Wonder Woman (or not?)

Breathe Deep

2006-06-12T16:42:00.000-07:00

It has been hard for me to blog again. Silly I know. I need to develop a tougher shell (my heart if stone reputation is being dispelled day by day). God knows my heart (which at times can be frightening but at times brings much peace) so I don’t have to worry about defending myself. Writing is good for me; I find it to be very therapeutic. I have still been writing, but more so in my personal journal and while I was in school I poured myself into my many assignments.

This is such a beautiful time of year. I take great delight in so many of the little blessings of spring. I love that the skies are once again dramatic and captivating. I love all the new growth. I love hearing the children playing outside once again (I especially love when they smile at me or say hello when I walk past… there are many children in my neighborhood, woot woot!). I love how the days just seem to be laced with hope and promise. I love how the days are longer and I feel like I can tackle about 83.9 more things per day. I love how God thaws my frozen winter body with the sun, and with His mercy. (I love the oilers they are rocking my world and even if they don’t win the playoffs I am still proud of them boys). But one of the things I love most (besides the warmth of the sun) is the fresh air and the scents. I do adore the smell of fresh cut grass… sometimes I think I should get a job for the city mowing lawns…maybe next year. There is one scent of spring that every year makes me a bit sentimental, and that is the scent of the lilacs. I love that smell. It brings me back to my walks to and from school, through out my high school days… when I would pass lilac bushes my walk would always slow down. The love of this scent is another thing I share with my precious Popple. I remember how we came up with this whole sneaky plan to go out at night (dressed in all black of course) and steal peoples lilac bushes. Just for the record we never actually carried out our plan. The past two springs I think that I missed lilac season, when I was living at my old place there were no lilacs around. Two years without this glorious scent. I think that is why this year its seems all the more fantastically aromatic. Through out my town house complex there are many lilac bushes gracing the area. I have found myself walking back and forth this one path breathing deeply trying to take in all of the lilac scent I could. I spend most of my mornings these days reading and studying in my little front yard, even from there I can get wafts of this beloved scent (I am such a dork). Sometimes I just had to get up though, and go to the path to more fully enjoy the scent. I guess I have been really trying to breathe it all in as deeply as I can while I can. I did not think that these lilacs would actually last as long as they did, and I just didn’t want miss out. With all the rain we have been having the smell has only intensified… so I am still breathing in deeply every time I step outside, locking in the memory of the lilacs.

I write all that and yeah I realize I sound completely out of control… but that’s ok with me, I don’t want to miss out… and I find this compares to same many things in my life. I want to live my life breathing deeply everyday. I want to enjoy life, enjoy people, searching for beauty, meaning, freedom, hope, love, and above all else God. For just as the lilacs might be gone tomorrow, so could I, or someone that is dear to me. I want to everyday breathe in deep, letting the beauty of each person, each day become engrained in my memory. There are so many seasons in our lives, so many things that God takes us through… each season that He brings me through, I want to attempt to breathe it all in, taking in all I can. I am not saying these seasons don’t have trails and heartaches… they do. This is life. But amidst all the agonies there are little treasures to be found… pieces of Gods heart. While I am in this season, I will breathe deep, taking the time to enjoy the fresh beauty of the lilacs, choosing that as my memory instead of getting caught in the darkness of each passing day. I don’t know if anyone out there will get this. I feel kind of silly now that I have wrote this… but oh well… Breathe deep (unless you have allergies).

A sad response

2006-03-28T00:01:00.000-08:00

In Response to an anonymous comment, and to help clarify some things from my previous post…

I have a tendency to just spew out my thoughts on paper in a mad rush of urgency, sometimes not fully developing a thought pattern, or leaving things unexplained, or unclear, I should be more careful but I doubt I will.

Okay to start of with in my last point my intention was never to condemn my youth girls, I am very sad to hear that is how I came across. My frustration is by no means youth girls, or even girls in general. My frustration is with society and its lies about acceptance, riches, beauty and many other things. I am frustrated because amazing, talented, Godly, well-meaning people (not youth girls specifically that was just my example in the other blog) can easily fall into trap, can easily become a part of the cycle…It does exist within the youth leaders, I fully realize that, I see it regularly. I see it within the young adults, and I even at times see it amongst adults. But most of all, I see it within myself and that I hate. It is easy for any of us to get consumed with meaningless things. I am not immune and I by no means have arrived at cutting out all vanities from my life.

I do struggle with the cycle I mentioned in the other post… I have fallen prey, and maybe that is part of the reason why I hate it so much. I seethe damage it has done to me, I see that there are lies, and I see how when I begin to believe the lies and live in them it can affect others. I am thankful that God has freed me from a place I once was, a place where I was crippled by the lies of what I thought I had to become. That is not the girl I am now. I still at times have seasons where I have to battle it all over again, and I am sure most of us do and will have to continue battling it if not for ourselves then for somebody else. We live in a fallen world, so I am pretty sure I will have to fight to not be overcome with meaningless things all my life. I am thankful that I now have a greater perspective, that I am often able to catch myself but not always. Sometimes I will be in mid conversation with someone and realize OH CRAP… I have just perpetuated the cycle, when this happens I feel like crap I hate it, I really do.

I am not perfect I mess up. But here is the thing I have a desire to be a part of something more… something more than meaningless vanities… Everyday we are bombarded by so many meaningless things (and some we can’t avoid, yes laundry must be done, and yes we must buy groceries and wash our cars… those are not the meaningless things I mean). I have the choice each day of being a part of that something more that I know that God has for me, or the current of meaningless things can easily pull me under…

I will mess up often but my goals are to live in truth, my goals are to love people with all I am. My goals are to live for a purpose that is beyond my own… My desire is to inspire rather than impress… my desire is hear Gods heart and act on it, that I would become more like my savior everyday. My desire is to not consume myself with meaningless things and more than that that I wouldn’t make anyone else stumble. This is my prayer.

I am sad that my anonymous commenter sees me as being one who has lost myself and have now become one who must be done up all the time and spends countless hours on my hair. I will not deny the fact that over the years I have molded myself to some degree, I have fallen prey like I said before. But in reality I have become freer than ever before… I may spend a bit more time than I would like on myself in the morning, but I am in a process and I really am still the same girl… the same girl that likes to buy her clothes on sale or find steals at value village, the girl that doesn’t believe in washing her hair (unless she really really has too). Part of the change has been me growing up, part of the change has been me becoming a bit of what I hate. I do truly hope that I do not come across as that much of a “done up” girl. I am trying to watch how I act and portray myself, I do not want to pull others done. Like I have said before my desire is to actually help encourage others to be who they were really created to be, to help others see their own worth. To believe in others loving and accepting them as they are. I long to see people believing they are beautiful and valuable because they are Gods precious creations…I hope as I continue to look to God and continue to try and say no to the meaningless things that I will truly become the self-less woman of God I want long to be.

This was another blog that I just spewed out in a mad rush… I hope it provides some kind of balance to my other post… I really really never meant to condemn my youth… but was rather trying to express a frustration, a frustration with no one in particular, something that I don’t know how to end (but am trying to in if only my own actions) and something that I too at times fall into but long to fight against.

Many impress, few inspire

2006-03-24T15:40:00.000-08:00

MEANINGLESS, MEANINGLESS... I just feel like screaming sometimes... We waste so much energy, emotions, and money on meaningless, meaningless things.

VANITIES VANITIES... so much is meaningless. We waste so much money on the lastest fashions, hoping to impress, hoping to convince ourselves that we are acceptable and worthwhile (not that I don't like having new clothes and looking nice...). We waste our energy trying to hard to gain acceptance from those around us, trying to gain favor, hoping that people will like us. We guard our true feelings, we stifle our emotions, we harden ourselves up so that we can fit in. And often we lose a piece of our true selves... and we forget the things that truly make us live. We are scared to show weakness, and so again time wasted trying to put on the facade of being "put together". We numb ourselves to the real world and real problems by drowning ourselves in the utterly meaningless and perverted hollywood culture, applauding those that fully succeed living imaginary lives. It hurts my heart as i watch it happens, and I am just so sure it hurts the heart of God too. We get lost in the pursuit of so many things that just don't matter, and not only that but in doing that we perpuate a vicious cycle... As we get caught up trying to perfect ourselves to this impossible standards the world imposing upon us, we are only making harder for someone else. I don't know if I will be able to explain my thoughts here but let me try... Ill write a little scenario the story of probably way too many people...

So Jane is a very talented and compassionate young person. Lets say she is in grade 11 sounds good. Ok so she is fun, pretty, wise, and has a heart full of mercy...but she doesn't see that...what she sees is a girl who just can't live up to the standards of those around her... They all seem so perfect, they all dress a certain way, they all like the same things... if only she could be like them. So she begins to mold herself into their image (forgetting that she is made in the image of God and forgetting that she should be investing time in developing her identity in Christ not sacrificing her identity to the culture around her). So she spends large amounts of money on clothes, she pretty much revamps her whole style... she goes tanning regularl, nothing like some nice mocha brown skin. She starts spending more and more time on herself in the morning (meanwhile sacrificing some of her personal devotions time)... and guess what YEAH FOR HER... she gets noticed by the "cool" people (what does she get noticed for???? surely not the heart of compassion or her wisdom??). WOOT WOOT, give her a medal, sucess its acheived... or is it...?

Lets take a step back and look at it from Mary's perspective. So Jane and Mary were best friends... life was good, there relationship was fun, inspiring and real. But than Jane started to want something more... more than just a fun, inspiring genuine friend... And Mary watches as Jane becomes a perfect little clone of the "perfect" people. Mary used to be ok with the fact that maybe she didn't have the most name brand clothes, or that she didn't have a skeletal figure, but as time passes and Jane moves more into the other world, mary is left feeling insecure, and feeling she too needs to live up to some impossible standard. And so she changes herself...and yeah for her so impressive shes become... as she loses some weight, and becomes perfect, she succeeds in also fooling the world into thinking she is really happy and put together and then other impressionable girls around her see the changes shes made and feel they too need to live up to that, for surely that is the key to happiness... and the cycle goes on and on and on... with every girl buying into the lie, the lie gets more convincing.... gathering strength...snowballing... entangling almost everykid on its way down. And poor Michelle, one of the only girls left who realizes her value is found in the Lord, a girl who longs to not get caught all the meaningless things this world throws at her...but how lonely it is for her, one of the only kids left with a clear sense of self and purpose. I hope she doesn't get so lonely there by herself that she falls into the trap of those around her.

Wow that got long.... ok sorry but i really do see this happening ... and i have to catch myself as well... asking God to help me see the lie, and not let me fall into it... it can be hard at times... but I watch this lie spread through my youth group and church... Its sad. I HATE IT.

I want to grab hold of things that are bigger than myself... I want to learn to turn my back on the meaningless temporal things of this world (Above I have really only concentrated on only one area to save time, but the meaningless things are everywhere and in so many forms). Many impress but few inspire... OH THAT I MAY BE ONE THAT INSPIRES AND HELPS PULL PEOPLE OUT OF THE LIES OF THIS WORLD... helps them find true worth, acceptance and identity. God help me not to fall prey to the many meaningless things... AHhhhh

meaningless meaningless....

I have a heart;often it aches

2006-03-01T22:09:00.000-08:00

I returned to school this monday after a glorious two weeks off from classes (now don't get me wrong, two weeks off did not equate to Kristy-Anne watching TV doing nothing, I was very effective with my time and still managed to keep incredibly busy) to realize that "it" is back. Thats right folks its roll up time, and in honor of this monumentous occassion i have decided to link one of my old blogshere. I am linking you to my old blog entry because it is one of my favorites, and I have gained a lot more readers since then, so for those of you who missed this blog from last year... well ahhh... I just didn't want to deprive you off that joy.

I am learning so much these days... so much about myself, so much about others, so much about God, just so much... I think it is great, but well can be extremely challenging, and really my desire is to never just Learn someting and not practical apply what i've learned, or change what I've learned... Hard.

Over the past year (from feb last year to this year) I can seriously not believe how much I have grown as a person. It has been a real year of discovery. I can't get started on all this really cause well I get so passionate about it all and well then this would be 5gagillion words long...

I have learned that I do have a heart, its been there all along, but well since I don't feel in the same way others do, or at the "right" times (like when a service is supposed to get all emotional) I thought I was a cold person. But man I am not an unemotional person, nope, I have tons of emotions, and a heart, a heart that daily aches for the wounded, the broken. I have a heart that hopes and a heart that longs to encourage, to offer comfort. I really am glad to see I have a heart and emotions, I was quite concerned for a while. An emotion that is relatively new to me is Anger. I have never really been an angry person, but well lately I see that I have a lot of anger, which I actually think is healthy for me. I am not angry at a person, or anything like that, but well angry that the church that should be healing people is really wounding many, crippling them (not all churches but some). Angry that people get so caught up in religion that they forget to love. I have a lot of frustration towards "church" and "religion" and I have realized I am kind of a rebel, but not one who will rebel away from church/religion but rather will rebel from the aspects of church/religion that I hate, that frustrate me. I am not running away but rather I am learning to stand for something different. I will pray, I will dream,I will love and I will be learn what not to do.I am journalling my frustrations and asking God to show me how I can not repeat these things, how I can be different. I am being quite brief with this and I hope it makes some sense.

School and working and ministry is wearing, but I love it, I don't like being crazy busy, but I am excited about it. YEAH FOR LEARNING. I am not even going to start talking about it more tonight...

I am trying to keep this short today but will leave you with something a friend once said in passing, I really liked it and wrote it down on a post it. I have found the post it many months later and want to share it... just cause.

"Words he [God] gives us to speak could just be the air of heaven in our lungs. The breathe we use to form the words Christ has put in our mouths will bring Gods children home"

I like that.

legwarmers

2006-02-12T21:56:00.000-08:00

I finished knitting my first pair of legwarmers this weekend, this shot doesn't do them justice but i am just so excited about them I had to post it, I am excited to wear them tomorrow, but even more excited that lynnel is coming to VISIT ME TOMORROW!!! WOOT WOOT, I will blog my life out soon... too much too much... just wait till you hear my yoga story... that ones really worth checking back for! Well and then theres my thoughts...BE AFRAID...Oh but I have to get this out, So yeah in the summer I was introduced to THE AMAZING DALLAS GREEN (from alexisonfire, and his own city, somtimes, city and colour came out november2005). Anyway it was love, love i tell you from the first sentance he sang. Well Last week I heard such great news, hes comign to EDmonton, March 26... I was estatic, I had it in my mind that I MUST GO, despite the fact that it would mean I would miss youth... but well ITS DALLAS GREEN... (if you've heard his stuff you'd understand!). Well Saturday, the first day to buy tickets I was ready to go, i didn't want to take anychances... BUT I WAS ALREADY TOO LATE... At 5pm they were already sold out. THIS IS BEYOND SAD... you don't even understand the sorrow within my soul. IT HURTS ME TO THINK ABOUT IT. What is going to be worse is March 24 when I am at youth, just imagining all the other stupid people who beat me to get tickets, I HATE THEM ALL. Ok myabe not hate, but well close to it. Ok, off to bed for me, maybe tomorrow this wound won't be quite so fresh.

my head hurts

2006-01-25T00:24:00.000-08:00

Once again its late, and my head hurts, the smart thing would be to go to bed, but well maybe my head hurts so much cause I have so much stuff to get out?!

First off, the promised story of regarding me being frozen in the tundra perceived by many to be lost/missing. So last week on Wednesday a bunch of us were volunteering for the conservative party, this time our duty was to drop off some information to a whack load of houses (all houses that are known to be conservative voters). We broke into groups of about four or five and then each group was given a stack of paper that contained the addresses for all of the houses we had to drop of this info cards too. Each team was given an area its not like we were driving all around the city or anything but there was still a lot of work to be done. At first our team had great energy, we made a team name, a team cheer and everything. Oh before I go on I need to add in here that it was sooo convenient that we ended up having to do all this on the coldest night of the year…

Okay back to the story… So we were having some issues with our team not really understanding the neighborhoods and us getting kind of lost (I should have been more aggressive cause I knew the area pretty well and had I trusted my gut with the directions we could have saved ourselves some grief). We started out by driving to each individual house and someone running out of the car and dropping off the info card. This was taking way too long so eventually we had to come up with another plan. Aaron and I took a few sheets of paper with the house numbers and some cards and well we got out off the car and ran them, much faster than driving around to all the individual houses. We realized that was a good system, so after completing that first run we decided too park the car completely and split up into three groups (two groups of two and then me, by myself) and just go hard. I knew the area so I finally kind of took charge and gave them all their assignments I took the largest stack confident that because I was familiar with the area and by myself I’d be able to move quickly. So we split off. I’m enjoying myself despite the BLOODY COLD (and well I’ve been told I don’t really have a proper winter jacket so for the minus 15 it wasn’t really that warm…but I did wear one of my pairs of legwarmers which helped). I was moving swiftly… from house to house, from block to block, I actually ended up delivering cards to both of my best friends houses… Tara and Ladonna, the one to Ladonnas house actually still had my name on the sheet (Ladonna and I used to be roommates but then Ladonna had the audacity to get married so I had to move out).

Aside from the fact that my legs were like 3000 pounds from being so frozen and aside from my face becoming numb I was enjoying myself… it was snowing lightly and it was a good time to be praying for my nation. So I have no concept of time, I did not have my cell with me or a watch, I just figured Id continue on until I was done all my houses… I had been out there for a long time and was getting quite tired…(I had kind of got myself into a lot, cause the stack I took was the furthest away and had the most houses) but I just figured that I had to finish all my stuff. I am not one to leave a job incomplete…and not one to quit so I just kept at it despite my frozen limbs. I walked speedily with a very determined step thinking “I MUST COMPLETE THIS TASK”. I wondered how the other teams were doing, I wondered if they had already completed their houses and returned to the car. Anyway I just kept going…with the must complete task mentality, the thought of returning to the car with some houses not done never really entering my mind.
I had about three blocks left to cover when I ran out of the actually info cards to deliver, at the time I was like DRAT… I was thinking I was so close to being done what a shame I hadn’t grabbed enough of the info cards. So I began my long walk back to the car. As I am walking back I realize that I probably have been gone a long time, and I began to worry that perhaps they might be waiting for me, or worse yet left without me. SILLY ME. I am finally approaching our meeting point and our car drives up from behind me… I get into the car and they are all quite frantic/relieved to have found me. See apparently it was way past our quitting time and well they had been driving around for how long looking for me. They actually called the other teams and when the other teams heard they all started to head over to help look for me…thinking I was lost or who knows what. I found out later that they were seriously concerned… and here I was just walking around having a grand old time completely unaware that everything thought I was missing. So once I’m safely in the car they all get on their cells to let everyone know I was found/OK and to call of the search. When I saw the time I was shocked, I had no idea I had been gone for so long. I was seriously so frozen I think the passion and purpose I carried while delivering the flyers kind of numbed me so I didn’t realize how cold I was until I got into the car and couldn’t speak properly anymore cause my mouth was so frozen. It was all quite the experience. I don’t think I am really doing a good job of telling this story… Oh well… so yeah. I wasn’t lost; I knew where I was the whole time.

Oh yeah and the aftermath of all this… I GAVE MYSELF SHIN SPLINTS! I think its cause my shoes are not really walking shoes, they have a heel and well I walk with like I said a very determined step… plus Id speed walk run/walk really fast/run. I never felt the pain in the moment but WOW the next 4 days it was very painful to walk… and I had to kind of limp… OH the adventure.

I am excited about the election results… I am passionate about much right now… and am learning so much (not just cause I am in school). But all of my real thoughts will have to wait for another day…

Oh but one more thing…. I wore my black legwarmers to church on Sunday with my black high heels and a skirt and it was awesome… I was nervous at first… I mean I love them but well was kind of concerned… see for a few weeks I had been wearing them in the car to church but before going in I’d remove them… but this time I decided to go for it. I should take a pic next time. I got many compliments on my legwarmers! Legwarmers are so hot right now…and I know everyone wants them now!

I promise soon I’ll write about what really matters too me and not just random nonsence.

Frozen

2006-01-19T00:39:00.000-08:00

It’s late and I really should be in bed, especially since I have a class tomorrow morning at eight such a blessed early hour. I fully love school so much, and will blog about that another time. So much in my head… I need desperately to get some of it out. I am currently listening to Sigur Ros, such amazing inspirational music… I love it when I am studying, or creating… or really at any time, it moves me. I love music so much; it’s kind of out of control. My friend Ellen (Sarah) and I decided we might need a support group… kind of like an AA group, but for us musicoholics?! Itunes hasn’t helped things, it only makes music that much more accessible, thus more of a snare. Ugh this is not what I want to blog about…moving on…

First off I want to thank all you people for reading my blogs, and for the comments and really for just taking the time to read and think about my SUPER LENGTHY blogs. I am sorry I have not been commenting or even checking up on all of your blogs in return, it is my goal to someday get there, but for now I am hardly even able to update my own blog.

Okay so I don’t know if I really should blog about this but I am going to anyway… here I go. Today this guy from my church asked me to go on a date with him, he has kind of liked me for about 2.5 years, he has tried out a few different girls in that time but always comes back to me, and I always shut him down. It is not that I think he is a bad guy, or that I am too good for him, its just I really don’t see it happening. We are too different. Often he seems to think it is just cause I have a poor self-esteem, and that I think that I am not good enough for him, well that is not really it, yes in many ways I don’t think I am good enough for what he wants, but mostly I feel we just care about different things. If I try to tell him its about our call and priorities and what have you he seems to think that since we both minister in the church, that should be great. Anyway… I have yeah tried to be frank with him, I once told him he was on my “ No there is never a chance list” and still he tries. I guess he gets marks for persistence… but I just can’t change my mind. He really doesn’t seem to get how different we are… SO VERY DIFFERENT. For example if he were to ever take the time to read my blog, he would probably get weirded out by all I have to say, and how I care about certain things so much. He would probably think it is weird that I love to pray on swings… or that I get so deeply moved by the beauty around me… I am an artist through and through, and I think if he knew how deep it was in me, he would conclude that I am insane, he is just not that type of person. Maybe I should give him more credit… he really isn’t a bad guy… Well today when he asked me out I almost wondered if maybe I should just give him a chance… but well by the end of the chat I had decided against it. I tried a different tactic some randomness. To show him how we really are different. I started by telling him I hated how he bought such an expensive (+$1000!!) jacket, how that totally didn’t impress me, how if anything that lowered my opinion of him. Then later I asked him if he was going to be voting. And he said “ haha, no. I guess you won’t go out with me then hey? “ I don’t think he really anticipated how right he was in saying that (and what a can of worms he had opened). I was like “actually your right, that is precisely why I won’t go out with you right there”. Well then he tried to make arguments about how what difference does it make if he votes… and really the east just gets a monopoly anyway so what does it matter if he voted or not. Well that’s pretty much all bunk, all crap, I told him that he was buying into lies, and that we really can make a difference and that change starts with individuals…and if all of us were just saying … well my vote really doesn’t matter… what would happen?? It’s a lie that we can’t make a difference… a lie that too many youth/young adults buy into… Don’t buy into it… DON’T. I have so many dreams, and I am sure you do too… many of them seem impossible, does that mean I am not even going to try and attain them? It makes me sad that too many Christians are willing to just sit by and do nothing, concluded that it is all too hopeless anyway. Well I am just so sure that is the attitude Christ would have us take… a defeatist attitude… that’s just swell. To him it’s just a simple vote that means nothing. TO me the fact that he doesn’t vote speaks volumes… shows how very different we are. I don’t know if I am fully getting my point across… I have more to say on all this…and have it all burning in me…but I really must go to bed soon… like 4 hours ago… Anyway, he still doesn’t realize how different we were… he told me to think it all over more, I told him I had to go, cause I was just off to go volunteer with the conservative party. He laughed, he thought I was just joking, but I wasn’t. He was like “really???” I said yes, I told him that I have big dreams, and that I am passionate about Canada, about souls, and well about changing the world… and I don’t think its right for Christians to just be like “ ohhh well I am praying for Canada” GOSH well what are they doing about it… (Faith without works is dead… thanks Kayle for really giving that scripture so much new meaning for me). If I am say ohhh yeah I am praying for such and such or for __________ to happen but we aren’t willing to actually take any time, or do anything practical to back that up… then as much as I believe in the power of prayer, its kind of a cop out. I realize that we can’t all do everything and that we can’t all reach everyone…and so yes sometimes all we can do is pray…I ended my conversation with him by saying that I am probably too passionate for him, and that would probably freak him out, and I told him I was willing to do whatever it takes no matter how little or seemingly meaningless to ensure that I do see this world changed for the better because normally change doesn’t happen by one BIG act… it’s a ton of little choices, or acts…

I was hoping to get to the more fun and exciting part of my story… the part where I am completely frozen outside delivering stuff for the conservatives… not realizing that there is a search party sent out for me… well that story will come later I suppose…. It really is a good one. I sure do hope you all are planning to vote on January 23, if you weren’t planning on it, can I URGE YOU TO??? It’s about more than just politics!

