Changes

Her heart sank when she realized what Alex was doing.  Hearing Taylor's approach, Alex turned to look at her.  She met Taylor's eyes for a moment and in that instant Taylor read her best friend's every thought.  Taylor hoped her own expression had been just as clear as Alex's. She wanted Alex to see her shock, her disappointment, and her concern.  She wanted Alex to know that she did not approve and was worried.
At first on Alex's face she saw exhaustion and a little hopelessness.  But her mouth was set and her expression was hard and unyielding.  It very clearly told Taylor "I don't care what you think of me.  You have no right to judge me and nothing you say will make a difference."  But underneath the stubbornness on her face, there was something more.  There was fear in her eyes as well.  As much as she tried to hide it under her confidence, Taylor could see Alex gauging her reaction.  Alex was silently pleading with Taylor to understand.  She apologized for disappointing her friend and begged her to not be angry.  There was desperation deep within her expression.
Alex looked away as if sensing the intensity of her friend's thoughts and made her usual complaint.  "It's cold."
"Yup," Taylor replied easily.
And then they continued as if everything was normal.

A Faithful Saying

If we died with him,
we will also live with him;
If we endure,
we will also reign with him.
If we disown him,
he will also disown us;
If we are faithless,
he will remain faithful,
for he cannot disown himself.

Words from Ashes

I started a new blog for my poetry: http://wordsfromashes.blogspot.com/
I wanted a separate place for all my poetry and I want this blog to be more focused on my desire to serve God as a missionary.  I deleted a lot of my meaningless posts and the poetry (which is now all on Words from Ashes).  I will be giving this blog yet another makeover, however, I will be keeping the name the same for the time being.  I wanted to keep some things that were already on the blog, and this makes it easier.  Besides that, Blog2b still serves its purpose and I expect that once I start college I will be starting a new blog.  That's all for now.

Prayer Request

I have a quick prayer request. Lately I was listening to an interview Alex and Brett Harris did on Focus on the Family a few years ago to refocus my life and remind myself how to do hard things. They spoke a little about the three pillars: character, competence and collaboration.

"A lot of times we need the humility to say I can’t do everything, I need to bring other people on my team and if this is really a vision with getting excited about, and this is really something too big to be accomplished alone, I need to be able to bring other people on my team."

I’ve been listening with my ESL project at my high school in mind and also my future as a missionary as well. As for the ESL project, I was working with a girl last year but the bulk of the project fell on me, and I was okay with that, I wanted it that way really. But she graduated and I know that I was falling short on my responsibilities. So I’m praying for God to show me someone who will be interested in coming alongside me with this project, and also for the humility to accept that person’s help. So if you could just remember me over the course of the semester, I’d appreciate it.

Piano Hands

I just had to share this picture.  I was practicing piano the other day and one of my mom's daycare kids came downstairs and watched.  I asked him if he wanted to sit with me so he climbed up on the bench.  I asked him if he wanted to try so he started playing.  It was so cute; he would turn the pages of the music and try to imitate me.  I love this picture of his hands on my piano.