Day 2 and 3

I'm super exhausted but remembered my brilliant plan to keep everyone updated... did I really say that? :P
  Well we all got started in on our lessons which was a bit harder than I anticipated. Learning verb conjugations is hard in English let along Spanish. Just sayin'. Anyways, We got to see the town a bit, which reminds me a ton on Colombia, and went shopping for our food. Can't wait to try this coffee shop called Oh La La. I've heard it's famous for it's pastries.

  Today, Wednesday, we basically did everything over again, devos, classes, studying, then went to church. It was completely different than what I was expecting. In Ecuador its not unusual for people to clap their hands or even dance. Here it was actually very orderly. It wasn't what I expected but good just the same. After church we went to this taco place that was... wow. Words escape me. For all y'all who think Taco Bell is good... yeah. You ain't seen nothing yet.

  God has really been pulling at my heart these 2 days already. Trying to keep me humble in my Spanish and let me tell you... it's working. It's only by His strength that I'm going to be able to do this. But that's the point isn't it? To learn Spanish so I can become a better vessel for Him to use. Granted God doesn't need me to do anything because He's that powerful He gets things done on His own. It's by His grace that He wants to use us.

  I won't be surprised if any of this doesn't make sense. I AM kinda tired. But I really wanted to let y'all know whats going on. Please continue to pray for us. We really need it!

  Ash- Bash

I'm going to be coming here quite often. <3

The roomie and I!

These stairs were just calling my name... another day perhaps :P

First official team selfie!! Even if it is blurry,

I couldn't take my eyes off this guy! He would cut the pork,
cut the pineapple and place it on the taco. Soo cool!

Language School Day 1

Hello mine people!

  I thought that it may be a good idea to start up my blog again for those of you who are even remotely interested in my life. :P For those of you that know me you know that I often say things with the full intention of fulfilling them... and then a year later. Meaning this blog. It may or may not continue after this grand adventure. I can only promise that while I'm here in Mexico I will do my utmost to keep you all informed. With that being said, lets jump right in!

  Yesterday I was up at o'dark thirty to get to the airport only to see 6 inches of snow on the ground and hear that my plane had been delayed 35 minutes. Now, I'm a pretty calm person... sometimes. I have learned in these situations to pray. Hard. Which is what I did. God was gracious enough to get me up in the air and make it to my connecting flight in Atlanta. I met up with our team leader, John Shoemaker, and found out that one of our teammates was stuck because of the snow and we would see him the next day. We then proceeded to board our 4 1/2 hour flight to Mexico City. With two kids watching Frozen in front of me I was bound to get a little airsick. :P I mean really?! Even going out of the Country I can't escape it. Figures. Anyways, we got to Mexico City just fine, minus our Frozen encounter, met up with the 3rd team mate, Kim Krause, and... here's where it gets interesting.

   I have always been conscientious about being on time. Call it what you will. Maybe coming from a big family I grew a bit tired of being late to things. :P But I mean especially with International flights (Thanks Daniel Cavanaugh and Liz Fox) I know enough that we need to be at our gate pronto. Well, we get to our gate and are wondering which line we should get into. Keep in mind that only one of us can speak Spanish well. We then learn that we're late to our flight and if we want to make it then we'd better run. So. That's what we did. Through the airport to the bus terminal where no one wants to talk to us or help us. Finally, a very nice, friendly, young man decides that we poor Americans need some help. He then proceeds to talk to an official, tell us the plane was actually late not us and, when it was time to go, helped us get on the right bus. Talk about relief!!

   We made it to our final destination without any further interruptions and sat waiting for our host to pick us up. I had brought my violin along and, not one to waste and opportunity to perform, decided to warm up a bit. How it turned into the airport people and taxi drivers all calling out songs, getting out their phones to record me, I've no idea. :P I've gotta say it was pretty fun though!

   So that makes it to today. My roommate Kim is pretty fabulous and I think we will get along perfectly! We are now waiting for our Spanish evaluation to see what class we should be placed in. Which is why I have time to write my first post! :) Please be praying for us. I covet your prayers greatly especially for peace, wisdom, strength, and health. God is going to do an amazing work here! I know that because He already has! I luv you all so much... for reading this. ;)

  Ash-Bash

St. Louis... Meh.

Mountains Gandalf!!

First selfie in Mexico!

        Why do people like Titanic so much???

Graduation!!!!!

