saint rooster

With those tiny arms, there are a lot of things T-Rex just can’t do :(

2012-02-10T13:51:00.001-08:00

The Silent Evolution

2012-01-31T21:17:00.000-08:00

Underwater Sculptures by Jason de Caires Taylor.

2012-01-31T10:43:00.001-08:00

2012-01-30T08:49:00.001-08:00

living above your circumstances.

2012-01-27T09:37:00.000-08:00

i was reading this morning and came across a line that said, (read as if God was speaking directly to you) "Thank Me for troublesome situations; the Peace they can produce far outweighs the trials you endure." i started thinking about how terrible 2011 was, and i imagined reading that sentence and wanting to know what it would mean to me if i didn't know God. how confusing it would be or how meaningless.

it's one thing to build up strength from a situation and say, "Well, if i can make it through that, I can survive anything." but it is another to find Peace in it. strength and peace don't always go together. in fact, my strength fails me quite a lot.

the Peace that God offers us is engulfed in the understanding of how to live above your circumstances. to be frank with you, it's learning how to let go and embrace the truth that your ultimate purpose of being on Earth is not for your own happiness, but for God's. (though i am fully aware that God loves for us to be happy). this gospel liberates. and i know that many Christians in the past have abused the Gospel and have misunderstood it. Westboro Baptist church comes to mind immediately. but the freedom in this whole story is that God loves us enough to give us a choice to love Him back. and that means we can choose not too love Him and we can choose to do things while on earth that are quite horrific and bring sorrow to God's heart.

i know this blog post might ruffle some feathers, but to be flat honest, i'm really tired of Christians treating God like he's a genie in a lamp. if i sit here and profess to be a Christian running round with Jeremiah 29:11 on my lips and yet cannot embrace that same Promise when my father dies in front of my face and i am utterly betrayed by the man i thought i was to marry, then i am a hypocrite and something is radically wrong with my understanding of who God is.

if anything from the trials i have to endure, i want to learn how to love other people well because that's what Jesus commands us to do, friends. not to judge. not to ostracize. not to be double-minded and weary in our beliefs, but to love and to love unconditionally. when i let go of always needing to be the happiest person in the room, i am free to enjoy other people's happiness and value the bigger picture. i begin to live above my circumstances and cherish more and more the grace that God turned His face that fateful hour, so Love could win.

HA! Office sleep bag, designed by Kawamura Ganjavian

2012-01-25T14:28:00.001-08:00

woo hoo ! get it!

2012-01-18T07:45:00.001-08:00

prayer.

2012-01-14T20:32:00.000-08:00

i love this prayer.

2012-01-11T19:00:00.001-08:00

what if.

2011-11-16T07:59:00.001-08:00

I've been trying real hard lately to be disciplined and more intentional about spending time alone with God. This is hard for me. I've never been good at it. I get bored, I get distracted, or I drift off deliberating on what it is I have to accomplish during the week, instead of sitting in God's Presence.
This morning, I caught myself wondering again, but in a different way. And I want to address it.

It is my opinion, that too often we Christians spend our time alone with God trying to convince ourselves of something we do not truly believe. And when I say "believe", I am not attacking your foundational conviction that the God of the Bible is real and sent His Son to die for us all. I am addressing the day in, day out, belief that God is who He says He is.

So at 7am this morning, as I watched the rain fall on the tail-end of Autumn, I asked myself, what if? What if God truly is the Pursuer of my soul? What if I actually believed that God is the Wooer of my heart? What if Matthew 10:30 was real to me?...that God cares for me so intimately that He knows how many hairs are on my head? How would that make my life look different?
Would I still have as many worries and concerns or would my burdens be lightened because I would trust what God says about me over what I or my friend say about me? How would my relationships look different? Would I be more patient and loving with people, or would I continue to not live past my nose when my circumstances get hard and life is "unfair"?

Is it that simple? Not easy, but simple? Is that what Jesus meant when He said that the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to children (Matt. 19:14)? Because kids just trust? Because kids don't worry about next week or next year. Because kids are only aware of today and they're okay with that.

So....do I really believe God is who He says He is.

I think if I did, I'd be strong. I could be a leader. I could handle sadness and not get depressed. I would utilize self-control. I would think of others more. I wouldn't fear being alone for the rest of my life. I'd see Death as a swinging door. Nature would be more beautiful to me. I would be bold. I would be humbled.

Don Miller once stated that Christian Spirituality cannot be explained, it can only be experienced. And I agree. I want my time alone with God to be an experience. I want the God of the Bible to tear up all of my formulas and ravage my heart. I want to preach God to people without using words. I want to show you Love when I am down-trodden and weak of heart.
I want to let God be in my life who He says He is.

givenchy sweater. i want.

2011-11-12T10:05:00.001-08:00

an excerpt from Donald Miller's book "Searching for God Knows What"

2011-11-08T13:39:00.001-08:00

I know there are people who have actually gone from misery to happiness, but they didn’t do it by walking through three steps; they did it because they had a certain set of parents and heard a certain song and knew somebody who had a certain experience and saw some movie, read some book, had something happen to them like a car wreck or a trip to Seattle. Then they called on God, and a week later read something in a magazine or met a girl in Wichita, and when all this had happened they had an epiphany, and somebody may have helped them fulfill what this epiphany made them feel, and several years later they rationalized this mystic experience with three steps, then they told the three steps to us in a book. I’m not saying they weren’t trying to be helpful; I bring this up only because life is complex, and the idea that you can break it down or fix it in a few steps is rather silly.
The truth is there are a million steps, and we don’t even know what the steps are, and worse, at any given moment we may not be willing or even able to take them; and still worse, they are different for you and me and they are always changing. I have come to believe the sooner we find this truth beautiful, the sooner we will fall in love with the God who keeps shaking things up, keeps changing the path, keeps rocking the boat to test our faith in Him, teaching us to not rely on easy answers, bullet points, magic mantras, or genies in lamps, but rather rely on His guidance, His existence, His mercy, and His love.
Personally, I was miserable before I understood these ideas, but now I am so happy I laugh all the time, even in my sleep.
This passage was excerpted from Searching For God Knows What.

Reconciling Revenge

2011-11-02T10:40:00.001-07:00

today i thought i'd share a post on revenge by Jordan Green.

I would generally consider myself a pacifist. I say “generally”, because I don’t really know how I’d react in a given situation. If, for instance, a crazed hobo woman attacked my daughter, I’m fairly certain I would resort to physical violence in order to get her to stop. So maybe I’m a pacifist when it comes to larger communities, like nation-states and youth groups. Because of my semi-pacifist philosophy, I’ve always had one major hang-up with narrative morality, an idea this blog’s esteemed owner discusses in A Million Miles in a Thousand Years. That hang-up is this: when played out in story, revenge is sort of awesome.
For instance, I’m reading through George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire series right now, and there are plenty of characters in this epic, sprawling fantasy series who I want to pay. And I don’t want them merely brought to justice in a court of law and imprisoned for life. They are evil people, and I want them to die the most painful deaths possible. Most of them do end up dying horrific deaths, simply because (SPOILER ALERT) a lot of people die in these books.(END SPOILER ALERT)
Of course, the characters in Martin’s novels aren’t real, but real life has its share of bad guys. The latter half of the 20th century seemed to mark a turn away from Old Testament-style justice. Adolph Hitler: committed suicide to avoid capture by the Red Army. Joseph Stalin: died of a cerebral hemorrhage at 74. Pol Pot: died at home of a heart attack. Slobodan Milosevic: heart attack while under trial for war crimes. Saddam Hussein: hanged after being convicted for crimes against humanity. The point is, the deaths of some of the 20th century’s worst people were decidedly unlike that of your average Bond villain.
Then, in the last six months, Osama Bin Laden and Muammar Gaddafi died extremely violent deaths. The former, of course, was shot in the head during a raid by US forces. The latter was captured in a hole, beaten viciously, and, according to some reports, took around 30 minutes to die after being shot in the head and chest.
Now, I know I am supposed to love my enemies, to pray for them and even bless them. I know this because it is discussed pointedly in Romans, Luke, 1 Peter and 1 John. But what’s curious to me is how these deaths feel to me from a purely narrative standpoint. And, if I’m honest, the deaths of Osama Bin Laden and Muammar Gaddafi feel somewhat…well…right. As much as I tell myself the death of a human being should never be celebrated, I do at least feel some satisfaction knowing these men are gone. Gaddafi was a madman who ruled with an iron hand, who lived in unchecked opulence while his people suffered. Osama Bin Laden was Osama Bin Laden. One of the key components of Protestant Christianity is the belief we do not get what we deserve, that through following Christ all sin is absolved, but there is still a very real part of us that wants to see certain people get what’s coming to them, from cruel despots to schoolyard bullies. If narrative morality is ingrained in us by our creator — and I think for the most part it is — why is vengeance so undeniably gratifying?
The easiest answer is to say we want justice, and that’s partly true. We yearn for God to put the world right. But there’s more to it than that. One of my favorite stories takes place in Corrie Ten Boom’s book Tramp for the Lord. Ms. Ten Boom is lecturing in Germany when she is approached by a man whom she quickly recognizes as a particularly brutal Ravensbruck guard. Before he can speak, she forgives him:

“For a long moment, we grasped each other’s hands, the former guard and the former prisoner. I had never known God’s love so intensely as I did then.”

