Mystery Popcorn Theater

sew creative

Torn shirt

+

homemade patch

+

some creativity & a sewing machine

=

my now unique plaid shirt :)

*******

I finally got a plaid shirt

and proceeded to rip the right sleeve the first day I wore it.

(that beautiful pile of fall leaves was just too tempting to dive into!!)

So, I took it upon myself to patch it.

Here is the sleeve torn...

Here is the cute bird patch i made...

And voilà, here is my now wearable shirt : )

xoxo, Jamie

Hey Mr. Snake

Changes

God has been speaking to me about changes.
Good changes.
I have come to a time in my life when there was a great opportunity ahead of me
and I felt God had the door wide open for me.
Now all of a sudden I feel that door closed.
But He is so great!
Because He
IMMEDIATELY
opened another door for me.
And I feel at peace.
I feel relieved.
I feel excited for the plan He has for my future.

Erase the Dark

WHY DID GOD MAKE HANDS?

I submitted this to erase the dark this last Friday (yesterday night).
Thought it was a great night :)
I got the idea from a talk Nate did last summer where he asked the question:
"Why did God make hands?"
And answered: "to be generous."
That night my friend Katie wrote "why?" on her hand,
so I drew a little hand on my notes.
A month ago or so I was cleaning through my room and found the notes
and thus my idea for this picture was born.

A Servant's Heart

I have always felt fuller and more at home when I am serving. It takes all focus off of myself and channels it to where God wants me. I always feel satisfied when I am helping others.

With this in mind, I joined the 6:30 prayer team at the Stirring. This will change my Sunday nights. It already has because last Sunday was amazing! I felt God's presence in such a powerful way. I was able to worship Him like I haven't been able to in a while.

Thanks God!

Yes I can...

A few weeks ago my bathroom faucet was leaking very badly.
Other than wasting water it gave off an annoying
drip drip drip drip drip ....
So, rather than waiting for my dad to fix it,
I pulled out a trusty "how-to fix-household-things" book
and went to work with a screwdriver and wrench.
I ended up having to visit Lowes with my dad to get some new parts,
but I did it!
I took it apart and put it back together all by myself.
My dad was pretty impressed and I was too! haha.

All's well

My brother's wedding went really well.
It was beautiful and took my breath away
when I was escorted down the aisle by my groomsman.
My dress fit perfectly and I felt beautiful.

One of Dale's best friends, Micheal and I

Aren't they so giddy with joy!

Walking out

Wedding party

I had to put this one up.
It's my baby cousin Alexis and I .

better

so the other night i unloaded all my stress to my mom and then she told my dad (she always does that), and so my dad talked to me today, telling me that getting a job isn't one of his expectations for me right now, that my job is to go to school. So i'm not worrying about that for right now. i feel really relieved.

the stirring was amazing on sunday. i got an awesome very needed hug from Jordyn, my fave greeter ;) and then Jake did an amazing job of leading us in worship. he inspires me. i sang my heart out.

it's all a bit confusing...

...impossible at best.

I'm a bit overwhelmed at the moment.
Overwhelmed with what college I'm going to transfer to,
looking for a job,
and getting ready for my brother's wedding which is in 17 DAYS!
I am so not ready.

For any of it (mostly the wedding).

College:
1) I fear being far away from all my friends and family and being...alone...with no friends.
2) I'm afraid I'll choose the WRONG college.

Job:
If someone were to just hand me a great job, I'd be happy,
but looking for one stresses me out.

Wedding:
I'm afraid I've gained a few pounds since I last tried on the dress, and I have awful tan lines which don't go well with a strapless dress. I hope it's not selfish to want to look good on my brother's wedding day. I just don't want to look back at photos in a few years and say "EWW!"

I've been feeling down the last few days...all these things running around in my mind. I've been thinking about AHLOT of stuff, wishing I could write it all down but being too lazy cuz it's so much.

On a bright note, my mom gave me this really great devotional, I forget the name, but it's kinda all about how to have a devotional. I feel like I have gotten out of the rhythm of spending time with God and I wasn't really sure where to start again. So it was me praying and journaling. I feel like I'm slowly coming out of my rut.

Will write more soon :D
All Love,
Jamie

In these moments...