(My body is still frozen from tonight’s escapade…. and that was about 4 hours ago)

Trains and Sewing machines

2006-01-05T06:39:00.000-08:00

Often I dream of changing the world, and some days I truly believe that I can be a part of something larger than myself, something that would actually alter lives and history. Sadly most days it all seems way to impossible, way to huge; just the whimsical fancies of a naive girl. And still other days it can be a challenge to make it through my own small life, how could I possibly change anything?

However deep down I believe in this dream… I believe I was created for more, we all are. I remember throughout my high school years we all had big dreams. Dreams of yes, changing the world; doing amazing things for God. We were passionate, believing we could evoke good change, and help save the world for God. Man was I excited to see as we all grew up and how God would use each of us with our unique giftings and personalities, what exciting lives I was sure we all would live. Later when I moved to Edmonton, it took a while but eventually I found other people to dream with, I seemed to be surrounded by passionate men and woman of God (so many of them in bible school) all of them dreaming of being a part of the worldwide takeover of God (just to clarify when I mention saving the world, or taking over the world, I don’t mean slamming the gospel down peoples throats and forcing them to accept Christ, I mean more in a gentle way with the Love of God speaking volumes). I looked so forward to my late night talks with a few of these people, dreaming that things could be different, believing in the Almighty loving God. Sadly as years have past, and life has thrown so many curve balls and so many storms have come it seems that people don’t dream like they used too. Life has made many too logical to believe that one person could possibly impact the world, and the scars of life have robbed many of their passions. Some people that used to be some of the biggest dreamers, the ones I used to look at and think, man if only I could be like that, are now the ones who have lost these passions, their zeal for the things of God. Even men and woman of God seem a little too skeptical to believe in changing the world. The other day I was with a friend, and I just randomly threw out a comment “ I want to help change the world” and she kind of laughed at me, and then we moved on… Now I realize she partly laughed cause of my random comments that come out of nowhere… like seriously we were wrapping presents and really talking about nothing important…and then wham… one of my random thoughts… so yes I understand why she laughed…but her laugh was also kind of like, “ oh silly Kristy-Anne, lets be realistic here”. I almost felt like I had to explain myself, or take my comment back. I shouldn’t have to be embarrassed about being a dreamer, of wanting to make a positive impact on the world. If one doesn’t dream big, if one doesn’t have goals… then what? Lethargy? Listlessness? Complacency? I realize that I am young, and that I have many years, and I realize I don’t have to have everything figured out and done by time I’m 28… but why not start now? Gee I have much more I could say … One of the saddest moments I remember from one of my missions trips was when I was talking to this group of girls probably about 14 years of age. I was chatting with them, asking them about what they want to do when they grow up… one girl was like ohhh I want to be a lawyer, another wanted to be a doctor, those are big dreams for children living in a third world country with basically no money. However it was beautiful to hear they had dreams. What got me was the girl who had told me she had no dreams, I am pretty sure she was thinking what was the point in dreaming when it could never happen. This broke my heart… I don’t know why it got me so, but it did.

I just urge you all to be dreamers, remind yourself of the dreams you once had, so often it is God that puts those in our hearts… Don’t let people tell you those are childish, or tell you that they are impossible. I hate dream squishers; if anyone tries to squish your dreams let me know and ill punch them in the face. I may not change the world tomorrow, but I am also not going to wait till I’m sixty. I want to positively impact my environment everyday, doing little things to make this world a better place… and maybe someday it will all add up to some big impact?! In 2006 I hope you don’t let the sadness and chaos of our world tell you that change is impossible, that you can’t make a difference in this universe. Even little things like being a true friend to an unloved person is an example of changing some bodies universe.

Stay tuned I plan on updating soon about:
Vanessa
Thoughts on 2005
Politics
Me going back to school!!! (I think I’m going to braid my hair and wear a skirt)
My giraffe escapade
Why you shouldn’t try to whip whip cream without electric beaters
Knitting (my new passion)
Cool people
Legwarmers (my dream of having a great legwarmer collection is coming true)
How much I miss you all

Goodnight!

Trains and sewing machines

2006-01-05T00:59:00.000-08:00

I want to encourage and inspire, rather than discourage and destroy

2005-10-26T00:13:00.000-07:00

Okay so I think that I might be back into the blog swing of things, its normally just one long intense entry that holds me back…but now that I got that one finally out, I am freer to write.

So first off, thank you to all who are praying for Vanessa and thanks also for all the comments! They fully encouraged me and so when I was at youth tonight and chatting it up with her, I just had that much more faith for her, and though she was pretty discouraged she just kept on laughing at me cause I was getting so excited talking to her… Vanessa knows that there are some people that pray for her, and that always shocks her, but tonight I was telling her how there are even more people than she could ever imagine praying for her, believing for her (that includes a lot of you folk) and well she was kind of blown away. Though she is still pretty much seeing her own situation as pretty hopeless I am thankful that God is continually increasing my faith and expectancy and yeah as I was telling her how much I was believing for her and getting all excited that’s when she was smiling. So thanks all for the support. Ill keep you posted on her progress… Tonight she had to have like a bodyguard with her (I am thinking for protection from herself?), interesting…

This next section will probably only be understood by the ladies out there…
So this Friday for youth we are doing one of my most dreaded activities… we are going to the Waterpark. I just don’t really enjoy having to put on a bathing suit and the lakes a little better, a little more private, but well the Waterpark is so ahh well Public? But apparently I am not the only one who is dreading this activity, a whole bunch of the girl leaders were standing around tonight after the service talking about it. One of my the girls was like… I am NOT going, I am just not going, and another girl was like yeah I don’t want to go either…. Blah blah blah…and as one girl continued on about being nervous in a bathing suit another girl followed, and it was just a big circle of insecurities being let out and only making others more insecure. I walked in and made myself a part of the conversation…” You guys are all going, you know that it is not easy on any of us to go to the Waterpark, you guys are all beautiful and well its important you go” (it was something like that). Then the one leader the one who pretty much started the whole thing was like “well then I think I am going to fast all weekend” To which I was like “And NO you are NOT going to DO THAT EITHER”. To which her and a few others were like “well we don’t own one pieces”, to which me and another girl were like, well then wear a tank top over it. The conversation continued on like that pointlessly for a while longer, than I just couldn’t handle it anymore and moved on.

Okay so there are some things I want to point out from that whole scenario that are just really bothering me. So for starters, they are all gorgeous girls, and they are all also leaders. I am not pointing this all out cause I think that leaders should be perfect but rather because I think it is sad, very sad. I still struggle with insecurities (who doesn’t at times?), I probably more than any of those girls don’t want to go swimming… Its sad that so many people struggle with insecurity issues but well that’s another topic for another post… but what I’m learning is that though I may be feeling ugly one day, though I may feel like a skid… I am doing no one a favor by announcing it to the world. As a leader there are a lot of kids that are around me and listen to what I say. There have been times that I’ve felt like such a beast and I’ve probably declared it aloud in front of people not looking for their compliments but simply declaring how I felt. But God has kind of opened my eyes to what this does. If I say a comment like that normally somebody else will pipe in and be like ohhh me too, I look horrible. It’s just the exact opposite of encouraging company. I’ve heard other girls do it too and well these are BEAUTIFUL girls and when they say, “oh I look like crap” I only think oh man what must I look like? It’s all so destructive. So back to the original conversation…by all those youth leaders not wanting to go swimming cause they are too insecure, how much more insecure are the youth going to feel? And pretty much by being so verbal about it we are really only setting a precedent and pretty much telling those girls that it is normal to feel awful about your body, it is NORMAL to be horribly insecure, and well pretty much we all might as well stop eating. BUT NO… NO… these are LIES. It hurts me inside to hear all this, to see all this. Especially cause its just not stuff to take lightly… I know that some of the leaders do just say it more for attention, but that’s soo bad, cause by one or two doing it for attention, the others truly struggling are normally even more destroyed. UGHHHH. It gets me so sad… so frustrated. One of the things that I know that God is calling me too, is to not stand for mediocrity, to not just sit by and let things like this go by and become accepted… like I will not stand and watch generations of girls growing up to believe that they are of no value if they aren’t crazily skinny, I do not want to watch Christians be crippled by insecurities all their lives and believe that that is just a part of life. NO, we are then not giving full credit to God for what he did on the cross… he did not die and rise again so that we could be partially free. AHHH… I know that we are all works in progress and well that people are going to struggle, but what gets me about all this is how much damage people are doing to one another, I have watched as lets say a leader of a group of girls is like ahh im so fat, im not going to eat blah blah blah… well watch how that effects the other girls. Ughhh. I know this is a rant and I’m sorry, it just is really bothersome.

I guess to turn this all back on me, cause I can’t just constantly look at what I am frustrated around me, I must look at what I am going to do. Well what God has been showing me about all this is kind of what I said above, but well I just have to watch what I say and when I say it. Yeah I may honestly be struggling, having a rough week, but the place to vent about that is not in public, it is with a really close trustworthy friend, or by exposing myself before God. Again if I let it out in public I am potentially making it harder on somebody else. Also I’ve kind of said it before to some people but well I want to be a different kind of beautiful, I don’t want to be like so many of those gorgeous girls out there who really do to their own issues and insecurities and attempts make others feel worse about themselves. Instead I want to be the kind of beautiful that makes others feel more beautiful…accepted, encouraged… I have more I could say, but its late, and well my rant was im sure long enough. Id love to hear feedback from you girls…. (I hope my point kind of came across)

Much love…

21 Stitches

2005-10-23T23:33:00.000-07:00

Well this is my first REAL post (a post of substance) as a 22 year old, I hope that with my old age comes much wisdom. There is so much to tell you all, I had initially planned on posting a whole big yearlong reflection, looking at how I’ve grown and such over the past year. I do truly feel that 21 was a monumental year for me, looking back, I just can’t believe how far Gods taken me, I am thankful to him, he has been so faithful.

Something new… IM GOING TO BACK TO SCHOOL!!! I started my first course this past week, a Hermeneutics course I am taking correspondence with my dear Popple. I had so much fun in his class this week, he doesn’t even care if I eat in his class, maybe that’s cause he can’t see me. He never answers my questions either, which is strange. CPC does great correspondence courses because they are actually video recordings of the classes on DVD its great cause I get to follow along with the whole classes dialogue from the comfort of my living room, wrapped in a blanket. In January the plan is to take two normal courses at Vanguard (the bible college In Edmonton) and one modular course, as well as another correspondence course through CPC. I am very excited about all this, and yet very scared… I have wanted this for soo long that now that it is here I get kind of nervous. I am going to have to cut back at work and well I still have to talk to my boss, so yeah don’t go calling him or anything… I pray that that all goes well, I am going to have to cut back hours quite a bit throughout the semester but would go back to full time hours for the summer. Finances will be tough, but I am trusting in God and know that if I want to follow my dreams any sacrifices I have to make it will be worth it. I could go on and on about all of this but will stop because there is something far more important I want to write about.

I don’t know how many of you remember but in one of my prior posts I referred to a girl named Vanessa. For those of you who didn’t read that post… you should… (If you do want to read it you can find it in my July archives, and the post is called Light stuff). A little recap about her… She is a girl who got saved at my church one night and that God really impressed on my heart to make sure that she would not be lost, forgotten. She is a girl who has a very sad story, she has experienced more pain in her 17 years than a person should have to experience in a lifetime. She has been in foster homes for years now, and has experienced much abuse. She is a good kid who has not turned to drugs or alcohol, but her coping mechanism is cutting. Where I left off in my prior post is that I had been praying for this very hurting girl silently throughout worship one night, praying that God would heal her, set her free, show his love to her. God showed me that if I truly want to see this girl set free, healed, and loved, than maybe he wants to use me to bring her freedom, wholeness, love. If I really wanted to see her transformed than I had to be willing to give of my life no matter what the cost, I vowed to God that I wanted to be used, I wanted to be a part of his plan to bring her hope and love. So that’s I think pretty much where I left off in her story, now months later I want to fill you in on the progress.

Well I wish it were all a happy story, but its not. I did my best to be there for Vanessa, I would call her, she would call me, I took her out for coffee, and I would look for her in church… It was cool cause she would really open up, and she definitely loved coming to church, but it was hard, cause she’s not at all easy to talk to. She is very negative and full of hopelessness. I would do my best to try to get her mind of all the bad, I would listen and listen but I also tried to discover what used to inspire this girl, what maybe at one point in her life would have brought her joy. It was cool cause I realized that I was not alone in this overwhelming mission, (now when I say mission I don’t mean that it was like my “mission” to save her and that I didn’t care about her, no I wanted to befriend this girl love her and help her understand more fully her fathers love). Thankfully God had also been bringing other people from the youth group into her life. There is such a good group of about 3 girls who all come from very broken family situations too that went out of their way to include Vanessa, and make her feel loved and welcomed. Also God was putting Vanessa on the hearts of our part time youth pastor Erin, and the intensive intern pastors wife Brandy. Vanessa has never really felt loved in her entire life, and has been abandoned by so many. The deep hurts she has are huge, and she really needs love, more love than just one person can give, so I am so thankful that God has brought more people than just me into her life. So far so good right? Well this is where it gets strangely worse, so here Vanessa is coming regularly to church, has people trying to love her, but yet she gets worse in terms of her cutting. Cutting becomes more and more of a regular dangerous part of her life. She becomes more and more hopeless. I become very worried about her when I don’t see her at church sometimes, always praying that nothing had happened to her. One week she shows up to youth church and it turns out her cutting got so bad that she had to get 21 stitches on her leg. I didn’t know what to say; she told me that she was scaring herself… She had been cutting since she was 12 (I think it was 12 around then, it might have been earlier) but it had never been this bad. She cuts pretty much her entire body, it is so sad, her body arms and hands look like they have been through a cheese grater and her legs look like zebra stripes, so scarred. I was scared for her, because of this stitches incident she was then put with a one on one (that’s where she has a worker with her 24 hours a day for her own protection). I think a week went by after this incident and I was sitting beside her again at youth church and she was particularly down. She just stands there so broken, so scared, I can’t describe it, her head is always downcast she is so stiff, and closed in, no emotion. I was praying for her silently through out the whole worship service, near the end of the worship set I did pray with her aloud, and she just shock, and cried silently. When worship was done and the announcements were going on, She was still so shook up, with her body so hunched over and her head so down, shaking. I got out of her that she was now having to take these medications that her psychiatrist had given her to sedate her to prevent her from cutting. The problem with the pills was that they made her sleep all the time. She was so upset cause she felt like they just wanted her to sleep her life away rather than actually help her, listen to her. I got very scared when I got out of her that she would rather die than sleep her life away. I asked her if she maybe wanted to leave the service and talk. She said no, I asked her again, she said, it didn’t matter. I really felt that she needed to talk. I went to my youth pastors wife, Karyn (whom I respect so much and hope to someday be like) to ask her what she thought I should do. We decided to take Vanessa to Karyns mini van to try and calm her down, let her talk, pray with her. So we ended up listening and praying with Vanessa for over an hour. I am so glad we did this, not that things got better (visibly) after this. The one cool thing that we did get out of this time with her was that she honestly truly felt that we (her friends from church) truly care about her, and she didn’t feel like anyone else in the world did, but yeah she felt we genuinely cared. That meant the world to me, cause sometimes when its not easy to love a person one wonders if it love still comes across. But thanks be to God who takes our love and makes it so much stronger, purer.

Moving on in the story, things get worse, despite the one on one care she still managed to cut herself very badly and after another 15 stitches they ended up moving Vanessa to a closed facility where they put youth that are in dangerous positions. She was to stay there for 21 days, and there she was under even closer watch and could not hurt herself. The regime was very set and protected. Vanessa hated it here; she couldn’t ever leave, and couldn’t have visitors. One thing that was cool though was that I Vanessa mentioned my name as being somebody important to her and I besides the Pastors was the only one approved that she could call or receive calls from. Thankfully I was also able to go and visit her twice while she was there because I went with Erin (the part time pastor) and one time with Erin and Brandy. The visits we made were hard, so hopeless she was. Our second visit though we did have one very special moment, Vanessa didn’t know we were coming and so when her worker went to go tell her she had visitors she came running around the corner so quickly with the hugest smile on her face and she tackled the three of us with hugs, what a memory!

Anyway there is so much more I could write but ill try to bring it to a close here… Well Vanessa got out of this secure care facility on Friday, the scariest part is that she is scared of herself cause she doesn’t want to go back to that facility but now that she is out she is able to cut again and the desire is ever there. She was so happy to be in church today, her smile was real, but her situation is still hard. She has already been cutting again, so she has one on ones again with her… and they might send her back to the secure care facility, which scares her to death. She’s already had to be restrained a lot and taken to the hospital; she is even cutting herself with her nails in her sleep. After tonight’s service I was praying for her, holding her as she shook. For quite awhile, eventually I think we had about 5 girls praying with her. It was very sad, draining; I think I held her for about an hour. So now that you are up to date, what’s the point of all this? Well because there is going to be a miracle in this girl’s life, there is going to be freedom… there is going to be wholeness. This girl is going to have such a testimony of the power of God. Right now it seems overwhelming and impossible, but God did not put her in my life for no reason, he did not send all these people around her for no reason. Though right now in my natural eyes it all seems impossible, it isn’t cause my God is huge and loving. Also I wanted to write all this, cause when we pray and say God set this person free, or God use me in this person’s life, it is not always an easy task. When I vowed to God that I would do whatever it took to help Vanessa, I knew it would be hard… and it has been!!! I have had to devote much time, prayer, energy and emotion. But what I know is that God Is in control, and someday I am going to finish this story with a very amazing conclusion of Gods mighty love and faithfulness. Just you wait.

I once again apologize for a lengthy post, but read it in spurts if you have to… I just didn’t know how to shorten it. For those of you who did read it, thanks for caring. Much Love.

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2005-10-14T06:56:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

silliness gone wild... GOSH IT WAS GOOD TO SEE YOU ALL!

My home computers broken thus no real blogs from me, I really pray my computers ok... Its a currently a concern!

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2005-10-07T03:54:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

Just so you all know Im coming home to paradise today... saskatoon that is...

So I think that Kristin should have a party on Sunday night at her place so I can see all you folk!!! Everyone bring some goodies some sweets... and we'll party till the night is over.

To all you other folk that aren't in Saskatoon...well Happy Thanksgiving...

I am thankful for you all. I am thankful for all of the amazing friends I have who teach and inspire me so much. Be blessed!

the old gang (my hometown girls)

2005-09-29T06:29:00.000-07:00

the old gang (my hometown girls)
Posted by: kristyanne.

It was so nice to see you girls when I was home! I miss you all so much, and I had sooo much fun with you all. Jenna I was sooo glad to see you too, oh and I got to see Regan and Lauren too (happy to spend some qtime there too!).

I do hope to write details someday! UGHHHH....

I feel like its friday, but its definitely not friday, and I have to keep reminding myself of that. KRISTY-ANNE, it is NOT friday. Its too bad though, Fridays=good

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2005-09-21T05:41:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

Im back from Saskatoon now, was a great trip and stay tuned for more details soon.This photo was taken on the way to saskatoon from the car window, I LOVE fog. But yeah more to come, but right now im just tired, so tired...falling asleep at my desk. One can only have so much coffee in a day, what to do. So tired I am. Also on my trip back to Edmonton a whole container of fabric softener spilled in my trunk. Smells good to me, but my parents gave me the softener cause they all hated the smell. Happy Belated Birthday to Kelly-Anne, she turned 24 on the 17th. I hope you had a most fantastic birthday.

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2005-09-15T08:20:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

Watch out all you tooners...I am coming this weekend! I am excited!

Yawn

2005-09-13T23:55:00.000-07:00

There is something about fall that just steals my heart. I’m not exactly sure what it is, maybe it’s the brisk cool air, maybe it’s the smells, or all the school supplies that tempt me at every store. I know for sure that I am in love with the brilliant way the leaves change color! Providing a natural canvas of beauty that cannot help but be admired by all. But what I also love about fall is that it is about new beginnings, and routine. Summers was amazing, a time of Romance with God (reflections on my summer could be a 130 999 blog in itself) but then comes fall and that is a time of digging deeper, pressing in, and pouring out. It’s also time for me to do some more pruning. God is asking me to lay some things down, to cut some things out, and I desire to be obedient to him. Really if I want to grow, then I am going to have to change… Anyway I told myself I wasn’t going to make this long (a hard task for me), so yeah I’ll stop with my fall reflections now. Well just about, I was going through some of my old stuff and I stumbled across a piece of paper from my college days. On it was an exercise we did in one of our classes about a month or so into the program. The exercise was that we had to write an observation about every person in the class, and then the teacher collected them all and printed them out for each of us. They weren’t supposed to be judgments or assumptions but rather little things we had noticed that the person does… something like that. Anyway I am posting it with my comments added in brackets.