What we truly want is for villains to repent. Ideally, we want a villain to understand what he did was wrong, and redeem his horrible actions. When that doesn’t suffice, we want him to realize he was not as powerful as he thought. This is why, when a villain dies in a story, we are shown his reaction one last time as he plummets to his death or realizes a bomb is about to explode. We want to see him recognize he is a broken man.
The question from there is whether we want our villains forgiven, and I suspect that’s a matter of perspective. Did anyone really want Die Hard to end with John McClane forgiving Hans Gruber, grasping hands, and experiencing God’s love? Doubtful, but this is partly because Hans Gruber is not a real human. He’s an avatar for evil. Real people are a lot messier, with compounding factors like traumatic childhood experiences and mental illness.
Like all sin, we each have our limits. The tools God gives us to push those limits — empathy and a willingness to cede control of our lives — are crucial in determining our reactions. If I had known Muammar Gaddafi, or Osama Bin Laden, I wonder if that glimmer of satisfaction I felt would’ve been diminished completely, and a story read as justice served would more closely resemble a tragedy.

are you a Christian single, or a single Christian.

2011-11-01T15:19:00.000-07:00

Singles Fellowship

Singled Out by God for Good
by Paige Benton Brown

Had I any vague premonition of my present plight when I was six, I would have demanded that Stephen Herbison (incontestably the catch of the second grade) put his marriage proposal into writing and have it notarized. I do want this piece to be practical, so to all you first-graders: CARPE DIEM.

Over the past several years I have perfected the artistry of escape regarding any singles functions—cookouts, conferences, Sunday school classes, and my personal favorite, putt-putt. My avoidance mechanism is triggered not so much by a lack of patience with such activities as it is by a lack of stomach for the pervasive attitudes. Thoreau insists that most men lead lives of quiet desperation; I insist that many singles lead lives of loud aggravation. Being immersed in singles can be like finding yourself in the midst of "The Whiners" of 1980's Saturday Night Live—it gives a whole new meaning to "pity party."

Much has been written in Christian circles about singleness. The objective is usually either to chide the married population for their misunderstanding and segregationism or to empathize with the unmarried population as they bear the cross of “Plan B” for the Christian life, bolstered only by the consolation prizes of innumerable sermons on I Corinthians 7 and the fact that you can cut your toenails in bed. Yet singles, like all believers, need scriptural critique and instruction seasoned by sober grace, not condolences and putt-putt accompanied with pious platitudes.

John Calvin’s secret to sanctification is the interaction of the knowledge of God and knowledge of self. Singles, like all other sinners, typically dismiss the first element of the formula, and therein lies the root of all identity crises. It is not that hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, but that life has no tragedy like our God ignored. Every problem is a theological problem, and the habitual discontent of us singles is no exception.

Can God be any less good to me on the average Tuesday morning than he was on that monumental Friday afternoon when he hung on a cross in my place? The answer is a resounding NO. God will not be less good to me tomorrow either, because God cannot be less good to me. His goodness is not the effect of his disposition but the essence of his person—not an attitude but an attribute.

I long to be married. My younger sister got married two months ago. She now has an adoring husband, a beautiful home, a whirlpool bathtub, and all-new Corningware. Is God being any less good to me than he is to her? The answer is a resounding NO. God will not be less good to me because God cannot be less good to me. It is a cosmic impossibility for God to shortchange any of his children. God can no more live in me apart from the perfect fullness of his goodness and grace than I can live in Nashville and not be white. If he fluctuated one quark in his goodness, he would cease to be God.

Warped theology is at the heart of attempts to "explain" singleness:

"As soon as you’re satisfied with God alone, he’ll bring someone special into your life”—as though God’s blessings are ever earned by our contentment.
"You’re too picky”—as though God is frustrated by our fickle whims and needs broader parameters in which to work.
"As a single you can commit yourself wholeheartedly to the Lord’s work”—as though God requires emotional martyrs to do his work, of which marriage must be no part.
"Before you can marry someone wonderful, the Lord has to make you someone wonderful"—as though God grants marriage as a second blessing to the satisfactorily sanctified.

Accepting singleness, whether temporary or permanent, does not hinge on speculation about answers God has not given to our list of whys, but rather on celebration of the life he has given. I am not single because I am too spiritually unstable to possibly deserve a husband, nor because I am too spiritually mature to possibly need one. I am single because God is so abundantly good to me, because this is his best for me. It is a cosmic impossibility that anything could be better for me right now than being single, The psalmists confirm that I should not want, I shall not want, because no good thing will God withhold from me.

Such knowledge of God must transform subsequent knowledge of self-theological readjustment is always the catalyst for renewed self-awareness. This keeps identity right-side-up with nouns and modifiers in their correct place. Am I a Christian single or am I a single Christian? The discrepancy in grammatical construction may be somewhat subtle, but the difference in mindset is profound. Which word is determinative and which is descriptive? You see, we singles are chronic amnesiacs—we forget who we are, we forget whose we are. I am a single Christian. My identity is not found in my marital status but in my redemptive status. I 'm one of the "haves," not one of the "have-nots."

Have you ever wondered at what age one is officially single? Perhaps a sliding scale is in order: 38 for a Wall Street tycoon; 21 for a Mississippi sorority girl; 14 for a Zulu princess; and five years older than I am for me. It is a relevant question because at some point we see ourselves as “single,” and that point is a place of greater danger than despair. Singleness can be a mere euphemism for self-absorption—now is the "you time." No wife to support? No husband to pamper? Well, then, by all means join three different golf courses, get a weekly pedicure, raise emus, subscribe to People.

Singleness is never carte blanche for selfishness. A spouse is not a sufficient countermeasure for self. The gospel is the only antidote for egocentricity. Christ did not come simply to save us from our sins, he came to save us from our selves. And he most often rescues us from us through relationships, all kinds of relationships.

"Are you seeing anyone special?" a young matron in my home church asked patronizingly. "Sure," I smiled. "I see you and you’re special."

OK, my sentiment was a little less than kind, but the message is true.
To be single is not to be alone. If someone asks if you are in a relationship right now, your immediate response should be that you are in dozens. Our range of relational options is not limited to getting married or to living in the sound-proof, isolated booth of Miss America pageants. Christian growth mandates relational richness.

The only time folks talk about human covenants is in premarital counseling. How anemic. If our God is a covenantal God, then all of our relationships are covenantal. The gospel is not about how much I love God (I typically love him very little); it is about how much God loves me. My relationships are not about how much friends should love me, they are about how much I get to love them. No single should ever expect relational impoverishment by virtue of being single. We should covenant to love people— to initiate, to serve, to commit.
Many of my Vanderbilt girls have been reading Lady in Waiting, a popular book for Christian women struggling with singleness. That’s all fine and dandy, but what about a subtitle: And Meanwhile, Lady, Get Working. It is a cosmic impossibility for God to require less of me in my relationships than he does of the mother of four whose office is next door. Obedience knows no ages or stages.