I had a weird moment today.
It has happened before.
It was a moment when I was writing my name,
and I started to stare at it and I said it out loud.
Jay-Mee.
And in some surreal way I felt separated from my mind and body,
staring at my name.
This is what I am called,
Jamie.
And in that separated moment it looked so funny
and sounded so weird.
Jay-Mee.
Who is this girl? Or Who is this person?
It's a person?
Who thought of this name, these sounds that you put together to form a word?

***
In that moment I also thought of the person I AM.
The person God created.
With purpose.
A human being existing in this marvelous world He created.
A person out of a gazillion.
He loves me.
He's the God who has all things and still wants ME!

A Jar of Rocks

I was at my Life Group on Thursday and my friend Jordyn was saying that she could never find time to spend with God. She is continually bombarded by homework and chores. This seems to be a common occurrence amongst most people.

What would happen if we stepped out in faith by spending that time with God FIRST, and then trusting Him to help us get, in this case, our homework done?

My good friend Rachel told me of a time last semester at Simpson when she felt God calling her to skip school for one whole day and go up to Whisky Town Lake to spend time with Him. She was afraid to get behind in her studies, but she stepped out in faith and spent all day with Him at the lake. That was a wonderful day for her to be refreshed and replenished by the Lord, and she knew that He would provide her with the time to catch up on her studies.

There is a good metaphor about this, (or time management in general)...

Imagine you have a glass jar, the bigger the size the better.

Now fill it with some fist-sized rocks.
When the jar is full, put a few more in for good measure :D

Is the jar full? You might say yes, but it's not.
Now add some pebbles, shaking the jar to cause the pebbles
to work themselves down into the spaces between the big rocks.

Then, pour in a bunch of sand,
filling all the spaces between the rocks AND the pebbles.
One last thing, grab a pitcher of water and pour it in until the jar is filled to the brim.

The point of this is, if you don't put the big rocks in first, you'll never get them in at all. These big rocks represent our most important priorities. Our most important prioritY should be God, and our time with Him. When we fit Him in first, He makes everything fit in around Him, but not before Him. I hope this helps someone, I know that I need to work on this in MY own life.

Cheers,
Jamie Ann

Finding Beauty in Ugly Things...

I currently have a Tarantula named Penelope living in my room this next week and a half while my good friend Caitlin is off in Hawaii, swimming in crystal clear blue waters and relaxing on soft white sands, soaking in the glorious warm tropical sun.


At her request of me pet sitting I was hesitant, reluctant... but then I thought, how bad could it be? I don't have to hold it, just mist its cage and throw in some crickets (which on a side note are my own personal chirping summer night in a Cool Whip container). I agreed to the task.

Usually when I mist Penelope's cage she retreats further into her log home, but tonight she came out a bit. It was almost as if she was longing for some attention, for the familiar Caitlin hand to lovingly reach out to her. I found myself in awe of her. How could something so hairy with 10 legs be so captivating? You may be cringing and gaging at the thought of this big spider, but I was enthralled by her beauty. Each leg was so carefully placed, one hovering still in the air, waiting.

Waiting? For me? So after much thought and rationalizing, I slowly placed my hand on the bark at the bottom of the cage, inches from her, waiting for her to climb onto my hand.

Unfortunately, my human gut instinct is to pull away from dangerous things (she's not dangerous, but still a spider), so after a few seconds when she suddenly moved her feet forward a HUGE rush of adrenaline poured through my body and I JERKED my hand out of the cage. I had done that without even thinking. My body just reacted.

I never got the courage up to put my hand down again and after a few minutes of gazing at her she retreated into her home.

I'm sorry Penelope, I will try again tomorrow.

Automatic flatterer :)

hehe try it out...it put a smile on my face :D
http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~geoffo/humour/flattery.html

hehe funny video... "love corner"

"Good quote"

"I can do no more justice
to the awesome wonder-filled theme called love
than a child can grasp a star.
Still by reaching toward the star
the child may call attention to it
and even indicate the direction
one might look to see it.
So, as I stretch my heart
toward the high shining love of God,
someone who has not before known about it
may be encouraged to look up and have hope."
~A. W. Tozer.

Como se llama usted?

