Equestrian Blog

 (Continued from Restoration 1 blog)  Under the house, that is where we had to go! It was a small space - we had to lay flat on our backs in order to fit - dark, wet, and muddy.  Our job was to nail in cross supports.  It didn't take long to realize that nailing over our heads was not going to last long. Thankfully there was a nail gun. With this piece of modern technology, only two people were needed to finish the nailing, so the other two of us went out to help with the other work. Later that day, insulation needed to be installed under the house. Since I had been under before and was already partially covered in mud I went back to finish the adventure. There were four of us under the house and two people feeding us insulation through the vents in the side if the foundation. We were at it for a good couple of hours when we had to quit because of lack of light. The job was finished the next day by a group of different girls. Audra and I, members of the original "under-the-house-crew," went under the second house to lay the moisture barrier and do the nailing.

The second day was pretty much a repeat of the day before: putting in insulation and painting trim. The only difference was that it was at the second house.

On the third day, the girls who finished putting the insulation under the first house put it under the second house. Going under at the second house wasn't as bad, though, because there seemed to be a bit more space and it was not wet and muddy like the first house.

Everyone else worked at finishing the insulation in the house and painting trim. We got done with what we could a little bit early that day so after we got back to the school and cleaned up we went to a local church and did some cleaning for them.

 (continued from Restoration 2 blog)  During Restoration Week, we did a lot of work and helped a lot of people. What we did wasn't just about building a house for a family that didn't have one or about reading to kids who couldn't read yet. It was about showing Gods love to our community and by doing that, we saw Gods love ourselves.

In addition to the work, we had a ton of fun. On the work sites, we always found something to entertain ourselves, whether it was just being goofy or having a paint war. Every evening we would have a fun activity. One night we had a picture scavenger hunt and another day we watched a movie. We also had a game night.

Every night we also had a worship service. It was a time that we reflected on our day and focused on God and reminded ourselves that what we were doing was for him. Every night, in addition to having a devotion by a different girl each night and singing praise and worship songs, we would sing what became our theme song for the week:  Follow You  by Leeland.

The song says,

                        And I'll follow you into the homes that are broken

Follow you into the world

Meet the needs of the poor and the needy God

Follow you into the world

Use my hands use me feet

To make your kingdom come

Through the corners of the earth

Until your work is done. ...

I give all myself to you ...

The words of this song were our mission. We were not doing this work by ourselves, but following God in everything we did.

God did great things that week, not only for our community, but for us. He showed us who he was and brought us closer to him.

This year I have made up for all of the years that I have never gone Christmas caroling.

Ok, I didn't really do THAT much caroling that I can really say that it made up for 19 years of NEVER caroling, but I did go twice. Both times were very interesting and very different experiences.

The first Christmas Caroling trip was at Judson. A couple of my friends and I were at the school waiting for Restoration ( a local mission project that a group of Judson girls participated in) to start. We were in the Christmas mood and decided that caroling would be the perfect outlet for such a mood. Everyone then agreed it would be a good idea to do a little practice session. I don't really think that the practice did us much good other then eliminating a number of songs that we could not sing. We had a little bit of an issue remembering all of the words for most songs that aren't your standard Jingle Bells and Away In A Manger. Our first stop was the Fowler's house. Before being off to our next victim (I mean our next audience), we had to step in for some hot chocolate. We spent a good while socializing and when we had emptied our cups we continued on our singing travels! We made two more stops, both to people who were also associated with Judson. It may have been a better idea, though, to have quit after our first stop since it had gotten extremely late, but we didn't. Luckily we didn't wake anyone up, but it was very obvious that they were not expecting visitors.

My next Caroling experience for the year was on Christmas Eve in Florida. My family and I were visiting my grandparents for the holidays. One of their traditions is to go caroling with some of their friends - or anyone who wants to join in - in the park where they live and my mother insisted my brother and I join the party. I enjoy signing so had no problem with this. It was an experience, though...  You see out of the whole group, me, my mom and my brother were the only ones under the age of 65.  This, however, may have made the experience all the more interesting! Everyone was in good humor and just enjoying each others company. They were not there so much because of their singing ability, which was obvious, but to share the Christmas spirit with others.

Both of my caroling experiences were very different, but both of them alike. Both served the purpose of carrying the spirit of Christmas that was in our hearts to others.

Maybe I will add these experiences to my Christmas traditions, or maybe I will just add the tradition of caroling.

It has been a crazy week already!

I guess the weekend started it off...

Friday night, we had a "snow party." There was a good chance of snow predicted for that night so a couple of my friends decided that we would stay up and wait for it. We gathered in the lobby of our dorm to watch movies and make one another and our friends Christmas signs. There were art and craft supplies all over the place. There was glitter glue, patter, stickers, markers, scissors, and absolutely anything else you could probably think of scattered around the floor and all the tables. Some one else walked in at one point and made the comment that it looked like a craft store sneezed, I guess she was right.

I am glad we stayed up because around midnight the flurries began. It was more like slush falling from the sky to begin because it was mixed with rain, but about an hour later it was obviously snow. We gave mother nature a little longer to get some more of the white fluffy stuff down for us to play with then bundled up, or as close to bundled up as we could get which pretty much entailed a jacket and rain boots, and headed out. Unfortunately, because this is Alabama and it was only the beginning of December, it stuck to nothing but the cars. We had fun nonetheless running around, making snowballs to throw at each other from the snow on our cars, and of course writing on the windshields in the snow. We weren't out long though before the rain returned and forced the snow to say its farewell before any of us were ready to say our goodbyes.

It was a beautiful program, if I may say so myself. All three groups - Choir, Faith, and the Handbell Choir - did a great job. I know everyone put a lot of work into it and it paid off.

Sunday was a little slower paced and I took some time to catch up on sleep. The whole day couldn't be wasted though - there was much studying to be done! My first exam was Monday night so I attempted to get ready for that. It wasn't completely a failed attempt, but lets just say I am not the most motivated studier... 

Regardless the exam went well Monday night and that brings us to this point....FINALS WEEK!