The Sapphire Sea...

I was watching PBS last night and I saw this half hour program on Crater Lake entitled "The Mirror of Heaven" and it captivated me. Yes, I know, I'm a nerd and I love watching PBS and am very saddened at the fact that I can't get the History Channel. Now that I got that out of the way...seriously, I was facinated. I want to go there. As the credits started rolling, I ran into the kitchen and started writing down lyrics or verses, I'm not sure yet. Usually with me, they're just verse, since I can never come up with a tune. The point is, that I haven't been that inspired in a long time. I can really feel God moving and drawing me further in and further up. All I have to do is follow. I want to follow and as I sit here in my rocking chair in the living room with my candles lit and music playing, I say, "of course I'll follow!", but then I'll have to get up and go to work tomorrow. I just ask for the grace and strength to keep following.

Until next time, grace and peace!

Prayer request

**UPDATE**
We had some of the info wrong, so I'm fixing it

Hello all. Just a quick entry tonight. I wanted to ask you all to pray for our assistant manager Barbara's daughter Kathy. She's a few weeks older than me and has a blood clot on her lung. Barbara has headed over to Orlando to be with her since she has to lay completely still for the rest of the week. This is not the first serious family health problem they've had in the last few months. Her husband found out a few months back that he had had a heart attack and never knew. He is now functioning with only the front section of his heart. Anyway, they just need a lot of prayers sent their way.

Thanks all.

Go under the mercy!

6 days...

It's 6 days until my birthday, 5 days until the most dreaded day in retail, and 4 days to Thanksgiving. As all of these things are drawing closer, I can't help but look past them to Christmas. It's a little odd, since Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays, but the whole Christmas season has always made me feel excited. I love the decorations, the music, and most importantly, the meaning behind all of it. I love the symbolism and the pagentry. I love the traditions that have been passed down. We're one week away from Advent, but I feel as if I'm already there.

This will be my first year working in retail at Christmas, and I'm really hoping that it won't dampen my spirit. I suppose that I'll just need to be more vigilant about keeping myself fed. That's where I have been lax in the last few weeks and maybe even longer than that. I allow myself to go into these modes where I get "too busy" and don't make the time that I need to be in the Word and in prayer. Not to say that I'm not praying, because that's almost a constant thing, but I'm not taking to time to listen for His Word for me. I wish that I could snap my fingers and all of a sudden I'd be back on track, but we all know that wouldn't work! :)


All that being said, I just pray that I can fully enter into the season this year and that He will grant me a peace in my heart that will allow me to share my experiences with all the people that I come in contact with, which is a lot of people! That's probably enough deep thought for tonight. Until next time, go under the mercy!

Hello World!

Sooo...I open my email on Saturday morning and I have an email from Shimmy (producer of Total Axxess: a nightly Christian Music radio show broadcast on WAY-FM, their affiliates, and worldwide on the web) telling me about their new site, that is going to be launching this week. Since I used to run the "unofficial messageboard" for almost a year, they thought of me to help moderate the messageboard that was going to be on the new site. It's not a paying job, but I've got an in to the latest stuff going on out of Nashvegas, which is pretty sweet. Plus, it's a lot of fun. The show is great and they always have really interesting artists on. So...I said yes. Fast forward....

I'm heading to Ft. Myers on Sunday night because I'm going to meet up with my college roommate, Tracy Lee, and her husband, Tim, who are staying in Marco Island. I decided to stay in Ft. Myers for the night, get up in the morning and go to the WAY-FM station down there and say hi to everyone, then head down to Naples to see Tracy and Tim. I had found a room off of Hotwire, which had never let me down...yet. I was staying right on the beach, well, kinda. The room that I was supposed to have was actually across the street from the main hotel and looked more like a "no-tell-motel" if you get my drift. It was creepy. I went back over and told them I wasn't staying, so they gave me a room in the main hotel. Great. Yeah...except for the reggae music from the Tiki Bar that lasted until 2am. Thank the Lord for earplugs and clock radios. I got up Monday and was pleasantly surprised that my bill was actually a lot less than it would have been to stay in the cruddy room. I went to the station and while I was waiting to talk to Jeff (who was on-air at the time), I met Cobi or Nate who works at the station. When Jeff came out I told him about how Shimmy had emailed me and all and he just started laughing and called Cobi back out because he is actually the person who designed and wrote the new website. So, before my email ever reached Nashville and before the site even went live, I was set up with a user name, a password, and had Site Admin status. It was pretty sweet. I hung out with Tracy and Tim in Naples and we went to the beach. I forgot to put on sunscreen, so I now have a boatneck sunburn that is oh-so-attractive. I stopped back by the station and then headed home.

Now I'm looking forward to Saturday, which is of course, the Andrew Peterson concert here in Lakeland! It's also our Holiday Open House at Hallmark, so everyone should stop by in the morning and then go to the concert in the afternoon. (Since most of you live NOWHERE near me! LOL) Ok, I think that's all that I can pour out onto the screen at this moment. I'm pretty tired and I'm opening in the morning.

God bless and go under the mercy!