Day 112: Flowers in My Hair

A couple of friends and I ran to Walmart late this evening to buy flowers for our hair tomorrow. We made headbands and will wear them to church in the morning.

Day 111: Shower

The food we prepared for another friend's shower. And she brought us these bright and glittery flowers. So fun!

Day 110: This is Texas

Bales of hay stacked alongside a barn remind me of the country. And I often think of Texas when I think of the country. I had a great day at HERO today, and these hay bales were out at the barn where the kids ride. For some strange reason (probably because I'm strange), I liked the look of them.

Day 109: Wide Open Spaces

One of my favourite things about Texas is the sky. It's so often lit with a beautiful sunrise or sunset. Today the clouds seemed to march into the distance, extending the horizon. Even from my driveway, which is clearly obscured by cars and trees, the sky almost seems limitless.

Day 108: Potato Chips

Today I had potato chips instead of yesterday's tortilla chips. Normally I just eat my chips out of the bag. And normally individual bags don't have very many chips. But today I poured the bag out onto a plate and was surprised by the quantity of chips. I would never get that many chips to eat with a sandwich!

But I ate them all today.

Day 107: Olive Tortilla Chips

We had the multigrain variety of these chips all summer in Houston. They are especially good with hummus. So, when I saw these in the campus center, I got real excited. I love olives and these chips are quite tasty.

Day 106: He is Risen!

Or, as we say in Greek, "Christos anesti." I love the Easter season, the season of spring and green and newness and resurrection. The highlight of my church's Easter service is always a stirring rendition of "Arise, My Love." It was powerfully sung this morning and, as always, the song blessed my day.

My dad's sister and her family always come in on Easter and we celebrate with them and my grandparents. These are my cousins on my dad's side (plus my brother Joel, minus my sister Amara who is still in Oxford).

Wait, is that a second picture, you say; are you allowed to do that? Well, I say that I am, so this is my first day with two pictures. We finally received the desperately-needed rain that we've been praying for. Almost three inches at my parents house! Unfortunately it came with tornadoes and hail as well, almost ping-pong sized hail at our house. Other Abilenians reported baseball and softball sized hail.

Hail aside, I am so thankful for this day of new life, in Jesus Christ and in the life-giving rain.

Day 105: Family Get-Together

Okay, so I forgot to take my camera out while the family was actually getting together. But I snapped a pic of this lovely rose before they all came to my parent's house. We had a nice time eating together, talking and playing ping-pong. It rained for all of about 10 seconds, which was not nearly enough to even dampen the ground. Hopefully the rain will come soon.

Day 104: Riding the Sky

"No hour of life is wasted that is spent in the saddle." ~ Winston Churchill

And I spent two hours in the saddle today. It's always time well-spent. This boy was surprisingly well-behaved today, given the heavily gusting winds that were blowing today. I expected him to be antsy but, other than trying to eat everything green that we rode by, he was very responsive.

Day 103: Storm Front

Another line of thunderstorms rolled through this area, dropping hail and a tornado. Thankfully the severe weather missed Abilene. Of course, Abilene didn't manage to receive a single drop of rain. The colours of Texas sky are so beautiful, but often so difficult to capture.

Day 102: Nocciola

European chocolate is just so much tastier than American chocolate. These Italian chocolates are no different. Mom and Dad gave them to me this past weekend when they got back from Italy. The chocolate is so smooth and sweet. Yumm! The hazelnut - nocciola - is probably my favourite.

Day 101: Route 44

Yumm, yumm. I've got my Route 44 cherry limeade from Sonic, which made my day a little better. A couple of friends brought it up to me at work today.

Tuesdays are long for me - I work from 9:00-1:30, go to class from 1:30-3:00, work again from 3:00-6:30 and then am in class from 6:30 until 9:30. It's a long and wearying day, so I'm thankful for my friends who cheered me up with this lovely beverage.

Day 100: Haze

The sky doesn't look too hazy in this picture, but it really is. The wildfires burning all around us make the sky look brown and the acrid smell of smoke is in the air. Here in the Big Country it's the driest it's been since 1917 and tomorrows forecast of high temperatures and wind speeds mean the fires will likely not die down soon.

Day 99: Hosanna

"Hosanna in the highest heaven!"

Today is Palm Sunday and at church we celebrated Jesus riding into Jerusalem, to his death. The kids of the church all grabbed palm branches. They waved them in the air and walked to the front of the church as we all sang hosanna! I love this time of year, when we intentionally remember Jesus' death, burial and resurrection.

Day 98: A Cuppa

Anna and I threw a shower for JoAnna today. We had a lovely tea party with Scottish oat scones and cranberry-orange scones. They were delicious! And the party was a lot fun.

By the way, "cuppa" is British slang for 'a cup of tea.'

Day 97: University Honors

It's done - my honors capstone project, that is. When I started as a freshman at ACU, I had already decided that I would not complete the honors program - 18 hours of lower division work, 3 colloquia, six hours of contract work and a capstone project.

But I did. Today I turned in my capstone project. It feels so good to be done, and I'm proud of myself for completing the program.

Day 96: Senior Blessing

My camera didn't switch bags with me today, which is too bad. I did snap a picture with my phone, hence the poor quality.

