There Are No Words...

Hello my darlings. I'm sorry to realize that once again I have left you without a real blog for a full three weeks. I am back at school, as you know, and school is excited to have me back. So excited, in fact, that it decided to assure its time with me by filling my life with readings, papers, assignments, papers, recitations, and more papers. With all these papers to write, I could not bring myself to write more in my free-time. I planned on it everyday. I would think to myself, "My faithful readers are expecting a post. When I need a break from these essays, I will write a blog." As it turns out, when I needed a break from writing, I could not bring myself to write more. "Well," I'm sure you are wondering, "If you weren't writing for us, what were you doing with all that time?" An excellent question, my friend! I will tell you! I spent the last three weeks cooking.

To start, a few friends and I banded together to make Jollof Rice on a Friday (every time I mentioned this to someone they heard me say "Jello fries" and were sorely disappointed when they found out what I was offering them did not consist mainly of sugar. But the rice was delicious, I assure you). On Valentine's Day I baked little brownies shaped like people and carried them around my dorm with a tube of frosting, offering everyone I encountered the opportunity to decorate and then eat their own little chocolate valentine. (This turned into an interesting experiment. Some gave their brownie men faces, some gave them hearts, some gave them little T-shirts, and some merely squirted a bit of frosting on them and then bit off their heads.) And then the next day my miniature cupcake tins arrived and I had to use them, so naturally I spent the next day making tiny red velvet cupcakes, which also promptly disappeared.

The next week a friend and I gathered ingredients and took over our dorm's kitchen to make her family's old recipe for Lumpias (a sort of Filipino egg roll), which, by the way was quite a feat. We had to fry them in oil, and each time a roll encountered the boiling oil it would explode in a hundred tiny little splashes, until we were both sprinkled with teeny tiny burns and the kitchen floor was coated with oil. But those little Lumpias were certainly worth it, and the sauce we crafted to go with them was delectable, enough so that when the rest of the girls in our hall saw what we were making, the remaining Lumpias mysteriously disappeared. And finally to top it all off we made one large batch of cookies, which also promptly disappeared.

In the midst of all this eating I wrote quite a few papers, and by the end of last week felt I had climbed a veritable mountain, homework wise, and was ready for the downhill trek when things got a little easier. No such luck. Another week, another four papers to write. I will keep you posted on this week's cooking. I plan on making muffins.

Genesis 2:2-3 tells us that when God finished creating the world, he rested, and then "...God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done." When I am overwhelmed by schoolwork and just need a moment to sit or cook or rest, it's so encouraging to know that God himself rested from His work (albeit much greater work than what I've been laboring over), and set aside time for us to do the same. So take comfort, take a break, and know that you're in good company.

Truly His,
Caroline

Wish You Were Here

Hello my dear friends! I've come to offer an apology and not much more; I have abandoned you, and I'm sorry. This week has been crazy and I haven't found time to write. BUT I promise you a blog very soon!

In the meantime, something to once again draw your attention to as the day of Valentine approaches: Romans 5:8 " But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." You are so very loved! Don't doubt it.

Truly His,
Caroline

Lost and Found

Hello my darling readers. Yesterday, like all days, was the first day of the rest of my life! Unlike all other days, yesterday was also the beginning of my second semester at college. This is a fact that, a week ago, caused me much trepidation. A week ago I was home, comfortable and happy and spending all my time with my family, and going back to school seemed a terror. But it was good; I was going to college and I was going to learn all about the world around me! To convince myself of this, last Friday I took a look at my schedule. My schedule told me that six hours a week I would be sitting in a Bible class. Excellent! No complaint there. An hour and a half a week I would be in an English class. Also wonderful! I would be learning! And another fifteen hours a week I would be sitting in art classes. Realizing this, my heart sank. Art classes were great and all, but drawing for fifteen hours a week would be fifteen hours a week of school in which I would hardly learn anything. I wailed. I complained. I bemoaned these classes to my dad, to which he replied, "You know, you can always change your classes."

A revelation! I set to rearranging my schedule immediately. I wanted to learn, I wanted to take classes that reminded me I am in school. Math, I decided, would be the perfect solution. So I looked through the course catalog at math classes and decided on Introduction to Probability and Stats. That was sure to be something of a challenge. I added the class as well as another, Foundations of Global Studies, and gazed at my new and improved schedule affectionately. I was really a student! I was going to college and I was going to learn things!

So, yesterday I put on my sparkly purple shoes and set out with a great excitement for my classes and a fresh zeal for education! I found my way to my first class without a problem, noting all the people I knew in that class. "I have friends!" I thought to myself. What a joy! The first session of that class hinted that it would be difficult, but well worth the effort. Exactly what I was hoping for. So off I went to the next class, my friend and I getting slightly lost on the way and arriving a few minutes late to what looked to be another excellent class. And finally, when that class was over, it was time for Math! I was going to stare at numbers and learn about statistics and feel like I'm definitely in college! I headed over to my class room and looked in the window. There was another class in there, one that had clearly been going on for a while. "That makes sense," I thought, "My class doesn't start for another six minutes." So I found a place to sit down and read for a few minutes while I waited. A few minutes passed. It was 1:15. My class started at 1:15. I looked in the window; the other class was still there. I checked my schedule. I checked the room number. I paced back and forth. Maybe I wrote it down wrong. Maybe this was the wrong room! I ran to the nearest office and begged to look up the classes on their computer.

"Which class?"

"Probability and Statistics!"

"Oh, the one at 1:30?"

...Oh. So I made it to class a few moments later only slightly embarrassed by my apparent inability to read my own schedule. And I am struck once again by my ability to get lost even when my directions are clear, even when I have read them over time and time again. I can always manage to miss something, to get myself lost again. But luckily for me, I serve a God who knows this about me and goes far and wide to bring me back. In Luke 19:10 Jesus said, "For the Son of Man [that's Jesus] came to seek and to save what was lost." I'm amazed to know that even when I foolishly get myself lost over and over again, my Lord seeks me out and brings me back. That's what he came for.

Truly His,
Caroline