The Boiler Room~ a message of hope

Today I went to church, which isn't something out of the ordinary for me on a Sunday morning. However, I escaped from the norm and visited a church called the  Boiler Room in Kansas City, MO. I've been there a couple of times before and loved it each time, today was no exception. It's a small very unique church. The worship was wonderful and the message was spectacular. The pastor spoke on hope today, and while hope seems like such a simple word, it has so much meaning behind it. I'll just give a few highlights of some notes I took during the service:
Romans 15:13 - Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so you will abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Hope- a joyful, confident expectation of good rooted in Jesus Christ
Hope is the environment the makes faith possible, the soil that faith grows in.
Where are you worn out, defeated, jaded, disappointed, and without expectation of good in yourself, in your relationships, or your perspective?
Where do you need to meet Jesus?
One question he brought up that really stuck out to me and that I've been reflecting on a lot was this:
What was it like for Jesus to hear the voices he has made condemn Him?
When I think about this question I can only imagine how brokenhearted He was and the great pain He felt. His own creation condemning Him. And look at the world now, I believe I still see his children that he loves and died for condemning Him every day. Does it pierce his heart each time He sees his creation turn their faces from Him?
Ok, I'm done preaching my own little message, now back to the original.
Most of the world pretends that it's still Saturday, that Jesus hasn't risen from the dead. BUT, death has lost its sting, the GRAVE has lost it's victory. There are plans for our life where Saturdays seem to dominate. When we come to that place we think He is dead there.
Why has your heart been broken? Encounter resurrection.
So, that's just a brief synopsis of the wonderful message today.

And there it is: The Boiler Room

Everything I Have

I'd like to start this post off with this quote that I've been reflecting on: "What kind of God is is who asks everything of us? The same God who "...did not spare his own Son, but gave Him up for us all; and with this gift how can He fail to lavish upon us all He has to give?" He gives all. He asks all." - Elizabeth Elliot

So the other day I made a comment how I was done posting about India, however I'm actually not. One of the days we were in India some of my friends and I decided to go shopping and exploring along the streets of India. My friend Amanda, who is a photographer took my camera and got some great pictures, so I thought I'd share some.

Me in punjabi and all crossing the streets of India

We took a picture of this lady and she was so happy she gave us flowers for our hair.

A sari shop

Look a Sewing Machine!

The Stripe Bazaar

Another good couple days of work. I continue to have lots of fun each day. Next Wednesday the bank is having jean day. I'm so excited about that. I never thought I would be so happy for a jean day at work. I'm running out of cute, fashionable, professional outfits.
Tomorrow morning I'm enrolling for all my classes for school. I sure hope I can get into all my classes before they get too full. I will be continuing to work at the bank while I'm in school, therefore, my schedule only works one possible way, so I have one shot. Wish me luck as I battle it out tomorrow.
I have been really into making fashion collages lately. I enjoyed making the first one so much that I decided I might as well make it a habit/ hobby.  This one is all about stripes. Stripes somehow make me smile and I think they are bold, defining, and fun.

Alice's Garden

Working as a bank teller is still going quite well and I'm really enjoying getting to know all my really nice coworkers. I also enjoy dressing up very professionally everyday. It's proven to be rather fun. However, I do miss my skinny jeans. Anyway none of that really matters.
I don't know if I've announced this on here or not, because honestly I don't remember all I talk about on this blog, but this is pretty exciting, at least to me. Guess what???? That's right! I'm going to fashion school in the fall. Now I'd love to be able to tell you all about how I'm moving to New York etc. etc. However, I'm staying right here in KS and going to JCCC. While JCCC isn't near as grand as some great big fashion school in New York, I'm still very excited. All this is to say that last night I guess you could say I made a fashion collage. I really liked how it turned out and just thought I'd post it on here.