Kristy-Anne
Sarcastic (nahhh)
Sweaters, only wears (well we live in Canada what do you think I’m going to wear)
Aims to please (never)
Creative (well I try)
Insightful (unnnnnnn)
Soft-spoken (hmmm)
Feminine dress, lots of pink (I think they have me confused for someone else, I rarely wear pink, and feminine? Have they seen my man arms)?
Quiet (at heart)
Pushes her hair back same sort of a little flip (really?)
Seems to handle stress well (if they only knew)
Patient in nature (sometimes)
Subtle humor, laughs at her own jokes, “oh my word”
Patterns in clothing (really?)
Wears different hats on Thursdays (long story)
Quiet (hmmmm)
Loves her coffee from Second Cup (you betcha)
can’t be mad (well this just in, I am capable of anger, kudos to Tina for helping me there)
Everything petite (really) hmmm
All around young (?) and tiny (hmmm)
Reserved, quiet until spoken to (yeah that’s right on the nose)
Can be summed up in a word –perfect-little innocent, clear and hard worker, calm, reserved, overly responsible type (hmmmm this one totally confuses me
Egalitarian (d like to believe so)

Well that brought back memories, makes me laugh.

2005-09-09T11:55:00.000-07:00

Nothing to do with bubblegum

2005-09-08T23:23:00.000-07:00

The results are in from the picture trivia…Tara (my best friend) got engaged on Friday, my job was to get her out to the lake and fake a photo shoot with her on her dock. She didn’t think he (Andy) would be at the lake till the next day, it was special…I am being very brief with this story, I really could elaborate but I won’t just yet, maybe I will another day.

Jenn you get twelve gold stars for getting answer right…
Tina gets 6.5 gold stars she was wrong but made me smile
Ladyyvonne gets a huge 12 bazillion gold stars for her clever interpretation, man I wish that were the story!
CM? Who are you?
Jenna, I like you so you get 2 gold stars…
Kayle, you could get a whole shwack of gold stars if I win your Norwegian word game… but this is not a bribe.

I am sitting in the park, in the same spot, under the same tree that I have sat by so many times over this past summer/spring. This may be one of my last times here until next summer, how sad. I think I am going to need to go purchase a years membership at the muttart conservatory soon… this is my plan to stay somewhat sane in the winter…The muttart conservatory is quite a large conservatory with quite a few different rooms of flowers and such, and of course all windows=much natural light. It smells nice, and is bright, I am going to go there regularly this winter to try and pretend that it is not cold and winter outside. This is my “stay alive through winter” strategy, lets see how it works.

I feel like I need two blogs. So much I could write about in terms of just my life, the funny/random things that happen… the friends, the enemies (yeah enemies… I have a lot of those!). But I also have so much to write in terms of what my brains trying to work through. I like writing about both but lately it just seems like there is too much to write about in both categories…and I can’t choose just one so I don’t write at all. BAHHH… I mean I have like a whole 500 word or more stories I could write on my best friend getting engaged on Friday… I could also write about how I went to the forest the other day and encountered a clan of unicorns… (Ok so maybe that one didn’t happen…over active imagination maybe?)

I guess I just start with my most recent thoughts that are heavily entangled with other thoughts and see where this leads me. Hurricane Katrina has been on my mind, as I am sure it has been on so many other people’s brains too. It is so horrible what has happened, and yet it just feels strange living here, so safe so away from it all. And it is easy to just carry on in my life…and not really realize the devastation that is their realities right now. I feel guilty living in my safe space, not having to think about all of this, but I am challenged, to not just forget…to not just carry on with my little life… I am challenged to not be ignorant.

For a long time I have kind of felt that it was important for me to not be ignorant of what is going on in the world, but I haven’t really done much about to remedy my ignorance. I have the desire, to know what’s going on, but have not taken the time to read, to listen to study… I guess its cause I get so overwhelmed, there is soo much going on, there is sooo many problems in the world, it is just SOO much, and what can little me do? But that is what the enemy would have me believe, he would have me believe that I am powerless and can do nothing, and that it would be better for me to stay in my own bubble. But I fear that God would not be pleased with this attitude.

When a person chooses to read further than the headlines of the hurricane Katrina situation, you hear the true stories of people, just like you and me whose lives have been turned upside down, it’s horrendous. Is it enough to be like wow that’s all too bad? I don’t know…. I don’t know… I don’t know… I think that in a way we can honor these people by reading their stories. Lets parallel this to a friendship for a second here. So your friend has a major problem that she begins to recount to you, but you have really no answer to help her you realize its beyond you… do you then inform her that there is no point in you listening to her (his) story? NO (well I sure hope you said no) a good friend listens, and has compassion for their friend, even if there are no answers, even if there is nothing you can do. And if there is something you can do, you try to help, in whatever small way possible, one way we can always help our friends, is through prayer… so a good friend would pray and intercede on their friend’s behalf. Would your friend hold it against you if you couldn’t do anything for them? If you couldn’t magically make there situation go away? No, (I should hope not at least) but I am sure they felt a bit of relief or peace from you listening…comforted by your listening ear and compassionate spirit. Also in friendships, if you don’t see a person for a long while, and have no contact with them, it is easy to lose a burden for that person, and to just plain forget them.

So many of us probably feel that there is nothing we can do, so maybe we just chose to ignore the whole situation (and this goes for other world travesties as well, not just hurricane Katrina). But I think that in even just reading the stories, and thinking upon how many thousands upon thousands this affects, we are maybe helping in a small way? I am being challenged to recheck my spending habits and to give more to different things, like hurricane Katrina for example. Again we think we are soo small and that we can’t do anything, but seriously, if everyone of you who read my blog gave even $20 towards relief with this catastrophe, that could be help a lot of people. We can’t allow our smallness to stop us, cause together we can do so much. I am also praying… Sometimes we just don’t bother to pray allowing our helplessness to cripple us, thinking what good will my little prayer do? Sometimes I wonder why I pray, I often wonder what good it is doing, not feeling a thing. But what I do know is that the bible tells me prayer is powerful, and I also know my God is big, and really he is the only one who can really offer peace to these people. Oh that I would have the faith to believe that my prayers, our prayers could really help these people.

Its raining now…and I should get back to work. I guess I wanted to close this by saying, I refuse to live just my own little world, I want to take time to listen to the stories from all over the world, cause hurricane Katrina is horrible, but then there is also all the genocide in Africa…all the other devastating stories in other places that are so completely ignored… Even if I can’t stop it all from happening I must listen to their stories.

This was a very very rough (quickly written) blog, sorry. More thought out thoughts to come another day.

Crap bees just flew into my bran muffins and are sitting on them and contaminating them…there goes my lunch (and believe it or not this is not the first time I have lost my lunch to bees…really I could write at least a 1001word blog on all my more recent bug stories…).

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2005-09-08T01:36:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

Gold star for whoever can figure out from this series of photos what happened on friday night.

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2005-09-02T06:17:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

This is a shot I took last week at the lake... tonight I return to the lake for one last night...*tear* I really don't know what Im going to do... I come back Saturday, and will be returning Monday to the Lake for a youth leaders training day (should be fun, but not really a proper farewell to my beloved lake). I hope everyone has a good weekend, I know Ill be starting a real blog tonight... but Ill explain all that later.

Feathers and Sunshine

2005-08-25T21:35:00.000-07:00

WARNING! Do not try this at home

The past three nights I had to stay at the studio and shoot late. We (my boss and a new girl) set up a bedroom scene in the studio, and had arranged models for three days in a row, planning to shoot very possible scenerio. Last night was definitely my favorite night of the three. This is when I got the privilege of hanging out with two precious girls (see the wonderwoman photo below for one of the girls pics). Don and I saved one very special scenerio for last...a pillow fight between the girls, where we would open up a feather pillow and throw the feathers into the air. Sounds like fun right? Man it was fun, and was hilarious, but I need to warn you, DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME! As fun as it was, and as great of a photo as I got out of it... I don't think any of us were prepared for just how messy and hard to clean up this would be. Now have any of you ever opened a feather pillow before? For most of you who haven't (including myself before yesterday) let me fill you in, the feathers are not like full feathers, they are not nice long feathers like you see on the ground sometimes in summer. They are not like the feathers you did crafts with as kids....NO! They are super fine, impossibly fine, and they float and go everywhere, and goodluck catching them. We really didn't even throw up more than half the pillow and still feathers went all over our studio. They even floated right up to my desk on the second floor. We decided to leave the cleanup till morning and let the feathers settle (seriously I don't think I could ever fully to this scene justice, it was craziness!). We realized after trying to catch a few feathers, how hard it was going to be to clean up, and came to the realization that really a vacume cleaner would be our only hope at getting the studio clean. So today Don brought in a shop vacume and he, Leah (the new girl) and I started at the impossible task of cleaning up. Now since there was only one vacume, Leah and I were trying to just pick up and capture the feathers. Umm not so easy... and once you maybe get a handful, they are so fine that on your way to throw them in the garbage can you lose half of them. GOODNESS...what a scene, I was laughing the whole time (well rather than when I was choking on feathers) And even if you do manage to get them in there most of those float back out, and as you throw the new ones in old feathers float out. What an impossible situation. And how was it going with the vacume? Well a little better, but we had to empty it very frequently cause the feathers would clog it. So once the clog happened wed go outside and the open up the vacume clean it out and release the feathers...(no point putting them in the garbage out there...they just floated away anyway. It was so out of control! Seriously you would have thought we emptied 12.5 pillows with all the feathers. People from other buildings were outside on smoke breaks and wondering what in the world was going on, because now there was fine white stuff outside and they didn't have a clue where it was coming from. FEATHERS EVERYWHERE! So anyway, after about 2 hours of us working on cleaning it all (youd clean an area once and have to go back there about 5 other times cause more would float back) and after about 30 empties of the shopvac. the studio was pretty much back to normal, although youd still get the occasional ones flying around. So funny, so again, I warn you don't try this...ever...although when I was releassing the feathers outside it did look really cool like when you blow a dandilions, it looked like that but way cooler. I think I might someday just release a pillow in a field and take pics it would look very cool. So yeah, today I was breathing in feathers...I coughed up a few too.

Oh I find my life to be so comical really people should have had a camera rolling while we attempted so horribly to clean this all up. I never did even share with you all the story of our recent grasshopper and fruitflie infestation, that too was an adventure...quite disgusting (OK VERY DISGUSTING) but hilarious. I won't go into detail now but let me just put it this was, we had about a gazillion grasshoppers sneak in from our garage door, but at the same time a fruitfly infestation had occured from some hidden garbage (from some model we don't even know how long it was there!) that happened to like seep into the floor and everywhere. FRUITFLIES WERE EVERYWHERE! SO NASTY.

Anyway, onto other things. Summer has been amazing for me, the best part about it has been the many precious private God times I've had (honestly if you really get me talking about this in person, tears well up in my normally dry eyes) Today I got to have one such time, I spent about an hour and a half at a park ( I also discovered a tini hidden entrance to another mini forest that Im going to go and further explore at a later date). As great as these times have been, there is this part of me that is so fearful for summer and all this to end. I realize that God is not only around in summer, but I do find that in the summer a part of me always thaws and comes alive, this year especially. I know that God is always present and still faithful and good and all that...but there are times in our lives when he seems particularly far away, and silent. For me these times usually occur in the winter. Dry desert times, that I am not so excited to experience again...but at the same time I know that in those times if I choose to look and press into God, strength and roots are developed. Maybe this all doesn't make sense to you guys... maybe im the only one that feels this way, I did realize this year how much I am an artsy and that I am hugely effected by the weather. But even as the summerdays fade, and the days of swinging in the sunshine, with beautiful greenness everywhere disappear, I will not allow myself to forget the ways my saviour captivated my heart this summer. I will also not stop running after him, and searching for his beauty. Blast, I hope I don't sound like a complete granola with all this. One thing I miss about summer though is ministry and church, I look forward to being able to further dive in and pour out this fall. I am going to use all that God has given me, as he has refreshed me a new, I am going to pour out all that I have.

Words from a song that I feel totally express how I feel this summer... The song is called "How I love you so" its off of an old vineyard cd called "Mystery"...I've loved this song for years, but when I played it today while swinging today it hit me in a new way.

You came and opened me
Just like a windowpane
You blew right into me
You gave me songs to sing
You gave me dancing feet
You made me come alive

Do you know how I love you so

You are my summers day
The sunlight on my skin
Stay here so close to me
Your beauty fills my eyes
So hear me when I say
Your everything to me

Do you know
How I love you so

In Conclusion... I love really enjoy summer... and well don't open up feather pillows...

Wonderwoman!

2005-08-25T06:55:00.000-07:00

Wonderwoman!
Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

I was playing with some girls at the studio last night, inbetween shooting them. I got out my old dressup clothes that I keep for such a time as this, and they had soo much fun (and I had so much fun too!). They especially liked my wonderwoman outfit and it looked perfect on the younger girl. They had never heard of wonderwoman before though, so I had to show them pictures, and an old one of me wearing that outfit...by the end they were hooked on wonderwoman, they kept asking "do I look like wonderwoman now?" SO CUTE!

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2005-08-18T02:05:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

A Night Out

2005-08-17T20:49:00.000-07:00

Tonight I felt an urgent need to get away. The rain finally stopped and the sun had broke through and was setting. There are no longer any mini forests near me, so I opted for the next best thing. I walked to a park that had swings. And I swung, into the night sky.

I swung, I prayed.
I thought about...
seeing beauty
seeing freedom
seeing fun

I listened and prayed some more.
I listened to the wind, and enjoyed its cool breeze as I swung high, into the air.
I wished to cry, but not out of my own sadness, but no tears came.

I swung, and I swung until my arms were numb, and my feet were limp.

It was a great night out

Rebellion Hits; A Crime Committed

2005-08-09T21:55:00.000-07:00

The following story is all true, only the names of some characters have been changed to protect the guilty.

Saturday looked to be a promising day for Annie, it was sunny, there were no wedding to attend, and she had tickets to go see Amos Lee at the folkfest. She had been looking forward to this concert for months...counting down the days and listening to his music over and over. It was really a matter of fluke that not shortly after falling in love with Amos Lee, her friend Jorge discovered that Amos would be playing at Folkfest Edmonton 2005. When the two saw the goodnews that he would be playing two nights at the Folkfest they knew that they must attend. The times on the website were not specified but Sat night was enough information for them and they bought tickets right away. It was a good thing they did because, little did they know that Folkfest is actually a huge deal, and that tickets sell out quickly. So months,days,hours pass and it is finally time for Annie and Jorge to go the Folkfest, they still didn't know what time the concert actually started at but what they did know was that their tickets weren't good till 6pm. So at 5:30pm they are on there way to the Folkfest silent with anticipation. Upon arriving at the location they were astonished to see what a big deal the folkfest actually was! They later discovered that over 10,000 people come out each year and that many camp out at 5:30am to ensure a good spot on the mainstage hill. When Annie and Jorge made it through security they began to take in this big deal of a festival. This is definitely a granola sort of event... kind of reminded Annie of the Luminara festival she recently visited in Victoria. There were tents,mini lawn chairs, and hippies everywhere. Now the two had to figure out where they needed to be for the Amos concert, not as easy of a task as they intially thought. There were many stages...and what seemed like no information booths. Everybody else seemed to know what they were doing or where they were going, obviously everyone else had been to the Folkfest before. The two walk around for awhile, excitment building over getting to hear/see Amos play in just a few minutes. As they realize that they might need to purchase a $5program (walking around was doing nothing to help them discover where/when Amos was playing) they stumbled upon Annies friend Rock, reporter from the Edmonton Journal. They ask him if he knows where Amos, he says no. They begin to make small talk, Annie questions him regarding what stories he's covering at the Folkfest. He fills her in that he is writing a story about Hippies and whether they are the real deal or just posers. They talk a bit, Annie saying probably a bit too much, cause Rock informs her that he is going to use her in his story now. She becomes kind of defensive, telling him shes no hippie, she can't help it looks like one sometimes, shes no poser.

Skipping ahead for a moment, the Rock did actually use her in his story which appeared in the city section of the Sunday edition of the Edmonton Journal. An excert from his article: Hippie revival or just fashion statement?

"Annie_______, a 21-year-old photographer,certainly looked the part. Worn-out sandals: check. Long,crimped hair:check. A sweeping,ankle-length,earth-toned skirt:check. Time to see if she's the real deal.

"I've been crimping my hair for years and I've had this skirt for a long time!" she says with the zeal of a true maverick. "I'm not a wannabe!"

In her defence: "I've never claimed to be a hippie,anyway," she insists."

Okay now back to the Saturday. As the Rock is threatening to use Annie in his story, Jorge spots none other than Amos Lee himself. Annie and Jorge couldn't believe it. Jorge says they should follow him, Annie can't move. Amos walks away. Annie then asks the Rock to find out when Amos' show is at and at what stage. The Rock goes into his important media tent for a few moments, while Annie and Jorge are still starstruck.

When the Rock returns he says, " I've got good news and I've got bad news... The bad news is Amos played at 3, the good news is that he plays again tomorrow".

Annie and Jorges hearts dropped, how could this be, they both wondered. The website had said Saturday night, not day. Their tickets were only good for Saturday night so they wouldn't be able to return on Sunday. Sunday tickets had been sold out way back when they first bought their tickets. How tragic, the excited two had quickly been transformed into sullen victims. How could this have happened... feeling stupid, sad, and devasted the two searched for some sort of answer and someone to blame. The two decided they would just leave, they just weren't really in the mood to stay and listen to all the other live music, after such a catastrophe. As they proceed to say there goodbyes, The Rock tells them to come back on Sunday and he would try and sneak them in. Security he said was so slack and he could let them in through his media entrance. Annie gets the times from the Rock, thanks him and says they'll think it over.

A different kind of silence had fell upon the two on there return home, a silence of broken dreams, and tragedy. Trying to reach for a grain of hope, Annie tosses the idea of sneaking in. Jorge reminds her that if she wants to do that she can but that he can't, cause he leaves to go work at a camp the next day. It truly was a sad day. Annie wishes she could make it all better, but she can't. Jorge so wanted to go see Amos that he considered calling the camp to tell them hed come a day late just so he could take in the concert. Tempting it was, but for one there was no guarantees that the Rock really would be able to sneak them in, and secondly, he is very dedicated to the camp, and just couldn't let them down. Despite the fact that she would have to go alone Annie decides that even though it would be sad to see Amos alone, she must still try, better one see it then none. Twas a tragic night.

Sunday afternnoon rolls around and the normally very moral,upright, and law abiding citizen, Annie, makes her way once more to the Folkfest. Upon arriving at the grounds, she receives a phone call from the Rock, he is sad to inform her that security had been tightened, it was not going to be easy to get her in. She asks him if she should just go home, but he says no "we'll get you in somehow.". He tells her to call him when she arrives at a specific location (he would be on the inside and she on the outside of the fence). When she spots him, they make phone contact and try to come up with a plan. The whole park/festival area was fenced in to prevent people from sneaking in, but they wonder if they could find some gap or way in. They kind of make there way to a forest area (hes still on the inside, she on the outside) and find another girl looking in through the fence. The Rock asks her if shes trying to sneak in, she says "yes, I only want to get in to see the guy playing at the stage below (below the hill, one couldn't see the stage but could faintly hear the music)". It was Amos playing, Annie and the girl, Amy, shared a moment as they both realized they were trying to do the same thing. The three try to come up with a plan, but its not so easy. Annie wonders if they could just slide in under the fence, but the problem with that was that there was security all around the grounds. Even at that exact moment there was a security guard closely watching the three, suspecting they were up to something. Annie wonders if they can distract the security guy while one at a time the girls would attempt slipping under the fence. Annie walks alittle out of the one security dudes site to see if theres another place she could slip in, but if she tried to crawl in a little further down the fence it would be too visible to the rest of the passersby. Oh dear what a pickle. Annie at this time was also considering the moral issues with the plan of sneaking in, the girl was feeling guilty with this plan. But she justified it to herself cause she had been kind of scammed out of a concert due to an evasive website, and she HAD bought a ticket for the one night and not gone. Just as she is pondering all these things another security dude comes and gets the other dude. The Rock is on the phone with Annie as she is just a ways away from the him and Amy. He tells informs her that Amy just crawled under the fence, he tells her to come back. As Annie passes the two security people she tries to look natural, and then she hurries and glides, faster than lightening,under the fence before another security guard would come a long. They are in!!! They can't believe it...off through the forest they run and enter mostly unnoticed into the mob of people. Annie and Amy are now hurrying frantically to catch the end of Amos Lees set. Finally they found there way to the proper stage and make there way to find a spot on the grassy hill. As they sit down Annie remembers tries to keep her wrist hidden under her jacket as she does not have a wrist pass. The Rock, the girls new hero, leaves the two to go and try to make news. Annie is quickly lost in the smooth and refreshing sound of Amos Lees voice. He was on the stage singing away, no band, just him and his acoustic...aboslutely perfect. As she listened to him sing, and interact with the crowd, Annie was amazed at how funny he was. He was just plain fun, and well when he opened his mouth to sing.... she says it was utterly wonderful. It was also quite funny to Annie that she was now sitting with this girl Amy who she had just met moments before, as though they were old friends. But really it just goes to show how easy one can befriend a person if you share a common love for music. Sadly due to the actually time required to sneak in, the girls did miss a few of the songs. When the concert was done the girls walk around a bit trying to decide what to do next, they learned that amos would be signing autographs in about 30minutes, they knew theyd have to go to that. They walk around for a bit, get to know eachother, and Annie calls the Rock to check up on his status. He meets up with them and they continue to chat. They stand in line to wait to meet Amos and get his autographe. The Rock and Amy realize they are of two opposing political views, so they fight back and forth to pass the time, while Annie evaluates the past two days. Happy was she that she got to see Amos play, sad was she that Jorge had to miss it. Sad also that she didn't get to see the whole show, but again more sad that they missed the first show on Saturday. Her conscience was also getting to her a bit, for not only had she snuck in, but she had parked in a residential area, where only resdients could park, and she had also had to skip church to commit her crime. Oh dear, what a heathen.

Anyway to make the story short, Annie meets Amos, doesn't chat long cause shes shy and doesn't want to appear too starstruck. Annie and her new friend Amy part ways, oh the good times they shared. The Rock and Annie hang out at Folkfest for awhile longer, enjoying the sun and the sites... he did leave for the Ryan Adams concert to do an interview, which she was okay with cause she was lost in the music. In conclusion Annie thought it was a good day, the Rock really came to the resuce, and she did get to see Amos, but still hard to fully enjoy it knowing Jorge had to miss it. Annie wonders if she needs to get saved...again.

New Room

2005-08-08T17:01:00.000-07:00

New Room
Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

So this is my new room, Ive mostly all unpacked now...those boxes are all gone, I love my new place... I have much to blog about and well tomorrow...well really today (but Im talking tuesday night) I will have quite the blog for you all...so get ready... I've got a good story coming...stay tuned...buckle your safety belts...and come check out my site again tomorrow/today...

