Just knocking on doors.   

Many great ideas have been lost because the people who had them could not stand being laughed at.

~Author Unknown

Going golfing for the first time in 5 hours. :)

Reasons I haven't been blogging this week:

(I have a list)

-I feel like I'm wasting part of who I am by not writing something bigger.
-I hate that I can't post pictures and I'm just loading you all up with heavy text.
-Last weekend feels like too much to capture, and I'd hate to do it without photos.
-I really like life right now, and I like living it more than describing it.
-I work at an office that provides very few opportunities in the day to blog.
-In the evenings, I have better things to do than blog.
-In the mornings, if I get out of bed in time, I know I should run rather than sit at a computer for any more  time than I already do all day long..

But I hope to get back to writing a bit more artistic work soon. 

Camping was fantastic.  It was so refreshing to be outdoors, and to be there with a group of people who are kind and funny and up for shenanigans.  It's what I needed. It was like dumping a bucket of cold water onto my life... made me feel my hands and fingers, made my toes tingle.  Made me taste a bit of adventure and remember what it's like to take a risk.  Be it running around a fort at night, climbing the face of a mountain, or opening my heart a bit more.  I'm grateful for those people.  I'm also grateful I got to check off one more of my 25 goals for the year.  I have a lot more to go!

From Southern Nomad. 

I love this! And I love that she entitled it "Risk". 

Even a fool is thought wise if he stays silent, and a foolish girl if she doesn't move.... but what good is a fool undiscovered?  Only doomed to remain a scared fool. 

These are the goals I posted last January.   They've been on the sidebar of my blog all year:

New Years Goals

-Write more.

-Be more gracious and patient.

-Be more generous- which means spend less on me (and save more)/ budget.

-Read through the Bible again. Genesis-Revelation

-Re-learn Italian

-Study architecture more.

-Become on the outside, the person I've been on the inside.

-Step into my dreams.

I did write more. But, I didn't really attempt to write. If you get the difference.
Be more gracious and patient. I certainly had more opportunities than I have my entire life. And I think I realized just how impatient and ungracious I can be. But I don't know if I really grew in it. :(
I did grow in generosity. I was intentional and sought to give to others when I wanted to spend on myself. However, I still indulged a lot on myself. This coming year I want to get better at saying "no" to myself. But still, I think I achieved this goal.
I didn't "relearn architecture." I didn't even re-learn ANY. Not a verb.
I read Genesis and Exodus straight through.
I enjoyed architecture more. I spent more time looking up things, enjoying beautiful pieces and photography. But I didn't really study it.
I don't really feel prepared to comment on the last two.

This past year has been a very difficult year. I don't know if I even realized just how difficult until the end. I felt heartaches - real heartaches. I felt fear - real fear. I faced real questions - real tough questions. And a lot of it I had to grow up and do it on my own - not giving in or getting stuck. There were incredible people there for me, but I had to make the choices in my secret heart. In some ways I don't know if I am more the person on the outside that I've been on the inside, but, I suspect I am. I also feel less sure of a lot of things. I trust myself less. And yet, I know I'm more capable. I see more of my strengths, and understand them better I think. I also see more of my weaknesses. I know what hurts me most. I know what I dislike. I know what I treasure. I know what can bring me to tears. I know what I can't seem to make myself say. And what I can't stop myself from saying.

I know the Lord has been faithful to me through every minute and mess and muddled up moment.

And I can't help but smile as I look at this list and think how I failed it - but how He succeeded at it. Because ultimately, I've come to know what I believe about the Word better. I've learned how to be more generous, I've discovered my own failures and become more desperate to be gracious with others, because I need grace. I've come to a place where I care more for things to just be said, and be... lived. And here I am, about to begin a new job, that's closer to my dreams than anything yet, and it's embedded in architecture. How very, very sweet.

Time to put 2011 away. Time to give sweet kisses goodbye, pack away remembrances and look for signs in 2012's dawn. I think this year is truly going to be good. Not just painfully good, not just bittersweet, but sweet, through and through. I hope this is a year for the tender, the kind, the hopeful and joyful smiles. For healing and hope. I hope this is a year I can live unreserved in, because that's how I'm going in. I'm walking in surrounded by risk and hard-held-to courage.

Something in me just wants to tell everyone I know and love, "Let's risk it." It feels a season for it, doesn't it? Like things really could be different all at once when we wake up.

It's official. 

I'm hanging up my coat at LLF.  

My last day will be January 5th.   I figured my 25th Birthday would be a good day to say goodbye to one season and hello to the next. (or to some of you - two days AFTER my birthday ;) Don't worry B&J, I took the 3rd off for my birthday this year.)

Here's to taking risks, new opportunities, and to openness.  Here's to 25.

I'm on the UCLA grad school website, looking at the application process. I'm day dreaming... about life and hopes and the future, all the 'doors' ahead. And I'm feeling more aware than ever of what it really means to say, "Lord, all my hopes are in You." 

If you can accomplish your dreams on your own... they probably aren't worth living for. I want to be spent up on something that my life can't afford, I want to be poured out into something that my life can't fill up on it's own. Pressed down, shaken up, and pouring over....

"I think right now I am seeing again, just as I began to see when I was 18, that I am who I am. All I was and am going to be is curled up somewhere inside of me, waiting for a reason to burst through my skin and become present. But it takes risk, it takes risk to live in the present. It takes courage. It takes a yielding of your will, to be who you are."

-Abigail Suiter