So I was responding to Meredith’s comment and realized I was starting a rant/blog...so I chose to end that comment and then come here and rant/blog instead. Not that Meredith would mind...or at least I don’t think she would. [why is my font/text size so freaking small??? (ctrl+scrol fixes it all!)]

So I'm drained! Spent the weekend with jr high and high school students in Seattle at the Dare to Share evangelism conference. It was amazing b/c its been a really long time since I've been to that kind of youth event (I like to think of it as my kind of youth even b/c its the kind I grew up going to ^.^ makes me so happy!!!) The students were really into the whole thing, which is exciting.

I really love my youth group. Another thing that I’ve discovered this semester, how did I live without them for so long??? Well…(in answering my own question) I didn’t live as fully or as well as I could have. I learn so much from these students about the world, myself, God and of course about them. <3

Also, I finally picked a kid to sponsor through Compassion International. His name is Peter and he lives in Kenya. ^.^ I picked him specifically because he lives in an Aids/HIV affected area. I’ve been thinking about doing this for some time now and I’ve always used the excuse that I’m just not financially secure enough to promise 32$ a month. Which is a load of BS, because God has always provide financially for me and my family and in making this commitment I’m doing what He’s asked of me so He’ll provide. And when I got home (from the conference), I found out that I’ve been accept for a credit card attached to my bank! Which just means that if I don’t have the money right away, Compassion can charge my card and I have a few extra weeks to pull the money out of savings (if need be).

I just finished sorting out what class’ I need to take for next year…Its mind boggling to me all the juggling that is necessary to get the class I have to take and Ceramics at the same time, because now that I have taken Ceramics I’m not sure how I will get through the summer without it… I need my own pottery lab. It’s becoming an obsession… And I haven’t even made that much stuff because I live off campus and can’t go to the lab as often as I would if I lived on campus. I think I’m gonna sing up for a PCC ceramics class this summer. Maybe I can do an independent study….

Lastly, jumping back to this weekend’s conference; I’ve made some decisions about how I’ve been living and how I’m gonna try to live from now on. Nothing really huge, in fact you’ve already seen it here in this blog. I’m gonna stop shying away from talking about God. For so many years I’ve avoided say stuff about God/Jesus/Holy Sprit; every now and then I’d say/blog something but for the most part, I’ve censored/deleted it in order to avoid a negative confrontation that “might” happen.

Back at the beginning in 8th grade I was really close to a girl named Dorothy. Dorothy lived to fight about intellectual stuff, in order to prove her superiority; she was/is also an atheist. She never seemed happier then when she was grilling me about God and Jesus and “showing” me how incredibly wrong I was to believe. She brow beat me out of talking about God. We were friends into high school; and even though I know that the group of friends I gained in high school (and still have) would never have verbally beat me up as much as Dorothy had, I got use to not saying anything. Over the last few years I’ve gotten a bit more comfortable saying God stuff around those friends who don’t necessarily agree with me. But for years it’s been this…understood silence on the topic of “religion”. (we don’t talk about politics either ). I don’t even know what you hold as true or what exactly we disagree on…I’ve come to think that this is a little absurd.

I’m not posting this as some kind of “Watch out steph’s gone religious on you all!” It’s just part of what I’m thinking about and that’s what a blog is; thoughts.

So, there it is. God is cool, and yes, I’m a Jesus Freak.