Unforgettable

2005-07-30T23:58:00.000-07:00

*Warning... this post may not please all my readers (mainly my parentals)...read at your own risk*

So i had the most peculiar experience on Friday night. I personally think its hilarious but some of you may not... I don't see how you couldn't at least find it somewhat humorous. So I moved into my new home on Thursday and I love love it... yep I love it... I am passionate about my huge window. Well I had two roommates for two days and now they are both gone. Amy who the house belongs to is gone for about three weeks, on a missions trip to Ukraine. The other roommate Lindsey got married today. So Friday night was my last night with them all. Anyway I got home at 1230 and went to go unlock the top lock, no problem went to unlock the doorknob...only slight problems...(but thats cause in the dark I had a hard time figuring out which key it was). So then the door was unlocked...it should have opend correct? NOPE... When Lindsey arrived home that evening she must have thought that I was already home and deadbolted the door. I COULD NOT GET IN. So yeah the girls are both sleeping and I don't want to wake either of them up... Amy well she had to be up really early in the morning to catch her plane...and well Lindsey...she was getting married... she'll need her sleep. So I am trying to work all this through in my head...what am I going to do. I examine all the windows, wondering if there was a way in. I tried many many times to get the deadbolt undone.. Gee what was I to do? I decided to try and sleep in my car, Amy would probably be getting up at around 4ish so I just have to last about 4 hours. So thats what I attempted to do...but it was a lot harder then I anticipated...Firstly...my jeans were wet on the bottoms (im short my jeans are long, and well the grass was wet) thus I was freezing... cold feet=freezing kristy-anne. Secondly, its just kind of weird trying to sleep parked on the street in ones car. I tried about a million different positions, backseat positions, to front seat, passengers and drivers seats, Underneath the passengers side (kind of underneath glove compartment). Gee it was just really hard to sleep. I also had my contacts in...not good. Anyhow the night went on...ever so slowly. At around 130 the cold was really getting to me...I searched my car and found an old pair of workout socks...thank goodness... i also wrapped my work out shorts around me. At around 230 i was just way too cold so I had to start my car for some heat. I think I startled some people when this car just randomly turned on.( I kept it running for about 7minutes trying to unthaw my body) At around 3:30 I just couldn't take it any more... I needed more heat and badly. I didn't have my wallet or cell phone... I had nothing...but a loonie.I was really realizing at this point that I shoul dhave just woke the girls up to let me in... I went to Tim hortens and got a tea which came exactly to 1.00$. But Tim Hortens was freezing so rather than siting in there and reading the paper I had to go back to my car in the parking lot. After a little while in there parking lot, I went to a mall parking lot, there I got the best 15 minutes of sleep of the night. Then I progressed back to my homeland, not wanting to miss when Amy's lights would turn on and Id be able to get back in. The last half hour from 4-4:30 was the worst..everyminute seemed like twenty, more like twenty gazillion. SO I sat, and tried to watch for signs of life in our house. At around 4:30 I saw her ride arrive. THANK GOODNESS... I ran down the street to our townhouse and made my way in, much to the shock of Amy. Amy was like KRISTY-ANNE you should have just woke me up... (yeah I was starting to really realize that but way too late). She thought I was ridiculous, and well I think I am too. I won't be repeating this story anytime soon. So I said goodbye to my new roommate and hopped into my bed for my second night in my new home. Unfortuantely the traumatic events of the day made it hard for me to sleep. All in all i think that this is the funniest story ever. Ah man you should have seen me crawled up in a ball trying to stay warm in my car... or at Tim hortens half dead trying to figure out what I could afford for a dollar. Anyway I need to go to bed now. GOODNIGHT...

P.S. Alison I made sushi today! YUM, although there were no avocados... i was disappointed but other than that they turned out amazing.

Im in love!

2005-07-26T06:27:00.000-07:00

Im in love!
Posted by: kristyanne.

Im back from Victoria, and Im definitely in love. I think its the most beautiful place ever...(aside from sylvan which will always remain my favorite due to sentimental reasons) Alison is the best host ever! And I have stories... unfortunately now I must work, and tomorrow I must move... and really my future looks quite crazy and packed in the days to come...but hopefully just maybe Ill squeeze in some real blog time! THANKS ALISON...and Fam...

For Leon...

I know that someday I will be able to forgive Alison,
And I hope that someday I will be able to forgive myself,
but I will never *pauses, stares with very serious death eyes* never be able to forgive you.

Thanks guys!

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2005-07-20T13:18:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

I got new glasses, and the best part about it is that I only had to pay for the lenses, and even that I got at cost. My boss did photos for a frame designer and as part of the agreement he got four free frames out of it. My boss figured he didn't need all four frames so he let me have a pair. It feels so strange to wear glasses again, like I now have no perifial vision. When I look down I get kind of dizzy.I really haven't worn them since I moved away from Saskatoon. Few people in Edmonton even know I wear glasses. My glasses make me feel artsy! And a tad bit smart!

But more exciting then my new glasses is that Im going to Victoria tomorrow to hangout with one of the coolest people ever...ALISON!!! YEAHHHHH PARTY! I feel like such a grown up going on a real vacation...booking the flight with my ViSA. IM SO GROWN UP...ok not reallly.

2005-07-20T08:39:00.000-07:00

Light stuff...

Oh dear, I hate brushing my hair, it takes so stinking long. Most of you probably didn’t realize I brush my hair, well I do. I brush it before I am going to wash it, I dread brushing my hair so much, it just one of those habitual tasks that I hate. Last night I was putting off brushing my hair, and I was doing random things, wasting time, I’m seriously deranged. Anyway I decided that night to time how long this annoying task actually takes me, it took me five whole minutes. I am not even joking, I have one tangled mane. Sometimes I think I should just cut it all off, but then I realize I could never do that. Some of you may be saying, “If you hate brushing your hair so much why don’t you just stop brushing it?” Well if I did that I fear that my mane would become one matted dreadlock, so I do the brushing as a preventative measure.

So I’ve witnessed some horrible murders lately. The other morning as I was readying myself for the day in the bathroom a Stanley (a spider) had caught a Walter (beetle like creature) in his web and he was killing him. What did I do? Did I help?… kill Stanley, rescue Walter? Kill both? Do I call 911? Kill both of them? Honestly I just didn’t know what to do, my heart was cold, and I just stood there and watched him die. It was horrible.

I had planned that I would make this whole blog a little more lighthearted, you know not get into all the deep serious stuff, but I just can’t help it…my thoughts need to be written even if it is only for my own sanity. So here is one of the subjects that has been on my mind for quite a while now but has really consumed my thoughts today…

On a more serious note...

Am I ready to pay the price to be Gods love personified? God has called us to love those around us, and true selfless love can be messy, and time consuming. I have always wanted to be one who loves people excessively, one who would always go the extra mile, one who would spend time in prayer for the needs of those around me. Inasmuch as I have enjoyed this past month, I sure wanted to stay at the Lake forever; I knew that I had to come back to the real world, the one with people in it. Let me get back on topic…loving people, well more than ever I really want to love people. There are many people who are easy to love, like all of you people reading this, I love you, believe in you, you are all so likable (at least I think you are, I don’t know if I have any blurkers but if I do I can’t really say I love you). There is however people in our lives that are harder to love, but they perhaps more than anyone need our love. These people are often “misfits” or the needy clingy people, or often both. Loving these people can take a lot more work, and isn’t as easy or enjoyable as a coffee date every once and awhile. I am sure we have all met people like this, but have we loved them? Here is the problem how many needy people have we (me personally, or the church corporately) let fall through the cracks because we weren’t ready to pay the cost?

Back when I was in youth group there was this one guy named Matt who used to come pretty regularly. For those of you who weren’t in youth with me, Matt was what you could call a misfit. He had come from a bad family situation, and had done far too many drugs at a young age and had pretty well messed himself really badly. I don’t know his whole story, but I do know he found his way to our church. He had long shaggy dirty hair, and he wore these old ragged jeans, had coke bottle glasses, he wore this way to large jacket for his tiny frame. He had to dismiss himself quite often to go for his smoke breaks. He was always quite shaky, and spoke very slowly, and well, he was pretty slow. I remember wondering even back then what it meant to love him; I remember wondering what our role, as a youth body was to love him. One time we had a worship band retreat; Steve Simpson was up to teach us not only musically but spiritually too. He spoke at our normal Friday youth service and then through out the weekend for our team. I will never forget what he said to us during one of our meetings. He had met Matt and talked with him at the youth service. And he told us that it was our job to love Matt, to embrace him, to include him… He said if we didn’t Matt would be dead within a year. Now I can’t remember if he said dead or if that was the just of it, meaning more spiritually. That fact is inconsequential to my story. That challenged me, and I knew that it would be hard and costly for us to really love Matt…but wow this was a life at stake here. Sadly I don’t think that we rose to the challenge. Sadly I don’t know what happened to Matt, but I am pretty sure we missed our chance to be Gods love personified to a person who was pretty much reeking of need. Were we all just too self-consumed? I don’t know all of what happened but I fear that Matt truly is dead. The memory of Matt has been haunting me lately, and I pray that I do not repeat this sad story with another needy person.

Bringing this all back to recent days, I have been praying that God would give me people to pour out over, to love. There are many people I love, and I pray that I bless many… but I have been challenged that I want to be one who loves the unloved. God has brought a girl into my life who is like another Matt. Her story is a very sad one, and I don’t even know it all. I know that she has been through many different foster homes and now at the age of 16 (might be 17)is living on her own. I know that she has a messed up back, like the spine is way out of whack and causes her to be quite hunched over, and causes her much pain. I know that she was recently sexually assaulted. I know that she is an unloved individual. I know that she is a girl who desperately needs Gods love personified. I don’t know how she first happened upon our church but she showed up at the service my mexico missions team did upon our return. She gave her heart to Jesus that night, and I remember praying with her, getting her number, and crying out to God that she wouldn’t be lost. She is a kind of quiet girl, always early, stands by herself, she is not exactly the easiet girl to talk to. I know that some of the youth girls have tried to befriend her but I am pretty sure that they have already become discouraged and given up. Tonight at rock church I sat with her, as I tried to check up with her on how things have been going, and how she’s been handling things she said not to well, and pulled up her sleeve to reveal to me the bandages on her arm where I assume she has been cutting herself. My spirit weeps for her. I wanted to cry out for her. This poor girl, I wish that I could just erase all the injustice that has happened to her to be wiped away. I prayed a bit for her before she left that night, all the while in my heart praying that she too wouldn’t be lost like Matt. I wondered how all these things good happen to a person, and it is easy to wonder how God could let it happen but I know that this is not the right question. I know that though she may be weeping and crying God is always right there, and he is weeping right along with her. So I know that this has been the longest blog ever but well I had to attempt at putting this into words (though not very well).

What I realized tonight was that maybe, just maybe I am one of the ways God is going to bring freedom to this girl. We were singing “freedom reigns” and I wished it were as easy as just singing a song and asking God to free us. But I knew that when it came to this girl, it was going to take time, and dedication. Often times we pray for our friends or those around us and we ask God to free them, and I totally believe in prayer, but did you ever wonder if maybe God was wanting us to put our prayers inaction. For us to be Gods freedom fighters, not just through our prayers but by how we come alongside of those in need, and give them our legs to stand on until they are strong enough to stand on there own. I commit this day to be legs for this girl, to be Gods love personified for her, to do my best to be a tool to bring freedom to her. God help me. This is easy to say but it is going to take commitment, it is going to take phone calls, it is going to take being her friend even though it is very hard. I don’t want to let this girl die, when life is so near.

I am sorry for the length of this blog, I feel it was important for me to get this out. I don’t feel I totally was able to explain my thoughts, consider it perhaps a sketch of them. Gold stars for those of you who actually read this. I apologize again for being so longwinded. Goodnight.

Postscript… what are you doing to actually love those around you, not just when its easy and fun. What are you doing to assist in freedom and happiness in there lives. I myself am challenged to spend more time on my knees for the many needs around me. If you don’t feel passion to pray, if can’t find yourself really caring(yeah I've been there too), then all the more reason to pray…pray until you get a burden a passion.

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2005-07-14T06:51:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

rainbows!!!

boats and bugs

2005-07-13T23:55:00.000-07:00

boats and bugs
Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

So the only problem with my night walks at the lake were the bugs. Misquitos yes (i have many bites to prove it) but more so Aphids. There were millions and millions of them. But eventually my feelings grew from disgust to more of a special appreciation. When I took this photo they were everywhere... just walking through them I got covered in them, they stuck to my shirt, my face, my mouth...yum. That wasn't pleasent...but they do look cool in the photo.

Remembering.

2005-07-13T23:19:00.000-07:00

Well I am back, and not due to the desperate cries of my fans. I was just away from technology for the past little while, I was at the Sylvan Lake the past two weekends, plus I stayed out a little longer for some of my holiday time. When I wasn’t at the lake I was working super late hours to try and get all my crap done. ANYWAY… alas IM BACK… I don’t really know how to start anything writing cause there is really so much on my cranium. I am going to just start writing about Sylvan Lake and see where that takes me.

Sylvan Lake is my favorite place. I have so much history there, and so many good memories. Summer after summer I have spent quality time at the lake, and I always left feeling like it wasn’t enough. I never really had friends to play with at the Lake, cause contrary to popular belief I am quite shy. This didn’t bother me much, especially as I grew older, I just loved spending time there…I love to reflect at the Lake. Ever since I think about grade 10 I would go off be myself for crazy long walks, and just think and pray, and listen to worship music (id occasionally dance up and down the path if no one was watching). Such good times. The week or two that I would get to spend at the Lake each year were definitely the highlights off my summers. A few years when I was in high school our family ended up being out at Sylvan on the same week that teen camp was going on at Sunnyside. It was kind of a strange feeling to know there were so many teens up there and I didn’t know anyone of them. Actually for quite a few years I have gone in and sat at the back for a few services out of teen camp, but I would normally leave early and then go and sit on my dock by myself and ponder the sermons and how I could really be changed. I wish I could describe those times to you; they were truly special, in the stillness. For lots of people Sylvan Lake holds memories of crazy holy spirit, prophetic times. For me my experiences were and are very different. Sometimes I longed to hear him in that powerful loud way, like so many teens at camp. I often long to hear his voice loud and clear (no discernment required) revealing to me the mysteries of my life. But I have learned (especially this year) to look for God in the little miracles all around me, through the whispers; and as surely as Moses met with God at the burning bush, I too can say I have met with my creator. I have been training my eyes to not just look but see… and wow!

I have seen God all around me, in the rolling waves shining brighter than silver. The artist of the late evening sun has captivated me by the magic light. I have been blessed to witness some of the most amazing skies lately. Seriously they have been breathtaking! On my last drive to the lake it was incredible, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it. I found myself repeating to myself aloud “oh my goodness, oh my goodness” like I was seriously in awe. For one the clouds were amazing, but then this beautiful thing called a rainbow appeared (I could write a whole blog about the rainbows and I might just do that hmm). And then there were two! I had to stop three times on the highway to try and take pictures. I was hyper and giddy off of the beauty surrounding me. By the time I made it to the Lake I was over an hour late and very wet and muddy, but I didn’t care, I was pleased I had seen my maker. I have seen the creative and intricate side of God creations in the gazillions of aphids that dance around like fairies in the setting sun. I heard his song of hope in the voices of the free and carefree birds. I loved the songs of the trees as the wind makes the leaves sway rapidly. I saw him in the calm of the water moving so peacefully, so rhythmically, like silk untouched, undisturbed. I saw God in the vivaciousness and laughter of the innocent children; their smiles reminding me that God does still exist in this corrupt and fallen world. Also how could I not see the master creator in the wonder of my cousins newborn child That child was dearly loved, smothered with love all around, everyone so proud of that baby girl. The babies Father, was just head over heels, he never wanted to let go off her. I couldn’t help but wonder how much more our heavenly father takes great pride and delight in us, his creations. I also saw Gods faithfulness in the lives of my grandparents, parents, and other older relatives. They all have been through, or are going through hard times, but they also all have stories about how God provided, and has never left their side. And how does anything compare to the majesty of thunder, and the beauty of lightening ( I sat on the dock for over an hour just taking in the show).

Though my life remains as complex and confusing as ever, I can surely say that I have heard the voice of my Father, I can say I have seen his face. Indeed that place (sylvan lake) is holy ground.

And I write these things so that I remember, so that in moments when the truth seems so much dimmer, when I am without hope, overcome with grief (for I know harder times are sure to come) I will remember. I must never forget the good things God has done. It is so important that when we have lost all our dreams, when we have strayed from the straight and narrow path, when we are enveloped in depression, that we recollect the faithfulness of God. It is important to go back and remember how he has worked miracles before, having faith that he can do it again. Okay I am going to stop writing for tonight cause my eyes are shutting.

P.S. I love sylvan.

One more real laugh shot

2005-06-30T06:33:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

One more real laugh shot

I might just join the army

2005-06-29T16:31:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne on Buzznet

I might just join the army

.

2005-06-27T08:37:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

Oh he looks all peaceful and quiet here, but let me tell you Kayden was being quite the terror this day. Here is not actually sleeping, he is pretending to be sleeping because he was mad, when he wouldn't get his way, he would stop walking, lie down on the ground and pretend to be sleeping, Jenna and I had to try so hard not to laugh.

The End

2005-06-26T22:55:00.000-07:00

Im on the last page of my current journal, and this is kind of sad. My journals are very special to me, cause they are filled with the documentation of so many things. Hopes,dreams, prophetic words, prayers,worries,random ponderings about God and life. I love finishing a journal and then looking back and seeing how far I've come since the beginnng of that journal. I love making journals for people, some of you know this, because you have received one. Each journal I make I pray about, and ask that God would inspire me and give me something specific for that person, its not something I can rush, there are people I want to make journals for still but I just am waiting for the theme, the concept. I love to make journals for people because I think that writing is so important for people. For me journalling reminds me of where I've been and where Im going. It reminds me that God does answer prayers and that he does have a plan for my life. When I lose focus, or forget about some of my dreams, or when I need to sort things out...my journal is so helpful. I like to write down moments of clarity, because they really are only moments... so fleeting... and so its important for me to document them, so I know they actually happened. My last journal was made for me by my dear friend Ladonna Majeau, who got me started making journals. The journal she made me was quite perfect, mostly words that were themes that ran through my entire journal.The themes were...

It's your life, how do you want to spent it? (lynnel this makes me think of your post...which i really could go on and on about but wont at this present moment)

spirited, confident, loving,expressive,giving,peaceful,caring,playful,free (ok so im still working on this)

It's OK to want more from life. (guys it really is!)

On the inside of the journal she put these words...

You have the right to be free ( this one was especially important to me, It was so cool that she found a magazine with that written in it cause it was perfect for me, cause I totally believe in freedom... infact I even made myself a t-shirt that said that)

The made myself a new journal, as much as I am sad to say goodbye to the old guy the new blank one excites me too. I wonder what kind of adventures/hardships will fill those pages. The themes of my new journal are

Open your eyes and see (thats on the front of the journal)

see beauty
see freedom
see fun (this is on the back of the journal)

Breakthrough (this is on the inside page)

Well this is really not an exciting blog, so I am going to finish it with a good quote from a real author. Its from "blue like jazz" and I know that you all have probably heard enough about this book, but honestly it really does have some intense thoughts.

"if I do not introduce people to Jesus, then I don't believe Jesus is an important person."

Blue Like Jazz, by Don Miller
Page 110

Goodnight.

PostScript- TW you inspired my last blog because when you spoke here, you mentioned that living with intention was good, but that you wanted more, to live deeply. Also I can't believe you met Don Miller, I am only slightly jealous.

.

2005-06-26T14:36:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

This is my dads fathers day card... its posted a little bit late, but here it is nonetheless. See I had to post it because my dad was getting worried when he saw nothing of himself being posted, he was wondering if the people out there even knew I had a dad... well I do have a dad and his name is Popple, and honestly POPPLE wasn't the HERO blog enough for you... (hes so hungry for fame and the spotlight my popple is). Well Father Charles I love you.

In addition to the below post...

2005-06-22T08:09:00.000-07:00

Heres another quote from a John Eldredge book that I just want to add kind of on the lines of my below post.

"God has shown me how to invest even the most mundane activites of my life with holiness"

Im working on that.

Living Deeply.

2005-06-21T22:18:00.000-07:00

I long to live my life with intention, but more than that I long to live my life deeply (thanks TW).

Now that I live like a gazillion miles from anything I have no time to go home after work before I go to church each night. I normally spend this 1-1.5hours at either the gym or reading/reflecting/praying. When I go for the later option I normally do my best to find a nice spot outside where I can enjoy the beauty of the world around me. I’m always on the lookout for new spots, its quite fun discovering new trials, bridges or forests (finding these places bring me so much joy cause then I really am able to feel so far away from the city. Anyway today was a beautiful day, so rather than go work out I opted to wash my car (ewww tons of bugs guts to scrub off) and then go and find a nice place outside to pray and read my bible. So I drove randomly down a street and down an alley and stumbled across this little park that was stuck in between all the back yards. There was one picnic table, a few swings and a bit of other playground junk. So I was listening to my worship mix, and reading a bit in the psalms. I really didn’t have as much time as I would have liked (oh when do I ever I could sit for hours if I had the opportunity) but I’ve learned that even 15minutes can bring me such peace and perspective. On with the story, it was time for me to go if I wanted to make it to prayer on time, I had had a very nice time (though short) but I just couldn’t bring myself to leave quite yet. I looked at the swings excitedly and decided that I would listen to the one worship song I had been playing on repeat all day,(“All I can say” by David Crowder) one more time while on the swing. When the song was up it would be time to go. I haven’t been on a swing in probably about 25 years, so its not like I’m an obsessive swing girl, nope I just had a little girl desire in me rise up and I went for it. Man am I glad I did, what a great time of worship, who knew that 5 minutes on a swing in the sunshine with an anointed song could bring such refreshing, such peace. I swung my little heart out, I felt so free, so grateful to my God, who says that one has to be in church to have worship, cause I tell you I haven’t had many moments of worship like that in my life. The wind was blowing my hair back and the sun was beating down on my face and I was all alone in this park (well at least I think I was, I always wonder what people think when they see me this young woman alone doing the things I do, I don’t really care but I think I am quite unusual). I would close my eyes and just suck in what felt like pure life, it was just me and Jesus playing in the park, living life deeply. When I came to the park my mind was as confused as ever, and when I left had God given me answers to all of my hearts questions? Nope, he sure didn’t, did he bring clarity to the fuzzy picture that is my life? Nope not really, but what did evolve from this encounter with my maker was that I fell deeper in love with him. I was left with a sense of peace and a knowledge that my savior loves me deeply and that he receives my offering of worship, of myself. Here are the lyrics to the song that totally fit how I was feeling…

.Lord Im tired so tired from walking
And lord Im so alone
Lord the dark is creeping in
Creeping up to swallow me
I think Ill stop and rest here awhile.

This is all that I can say right
And this is all that I can give
And that’s my everything
And this is all that I can say right now
and I know its not much this all that I can give,
and that’s my everything.

Did you see me crying
Did you hear me call your name
Wasn’t it you I gave my heart too
Wish you would remember where you set it down

Didn’t notice you were standing here
Didn’t know that was you holding me
Didn’t notice you were crying too
Didn’t know that was you washing my feet

In those few moments on that swing I truly felt like I was giving God my everything…strange I know.
I wish I could really better embellish this moment of bliss, but I am not could with similes and descriptive words. But seriously it was amazing. I also know that God was pleased with my offering of worship, with our playtime. I don’t know why I am sharing all of this with you guys, I also love taking time when im in the park all alone to pick up a expired dandelion and blow it and watch all of the parts float away, too me I love watching a young couple with there little girl roll down the hill, high on life. I think a part of living deeply is looking for the beauty of God in the little things. I long to live deeply, and I know that there is so much to living deeply, but I just feel that often times this is the kind of stuff that gets overlooked, that people don’t even think about. But it is important for me to be like a child and to take time to be captivated by the beautiful simplicity of little things.Living life deeply will look different Im sure from person, but heres a glimpse of what it looks like to me, you may think Im a bit of a geek (please if your gonna mock me at least of the guts to not do it anonymously) but you know you want to go find some swings now, you know its ture. So anyone want to go to the park?

