It's Coming To A Close

Spring Break, that is.

Thursday I got to see one of my very best friends, Brittany Carter. Since she is a big girl, and has a big girl job, we squeezed in a lunch date to catch up on life. It's so encouraging to see how the Lord is working in her and her husband's lives. They are very involved in their church, and God is completely blessing their marriage for being faithful. I'm excited for the day when I can fully invest in their lives and hopefully be a blessing to them. We ate at a whole foods, which was a new experience for me.

Short tangent: Ever since living in Haiti, my views on organic foods and eating "clean" have changed a great deal. I try to eat mostly organic while I'm here, and I have never felt better in my life. I have hardly been sick, except for the amount of bugs that I've ingested, and I just feel wonderful. I know that eating organic costs more, but I really have seen the benefits of it. Not only do I want to eat organic, but I've realized how important it is to truly "go green." I'm really working at jotting down my views and how I want my life to look as far as organic and going green. If you have any advice on how to do either of these things, holler at your girl!

So after lunch I went downtown to help set up things before the youth evangelism conference that was happening that weekend. I got there and automatically got put to work. I visited for a few minutes, then started sorting t-shirts for the several t-shirt tables. I then had the privilege of putting these awesome t-shirts on fake bodies and hanging them up for people to purchase. Sounds super boring, but I got to do this with a bunch of my friends. We made it super fun, and finished surprisingly quick.

As a nice little treat, Kent, the guy who runs YEC/pastor of Hope Fellowship, took some of us to Chili's for dinner. Since I was going to dinner with my family that night, I didn't actually eat, but really loved getting to bond with some of my friends. We had a really wonderful dinner topped off with an amazing molten lava cake. We ordered one normal one and one with peanut butter on the inside. It was probably the best dessert I've had in a long time. The peanut butter one tasted like a melted Reece's Cup! Every time I tried to take a bite, Jared would literally hit my spoon and steal my bite. I would perfectly concoct my bite, then he would jack it. You think I would learn after the first 3 times it happened, but I was convinced that I would get to eat that marvelous piece of cake. I got maybe two bites. But those two bites were fantastic!

I rode with Jared to Chili's, so before he took me back to my car, he, Justin and I went to the bookstore. I didn't really know Justin, so it was fun getting to know him and us all goofing around in the store. While we were walking back to the car, the boys decided last minute to carry me across the pedestrian walkway. We gave a lot of people a lot of laughs because not only were they carrying me, but Justin is somewhere around 6'3" and Jared is probably 5'10". So I was lopsided being carried across a busy intersection, giving everyone a pretty good laugh.

I finally got to my car, and drove to meet my family for my last dinner before I went back. My sister was literally about to pop, and I wanted to see her husband's parents before I came back to Haiti. We went to my favorite Hibachi Japanese place, Kabuto. What I'm about to say might completely shock you! I ate SUSHI! And what is even more surprising is that I LIKED IT! I had a bite of a Tennessee role, which technically is deep fried, but it still tasted wonderful. I had a little gag reflex because I realized that I was eating sushi. But thats not even the start of it. After my sushi tasting adventure, I ATE SHRIMP! And I LOVED IT! I've been missing out on the wonderfulness of these foods, but since living in Haiti, I've branched out and started eating so much more of a variety. It was so good to sit around and talk to my very preggo sister, her husband and his family. I really do love my family, and I'm thankful for every time I get to see them.

Family Dinner

My next blog is going to be my favorite one. I can't wait to share with you what God did at the Youth Evangelism Conference!

Why, oh why did I decide Public Relations?

Today, our huge project was supposed to be due. Of course, the teacher decided to push back the due date, so now it is due on Thursday. I almost wish it would have been over today. I'm so tired of public relations, and especially this project.

Today we had to go to class to take our senior exit exam. That was a little scary knowing that was the last PR test I will EVER have to take. I'm super excited though because After next Tuesday I will be completely done with public relations FOREVER.

This class is called campaigns (or pr 470). Basically, the teacher picks a client, and a team of six creates an entire campaign. Most of the campaigns are awareness or fundraising campaigns.

Our client is Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic in Blount County. Sounds like a blast, right? When she announced that this would be our client, I freaked out a little bit because I had never even heard of them. Turns out, they are a non-profit organization that records books for children with reading disabilities.

Our campaign focuses on the fact that no one knows about them, and they have no money. As you can imagine, creating a campaign that is cost-effective but tells everyone about them is a little ridiculous and very hard to do. So I've spent this entire semester along with 5 girls trying to figure out how to make this work. It hasn't been easy, but I think we did a pretty good job. We are having it printed tomorrow and we will turn it in on Thursday morning. Our presentation to the client is next Tuesday, then I'm done! Praise the Lord!

I did get a little break from it the other day. I went home to Nashville last weekend to visit my family. I had not seen my dad is around 2 months, so it was really great to be able to hang out with them. We went to the Titans game on Sunday, and it reminded me of when I was a little girl and how I always loved going to the games with him. I got to see Brittany too, my best friend EVER. We went and drank some Starbucks coffee (except she had apple spice and I had hot chocolate hehe) and we sat and talked for a few hours. I am so proud of her because she was telling me how she was struggling, but also how she was facing those struggles. She's such a strong girl, and she definitely helped me with some of the things I was going through. She is so wise to be so young, but she's absolutely amazing and I love her to death. Here's a picture of us in St. Louis spring break.

We were pretending to be bears.

I also started knitting again! This time, I think I'm going to give all my scarves that I knit to homeless people. Good stress reliever and turning it around to do something good.

I hope all of you have a wonderful day, and remember to count your blessings this month (and all the time :)

Peace out!

>K