Let’s face it: singleness is not an inherently inferior state of affairs. If it were, heaven would be inferior to this world for the majority of Christians (Mom is reconciled to being unmarried in glory as long as she can be Daddy’s roommate). But I want to be married. I pray to that end every day. I may meet someone and walk down the aisle in the next couple of years because God is so good to me. I may never have another date and die an old maid at 93 because God is so good to me. Not my will but his be done. Until then I am claiming as my theme verse, “If any man would come after me, let him. . . "

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T11:13:00.000-07:00

Ghost of the Cepheus Flare
Image Credit &Copyright: Adam Block,Mt. Lemmon SkyCenter,University of Arizona

Explanation: Spooky shapes seem to hauntthisstarry expanse, drifting through the night in the royal constellationCepheus.Of course, the shapes are cosmic dust clouds faintly visiblein dimly reflected starlight.Far from your ownneighborhood on planet Earth, they lurk at the edge of theCepheus Flaremolecular cloud complex some 1,200 light-years away.Over 2 light-years across the ghostly nebula and relativelyisolatedBok globule, also known asvdB 141or Sh2-136,is near the center of the field.The core of the dark cloud on the right is collapsing and islikely a binary star system in theearly stages of formation. Even so, if the spooky shapes could talk, they might well wish you a happy Halloween.

God knows me, but do i know Him.

2011-10-28T09:52:00.000-07:00

i feel as if i have never known the Lord.

that is a big statement to make. let me explain.
you know those times when you realize how small you are? you might live your life where you are always # 1. your mistakes and problems make you feel like the world is going to end right in front of your face. and you fall to your knees in confusion and in desperation for something better. something bigger.
well that has been my life over the past 8 months. and i find myself without a career, living in my parents basement, wondering what the hell could happen next. i'm sure we have all come to this standstill in life, though the circumstances may look different.

i've come to realize that God has never been enough for me. i've short-changed who i think He is and what i believe He thinks of me. i can sit here and tell you that i'm a sweet caring follower of Christ who trusts in the Lord beyond measure and who has faith that could move mountains, but that is not true.

i'm in pain. and i struggle. there are days when i'm confident in God's grace for me and there are days when i feel like i'm swimming emotionally/spiritually through mud.
i have never really known God because i never really needed Him.
until now.

i read about the treacherous trials of Job, i immerse myself into the sweeping pain and prosperity of David, author of the Pslams, and amongst many emotions, i am thankful.
i am thankful that men and women have been honest. that followers of Christ long ago understood that sharing your struggle in your faith is just as important as sharing your strength.
and i am better for it. i read about Joseph, Moses, and Paul who have faced far more devastating circumstances than i, and i am encouraged. somehow, despite my pain and confusion, there is something bigger. and this something bigger looks at me and says, you are beautiful. He says, with you, i am well pleased.

may we all be a people of honesty, of hope, and of love. for God looks at us and says, you are worth it.

2011-10-27T08:57:00.001-07:00

the Lord is my shepherd, i lack nothing.

-psalm 23:1

Sit here.

2011-10-18T12:21:00.000-07:00

Are we devotees to a cause or disciples of the Lord? He said to the disciples, "Sit here." If they had been like some of us they would have said, "No, it is absurd. We must go and do something."
The more we get into the atmosphere of the New Testament the more we discover the unfathomable and unhasting leisure of our Lord's life, no matter what His agony. The difficulty is that when we do what God wants us to do, our friends say, "It is all well, but suppose we all did that?" Our Lord did not tell all the disciples to sit there while He prayed; He told only three of them. The point is that we must take as from God the haphazard arrangement of our lives. If we accept the Lord Jesus Christ and the domination of His lordship, we also accept that nothing happens by chance, because we know that God orders and engineers circumstances; the fuss has gone, the amateur providence has gone, the amateur disposer has gone, and we know that "all things work together for good to those who love God." If Jesus says, "Sit here, while I go pray over there," the only appropriate thing we can do is to sit there."

- If You Will Ask

2011-10-17T12:01:00.000-07:00

This morning I am waking up with Psalm 34 on my lips and in my heart.
How hard it is to grieve a loss..to feel horrifying betrayal..to fall asleep with a "future" and wake up to a blank canvas. It is scary and it is hard.
But I awake this morning with praises to our Lord on my lips. How blessed am I that He would bring such evil darkness into light.
I'm a mess. I really hurt. But the Lord shall be praised in this house.

2011-10-16T22:05:00.001-07:00

the bubble nebula.

a devotion my friend sent me this morning.

2011-10-14T11:01:00.000-07:00

October 14, 2011

Be prepared to suffer for me, in my Name. All suffering has meaning in My kingdom. Pain and problems are opportunities to demonstrate your trust in Me. Bearing your circumstances bravely- even thanking me for them- is one of the highest forms of praise. This sacrifice of thanksgiving rings golden-toned blessings of joy thought-out heavenly realms. On earth also, your patient suffering sends out ripples of good tidings in ever-widening circles.

When suffering strikes, remember that I am sovereign and that I can bring good out of everything. Do not try to run from pain or hide form problems. Instead, accept adversity in My Name, offering it up to Me for My purposes. Thus, your suffering gains meaning and draws you closer to Me. Joy emerges from the ashes of adversity though your trust and thankfulness.

James 1:2-4

Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.
Psalm 107:21-22
Oh that men would give thanks to the Lord for his unfailing love
and his wonderful deeds for mankind.
Let them sacrifice thank offerings
and tell of his works with songs of joy.

i won't rot.

2011-10-13T13:29:00.000-07:00

And after the storm,
I run and run as the rains come
And I look up, I look up,
on my knees and out of luck,
I look up.

Night has always pushed up day
You must know life to see decay
But I won't rot, I won't rot
Not this mind and not this heart,
I won't rot.

And I took you by the hand
And we stood tall,
And remembered our own land,
What we lived for.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more
tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your
fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And now I cling to what I knew
I saw exactly what was true
But oh no more.
That's why I hold,
That's why I hold with all I have.
That's why I hold.

I will die alone and be left there.
Well I guess I'll just go home,
Oh God knows where.
Because death is just so full and man so small.
Well I'm scared of what's behind and what's before.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more
tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your
fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,
With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more
tears.
And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your
fears.
Get over your hill and see what you find there,

With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

my dad died. my boyfriend cheated.

2011-10-12T10:30:00.000-07:00

This year has been the worst year of my life. I am officially giving 2011 the middle finger.
The few people who read this blog know that my dad died in a car accident on Valentine's Day this year. Well... as of 11 days ago, I found out that the man I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with, was unfaithful to me. Had been our entire relationship with several women.
I had no clue.

So... I've been weeping. A lot. I've been angry. Confused. And thought I couldn't take anymore. I've cried so deeply this week that I felt as if my middle core was paper thin and I would fold over and die. Sadness has been my friend.

However I'm still alive today... popping zits in the morning and thinking/worrying about my ever so unpredictable future. Sometimes you just keep going because you know you're not going to kill yourself and the sun will always rise. This has been my reality.

And yet, I am changed. God is bigger and mysterious and I am changed. This past week, I've been walking the streets of Portland and resting by the Puget Sound here in Washington, pondering over my pain. And something started making sense that never had before. I realized that I had a mold. I had a mental blueprint outlined of what I wanted or thought I needed in my life and it hadn't played out. It had frustrated me and it was disappointing me. Hoping to create my own version of "happily-ever-after", I had become critical and controlling. I couldn't live like this anymore. God hadn't wanted me to and had striped me of everything to show me that. The mold hadn't worked because it was mine and not God's.

Next week I'm making the big truck across country again to join the benevolence and open arms of the South, and I'm going back changed. I am learning that there is a freedom in Christ's love that I have been rejecting for a while now. Too often we find ourselves accepting the great things in life from God and deflecting the bad ...thinking that they couldn't possibly be a part of God's plan for us. Well that's just plain wrong. The beauty in taking your mess to Christ and being confident that He's got your back, forever, liberates and allows you to prosper. It doesn't mean you're not scared and it doesn't mean you're not worried from time to time. What it does mean is that you don't have to have it all together and that's okay.

So here I go into the Holidays learning to let go and joyfully allow my story to be written by Someone Else. May His love flow into my pain and make me whole again.

Wahclella Falls. Portland.

Zenos Frudakis: Freedom

2011-09-30T15:43:00.001-07:00

old ads. ha.

2011-09-24T15:08:00.001-07:00

worth watching.

2011-09-21T11:20:00.001-07:00

Emmanuel's audition

update my rooster

2011-09-19T12:30:00.000-07:00

need ideas for my rooster! time for an update!

APAK

2011-09-15T11:51:00.001-07:00

great art by APAK

got rid of the red, went ombre

2011-09-15T10:29:00.001-07:00

2011-09-13T14:24:00.001-07:00

Awake, my soul.

2011-09-13T00:26:00.000-07:00

I love this song. Challenging, forgiving, flawed, questioning, hopeful, - the entire gamut of the human experience in our quest to walk with God.

Awake, my soul.