Mwah ha ha

2005-06-17T13:48:00.000-07:00

I always plan on blogging the funny incidents that are a regular part of my life, but I always find myself so overwhelmed with thoughts that to me are of more consequence… so then I don’t get around to blogging them. Don’t get me wrong its not that laughter isn’t important… it totally is. So today I will try to keep my heart serious stuff to a minimum.

I don’t really like to recommend music on my blog, but I want to recommend Amos Lee to you all. I bought this cd for $9.99 in Canadian funds, that’s some good value; I am currently listening to this cd, and was overlooking the lyrics and stuff of his songs and am very impressed. I feel like blogging about at least 3 of the songs, or at least posting some of the lyrics. Some of you may not dig this type of music and that’s ok, but to me this music is the goods, if you don’t agree with me I can still respect you. The one song that I have been putting on repeat over and over again today is “soul suckers” and here’s the line that really hits home for me, its ringing over and over again in my head.

“nothing is more powerful than beauty in a wicked world
play it girl, play it girl”

I think this is kind of like my motto for my life, and I’m not talking about me being Americas next top model, nope I am not. For one I am not American and for two I am no model. Anyhow, I just think that the beauty that is the cross, that is the love of God, is the most powerful weapon. What blows me away is that because I am a child of Father God, I have this beauty within me! And I want my life to be one that paints this black and white world with such vibrant colors. I want to be one that gives life and beauty wherever I go, not a vain outward beauty, but the beauty of the one who is my savior, my friend. I hope that you all realize the power you have to offer this hurting world, please offer freely your beauty, your life.

Now this story is now so beginning of June, but see Kristin really has been getting on my case to share her embarrassing moments with the world. Why? I am really not sure why she wants me to expose her…you can ask her that. Well back when she came to visit me in Edmonton, we (her friend Angela, herself and I) went to eat at the Olive Garden. The girls went early to try to get us a seat, and I was so concerned cause I was so late to meet them there, but when I got there 15minutes after I had said I would probably arrive. The girls were still sitting in the waiting area. By the time our table for three was ready the girls had already been at the restaurant for about an hour, as we were sauntering over to our table, a man asked in a slightly humorous tone if he could have our table. We of course laughed politely and continued on to our table. Once seated, everything was going fine and dandy (besides the do you have any “ideas” caper) we waited an eternity to get our food and what not, luckily they stuff you with yummy salad and breadsticks first. Anyway about 45minutes after we had sat down, Kristin all of sudden screams (well more like related in an excited fashion) “ I should have offered the guy $50 bucks in exchange for our table” and she was laughing like a lunatic. Angela and myself kind of glance at each other and are like what is she talking about? Then she filled us in that she would have been sooooo witty if she had thought to tell the guy who asked for our table that he could have had it for $50. It’s not really that funny but what is funny is that she thought of her comeback so much later and was not able to let it go all night. All night she lived in regret of a witty comment coming too late. Well Kristin you need to be a bit quicker.

Also another short Kristin story, well we were talking and then Kristin was like “ohhh yeah well that’s not really my ball of cheese”… well for those of you how aren’t smart, its supposed to be “oh yeah well that is not really my cup of tea”. Well again maybe it’s not funny to you but it was really funny to me, I was just a chucking it. Wait a second maybe it was me and not Kristin who said that…hmmmm… sorry Kristin, I just thought it seemed a lot more believable if you said it and not me.

Yesterday was a great day, it was beautiful outside and I was able to allow my skin to continue to bronze up, guys I am so dark, I am practically black, I think I may be browner than my brown friends (I sure hope so), my Edmonton friends may not even recognize me. Anyway it was also a great day cause of all the events I enjoyed. I got to shoot alpacas in the morning (they are like llamas) they are so funny looking but cute, there were new born baby alpacas too that were ADORABLE. I love farms, and animals. Anyways alpacas are just hilarious creatures. Then I got to shoot Jenna and Kayden (the cutest kid in the world). This was hard hard work, that kid is stubborn, but what a character. I had so much fun regardless of the spazes… and he did tell me that he likes me and that I was his best friend! YES! Gold star for me. We went on the train at Kinsmen Park and the merry-go-ride I was trying to take pictures but well he wasn’t exactly thrilled with the camera, it was a challenge. Regardless it was a great time, and I am always thrilled to have quality time with Jenna. Jenna your great, I am privileged to know you.

I did another shoot for Chantelle Kinzel in the afternoon; she’s graduating this year…what happened to all my old little youth girls. Everyone’s growing up. It was nice to spend time with that beautiful girl.

In the evening I was going to be shooting some of my friends but then the weather didn’t lend itself to a very conducive shooting environment. So the boys decided to go play poker (what is with boys these days and they’re poker). I was fine with that really cause then I got quality time with LYNNEL (she’s so cool). I made her go and chase a sunset with me, and I was enjoying the night lights… night light is simply magical to me. Anyway that was fabulous and I think I got some good shots of the skyline and some bridges and a lamppost. Seriously guy’s shots of lampposts are great. Besides the mosquitoes eating me alive, it was a great night to be outdoors. And a great sky too! Saskatchewan land of the living skies! SO TRUE. After I made her go night shooting with me, we went out for coffee and had great conversation. I was glad we got that time to break it down. Lynnel don’t forget about your homework.

Anyway now today is calling me to accomplish stuff so its over and out for now. And a special happy birthday belated to Kayle!!!

Is Ignorance bliss?

2005-06-15T07:53:00.000-07:00

It is strange how when I am visiting my parents I all of a sudden become absentminded. After being in Saskatoon less than a day I had already lost two things… what is wrong with me. Also my room is a mess… and I don’t mean a Kristy-Anne mess, like my cloths are out of their proper color co-ordination, nooo I mean like I have a whole stack of clothes unfolded in a pile on the FLOOR (shock, gasp, disbelief)! I also tend to be extremely exhausted at home, cause its hard work for me not having to work more than full time hours here, its hard work having a mom make me dinner and a father who helps me carry my camera gear. I am constantly left feeling somnolent.

People should read more, (as long as you pick the right books) because reading helps me know that I am not alone in my insanity or sanity. Not that I want to be just like everyone else, but I do often find that I end up conveniently reading just the right book for a particular moment in my life. So many times when reading, things just totally hit home, and help parallel ideas that I have been searching independently, or shed more light on the questions I have been asking myself. Sometimes it is months later that a quote I wrote down earlier really attacks me. P lease read (but read good books, ask for my help if need be, but read).

An excerpt taken from one of the books I currently have on the go entitled “Name of the Rose”

“Then we are living in a place abandoned by God,” I said disheartened.
“Have you found any places where God would have felt at home?” William asked me, looking down from his great height.
Then he sent me to rest. As I lay on my pallet, I concluded that my father should not have sent me out into the world, which was more complicated than I had thought. I was learning too many things.

This is how I feel so often these days. I wrote a poem about it once, I would include it if I had the poem with me now, but alas I don’t…so my thoughts will have to do. Growing up is good, but painful, I miss the days of my youth and ignorance. Growing up is slightly tragic because it exposes so many painfully horrible truths, and destroys so many of our idealistic viewpoints. I think too much, I watch too much, I explore too much and the more I do all this the more I realize we live in an imperfect world. Once in my life I thought that all of my friends and myself would actually do all of the things we dreamed off. Once in my I thought that churches were good and safe and were functioning perfectly. Once in my life I thought that life would make more sense when I got older, that the pieces would begin to fit together and I would know that I was exactly where I needed to be. Yep so I was quite wrong, and sometimes I wish I could go back and shut my eyes and not see the fact that the church is filled with so many rotting Christians, their stenches turning off the wounded and the needed. I wish I could like wake up and be back in a world of ideals and simplicity, in a world where pastors weren’t stumbling all around me, in a world where I was not concerned that all the churches around me may be falling apart. I wish I could go back sometimes to the moments when my friends and I were all young and innocent with big dreams… instead of being stuck in a world where it seems like everyone has forgotten their dreams, and are wondering how their souls got way out here. But alas I can’t go back. Ignorance is bliss but really in retrospect I am happy, I find that by being made aware of all of life’s imperfections I am stirred up even more to seek God and ask him how I am to go about living in this world. I hope that by being more and more exposed to the deep pains of this world, I will be only that more eager to be ready to bandage and help bring life. I could not be making sense to anyone but myself…but I do hope that somebody is getting a bit of what I’m trying to sort out. I am happy to know what I know, but sometimes I know it would be so much easier to not feel…to go back to a place of naivety.

For example, with friends, I truly do want my friends to feel like they can share anything with me, even the dirty rotten truth, and I pray they know I won’t judge them and will love them all the same. Sometimes it hurts to hear the truth, I want to believe that they wouldn’t have made choices they have made, whether it be drugs, turning their back on God or a number of other things. Is it better to be in a place where one is unaware, It could be easier, nicer, at times to not get involve, but I would say that I would rather know, even though I am sometimes disappointed in them, but this is mostly only because I want so much more for them. I believed in them so much, more than I believed in myself… I thought they would be that person they dreamed of being. If 8 years ago you had asked me where I thought some of my friends would be… it would definitely not be where they are today… I believe in you guys… I want you to succeed, and I want to see you reaching the dreams you once had for yourselves. Bringing it back around… I am glad that my friends would reveal their true selves to me; I respect them for being honest.

I am learning too many things…and I love this and hate it…It is so bittersweet. I think however that by becoming more aware of the imperfections of the world, I can somehow more fully enjoy and appreciate life’s little beauties and blessings.

I need an editor cause I don’t make sense, or maybe I do but an editor would maybe help make me flow better. Goodnight.

Some thoughts.

2005-06-12T23:14:00.000-07:00

I am currently in the ever so cool, yet incredibly flat, Saskatoon Saskatchewan. I now have a new favorite thing, its called cruise control. A feature I have never before had the leisure of enjoying on a vehicle before. Before departing to Saskatoon I made sure to read my cars instruction manual to make sure that I was properly educated on the how tos of cruise control. I was partial excited and partial nervous for my first road trip with my new car (which still remains nameless… any suggestions?), so anxious was I to get on the highway to try out the cruise control (as a random aside my mom made me promise to get eight hours of sleep before I left…I tried really hard I didn’t quite make it though don’t tell her though… I only got 7.45hours). So off I go (with my coffee and my tunes a blaring)… and I’m on the highway and I’m ready to try this feature…and at first when I set the cruise I was taken aback… the car felt possessed or something. I don’t really know what I was expecting but really I wasn’t prepared for this, so I was very tightly gripping the steering wheel to make sure I was still partially in control. Eventually I was able to loosen up a bit and then I was all about the cruise for it allowed me to sing louder, think clearer, and more thoroughly enjoy the incomparable beauty of the prairies (yes I did say beauty it really is beautiful, if you don’t agree well then maybe I’ll beat you up). I was pretty much giddy with excitement not only was I going HOME…but I was also getting the privilege of seeing the precious and unbelievably amazing Alison!

As soon as I got to Saskatoon I quickly unpacked and did some preliminary short greetings with Bob and Popple, and then rushed off to meet Alison. When I saw her it was like I pretty much didn’t know what to do with myself I was just beside myself with excitement (ex·cite·ment n 1.the feeling or condition of lively enjoyment or pleasant anticipation 2.something that engages people’s attention or emotions in a lively and compelling way). I picked her up from her up from the mall and when she got in my car it was like I didn’t know what to do or say, where to start, and so much to say but knowing I had to still get us somewhere. We opted to go to starbucks, really the best place to go if one has excessive amounts of information to exchange. Anyway I don’t really know how to express how valuable that time was with her, but lets just say if I would have had to return to Edmonton after the three hours we spent together, it would have been a worthwhile trip. For those of you who don’t know her, (and I truly pity you) Alison was a youth leader at Elim (my church in Saskatoon) when I was just a young lass. She was one of a kind, and she quickly worked her way into the hearts of many of the youth girls. I The time, the prayers, the love that Alison so freely lavished upon us girls was not in vain, she was a constant encouragement and was an excellent mentor. She set an example for us girls, and so thankful that God brought her into my life. I wish I could do her justice with my words, but honestly I can’t, read Lynnel’s blog, she does a much better job of honoring her. Alison though she was our youth leader, she was also our friend, and she didn’t make us feel just like “work” to hang out with (well for the most part…cause sometimes we were impossible). Well to put this long paragraph to an end I just wanted to let Alison know that I was so happy to get to see you, and as usual I was inspired and encouraged by your wise words. I would not be who I am today If it weren’t for you (and I mean that in a good way) and I pray that now that I am a youth leader I too can impact lives for the glory of God like you impacted so many of our lives when you were our leader. Thank You Alison. I hope you were able to find a little of what you were looking for during your short stay in Saskatoon.
Now I want to return to my drive home to Saskatoon. The night before I left I was informed that a friend of many of my friends had just died in a car accident that week. The young woman was on her way to Winnipeg to pick up her wedding dress and celebrate her birthday when she lost control and flipped her vehicle and died. She had just completed her nursing degree this year and was due to be married in just a few short weeks. I do not personally know the girl but know of her and her fiancé, and yet, this tragic event has been haunting me. My whole drive home I could not get this event out of my mind, my heart goes out to all those effected… how does one cope with this? How does her fiancé go on? And I know that God is still good and in control, but I just wish I knew what kind of advice he would have to share with the grieving family and friends. And it makes my faith seem so simple and fake, of course its easy for me to say God is good, I have never had to look such an extreme circumstance right in the face, and through such pain still have to say, yes God though you took the love of my life away, you are still good. In talking with some of her friends the one consolation is that she was a Christian and so we know that she is in a better place (but even that sounds like such empty words in the midst of such grief…though I “know” it to be true). But all of this got me also to thinking about how many of my friends are dead or are dying spiritually I wonder right now how many of my friends if they had died in that car accident, how many of them would be ready to meet their maker. This breaks my heart but I know that there are quite a few who would not be prepared. I’m kind of sorry if I’m making some of my readers uncomfortable while you read this, but well really its kind of too important. I pray that I am wrong; I pray that all of you know Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and savior (its not the same thing to know about him as it is to “know” him). If right now you are not right with God, I urge you to invite him in, whether it is for the first time or the 49th time. Death is real, we can’t prevent it, and we really can never know when it will happen. And death is so final; there are no second chances. What’s holding you back from the arms of a loving and gracious Father (cause I can assure you his arms are wide open)?

Well I have many funny little moments to blog about so hopefully I will get to that tomorrow, but now, I must sleep. Buenos noches.

The gift of you

2005-06-08T08:12:00.000-07:00

So I finally got a dustbuster thinking that this would help solve all my “friends” issues…but unfortunately there are some elements I overlooked in the making of my plan (my plan to rid my temporary living conditions of all evil bugs). I kind of forgot how much noise a dustbuster makes, so the problem with that is that I live with my aunt, and well she goes to bed like most people do, and the big issue for me is that the bugs… or should I say the Stanley’s and Walters usually show up in the wee hours of the night. So now I have the dustbuster just sitting ready to suck up all those evil grosses however they are smart, and so they stare at me in the midnight hour and its as if they are taunting me saying” hahaha you know you can’t suck us now… or you’ll wake your aunt and her silly dog” .I wonder if it is better to rid the house of these creatures, or to rid my aunt of her sleep. Also I have discovered mysterious marks on my body which I am convinced are my little friends (some of them are getting very big now) are attacking me in my sleep.

So now on to some deeper thoughts… I will start with a quote that I restumbled upon, and have been reading a lot lately, I wrote it down from a book I read, or maybe listened to on cd (unabridged…its an awesome way to multitask, learning and working at the same times its awesome! Can anyone say geek?)…And I didn’t write down what books its from but its either “wild at heart” or “awaken the dead” by John Eldredge. Anyway here it is…

“ I desperately want to be who I am, I don’t want the glory that I marvel at in others anymore. I want to be the glory that God set in me.”

Well I think that is a lot of how I have been feeling lately, for so long in my life I have crippled myself by constantly comparing myself to other people, feeling like I never measured up. Always wishing to be a bit more like that person and a bit like that person, really wanting nothing of myself, thinking I was useless. But God has been showing me that I AM special, that I AM cool, that I HAVE worth, and that he feels that way about ME, Kristy-Anne! I have really always “known” this, but it is really only more recently that I have begun to embrace all of my quirky weird and unique ways. I was doing the world little good when I was caught up in trying to be more like her, or him. Allowing myself to be the GIRL (yes I did say girl, yes and if I had more time I’d highlight that word in bright pink too) God created me to be is quite freeing! I am passionate about finding out who that girl truly is, and am having a really great time (for the most part…getting through some of the deep stuff is not always pretty) discovering my unique makeup. One of the best things I can offer the world is me, a Kristy-Anne that is true to the heart that God has put inside of her. No one else has the piece of Gods heart that I have. No one else can offer the world what I have to offer; so I am going to quite trying to be or do something else, cause somebody else is already doing that. I know I will shine brighter, and bring life to more dead places, and set more captives free by being Kristy-Anne Charissa Glubish, daughter and warrior of the most high God, than by being anything else. I am not completely successful at this, but alas another one of those works in progress things. But I do have to say, its fun being me (tiring, but fun).

So I challenge you to bless the world by being uniquely you!

A bit about my weekend.

2005-06-06T13:23:00.000-07:00

So much to everyone’s surprise my life has been fairly jam-packed and running over with stuff lately…(gasp, shock I know) but it has been filled with many great and wonderful things (and some not so great things as well).

I shot a wedding on Friday, it was a very long day, and I didn’t get home till after 12 that is a long workday! But they were my friends Dave and Berrie, and they are very cool people very funky so I was able to have a lot of fun with the pictures. We went on the roof of Vanguard college (the bible school they both attend, and its like a totally old school brick 4 story? Old structure) and we brought a leather black couch out, and in the distance there was the city skyline. It was supposed to rain that day, but once again, God answered my prayers and it really only rained when we were driving too and fro… and so the weather ended up being perfect for pictures, nice soft diffused light and the clouds were quite moody for some of the roof shots. Some may say its coincidence about the rain but I don’t think so, its happened to many times like this for me to believe its coincidence. I haven’t really looked at the shots yet but for the first time in my life I think I did a good job. Yeah. Maybe I like weddings after all?

Saturday, I had to work all day and I was dead dog tired, I sure did not want to get up in the morning, and my voice was all scratchy, and it wasn’t like I just got to go sit a my computer and do finger exercises of pressing the mouse and keys, in my own little world (like I usually get to, grownup coloring that’s all it is anyone can do it right). NOOOO I had to do this big, gong show of a photo shoot. OH MY WORD. I could go on and on about how it was not my favorite thing in the world but instead I will focus in on one beautiful moment from the shoot. Okay so Ill start by letting you all know that one of the coolest things about being a photographer is meeting so many diverse and special people. In my travels I have been truly blessed by many of the individuals I have met. On Saturday I met a very special lady, her name was Betty Miller, she was probably around 70 years old, but she was amazingly young at heart. She was not some stiff uptight old lady, she was crazy and fun, and was making me laugh so hard…When I got the pleasure of shooting her I would often have to take breaks to regain my composure she was so funny. But later in the day when I was just shooting her and a girl a bit younger than I and another lady she was just telling us a bit about her life, and that was a real blessing. She shared about how she had been really sick with cancer about a year ago and had almost died, she went through extreme amounts of chemo treatment and that in itself nearly killed her. Also her husband had passed away I think about a year or two ago, leaving her to face many battles on her own. Anyway her courage and strength through these situations alone is impressive, but the way she talked about how God and how he was her strength really is a testimony. She also went on to share how her she had learned that life is too short to take things to seriously, one must enjoy life while you its still possible. She said that so often we get ourselves so busy that we don’t have time to enjoy the little blessings that God has given us. She said many things while I was taking her photograph and she really was an encouragement to my soul. At the same time however she said that she was just so blessed to have been able to come out on this day to be a part of this photo shoot. She said it was nice to be around some young people, makes her feel young again, and she just kept on repeating how much fun it was for her. Well that too made me happy cause so often when I am doing photo shoots I feel so bad for the models thinking to myself “ oh man they must be having the worst time”. But here was Betty just feeling so elated and alive because she was able to be apart of our photo shoot. This made me happy, and made the whole gong show of a photo shoot worthwhile. I love listening to old people share about there lives, when they say that God has been faithful to them it holds a lot more clout then when I say it.

Kristin and Jenna Eagle were in my little town for the weekend because Jenna was here for a wedding. I got to have Supper with Kristin and her friend Angela on Saturday night, what a pleasure, and oh the laughs. Well Kristin did give me permission to share some stories about supper but I figured I didn’t really want to expose how much of a blonde she can be to the world, so I decided not to post anything…but of course I changed my mind. So my favorite Kristin blonde moment of the weekend was when we finally got seated at the olive garden (Kristin and Angela waited for about an hour to get us seats) our server offered us a sample of wine (not a glass or a bottle just a little sample) so we said yes. The waiter, or should I say server, (I believe that is the more correct term…am I right) asked us if we had our Ids well Kristin pipes up very loudly and quickly “No” and we both look at her and are like…what are you talking about? She continues to say yeah no, I have no ideas, Angela says “isn’t it in your purse?” and our server is kind of just standing there not knowing what to say… Then Kristin finally gets it, he wants our Ids, see she thought he said ideas…like do you have any ideas about supper…what you want to order… Okay so I’m not sure if this story translates very well into writing, but honestly it was so funny, the waiter thought she was so dumb I am sure (haha but I know your not dumb Kristin and all you people out there reading this Kristin is a very smart girl she was top student in some of her classes). Our waiter came back later and was trying to be funny and get a tip and was like “so do we have an ideas?” Not funny.

