Awakened me, from my sleep

Your love it beckons deeply,
a call to come and die.
By grace now I will come
And take this life, take your life.

Sin has lost it's power,
death has lost it's sting.
From the grave you've risen
VICTORIOUSLY!

Into marvelous light I'm running,
Out of darkness, out of shame.
By the cross you are the truth,
You are the life, you are the way

My dead heart now is beating,
My deepest stains now clean.
Your breath fills up my lungs.
Now I'm free. now I'm free!

Lift my hands and spin around,
See the light that i have found.
Oh the marvelous light
Marvelous light

Lift my hands and spin
See the light within...

Let God Arise (Chris Tomlin)

Hear the holy roar of God resound
Watch the waters part before us now
Come and see what He has done for us
Tell the world of His great love

Our God is a God who saves
Our God is a God who saves

Let God arise
Let God arise
Our God reigns now and forever
He reigns now and forever

His enemies will run for sure
The church will stand, she will endure
He holds the keys of life, our Lord
Death has no sting, no final word

A Little Weekend Inventory

This weekend was Passion 08, in Atlanta, GA. Thanks for the refreshing weekend, Jesus! It was phenomenal. And thanks to my FBC friends to made me come and were so fun. (haha that rhymed a little)

I got back happy and very tired. Studying has been a little strange - I zone out a lot.

[Worship with 9k people!]
[My Katies][Towels we all brought for the homeless]
[Louis Giglio]

Tonight is my new escapist pleasure: Jon & Kate + 8. I only just started watching last Monday night, but I love it. Those kids are the cutest thing that ever happened. And I think they love Jesus! ..at least they have Bible verses taped up around their house (if you look closely).

Here We Are, Again

It's Tuesday, but it's a Monday-ish Tuesday. No, maybe it is a Tuesday, and Monday was just odd, so Tuesday feels inclined to take up where Monday left off.
But the weekend was lovely and relaxing - hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa, and then lazying around with Josh.
This week is going to be short. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not. But I'll take it and not complain.

Sunday Afternoon

Josh and I spent the afternoon wandering along the Riverwalk: it was lovely. Okay, well, it was really Josh doing a photo shoot with some friends here (I, assisting) - but it was fun and lovely all the same.
And then we went to Sonic Happy Hour. It was my first time. I had strawberry limeaide and he had cranberry.

Check it out now

I've got a website, a real one. Right here. There is also a new photoblog (the old one really was just a temporary). It's sweet.

Being Positive?

i am somewhat inclined to feel negative today: its drizzly, i have a billion things due, and my apartment is cold. but that's okay because

-it's not snowing
-the internet is full of amazing things
-there really is some information on atrial crosses in central mexico, if you search really, really hard
-my rough draft only has to be 3 pages
-cornbread muffins are delicious
-josh is cute
-i don't have engagement competition drama
-there are people at school who know my name
-grandma and grandpa are coming
-passion is coming up
-i made money on saturday
-monday is over half way through, and the week has just begun

Wait, where?

In the last week I have spoken with two different individuals who reminded me again of how little Southerners (generalization) know about what or where Oregon is. Last week someone was talking about how Oregon wasn't that long of a drive, and, seeing my confused face, said, "Isn't it over by Iowa?". This week, a friend looked confused when I said one could view whales in Oregon. She asked where and I said "in the water". Josh apologized for my sarcasm, and then we proceeded to discuss that yes, Oregon is a coastal state.
But I too am always discovering new things about Portland and Oregon. In my search of possible alternative locations to Ankeny Square for wedding photos, I discovered that in 1984 (good year) there was a performance sculpture at the Portland Art Museum. Very awesome, indeed.

News

Josh and I have a little wedding website on theknot.com. Its nothing much, but it gives a few details if you had been wondering.

A Little Fashion Tip

To the girl standing outside Gambrell this afternoon:
If you're going for Goth, don't wear capris: you are shooting yourself in the foot and looking ridiculous all at the same time.
Trust me.

Good Friday

“Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him."
John 13:18

Here.

I had one of those moments of existence. Where you have a feeling of existing in the world - not of your significance or insignificance, but of standing and being and moving in the world. This is what I feel when I snowboard; when I'm all alone in powder. Me, my breath, the crunch and hiss of the snow, the occasional squeak or lumbering crash of snow dumping off a branch to crush the drift below. Tonight I walked down a slight hill, past unoccupied construction. In the muffled silence of evening I heard my footfalls, and the zip zip of pants that have come too close in the thighs, or the knees, when I loose my balance ever so slightly.

Spring Rain

Yesterday I wore a t-shirt dress, Wellies, and walked under an umbrella. It was very enjoyable.And I discovered two daphne plants on campus. There are white flowering trees everywhere in Columbia, and, while they look nice, they do not smell good at all. Thank goodness for the heavenly daphne.The azaleas are starting to bloom, as well, with no smell. So it was a pleasant surprise when I took a different path to class and got a whiff of daphne.
Mmm... smells like Easter.

