Goodies

It's been awhile since I have picked up one of my favorite books, The Valley of Vision, compiled by Arthur Bennett. It's a collection of Puritan prayers...I love it because 1) wow could they pray! :) 2) it voices stuff that I have trouble putting into words. I hadn't used it in a couple of months until a recent blog by Tim Challies reminded me to pull it from the shelves again. Here's one I read the other day that I hadn't before. It shouldn't amaze me, but it does, that people hundreds of years ago faced the same flesh/spirit struggles...the world vs God...we know who should win...but if you're like me, who can drag my feet, make every excuse imaginable, or stick my fingers in my ears to try to ignore the fact that it must also be acted out...its a blessing to have reminders. Thank God for His willingness to gently teach (yeah with me, I think its more like clobber over the head or drag me kicking and screaming, but hey, we'll call that semantics ;-) ) the truths we so desperately need to know. The language in this is old (we are talking Puritans here :) ))...but its sooo beautiful.

Fullness

Heavenly Father,

Thou has revealed to me myself as a mass of sin, and thyself as the fullness of goodness,
with strength enough to succor me,
wisdom enough to guide me,
mercy enough to quicken me,
love enough to satisfy me.
Though has shown me that because thou are mine I can live by thy life
be strong in thy strength,
be guided by thy wisdom;
so I can pitch my thoughts and heart in thee.
This is the exchange of the wonderful love-
for me to have thee for myself,
and for thee to have me, and to give me thyself.
There is in thee all fullness of the good I need,
and the fullness of all grace to draw me to thyself,
who else could never have come.
But having come, I must cleave to thee,
be knit to thee,
always seek thee.
There is none all good as thou are:
With thee I can live without other things,
for thou art God all-sufficient,
and the glory, peace, rest, joy of the world is a creaturely, perishing thing in comparison with thee
Help me to know that he who hopes for nothing but thee, and for all things only for thee, hopes truly,
and that I must place all my happiness in holiness, if I hope to be filled with all grace
Convince me that I can have no peace at death, nor hope that I should go to Christ,
unless I intend to do his will
and have his fullness while I live.

Hmm...not so odious bike? Maybe...

So, I have a sprint triathlon coming up in two weeks and with my trip to Russia and then vacation, my training hasn't been all that great...getting some runs in is easy (yes, I did run on vacation)...but I haven't been on a bike since my last triathlon back in August...and you all remember how those practices went :)

So I re-borrowed my friend Jeff's bike (there's this whole saga to me actually buying a bike which I won't bore you with) and I took it out early this morning to see if I could still get on and off the bike without accidentally amputating my leg or arm or ear (with me, you never know what could happen). Success! I didn't fall off the bike! Or over or under the bike (I did however, somehow manage to gouge my inner ankle wheeling the bike OUT of the garage...go figure).

So after church today I took it on a 6 mile ride. Not bad...I forgot how much wind resistance changes things, but I definitely feel more comfortable on it now than I did in August. After my ride, I added a short run. Doing two events from a tri back-to-back is called a brick workout. My run ended up being only 0.5 miles, because well, let's just say I had some wicked jelly legs...I know I will be able to complete the tri, but it won't be a great performance due to the lack of training...just more impetus to do another in June ;-)...however, I am SOOOO thankful that my leg has healed. God definitely taught me patience throughout that experience...and to lean on Him harder to sustain me throughout the day and not just rely on the endorphin/stress release high that exercise provides. I'm so glad God wants His children to know him better and better and that He patiently and diligently teaches us these lessons that sound so easy but are oh so difficult to act out.

Phase 3 vacation summary- Hawaii

So I am just going to post some pictures here. I will eventually get around to getting a whole album up...

First off, yay for landing in Houston before this huge thunderstorm hit. Boo for our flight from Honolulu being delayed until 2am...yay for good sushi restaurants within walking distance of the airport, boo for super cold airplanes, yay for bringing jeans to change into and sticking my feet into my purse to keep them warm :) (yes I really stuck my feet into my purse and it really did help...I slept the whole rest of the flight!)

After delaying my flight to Oahu by a day, the girls (Lydia and Emily (they are sisters and I went to school with Lydia...we've known each other for 17 years!!!) picked me up and we headed out to the Likelike (pronounced 'leaky leaky") Highway, a really pretty drive on Oahu). We stopped at Chinaman's Hat for some pictures, drove around to see some of the pretty beaches and overlooks (and saw some humpback whales spouting off the shore!!!), saw Haunama Bay, and the sunset.

Me, Emily, and Lydia in front of Chinaman's Hat

Sunset near Haunama Bay

The next day we woke up very early (4am!) and went to hike Diamondhead Crater.

Lydia, Emily, and me on Diamondhead Craater, Honolulu in the background

We met up with another group of my friends (Tima, Katrina, and Mark, and their friend Patty) for breakfast at one of our favorite restaurants on Oahu, Eggs and Things.