Another funny story (well funny to me and the girls), after we picked up Jenna from the wedding she was attending and got back (it took us awhile to find the place, not because I am bad with directions but because it was a very weird street thing. Anyway we finally got back to the hotel at like 10:45 and we decided to go see how late the pool would be open (I was pretty sure that the pool would be closed but they sure didn’t ask for my opinion) so we went on what ended up being this super long trek like it was seriously like a ten minute walk through our hotel and then it looked like we were in the wrong place… it was very strange it looked like we were in a big warehouse and then we took the wrong turn and we were all of a sudden hearing that an event was going on and it turned out that it was a funeral. A funeral, not funny, but weird very strange that it was going on in this strange place that looked like a warehouse and that it was happening at like 11pm. Okay so then we turned back and found the right entrance that really didn’t look like a proper entrance at all I’ll have to find you a picture of it to help you understand. And then of course we learned that the pool was already closed. Great so then back on the long hike back to our room (it’s a good thing I like walking). Also funny was the fact that there was this wedding going on, and the window to our room overlooked the wedding. The wedding was like so 80s and there were like 8 people dancing at a time, and really didn’t seem like a very exciting wedding but the music sure was loud. Kristin at around 11:15 was getting annoyed with the music so she spent about 5 minutes (no joke) trying to figure out how to reach front desk to politely ask how much longer the music would continue on for. Oh and one more thing, before I showed up at the hotel, like before we went to pick up Jenna, Kristin and Angela were lying on the floor with the lights off in there room with the curtains open so they could watch the wedding…silly silly girls. Of course there were many other laughs that weekend. Like say how Jenna forgot to bring everything… well not everything I have to commend her for bringing her toothbrush (she never remembered that growing up). No razor, shaving gel, toothpaste, brush, contact solution, face wash, moisturizer, deodorant, I’m sure there’s more things she forgot I just can’t remember them all. She really is funny, it was fun to see that she was still the girl I once knew, like she is so grown up in so many ways but it was fun to see that part of her. Besides its not often that she is without her cutest little boy, Kayden, so she was allowed to be absentminded. When she’s looking after Kayden she really has to be all responsible and forgets nothing for him, she really is a great mom. It was nice to see her be able to just kick back and relax and act her age.

That’s all for now, but man am I glad I have something to look forward to this week or else I think I would have a really hard time getting up in the morning,

Crimped Hair is COOL!

2005-06-02T15:09:00.000-07:00

So way back in grade 10, when nobody was crimping their hair, I began to crimp my hair. I say that I thought and actually still think that it looked cool, oh man people wished they could be me, im sure they did, my crimped hair did not look like the poodle fluff of the 80s and 90s nope it was wicked. Not only did it look cool, (I got many compliments) but it was also low maintenance, no work for three days! Can we talk about goodness? THATS GOODNESS (im all about not doing my hair whenever possible). Anyway so one time I was at church with crimped hair, and Tina came up to me and said, "Kristy-Anne get a clue, crimped hair thats so not cool". OUCH. I was almost crushed. But I think shes wrong, maybe on some people it isn't cool, but I believe I can rock the crimped hair and will till im at least 30. I mean Im still crimping it these days and its fabulous, I mean Im now letting it sit for four days without washing it! THATS WHAT I CALL AWESOME. I have such hippy undertones, kind of like some perfumes have vanilla or licorice undertones, i have hippy undertones...the crimped hair well its just a part of that i think. Anyway, maybe im wrong. Maybe I need to move on past the crimped hair, (maybe i should wash my hair...like right now?) but in my mind, its cool...so there TINA. So maybe i need some feedback...is it time to throw away the crimper? Is it time for me to get a grip on reality and realize crimping my hair was never a good thing to do? I need some help here... COMMENTS PLEASE!

TINA CRIMPED HAIR IS COOL!

2005-06-02T08:04:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne

TINA CRIMPED HAIR IS COOL!
This is me with a girl from my small group, she is very cool. She is in grade9 but looks a lot older.

Family

2005-06-02T07:30:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Family
More proof that crimped hair is awesome...?

Crimped hair.

2005-06-02T05:28:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Crimped hair.
Crimped hair is cool

Stanleys and Walters and other stuff.

2005-05-31T08:12:00.000-07:00

So there is some late and breaking news I would like to share with you folk, you Saskatoon folk are the only ones who it really applies too, but I know that the rest of you will be excited about this as well (right? And if not pretend you are). So in about a week and a half the Kristy-Anne Charissa Glubish is coming home to Saskatoon for a bit over a week!

*pauses waits for readers to get a grip*

Yes it’s so very true, your dreams are going to become a reality because I am coming home. Please feel free to plan me many parties, like welcome home parties, and then so long farewell parties for when im about to leave again, or even like a hip hip hooray Sumos cool party, all of those would be okay with me. I really really want to hit Baileys on Tuesday night (that is the night they have live jazz right?) so I expect you all to have it free to hang out with me. Also if you all would like to have flowers waiting for me, streamers streaming and signs a painted to welcome me home that would be okay too, please just contact my agent, bob…aka mom. So yes it’s exciting I know. I can’t wait to see you hicks.

In other news, my “friends”, the spiders and the other unknown mystery bug, have been multiplying it seems daily. Also I have mystery marks on my body that I think may be in direct relation to the underground spider clan. I have also decided to refer to the spiders in my house as Stanleys, and the mystery bugs as Walters. The other day I actually had a spider crawling up my leg, (yes inside the safety, or so I thought, of my temp home). This is not acceptable. I am thinking I might need to get some theme music to help pump me up to kill all the grosseess… maybe like something like lets get ready to rumble…or a slogan like “just do it” any ideas? This is all really hard for me. I also need to get that dust buster and quick. Oh the stresses of life.

So YC was this past weekend and it was very good, but very tiring, cause I was pretty much always on the go from venue to venue to catch almost every event (I was the YC official photographer). I honestly however had a lot of fun; it was nice to see a lot of people I haven’t seen in a while. Also I met some new people, and even some band members. I decided that I do love doing concert photography, especially when the lights are as good as they are at a big event like that. I know that I would not really enjoy YC, as much if I were an usher or just a random person attending, I just loved taking the photos. Even when I knew I probably had way too many photos I still just couldn’t help myself. My two favorite concerts were Delirious and Mat Kearney. Delirious I loved, but of course that’s no surprise, but I heard a few people say that there show wasn’t as exciting as usual, and well maybe so, but should that matter? What I thought was really cool was how they were all wearing matching black pin striped suits and maybe I was reading into this, but what I got out of it was that they were like don’t look at us, its not about us, its about God and praising him. To me there’s wasn’t a “show” and I like that. Mat Kearney I had never heard of before YC (sadly), when I read his profile, my eyes locked in on the word acoustic, and I was like man I must see this guy. So anyway he was very very good, it is refreshing to have a Christian artist do something unique, its kind of hard to describe his music, but its very good, and I encourage you to check him out. So yeah being the hotographer (its fun to remove the p from that word…right Lynnel) I had a few moments of feeling like a celebrity myself. Another highlight of the weekend was seeing DEAR LYNNEL. How I do adore her, our visits were short and awkward to schedule, but always enjoyable, funny and insightful (that kids pretty wise!). I look forward to seeing her again soon!!! Maybe ill get to see Kristin and Jenna this coming up weekend.

So I went to Millcreek Ravine after work to sit on a hill in the beautiful sunshine (have I ever mentioned that I love the sun cause if I haven’t then let it be noted right now that I do!!! LOTS!!!) And read my bible and think. Some people may argue that I think too much so why would I need to spend more time doing that. Well here’s what I say to that… When I take the time to just sit and reflect and process my thoughts, unrushed that, is when I start to have clarity and purpose for my life. It is in the specific dates I have alone that I am able to work through the fast paced chaotic thoughts I have stored from days and days of accumulated thoughts. I believe that yes God is speaking to me through out me day, but again I need to take that time out, to really think, to really break it down, (or rather let God break it down). I think to many people chose to ignore there thoughts, to ignore what God is trying to speak to them about, work out in them. It may be easier at the time, in fact it may always seem easier, but I believe that it can also cripple a person from living the deeper more exciting (scary too) life. Anyone have any thoughts.

Question for you all… (Some of you may have already answered so don’t feel like you need to answer again) If I were a color what color would you say I am?

Adios all you super-so-super cool wicked awesome people!

La teeee daaaa

2005-05-28T22:02:00.000-07:00

Sometimes life really confuses me, let me rephrase that, life is always confusing too me, especially right now ( Im not saying thats bad Im just stating a fact).

A bit about me.

2005-05-28T10:08:00.000-07:00

“You can do anything you want to do, what is rare is the actual wanting to do a specific thing; wanting it so much that you are practically blind to all other things, that nothing else will satisfy you. “

This is a quote from one of my very most favorite books in the world, entitled “ My name is Asher Lev by Chaim Potok (I loved this book so much that I read it twice in one year and it is by no means a short book). This is a quote that I have kept on my magnet board (previously a bulletin board) for over 4 years now, ever since I moved to Edmonton. Anyhow for I would read this quote over and over, and knew this quote applied to me but always figuring it was supposed to be in regards to my photography, but I would be a liar to say that this is actually how I feel about photography. As I would dwell on this quote I would wished that I could make myself feel that way about photography, I love my job it is great, but still. I have often felt like such a poser, feeling guilty that photography wasn’t more of a consuming passion. Id look at other “artists” and watch how excited they’d be about the arts and wished I could be like that. I do have a passion to create beauty and a desire to be a part of redeeming the arts for God, uggghhh what am I trying to say…

Okay so here it is, I was reading over this quote again the other day and it dawned on me, this quote is applicable to my life not in terms of photography but it is exactly for me and has been for me I just didn’t see it, its in regards to my heart for “ministry”. I have had such a longing to do the things of God in a fuller capacity all my life, when I say ministry I realize that yes we are all called to minister in our particular vocations, but for me it is more, I feel “called” to the ministry, ( I don’t know in what exact dimension yet but that’s ok,,, oh the control freak in me wishes I could know the whole picture) not just being a youth leader, or on the prayer team (all good things, but I long for more). I did want to do photography but it has in a way been quite hard for me at times, when so much of me just wanted to go off to bible school or dedicate my life to the church (after my first year of photo school I so wanted God to audibly speak to me and tell me it was okay to quit photography and go to bible school), but I see Gods hand so much now in it all. It was so funny that so many of my friends from Edmonton go (or did go) to bible school, sometimes hearing them talk about Bible school my insides would swell up so much inside I think id burst, I wanted to scream cause I wanted to be doing that so much. If they would be complaining about a course or the work they were doing it was hard for me to listen compassionately cause I so wanted to be in there shoes. You might be wondering if I wanted this so bad why didn’t I just go to bible school? Well it has a lot to do with timing, if I wouldn’t have gone to NAIT when I did I never would have got this wicked awesome job, and I believe that this job I am currently in is the place where I am supposed to be right now, I believe that this is a job I will continue to work at for a long time still just not in a full time capacity, and I believe it will help finance whatever else im doing. I believe that also I will be able to use my photography and arts in many ways, throughout my life.

I have been one who has gone after my dreams, succeeding with my photography is one of the dreams I am watching come true, but one of the dreams I have had to put on the shelf for a long time is going to bible school, to more fully equip myself for whatever ministry I might be apart of. But heres the exciting part, this summer I am taking my first bible school course correspondance with my dear popple. And in the fall I am planning to take two courses at the Bible college here, I am so excited, it is cool how I feel God is leading me in this direction now and saying to me that now my daughter, now is the time. Yipee!!! So I am stoked, really really excited, I can’t believe Im going back to school! YEAH.

In Conclusion, Nothing else will satisfy me rather than God and being a part of the things of God (including being a part of the worldwide takeover of God).

Untitled

2005-05-27T10:02:00.000-07:00

So it is far to0 late for me to be blogging, but my mind is racing and I am hoping that by getting a thought or two down in writing I might just be able to sleep.

One thing I hate really lots is wasted potential. Yes that’s right, wasted potential. I am not sure why I am writing about this, and I am not going to go on for long about this, but it really is hard to watch. There are so many gifted people out there, and when I say out there, I don’t mean globally (although there are) but I’m even referring to people I know. This is not to beat up on anyone, for I realize in many ways I am wasting some of my own potential (or should I say Gods potential for my life?). But what is it that is holding people back? I can look back to my high school years, when we were young enough to be able to dream big, without really having to do anything about it. So many of the people I knew were gifted beyond reason, and I’m not just meaning that oh somebody was brilliant mathematically or a genius behind a camera (oh wait that’s me… jj) but even in terms of their abilities to love or comfort other people. I was convinced that together we could change the world, and I pray if we properly cultivate the gifts God has given us maybe we still can. I hate watching my friends turn from God, that breaks my heart (I just threw that in there for free). I hate watching people I love and believe in not believe in themselves. I find it sad that people all around them will have so much faith in that person and would do anything for that person and yet that person doubts there worth. I wish I could just tell them how special they are and how God has put so much potential within them that he wants to use for great and amazing things. I don’t think that any of this is making sense, I could write and take this about twelve point four ways and I am just far to tired to try and make my thoughts cohesive. I guess what I am trying to say through this blog is that don’t doubt yourself, don’t hold back (even if you are scared beyond reason, even if you think you have nothing to offer). No I don’t know if this is what I am trying to say. Well my attempt to write today was pointless, maybe somebody will get something out of this, consider this a really really really rough draft.

...

2005-05-26T11:45:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

Yes I was in the wedding.

"Friends"

2005-05-26T08:14:00.000-07:00

Still have a lot of unsorted thoughts on my mind (yeah when do I not) so we’ll see if I actually get to anything of relevance today. To start off I just want to write a bit about my new living conditions. I am temporarily living with my aunt on the south side of the city; in September I will be moving in with Amy Wagner. Now when I first moved into my aunt’s place last Monday, I was under the impression that it would be just her, her miniature dashound and me, her upstairs and me in the basement. Well I was wrong, and I wished I had forewarned. Before I moved in there were some who already considered the basement their home. Yes its true there are many a creepy crawlers in the basement here. I’m not really a big fan of the bugs, now outdoors its not big deal, they keep to themselves I keep to myself but indoor it’s a different story. So since I have been here I have had to share my space with these grosseees. Daily I have been forced to live with these guys. I am kind of a private person so I really don’t like them invading my space. At first I thought maybe we could all be friends, I mean they were there first, but I just can’t do it. I try to kill at least one a day but there are some that I just let be, I just don’t have the heart to kill them all. That or I just don’t have the mental strength to kill more than that. What disturbs me most is if there are that many visible how many more exist behind closed doors. I am really tired and I keep on getting flashbacks from my car accident so I m going to say goodnight.

Okay so its morning and what friendly thing did I see this morning, yes you guessed it a big ugly spider in my closet, I don’t know what’s worse though, the fact that it was there or the fact that later it wasn’t, and who knows if he was just spying on me to then go back to his huge massive army of spiders to transfer information. What I used to do in regards to creepy crawlers when I lived with my grandparents was to suck them up with the good old dust buster. It wasn’t nearly as intimidating as squishing them (ughhh I hate the squish). Now of course because my little mind imagines much it wasn’t enough to just suck them up, I had to them shake the dust buster profusely, normally sucking up random rocks and grit I could find that would then hit and really kill the grosses for sure. I mean one can really take no chances, what if I succeeded at sucking up a big gross spider but he didn’t die in the process and then proceeded to lay eggs in the dust buster and then soon an army of spiders comes crawling out to kill me. No I can’t take chances like that. Anyways that was at my grandparents now im at my aunts. I think what I need is a dust buster…its true. Or else who knows where my imagination with all these “friends” will take me. Please keep me in your prayers with this matter; I really just need some extra strength, and compassion to handle this situation. I know that I will survive, I will be victorious, and okay I should really get away from the keyboard and get back to work.

Goodbye friends…

Oh and as a side note, I am not actually afraid of bugs, no I just find them disturbing…nope not afraid.

Advice from 12th grade.

2005-05-25T11:53:00.000-07:00

Did anyone see the sky tonight? It was quite splendid; it was a myriad of different colors, I was quite captivated. Anyway for those of you who read my last post there is very good news… I have found what I’ve been looking for, so sleep easy tonight. However, my thoughts are still very scattered, so I am going to blog something I wrote years ago. I came across this assignment when I was packing up all my stuff (I take a really long time to pack because I really sort through everything and make sure everything is even more organized then before, and I also try to eliminate as much junk as possible) I believe it was a grade 12 English project. I think it was supposed to be a paragraph on advice wed give to somebody, but I could be wrong, So now your asking why am I blogging it, well let me tell you, I really don’t know, I just found it interesting to read my thoughts from that time…that was over 4 years ago. So with out further ado…

Advice
By Kristy-Anne Glubish

The world could end tomorrow but, if it doesn’t, here is my advice to you:
Dwell on the good times rather than the bad; it makes life so much more enjoyable, for you and your friends.
Exercise.
Discover your family. They have stories too, so listen up. Find out how you are different and how you are the same. There is so much to be learned from your family, even if it is only what not to do
Try to grasp that you are special because you are unique, not because you have the same brand-name jeans as everyone else.
Dance; jazz, hip-hop, ballet or, your own distinct dance.
Sing on the top of your lungs, by yourself or with your friends.
Go to a third world country but not as a tourist. You will learn more than you could have ever imagined. The experience will put your own life into perspective.
Be crazy.
Be sarcastic but only on Tuesdays and every second Thursday.
Friends are one of life’s greatest gifts, so be careful with them. Strive to be the best friend you can be. Be open to new friendships.
Love is the most powerful weapon.
It doesn’t take much to be a child’s hero and friend, but the impact you could have is priceless. When you mess up and your life seems to be falling apart, it’s comforting to know that those children will still think the world of you.
Don’t fall in to stereotypes. Go against the crowd. Dare to be different!
Listen more than you speak.
Laugh in excess.
Smile.
In conclusion, love God;” everything else is meaningless”.

Well there you have it, one of my high school assignments, want to know what mark I got? I got 8/10. My teacher’s comments were “Good ideas for how a person should live. Be sarcastic-rather negative-it’s a form of abuse”. I find that sooo funny; I guess I am a very abusive person so I apologize to all of you. Can you find it in your heart to forgive me, a highly abusive person? Anyway that teacher wanted so badly to not like me because I was open about my Christianity and she was an atheist, but she just couldn’t help it… I am just soooo clever and lovable (right, right sarcasm is bad a form of abuse I’ll stop now). It really was a stretching class for me though, cause my teacher really did take offense to my Christianity, but I also know that she found me curious because I was actually living my faith as opposed to just saying I was a Christian. Well enough about grade 12. Its time for bed, Buenos noches.

She weds

2005-05-25T02:01:00.000-07:00

She weds
Posted by: kristyanne.

My bestfriend and former roommate got married on saturday, here are some of the shots I took at the church. No I was not the official photographer for the wedding, they wished I could have been but since I was a bridesmaid it would have been kind of tricky. So I just brought along my little camera and snapped some candid stuff.

The ever so Crazy-and-Exciting Kayle+Trisha(TW)

2005-05-24T14:02:00.000-07:00

The ever so Crazy-and-Exciting Kayle+Trisha(TW)
Posted by: kristyanne.

Here they are exploring the deep dark forbidden(yet magical) hallways that lead to the secret back door to homegrown (a hiphop shop where we white kids didnt belong, on whyte ave).

Somethings Missing

2005-05-24T07:57:00.000-07:00

Okay so it’s been like 12 years since I’ve last blogged… I have many reasons for that, one being that my best friend and former roommate (for those of you who didn’t know I moved in this past week with my aunt temporarily for the summer) got married this past weekend. My life’s been a bit chaotic lately; funny that my life has been so stinking busy when the goal of my life for right now has been to “ruthlessly eliminate hurry from my life”. Anyhow this blog is not going to be super long or super intense I have like three million things on my mind but the first blog back after a long time is always the hardest, so I will just write and see what happens. Later on this week hopefully I will be able to write about some of the new things I have been learning, some funny stories and about this amazingly cool new friend I met from Redding California named Trisha.

So right now it is hard for me to have organized thoughts because I have been feeling such chaos in my life, and I realized tonight that this is because something has been missing in my life. It is strange how sometimes we don’t realize how much good and peace something brings until it’s lost. Life has just been happening so fast that I can’t even pinpoint when I lost this something. But now I’ve realized what I’ve lost and I am missing it dearly. I am realizing that my life is just not the same without it… I wish I could just tell it to come back… to show it how I was able to live such a richer life with it. I am debating if I should reveal publicly to all of my fans what exactly this loss entails. I suppose I have vowed to be as genuine as possible in this life, so though I may be mocked, though I may just be revealing a little too much about my personal life here goes nothing. What I am missing is the folding board I created for myself. Yes I know you are all in shock and I know you are all feeling my pain right now. It is so hard. For those of you who don’t know about my folding board, it is a board I made out of an old binder that I use to enable me to fold all of my shirts to exactly the same dimensions. Without this board all of my shirts are in a disarray, and without them being all the same width I have such a hard time caring if they are all in their proper color coordinated order. I just have no strength left in me now that my board is gone. Yes I believe this to be the root of the chaos in my life. For in my life if there is order in my living conditions (and car) then I feel so much more order in my life. So I now realize that I may be freaking you all out with my super neat freak ways, but that’s okay with me. At least I was open with you all about my dilemma. I sure hope I find my folding board soon; life has just not been the same with out it. Anyway I guess I should sign off for now and continue to search high and low for the board… I will keep you posted on whether or not I find my precious. (oh Alison I suppose you could say that this in a way is one of my quirks…my neatfreakness…it sometimes gets out of control) Good night all you cool (and not so cool) folk.

Post-Script… the drama presented from my present situation may be a slight hyperbole.

Ladonna

2005-05-24T05:51:00.000-07:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Ladonna
Ladonna is now married! YIPEE! She looked absolutely amazing, never seen anything like it. Ill make a composite image of the days events at a later time, but here is a pic for all you girls out there who would want to see her dress. She is so beautiful!

Happy Mothers Day!

2005-05-07T11:00:00.000-07:00

Happy Mothers Day!
Posted by: kristyanne.

I love you MOM!!!

Image Of God

2005-05-05T08:44:00.000-07:00

Okay so here’s the deal I haven’t blogged in a really long time because I just don’t know where to start… as usual this is my problem, do I start writing when I know I don’t have time to finish my thoughts? So I apologize to all my fans out there (all 2.34 of you) I will try not to let it happen again. So first off I since the beginning of Alison’s challenge to write about where we find the image of God had intended to write about it, but for the above reasons have put it off and now I Rylan went and stole my thoughts (Rylan if you don’t believe me come and check out my journal…you idea stealer…gee whiz), but regardless I am going to write a bit about it and move on.

For me it is within the lives of children that I so often see mirrored the image of God. If I had to put my finger on one thing in particular that does stands out to me about children reflecting the image of God it would probably be the way they love. A Childs love is so powerful because when they love they love so completely, so wholeheartedly (same thing I know). Their love is so honest, so genuine. In a Childs love I am never left insecure or inferior, instead I feel stronger and more beautiful than ever before. Children love excessively even when you don’t deserve it. For those of you who know me from my Saskatoon days I think back to the Hamata girls… They loved me so much, and though I did love them, I don’t think I could ever deserve how much they adored me, I was highly esteemed in their eyes… I was perfect to them. Sometimes I would be tired and maybe a bit harsh with them, but that would not diminish their love for me. And if I made a mistake, maybe yelled at them (sometimes for good reason…like honestly Jessica would not stop talking to herself for sometimes over an hour after she was in bed) maybe they’d be upset for a moment but so quickly they would forgive and forget. I think the Hamata girls were often my biggest fans…I was to them the best babysitter in the world. Well in a time in my life when I was as Alison put it in her blog, so often crippled by insecurities these girls and their wholehearted love for me was healing. With them I was safe, I didn’t have to try, they loved me for all that I was, and considered me precious, they made me feel worthwhile. For the people who know me here in Edmonton, another example of some children that remind me of the character of God are Con’s children (Con is an amazing Christian man that I work with, he has an incredible wife Suzette and 4 wicked awesome children). Those kids love and love and love. When I come over they are just waiting at the door to tackle me with hugs. And when you get in man how they all fight over your attention. They love to be the object of your attention. They love to share with you the little pleasures of their life, their little secrets. And even if I may be a little disinterested it doesn’t stop them, they are still there with such sparkle in their eyes. Such gentle spirits. Don’t you agree that there is just something about a Childs smile, their hugs, their love that makes you feel special and wanted?