Mi llamo Jamie.
I got into my Spanish class. Yay!
My teacher is so fun.
We laugh so hard in class.
I hope I can keep up with all the homework.
:)
HAND
~ Jamie

up to randomness :)

Sorry about there being two slideshow in that last post. :) I didn't think that it was working and I guess it did!!! :)
-Lately I have been babysitting and earning money. SWEET!
-I start a Spanish class this Tuesday with my bro. I am actually on the waiting list, but will go the first day and try to get in. Pray that I will!!!
-I don't start the rest of my classes until Sept. the 6th I think.
-I have been helplessly addicted to myspace.
-I am making a skirt out of some old ripped jeans of mine. I cant wait until they are done!
-I have been burning all my pictures onto CDs because they are taking up room on my HD and making the computer go too slow!!!!
HAND (Have A Nice Day)
~ Jamie

camping slideshow!

| View | Add Favorite

Filoli Gardens

This last weekend my parents and I went down to Saratoga for a surprise party of a family friend. He's like an uncle to me. It was a blast.

On Friday we went to this Mansion with a garden called Filoli...the garden is HUGE!!!! They have 30 full time gardeners...and it is gorgeous. Peter...the family friend...loves to take pictures...so he had my mom and his wife, Denise, dress up to be in his pics. He let me use one of his nice cameras...it was fun.

On Saturday was the surprise party. I helped Denise’s friend Ronita blow up balloons…it was hard! ;-) Ronita told me I could come to her house anytime! LOL! My mom says that I’m hers and no one else can have me.

On Sunday we hung out with Peter, Denise, their son Chris and his wife Lea. Also Danny, Theresa, and 3-year-old Daniel…all who my mom and I met at Chris and Lea’s wedding. They are an awesome family. Theresa took my mom and I to this whole food store in their friend’s car…a convertible BMW…it was so cool. We drove with the top down of course.

HAND (Have A Nice Day)
~ Jamie

Here is a good pic I took of myself.

I am Back, sorta

Hi all, if anyone reads this anymore that is. :-) I have been totaly caught up with Myspace, it's not even funny how obsessed I have become. Here is a cute pic of most of my good friends.
I probably won't post that often.
~ Jamie

Well, long time no post (again).

I joined Myspace with a friend, so we have a jointed site, pretty cool!

Last week I took Driver's Education with Katie Lynne. We both passed with an A!!!! :-) A lot of the kids were depending on their final to pass, but not Katie and I.
I think the best part (other than now being able to get my permit and driver's license) was the lunch break because Bob Fink's driving school is right next to Yaks koffee shop. Yaks is SO cool! Katie and I had a lot of fun hanging out there for 4 days in a row. They have tables and couches and a bookshelf full of games and a really cool old Monopoly table. Their coffee and sandwiches are good.

For Christmas my mom and I went to my Pop and Nana's (her parents). My dad and brother couldn't come because they were both working. It was okay, but pretty boring. I was glad to be back home on Monday because then we had our family Christmas with my dad and brother. It was so fun! I gave my brother a new air guitar, I thought he might be disappointed, but he REALY liked it! :-) And he has been using it a lot since he got a video ipod from Dad. I got one too! It was so funny how dad gave them to us.

First we had no clue that we were getting ipods. So, Dad gave us these presents and made a big deal about them, like they were really special. We open them up and they are big books. And not just any books, thick random used books that say $2.00 in the cover. I flip through mine, which is about symphonies, and try to look cool like it's a cool present, right? Then I get to the middle and a rectangle in the middle if the pages is cut out. I was like "What? Part of the pages are cut out!" Then I notice an ipod in the hole. I was so surprised! I love surprises. Dale said that he wouldn't have found his if I hadn't kept flipping through and found mine. It was like the recent LOST episode when Lock finds part of the video reel in that Bible.
It's probably that best present I've received. And Dale's air guitar is probably the best present I've given. :-) Besides Lynda's falafel mix and canned snake (the other other other white meat). That was pretty fun to give too.
Well TTFN, Ta Ta For Now!
~ Jamie

P.S. with all this deal about saying "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas." I thought you'd all like to know that the word "holiday" comes from the Middle English word holidai, meaning "holy day." So I hope y'all had a great Holy Day and remembered that Jesus is the reason for the Season.

Yah Baby!!