The gang at Eggs and Things

Then we all flew to Maui. Our condo was awesome! Within barefoot walking distance of the beach (Kamaole II) in the town of Kihei (south Maui). We hit the beach first thing of course :).

Our beach

Since Tima and all only had a few days on Maui, they were going to cram as much as possible into those days. We joined them at 3:50am to drive up Haleakala, the dormant volcano, to watch the sunrise. The elevation is just over 10,000 feet and it was freezing! (literally).

Sun rising on Haleakala (yeah, we were above the clouds...so cool!)

Me and Tima on Haleakala

The girls...thawed out finally

Then we drove the Road to Hana and hiked to Waimoku Falls (407 foot waterfall).

Me and my old roomies, Tima and Katrina


Lydia and Tima

Big waterfall

I talked Emily and Mark into joining me in the waterfall!!!


Wahoo!

We then visited Wai'anapanapa State Park and the black sand beach. Alas, we couldn't swim in it though...you can see why...

Ooh pretty black sand (it wasn't soft though...)


Umm, yikes.

We went to Lahaina, really quaint old town, good shops, and we went to the Old Lahaina Luau, which was a lot of fun. We sat with a great group of folks and had a really fun time with them.

Taking out the kahlua pig


Enjoying my mai tai



Sunset from Lahaina

At the Old Lahaina Luau (all the girls at our table and some friendly visitors :) )


After our botched kayaking/snorkeling, seasickness/freezing adventure (of which we have NO pictures from!). We spent our last beach day on this beach, Makena Beach. Wow.


Sunset from the condo balcony (our last night on Maui)



Last picture on our beach (it was sooo windy so we weren't too sad about not being able to have one last beach day)

Our last day on Maui we went back to Lahaina and drove around the coffee plantation. And then got one last iced coffee at the Maui Planatation Coffee House. Yum!


I really like coffee

Great trip. Great great great.

World Cup 2010

I just found out that we (my brother, my friend Jana and her husband Scott) got our tickets for World Cup 2010. It is in South Africa!!! And the best news is, its during a beta cutout so no silly Shuttle launches can get in the way! (beta cutout means that the sun angle is too high (Shuttle will get too hot) during a particular timeframe...this one just so happens to extend over the world Cup timeframe). ::happy dance, happy dance::

Feeding the Fishies

So we signed up for this tour that takes you kayaking around the island and then you snorkel from your kayak. Cool right? Yeaaaaah....

So holy-choppy-water-Batman. And guess who didn't even think to take her Dramamine. And when you get out of the kayak to snorkel you still bob up and down and side to side cause of the stupid lifevest. I did get to see sea turtles! And a ton of colorful fish...

I also fed the fish...twice...hope they liked my breakfast.

Maui :)

So I've been too exhausted at the end of each day to blog, and the internet is having issues so I only managed to get one photot loaded...but, let me just say, I heart Maui and am never coming home. Nope. (I did spend a whirlwind 12 hours on Oahu as well, taking the girls to all the sites I saw the last time I was here...fun and tiring!)

We have an amazing condo with an ocean view and about a 2 minute walk from a bee-yew-ti-ful beach.

Me on the baclony of the condo..ocean is behind me :)

Yesterday we woke up at 3am to drive to the summit of Haleakala (the inactive volano here) to watch the sunrise. Breathtaking and frostbiting (elevation 10,000 feet). Then we drove back down and drove the Road to Hana. This road has 671 turns (no, I didn't count, someone else did in my travel book). Talk about hairpin turns! The have these one lane bridges that tell you to yield to oncoming traffic- thing is, the turns are so tight, you can't see the oncoming traffic...so we decided youd need to be a Jedi or something to determine if there was oncoming traffic (believe this decision generated a LOT of laughter and ensuing dorkiness).

Then at the end of the Road, we did a four mile hike into a waterfall and I STOOD UNDER A WATERFALL!!!! And I got two people to do it with me too! Everyone else was dissuaded by the "Danger of falling rocks beyond this point" sign. Good thing I feigned illiteracy ;-).

Great trip so far. Today is church and then we are going to crash on the beach for the rest of the day for some much need recuperation :D.

Not coming back.

Phase 2 drama

So phase 2 of my vacation was supposed to consist of a whirlwind trip down to Tucson to visit my parents, a haircut, back to Phoenix to visit some friends and then fly out to Hawaii...

But, it's me, right?

So instead, that stomach bug I had for a bit in Idaho decided to come back, this time full force and I ended up in urgent care being pumped with fluids because I couldn't keep fluid, well, in. I am such a fan of anti-nausea medicine by the way. And can you say holy high fever batman?

So obviously, I wasn't going to be able to make my original flight to Hawaii. After keeping down some jello and a popsicle, I spent an hour on the phone with Expedia last night (I'll spare you the bloody details but I ended up having to "speak with a supervisor"), I delayed my flight by a day, which isn't bad at all, since that is one of the days we were going to be on Oahu and I've already been there.

So, I am now going to go sit on my bum, eat a popsicle, watch a Doctor Who and continue to recover.

Definitely ready for phase 2 to be over... :)