Hey people!!
  So before the whole world faints from shock at seeing me on here let me tell you one thing... I'M A COLLEGE GRADUATE!!!!!! WHOOOOHHHOOOOO!!!!!!!!! You have no idea how excited I was after I did my very last task, which was another senior recital. The day after that I walked and received my diploma complete with Honors. What a great feeling it was too! Also I had a TON of family there to see me which was pretty awesome. I told everyone who was walking with me that they would know my family because they were the loudest ones. :P After all the formalities we took sooo soooo many pictures! The thing was is that I had to hop on a plan at 3 and we got out at 12... and I hadn't packed yet... and it was really hot... and now I'm just complaining. Stopping... NOW.
       We had such fun with everyone! After my recital we saw the new Star Trek, which was ok, and then after graduation had a little family party. It was soooooooooo great! I think just being with family was the biggest thing. I hadn't seen many of my extended family in over two years and I was especially thrilled that my 3 first cousins were there. Anyways, I just wanted to give you all a quick synopsis on what has gone on the last couple weeks. According to the stats I haven't written anything since December. Ouch. Yeah. that really hurts. See I always have this idea that I'm going to get better at updating... and it totally doesn't work. I'm going to say that since now I'm at Summit and will have more time, in a way, I'll be able to keep everyone more updated. However, I really think you all should get facebook or instagram that way I won't have to update this. But this is fun too so I guess whatever. :P Luv you guys and gals!
  Ash

Studying

Hey all.
  It's currently... 1 am and I'm studying for my music history final tomorrow morning at 10. Should be exciting times. To be completely honest lots has been going on and I could've written about it buuuuut..... like I said, much has been going on. I'm actually just taking a break to let you know that I'm still here alive and kicking... not sure after tomorrow though. If you all could be praying for me I would greatly appreciate it. Little late I know. :P What can I say. I'll give you more information on life when... tomorrow is over how about? Ok good. :) See you on the other side... maybe. :P
  Ash

#P4C12 Part 1

This past week I had the great privilege of being able to go to the Passion 4 Christ conference in Perrysville Ohio. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to go or not because of funds but God wanted me to go so He provided. :)
     
    Let me tell you... it was... beyond incredible. Exactly what I needed. Even now I don't know how to put into words what I experienced while I was there. All I can say is that I believe I have never ever experienced Christ in the way that I did while I was there. He used every aspect of the conference to reach into the deepest corners of my heart. There are a few moments that stuck out to me in particular. 

    I had no idea that so many of my friends would be there which turned into a nice surprise. I remember getting to know people even better than I knew them before and completely opened up my heart to them and they did the same. We had sweet fellowship with each other and many times simply sat and excitedly told each other what Christ had been revealing to us or expressed our desire to understand hard questions that we had been struggling with. I was inspired by these people because I could see that they wanted Christ to be the forefront of their lives. It was so encouraging to be with these like-minded people for several days gleaning from their experiences and sharing and encouraging them as well. 

   Worship. Ohhhhh how I look at the word completely different now! In one session we defined what worship exactly and instead of making this post longer than it already is I'm going to save that for another time. But before every session we had a sweet time singing praises to the Lord of Heaven. Many I have heard before but there were two that I hadn't heard that had me on my knees before Christ. I'll post the link but wanted to write the words so you can see how powerful it is. 
     Oh Great God of Highest Heaven
     Occupy my lowly heart
     Own it all and reign Supreme
     Conquer every rebel power
     Let no vice or sin remain
     That resists Your holy war
     You have loved and purchased me
     Make me Yours forever more

     I was blinded by my sin
     Had no ears to hear Your voice
     Did not know Your love within
     Had not taste for heavens joy
     Then Your Spirit gave me life
     Opened up Your Word to me
     Through the Gospel of Your Son
     Gave me endless hope and peace

     Help me now to live a life
     That's dependent on Your grace
     Keep my heart and guard my soul
     From the evils that I face
     You are worthy to be praised
     With my every thought and deed
     Oh Great God of Highest Heaven
     Glorify Your name through me

This song is... overwhelming. It says all that is in my heart. We sang this song maybe three times and I was astounded by the simplicity of the words but how powerful they were. This is my prayer every day.Oh Great God of Highest Heaven
           
   One of the greatest eye opening moments was my "Lunch with Jesus". A two and a half hour time with just you and Jesus. Soooooo revealing! Jesus spoke to me! It was such an amazing moment! I was sitting outside going over my notes from the previous sessions about becoming immersed with the gifts of Christ in us. I decided to list all of the gifts I could see that Christ had given me. There I was listing them when all of a sudden, as I was reading a certain verse, I felt a lightning bolt of revelation. Philippians 4:19 says "And my God shall supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus." So, if Christ is in me and Christ has every gift... then that means that the gifts that are in me aren't even mine but Christs! Which means that I have a piece of Christ in me!! My gifts are His!! I got sooo excited in this revelation and still am!! It was just such an out of body experience!
  