How fickle my heart and how woozy my eyes
I struggle to find any truth in your lies
And now my heart stumbles on things I don't know
This weakness I feel I must finally show

Lend me your hand and we'll conquer them all
But lend me your heart and I'll just let you fall
Lend me your eyes I can change what you see
But your soul you must keep, totally free

In these bodies we will live, in these bodies we will die
Where you invest your love, you invest your life
In these bodies we will live, in these bodies we will die
Where you invest your love, you invest your life

Awake my soul, awake my soul
Awake my soul
You were made to meet your Maker
Awake my soul, awake my soul
Awake my soul
You were made to meet your Maker
You were made to meet your Maker

good thoughts by donald miller

2011-09-12T12:18:00.000-07:00

All great spirituality is subversive, including the spirituality of following Jesus. Jesus was poor because the truth is there is more to life than money, and money is only a tool. Jesus did not cower to the power of religious authority, because the religious authority was corrupt and misrepresented God. Jesus did not take a wife or even a girlfriend because there is more to life than romance and sex. Jesus did not associate his identity with a specific fashion because clothes themselves cover the truth.

So when we follow Christ, everything about us becomes subversive. We have the audacity to stand in the middle of the world and weep over the false idols of culture, the power, the money, the sex, the fashion. And we do the same within the church. We say to the religious that their rules will not redeem them, to the performers of ritual that their actions have no power. We say to the angry theologian that Jesus is not an idea, and to the fundamentalist that he is too cowardly to accept or give grace.

Jesus is even subversive about the harsh reality of death, standing in the face of it and proving it powerless. Everything we worship, He dismisses, and everything we fear He faces. He is God.

All the false idols of our culture are reversed in Christ, and we can find comfort in this. Why? Because look at the pain in your life. Look at the hardship. How much of the pain has been caused by sacrificing to idols that have no power to help you, no power to heal you, no power to redeem you? Christ wants us to return to Him and find a true God, hanging on a cross where before we worshiped at the feet of flannel shirts stuffed with straw.

Don Miller's blog

2011-09-08T12:51:00.001-07:00

painted a bed!

2011-09-07T18:21:00.001-07:00

the bed is from Crate & Barrel and was originally just white.

hip hop hurray! for Native American Fashion.

2011-09-01T14:02:00.001-07:00

thinking of my dad tonight.

2011-08-29T23:22:00.000-07:00

It's been 6 months since my dad died. Today was one of those hard days. A close friend gave me a book tonight that I started reading. It has a poem in the beginning written by a man named Khalil Gibran. He wrote it in 1883.

Joy and Sorrow

Then a woman said, "Speak to us of Joy and Sorrow."

And he answered:

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked.

And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears.

And how else can it be?

The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain.

Is not the cup that hold your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter's oven?

And is not the lute that soothes your spirit, the very wood that was hollowed with knives?

When you are joyous, look deep into your heart and you shall find it is only that which has given you sorrow that is giving you joy.

When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.

Some of you say, "Joy is greater than sorrow," and others say, "Nay, sorrow is the greater."

But I say unto you, they are inseparable.

Together they come, and when one sits alone with you at your board, remember that the other is asleep upon your bed.

Verily you are suspended like scales between your sorrow and your joy.

Only when you are empty are you at standstill and balanced.

When the treasure-keeper lifts you to weigh his gold and his silver, needs must your joy or your sorrow rise or fall.

Khalil Gibran

Into the Woods Vogue US September 2009

2011-08-29T11:43:00.001-07:00

Natalia Vodianova

2011-08-29T11:16:00.000-07:00

painted a chalkboard for my lil niece to draw on in her room!

Candyland SR restoration

2011-08-27T10:17:00.000-07:00

The table was green and ugly before. I decided to paint Candyland on it! I used the vintage Candyland mostly but also put in some of the newer versions of the characters here and there.

dripped french tips.

2011-08-08T13:16:00.001-07:00

astronomy pic of the day

2011-08-04T19:48:00.000-07:00

bindi. hair.

2011-07-25T15:39:00.001-07:00

remember before America started pumping out all the Pop crap.

2011-07-10T14:20:00.001-07:00

Jeff Buckley

wonderful art by Elly MacKay.

2011-07-05T11:39:00.001-07:00

Elly MacKay

check out her process on her site!

swimsuits i want from Mercedes Benz Fashion Week this year

2011-06-30T16:52:00.001-07:00

and a cover i'd rock.

sitting in something real.

2011-06-27T10:27:00.000-07:00

life is unpredictable and really really hard sometimes.

over these last few months, i lost my father to a drunken car accident and watched him die on a hospital bed in front of my face, i kissed the sweet, soft temple of my new born nephew 3 days later, i was supposed to be "happy" and celebrate my birthday 2 days after that, and met the man of my dreams that same week. this all, within 1 month.

i've been a little confused to say the least.

i find myself, 4 months later, sitting in a reality so much more palpable than i ever could have imagined.

my reality is sitting with God, angry, confused, frustrated, and yet not losing the knowledge of His goodness and care for me and mankind. His justice is beyond what i know Justice to be and his Love is deeper for Man than i can ever understand.

i've been mad at God. no one should have to pull the plug on their own father. i don't know why i have to go through and face what i have to, but God knows how many hairs are on my head and knows how much i can handle. and He is right.

here i am, on the other side of it, finally starting to edge towards the window to let the sun rays hit my face again and i might be happy you could say. and i might know God a little better.

being a follower of Christ doesn't mean ignoring what's evil and painful in life. it doesn't mean putting on a fake smile running around with Praise Jesus on your lips all day. it means sitting with Him, on the floor, weeping out your sorrow and pleading for more of Him, with full knowledge that you don't and will never grasp life the way He created it to be.

2011-06-14T11:22:00.000-07:00

a baby porcupine.

2011-06-12T10:24:00.000-07:00

US Vogue May 2009 "Meet The Boyfriends"

2011-06-09T15:49:00.001-07:00

super models and their short boyfriends. i love it.

i wanna swim with an elephant.

2011-06-08T23:09:00.001-07:00

boom.

2011-06-08T23:07:00.000-07:00

i s'port merica.

2011-06-07T22:48:00.001-07:00

Give Us Names

2011-06-07T21:13:00.000-07:00

friends who care enough to read my blog,

hi. :)

and secondly, as you guys know, i'm real good friends with a group of guys back in ATL who started/run a charity called Give Us Names. they've been running it for almost 2 years.

check em out if you haven't already.

Give Us Names

they could really use your right index finger (or left if you're an awesome lefty) to vote for them at the following website.

Gives Back Project

no money required, i'm not asking for a donation. just a click.

you can read all about this charity and the project on the site. please vote for them every day for the next few days. they realllly need this endorsement.

thanks everyone. :) peace out, a-town down.

2011-06-03T00:20:00.001-07:00

2011-06-03T00:19:00.001-07:00

purp it right.

2011-05-28T10:59:00.001-07:00

Leigh Jay Nacht

2011-05-28T10:37:00.001-07:00

Doyle & Doyle

2011-05-27T18:48:00.001-07:00

loving Doyle & Doyle antique jewelry in NYC.

Fan-Tastic.

2011-05-23T15:18:00.001-07:00

Leviticans

2011-05-15T17:38:00.000-07:00

a post i came across written by a guy named john.

Leviticans

On occasion people ask me what, exactly, it is I have against Christianity, inasmuch as I seem to rail against it quite a bit. My general response is: I have nothing against Christianity. I wish more Christians practiced it. The famous bumper sticker says "Christians aren't perfect, just forgiven," but I often wonder just how often they check in with Christ about that last one. I look at the picture I included with the last entry, the one with the kid protesting the gay marriages in San Francisco, wearing the shirt that has "homo" written on it with a circle and slash through the word, and I try to find some of Christ's teachings in that. As you might imagine, I'm finding very little.

If that kid were hit by a bus and got to meet Christ shortly thereafter, I do imagine the conversation would be a sorrowful one, as the homo-negating young man would have to try to reconcile his shirt with the admonition to love others as one loves one's self. I would imagine at the end of that conversation, the young man would be looking to see if Christ were holding a lever, and if there were a trap door under the young man's feet.