Go With the Flow

So the toilet paper I just bought is made from 100% recycled paper.
Is that gross?

Historic Columbia

Travel Buddies

Historic Savannah

Tybee Island

Spring

After sitting out on the deck doing homework and eating lunch today, I have a slight tan on my feet! Yay!
Too bad it wasn't this nice when Tracy was here. :(

Washington?

So on my way to work today I see the car in front of me at the stoplight. In the bottom-left corner there is a sticker that says 'I <3 Whistler that I know of, and I can't imagine someone from SC driving to Whislter. I had read the sticker correctly, and the license plate was from Washington. That makes sense.

/question mark

What is someone from Washington doin' driving to SC?

Southern Anecdotal Moment

So I just had one of my weirder cultural (if you will) experiences tonight.

A little background information: Columbia's downtown isn't the most happening of downtowns, nor is it by far the most happening part of Columbia. Not by a long shot. And some blocks even less.
Tonight, I happened about this block. It's the only retail block in downtown (the rest are mostly food and lawyers, etc), and it contains ethnic sorts of stores and wig shops. Yeah.

Now that you have the visual, let me explain why I was there. I'm in an art house film class, where we go to Columbia's art house film theater on Thursday nights and watch a film, talk about it for 45 min, then go home and write a little paper on it. (And we learn about film and non-profit organizations.) In a year and a half it will be moving into a much bigger theater 5 blocks away. Right now, however, unless you are more than, say 45 years old, you would not know the building is a theater. It is atop a building called Solid Gold Beauty Supply (guess what it sells? Asian wigs. I know). Suffice it to say, right now the owner of the Nick, or teacher Larry, is the only white guy who is seen hanging out on that block. Till tonight.

For the sake of learning more about the art house film industry, my class was to forgo a film (super sad day; I thought we were watching Persepolis) and take a tour of the new home. Our prof was to meet us there at 6pm, and, as good students we are, most of us were early. Josh kindly dropped me off, or rather, waited with me so I wouldn't have to stand there alone looking ... awkward. Pretty soon I saw an uncomfortable looking white girl walk up and stand uncertainly in front of a jewelry store, next to Solid Gold Beauty Supply. The, two equally awkward looking white guys joined her. Convinced it was my class, I also joined them. Pretty soon we were a group of about 10 white kids with backpacks trying to look natural in front of a jewelry store.

Pretty soon, an African American security guy walks up and asks us what we are doing there. (Needless to say we looked out of place.) We all laughed uncomfortably, and then one guy piped up and said we were looking for the new home of the Nickelodeon. The man laughed and said we had found it, and then added that it wasn't too often that he saw people... looking like us loitering on that block. We all felt a little weird and then just embraced the humor (the security man certainly had - he thought it was hilarious), and we laughed.

And then Larry showed up and we were all a little relieved.

Tornado warning! Eee!

Exotic and hick, all at the same time. I think tropical storm and wild phenomena; the girl at the front desk thinks "I'd better call my mom and warn her: she lives in a trailer".

The Good News and the Bad News

The good news is I made it into the Student Art Exhibition so I know I placed at least 36th out of 102 entries. The bad news is I didn't place in the show for the monetary prizes. Ah well. It was worth a shot.

Goodmorning

Jackson Pollock, Lavender Mist, 1950

"Lavender Mist epitomizes Pollock's ultimate style, in which physical action and emotional expression achieve balance. It is an astounding tapestry of color, poured, dripped, and flung on the canvas." -www.nga.gov

When I am in my painting, I'm not aware of what I'm doing. It's only after a sort of "get acquainted" period that I see what I have been about. I have no fears about making changes, destroying the image, etc., because the painting has a life of its own.
- quoted in Possibilities I, Winter 1947-48

La Lune

Last night Mallory and I went out and watched the total lunar eclipse. So did a bunch of other people from West Quad - it was the most I've ever done with people from my dorm aside from being outside together when the fire alarm goes off.
It was pretty sweet: thanks God!

It's Eternal

Talk radio that is. I have to say I used to hate it growing up as my mom listened to the radio. However, now that I have a job it helps time go by so fast. By far my favorite is the Glenn Beck Program. That guy is crazy, but scarily accurate, and definitely the most entertaining. Seriously, if you have a job and need some entertainment turn him on. Also if you read non-fiction I highly recommend his book, an Inconvenient Book.

Valentine's Day

There were lots of jokes running around the retreat with the youth leader's couples about spending Valentine's day with 40 high schoolers - but what a great way to share love with lots of people who really need it, right? I got more hugs this weekend than in the last few weeks combined.
But for our Valentine's day, Josh took me to Nonnah's (amazing dessert place in The Vista) the weekend before. He also got me a gift card to Walmart. Have we been living in the South too long? No really - it was something I wanted: the rest of the set of dishes I got when I moved into my apartment. I just ordered them today!

Winter Retreat

"Day-homie!" Weekend t-shirt

A view of the Smokey Mountains from the slopes.

One of many (much needed) snow blowers.
Josh and I at the top of the run.