   I have soooo much more to say over my time but sadly not enough time right now. But no worries. I will write again soon!

A challenge to keep up

I must say I have been very lax in my efforts to keep up on this blog. I deeply apologize. Sometimes I think my life must be very uninteresting to the average reader soooo... I don't bother writing. Other times I use business as my excuse. All in all though I should be better than I am now at writing. I promise to make a valiant effort to write at least once a week. This is actually therapy for me so I shouldn't be too hard to keep up. :P Now to catch up on life here's whats gone on this week.
  
   School, work, sleep, school, work, maybe sleep, school, work, no sleep then school. Weeeellll... actually it's not all that bad. The highlight of my week was seeing the Broadway play of Les Miserables with my mom. I had obtained some tickets for her birthday and the showing ended up being sooner than I thought. :P But it was absolutely AMAZING! If I wasn't addicted to it already then I am now.
  
   The play did remind me of something though. For the first part of the play I was disappointed because of a scene that was very descriptive. I found myself actually asking my mom if she wanted to leave. She said that it was only for this one scene and the rest would be better but I was still very uneasy and uncomfortable throughout the scene. I was troubled that no one else seemed bothered by it. This is the society we live in today. No one cares whats honoring to God. They only care about being entertained which is... extremely sad to say the least. Thankfully the rest of the play was incredible and I was able to enjoy myself and bask in the singers voices, the set, the orchestra, and the costumes. 
   

   This story reminded me of how we are called by Christ to die to ourselves. Take up our crosses and follow Him. Jean Val'Jeans life was not easy in the least and yet He put everything aside once he saw the Christ had redeemed him and followed after Him. This was very encouraging to me because it showed me that everything is worth it in the long run because once we get to a certain point the only thing that we see is Christ. That's how life should be. Or I should say how we should live it.

Summer Part 3- The Wedding

Before I being I must make a disclaimer. I am NOT a photographer. Not at all. I did take on a few of the hints my older sister Christina gave to me though. However, she is the photographer of the family so when I post photos you must know that they are unedited and uncut. Although many of these photos of the wedding are not ones that I took. Just had to make that clear. :P
  Ok! Now that that's out of the way we can move on.
My cousin has been wanting to get married for awhile now but her fiance and her just have been so busy and dealing with issues that they haven't been able to settle on a date. They finally were able to and thankfully put it just early enough in the summer so we could all be there which meant alot to her since we are her only cousins.
     Anyways, we went down to California a few days before the wedding to help with the preparations. Mainly cleaning, cooking, and watching my little cousin Nevaeh. Behind the scenes was certainly not how I pictured it to be. But God taught me alot during that time. I learned flexibility as many times one person would tell us to do one thing a certain way, then another person would tell us to do something entirely different. Also, patience. Everyone that knows me knows that I l-o-v-e kids. I would babysit kids for the rest of my life... or so I thought. As it turns out my little cousin Nevaeh took quiet a liking to me and shadowed me most days. I didn't mind this and in fact relished in it... until I wanted to have a few moments to myself with the forever chanting of "Ashy" going on, no matter how precious it was. But I learned to take this all in stride and live in the moment. We had quite a few fun times as I taught her how to "clink" her cup like on the movie "Despicable Me".
    The last character that I learned the most was how important it is to be organized. There were those moments as we were preparing that my siblings and I just shared looks as if saying "are you for real? That isn't the best way to do it." However, I learned that when people want your opinion they will ask for it. :P Soooooo... I guess that whenever I'm involved in a wedding I think of what I would do and what I wouldn't do. Good stuff. :P
    Overall, it was an interesting wedding. The party really got hopping though when we decided to do some line dancing. FUN STUFF!! Later we all sat down and talked about some aspects of the wedding that we agreed with and others that we had issues with. One thing about my family, although we may disagree with respect each other. At least the majority of us do. ;)
     With all that, enjoy this little segment from the wedding!

                                                                The ecstatic bride

                                     My cousin trying to be a cool groomsman. Did it work? :P

                                                                       The groom

                                            Sister of the bride, my cousin, and maid of honor

                                  Look at all that CANDY!!!! That's what I'm talking about!

                                     Getting out on the dance floor to show off our mad skilz.

                               The flower girl, my cousin Nevaeh, was having some issues. :P

                      Aren't we a good looking group? I believe this is our first family/kid
                                                         picture for the entire summer!