In the comment thread of the last entry, one of the posters wondered why many fundamentalists spend so much time in Leviticus and so little time in the New Testament, and I think that's a remarkably cogent question. Indeed, it is so cogent that I would like to make the suggestion that there is an entire class of self-identified "Christians" who are not Christian at all, in the sense that they don't follow the actual teachings of Christ in any meaningful way. Rather these people nod toward Christ in a cursory fashion on their way to spend time in the bloodier books of the Bible (which tend to be found in the Old Testament), using the text selectively as a support for their own hates and prejudices, using the Bible as a cudgel rather than a door. That being the case, I suggest we stop calling these people Christians and start calling them something that befits their faith, inclinations and enthusiasms.

I say we call them Leviticans, after Leviticus, the third book of the Old Testament, famous for its rules, and also the home of the passages most likely to be thrown out by Leviticans to justify their intolerance (including, in recent days, against gays and lesbians -- Leviticus Chapter 18, Verse 22: "Thou shalt not not lie with mankind, as with womankind; it is abomination").

To suggest that a Christian is actually a Levitican is not to say he or she is false in faith -- rather, it is to suggest that their faith is elsewhere in the Bible, in the parts that are easy to understand: The rules, the regulations, all the things that are clear cut about what you can do and what you can't do to be right with God. Rules are far easier to follow than Christ's actual path, which needs humility and sacrifice and the ability to forgive, love and cherish even those who you oppose and who oppose and hate you. Any idiot can follow rules; indeed, there's a good argument to made that idiots can only follow rules. This is why Leviticans love Leviticus (and other pentateuchal and Old Testament books): Chock full of rules. And you can believe in rules. That's why they're rules.

So, back to the guy with the "homo" shirt. Is he a Christian? Well, on the basis of his actions, it would appear not. But he's undoubtedly a Levitican -- a Levitican is just the sort of person who would go to the San Francisco City Hall and yell atgays and lesbians for having the temerity to want the same rights as the rest of us. Fred Phelps and his merry band followers who picket funerals of gay men with "God Hates Fags" signs are Leviticans through and through -- not a drop of Christ in them, but they sure are full of their Bible books. John Ashcroft: Filled with the Levitican spirit and not terribly shy about it. Pat Roberts and Jerry Falwell showed their Levitican membership cards right after 9/11 when they suggested that America invited the terrorist attacks by being tolerant of "the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle." The guys who shoot abortion doctors: Leviticans to the core. Judge Roy "Put those ten commandments in the rotunda" Moore: Levitican. Hardcore.

Let's be clear: Not every Christian is a Levitican, not by a long shot. Not every fundamentalist Christian is a Levitican. And not every person who believes that allowing gays and lesbians to marry is morally wrong is Levitican, either. (Also to be clear: Although Leviticus is part of the Torah, I don't see too many Leviticans among the Jews, who in my experience see the Torah as a jumping off point to engage the world rather than a defense against it.) People of good will can disagree, vehemently, about what it right and what is wrong, what is moral and what is immoral, and what should be done about it. What makes a Levitican, in my book at least, is the willingness to transmute one's beliefs into hate and intolerance, to deprive others of rights they ought to enjoy. Leviticans have ever been with us. They quoted the Bible to justify slavery. They quoted the Bible to try to keep women in the home. They quoted the Bible to keep the races pure. They quote the Bible to try to keep gays and lesbians from the benefits of marriage. And each time, after they've quoted the Bible to their satisfaction, they go out and use that justification for their hate to do terrible things.

In my opinion, the best thing Christians can do is recognize this group within their host -- one that reads the same book, purports to follow the same teachings and alleges to worship the same Christ, but through its actions proves itself time and again to be something other than Christian. And I think Christians should ask these people: Who are you? Do you follow the loving example of Christ or do you follow the rules of Leviticus? Do you use the Bible to illuminate your love or justify your hate? When Christ comes back, how will you show that you've followed his path? By the number of people that you've loved, or the number of the people whom you have "righteously" opposed? Do you love Christ or do you love rules? Are you a Christian, or are you a Levitican?

As for the rest of us, I propose we do our best to separate the Christians from the Leviticans in our minds. I see no reason to blame those who genuinely follow Christ for the actions of those who merely use Christ as a shield for their own hates and fears. And when a Levitican comes across your path, politely point out to him or her what he or she really is: Not a Christian, merely a Levitican.

Most likely, the Levitican will hate you for it. But that just goes to prove the point.

for you, today.

2011-05-09T15:06:00.001-07:00

My Reel!

2011-05-03T12:09:00.000-07:00

Finally!! My first reel!!! Please let me know what you think!

Click here!

i love this artist....to death.

2011-04-25T17:27:00.000-07:00

why not use anthropomorphic taxidermy to make amaaaazing bijoux for ladies?

San Francisco artist:

Loved to Death

{bird wing hair clip}

{squirrel heart ring, dipped in rose gold}

{a human tooth ring}

{a sparrow head rose gold necklace}

{sterling silver seahorse earrings}

{prairie dog paw necklace}

{ gold muskrat earrings}

extraterrestrials. thoughts?

2011-04-20T11:43:00.000-07:00

aliens

my BING commercial!

2011-04-14T10:47:00.000-07:00

or check it out here!

kinetic energy into art.

2011-04-07T09:30:00.000-07:00

thank you BBC

whatever reconciles me to God.

2011-04-04T08:35:00.000-07:00

last night, i couldn't sleep. i'm in NYC for a few days and found myself wide awake at 4am tossing and turning on my step-sister's air mattress. i was anxious and couldn't settle down, even after a good 2 hrs of my secret vice, Jersey Shore. i couldn't stop thinking about the decision i had made that had brought me 3,000 miles across the country. i had given up a chance at a HUGE audition in order to be in NY for my sister's CD release party. and i didn't know if i had made the right decision. i'm dedicated to dance. ever since my dad passed away, it's almost as if everything is a little clearer in my life. mind you, it took me a month of hell and despair to get here, but the fog has begun to clear and i am confident that dance is my path for today.

and here i was starring at the ceiling, sweating over my choices. the decision had been made, i couldn't go back to LA in time for the audition and yet i felt so uneasy and troubled by it all. i didn't know if my concern was coming from fear and other terrible roots that i shouldn't nurture or listen to, or from God, who was pushing my spirit in a certain direction. so i started to pray. i didn't want to because i hadn't in a while and always get a feeling of shame when i start back into it again. like the feeling you might get when you see an old friend who's lost someone close and you haven't even called him/her in almost a year.
so i just started emotionally puking on God. an unfiltered rant. i started confessing my weaknesses, the things that i could feel my mind battling against, and raped my brain for scriptures that could help me in this place i didn't want to be.
and after about 15 minutes, i got there.
God reminded me of the first line of Psalm 24. "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it."
there i was, worried i had made the wrong decision, believing that God couldn't work His will within my choices. and it was dumb. his Scripture gave me some peace and i started analyzing all the energy i was putting into my fearfulness. what did i really care about? what did i want people to say when they walked past my grave stone? why was i so concerned about dancing behind some pop artist i didn't even know? and i came to the conclusion that my values were effed up. that i was going to begin intentionally pursuing whatever reconciles me to God. fundamentally, this concept was the most important thing to me anyway, so how had i drifted so far? Philippians 4:8 came to mind. "And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise."
i hadn't been. i had lost control of my thoughts and was up at 4am because of it. 2 Corinthians 10: 4-5 says, "For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds. We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God, and take every thought captive to the obedience of Christ."
i wanted to live like this again. in this light, having full confidence in the God i called myself a Christian for. and that is my prayer for us all. may we be a believing people who don't get tossed back and forth by the waves of the sea.

pretty awesome.

2011-03-31T18:53:00.000-07:00

i take a picture of you now, i take a picture of you later.

2011-03-27T22:31:00.000-07:00

photographer: Irina Werning.

(double click on photos to enlarge)

Irina's parents IN 1970 & 2010, Buenos Aires

TOMMY IN 1977 & 2010, Buenos Aires

NICO IN 1990 & 2010, France

Nico in 1986 & 2010, Buenos Aires

La Negra 1980 and 2010, Buenos Aires

FLOR, MAL, SIL IN 1983 & 2010

DAMIAN IN 1989 & 2010, London

CECILE IN 1987 & 2010, France

BENN AND DAN IN 1979 & 2010, London

Ato 1992 & 2010, Buenos Aires

gwen.

2011-03-27T18:33:00.001-07:00

wonderful idea for hardwood floors.

2011-03-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

trust.

2011-03-25T11:59:00.000-07:00

i try to do something everyday to keep, or sometimes, get me connected with God. i'll read, i'll go on a walk, i'll listen to a song and think about it, i'll listen and love a friend, i'll take a minute and sit quietly, or i'll put on some meditation music and think about one word. lately the word has been Peace.

today i read something that i thought i'd share.