Yay!!! Today it snowed at least 2 inches at my house! It was awesome. To see snow falling is so glorious and beautiful. But then it started to rain which makes me cry. I hope it snows more.
My thanksgiving went well. My family and I went down to my Mom's parent's house, so it was small, but nice. Usually we go up to my Dad's parent's house, but my Pop's (mom's dad) health isn't doing so well so we wanted to spend time with him and my Nana. We don't really know if he will get better or not. Would you pray that they become Christians? That would be so great.
Have a wonderful and happy week!
~ Jamie

And in all things pray

"Pray without ceasing." ~ 1 Thessalonians 5:17
"Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer." ~ Romans 12:12

Please pray for my family, especially my dad. We are going through a hard situation right now with my dad's job. Yesterday the hospital where he works fired his boss/supervisor out of the blue. They don't even have a back up plan or someone to replace her! Dad said that by the end of this year he might not be working there anymore. Recently the hospital changed hands - they switched owners - and these new owners don't care about the people at all. We are not really worried about it. Worrying doesn't get people anywhere. I just hope and pray that everything turns out okay.

~ Jamie

Well, I have a cold AGAIN! :-( Pray that I will get better and not use it as an excuse to goof off. :-)
Have you heard about the golden retriever puppy that was born green - yes, the color green - in Southern California? They say it was just the mother's placenta that stained it and the color should go away. His name is Wasabi! If you don't know what that is - it's a green Japanese mustard that is REALLY spicy. (My dad really likes it.) :-)

Life is Like a Toilet Paper Roll

Well, it has been a long time since I have posted. Time flies, but life is good. I heard somewhere that life is like a toilet paper roll - the less there is the faster it goes. That is so true.

4 weeks ago our dear friend Caleb got married to a wonderful woman named Becky. They are the perfect couple - Christ just freely emanates out of them. Their wedding was awesome and probably the best one I have been to so far. It is sad to lose Caleb, but it is even sadder to lose Caleb and Becky because they have moved up to Kelso, Washington. Caleb got a job at a church up there as the youth/worship pastor.

Tonight Sunny came over with 7 week year old Joy Anneliese. She is such a precious baby; it was so fun to hold her. She has dark hair like her dad. Life is so precious. It made me look forward to motherhood someday in the far future.

~Have a great night's sleep! Jamie

Which book of the Bible are you?

You are Psalms.


Which book of the Bible are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

hip hip, hooray!!!

My dad got home yesterday!! I am so glad to have him back. He got me this really cool necklace from Africa--black seed beads and a black and white striped tear drop stone in the middle. Also some really beautiful beads from The Lourve in Paris.
That's probably the best part of my week. I had food poisoning on Sunday and now I have a cold so I am really tired and my body feels worn out. No fun. Plus I feel overwhelmed with school work. Ugh.
I hope the rest of you are having a better week!
~ Jamie

Refreshed

My dad called yesterday from Africa. It was so cool! It was good to hear his voice. Yesterday was his birthday, so my mom, brother, and I went out to Cheveys to celebrate! It was fun.
Night of Worship was SO powerful! I feel refreshed. The worship was great and the calls down to the front were great. I went both times. GOD IS AWESOME!!!
************************
Here is an email that a freind sent me that I really like:


Find a guy who calls you beautiful instead of hot,
who calls you back when you hang up on him,
who will stay awake just to watch you sleep.

Wait for the guy who kisses your forehead,
who wants to show you off to the world when you are in your sweats,
who holds your hand in front of his friends,

I thought this was cute, at least the top part. It really is true...

Wait for the one who is constantly reminding you of
how much he cares about you and how lucky he is to have you.
Wait for the one who turns to his friends and says,"...that's her."
************************

At the end it said,"in 5 minutes your true love will call or message you."
Well that didn't happen to me!:-)

have a good day, All Love, Jamie

Hi all!

We have heard a lot from my dad. He emails a lot. He said that they got there safely. He has been doing a lot of construction and the guys he is working with speak mainly French so he said that the "French to English is fun." He and some people went exploring in some caves and saw "really big bats." He also said "they went down there to heal people, when really it is them being healed." No specific stuff, but I thought that that was pretty cool. He gets home in 13 more days!!! Yay!
**********************
So, Wednesday night there was a big youth rally thing for "Inundate" (a week of prayer evangelism put on by Redding Transformation led by my worship pastor Jon). I was really cool. There was worship and then Jon and another youth pastor spoke about God and us changing our city.
**********************
I caught the last 20 min. of LOST last night and it was too weird! I can't wait til next week!!!!
That's all for now!
All Love, Jamie

Here I am, finally posting!!!

