Sarah's Recital

My dear JBU friend and one of my summer roommates in Lake City recently had her senior piano recital. It was incredible. She looked gorgeous and played beautifully. I continue to be in awe of so many of my friends' musical gifts and their dedication to perfect them. I was honored to co-host Sarah's recital reception along with my wonderful Teeny. Teen and I cooked until 1 am the night before and had a blast preparing for this reception. We were incredibly determined to make it the most impressive reception of all time. Nothing but the best. I made my favorite chocolate cookies (masses of them), 3 loaves of cranberry orange bread, spinach artichoke dip, and fruit dip. Teeny made beautiful trays of vegetables and fruit as well as super yummy punch and cider. It was a fun and crazy weekend and I enjoyed it thoroughly. It is also always great to be back in Siloam and hang out with the best friends around.

Happy Thanksgiving

I have had a wonderful day with family and friends. My mother and I cooked all morning and enjoyed our tradition of watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade on a TV in our kitchen. My dad and brothers enjoyed their epic tradition of the Sapulpa Turkey Bowl. The Turkey Bowl is a football game at the high school field in town that a bunch of guys in their late twenties started playing over twenty years ago. Over the years their sons started coming and their friends. My dad was one of the original founders and my brothers have been able to go since about age 10. They love it. Mom and I excitedly wait for them to come home and before they even get up the stairs to the kitchen they are usually heralding their win or accomplishments in the game and commonly (as they did today) chanting about being men. My dad has been known to break ribs in this game the last couple years and Mom and I were pretty nervous about some injury occuring as he is about to turn 60 years old. But he prevailed on the winning team with no injuries this year though I did end up rubbing my older brother's back for a good 30 minutes after they got back due to a strained muscle, but all in all not very many injuries this year.

As a family we always have dinner at our friend's the Plinsky's house in Jenks, OK. Tim and Karen are my parents' closest friends from their years at JBU and have stayed such over the years. Their daughter and son-in-law (also JBU grads) and their three kids are always there. Their nephew and neice (also JBU grads--notice a trend?) and their two baby girls were there again this year and I loved to reconnect with them and try to establish that I do have more young friends around this area than I realize. They food was amazing and 4 year old Mia took me on a run, literally, around the neighborhood afterward so I enjoyed 2 pieces of pie because of my effort. It was a great day with family and friends that are our family as well. I'm very thankful for these times in my life!

Break from Check-Ups

I got back from Nashville late last night, multiple posts on that after I find my camera cord, and I woke up late this morning to my mother asking what time my appointment was. I forgot all about it--thank goodness for mothers. I went to see quirky Dr. Ray again and the appointment went awesome. He literally gave me a pat on the back for flossing and clapped because my incisions were healing so well. I am starting to be a pro at chewing again and am very carefully biting into things babying my still tender front sets of teeth--I know it sounds very basic but when you haven't been able to for over 2 months, it is very exciting. Dr. Ray was excited with how everything looked externally as well. To be honest I am not exactly sure what he is looking for but he stands in about 5 different points in the examination room and looks directly at my jaw and chin and today thought things were coming right along. I haven't posted a post surgery pic of myself yet but that's mostly because I've been swollen or bruised so pics will come soon with the Nashville posts--you get to see my new jaw very soon....

Recovery Update

Today I got my stitches out! I was sooo ready to get this done. They have been very uncomfortable and awkward and stressful to take care of. The appointment went well except for the actual stitch removal. The stitches were in there really tight which is good because they were holding everything up and together but they cut some of my gums getting them out which was painful and frustrating because it seemed to defeat the purpose.

Today I also ate more normal food than I have in the past two weeks. I am starting to feel the renew of energy they told me I would feel. They said after getting the terrible abscess out I would feel like a "new woman" and it would highly effect my health and I am starting to see that already so that is super exciting for me!

Pray for my continued healing and pain. I will still have checkups once a week for awhile. I also have stopped taking the heavy pain medication because it really over affects me and I have a hard time functioning on it. But because of this I am still kind of in pain all the time. It's an interesting thing and for me a really mental battle to overcome. My friend Billy gave me this quote from C.S. Lewis that God whispers through our pleasure and shouts through our pain, that's an awesome thought and I have definitely been experiencing that love!

BreakOff...movies & photoshoots....

Oh my, I just took the most lovely walk down memory lane.

I am redecorating my bedroom and trying to redo my bathroom, meanwhile I borrowed a lot of old movies and musicals from one of my friends. One of these is my very favorite--Singin' in the Rain. What a classic. I love and know all the songs and have a massive crush on Gene Kelly. I realized that I watch this film with a happy and contented grin on my face.

This film also makes me think of a fantastic and only JBUish possible memory that some friends and I created my senior year at JBU (the first one!). JBU has a fall retreat put on by the student ministries deparment called BreakAway. Well my friends KWood, Pammie, Alex, Luke and I decided we did not want to breakaway, we wanted to do our own retreat to KWood's apartment for the weekend with our own outlined schedule of events and fun calling it BreakOff. It was a brilliant idea, one of the more creative and ridiculous ideas I've been apart of. I would have to write alot more to explain all of the "events" we had together that weekend but two predominantly stick out in my memory.

First, watching Singin' in the Rain multiple times, even a couple times in a row. Imparticular rewatching and rewinding one of the first scenes in order to learn the "Coconut Grove" dance and learn it we did. Pam, KWood, and I may have performed it many other times including private performances in local coffee houses.

Second, planning on taking a "metropolitan walk" through Siloam Springs---dressing as unconventionally fashionably as we could and parading around downtown. This idea then turned into Alex conducting a photoshoot and eventually using us as a photography project. These pictures deserve to be immortalized even years later. Look with caution--my reaction ranges from "Alex is so creative" "Arkansas was very humid" and bursts of laughter at the ridiculousness and excess of self-confidence captured in these photos. Enjoy.