Log cabin suburbia.

Apres ski spa night!

Never having worked with high schoolers, I had not realized what a difference a few years makes. Every time the girls in my room cleaned up after themselves, or got up when they needed to, I was amazed. Jr hi is very different. I love both, don't get me wrong, but this weekend really was a bit more like a retreat. We all had such a great time. God worked in the kids and the leaders, as well. It was so fun getting to know the group, too - 40 kids and 9 leaders.
To sum it up: no injuries, lots of prayer, word games and really cool kids.

Big Fan

DCB. They rock. Listen to Never Let Go.

I just got a text from Allison. "Ding!"
That means she's gonna get a raptor.

Rare

This morning I talked myself into getting up on time - and showering - so I could get to class on time. I didn't want to skip class because we have an exam scheduled for Thursday.
I am sick, but walked half an hour to get there anyway. We sat around for about 10 minutes while the prof and ta tried to get a film clip to work (of which I watched the entire thing last night somehow). It didn't work, and he dismissed us, telling us we would watch it Thursday. I went up and asked him about the exam and he said we weren't having one yet. That is a pain because I already started studying, and now that test is going to end up in the same week as another one. Sigh.
But it wasn't all a loss. I left class and decided to stop at the school library on the way home to check out the exhibit of illuminated manuscripts my Northern Renaissance Art History prof had raved about. It was fantastic! There was everything from tiny Books of Hours to huge lectern Psalters. They also had some history books, Bibles, and pages out of similar items. It was very exciting.

Study Browsing

http://www.arthistoryarchive.com/arthistory/abstractexpressionism/

I just found this website while searching for a Lee Krasner image. It is a fabulous collection of abstract expressionist works. Love it.

April 15th and 600

Yes, it's that time of year. Have you received all your tax information from the church, job, and school. I know I have. Did you know that the total you can earn before having to claim it on your taxes is $600. I am at about $140 so far this year. Here's to the number 599 and sticking it to the man.

Chicken?

I found this add for a slow-cooker. I'm gona call this bad advertising - that chicken looks really scary.

Sweetness.

I was kind of irritated with the world tonight, so as I sat in film discussion after class, I felt very antagonistic and was probably scowling. At the end of class the teacher announced he was showing us our papers from last week (I thought we weren't getting them back till after midterms) and he said he had graded us on a scale from 1 - 10. He wanted to read us some titles so we know what a good topic is, but that we all did well - between 7 and 10. I waited eagerly to hear if my topic was read. No luck. Then, when I got my paper back, it had a 10 circled on the top, and three, scrawled notes. Two of my classmates who I sort of actually know had received 9 1/2 and he told them "great paper". One of them asked why he only got a 9 1/2 if it was so good, and he replied, "well it wasn't *that* good - I only gave out one 10".
It's amazing how fast your day can improve.
Then one of the 9 1/2s told me I should go back to Portland and take my fiancee with me if he's anything like me. He loves to talk trash. It was fun.
Now I'm eating beef barley soup and attempting to finish my French history paper.

Just a shout out to all the Canadians who will understand this, sorta. We in South Carolina are in the middle of a chinook. Well, not really, but it's 80 degrees Fahrenheit, in the middle of winter.

Beautiful things:

-not Starbucks
-warm, flowery smells
-picking a camellia (pamela style)
-being given mardi gras beads from my barista
-talking about good, imported beer with a South Carolinian
-walking on bricks under naked crepe myrtles

You're gonna need pencil and paper for this...

So, here is the deal these are the thirty odd finalists. The choice is yours what happens to them. This is what you need to do. First, go find a Post-It note, 3x5 card, notebook paper, or envelope. Second, your favorite marker, pen, pencil, or Sharpie. Third, your favorite piece of jazz music. If you don't have any I would suggest looking up something on YouTube (Seriously, you need some jazz music cause for some reason there is some bluegrass song on the slide show. Turn the sound off if you have to). Then watch the video and pick your top 10 photographs. They don't have to be in a specific order, just your 10 favs. Then post your fav 10 (if you need you can just make a list of numbers - 1 being the first photograph) That's it, no expository commenting necessary. Oh, and pick one that you think is the worst (not necessarily bad, but the worst at of the bunch)

Advanced Black and White Project 2

Ok, so this really isn't the first project, but I didn't want to be outdone. It's the pre-project goofing around. We were supposed to take photographs of whatever we want. In class we will learn how to make digital BW prints, that are comparable to film prints (such as silver gelatin). So Al was my first subject.

Print Project #1

The project was "Self-portrait as Evil Dopplganger". Pretty fun! This is me as a sorority girl (notice the long hair, pearl earring, dixie cup of cheap beer, and disco light). The original sketch is nicest, but I don't have a picture of it. The sketch on top is the mirrored version with the incorrect hand. The bottom image is more or less what the print actually looks like, only with nicer, creamy paper and a few straighter lines. I made eight, of which two are close to perfect.
I smell like ink, vegetable oil, and baby powder. It's somewhat disgusting.