So in closing… do you see how comparable a Childs love is to the love of Christ? How forgiving he is with us, how he considers us beautiful, perfect, worthwhile. How he too longs to reveal his secrets to us, his heart. How he longs to be the object of our affection? I could go on and on. But I thank God for the miraculous love of children. If you don’t have some children in your life…get some.

Post Script. I had such a delightful time writing this blog, for once again the sun is out (thank you God!!!) and so I decided to go cloud chasing… (for work of course… I do need shots of clouds, I honestly do) After finishing taking some pictures of clouds I grabbed my laptop and wrote all this sitting on a hill with the view of the city skyline, with the suns rays warming me. What a great time. Three cheers for the sun and being outside. (Popple I can’t believe the battery has lasted for over 30minutes…and I am still at 26%!!!)

For My Dad

2005-05-04T05:25:00.000-07:00

For My Dad
Posted by: kristyanne.

Dear Dad, this is for you... I love you...

A Sunny Sunday

2005-04-25T11:00:00.000-07:00

SO I had a delightful Sunday afternoon again yesterday. It was extemely warm here yesterday, and I wanted to soak up all the sun while I could (knowing that weather like this is fleeting in edmonton!). So I rushed home from church (i honestly think I talked to only one person, thats pretty amazing for me) and I made myself a yummie lunch (it was a pita with chicken, mushrooms,onions,tomatoes,greenpeppers and salad, just incase your wondering on my definition of yummie). Then I packed my bag and hurried of to the lake, (okay so it wasn't actually the lake, but it was the closest thing to it in the city, I went to a spot by the river, amongst rocks,grass,trees, and water...very few people around) and had some alone time. I had such a great time, I can't express to you the peace,the joy, the clarity that comes through moments like that. Anyway I was reading my bible, journaling, listening to some good tunes, and then reading over past journal entries... I thought id share a few random thoughts from my journal (they are from all different times) , I won't elaborate or expand on any of them (or maybe i will...), why..cause i said so... ( I think its cause a lot of these thoughts were never finished even in my own mind...just left hanging)

Why is it that it is so enticing to be seen as a mystery and yet at the same time our deepest longings are to be known and understood?

Why do we sometimes refuse to let Jesus heal our hearts, why do we hold onto the pain? Are we just too lazy , does it seem too impossible? What is it that keeps us from the joy that God has for our lives? Is it maybe because we are scared that if we reach happiness we will have nowhere else to go?

Its ok to want more from life.

Okay so theres more, i could go on and on but im going to stop now...(and everyone said...AMEN)

Daydreamer, and more on the topic of Authenticity

2005-04-23T12:57:00.000-07:00

So here’s the juicy scoop on me, I publicly confess to you all that I have this major bad habit of staying up daydreaming. I normally do not make it to bed before 1am and that is honestly too late, especially if I want to go work out before work in the morning. I live a pretty busy life but there is really no reason for me to be consistently up that late. I don’t have Internet at home, I don’t watch TV (even if I wanted to I get maybe the French channel on a good day) so what is it that prevents me from going to bed, I am most of the times home by 10, so what do I do with those three or more hours. I do sometimes cook, bake clean and read talk on the phone, this does account for most of the time. However, upon analyzing myself lately, I have realized that my big problem is that I am a daydreamer, especially at night (I honestly never identified this trait in myself till this week). So for example, I may be getting ready for bed and my mind begins to wander and before you know it I have wasted more than a half hour in the washroom, not on the toilet, but really just doing nothing. I get distracted, and begin to think about things and then minutes just fly by and its crazy late. It would probably be more productive of me if I could just off my mind, and get ready for bed and do whatever else I need to get done and then turn my mind back on; I have not yet been able to do this. But perhaps now that I have actually been able to pinpoint my daydreaming problem, maybe I will be able to catch myself and avoid wasting valuable minutes, nay hours (I wonder how many hours in a week I waste daydreaming). Now this daydreaming may not be all bad, my mind ponders important things (and some not so important ones), but again it would just be more beneficial if I got everything I needed to get done first and then I could use my remaining time to sit down with the specific purpose of letting my mind go free. Oh well.

I vet been thinking a lot more on the topic of being genuine and I think I need to add some stuff to my other entry Sadly, I think that a big reason that it can be so hard for many of us to be genuine is that at one time or another we exposed our heart with someone only to have them stomp all over it. They may have used whatever private knowledge they gained about you behind your back, maybe someone made fun of your dreams, or maybe someone made it seem like you were stupid to be concerned with such things; these scenarios can rip a person a part. I m sure that these kinds of situations have happened to all of us, I know its happened to me, but what is really horrible is that maybe I have done something like this to somebody else. I hope not, but it is likely I have. We live in a sinful world with sinful people, and people are going to let us down, it’s a part of life. Doesn’t mean its right, or that it doesn’t hurt. So what am I trying to say by all of this (yeah I bet your just wishing I would stop blabbing and say something funny) is that I am sorry if in the past you have been hurt by others, and I wish I could tell you it would never happen again, but it most likely will. Still, even knowing this I still think it is good to be as genuine as possible but at the same time guard your heart. I pray that God will guide us to know when we need to hold back and when it is safe. I hope to still lead my life as authentically as possible believing that even though it puts me at risk of being hurt by others, the amount of people that might be encouraged by seeing my life plain and raw will make it worthwhile. Ok so I m reading this paragraph over and I m not sure if I am actually getting across what I want, but I think I am going to stop regardless. So in conclusion, guard your heart, and use discernment but at the same time be as genuine as possible.

I almost commited murder, but I didn't try!

2005-04-21T21:59:00.000-07:00

Okay so now for something not so intense, even though I have so many intense things on my mind to write about, but maybe I should give you all a break, but by the end of this entry I may change my mind (I can feel it changing already, I can't help myself, I sit at the computer and my hands just type and don't stop, and as a side note... if you think that I talk fast well then you should see fast the thoughts in my head go...maybe thats why I talk fast, but really guys I don't think I talk fast). Actual now that I think of it murder is pretty intense in itself.

So heres the deal, Saturday April 16,2005 at exactly 10:38am, in Edmonton Alberta Canada, (thats in north america for all my international readers...wait a second what international readers??) Kristy-Anne Charissa Glubish nearly caused the death of Amy Wagner. Sad but true. It all started out fairly innocent both parties were attending a quaint breakfast shower for the super-so-super girl, Ladonna (who will be marrying the halfblack part native Justin Majeau). All was going fine and dandy, the ladies were in the kitchen trying to get all the food perfectly prepared, when all of a sudden, the two ladies turned and noticed the long stem calla lilies that Ladonna had purchased for her host, Kathy. The flowers were quite elegant and breathtaking, however since they were so long they needed to be trimmed. When the stems were trimmed the ladies were amazed at how remarkably the stems resembelled celery, the stems were approximately 1inch in diameter. So both ladies being adventurers by nature naturally were left wondering how this celery resembling stem would taste. The ever so witty Kristy-Anne then proceeded to dare the ever so daring Miss Amy Wagner to take a bite out of the flower stem. At first Miss Wagner refused, but you could tell she was pondering the dare. Kristy-Anne then proceeded to double dare Miss Wagner. Miss Wagner became even more restless. Kristy-Anne being ever so observant and clever realized that Miss Wagner was cracking, and Kristy-Anne knew that Miss Wagner would never be able to turn down a triple dog dare. Of course Kristy-Anne was correct in her assumption, upon receiving the ever so tempting triple dog dare, Miss Wagner proceeded to take a huge bite out of the "celery". At first all of the ladies were a little surprised Miss Wagner actually ate it, but they soon overcame there shock and laughter and moved onto other things, like chopping fruit. The incident was almost wiped from all of the ladies memories until, Miss Wagner quietly commented that her throat was feeling quite strange. This created quite a stir, the ladies were all quizzing her about her symptoms and soon realized that this seemingly innocent dare could have infact been fatal. The strange sensation within Miss Wagners throat was continuing to grow more and more unpleasant. It was then that one of ladies decided we might need to call the poison control center. But first the ladies convinced Miss Wagner to induce vomitting, she had never done this before and found this too to be an unpleasant experience. Now to make a long story short (not really that long but ill pretend) after vomitting she felt quite a bit better, and thankfully she never died, cause man would I have felt horrible if something had happened to her because of my silly dare. The moral of the story...don't eat flower stems.

Okay so even though I have more to write about, I am going to stop for now, post this up and who knows maybe write more later. But now its back to photoshopping for me...aren't I lucky? Working late! YEAH! Over and out.

Faces

2005-04-21T14:20:00.000-07:00

Faces
Posted by: kristyanne.

Here are some of the beautiful faces of children I met while in Mexico.

Genuine

2005-04-20T08:35:00.000-07:00

Oh how time escapes me, as I sit here at my super hot sexy computer (yes you heard me, if you’ve seen my computer you know that this is no exaggeration) at 12:23am (the times my blog records that I actually post is totally bogus…just so you know), I realize that I should probably go to bed, but alas I fear that if I go to bed now I may never record some of my present thoughts. After reading my thoughts you readers may feel that I would have been better off had I gone to bed, which is fine, but I realize that my blog is really a good way to sort out the chaos in my mind, so even if it is only for my own benefit that is okay.

Probably about a year ago (really it could have been 2.22years but that’s not really important to the story) I was chatting with someone (I don’t remember who, they must not have been important to me…right, right) and we were discussing how we would like our lives to be described if we could just choose one word. Well its hard to choose just one word, so I’m sure I choose a few, but one of the words I decided that I would wish to be and be described as was genuine. So I concluded in my mind that night that I really more then ever wanted to be an authentic person, open and honest. Well now looking back over the year (or the 2.22 years…who really knows…maybe im actually making it all up), I realize that I may be on the right track but I have not arrived. I could definitely stand to be more genuine with people and maybe some of you my dear readers could stand to be as well (this is for myself but who knows maybe it will hit home with somebody else too) and here’s why…

Because when we are genuine with one another, putting aside the carefully constructed façade we all benefit. I believe it to be true. Tonight after youth I (wait for it wait for it…) went out for coffee with some beautiful ladies (I know shocking, me the hermit socializing, mark this day). So often we can go out with people, have a good time talk about random important topics but never really get to another’s heart, their cores. Fellowship is good but in my fellowship I long for that something more…and I hate times when I’ve hung out with people and you really just do nothing of consequence, people don’t leave encouraged, maybe we ve talked about someone behind their back, had a few laughs…to me this sometimes seems like a waste when so many people are broken and need some encouraging, so many people have needs, I myself have so much growing to do (I often feel like I should have just stayed home with my books). Now I know that I could stand to work on my attitude in this area…Kristy-Anne its okay to socialize and just have fun…it is. Okay how am I going to bring all of my randomness around…hmmm… Back to chatting with the girls, okay so for a bit, or talk was nice, about nothing really, but then there was a switch and the conversation went to the next level. How I believe it came about because one person chose to be genuine and reveal the intense hardships she was experiences at home. Now I love this lady (she is my age but it is fun to call your peers ladies) and have known her for a while, prayed with her before, I thought that we were basically open with one another. But once she began sharing about these difficulties I was like ohhh man this is intense stuff, how can she be carrying this alone, how come I never saw this before. Really there was no way for me to have seen it, but my heart just broke for her, and I just wish I could have known sooner to have been even more aware and supportive to her. And like I said, I loved the girl before knowing about her struggles but having her share only made me more passionate to be there for her in every way I can. So bringing it back to the being genuine part… So by her being genuine about her not-so-perfect life, she just gained three people that want to help her, pray for her, support her with these specific needs. Not only that by her taking that first step, it freed the rest of us to be able to open up about the trying issues in our own lives. Were we annoyed to hear another story about something going wrong in a friends life, of course not, my friends struggles, only stir me to love them more, I m pretty sure they felt the same. I know I have been trying to be quite genuine with my life but I realized that often Ill hold back on revealing what I m really struggling with because I don’t want to burden someone with my woes, or maybe I m concerned about what people will think about me when they realize that I m not perfect (oh no the news is out…yes its true, Kristy-Anne Glubish is not perfect, shes quite flawed in fact, but shes a work in progress). Well I think that I should stop worrying about that so much because I think people are honored to be able to see the real me, flawed and all and I think that people for the most part delight in helping one another out.

Another thing I ve noticed in this process of not remaining an island, is that as we reveal ourselves to others I we learn that we are often not alone in our struggles, which is strangely comforting. Now I realize we have to be cautious with whom we expose our hearts; that we don’t just go spilling out our garbage everywhere, but hear my heart… The more we have the guts to quit pretending to be perfect the more others will feel they can do the same, and the more we all are transparent the more we ll be able to encourage, pray and help each other a long. I know that God longs to heal our wounds, and carry our burdens but I believe that he also wanted to use those around us in the mending process. We are not alone.

Before we left our little coffee time, we ended up having a beautiful and intense time of prayer... Now that gets me excited. I’m sure (well I hope) all four of us left encouraged, strengthened, and more passionate about the things of God, with a greater love for one another. All of this because she let us know that she was having a hard time. Gee Im glad I wasn’t a hermit tonight.
As a side note, its also good to be genuine with non Christians too, I think that they are often put off by the perfect little Christian façade. They are searching for truth. So maybe your not perfect, but the beauty of Jesus is in the cross, in grace.

MAN I WRITE LOTS. SORRY. And nothing about Mexico…oh man ill never get all my mexico reflections done at this rate. I hope this blog made some sense, Its just me trying to tie my thoughts together. Goodnight.

Milk

2005-04-19T01:56:00.000-07:00

Milk
Posted by: kristyanne.

I was asked to model for a milk campaign. They were wanting the pics to look like they were done in a photobooth. It was a lot of fun doing these shots, maybe I should be embarassed, but no it was fun. I guess these photostrip bookmarks are supposed to be handed out in all of the high schools in Alberta. Did I mention I spilled the spaghetti all over myself and it may have looked like I was enjoying eating it but in reality...YUCK. Anyhow don't worry mexico pictures soon, i left them on my home computer so hopefully tomorrow.

Mexico...and other thoughts

2005-04-18T08:24:00.000-07:00

What a beautiful day, honestly such a beautiful day. Today is Sunday, and as I am learning to obey the Sabbath and truly rest, I am learning that God created the Sabbath for a very good reason, our bodies really do need a break. I find I enjoy Sunday afternoons most if I just come home immediately after church, open the blinds, let the sun stream in, put on some tunes and just be. I love being by myself, I crave time alone…I don’t get enough of it! I am trying to keep Sunday afternoons as my ME time, just my books, my music, and my God. I always forget how much I love these times till I have them again, by the end of the afternoon I feel so refreshed, maybe even giddy, I just have such a great time. The extraverts out there may be reading this thinking I am a very weird, but that’s okay, part of the joy of life is due to our diversity. I don’t expect all of you out there to refuel the same way I do, but I do encourage you to evaluate how you do find your strength and to make sure you spend time doing whatever it is that recharges your battery. Wow I sure can ramble.

Mexico… Since it has taken me so long to write about Mexico, many of you have already heard about my trip, but for the sake of those who haven’t I am going to write about it. To those of you have already heard me talk about it…ummm… maybe read about it anyway to evaluate (oh no I have used evaluate twice in this blog) my accuracy. So here I go once again… Mexico… it was fantastic, amazing, life-changing. I went to Mexico with the youth from my wicked awesome church Bethesda. Our team was comprised of 23 members (I think) including Pastor Jeff (our youth pastor) and his wife Karyn, and Bruce and Carol Wiebe (really cool parents of one of the members of our team and a couple with a passion for the things of God), so there was 4 leaders, and 2 mini leaders, as I like to call them, which were Megan and myself. That is a horribly constructed sentence and I apologize but if I am ever to finish this report I must not concern myself with fabricating a perfect piece. So onward… This trip was quite different from past mission’s trips I have done; this doesn’t make this trip better or worse, just different. This trip was far more evangelistic then any of my other trips and it was cool because it wasn’t just us going in there thinking we would get the world saved, it was team work between us and the church that was hosting us down in Vera Cruz. We did 6 evangelistic outreaches (or was it 7) and one church plant. The outreaches normally went a little something like this… We (our team as well as many volunteers from their church) would arrive at our location and about 5 members of our team would stay back to start with face painting, games and balloon animals etc… the rest of the team would pair up with some of the Mexicans to go door to door inviting people to come to our outreach, we would normally spend about 20mins doing this. This in itself was interesting. Of all the times we went out I only had a person with me once who spoke English, it was a bit of a challenge communicating, but I enjoyed it nonetheless and felt rewarded with what little conversation I could make with my partner. As we would knock on doors I was amazed at the peoples responses… I think I only had one person ever refuse to take our pamphlets; everyone else was very gracious, they would listen and thank us, take our pamphlet and many would come to our outreach. It was crazy, I was thinking back to Canada and I was imagining us doing that here, and I doubted people would be so gracious, I doubted people would even open there door and listen to all that we had to say, I know I’m generalizing but I doubt people in Canada would get off of there couch and leave their TV to come and hear our presentation. The first time I went out I wondered if anybody would come…but people did every single time…many people. So after going door to door we would return to our outreach spot and play with whatever kids were piling in, making balloon animals and making basic conversation was what I would normally stick too. While all of this was going on the members of the church would be gathering phone numbers and names of the attendees. I will post some pictures from outreaches so you can begin to get a feel for what it was like, a couple of the girls on our team were amazing at face painting, they were so good you’ll have to see the pictures to understand. I have to say my balloon animal skills were a bit rusty, man was I a wicked awesome balloon animal maker when I was in Nicaragua, but that is also because we had to make like 20 times as many. In Mexico with the balloon animals I pretty much stuck to making perus (dogs) and sombreros (hats) and espadas (swords) my spelling is probably totally off but that’s ok. And more often then not as I was making them the balloons would pop (from the heat honest…I am good at balloons) and the kids would laugh at me, but that’s ok, it’s good to make people laugh. Laughter I can understand even in another language it sounds the same, just incase you didn’t know that. I was pretty good with making conversation with the kids, cause my Spanish was better than most (even though still very limited) so Id go around chatting with them trying asking them their names, how old they were, if they had brothers or sisters, all of which I would forget very shortly after (sad but true). After Id ask the kids the few questions I knew they would think that I knew Spanish so they would start to ask me things, and then Id be so sad cause I couldn’t understand them…man I want to know Spanish. My goal was to learn Spanish before I left on this trip, so being the multi tasker I am I got learn Spanish on tape. So I figured I could listen to these tapes and learn to be trilingual while at work. Well it was a little bit harder than I anticipated; the tapes I got out from the library were not so easy. They did not start with little words or everyday phrases…noooo the tapes started with full complete sentences and not like donde esta el banio (where is the toilet)… noooo paragraphs about going to the masquerade on Saturday evening. GEE WHIZ as if I could figure that out. I guess you’re supposed to read a book a long with it while you listen to the tapes. So that plan didn’t work out that well so now Im back and I want to learn Spanish more than ever but I think that I may try and take a course. So anyway getting back to Mexico, after playing with the kids for about 30mins we would go into our amazing (okay not so amazing, it was really God more than us) program. We had learned a few songs in Spanish (one of which was the happy song…if I ever have to sing that song again…). We had two dramas, one dance, and another kind of dance slash song. In between each of the specials we would have the members of our team introduce and explain the following presentation, they would try to relate the message of the song or drama to the people or even to their own lives, adding that personal element in there was really cool. Anyway after all of that Pastor Jeff would preach, and every time we would give a salvation call and every time many many people would respond. It was so fun listening to pastor Jeff preach with Pastor Greg (the pastor from down there) interpreting. They were such a dynamic duo, I learned to love listening to both languages, I miss that. Now this is where I get excited, because people just raising their hands and accepting Christ is awesome, but what used to worry me was what happens after we leave. Well this was the greatest part about that church, they were so ready for the harvest, and they were so great at consolidation. So with 48 hours of raising their hand the new convert would receive a phone call, within the week they would receive a personal visit and an invitation to a cell group in their area. The church was very strategic too in with planning the outreaches, they would only plan an outreach in an area that already had a cell group or two currently running to make sure that these new converts would have a place to go, grow and be loved. In total we saw I believe it was around 620 people receive Christ, and again with the church being so ready for the harvest it should be lasting fruit, 620 growing Christians. After the salvation call we would also take time to pray for people with specific needs especially for healing. That was cool God was of course so gracious and we saw quite a few miracles! So that is pretty much the extent of the outreaches…man I write a lot, well if you made it this far congratulations and gold stars for you as well. I think I am going to wait to tell more about my trip for another day. People wanted to know about my so I guess this is what you guess for asking. SOOO over and out for now… I hope this wasn’t completely boring to yall but if it was, I don’t really care. Adios amigos!

And Attempt At Blogging Again

2005-04-16T18:36:00.000-07:00

So yes I have been away from the virtual world for quite some time now, its not that I was ever the most faithful blogger to begin with... Anyhow, I am back, back from Mexico and hopefully back to blogging. Its hard to start blogging when you have been away for so long because there is honestly sooo much to write about ( I actually have a hard time blogging anytime because I always feel overwhelmed by the amount of random thoughts racing around in my brain). So Ive been waiting for a time when I would be less busy so I could really put some effort into writing something spectacluar, alas I should have known that a less busy time would never arise...so ive decided to just start writing and even though I know I won't even get to the bit about Mexico or anything else.... I just hoped this little paragrah would be a catalyst to write further,longer more indepth blogs. So do be on guard, great things are to come from my blog...great things...(ok probably not but thats ok read it anyway). Adios my friends.

Im OFF!!!

2005-03-23T16:26:00.000-08:00

Well Im so excited, yes,very excited...did I mention that I'm excited? Yes I am at that, I am off to Mexico in like 12 hours! AHHHH! So I am going to request your prayers while I am there. This is a bit of a different missions trip for me because I am a leader on this trip (honestly what were they thinking when they asked me to go??) so I have to be all good and responsible. Anyway I am really really excited (oh no theres that word again) to see how God is going to move in each of the teens lives, almost more than I am for anything else. I have so much to say, so much to write, so many thoughts... so much even to elaborate on my last blog, but alas, I can not because I must get home pack, and try to get an hour of sleep in before I depart... I realize that sleep is over-rated but still! Well Im sure Ill have a million things to write about when I get back so I won't bore you now...but please don't be strangers while Im gone...still leave me a comment or two...and pray for my team! We'll be back on the 4th of April late at night...so don't bother trying to call me that night. ADIOS AMIGOS!!!!

...

2005-03-23T08:08:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne.

Stupid winter in spring, just when I thought that we had seen the last of that nasty white stuff another few feet come a long. I was not so happy to see it this time. Anyway Im just glad Im leaving for Mexico tomorrow, im hoping that the snow is all gone when I come back. So long!