Little Lights

I've started my job as a bank teller and I thoroughly enjoy it. I have completed one week of training, and have one more to go. There is so much more than I ever imagined involved in banking, but I find it very fun.
So I figure it's about time for another India post and this is probably the last one. While we were in Chennai  we got to work with Little Lights, which is a safe place for children to live and go to school. It's such a neat  ministry and I really enjoyed working with them. We went everyday to help the children get ready for school ( I braided lots of hair), sat with them while they ate breakfast, and then saw them off to school. One of the days we were there I got to walk them to school. I absolutely loved it and held their hands all the way there. The kids are so precious and getting to hang out and love on them touched me so much. After they left for school we did chores around the house such as doing laundry (by hand- which after a ton of clothes gets super tiring), sweeping and mopping, and ironing uniforms. When they came home we would play with them and help them with homework. One night we were there we got to have a movie night with them. We passed around popcorn and watched Toy Story 3. The kids were all enthralled. After it was over I went to help put all the kids to bed and they couldn't get enough goodnight hugs and kisses from me.
These children were so sweet and I miss hanging out with them.

Ships Ahoy!

Suprise, Suprise, I've been sewing lately. I have a lot of projects actually that are in desperate need of me posting them, but I just haven't gotten around to it. Anyway, here are some baby onesies I've recently made. Hope you like them. I think they are pretty cute.

Family Time

I never finished telling about my time with my sister and her family while they were visiting. So, this post is dedicated to the Simmons family (Seth, Krista, Aidan, and Nora). First off, we had such a fun time together. I miss having talks with Aidan and Nora in the morning. We had a full two weeks of lots of playing and hanging out. Krista and I fortunately got to play a lot of games. We also got to go on an all girl shopping trip, and we made sure to take Nora with us. She seemed to enjoy it. I walked around with her in a carrier.

Look at that smile. She's going to be a future shopper I can tell. 

I love my sister and her adorable little Nora

Isn't she so adorable?

While they were here we also had a little family birthday party for Aidan. He was so excited, and we had a great time. We had quite the little party from opening presents, to decorating cupcakes, to egg hunts. Aidan was thrilled to have a party and loved all the attention. 

Aidan fell in love with these party blowers and barely took a rest from them the entire party

Blowing out the candles

I bought some party poppers for Aidan and he that they were great. He insisted we do all 12 of them as fast as possible.

I love this kid.

Children of India

The final city we went to in India was Chennai. There were many different things that we did there. One of them was helping out with a daycare in a leper colony. Now, this isn't your typical daycare. The mothers all dropped their children off to
a small building with a dirty cement floor and the kids spent the time playing with ancient toys that kids of America wouldn't touch. They were such sweet kids and it was great to just hang out with them. Here are the adorable children of India:

Acrobatic Painting, You've Heard of it Right?

I've decided it's probably time to do another blog post. I haven't been up to a whole lot lately, however, I did manage to get a job as a bank teller. I start Monday, and I'm pretty excited and nervous. This is a pretty important job, at least it seems that way to me. Alright enough about my career, after all it's really not that interesting. I'll get on to the main point of this post, which is to continue informing the world all about my trip to India. So here we go:
After resting up in Durgapur, we moved on to Coimbatore to minister at a leprosy hospice. We ministered in many various ways. The main ministry I was involved with while being there was getting up before the sun to bathe and care for the hospice patients. It was an early morning and I often had to drag myself out of bed, but it was good for me.

A. Thompson Photography

These are two lovely ladies from the hospice. They were fun.

I also spent many days painting the back of the hospice building. I never imagined how involved i'd get. Let's just say I offered to be a guinea pig and did some pretty crazy painting acrobatics. I'll have to show a picture to fully explain. First, let me introduce you to the building I came to know so well:

As you can see I'm sitting on a little ledge and I climbed the little ladder resting on the other ledge to get to it. Let's just say it was pretty precarious. At this point I thought I was being pretty daring, that was until we came up with another brilliant idea for painting every square inch of that building. After some trial and error and my eager willingness, we came up with a new system. 

Doesn't everyone paint buildings like this?

We decided the most effective and efficient way to finish painting, was for me to sit on a little log which was tied to a rope that the guys from my team were holding from the top of the roof and pulling me up. 

My life was in their hands...or teeth, quite literally. 

I must say my butt got pretty sore from sitting on that log for so long, but I also found out that I quite enjoyed being the only one that could brag about this feat. 

Yep, there I am covered in paint with my trusty little log seat in all my bragging glory.