Here we GOOOOO.....

I did it. I signed up for classes....

School starts a week from today. Monday Aug 29th I start classes again for the first time in 3 years!!!! AAAHHHH!!!! I only signed up for 2 classes and I figure that is a good place to start. I am going to be taking History before 1866 and Intro to Psyc!!!

I am super excited. I have so much going on in my life right now and I pray that God gives me the ability and the discipline to balance all of them.

I am starting some different things in our church for the children's ministry, starting school, working 30 hours a week, and I still need to give attention and love to my husband!!

I was always envious of the kids in high school who could juggle everything and still make straight A's.

I'm giving myself a vote of confidence and telling myself "You can do this, you can give 100% to everything, you can manage your time wisely, your going to do great!!!!!"

A step in a different direction....

I have been thinking a lot about where I am in life, what I'm doing, what I want to be... You know thinking about my life in general.

I realized that I have a wonderful life. I am beyond blessed. I have a wonderful husband who supports me. God is working wonders in my life and I have a wonderful job.

The delima is I was given the opportunity to get licensed and get a job with Allstate. Its a chance at a career and a chance most people don't get handed to them. I am so grateful for my opportunity. My line for everyone was I just had a career handed to me, all I had to do was study and pass some tests.

All this sounds great except the word career. I have a great job and a great boss. However this is not my calling. I was not made to make sales. I have a passion, I have desires, I have dreams, and goals, and not a single one of these depends on me making sales, sitting in front of a computer all hours of the day and making phone calls. My dreams and passions are children.

I feel like the past few weeks God has been telling me to go into Children's Ministry. I have listened and answered his call and am in the process of going through the motions and hoops to be a Children's Director. For now the job is all volunteer, so I will continue to work at Allstate.

The next goal is to get back to school. I want to go to school and learn. I want to be a teacher, I want to influence as many young people as I can. So, as of now I am in the process of finding out what I need to do to get through school.

Please pray for me. I am so excited about all this. I don't even know what to do with myself I am so excited, but at the same time, I am absolutely terrified.

This is going to be so difficult!!!!

I have been smoking for a LONG time... Since I was 16. I am now 22. That is 6 years. I want to quit so badly but it seems almost impossible.

I can do good with how much I smoke or how often but when I get home and its late... Like now its 9pm, I want to smoke and smoke a lot!!!

There are so many bad things about smoking, I know the list. All the Cancer, all the difficulty of breathing. I get it. Yet it is still so hard.

I am going to try with every bit of who I am to try to stop smoking for good. I want to never have to pick up a cigarette and lighter again. I could save tons and tons of money by not spending $8 a pack 3-4 times a week.

So, wish me luck... say a prayer. I need all the support I can get. Here goes a super hard fight!!!

Trust and Obey

I am a 22 year old licensed sales producer for Allstate. I am a wife, a church member, an aunt and, hopefully soon, be a mom.

I am already so busy with everything that goes on in my life. I want to do more though. I want to be involved more in my church. I want to do more with my job.

How do you budget your time? I was never good at taking time to work on school, or balance friends and work. How do I start this.

Right now in my life I want to relax. A lot has gone on with me and there has been a lot of hurt since 2007. 4 years of confusion. 4 years of struggles. 4 years of not letting go and letting God be in control.

I am ready to let go of what I think is best for me and my life and I want to let God be in control of me completely. I was raised in a church, I know the Bible. I know all the right christian things to say. I was involved in church heavily when I was in 9-11th grade. I quit going to church and turned away from people who loved me because I felt as if Christianity was used as a weapon and as a tool instead of a way of life and a way to show God's love.

I want to make a stand again for who I am. I want to make a stand for what I believe a christian is.

However, I am scared. I have my husband out here and I have good friends who love me and support me. They know my thoughts, my heart, and my beliefs and they accept me. The problem is that they don't all believe the same things that I believe. My husband does, and I know one of my girl friends believes close to what I believe. But I am scared of rejection. I am scared of being so far away from my family and being ridiculed for practicing what I believe.

I have always believed in God, I've always had a relationship with him. But I also know that it says in John 15:18-19 " If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you."

I am scared of being "hated" and not loved. In return to the hate that I KNOW will come, I don't want to start to use the Bible and my "religion" as a weapon. Christ taught love. He turned the other cheek, He sacrificed for us. So what do I do from here?

I take a step of faith. I follow the will of God, even though I am scared. Even though I don't know where it will lead me. I follow and I obey.

For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

What is a Home?!?!?

The definition of home is the place where one lives. But is a home not much more than that?

When I was 20 my parent divorced. I was upset that my home was being destroyed. I got married shortly after their divorce was final. I was happy as could be getting married to Carlos. I moved from Pearland TX to Flagstaff AZ. I hated it here. I didn't know where I belonged. I knew I was supposed to be with my husband but I didn't have a home. Carlos and I lived with his parents. I was and still am grateful for them letting us live with them. But I was not at home. I felt lost there. I felt as if my privacy was always invaded. I would get off work and drive around town forever avoiding going to their house. I couldn't possibly go to a home where I didn't feel like I had a place.

This past weekend Carlos and I moved to a little apartment. Its small, its nothing great, but its home. This apartment is perfect. Its everything that I lost when my parents divorced. It is a HOME.

When I was little my dad always told me that outside these four walls of our home the world is mean it will tear you down and it will make you want to die, but inside these four walls we will love each other, we will encourage each other. We were like any other family, we fought, we yelled and screamed from time to time, but for the most part we were loving. I knew that no matter what happened in life that I was going to be OK. I was going to have a home... I would always have a place to be safe and to be who I am.

I lost that home when my parents divorced and I moved out to Flagstaff.

Now as of August 12th 2011 I have a home again.