When we are in fear we can do nothing less than pray to God, but our Lord has a right to expect that those who name His name should have an understanding confidence in Him. God expects His children to be so confident in Him that in any crisis they are the reliable ones. Our trust is in God up to a certain point, then we go back to the elementary panic prayers of those who do not know God. We get to our wits' end, showing that we have not the slightest confidence in Him and His government of the world; He seems to be asleep, and we see nothing but breakers ahead.

"O you of little faith." What a bullet must have shot through the disciples. And what a bullet will go through us when we suddenly realize that we might have produced downright joy in the heart of God by remaining absolutely confident in Him, no matter what was ahead.

There are stages in life when there is no storm, no crisis, when we do our human best; it is when a crisis arises that we instantly reveal upon whom we rely. If we have been learning to worship God and to trust Him, the crisis will reveal that we will go to the breaking point and not break in our confidence in Him.

- Oswald Chambers

when my dad died, i was faced with this test of Trust pretty hard. my dad died from a car accident. it wasn't a peaceful death. and i have to wake up knowing that God is good and trusting that i don't understand His ways all the time. i think a lot of us are scared of death because we forget or don't know what's on the other side of it.

it hurt.

it still hurts. and always will.

but i can't keep my dad here on earth with me. he's not supposed to be here with me. not anymore. and i have a choice to trust God with it all or not.

i do.

i do today, and i'll have to choose to trust Him again tomorrow.

my childhood.

2011-03-22T16:08:00.001-07:00

i have excluded movies and music bc that would be too extensive, but thought i'd reminisce today on a few things that made my childhood great.

if you have others to share, please do!

mmm. art spaces.

2011-03-21T14:43:00.000-07:00

just, great.

2011-03-18T23:03:00.000-07:00

if you don't have a great homepage for your computer, Nasa's website that gives a daily astronomy picture taken by the Hubble Telescope is pretty perfect.

check out today's:

Perfect

so i've started back into dancing.

2011-03-18T12:26:00.000-07:00

and it's helped. A LOT.

i didn't think i was going to be able to dance again. i've felt paralyzed by it all. numb. weak. and just powerless. and yet i opened my bible last night and came to Phil. 4:13.

I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.

and i sat there thinking about these words. i've read them a million times and understand them. but then i thought that maybe i didn't understand them. so i pulled an I ♥ Huckabees and started repeating the sentence over and over again until it made more sense. and what stuck out to me were the words "Him who". it's always been obvious to me that this phrase means that you can't rely on your own strength to get through things sometimes. and then i thought well what does that look like to "rely on God's strength"? how would you go about doing that? and those two words pushed me out of the driver's seat. and new words came in "Let go."

i never want to let go. i'm comfortable being in control of my life. what i do, who i kiss, what i eat, where i go, what i say... everything. and yet here i was, miserable and knowing i needed to change. i needed to get out the way. well i simply asked God, "how do i do that?" and He said something like, "you only have this moment, Elizabeth. so why don't we just concentrate on that first."

so today, i'm going to believe Bob Marley when he says everything's gonna be alright and i'm gonna keep my gaze up hoping and believing in something Good.

so thank you Bob and thank you God.

cheers.

"Don't worry about a thing,
'Cause every little thing gonna be all right.
Singin': "Don't worry about

a thing,
'Cause every little thing gonna be all right!"

Rise up this mornin',
Smiled with the risin' sun,
Three little birds
Pitch by my doorstepSingin' sweet songs
Of melodies pure and true,
Sayin', ("This is my message to you-ou-ou:")

Singin': "Don't worry 'bout a thing,
'Cause every little thing

gonna be all right."
Singin': "Don't worry (don't worry) 'bout a thing,
'Cause every little thing gonna be all right!"

2011-03-17T23:25:00.000-07:00

i want my nails done like this and i want these shoes.

yaaas.

2011-03-17T13:17:00.000-07:00

"An Irishman is never drunk as long as he can hold onto one blade of grass to keep from falling off the earth."

happy st. patty's day.

2011-03-16T15:45:00.000-07:00

i want this shirt.

betta check yoself!

grief.

2011-03-07T19:20:00.000-08:00

i miss my dad. i miss him every day. i didn't know how hard this was going to be. this dreadful thing of grief.

it was real nice walking around on this earth, knowing i had a daddy. knowing i had a dad who i could introduce my future husband to, who would walk me down the aisle to meet that husband, and who would hold my future children close to his chest while they listened to that all too familiar fake valve in his heart go clickclick...clickclick...clickclick. he had a valve in his heart replaced when i was 17.

my dad died on Valentine's Day this year. that was 4 weeks ago last night. ever since then i've had moments where i didn't think i could take it. that i couldn't accept this reality i find myself unwillingly in every second. a few days ago i caught myself tagging my dad in a photo, and had to stop. a few days before that, i had to erase his number out of my phone. the week prior, i had to begin packing up his apartment. and two days ago i had to carry my dad's ashes in the seat next to me, all the way home.

i wear his watch around my wrist now. it's a 1991 Duke NCAA National Championship watch. it's too big, but i don't want to get it adjusted. i like remembering how much bigger his wrists were than mine every time i have to take it off to wash my hands. it slides down and even though it's broken, i don't want to get it wet.

i didn't want to write about my dad. i just want my mourning to be over. i want to turn a blind eye to it and move forward. i'm a control monster and you can't control grief. so here i am writing..to the few people who read my thoughts hoping that it meets something in the need of that reader.

my pastor back in Atlanta reminded me today that we don't have tomorrow and, my friends, that should change your now. the way you live. i know i'm changed. i'm going to be real honest about something important. i've never understood what Christians mean when they talk about "living in light of Eternity". i get the idea, but i've never resonated with it. until now. my father's death has made me realize that this whole thing we have goin on on earth is a swinging door.

it is not the end.

even though i'm in a season of lament and pain, there is a hope that surpasses my understanding and i couldn't live without it. it rips my heart up inside and angers the hell out of me to know that there's an exorbitant amount of people out there who have such a terrible and false view of Christianity. i want to be able to articulate what the loving and sacrificial life of that beat up 3o-something year old carpenter did for me and how it changes everything. but i never seem to know how to. or at least i worry too much about how it comes out of my mouth and how people will take it. but maybe, hopefully, over the years, my disorganized and unhinged deliberations will make sense or help someone.

it's hard to submit. to let go. it's probably my biggest weakness. but how can i make myself fully available to God if i don't? what opportunities to heal or learn or grow would i be missing out on if i constantly licked my own wounds and kept my heart shut up in a box where no one could touch it?

a lot.

ode to Mumford and Sons. this song has helped me breathe this week.

And after the storm,

I run and run as the rains come

And I look up, I look up,

on my knees and out of luck,

I look up.

Night has always pushed up day

You must know life to see decay

But I won't rot, I won't rot

Not this mind and not this heart,

I won't rot.

And I took you by the hand

And we stood tall,

And remembered our own land,

What we lived for.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.

And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.

Get over your hill and see what you find there,

With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

And now I cling to what I knew

I saw exactly what was true

But oh no more.

That's why I hold,

That's why I hold with all I have.

That's why I hold.

I will die alone and be left there.

Well I guess I'll just go home,

Oh God knows where.

Because death is just so full and mine so small.

Well I'm scared of what's behind and what's before.

And there will come a time, you'll see, with no more tears.

And love will not break your heart, but dismiss your fears.

Get over your hill and see what you find there,

With grace in your heart and flowers in your hair.

my father passed away this week.

2011-02-21T11:14:00.000-08:00

that's why i haven't written in a while.

it's still really hard to face everything right now, but i wanted to write a quick homage to my father to start facing it all...

Dad, when i dance, i dance for you. When i dine on BBQ ribs or cook up some Wienerschnitzel, i'll smile because i can't cook it aswell as you. And when i feel sad and know you're lookin down on me and want me to be happy, i'll throw on some James Brown or Sly & The Family Stone and i'll remember you. You'll be my daddy forever and i'll be your lizzy bo bizzy til the end. I love you. I miss you. Forever.

dancin me.

2011-02-06T16:29:00.000-08:00

For those who read my blog and haven't seen me dance and care about seeing me dance, here's a clip of a class i took last week in LA. i'm in the black fitted cap with the ice cream cone on my shirt! animation class, fun fun!

or if this is too little-bitty for you, check it out on my youtube channel.

What's hard.