Hi y'all. I have not posted much in a while. Labor Day weekend we had our friends Peter and Denise from the Bay area come up and we had a lot of fun. Their newly married son Chris and his wife Lea came too. On Saturday Peter, Chris, Lea, my dad, and I went hiking practically all day and saw a bunch of waterfalls, they were very cool!
***********

School started on Wednesday the 7th. It's just not the same without Dale and Brandons' loudness. It's really small and very quiet. Elyse said that everyone's probably just on their best behavior for the first day of class. Hopefully that is true. Anna did try to liven it up by opening her fizzy water during lunch and having it spray all over her. It was really funny. (I love you Anna.)
***********

This Saturday, the 10th, my mom and I drove with my dad and another doctor, Mark Nicholes (also a good friend of my dad's) to the San Francisco airport. We dropped my dad and Mark off and came home. There was another car with 5 people in it that were going too. My dad is going to Gabon, Africa for 26 days on a medical missions trip. (For the very few of you who don't know - my dad is a nurse) Although they will probably be having him do more construction work than medical stuff.
I miss him. It didn't really hit me until today when I was cleaning out my desk and I opened one of the drawers and there was a hidden note for me from him. It was really sweet and it made me all teary. I'm even teary just writing about it. :-) The cool thing about the note was that he had photo copied a doll that we have and that was the front of the note. Now I must tell you about the significance of the doll: When I was a baby my Aunt Sharon gave me this cute little stuffed doll. It looks like a dwarf - with the beard and the pointy hat. My mom liked the doll and kind of adopted it. So years ago my parents started this tradition that whenever they (we) went on a trip (together or apart) they would take the doll (whoever could get it first!) and hide it in eachother's suitcase or if they were going separately they would hide it under the other's pillow or in their drawer etc. So when I opened my drawer and there was a photo copied version staring up at me I was just pleasantly surprised. He hid the real doll for my mom, but we haven't found it yet!
***********

Today is my half birthday! I am officially fifteen and one half. Yay! :-)
*<:-)
birthday smiley

~ Have a good rest of the weekend! Jamie

Happy September! Youth group started on Wednesday. YAY!!! It was fun. This year is going to be good. I start school after Labor day. GTG, Jamie

Catching up

Okay peoples! You need to comment on my vacation posts! Comment comment comment!
Anyway, this week has not been as busy as last week. Last week I babysat/watched Lydia Staeck ALL week except Sunday and Thursday. From 12-5 except on Saturday I babysat from 6pm to 9:30pm. It wasn't that bad except I basically non-stop played with her the whole time during the week. Then on Saturday I went to Katie Hemeon's b-day party and had a blast. It was fun. We slept on the trampoline and didn't actually sleep until like 4:30 in the morning. Can you imagine 7 girls on the tramp? It was cozy.

This week I am doing a MAJOR cleaning in my closet. I took EVERYTHING out and assembled some new shelves and stuff to put in. It's looking pretty good, but my room still has half of my closet contents strewn about.

What else is new? hummmm... I know! I decided (yes, to follow Jesus, but that was a while ago) to do the year around program with Turtle Bay. So starting mid-September I will be volunteering 3 hours twice a month hopefully on Fridays.

~ All love, Jamie

I got a cell phone!

Well, not really... but it's the thought that counts! I finally got all my vacation pictures posted, so you have to go down like five posts and read them all. ~Jamie

ARE WE THERE YET?So, my uncle, aunt, cousin, mom, dad, and I went on a side trip for 3 days. We try to do this traditionally to see new places and spend more quality time together. In 2001 we went to Yellowstone National Park, in 2004 we went to Mt. Rushmore, and this year we went to Bozeman and Virginia City, Montana. ("Bozeman!" you say? Yes, we named our loverly dog after this city because we loved it so much. His middle name is even Montana! In fact, years ago we almost moved there. My Dad was offered a job at a hospital there, but our house never sold and some other things happened too.We still love it though.)

