Hooray for girl time with Julie! Tonight I got to spend some quality time with my lovely roommate, as the distracting boys in our lives were both otherwise engaged. I love talking to Julie, because I feel like she gets me. We tend to think alike about a lot of things, which is comforting. (Although it is slightly scary to think that there is someone else out there who is almost as weird as me...) Billee...I lahv you!

Have you ever had one of those moments where there are so many different, random thoughts going through your head, yet you can't seem to put any of them in words? That's me right now. And so I am going to take my random, thought saturated mind and put it to bed.

Searching

So I have recently found myself on a bit of quest. A quest for myself, the reasons I believe what I believe and act the way I act. A quest for God, how He is active in the world today and in my life and the plans he has for my life. This is a slightly daunting task, but I am quite excited about it, and would greatly appreciate prayers for the success of my little journey.

So today I finished my month-or-so-long effort of reading all the way through the Psalms. Here are a few of my favorite excerpts (what a great word! so many consonants...)

"May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer." ~Ps. 19:14

"Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the Lord our God. They are brought to their knees and fall, but we rise up and stand firm." ~Ps. 20:7-8

"Delight yourself in the Lord and he will give you the desires of your heart." ~Ps. 37:4

"The wicked plot against the righteous and gnash their teeth at them; but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he knows their day is coming." ~Ps. 37:12-13

"Blessed is the man who makes the Lord his trust, who does not look to the proud, to those who turn aside to false gods." ~Ps. 40:4

"Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall." ~Ps. 55:22

"Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you." ~Ps. 73: 23-25

"I seek you with all my heart; do not let me stray from your commands." ~Ps. 119:10

"Teach me knowledge and good judgement, for I believe in your commands." ~Ps. 119:66

"May my cry come before you, O Lord; give me understanding according to your word." ~Ps. 119:169

"Unless the Lord builds the house, its builders labor in vain." ~Ps. 127:1

"Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting." ~Ps. 139:23-24

"The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth." ~Ps. 145:18

Proud to be a wildcat

Ah, homecoming weekend. It's times like this when I realize what a severe lack of school spirit I actually have. Allow me to recap how I have spent the 3 ACU homecomings I have experienced thus far:

Freshman year: I was in the band, so I was forced to attend the homecoming festivities. Marched in the parade around campus, went to the football game, blah blah blah.

Sophmore year: Went home. To Arlington. A real homecoming.

This year: Went to McMurry with Ryan to experience their homecoming. Will be spending the rest of the weekend working. A lot.

Can we say ACU pride? Go wildcats.

Praise God for Tuesdays

I love Tuesdays. My day off. I began today with lofty goals and ambitions of getting caught up on all the homework I have put off for weeks. What a joke. I am pretty much the biggest procrastinator I know. I spent the day being incredibly lazy, and enjoyed every minute of it. Ryan came over and did nothing with me, which made it that much better. I'm pretty fond of that boy.

Since my mind is pretty much mush right now following its day of disuse, I leave you with the lyrics to a song that I find absolutely fabulous and goosebump-worthy:

Thorns in His head
Spear in His side
Yet it was a heartache
That made him cry
He gave his life
So you would understand
Is there any way you could say no to this man?

If Christ Himself
Were standing here
With His face full of glory
And His eyes full of tears
And if He held out His arms
And His nail-printed hands
Is there any way you could say no to this man?

How could you look into His tear-stained eyes
Knowing that it's you He's thinking of
Could you tell Him you're not ready now
To give Him your life
Could you say that you don't think you need His love

Jesus is here
With His arms open wide
You can see Him with your heart
If you'll stop looking with your eyes
He's left it up to you
He's done all that He can
Is there any way you could say no to this man?

ADD? What?

I seem to be having a very difficult time focusing right now, so here a few random thoughts:

I like Sudays. A good time to regroup and refocus for a new week.

It's great when you're totally dreading doing something, and then find out you don't have to do it after all.

I'm a huge procrastinator. Despite my best intentions, I can't seem to change my ways.

My roommates are insane. I like that. Most of the time.

I have a pretty awesome boyfriend. He puts up with my randomness and ramblings. That's no simple task.

God is good. He has blessed my life in so many ways that I don't even come close to deserving. What a deal.

I think maybe I'm insane

I like being a girl. I like that I can watch incredibly sappy movies and get totally goobly and excited over the sheer cheesiness of it all, and that's ok. Tonight I spent some much needed time with the girls. It was quality. We watched Mean Girls and 13 Going on 30 and ate lots of junk food. I also learned that Mr. Clean holds a special place in the heart of my dear friend Erin. I love that girl. She makes me laugh. A lot.

So last week I decided that I wanted to teach myself to be ambidextrous. It's kind of been a long-time dream of mine. During class or when I get bored at work, I just start trying to write with my left hand. It's kind of a slow process, but I'm convinced it will work. This week I started getting bored with that endeavor, and today I decided to try to teach myself to be fluent in Spanish using freetranslation.com. I figure if I just learn a few key phrases each day, eventually I'll get it. Then tonight while I was at work, bored out of my mind, I had this brilliant revelation. What if I combine the two? I could look up Spanish phrases online, and then practice writing them with my left hand!! What a deal! I think it could work. It all depends on my ability to stay focused on the task at hand...which puts my odds of success at about a billion to one. But I think it's worth a shot.