2011-01-26T14:33:00.000-08:00

You know what's difficult? Well, one: being honest with yourself and others sometimes, and two: really and truly believing that God has you in His hand. no matter what.

It's really tough right now for me. The entertainment industry can be like high school with its pettiness and politics. It's terrible. I live in it every day. In my mind, I battle being who i'm called to be. Outwardly, people don't see it, but inwardly it's a constant strife to be the best me. I find my thoughts escaping to a world of jealousy, or impatience, or the misconception that i have to do certain things i really don't want to do in order to reach my career goals. Like i said, high school. And what a silly way to exist.

You would think that by 28, i'd have this whole bone of contention figured out. I'm a hip hop dancer who doesn't like going to the bougie clubs where all the dancers hang out, who doesn't toke up (so always feel like the nerd left out in high school), who doesn't have sex (oooo....dear God! aren't i a prude!), and who doesn't feel like i need to be someone i'm not. My prayer and hope for myself, for my friends, and for the future friends i've yet to meet, is that we'd be a believing people who value serving God over ourselves and Man. no bullshit about it. it's difficult. i know it is. i didn't know God until i was 20. i've led a completely different life full of immodesty and shame that i wish never to struggle with again. but my hope is in what God did for me, thankfully, not in what i can do for Him. and if you don't believe in the God of the Bible, then i hope whatever your belief is, that you value it and trust in things beyond a compromising society that's full of cracks. that you seek truth and a better and deeper understanding of what this thing called Life is all about. what a shame if you never cared.

"Many men owe the grandeur of their lives to tremendous difficulties."
— Charles H. Spurgeon

been a long time, shouldntna left you without a dope beat to step to.

2011-01-12T12:10:00.001-08:00

ok. long time no write SR. sorry bout that. and sorry to anyone who actually reads what i write. i don't know if anyone does, but i figure since i have a few followers, there might be some who pop on here once and again to divulge in my thoughts.

so it's been a while. yes. and over the past few months, a lot has happened in the my life. i moved myself across country actually. hopped in a car in NC and drove all the way through, ATL, to New Orleans, to Austin TX, to Tuscan AZ, to San Diego, to LA...my home now. that's right, i live in Korea Town. you know, the town that's repped in the well circuited "Like a G6"medley. K-Town. And it's fun. i live with an old roomie from high school and we make it work just splendidly. we have an orange bathroom (or Mango Madness if you want to be specific) and the rest of the pad emulates the streets of Japan. a quirky fashion that has bright colors and random knickknacks all around. our apartment was built in the early 1900s and has a nautical feel about it....architecture-wise. even though it feels like we live in a rainbow (den lime green, kitchen red, hallway Tiffany blue, and the aforementioned mango bathroom) we call it the Boat House. and i like it.

i moved out here to dance, obviously for those who read this blog, and i must say so far so good. i'm awkwardly tall for a female hip hop dancer and ATL had worn me thin. i was ready for a change-o and my bottle had landed on the City of Angels. it's been 4 months now and LA has treated me well... so far. nuff bout that.

i'm learning. a lot. and i'm changing every day. i haven't written on here in a long time because every time i sit down to write i feel as if i'm in battle. i hear, "what you have to write isn't important" or "that's a stupid ass thing to write about, who would care about that" or "that's ridiculous, you know your thoughts on this or that will change into a different shape tomorrow...just wait a while, then you can write". and it gets me nowhere. and i click "Save Now" instead of "Publish Post".

but i DO have things to say. and i am constantly thinking about these things.

i went to a "community group" or whatthehellever, a bible study if you will, tonight. in Silver Lake. and it was good. it was nice to meet people who cared about loving people. i meet people all the time, at the club, at the bar, at a restaurant, at a gig, in the streets, at a class, wherever, and i care about them. immediately. it's weird at times. maybe it's weird because i'm not thriving in a community where people connect as quickly as that?....or maybe people ignore that pull they feel? i don't know. but i tell you, just like this blog that i neglect, i get scared and don't say what i want to say sometimes.

i've had a lot of sweet moments though recently. they've been so frequent that i feel as if God is purposefully making them happen in my life (at least i like to think that). a slap in the face to remind me of who i am and what matters on this earth. and i'm thankful. i'm really thankful because LA isn't for the faint-hearted. it's a metropolis full of vibrant life that is fast and furious.

even now, as i write, it's tough to put into words what i want to say.

i guess for now i'll just say that i'll try to write more in 2011. i might say things you don't agree with, that you have questions about, that you want me to extend on, etc...so please feel free to comment. in fact i encourage you to comment because who doesn't like knowing someone's listening?

i hope you've started your year off wonderfully and cheers to a new year full of taking the time to focus on what's important or at least figure that out if you don't know yet what that is for you.

Amazing table

2010-12-03T17:30:00.001-08:00

Kick ass table by I ♥ Belgium.

i want these Salt & Pepper shakers.

2010-10-15T13:47:00.001-07:00

love.

2010-09-20T12:19:00.000-07:00

2010-08-18T15:11:00.001-07:00

Sometimes you have to ram down the doors and demand God to tell you who you are. To remind you. Through tears, anger, splintered hands, and a desperation to give up my life so i can have more of Him.

pencil art

2010-08-14T09:10:00.000-07:00

more awesome outfits.

2010-08-10T13:07:00.001-07:00

"Lord I believe; help me with my unbelief." Mark 9:24

2010-08-02T06:55:00.000-07:00

I didn't realize this about myself till a dear friend pointed it out to me about a year ago. And man did his courage and knack for honesty change my life.

I'm a control freak. When it comes to decision making, I am usually very mindful and cautious. I became a Christian at 19 (i'm 27 now) and just recently, have I realized that, unfortunately, I have had Jesus in a box in a specific way. What I mean is that I try to figure Him out... how He relates to me, what it looks like when He works something out or sets something up in life. More specifically, I need to know what He's working out for the future...am I making the right decisions? Do I think God would want me to do this, or go there, or do I feel like maybe He's opening this door to walk through? The list is endless.

Now be assured that these questions aren't wrong to ask nor unhealthy to ponder and apply to life, but man can they box Him in if you're a control freak.

I'm used to seeing Jesus before me. So much so that I've found myself waiting in Nashville 2 years too long, or taken aback when my twin sister's response to my thoughts on moving to LA from Atlanta were "Umm, that's a no-brainer Liz". I need to see Jesus ahead of me in my decisions so much so that when He started doing something a little differently in my life recently, I thought He had abandoned me.

I couldn't feel Him when I prayed. I couldn't see Him directly pulling me towards any door. I didn't see Him going ahead of me and waiting there. And then, after a late night conversation with a friend that went well into the morning, I realized that God hadn't abandoned me. By any means. He was leading in a different way. He was beside me.

I constantly live in the future and not in the present. And how tragic is that? How many fantastic sunsets have I missed...phone calls have a not made...soul-restoring walks have I not taken....sweet moments have escaped me...because I have God in a box? Because I need a head-light God who structures my life to where I have a menu every night and an alarm to go off in the morning.

God says that His word is a lamp unto our feet (Psalm 119:105) ....it's not a spotlight. You're not gonna see a mile down the road and definitely not into tomorrow. Nope, you've got about 3 feet of light to work with and God says that's sufficient for you. In fact, it's His best. And you might not see Him in front of you pulling your hand everyday. Or patting you on the back for every good decision you make. But what we do know is that His grace is sufficient for us, for His power is made perfect in weakness (2 Corin. 12:9), and Prov. 16:9 "In his heart a man plans his path, but it is the Lord who determines his steps." These truths aren't always going to show themselves in your life like you want or expect them to. And even though God can live in the past, present, and future.... you and I can't.

So today, it is my pledge to be happy with the now and the unknowing. To trust that God's goodness isn't dependent on my happiness or comfort. And to actually be a Christian who has faith.

I will end with a brilliant man's thoughts on faith,

Martin Luther.

An excerpt from "An Introduction to St. Paul's Letter to the Romans,"

Luther's German Bible of 1522 by Martin Luther, 1483-1546

 "Faith is not what some people think it is. Their human dream is a delusion. Because they observe that faith is not followed by good works or a better life, they fall into error, even though they speak and hear much about faith. "Faith is not enough," they say, "You must do good works, you must be pious to be saved." They think that, when you hear the gospel, you start working, creating by your own strength a thankful heart which says, "I believe." That is what they think true faith is. But, because this is a human idea, a dream, the heart never learns anything from it, so it does nothing and reform doesn't come from this 'faith,' either.