In our home we are happy, we are loving. I am free to be who I want to be. I am free to be loud and crazy. I am free to be silent and write in my blog. I am free. To be free is a wonderful feeling and I love being free.

Home is more than the place you live. Home is where you are free, safe and loved! Home is our little apartment.

You dont have any Talent!!!!

Sometimes when you look back at the people you went to high school with, you see all the different things they have accomplished. You see all the talent that they have and you start to wonder "What's my talent? What can I do?"

Everyone has a different talent. Some people are musically inclined, some people its smarts, some people its their athletic ability. Everyone has a talent... so what's mine?

I hear my husband and my close friends and family tell me that I'm a great person, that I'm loving, things like that. But is that a talent? Is that not just my personality?

I think I need to take the person God has made me into, and show the world that I am talented too. I have an imagination, I'm not stupid, I believe I can do things. The thing I lack is drive. I know everyone has a talent be it one thing or another. The difference in me and someone famous, rich, and well known is the drive. Its the dedication to make yourself known. I don't want to be famous or a movie star or anything like that, however I do know I want to be PROUD of who I am.

I know a lot of times I don't see the good in me. I don't see the talent and gifts I've been given. I also know there are a lot of people out there who also don't see themselves in that light.

What can we do to change that? Changing your views on yourself is such a hard thing to do.

The first and simplest thing I am trying to do, is when I get a complement I will say "Thank you." Most of the time when I get a complement, I start talking about someone else, or I'll say "Oh, OK your crazy." When my husband tells me I'm beautiful most of the time I tell him, "Don't go get your eyes checked, I know you'll end up leaving me." I always say it in a fun joking way, but if I didn't believe what I was telling him then why would I always say it?!?!?

Today, I will start to make a conscience effort to say "Thank you" when I get complemented. I will make an effort to see what it is that others see in me that way I can believe in my "talents" and show the world how gifted I am.

The BEST Kiss EVER!!!!

There is nothing better than having a wonderful kiss... you know the kind where you feel like your walking on a cloud, the kind where you can't stop kissing that person because the high you get is way better than anything else on earth.

The best kiss I ever had was on my wedding day. When I was able to kiss my HUSBAND for the very first time it was euphoric. I didn't care who was watching and the look on his face after we kissed was priceless.

I wish I could start everyday off with that same kiss and end everyday with it. Yes, I get to kiss Carlos every morning and every night, but I don't get the same rush of emotions or the butterflies.

So how do you keep that feeling in a marriage or in a long term relationship?

I think the key to having the best kiss ever played over and over again is to keep your love strong and alive. Your not going to get that kiss every time... but it will still come.

Ok, so how do we keep the love strong and alive?!?!?!?

I have told Carlos before that I miss the excitement of a new relationship... I miss how I couldn't go 5 mins without talking to him or talking about him. He told me that I have to get used to it because were married and things aren't new and exciting anymore its just us and we know each other. Well, I don't want to accept that. I still cant stand the thought of us not talking all the time. I cant stop talking about him. He is everything to me. So what I have discovered is that we have to continue to get to know each other. We have to talk about everything. The more that I learn about Carlos the more I love him.

The times when I learn something new about Carlos or see him do things that I adore, or even just watching him be who he is... I kiss him...and I get to experience the BEST KISS EVER all over again!!

Don't Stop Believing...

I saw a quote today and I feel in love with it... "I believe in pink. I believe that laughing is the best calorie burner. I believe in kissing, kissing a lot. I believe in being strong when everything seems to be going wrong. I believe that happy girls are the prettiest girls. I believe that tomorrow is another day and I believe in miracles." - Audrey Hepburn

This quote reminded me so much of who I am, and how badly I want to get back to who I am. I have found that it is so easy to lose yourself in the crazy, hectic, stressful life we all live. I am a dreamer. I always have been I always will be. I choose to believe in the good of all people, I choose to believe in real life princesses and fairy tales.

You see life can get so scary, it can consume you and rob you of your innocence and joy. But when life starts to take you over and you feel consumed that is when you have to stand up and fight for what you believe in, you fight for your dreams, you fight to maintain a happy outlook on life, you fight to keep your self safe!

When I was younger I believed in EVERYTHING... frogs turning into a prince, unicorns, rainbows with leperchauns at the end of them, I believed someday I would get to meet my fairy god mother. And of course I believed that lighting bugs were really fairies. I believed I could talk to the animals like Dr. Dolittle. I was full of life, of imagination, of innocence and of joy.

Thru everything life has thrown at me, I am still true to the things I believe. I'm not as naive as I was when I was 6, however I still choose to believe the good in the world, the beauty of life, the magic of love. When I believe things whole heatedly like I do I find the hardest part of believing something is the realization that others aren't going to feel the same. You might not have the same beliefs as me and that is fine. We are all entitled to our own thoughts and opinions. However, sometimes (lets make that most of the time) I don't understand why people don't think the same and believe the same as me. I believe in the little things so much and have so much faith that I cant wrap my mind around someone not agreeing.

I guess what I'm trying to say with all of this is that... I started to loose faith in all the things I believed in the past year or so. Life has thrown me tons of curve balls. When I saw that quote today, I realized, like a light bulb going off in my head, that it doesn't matter how old I get, what happens in life, or what anyone says what I believe makes me who I am.

So, I will never give up on believing in the fairy tales, the miracles, the beauty of life, or love.

I'm forgetful....

I wanted to start this blog and I did a while back and I thought it was going pretty good I was getting out there and writing about what I feel... then I got lazy! So I have to get back to this. I think I will set a goal of making at least 3 post every week. That's not too much, I think I can write about whatever I feel like at least 3 times a week...

Y'all hold me to it now! :o)