Festivals=No Flipflops

Flip-flops were not the shoes of choice for yesterday. See, I went to the balloon-fest all night and now my ankles kind of hurt from walking on the uneven ground for so long. (the same thing happened after alive...where I also chose made the unwise decision to wear sandals) Anyways, I got there at about 6 thinking I'd stay for a couple of hours before I headed over to the lot party, but I ended up staying there until nearly 11. There was actually quite a few people there...a lot of whom I thought I'd never see again after graduation. Unfortunately I didn't find anyone to really walk around with, so I pretty much just wandered around for a bit then I'd go hang out with rachel...then go back to wandering around again. But anyways, then when rachel got off, we went over to the lot party. Apparently last night was the rave night, because I walked in and the lights were all dim with black lights and strobe lights and balloons all over the place. And to top it all off, benny had the radiohead cd going. We ended up just sitting on the couches/laying on the floor talking.


we're all the same
and love is blind
the sun is gone
before it shines
so if I had a chance
would you let me know
-the killers "change your mind"

Nooooooma

These past few days have been really quite interesting. Let's see, on monday I didn't really do much until I went to the college house for community dinner. After we were done with the bible study, we watched a couple of those nooma things. I really like those. So then on tuesday rachel and I were trying to get the worship team together, but our efforts failed, so it was just us two. We ended up getting the key to the college house from sean and watched the rest of those nooma things. We watched a couple of them before it started to storm really bad, so then we ran over into the church to try and be in a slightly safer location. After the storm had passed, we locked up the hosue and then just ended up going back to my house and watching the last of them. Anyways, then last night was bible by the pool...which was no bible and all pool. Needless to say, we skipped out of there a little early and went over to starbucks then back to the boy's house. My parents were frustrating me so much, but I called my dad at work today and talked to him for a while about it, so I think we should be cool now...at least I hope so.

Chipotle Goodness!

Rachel ate a whole burrito!

Home From Vacation!

Well, I'm home at last! Thank goodness my brother and I conviced my parents to take the drive home in one day. It was a long drive, but I'd rather have just gotten it done with instead of dragging it out over two days. It was pretty refreshing to get away for awhile, but at the same time, I was really missing a lot of the people here. For the most part, I got most of the reading I was planning on doing done. Anyways, we met the mumfords down there and stayed in a pretty nice house in corolla...which is pretty much as north as you can get in the outer banks. We went to the beach and hung out around the house a lot...it was pretty much a stress-free week. Corolla isn't really that commercialized, so there wasn't a whole lot of activity type stuff to do...but it wasn't boring or anything. I love snavely-mumford vacations.

I leave in just a couple of hours for vacation! Not looking forward to the drive, but definitly looking forward to the destination! I've still got some mixed feelings about the trip, but JR made a good point yesterday. It's better to leave when things are going well. A lot of the time people leave because they want to escape whatever problems or struggles they are going through, but leaving when everything is going well just makes you trust God even more that things will be alright when you get back. It's often harder to trust God when things are going well, so, I'm just going to trust him that things are still going to be alright when I get back. I guess my biggest hinderance is just knowing that I'll be gone from everyone for a week. I feel like I'll be missing out on whatever is going on. I haven't even left yet, and I'm already missing everyone already. (I think that's because I really didn't get a chance to say bye to some people.) But don't hesitate to call me if you want to talk for awhile because I'll have my cell phone. I've got more minutes than I know what to do with, and it's hopefully going to be a pretty stress-free vacation, so we'll probably just be hanging out a lot. Well, if I don't talk to you sooner, I'll see you all when I get home!

I guess now that it's after midnight, I technically leave tomorrow for vacation. I'm pretty excited, but then again I've kind of got mixed feelings about it. It just feels like things are going so well right now, so I kind of hate to leave. I think part of it is also that I know that when I get home, it will be really close to August, and that means summer is ending soon. But at the same time I'm excited to go see Steph (whom I haven't seen in what seems like forever) plus just to get away from here. It'll be good. So I brought my guitar home tonight and it was still in a weird tuning from this afternoon, so I was tuning it back to normal...and a string definitly broke. Ah! I just put a new full set on less than a week ago! So, I've either got to go buy some new strings tomorrow, or just not bring it on vacation. This week seems like it has flown by...I think it's just because I haven't been doing as much. Let's see...sunday I just hung out at my house, monday I went to the college house, tuesday I went out with the worship team, and then tonight I went to bible by the pool and stuff. Well, I guess I've actually been doing a lot more than I thought I had. I've got to do most of my packing tomorrow, but I still want to go out somewhere since it'll be my last night in town...plus I'll be with my family all next week. You know what I really feel like though...just going and hanging out at starbucks and having good conversation.