And clearly I am in dire need of sleep. I think I will go take care of that...now.

So today marks one month for me and Ryan. How exciting! In a way, it seems impossible that a month has already gone by, but at the same time, I feel like it's been so much longer. I feel like I've known him forever. It's a pretty awesome feeling, but terrifying at the same time. Wow.

Mark and Katrina are engaged!?!?! Wow. That is so exciting, but again, completely terrifying. Not that they're getting married, but that they are so close to my age and getting married. There's no way my peers should be old enough to even talk about getting married!! But then, I still feel like I'm 12 years old most of the time. Maybe one day I'll actually act my age. But I kind of hope not.

Can I just say how much I am looking forward to IW tomorrow night? I am in desperate need of some girl time. Bring on the estrogen!!

It is slightly cold outside. This excites me. I enjoy cold weather because the clothing options are so much better. Sweaters and long sleeved shirts...I love it.

Tomorrow instead of going to class, I get to go work at this wellness fair at the civic center and give flu shots to old people. I'm pretty excited about it. I don't know who decided that trading 8 hours of mind numbing classes for an hour and a half of giving shots was an even trade, but I like their logic. I approve.

In approximately 12 minutes, it will be Julie's 20th birthday. My little roommate is growing up right before my eyes!! *tear*

To Share or Not to Share?

So Ryan wants to read my blog. He's wanted to ever since he found out I have one, but I have stubbornly refused to give him the link to it. Today Julie told him what it is. This made me very nervous. Seeing I was obviously not entirely comfortable with the thought of him reading about the inner workings of my mind, Ryan promised me he wouldn't read it unless I gave him permission. What an awesome guy! So now I am debating whether or not to let him in on the rare and precious treasures that are my thoughts. I don't know why it's such a big deal to me. It's not like I've said anything I did't mean or am ashamed of. It's just awkward. But I guess that's the story of my life.

Why did the possum cross the road?

Tonight I hit and killed a possum on South 1st. It was a very traumatic event in my life. I have never hit an animal in my car before. Ryan was in the car with me. He laughed. We just had a conversation about a week ago about the fact that I had never hit an animal before. I think he jinxed me. I didn't even see the poor thing coming till I was about 6 inches away from it. Then I felt it. It was awful. Ryan suggested that we go back and check to see if it was ok. Bad idea. We returned to the scene of the incident only to find it splattered across the next lane. I thought I might cry. Ryan laughed harder. Note to self: if I ever hit another animal, do not go back to see if it's ok. Assume it walked it off and went to be with its happy animal friends and lived happily ever after.

So yesterday marked another major milestone in the Brooke-Ryan relationship. I met la familia de Ryan. It was a quality experience. His parents came in from The Woodlands and his younger sister and her boyfriend came in from Tech, so I got to meet them all. We went to lunch at Texas Roadhouse and I was entertained with stories from Ryan's mom and sister that made his face turn red. It was fabulous. After I got off work Saturday night, I got to see them all again. We went over to the hotel where his parents and sister were staying and played a rousing game of Sequence. I was on a team with his mom. We lost. Three times in a row. It was a sad day. But fun nonetheless. I love his family, and felt very at ease around them, so I think that's a pretty good thing. According to Ryan, I met with the approval of all members of his family as well, so that's definately a good thing. Apparently his sister has never liked any girl he's dated, and made that fact well known, but she said specifically that she likes me. This makes me happy, because I think she is awesome. She had me cracking up the whole time I was around her. So yay for that.

This weekend some of the high schoolers from my youth group in Arlington are in town, so I spent much of today hanging out with some friends who are still in high school. It was good times. They were very interested to meet this new boy in my life, so I subjected Ryan to further awkwardness by dragging him to a devo of approximately 30 high school kids, my youth minister, and various other adults from back home who are friends of my family. Slightly intimidating? I would think so. But I think it went well. There were some people there that he already knew, and he's pretty good at meeting new people, so things weren't too awkward. I'm assuming the people from home liked him, because he told me he got about 4 invitations to come to Arlington, so there you go.

I really think we're about to make my theory of experiencing every awkward moment possible within the first month of dating a reality. This coming Friday marks one month of us dating, and we've already met each other's whole families, as well as a good number of friends. I do have to say I've subjected him to a whole lot more of my friends than he's subjected me to his friends, but he's promised to get even. I'm thinking that there can't be a whole lot more awkwardness to be experienced, but I'm definately sure if there is we'll find it. We both seem to have a gift for awkward moments, so together there's no telling what kinds of adventures we'll stumble across.

The days are starting to run together...

Wow. Another week has come and gone just like that. Crazy. Today was my first day of clinicals. Slightly overwhelming? Yes, I think so. I feel like I am never going to know enough to be a decent nurse. I have to keep reminding myself that this is still my first semester of nursing school, and there's no way I could possibly know everything yet. But I wish I could.
Can I just take a moment to be girly and sappy? Ryan is wonderful. Everytime I am stressed out or in a weird mood or whatever, hanging out with him automatically makes me feel better. Tonight I was feeling pretty stressed after my day at the hospital, and he came over and just talked to me for like 4 hours. It was fabulous! I didn't even realize that much time had passed until he left. I don't know why God decided to put Ryan in my life right now, but I am definately glad he did.