You are so dumb, for real! Chicago!

Entering Chicago for our fun-filled trip!

Hey hey girl! Who is that in the mirror?

The whole group at the big mirrored bean in The Park!
This multi-million dollar bean provided a lot of amusement.

Heading back to the church van after traipsing around trying to
find a Starbucks.

My very favorite animal in the zoo! Isn't she beautiful?
If I wasn't so into art I might consider working with animals like this!

Got back from Chicago last night! It was such a great trip!

Other than the people, my favorite part of the trip was the zoo. We looked at every single animal there and then went over to the conservatory that had a whole room dedicated to orchids. My favorite were the seals (above) and there was a huge polar bear that was so great. Also, the giraffes. I forget how amazing giraffes are!

The planetarium was super great also! Well, except for the 3-D movie about The Great Observatories of theWorld or something like that. . .I wouldn't have minded it if it was an exhibit or something . . . but why waste the 3-D technology on observatories when there is space? Anyway, the Imax movie we watched was good. It was narrated by Whoopi Goldberg and there was a bit about the Big Bang (which didn't impress me) but the images of the stars and space were so stunning.

Dad said we can get a dog. Finally. I'm so ready.

Okay, I'm going to go outside because it's soooo beautiful!

Family Feud.

The first crayon drawing I did back in September or October.

First off, on my way home a boy on a scooter was behind me. I turned left onto my road and his scooter was backfiring so much I thought it was going to blow up, so I looked at him. He gave me the eye contact and slow nod. . .like the "I know you're checkin me out" look. Fail. No larger boy with your hat backwards riding down the road on a backfiring scooter, I do not think you are the least bit attractive.



I have had an insane week. My art portfolio needed to be sent out last night, so I had been working my butt off trying to get it to look nice and sent in. It had to be in silde format, so I assumed Powerpoint. It also had to be in pdf, but I didn't know what that meant. So, I just went ahead and did it in Powerpoint. Thank you Jesus for Ethan Helfrich! He sent me a converter so I could get the Powerpoint into Adobe. . .whew. I started freaking out a little Tuesday night.

Anyway, add that to some homework, just chore stuff, and trying to keep friends happy by doing stuff I've been a wreck. Last night I had some time to myself, but it was quickly eaten up by the prom dress search. I paid for a dress online only to get an email saying it wasn't available. What a mess.

So, tonight I have some time to myself and I just want it that way. I'm cleaning my room, reading a story my friend (who started a blogspot- General Life Americana) wrote, and then I'm going to the dance team's pep session!  And, I am most definatly going to enjoy this amazing weather.

I'm really ready for Spring Flipping Break. I'm going to State to see Lizzy, Jordyn, and Kaitlyn dance and I'm going to Chicago with some people of the youth group. We are working at a soup kitchen, going to a zoo, conservatory, and a planetarium. We are also going to Ed Debevic's, a restaraunt who has the waiters be rude to you. I'm pumped.

Okay, this has been a long post about nothing really worth writing a long post about. . . there you go.

Yeah.

Me, Rebecca, and Lizzy at the boy's Sectional game!

I haven't written in a while, my internet was being silly for a bit. I will upload the other part of the video soonly. It wasn't working right. . .

Good news- Yesterday I went to Crawford with the Academic Team to participate in the Fine Arts category. It was all based around Latin America. We got fourth, the Math group got first, and the Science group got third! So, way to go Mitchell! (I don't really think that any of the categories besides Math test intellegence, but memorization skills. Oh well.)

Bad News- Images of the tsunami and earthquake in Japan are all over the news, so I'm sure you've heard. It's hard to watch. I feel helpless, besides prayer. We watched a newsfeed in my Psychology class and I cried and cried. My friend Kayle told me we could turn it off, but I told her it was okay. You just can't live your whole life ignoring sad and hard things. This seriously breaks my heart. I know that things like this have happened in Haiti, Chile, and other places as of recently.

There was this shot of the wave carrying mud, houses, cars, boats, and fire rushing toward this above ground highway with cars speeding past. It didn't show the wave meet the highway, but there is no way that some of the cars avoided the vicious wave. Those are families, wives, husbands, mothers, sons, daughters, grandparents, and friends. I see the Burrises in one car and the Parsleys in another. I see my aunts and their families speeding past this wave. I can't even imagine what the people in Japan are feeling right now.

Well, yeah. Rebecca, Lizzy, and Lindsay are coming over any time. Gonna watch Thr3e.

Mamas and Papas

Just caught the last little bit of Les Miserables on television. Nick Jonas was one of the cast members? Weird, but good.  I'm not so secretly a fan of his. . .but not so much the other Jonas brothers.

Today we had a really interesting discussion about the things that confuse us (about God). Allen gave us a list of things we could agree with.  Among them were:
1. That God was real (We all believed that, so no further discussion)
2. That He sent His son (No arguments there)
3. That God was good (We had a really good discussion about that one)
4. That God loves us (Another good discussion)
5. That there was life after death (Because we decided we all believed God was real, we all believed in life after death)

I think that was all of the points, those are the ones I remember.  I was really interested in what people thought about the goodness and intentions of God and how he loved them.  Most people agreed that they do not understand why bad things happen like the Holocaust or a small child getting cancer in dying.  We all agreed that we believe there are supernatural battles happening between the angels and demons, devil and God, and the like.  So, are these bad things a result of  fallen world and are lost battles?

If we decide that they are lost battles, then we have to move on to why God can lose battles in the first place?  I think that we decided that these battles are lost because the gift of our freewill.  I honestly can't believe with my heart that God takes the life of someone's baby to prove a point or change the world.  I think He lost the battle.  The question then becomes: how much influence in our future does God have if He can lose battles?  Would He not already know that the battles are coming?  So, does He lose them on purpose?

All this pre-destination stuff can really get you messed up if you let it.  We have to admit we are bound by things like time and mortality and we will never and can never fully understand God and His ways.  That's okay, God gave me a brain and I'm going to use it.  I suggested that a part of the trinity does know what every minute will hold and another doesn't. God changes His mind in bible. 

Gary said that in part of the bible God argues with Himself over Their plans.  Can you imagine?  "Part One, I really think this is a good idea but the girl we made named Melissa is praying for something completely different. What do you think?" "I know what this road holds. Do you think another could work out for the plan?"  You know? It's like the tie-dye analogy I made forever ago.  God has a plan and ties up the tee-shirt just how he wants it and dyes it, but the way the colors blend and unfurl is completely on their own.

This was a really long post with no end really.  There you go blogging world.

Accidents get you sent home.

Here's Part Three those of you that might be watching this. This one is more about the wonders of the human body which strangely isn't as fascinating to me as the universe and planet stuff. It's still really amazing though.

I like Augustine's quote, "Men go abroad to wonder at the height of mountains, the huge waves of the sea, the long course of rivers, the vast compass of the oceans, the circular motion of the stars, but they pass by themselves and they don't even notice."

Anyway, I love the message of this video in its entirety.

I got my roomate and I a room yesterday! It is across the room from Rebecca's and it has two closets and three outlets! Score!