Why you leaving me now?
There must be some doubt in your mind
Can't you open your heart?
Don't want to be left behind.
--aqualung "left behind"

Well, it's only been one day since everyone left for mexico, and I'm lonely already. On friday night I went to the lot party and then spent the night at the church. The bands weren't all that great...but mostly because I'm not into hard core rock stuff. Once the boys realized the bands weren't good, they left me there to fend for myself...sometimes they just don't think outside of their immediate group. Luckily, rachel eventually showed up. So, I hung out at the church until about 4am because that's when the mexico bus left, then I went home. I probably wouldn't have stayed the whole time because all I pretty much wanted to do was sit down and talk with rachel because I hadn't been able to do that in awhile...but people kept following us...not that I dislike them or anything, I just wanted to talk. We literally didn't have a minute to really talk until nearly 2:30am. I wish the worship team as a whole would talk like that more often. It's really easy to only talk about music with all of them, not that music is bad or anything, but there is so much more to each of us than just playing an instrument. Sometimes I try, but people just shut down. I'm hoping that the worship team might become a good d-group sort of thing this fall. But anyways, yesterday I didn't really do much of anything other than lead worship at the church like normal. Then today I pretty much did the same thing...I got up and went to church then came home. I almost feel like I'm bothering people by asking them if they want to do anything, but I'm dying here people...let's go do something...even if it's nothing big.


I've been watching your world from afar
I've been trying to be where you are
And I've been secretly falling apart
To me, you're strange and you're beautiful
--aqualung "strange & beautiful"

So these past couple of days have been nothing extremely unusual...well kind of. On monday I went to the college house for a bbq then we all went out to go see fireworks, then tuesday was worship team, then last night was bible by the pool. It was essentially a big prayer time. It was pretty cool...then instead of swimming we went to starbucks and then over to shawn and ryan's place. But anyways, the most amazing thing happened after I got home. It was around 1am, but since I had gotten starbucks, I wasn't tired at all. However, instead of turning on the tv and watching conan or something like usual, I just really felt compelled to open up to 1 Corinthians and start reading. Sean asked me to read it for next wednesday. Usually I would wait until closer to next wednesday to actually do it, but something was different. The only way to explain what happened is that God was there. Ask me about it, because I'd love to talk with you about it, it's just that telling the story over the computer just doesn't do it justice. So anyways, I woke up this morning and I literally felt like everything that had happened the last night was a dream...but I know it wasn't.


and the wonder of it all
is that I'm living just to fall
more in love with you
--delirious "deeper"

Happy 4th of July! Nothing out of the ordinary is happening today. My parents and brother went up to some park up near my other brother's house...but obviously I didn't go. I stayed home because I was supposed to meet with my freshman today...but that fell through, so now i'm just hanging out here. I actually just got back from a pretty long walk. I went over into that neighborhood across lake o'springs and just wandered around there for almost an hour. Tonight I'm supposed to go to a bbq at the college house, I'm not sure if I really want to though, I'd almost rather just call rachel and see if her and some of the other w-team people want to do something else instead.

Yesterday I got up and went to church then me, rachel, josh, and ryan all went out to chipotle afterwards. Then after we dropped the boys off, rachel and I went back to her house. We literally were there all afternoon until we went to go see the fireworks later. So, I left my house at around 9am, but didn't even get home until 11pm. I could have stayed out later, but I kind of felt bad not being at my house all yesterday...like maybe my parents were going to be mad or something, but they werent, which was good. Rachel and I bonded over the greatness of damien rice's song called "the blower's daughter."


I can't take my mind off of you
--damien rice "the blower's daughter"

Well, this week flew by, like normal. I can't believe that today is July 1st. Tomorrow is my mom's birthday, so I have to go out and buy her a gift tonight...I hate picking out presents...I can never think of anything good. Well, let's see what's happened lately. People came over on tuesday night, and then I met with Sean on wednesday. We pretty much went full circle talking about worship. Then I was feeling slightly rebelious so I skipped out of bible by the pool. I felt kind of bad because I've been hyping it up so much and getting people to go, and then I didn't...but it was raining really hard, and I just didn't feel like going. I guess a week isn't going to kill anyone. So instead, me and rachel went and saw war of the worlds and then went to ihop with the boys. It was a good time. Life is great...so far I'm still able to hang out with all of my friends from the SH and go to all the college stuff. If anything, I think I've probably gotten about 10 times closer to them all since school's been out. Great times already, and it seems like summer has just begun!


We live in a beautiful world
Yeah we do, yeah we do
We live in a beautiful world
Oh, all that I know,
There's nothing here to run from,
Cause everybody here's got somebody to lean on.
--coldplay "don't panic"