Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I hope that you all have enjoyed all the food and time spent with family, friends or however you chose to spend your Thanksgiving! And most importantly I hope that you all take some time today to thank God for all that you have!

In honor of it being Thanksgiving, I thought that this post should be about the time I spent Thanksgiving in Guatemala! 2 years ago, Myself, Don, Travis and Beki went to visit some of my bestie, Shaun & Ashley in Guatemala, where they were missionaries at, at that time (which they have since moved back home to Ohio and now work with OTW).

This was such a fun trip. We spent a lot of time playing 5 crowns, meeting the kids at the Children’s home, by having dinner with the young boys one night, spent an afternoon with some of the girls, went grocery and christmas shopping for all of the kids, watched their Christmas program that a group of others came in to do for all of the kids. Experienced some new foods, had some games and piñata fun! It was really cool to meet the kids that we had heard so much about from Shaun & Ashley and to see where they were living and just experience life with them on the mission field a the Children’s Home they worked at.

We also spent a day in Antigua, which was absolutely beautiful. We walked around a lot and ate some really great food. Guatemala is a very beautiful country, with some pretty amazing people. I love experiencing culture, and this was a great trip to experience Thanksgiving with other people, but all coming together for one cause, and encouraging some friends on the field!

I encourage you, that if you have friends that are missionaries or support missionaries, especially ones that are overseas, find some way to encourage them. Whether that is to visit them, or write them/contact them consistently. It’s important and much appreciated!

There are so many photos, so I hope you enjoy them! 🙂 And if you ever get a chance to go to Antigua and the smaller towns in Guatemala, do it! It is quite the experience and a really fun culture!

I’ve learned quite a bit over this past year.
I can’t help but look back, and be grateful for a God who has been there the whole time and that He never stopped doing a work to soften my heart, to make me look like Him even when I felt like I was the furthest from Him than I ever had been. There’s been a lot of  heart change, and with this heart change has come some life lessons with only more to come in the future that I am excited to venture into.

One of the things that I have learned, very difficultly unfortunately, is that I just am not where I want to be spiritually, emotionally, maturely, physically…etc, and that does not mean that I won’t get there. I haven’t ‘peaked’. I haven’t reached my full potential in life yet. I haven’t accomplished everything I needed to accomplish. I’m not the best of the best. And until Christ’s return, I probably won’t achieve these things. There will always be something more to achieve, more of a godly person to be and grow into…and this, is the journey of life, and this is perfectly normal and okay.

For some reason I had come to believe that I had peaked, and that there was no where else to go, but down. So I did. All my dreams from a teenager and what I wanted to do with my life, had seemed to come true at such an early age, and I just didn’t know what else to do. It was like I stopped dreaming and I just went into this pit of not knowing where else I could go. What a dark pit that was.

What a humbling crawl out of the pit it has been.
Life seems to be this constant journey of trying, try some more, oh, try again.
Endure, endure some more, maybe some relief, and oh, wait a minute, you have to keep enduring!
Those journey’s are not the most enjoyable….but they are necessary for our humility, for our work ethic, for our character and our belief in the Goodness and character of God, and for our future character and strength among many other things. Because I can guarantee that there will be more pit’s. But the next time, hopefully I will have learned from the previous journey’s and trial’s to be able to get out of the pit quicker and faster and with more grace and godliness than before.

What a glorious day it will be, to be with Christ in my resurrected, perfect body for the rest of eternity, face to face, with no sin disrupting my way of life. BLISS.

There is always room to be better. Always room for more endurance, for more godliness, for a better, stronger, Jesus-like me. I’m not my best today, but tomorrow I may be better…and so on.

It can be discouraging to look at the now and see all of the flaws or things that you know you need to change or work on, but each day we have the choice to learn from our yesterdays, to learn from our mistakes, from our pit-falls, from our bad decisions. Each day we have a choice to make better decisions, to have a better attitude, to do something different than we did yesterday that will bring honor to God..

Each day, is a new day.
So if you messed this day up, God has given you another chance.
Grace and Mercy are at its best when we are at our lowest.
And the best part…God is WITH you every breath, every step.
His presence in my life, is of utmost importance.

I have been to Pennsylvania many times. When I was a part of Off The Wall Discipleship, we had many donors from that area, and OTW also has a partner church out there where many students came from (and continue to do so). So we spent many weekends traveling back and forth, and I quickly fell in love with the area and the people and the church out there!

I love the small towns that have an old town, New England feel. Doylestown is probably my favorite and if your out in eastern PA you have to walk around and shop at Peddler’s Village! The roads in PA are a bit windy and if your prone to car sickness…watch out, but in the fall is it so worth it, I would just hate to drive them in the winter, more power to all you PA people!

I had the privilege over my birthday about 2 weeks ago to attend a wedding in PA, and it was gorgeous and a blast, and I am blessed to have come back (it had been a while). So, I look forward to the next time (whenever that may be!)

Some memories shown here are of relationships being built upon bodily functions, laughing so hard you pee yourself, great food and fellowship….but all memories mostly involving laughing. 🙂 Some memories are missing, some sleepovers, a lot of great conversations with great people, but even though there aren’t photos to prove they existed, there are photos in my mind that I will forever cherish.

Enjoy!