FIRST DAY:Bozeman is a charming old town with lots and lots of very fun shops. So, when we arrived (it's about 4 hours from our cabin) we parked and walked the streets looking at shops. They have an awesome toy shop! I remember Dale and I always going in there. After shopping 'til dropping, not really, we went to dinner. Then we drove by The Museum Of The Rockies (which we were planning on going to the next day) to find out where it was and check out the exterior. Well, they have this HUGE replica of a T-Rex in the front of the museum name Big Mike. So we took a bunch of pictures of it. :-)

Did I say it was a replica? I didn't mean that. It was alive! A stalking skeleton:


















It almost ate Ross and I. We barely escaped by the skin of our teeth:












































The caveman in Ross is coming out:















This horse is made of chain:



















SECOND DAY:THE MUSEUMWe went to The Museum Of The Rockies. It is known for it's dinosaur exhibit. In fact, it's dinosaur exhibit and it's dino guy were the inspiration for the movies "Jurassic Park."First we did the 2 exhibits that were outside because it was going to get hot, and it did.~We started with the Lewis and Clark Challenge. You go around reading about their voyage, and doing things that they did, and seeing a lot of replicas of boats, teepees, their camp set-up, etc. At one point they had this circle of about 6 binocular/telescopes which when you looked through you saw the hills, plains, and mountains that they traveled through and over, etc. It was pretty cool. If you want to know more about it, just ask me. ;-)~The second outside exhibit was this old "living" house. It was this old 2 story house with a garden and a bunch of sod sheds etc.. which had people dressed in period clothing who "lived" and "worked" there. They had cows, chickens, and a couple of donkeys. There were about 5 men who were working in the huge garden, chopping wood, and working in the tool shed. There were 3 women who were cooking in the kitchen and later on they did crafts and weaving up stairs in one of the rooms. Upstairs they had a children's room with toys you could play with and clothes you could try on. I had Ross try on a bonnet. :-) The family that actually lived there had like 11 kids. It was really fun to explore the house and all of the rooms which were set up like people were living there. Like I said before, if you want to know more about it, just ask me. ;-)~After all of this fun it started to get hot so we ventured inside.These are the exhibits we went through: *Dino exhibit, [They had replicas of a ton of dinos. It is so cool and scary to see how BIG dinos were.]*an exhibit on Native American Indians,*an exhibit on the time period of early Bozeman (Lewis and Clark's time period), [They had fun hands-on-history things like a water pump that you could pump, duh, and water would come out. And a western horse saddle that you could get on; at this point Ross and I were starting to get a bit tired and board so we had lots of fun riding on the saddle. :-)]*an exhibit on Outer Space, [This was fun, everything was hands on. Most of it was finding certain things, stars and planets, on computer screens. It was very much to reach out to the kids.]Again, like I said before, if you want to know more about it, just ask me. ;-) [A.K.A. I have no time or desire to type out every detail.] IT WAS AN AWESOME MUSEUM!


Lewis and Clark miniature golf:













A ship that Lewis and Clark built:




















A canoe that the Indians carved:













This was a bear run. You had to run the length of the fence and back in like 30 seconds (as fast as a bear). Let's just say that Ross and I would be eaten!:




















Ross in a T.P. (Just kidding! I meant a teepee!):




















Outside of the old house:
















The family that lived in the house (they posed for me!):

















Ross and I playing dress-up (I Can't believe he actually wore the bonnet for me!):
































You get to guess what this is!:




















This is for Jordan and Cassie:




















The garden:















Stereoscope (they have one at Turtle Bay):





























Sod roof shed:















ith shop, Barber shop, Shoe repair. You couldn't walk in, you just looked through the door or window. Some even had it where you could walk in a little ways and then it was glassed off, some had picket fences instead of glass. They were all set up like they would have been, with goods etc. and some had mannequin people in them. All the shops were so fun! Most of the shops that you could buy stuff in were owned by people because the shops had all kinds of stuff that the owner had made. It even had an old Opera House that people actually still performed plays and stuff in. I wanted to see a play that was showing so badly, but it was too late in the day. The highlight was buying and eating homemade ice cream. Yummy, yum!!! It was so good. My flavors were chocolate and cowboy coffee. Delicious! I hope I am not making your mouth water! :-)


I got one for all the girls!:






















































Motorized ice cream maker:
















Yum yum:




















Ross got three scoops:




















Ross holding up the safe: