Day 9: Always by my side

Day 9: A picture of the one who has gotten you through the most

Its simple: In no way shape or form would I be who I am today without the support and love of my savior and redeemer. I know often people would agree and say the same thing and have the same belief and testimony I do in the strength he gives us. So it made me think a bit ...well how do we know? What if its really just our "mind" that tells us this? So that would mean its not him that helps us its just ourselves and our motive to believe?

Honest truth: You will NEVER EVER know...until you get on your knees and test that doubt of yours on an act of faith; then you will figure out that to question such is not needed.

I spend every day and night thinking about where Im at in life....

9749, miles away from home

from loved ones

friends

family

How did I get where I am at today? Since when did I have the strength and courage to do half the things I do or have done?

It hits me everyday like a rock - Everywhere I am placed, Everything I do, Every challenge I face he is there.

"Reach up as for as you can, and he will reach down the rest of the way"

I find that sometimes I forget to reach up...but, he never forgets to keep reaching down.

I get angry..He waits patiently.

 I forget .. he remembers.

 I let go..he holds on.

I doubt him..He never loses faith in me.

I speak to him..He listens

No matter how imperfect I may be the one person who always stands by my side and has faith in me during times of weakness..is my savior. I know that in everything I am weak in or fail in he is there to carry me and have faith in me:)  

Footprints in the sand:

One night I had a dream--

I dreamed I was walking along the beach with the Lord
and across the sky flashed scenes from my life.
For each scene I noticed two sets of footprints,
one belonged to me and the other to the Lord.
When the last scene of my life flashed before me,
I looked back at the footprints in the sand.
I noticed that many times along the path of my life,
there was only one set of footprints.
I also noticed that it happened at the very lowest
and saddest times in my life.
This really bothered me and I questioned the Lord about it.
"Lord, you said that once I decided to follow you,
you would walk with me all the way,
but I have noticed that during the most troublesome times in my life
there is only one set of footprints.
"I don't understand why in times when I needed you most,
you should leave me."
The Lord replied, "My precious, precious child,
I love you and I would never, never leave you
during your times of trial and suffering.
"When you saw only one set of footprints,
it was then that I carried you."

Day 8: Back in the day...

Day 8: A picture that makes you laugh

SO...I know I said id keep this blog limited to the australian life BUT I couldnt help but bring that memory back into play!! Back in the day :).....nearly 2 years ago to be exact me and these two lovely girls sent off all of our missionaries... ( dumb dumb dumb ) Of course we had no idea what was a head of us nor did we think .... Maybe in the future one of us will be married??? cough cough linsey....Or...maybe that one of us would be living halfway across the world in australia??? Random....or maybe one of us would be working our butts off to be financially stable THEN travel the world...lets just say back in the day we didnt really use the brain god provided us:) but we sure used our beautiful and talented cooking skills:) we decided this was our missionary waiting lifestyle....MUDDY BUDDIES!!! And for those of you who dont know what muddy buddies are...I will teach you the heavenly ways :) They are yummy peanut butter chocolate sugar coated chex mix!!!! What was so funny about this was...it was the DAILY happening!!! I am pretty sure we could take out a bowl within a couple days!! We decided to try and be domestic and bake the "time" away haha!! These 2 have been my closest friends for The longest times...we all pretty much have the most opposing personalities BUT managed to love each other regardless!! Linsey dear with the blonde hair there has got to be the most understanding person ever with the kindest intentions, she is now married to her new hubby in which we thought she was going to be the LAST of the bunch to get married because of the missionary that had been sent off!! Shar there in the middle...What to say???? haha pretty much me and her were COMPLETE opposites considering I am probably the most straight forward person ever and she is pretty sensitive!! But, I def learned to be more considerate of my choice of words and to listen more all because of this girl:) She now is living it up getting rich and educated (smart move) As for me....2 years later I am living the furthest away I could possibly get from home taking life as it comes :) I guess you could say the funny thing about this photo is the unexpected future we had lying ahead of us:)

Lesson Learned

Expect the Unexpected





Day 7: Most treasured

Day 7: Your most treasured Item

So this would LITERALLY be my most treasured Item. And yes this would be my exact CTR ring :) I have had this ring for almost two years and since day one that I recieved it I have NEVER taken it off. If you didnt know what CTR stands for it stands for

"Choose the right"

One time, (ok ONLY once) I took my ring off cause I was cooking or something n then next thing you know I couldnt find it anywhere!! Me being the spaz that I am took hours looking for it and stressing out about it, and as soon as I found it I have never taken it off, not for showers, dishes, cooking, or anything else your meant to take your rings off for!! So to be honest, this is my most treasured item not only because it became habit to wear it but, because of the meaning it holds! Its a good thing we are given reminders like this in our church because everytime I look down at my hand I remember my goals and my intent to learn and grow from the gospel! Since ive gotten this ring I have grown in so many ways, figuring out who I am and what I need to do in life! That being said, the meaning and the encouragement this ring gives me is my most valuable and treasured item!

Pure & Priceless.

Day 6: Trading Places

Day 6: A picture of someone you would want to trade places with for a day

Today I post about who id want to trade places with for a day...and my pick would be a street dancer!! Not a famous dancer, nor a professional dancer, or teacher, just straight street!! Basically, how I see it, these dancers are more passionate and more sincere in their dancing rather than trained and pressured!! To live my life out on the street doing what I LOVE to do without pressure, without the world telling me HOW to do what I do would be my dream day!! :) I love to dance and am nowhere near  good but, hey thats what daydreaming was invented for!! So that being said...Id LOVE to trade places with the allll natural street dancers for a day:)



Day 5: A little bit o this..n a little bit o that

Day 5: A picture of your favorite memory

Ok ok ... I know im so breaking the rule of just one picture..n using multiples but theirs one too many memories I have here in OZ n intend on sharing all of them considering their all pretty equal in importance haha! So I was trying to decide what was my favorite memory and then I realized that was dumb...australia overall has been my best memory!! I have met loads of people here who I just cant get enough of!! So this first pic of course I had already blogged about the famous decades dance:) Lets just say I went a little crazy cause I hadnt danced in too long n finally had some music rollin!!

 Me n TREEEGGOO!! love this girl she pretty much is going to be the coolest sister missionary eeever!

 Aw love these guys...the one on the far left would be Tinka train..CHOOO CHOO haha...cause apparently someone would love  to ride that train :P lol!! Thatd be laurence there in the middle..one night we were driving home with him and for some odd reason laurence has this fettish with wanting to go live in a bush!!! So one night he was STINK!! so we decided to give him a hygenic makeover:) and WALA there you land with this clean good smelling good loooking laurence!!! N of course the famous Kumbai ah crew liz!!! hahah

 Ah..my first night here in perth!! This would be the Beauty and the Geek river cruise!! I had no idea who these people were my first night here and come to find theyve become my new favorite people!! :)

 Me & Alex are pretty dang legit...we pretty much tore up the YSA decades dance floor with our mean dance battles!! Although..I looked like a true american fool this latino (or whatever he told me he was) had major dance skill!!!

 YSA sunday!! So this was the sunday we spent like 8 hours at church..Crazy ay? well thats how they roll in perth to get all the YSA together considering we all live like n hour away from each other!! It was real cool seeing all of the perth YSA together in one chapel it reminded me so much of home...yet filled with Australians and maoris..so id say it was much better then home ay!! The last hour or so of it im pretty sure half the congregation was asleep...poor speakers :/

This would be elder scicluna!! Pretty much just met him 3 days before he left to serve in Africa!! First time I ever saw him he was giving a farewell talk in church n was literally glowing..n I sure let him know that first time I met him haha good conversation starter!! Me n Tinka were there to give our handshakes goodbye!!!

 Me, Tiana, N candy at the airport posing away!! Tiana there in the middle is literally the fashion GODDESS!! op shop is a hugggge thing here in australia and probably going to be my latest and greatest addiction!!

 Hayleigh n Charles!! This night we all went to burswood to see one of our friends sing!! N charles there would prob be one of my favoritest ppl here in OZ considering I was cool enough to get a whole tribute to me and my american accent on his radio show ..SCOORREE!! 2 months in oz n famous already hahaha

 The canadian Jesse!! This guy is one of a kind ha first time I met him he was as hyper as ever!! Maybe its a canadian thing?? Well we played this cool game where we were lucky enough to win 20$ for getting flour blowed into our faces...tricky tricky!!! haha

Once again the famous bush man!!! This was at our YSA fastbreak sunday which was SOOO yummy and now becoming a tradition!! One thing these aussies like to do is get their feed on and socialize til the sun goes dowwwnn!!

So this would be the many pictures of my favorite memories!! And of course I have so many more from home BUT considering this is the "9,749 miles" blog we will keep it limited to my life down under:)



Day 4: KUMBAIII AHHH

Day 4: Your favorite night...

        
                                                    As you can tell....this would be sunrise..

                                                       Kumbai ah crew...at its finest:)

                                            

 One Night...Me, Ginny, Liz, and Jingles were driving home from Karaoke night. We decided to do a pit stop at northbridge :) First off...if you didnt know..its perfectly normal for you to see police officers riding around on horses..yes..horses? That being said...as we were roaming around we stopped to grab a feed!! As we were walking into the restraunt poor liz had dropped her wallet behind a horse...(first off...you should never bend over behind a horse) ..next thing you know...the horse KICKED her in the butt and she banged her head on the concrete!!!

And if that story were true..id continue in detail...but, fortunately enough its not. Funny thing is we told a number of people that story...n not one figured out it was a ridiculous story to believe. DUMMMB. hahahah One person..*cough cough laurence...even believed  the story of liz playing pin the tail on the donkey...and the donkey kicked her in the head...sooo gullible and soooo DUMMB!! hahaha!

True story:
First of all..we did go get a feed from northbridge!!! THEN we decided to go take it up to kingspark and kick it there for a bits:) Next thing you know Ginny n Liz decided they wanted to have a sisterly love argument..zzzz...as they carried on with that liz decided she wanted to take the car keys n go grab her purse so she could walk herself to the trainstation!!

30 mins later....

No liz. No. Car. No money. No ride.

HAHAHAHA!!! All we could think to do...was walk our stranded selves up to a little hut on the corner of a street...and chant our song of hope...

KUMBAII AHHH MY LORD>>
KUMBAII AHHH....

Honestly how pathetic we looked...was photo worthy!!! As we sat their laughing about how we were going to get home...with no car..and no money..Liz decided to show up ..
By that time it was about 3 o clock in the morning!! So we all hop in the car...no big deal were all sweet...then liz rants off about dropping her off at the train station. Considering they were closed Ginny decided to keep on driving...next thing you know ...

BOOOMM....

we look back and liz had jumped out of the car...
Pure dedication right there!!!
So...we swirved around and next thing you know...

                                                                      NECKBRACEEEE

hahahha as dramatic as this night was we all pretty much at the end of the day had a good laugh about it and it has made my "most favorite night" listing!!!

We spent our time in the hospital til about 5 in the morning...

First instinct when I saw that nurse roll liz in with her neckbrace was to bust out laughing!!! hahaha

That nurse honestly look at me like I was pure evil...

All was sweet at the end of the "morning" as we hit it off with a bang at famous ol

MACCAS!!! yummm:)

Kumbai Ah Crew Part 2: Coming soon:) 

Day 3: The latest & greatest impact

Day 3: A picture of something that has made a huge impact on your life recently

So I know that  It is supposed to be a picture of my biggest impact..but, that wouldnt really do me any justice!! As you know  I am a "nanny" ..But did you know I nanny to the two most beautiful children ever? Yeah..I thought so.

Lately, I have been growing in so many ways just through the days I spend with these 2 kids!! I have learned that being a "Nanny" is NOT easy so suck it up! I learn each and every day how to turn my selfish thoughts of what a tough job it can be at times into thoughts of how insanely blessed I really am. These beautiful kids have taught me...

*Patience

*The little things really DO matter most

*How to really listen

*Singing & Chocolate make it all better

*Expect the Unexpected

*Creativity

*The feeling of motherly love

*To them..Everyone is beautiful in their own way

These lessons from a 2 &3 year old dawn on me EVERY day. And I have learned to take everything I do in a days time, whether it be a rough day or not and be grateful for the lessons learned.

My biggest impact: The innocence of a child