I am SO excited to go to Japan.  SO excited!!  We had a meeting today and worked on some Japanese and learned what we will be doing while we are there.  It is going to be good.

I am a chaperone for middle school students that are going, which sounds like a bad combination.  But those kids are fun!  I hope they stay that way when we are traveling and everything, but at least they're nice now.  It'd be really scary if they were not very nice to begin with.

Earlier today, before the meeting, I was trying to work on some of the Japanese phrases because we were supposed to have most of the phrases in our notebook learned by now...some of it was kind of frustrating cause I found myself thinking--when am I going to use this?  Well, maybe I would use some of the phrases, but it seems like I should learn some more of the essentials first and THEN work on some of the obscure ones.  Yes, asking "Where is the dishwasher?"  might come in handy, but I think I'll probably be asking "Where is the restroom?"  more than that! 

I was thinking about how when I was a kid I used to say that phrase "My mother is Chinese, my father is Japanese, and I'm inbetween."  I wonder how my host family would react to that!?  Better yet, I found out tonight that I'm supposed to give a speech while we're there...That would be an even better place for that!

For the record, I CAN ask "where is the bathroom", so I guess I've got all the important bases covered.

I was at the pool for 3 hours today.  And I want to go back out.  I think I might be crazy.  It is just so nice out--or at least it seems like it when you're in water!  I ended up being at the pool for so long because I met some of my neighbors and they were so much fun.  Isn't it funny how when you see someone, you get a different impression than when you actually get to know them?

These women were blonde and pretty and I thought they would be kind of prissy or snobby to me, but we talked almost the whole day in the pool and they were so nice.  This one girl was making me laugh so much.  I don't think I have laughed that much in a long time!  Isn't it funny how you just sometimes connect with people?  I give them the credit, though, cause they were totally friendly.  I think they go swimming a lot, so hopefully I'll see them again.  It'll be like the old days, meeting my friends at the town pool!  haha

I was thinking today about friends and how I have a lot of friends with different interests, but sometimes there are things that I like to do that I don't know anybody that would like to do those things.  Well, maybe I do, but they have families and are not able to...I keep looking at the art museum's website and I see that they are going to have a France week coming up.  For some reason, I really like foreign films.  Especially French ones.  I think it is mostly because of the language (not because of the nudity, I promise!).  I like to listen to French and see if I can understand it because it is similar to Spanish.  And also, I think French sounds cool.

I've been studying a little Greek on the side the past few weeks and I'm discovering how similar a lot of languages are to each other.  Like there are similarities between Greek and Spanish, and even when I read The Kite Runner, there were similarities between the languages in Afghanistan and Pakistan to Spanish.

I find all this study of languages really interesting.  I was thinking the other day that I wonder if there is something you can do to study the history of languages--like a degree or something.  I've thought about going back to school, cause I love learning.  I was thinking that I am a better student than I am a teacher and I really enjoy it, but I don't know about that...maybe I need to start my own degree or something.

Anyway, all that to say, that the art museum is having French film week and I wish I knew someone that would be able to go, but if not I'm hoping to get to go to a movie in Japan.  That will be fun, right?

It's kind of funny that one of the books that I was buying on the Fateful Day of Bad Salespeople was Praying the Names of God.  I love looking at the names of God and seeing what they mean and how they are related to God's movement and Word.  So, I was really excited about it.  I have this other book by the same author.  I think it's just called Women of the Bible.  Something about the format is kind of hard for me to study, but I do like seeing the passages and the related names of God.  Each week you learn a new name and some of the passages where it can be found.  This week the name was Elohim--which means God is Strength.

So, I've been trying to focus on that this week and find out what God is trying to say to me through that.  How is he showing me his strength?  I am doing a Bible study with some people and this guy has been teaching from the book of Acts.  We have been studying very, very thoroughly and we were looking at what was different between the disciples before and after Christ's death and resurrection.  And we were saying how, after Jesus resurrected--He was alive!  If Jesus had stayed dead, then that would be it.  Story over.  But He didn't stay dead, He rose from the dead and He is alive.  NOW!

This song brought it all home for me.  The chorus is the best where it says--"The same power that conquered the grave lives in ME!" You ARE here, my Lord forever.  Amen.

Today is my fantabulous sister's birthday.  If you think you might possibly have the best sister, then I'm sorry to inform you with the simple truth that:  you. are. wrong.  As I was the younger sister, she was always protective of me.  In fact, she still is.  If somebody messes with me, she does not take to that kindly.  And it's nice having her on my side, because she is super strong.  Not just spiritually and all that, but she is seriously physically strong.  She's a great athlete.  Sometimes when I went out to P.E. with my classmates, she would be out on the track with her high school P.E. class.  I remember my classmates would always be in awe because she would run by really fast.  They would say, "Is that your sister!?"  Yeah!  (It was hard to believe cause I was always the slooow person on the track.)  I was always proud of her, watching her in marching band or in softball or basketball.  I'm still proud of her for being a great mom and glad she was always there to go ahead of me in life.

I hope you have a great birthday!

 (This picture was taken a long time ago--but it makes me laugh because right before we took it, my nephew had been in his stroller with that cup that had a milkshake in it, and even though there wasn't a straw, he tried to suck it out through the top and got it ALL over him.)

A few months ago, I read Matthew 6:26--"Look at the birds of the air, they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, ad yet your Heavenly Father feeds them.  Are you not much more valuable than they?"

At that time, I was having a hard time doing what I knew in my heart was right.  In fact, I am still having a hard time, and it comes down to his verse.  God showed it to me a few months ago, and I knew he was, in a way, saying that I could trust him to take care of my needs.  You know how when you know God is telling you to do something, but you rationalize it thinking of all the human reasons why it is not a good choice.  Especially of how you get a little frightened of what it might mean to give up?  I was scared of how I would be taken care of, and whether I would survive.  But God showed me this verse, asking--"Don't you trust me to take care of you?" More Here...