Instead, faith is God's work in us, that changes us and gives new birth from God. (John 1:13). It kills the Old Adam and makes us completely different people. It changes our hearts, our spirits, our thoughts and all our powers. It brings the Holy Spirit with it. Yes, it is a living, creative, active and powerful thing, this faith. Faith cannot help doing good works constantly. It doesn't stop to ask if good works ought to be done, but before anyone asks, it already has done them and continues to do them without ceasing.  Anyone who does not do good works in this manner is an unbeliever. He stumbles around and looks for faith and good works, even though he does not know what faith or good works are. Yet he gossips and chatters about faith and good works with many words.

Faith is a living, bold trust in God's grace, so certain of God's favor that it would risk death a thousand times trusting in it. Such confidence and knowledge of God's grace makes you happy, joyful and bold in your relationship to God and all creatures. The Holy Spirit makes this happen through faith. Because of it, you freely, willingly and joyfully do good to everyone, serve everyone, suffer all kinds of things, love and praise the God who has shown you such grace. Thus, it is just as impossible to separate faith and works as it is to separate heat and light from fire! Therefore, watch out for your own false ideas and guard against good-for-nothing gossips, who think they're smart enough to define faith and works, but really are the greatest of fools. Ask God to work faith in you, or you will remain forever without faith, no matter what you wish, say or can do.

i wish i had money so i could dress like this.

2010-07-21T14:07:00.000-07:00

the Author's note...

2010-07-12T12:45:00.000-07:00

...of Through Painted Deserts.

something wonderful.

It is Fall here now, my favorite of the four seasons. We get all four here, and they come at us under the doors, in through the windows. One morning you wake and need blankets; you take the fan out of the window to see clouds that mist out by midmorning, only to reveal a naked blue coolness like God yawning.

September is perfect Oregon. The blocks line up like postcards and the rosebuds bloom into themselves like children at bedtime. And in Portland we are proud of our roses; year after year, we are proud of them. When they are done, we sit in the parks and read stories into the air, whispering the gardens to sleep.

I come here, to Palio Coffee, for the big windows. If I sit outside, the sun gets on my computer screen, so I come inside, to this same table, and sit alongside the giant panes of glass. And it is like a movie out there, like a big screen of green, and today there is a man in shepherd's clothes, a hippie, all dirty, with a downed bike in the circle lawn across the street. He is eating bread from the bakery and drinking from a metal camp cup. He is tapping the cup against his leg, sitting like a monk, all striped in fabric. I wonder if he is happy, his blanket strapped to the rack on his bike, his no home, his no job. I wonder if he has left it all because he hated it or because it hated him. It is true some do not do well with conventional life. They think outside things and can't make sense of following a line. They see no walls, only doors from open space to open space, and from open space, supposedly, to the mind of God, or at least this is what we hope for them, and what they hope for themselves.

I remember the sweet sensation of leaving, years ago, some ten now, leaving Texas for who knows where. I could not have known about this beautiful place, the Oregon I have come to love, this city of great people, this smell of coffee and these evergreens reaching up into a mist of sky, these sunsets spilling over the west hills to slide a red glow down the streets of my town.

And I could not have known then that if I had been born here, I would have left here, gone someplace south to deal with horses, to get on some open land where you can see tomorrow's storm brewing over a high desert. I could not have known then that everybody, every person, has to leave, has to change like seasons; they have to or they die. The seasons remind me that I must keep changing, and I want to change because it is God's way. All my life I have been changing. I changed from a baby to a child, from soft toys to play daggers. I changed into a teenager to drive a car, into a worker to spend some money. I will change into a husband to love a woman, into a father to love a child, change houses so we are near water, and again so we are near mountains, and again so we are near friends, keep changing with my wife, getting our love so it dies and gets born again and again, like a garden, fed by four seasons, a cycle of change. Everybody has to change, or they expire. Everybody has to leave, everybody has to leave their home and come back so they can love it again for all new reasons.

I want to keep my soul fertile for the changes, so things keep getting born in me, so things keep dying when it is time for things to die. I want to keep walking away from the person I was a moment ago, because a mind was made to figure things out, not to read the same page recurrently.

Only the good stories have the characters different at the end than they were at the beginning. And the closest thing I can liken life to is a book, the way it stretches out on paper, page after page, as if to trick the mind into thinking it isn't all happening at once.

Time has pressed you and me into a book, too, this tiny chapter we share together, this vapor of a scene, pulling our seconds into minutes and minutes into hours. Everything we were is no more, and what we will become, will become what was. This is from where story stems, the stuff of its construction lying at our feet like cut strips of philosophy. I sometimes look into the endless heavens, the cosmos of which we can't find the edge, and ask God what it means. Did You really do all of this to dazzle us? Do You really keep it shifting, rolling round the pinions to stave off boredom? God forbid Your glory would be our distraction. And God forbid we would ignore Your glory.

Here is something I found to be true: you don't start processing death until you turn thirty. I live in visions, for instance, and they are cast out some fifty years, and just now, just last year I realized my visions were cast too far, they were out beyond my life span. It frightened me to think of it, that I passed up an early marriage or children to write these silly books, that I bought the lie that the academic life had to be separate from relational experience, as though God only wanted us to learn cognitive ideas, as if the heart of a man were only created to resonate with movies. No, life cannot be understood flat on a page. It has to be lived; a person has to get out of his head, has to fall in love, has to memorize poems, has to jump off bridges into rivers, has to stand in an empty desert and whisper sonnets under his breath:

I'll tell you how the sun rose
A ribbon at a time...

It's a living book, this life; it folds out in a million settings, cast with a billion beautiful characters, and it is almost over for you. It doesn't matter how old you are; it is coming to a close quickly, and soon the credits will roll and all your friends will fold out of your funeral and drive back to their homes in cold and still and silence. And they will make a fire and pour some wine and think about how you once were . . . and feel a kind of sickness at the idea you never again will be.

So soon you will be in that part of the book where you are holding the bulk of the pages in your left hand, and only a thin wisp of the story in your right. You will know by the page count, not by the narrative, that the Author is wrapping things up. You begin to mourn its ending, and want to pace yourself slowly toward its closure, knowing the last lines will speak of something beautiful, of the end of something long and earned, and you hope the thing closes out like last breaths, like whispers about how much and who the characters have come to love, and how authentic the sentiments feel when they have earned a hundred pages of qualification.

And so my prayer is that your story will have involved some leaving and some coming home, some summer and some winter, some roses blooming out like children in a play. My hope is your story will be about changing, about getting something beautiful born inside of you, about learning to love a woman or a man, about learning to love a child, about moving yourself around water, around mountains, around friends, about learning to love others more than we love ourselves, about learning oneness as a way of understanding God. We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and the resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?

It might be time for you to go. It might be time to change, to shine out.

I want to repeat one word for you:

Leave.

Roll the word around on your tongue for a bit. It is a beautiful word, isn't it? So strong and forceful, the way you have always wanted to be. And you will not be alone. You have never been alone. Don't worry. Everything will still be here when you get back. It is you who will have changed.

doodle days.

2010-07-08T11:00:00.000-07:00

there's something to be said about doodlers. and this guy, Timothy Reynolds, is pretty awesome at it.

out of Milwaukee, WI, Tim grew up with a knack for sketching. he does it constantly and with ease. and i don't get it. i don't understand how someone can grab a pen and just go. no structure, no limitations, just raw creativity in its most organic and unfettered form.

it's worth acknowledging and appreciating.

turnis left home

while on the phone.

or daydreaming perhaps.

for learning.

or just because you're damn good at it.

anyone else know of some great doodlers? i'd love to check them out and give them an interweb pat on the back.

how sick is this.

2010-06-23T08:51:00.000-07:00

2010-06-23T08:37:00.001-07:00

Why spend over $2,000 for a Gustavian headboard (like you see in the first two pictures) when you can make it yourself!

the wood came from an old Anthropologie store display:

a man who makes art with nails. wow.

2010-06-16T10:19:00.000-07:00

birch tree decals, stencils, etc..

2010-06-06T17:31:00.000-07:00

wonderful quote of the day.

2010-06-06T15:57:00.000-07:00

"There is a kind of happiness and wonder that makes you serious." - c.s. lewis

random thought before heading to bed.

2010-06-05T22:14:00.001-07:00

my biggest mistake right now in life is that i find myself believing that God accepts me as i should be, instead of as i am.

what a terrible misconception.