LIttle Girls Have Big Dreams Too!

2005-03-22T13:07:00.000-08:00

Well before I forget I want to acknowledge Alison and Lynnel, I think that I might have to start a petition to get you guys to write blogs. Especially you Alison, you are the one person who I really have no grapevine of sources to keep tabs on you (does that make sense?). I was so overjoyed to hear that you read our blogs!!! Honestly though you would have such a fantastic blog and I would just love to hear how you and Leon are doing, you are so the coolest! GOLD STARS FOR YOU GUYS!!! I know its hard cause you don't want to waste work time, I am in the same boat and that is why I don't blog as much as others, someday though I may have internet at home and then watch out, I'll have such a wicked awesome blog. Ok though please it pleed with you....make a blog!

So as usual I've been thinking a lot, and lately I've been thinking about moving from just dreaming about things to making them a reality. Well I have thought of course about this before but its been on my mind a lot again, and so I ask myself "what Kristy-Anne is holding you back from being that person you long to be". Sometimes we wait and we wait and think that something magical will happen and then we will *Poof* be that person, or acheived that goal or what not, but no not me, I'm not going to wait around, I am going to be that person. I don't know if any of this is going to make sense to any of you. It is hard to sometimes put into words the random thoughts of my head, how can I get it to make sense in words when it doesn't always even make sense in my head. Anyway here is a quote from Jewel, I have it on my magnet board at work, cause I try to remind myself of it daily.

If you never stop to take the time, If you are always too busy getting by to intiate change, change will be impossible, matter how much you want things to be different.

I think that is a very true statement. So often it is my own busy life that keeps me back from being that wonder woman I want to be. For me I am always dreaming of being stronger spiritually you know: being wiser, having more faith, listening to the Holy Spirit more, walking in the prophetic (don't be scared by that, im no flake but I still long for the prophetic in my daily life), growing in love for people. These are the things I long for in my life. And how am I going to see those things happen if I never stop to take the time to really listen, to really dig in in prayer, to meditate on the word. Im not talking about some quick 10 minutes devotions, no im talking about going deeper. I am not content to live just a good christian life. NOPE. I want more. And if I want to see myself living my dreams (dreams of being a strong woman of God moving fully in the power and authority I have through my saviour) then im going to have to take the time. And you know what else, the answers to my problems are in God, I know this stuff is so simple but its soo true. Honestly we try so hard to just deal with things on our own, or cover up our issues or ignore them, when really we'd see growth and healing more in our lives if we were open and honest with the God, who knows everything about us anyway, and if we'd find our strength in him. Theres so much I want to see in my lifetime (theres more to my to do list than hands stands, backflips, learning guitar, bass and upright bass, more than drawing pretty pictures and reading many books) and so im not going to wait till tomorrow, today I want to be moving forward towards my dreams (the dreams that I believe that God has placed in my life and so wants to see me reach). Man I sure hope this makes sense to some of you. I know its simple stuff but so often the answers, the steps, are so simple.

I have had so many other thoughts to share too but Im going to stop now. But im going to actually leave you with one more thought... God is not an anesthetic, he is not interested in just being your pain killer. Later !!!! Id love to hear your comments.

...

2005-03-18T07:04:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Yeah Im kind of strange, don't worry that mustache isn't real.

Love the new looK!?

2005-03-18T07:00:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Love the new looK!?
This was after youth one night, after the mall manhunt, do you think its a good look for me? Im with Anna, and Katrina, two awesome amazing girls in my youth group!

You can be my hero baby!

2005-03-12T10:46:00.000-08:00

Ladies and Gentlemen, boys and girls, people of all ages, I just want to apologize for leaving you all hanging for so very long, on the matter of my heroes. I would like to thank all of you out there who made an effort to guess who my heroes might be. And well it is now time for the much awaited revealing. So Reporter Brock named one of my heroes with his second guess on his list, although I am not sure if it was meant to be a blow, because he said " your mom" and so I don't know how many of you out there are aware of that "your mom" is often used in a not so nice fashion. He may actually have thought, my mom was my hero (and if so he would have been half right) but he also might have been trying to mock me which is actually more likely. My Popple, also known as my Father also got it quite right with the number two of his top ten list, his guess what my parentals.
*DINGDINGDING* gold star for him, he got it, although he did make ten guesses, (which is why he only gets the gold star and not the cash prize). So yes my heroes are my parents, now all you people out there who are ready to cry because you so hoped that you were my hero...don't cry, if you've ever met my parents before you can probably understand why I think they're soooo cool.

First off I better start by saying I have the bestest parents ever. They have always been there for me, believing in me, and encouraging me to go after my dreams. Not only are they incredibly supportive (except today when my mom was telling me I shouldn't bring a camera with me to mexico-- honestly what was she thinking????) but they are absolutely hilarious and they are very Godly people.

My Mom... Bob, what can I say about her??? Well she is the sweetest lady you'll ever meet. So kind and thoughtful, humble, Godly, compassionate and funny. She is pretty special. When I was really stressed with things a few weeks back she came to visit me and help me out with stuff even though I never asked and even though she knew that I was busy most of the weekend. She came and helped me out and even bought me some more cleaning supplies (YESSS!!!! I LOVE CLEAN!). So even though I was at the church most of the weekend and didn't actually get to spend tons of time with her, her pressence meant a lot. And as usual we made time for a coffee or two, the key to a good day. One more thing about my mom, its funny because she doesn't seem to fit in our family, all the rest of us can be so sarcastic, and crazy, and here is this kind caring woman who never makes fun of people (well shes starting to learn a bit about our sarcasm and even throws in a few random "your mom"comments to me and my brothers) she just seems to nice for the rest of us.

My Popple, Father Charles, hmmmm.... Well I love his passion for the word of God. He really inspires me, we share a huge love for books ( I think I might be addicted to books), in the summer we go around to all the used book stores looking for treasures and it is so much fun, but he is soo cool and smart and I only dream of being able to have the knowledge he has. And yes he is smart and gifted but he is also dedicated. He is very wise and is respected by all. I am his biggest fan, I try to get his sermons on cd and or dvd, I read his articles, when I think of him I am full of pride. Also my dad really is the funniest man ever,(except for his lame puns...ALL PUNS ARE LAME) especially in the last few years. I think that whenever I come home he gets a little bit giddy, and so the times are even crazier. When I hear stories about my father when he was younger, I could only wish that I could attain to that sort of creative brillance.

So yes my parents are definitely the coolest and I do only hope that I can someday be like them. But on an aside, a lot of other people have been heroes in my life too.My brothers for example, so cool. Nato so smart, and such a good business man and sooo talented, (so good at helping me make phone calls). Bennett, soo cute and funny, my little big brother. I think God buts specific people in our lives to be our heroes for that specific time. Like when I lived in Saskatoon when I was in grade 8 and into my high school years Jenna was my hero,and later into my high school years Alison was really a big hero to me, and my second year in Edmonton Ladonna was a hero to me, and right now Tara too is a hero to me. I could go on and on. The people who had an impact on my life and have challenged me to be a better person, they are my heros (so many more of you are my heros too kristin,lynnel)Oh and of course theres Bono who is also my hero...but thats a given. Okay all you people I hope I didn't bore you with this blog (what am I talking about of course I didn't bore you I am never boring...or long winded)

My beautiful mother ANd ME

2005-03-12T02:33:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

My beautiful mother ANd ME

Blonde?

2005-03-09T08:36:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Blonde?
Okay so I might get a cut and die...what do you think...

The Sun is Shining

2005-03-07T09:06:00.000-08:00

Well theres a new spring in everyones step, a new joy thats bubbling deep with in everyone, yes it is the time of year again....yes folks it is.... ROLL UP THE RIM TO WIN time! Don't deny it folks, I know that the sparkle in your eye is renewed by the excitment of this great time of year. Timmy's sure does know how to get business. People really do live for that little bit of adrenaline that comes as they struggle to roll up that rim, hoping nay, praying for that cash prize, but realizing that if they at least get a cookie Gods favor is all over them. I have heard it said that if you are not winning at roll up the rim, and you are a christian, then you have sin in your life. Well that is something I really gave some thought before I played (why do I say played roll up the rim, I mean it really isn't a sport or a game...its all nonsense) this year. You see last year I was very much a LOSER when it came to roll up. I honestly never even won a cookie, not even a napkin. All I ever got was that stupid " Please Play again". This was a hard time in my life, the rejection of never winning. Id go into Tim Hortens and people all around me would be laughing, singing, dancing, crying tears of joy because of the prizes they had one...but not me. And why do they tell you to please play again....why don't they just say..."You loser You lost, You must have sin in you life" or "SUCKER". But the "Please Play Again" makes me hostile. So it could be argued that last year I never won because I really only played 4 or 5 times. BUT STILL.

Anyway so when it came to this years roll up the rim, I decided that this year would be different for me. This year I would no longer be a loser, this year I would get that sin out of my life and be more than a conqueror. So yes I started early, fasting, praying, interceding getting that sin out of my life. In doing so I figured there could be no way I wouldn't win big. I figured that roll up was really an answer to my prayers... I have no car... Tims wants to give a few envoys away... God would use to Tim to give me a free vehicle. I mean it all seems so logical and right. Or at least the cash prize, Id take that too. So anyways after all my preparation I was ready for that trip to Tim Hortens, I was excited, pumped, just feeling the magic... I get my coffee...take it back to the office, (with faith Im sure thats bigger than a mustard seed) I felt no need to rush my rolling up of the rim... I already had visualized my victory, so I knew it to be true. I was pretty much ready to call some of the people who have been helping me look for cars, call them to tell them the search is off. So a few hours after getting my blessed coffee... I slowly roll up that rim... and I mean I was excited... and well... you will not guess what happenned... I got... I won... a ....... "Please play again". WHAT I THOUGHT??? How can this be... I rolled down the rim... and I tried again...thinking maybe this is what they mean be please play again, and the second time still nothing. So i did that 7 times... knowing that 7 is the number of completion and perfection (not 9 bennett) and well still nothing. So really ladies and gentleman I don't know what I have done wrong. Maybe I do still have sin in my life...and if I have bitterness towards any of you I just want to publicly apologize now. Anyhow I am now figuring that maybe I need to buy 7 coffees in total before winning...sometimes you need to try and try again...But im not really to sure on this one.

So I have played once and might play again...but im not sure. I don't want this to become an addiction for me. I realize how alluring the roll up the rim can be for christians especially who really don't get for much other opportunities to play the lottery ( I know its not the lottery but you know what I mean I hope). I don't want to come out of this season with a gambling problem... so i might stay away for Timmy's for awhile. Anyhow good luck to the rest of you out there who are playing the game... I hope that you have better luck than I.

Oh and I know that I said that my next blog would be about my heroes...but I felt that I needed to write about this super important matter first. Oh and id like to thank Brock for being one of the only ones to really make a guess at who my heros are....so black dot to him...oops I mean gold star.

Oh and a tiny note from the author... this post might be a slight exageration from the truth

JUST BREATHE.

2005-03-01T09:11:00.000-08:00

Been running so hard
When what I need is to unwind
The voice of reason is one I left
so far behind
I've wanted so long, so long to
play this part
And just remembered
That I'd forgotten about my heart.
-the gogos

I love my life however right now with so many things on my plate that I am not being as effective in some areas as I would like to be. I am wishing that I could do everything and help everybody. I know that my heart is in the right place but I need to realize that I can't do everything, I can't be everyones messiah and somehow....I haven't figured out how yet.... I am going to have to slow down and being to focus in on less so that I can still be effective in some areas. I know that often in my life I have made the mistake of trying too hard to help people, now that may sound strange but what i mean more is that I need to do my part but then have faith that God will do the rest. Once again random thoughts that are not really coming out in proper form but hopefully you get a bit of what I'm saying.

Stay tuned for next post, I am going to talk about my heros...any guesses as to who they might be???

Kaydenand I

2005-02-22T03:15:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Kaydenand I
Every time that I go to Saskatoon there are a few special people that I definitly make a point of seeing. One of my favorites is Jenna Miller and her beautiful boy Kayden. He is the cutest ever!

hottest pic of me!

2005-02-22T02:21:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

hottest pic of me!

Jenelle

2005-02-22T01:31:00.000-08:00

Posted by: kristyanne

Jenelle
I took this photo when I was home in Saskatoon over Christmas. It was great I got to spend quality time with an old friend and take beautiful pictures of her.

Dance

2005-02-22T01:26:00.000-08:00

Dance
Posted by: kristyanne.

I took this photo about a year ago for a dance studio, I just really like this photo.

TINA

2005-02-22T01:25:00.000-08:00

TINA
Posted by: kristyanne.

Here is a picture of my dear friend Tara and I... why post this picture? Because she is important to me?

Jon

2005-02-22T01:24:00.000-08:00

Jon
Posted by: kristyanne.

I took this picture when I was in college... I am posting it because it is still to this day one of my favorite pics. This one Jons first time smoking.

Reflections of a dependent on the loss of her independence

2005-02-21T23:19:00.000-08:00

As a result of last weeks car accident I have been forced to rely on a lot of people for help, which for those of you who don’t know is quite out of character. I am the kind of girl who is used to doing everything all on her own, I try to avoid asking for help, and even if people offer to do things for me I normally respond with a polite no thank you. Some people might think that I don’t receive help because I am such a perfectionist and that I wont be content unless I know it is done to my own standard, but although there might be a bit of truth to that assessment the main reason I don’t ask for help is that I hate to inconvenience people. When I first moved to Edmonton at 17, I really knew no one so I got used to being self-reliant quick. I know that being able to be independent can be a very good thing but I know that I have taken it to far in my life. This accident has helped me to realize how crazy independent I try to be; this loss of control on my part is very unusual. I now have to be dependent on others for rides and also need much assistance in the area of finding, buying, a new car and taking car of my wreck. It is humbling and I thank everyone for all your help!!! But what I am realizing is that it is ok to ask for help, people are not going to stop being my friend because I need there assistance. Maybe, just maybe some people actually like helping (strange that I have never realized this before maybe this is because I hate helping others). Through this situation I have realized that I have many people out there who care about me and who are willing to help, this in itself has been a valuable lesson.

It is crazy how much a car provides independence, and allowed me to accomplish three point two million tasks in a day (maybe a slight exaggeration). Now without one (and I know it has only been a week, but I am still allowed to make observations) I am learning that maybe it is okay to not save the world in a day. As much as I would like to be wonder woman I am not and it is about time I stop putting unrealistic expectations on myself. I know that these may seem to be random observations and completely unrelated to my car accident but the incident has made me more aware.

As another random aside, I have finally been working on one of the things on my way-to-long to do list (maybe ill make that list a blog sometime) and that is learn to play Halo. Now when I say learn to play halo, I don’t just mean understand how to shoot the guns and walk around, no my goal is to be good. I don’t need to win every time (although that would be ideal) but I at least want to someday be able to join in on some Halo games with the guys and be stiff competition or at least not be smoked. I mean I am a realist and I am aware that the boys have invested a high percentage of there life to that game (which I am unwilling to also devote) so I realize I am most likely not going to win, but I do at least hope to put up a decent fight.
Thank you to all you people out there who have been offering me your assistance (I still kind of wish I could do it all by myself but I cant), I am grateful.

There is a first for everything.

2005-02-16T19:05:00.000-08:00

Preface, or note from the author...
Please note that I am not writing this to gain sympathy or live in self-pity, it is more so to let my friends know about my lifes most recent events.

Ok so for those of you who haven't heard I got in my very first car accident. Yep its true, I was always scared for the day this would happen. My car is almost for surely a right off and the other guys blazer wasn't in to bad of shape. So thankfully neither of us were hurt, I was in shock for a bit...ok for quite a bit, but today I feel quite a bit better. Its all such a blur. Honestly I don't really remember anything, the only thing I really remember is the smell after it all happened. It took me a while to realize what happened, my air bags went off my car was rolling and smoking... yep i was kind of shaking. So after a few minutes when this was all sinking in and I was trying to be strong and figure out what to do and talk to the other guy, you won't guess what happened... ok im going to be real honest and tell you... but please don't spread it around... don't tell all your friends... I don't want it to ruin my reputation... ok ok the tears started to flow... yep thats right. They did. You heard me...Kristy-Anne cried!! So yeah it was all quite interesting and I was quite scared. But I am just so thankful no one was hurt. I feel so stupid because it was my fault... and you just wish that you could go back and replay the scene, I am normally such a good safe driver! I had a moment of negligence and it will set me back a lot. So yeah its to bad, I really really liked Troy (trokiakosmonoskipoikniasnovich, thats the name of my old dead car) . I don't know how I'll ever be able to match a name like that. So in all of this its quite overwhelming because I really had no idea where to start, I have no car, I need to get to the police station, how do I file a claim, and the whole time all I can think about is how it was my stupid fault...ALL MY FAULT. But I am so thankful for the all the blessing throughout this experience, honestly God had placed so many amazing people in my life to help me out. The first God thing is honestly that nobody was hurt! Secondly this nice guy stopped to help me out even though I told him he didn't have to and kept me calm and talking throughout my shaking shock period, and is able to verify that the other guy wasn't hurt. He let me sit in his car and warm up (even though my body was numb from shock) and waited with me while my brother came to help. Then my brother came and really he deserves the cool dude award through all of this. He totally is the reason everything has been going so well, he is so professional and was able to deal with the police and help me with my insurance stuff. He drove me to the mediclinic and bought me lunch and supper today! (my hands smell like food even though ive washed them 12million times ewww...) SO yeah Natos awesome, I don't know what I would have done without him. So he deffinately gets gold stars and I have talked to Ladonna and she has also approved him officially for the cool dude award. I am so thankful to all the people who are and were praying for me, I know it totally helped me. Normally this kind of a situation would overwhelm me especially since my life is normally a bit stressed anyway you would think id be a basket. But I honestly feel great peace, and am not even beating myself up about making such a stupid stupid costly mistake (which is craziness cause normally I am sooo hard on myself). So I am thankful for all the calls and prayers. So now my next step is just waiting to hear how much my insurance is now going to go up (ive had no previous accidents or tickets) and to hear how much theyll give me for my car. Im praying for a pink car (or salmon.... ok not really). Oh and thank you to all the people who are helping me look for a vehicle. And thank you to all the people who have offered to help drive me around (thanks Tara for the ride to work...sorry bout the train!). So yeah I am thankful, no one was hurt, and everyones been so helpful, it sucks still but I know its going to be ok... just a bit of a set back.

If I were to write a book...

2005-02-11T12:04:00.000-08:00

I live in a hyperbolic state. I do not lie, I simply over embellish the truth or elaborate extensively on lifes event.

If I were to write a book on my life it would probably start something like that. I kind of think that everyone should write a book on themselves even if no one reads it. I think it would be a huge adventure in self-discovery. Forcing yourself to sit down (well stand if you like) and really reflect on whats important to you, what makes you happy, sad, angry. Tracing back your life to discover the roots of issues. I find that this kind of reflecting can actually be quite scary, but mostly helpful, unless you choose to sit and dwell in self pity instead of looking at everything as a learning experience. HMMM. Ladonnna and Tara had to do these self-observatin projects for school and by the end of it all they both thought they were crazy, im sure that is the normal reaction on completion of that project. I know I would feel crazy, but then I normally do... so thats nothing new. Often I wonder... If so many normal people think they're crazy do crazy people think they are normal? I really wonder. Back to the opening of my book though, I really don't always lie, if people ask me to be truthful, i will (mostly). If somebody straight out asks me if im telling the truth, I am required to answer truthfully. So you people out there who are now wondering "Has anything Kristy-Anne's ever told me been the absolute truth?" rest assured that I normally reveal the truth...eventually. And if you do ask me to be honest... I will be. And if I start my sentance with an "Honestly..." its almost always the full truth. So all you folks have a beautiful day. Sorry I am so completely random (not to be confused with my friend random rabbit).

Beware Of Viruses

2005-02-07T21:20:00.000-08:00

Okay so I am going through complete withdrawal because Tuesday of last week I came back from my lunch break and my internet was no longer working. The guys here at the studio had been fiddling around with our router because the designpics main office has been getting attacked by a virus that seems to be coming from our server. This didn't explain why only my internet wasn't working but the guys didn't know why it wasn't working so there was no hope for me knowing. So I just kept praying it would start up again...but a week later it still hasn't. You may be asking yourself well then how is she writing now? That is a very good question, well I am using our spare computer here (at the studio) late at night because i am going through such withdrawal from not having internet access. You really don't realize how much you depend on internet till you don't have it anymore. Most of my working hours are spent photoshopping, so I sit at a desk and do grown up coloring. Now this is mostly enjoyable but can still become tedious, and since I have a major staying awake problem (which would really require another posting in itself) I really rely on my internet breaks to keep me awake. Whether it be checking the news, weather, browsing other photographers photos for inspiration, recipes, online banking, msn, e-mails...the list goes on and on. Now without these sanity breaks, I am really losing the victory folks. My peek losing the victory hours are between 10-11am and 230-422pm, if this keeps up I might even have to ask people to call me just to keep me awake and attentive (many of you may not realize how huge of a deal that would be for me, another blog would be required to try and explain my fear of phones). OH GEE, So much for me is done through emails:planning shoots, planning my social life, tearing people down, mocking people, being rude and rotten to people, encouraging people. GOSH. I just didn't realize how much I relied on it all till its gone. For those of you who work at a desk job you probably understand what I mean. Really I challenge you to go a week without internet at work! It wouldn't be so bad if I had internet at home...but alas I do not. So today while I was doing a shoot of a juggler/unicycle guy, Nathan Dyck, sorry that I really don't know how else to title him, my brother and Jordan Motz came to try and help me with my internet issues. Well the horrible news is that I HAVE A VIRUS. This virus is soo tricky it prevents me from having any access to the internet. I feel really horrible because I am the only one at work who has got a virus. And this is the second one. I use Nortan all the time almost everyday and it still wasn't catching it. MAN ALIVE. I am just so ashamed, I feel like a stupid girl (man I hate being a stupid girl). So this might be the end of my hotmail and msn days because even though I never open attachments and have my protection very high I have somehow still been attacked. SAD!!!! SO SAD!!! Well maybe these blogs will help me deal with my online addiction. GEE. Well now that I have been entirely pessimistic I will go home to bed, I mean it is 11pm, so maybe I should get some sleep. STUPID VIRUS!

Where to begin?

2005-02-03T19:04:00.000-08:00

Hi okay so really don't know why I am bothering to start a blog since i really don't have time for this or really anything else in my life, but really why not?! So here I go... really I don't really know where to start because really there is so many pointless things i could discuss, so many random thoughts i could turn into paragraphs of text! Where to begin? HMMM... Well I think that I will start by saying that I like this blog idea because now that im growing old and all its hard to stay in touch with everyone, especially my dear ole saskatoon friends. So this way the few people, who actually care enough to take the time to read my blogs, can stay up to date on my ever so fascinating life. And for people like Kristin Eagle and David Peter I will post pictures of my life in Edmonton, since you always ask! Alright so over and out for now...But stay tuned for ever exciting facts,myths,lies you know the norm!