The senior blessing for Bible majors was today, out at Lueders. It's a lovely area and we had a wonderful time of fellowship, games, prayer and blessing. It's hard to believe that I'm less than one month away from graduating. This beautiful afternoon reminded me of all of the reasons that I chose ACU and chose Biblical Text as a major. I know that I am a better person because of the people in the Bible department.

Day 95: A Beautiful Bouquet

One of the four-year-old girls at church brought me these flowers tonight. She picked them just for me! Funny how good this makes me feel when, if I saw these brightly-coloured weeds on the side of the road, I would dismiss them as weeds. But in the sticky hands of a child, they become a beautiful bouquet of flowers.

Day 94: Squirt

I was so pumped to see this in the Campus Center! I haven't had Squirt in ages, and I'm a big fan of this delicious, citrusy beverage. It reminds me of my childhood and my dad. He's a fan of Squirt too. To top it off, squirt was one of Dad's various nicknames for me as a baby.

Day 93: Cowgirl

Now, this picture didn't turn out quite the way I envisioned. Java, who looks slightly demonic in this photo, ran into the frame at the last second. The picture is supposed to be of me in my western shirt and cowboy boots.

My brother laughed at me when I told him this story, but it made my day so I decided to document it. A couple of girls came up behind me in line today. I noticed one of them look at me, at my lovely western shirt and down to my boots. And then she started to tell her friend how she used to want a horse.

Now, that little anecdote may not sound very exciting (in fact, I'm sure it doesn't). But I was pretty excited that someone looked at me and thought horse.

Day 92: Red

Abilene is green right now. This is somewhat of a rarity, so I get excited every time I look out and see the signs of spring.

This is Red - that's the tree's name. We planted the tree soon after we moved here. There is something exciting about seeing a tree grow like this. I'm somewhat in awe that the little sapling, which we lovingly set in the ground years ago, is becoming a mighty oak tree

Day 91: Missing Joel

I think this puppy is missing her boy. He's on a church retreat, so I'm staying with Java and Gladwyn. Java slept in Joel's room last night, even though he wasn't there. So cute.

Day 90: Tigger

Doesn't this boy look sad? He has a hurt hoof, so we aren't able to ride him. He whinnies and nickers the whole time we are out riding. He thinks he wants to go with us, but really he just misses his friends.

Day 89: Stop and Smell the Roses

Mom's roses are blooming and they are beautiful. These lovely pink roses make me happy whenever I venture out into the backyard. I haven't been outside much, because it's nice and hot for an April day. It doesn't feel much like spring when the mercury is rising above 90. At least it looks like spring, with all of the lovely blooming flowers.

Day 88: Bathroom Banana

Looks like someone forgot to grab their lunch.

The image above has not been enhanced or tampered with in any way. This banana was indeed sitting in a bathroom stall this afternoon. Now, it may just be me, but I don't feel comfortable taking my lunch into a public restroom with me while I do my business. But what do I know? It looks like that toilet paper dispenser does make a pretty nifty little table.

Day 87: Option

You may be thinking that this looks similar to another picture of the day. And you would be correct. This is very similar to my photo for Day 3. However, that was a picture of the command key, and this little tale is really about the option key.

You see, somehow a little bug ended up under my option and command keys. I couldn't remove it easily, so I had to pop the keys off. Now, I've taken off and replaced keys on my keyboard before (there was an incident involving a projectile popcorn bag), so I know how to do it. But I could not get that option key back on. I tried and tried, to no avail. Finally I took the little plastic mechanism out as well. That was a mistake. After an hour and a half, I finally managed to to get everything back together and working. But goodness, I will not be taking the keys off of this keyboard anytime soon.

Day 86: Team Jacob

Today was my roommate Alyssa's birthday. In celebration she cooked us all breakfast for dinner. I know that sounds a little backwards - the birthday girl cooking her own birthday meal. However, she wanted to cook and I was more than happy to eat her sausage casserole.

Stacie brought this awesome cake over for Alyssa. For the record, I'm not really Team Jacob or Team Edward, but I think I would probably choose the werewolf over the undead immortal who wants to drink my blood.

Day 85: Dipstick

It was hot out today - 97 degrees. Because of the warming weather, Java was shaved a couple of days ago. I can't help but giggle when I see her now. Her fluffy tail waves in air as she is completely oblivious to her ridiculous-looking short hair.

As you can see in the picture, she likes to sit on or by people's feet, so that they can pet her. She is such a dipstick (or idiot, dummy, etc... as she is affectionally called). She's an adorable dipstick though.

Day 84: Bluebonnets

Spring has sprung and in Texas this means bluebonnets carpet the fields. I love wildflowers and the joy they always bring me. They make we want to run barefoot through the grass and lay out in the sun surrounded by the flowers. I hope it's a good bluebonnet year!

Day 83: The Round Pen

Today was yet another riding day, which I always enjoy. It was a warm day, and my skin actually got its first bit of colour this season. The horses were a bit ornery today, so we made them run in the round pen before we mounted. I rode Soldier this week and he behaved after his little run.

I'm very thankful for glorious riding days like this one - and the people who make it possible (Shanna and Stacie).