Family, Weddings & College Reunions

Have you ever had one of those weekends that takes away all your energy, but by the end of it you are completely fulfilled? This past weekend was one of those weekends for me. Mike and I headed out to Southern Cali for one of my good college friend's wedding. We left early on Friday and got into LA around one and had In-N-Out with my friend and past roomie Kelly. We had a great couple of hours catching up on what's been going on in each others lives and showing off our wedding album that we received several weeks ago. My only regret was that I forgot to pull out my camera and get some pictures! :-( After a two hour break we hit the road again and drove out towards the Santa Monica area where we stayed at my Grandpa's old house.

Saturday flew by with an early morning visit from my family. I had made some banana bread and cranberry bread for a light snack/breakfast for our get together. Both my aunts--Sue and Kathy joined us along with my cousin's Bill & Andrea with their two precious boys, Ryan & Blake. We had not met Blake yet so it was a blessing to meet him! Ryan is such a good big brother--he loved giving Blake hugs & kisses. I wish I had captured some of those on my camera. Mike and I rarely make it out to CA with school being three semesters (spring, summer & fall) so it was extra special and fun to be able to have this time away from home and see family which we don't see often.

Bill, Blake, Ryan & Andrea

Bill, Andrea, A. Kathy, A. Sue & Danielle

Mike & Blake--I know precious! Mike did this on purpose.
He knows I love seeing him with babies.

My friend's Sarah & Joe finally got married! After 10 years of dating, they started dating in high school, God prepared such a lovely and perfect day for their wedding ceremony as they gave their lives to each other before God, family and friends. (Yes, I cried--it was too beautiful not to!) I also had the great joy of seeing some college friends that I had lost touch with. Sean moved to Chicago for a new job, and Grace, her husband Aaron and their two boys are back home in CA after four years of being in Hawaii with Aaron's service in the Army. Sarah, Grace & I were in a small group together and would sit and talk for hours about life, school, relationships & the day that we would all be married--we finally did it!!!

Grace, Sarah & Danielle
We finally did it!!! We all have our Mrs. Degree!

After the wedding Mike and I headed to my old stompin' grounds of Azusa Pacific University. I miss it there--it is so beautiful and has so many wonderful memories of friends, classes & events. I showed Mike where I had the majority of my classes on the University's west campus and we ran into one of my old professors Dr. Yarchin. He was so instrumental in helping me to find my passion of studying the Word. It was after my first Bible course (Exodus/Deuteronomy) with Dr. Yarchin that I changed my major to Christian Ministries and later added on my double with Biblical Studies. Thank you Lord for putting him in my life! Next we drove to east campus where the dorms are as well as other classrooms, various eating areas and everything else! I showed him around my dorm floor and met a gal who lives in the dorm right next to mine and chatted with her for a while. I also got to pop my head into my old dorm room before we left--that was a treat for me!

West Campus--they added a prayer garden

since I graduated. It's beautiful!

Every year a mural is added to the halls of 3rd West
(our floor & wing of the dorm) at the end of the
freshman year. 2001-2002

We left APU's campus and headed south to BJ's for dinner. We would often go to BJ's for birthday celebrations in college--sweet memories! Mike & I met up with my college neighbors Heather & Erin and my roomie of three years Karen and had a very yummy dinner. I love how we haven't seen each other in years and we could pick up like we had just seen each other yesterday. After a filling dinner we left and did one more APU tradition...Doughnut Man run! Of course in college we would go to Doughnut Man at midnight so we could fill up on a fresh, hot tiger tail. We needed brain food back then and it was a delicious and cheap way to get it! I left that night feeling extremely grateful for my time at APU and the life long friendships that were formed while I was there.

Karen, Heather, Erin & Danielle @ BJ's

Just when the trip should probably be over, we added in another stop to visit my Grandparents in Thousand Oaks. They moved there about a year and a half ago and are really enjoying the community that they are a part of. Mike and I had not seen their apartment before, so we got the grand tour. It's a beautiful place with enough space to feel spacious, but not too big. We had an excellent brunch there in the community dining room and an opportunity to hear how they are doing and share what we are doing as well. After brunch we hit the road and drove back to AZ through traffic, wind & dust. How blessed we were by such a wonderful weekend filled with family and friends!

What a weekend!

This weekend flew by! Friday Mike and I got up and went to the gym for our second workout with a trainer. I'm loving going to the gym so far, and I'm already seeing a bit of a difference. One thing that I've really liked so far about Pure Fitness is that when you first sign up you get two workouts with a trainer to plan a workout program for you based off your goals and needs. We had our first one a little over a week ago and our second one this past Friday. Man, did I get a good workout! I didn't have an opprtunity to get my cardio in while we were at the gym, so when we got home I went for a 20 minute walk/jog. (I would jog until I couldn't jog anymore, then I'd walk until I could breath a bit easier--never letting my heart rate get back to normal.) I was exhausted when I got home, but felt great!

Friday afternoon I baked a two layer yellow cake, lemon curd and buttercream frosting. Earlier that morning before heading to the gym I poured my vanilla ice cream batter into my kitchen aid freeze bowl and made ice cream while I put together a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs with diced ham and cheese--yummy! Back to the cake. After letting the cake cool I started the process of assembly. Seems pretty easy, but I had a bit of trouble. I was making a lemon-raspberry filling for the cake and my lemon curd was too runny, so I had to put a frosting barrier on the bottom layer of the cake, so my filling would fall off the edge. All in all, it worked okay. I then frosted the sides of the cake and the top, continued to add more until I realized that my frosting was melting off the side of my cake! This called for a quick rearrangement of the fridge so I could let the frosting chill and set before our company came for dessert. We had a lovely time with Diane and Brian and they said that the cake was a success.




Saturday we slept in and then spent the majority of our day on the west side visiting Mike's parents. They hadn't seen our wedding album yet, so we brought that along to show them. Sunday was a busy day as always with church in the morning. We came home for lunch, which we rarely do since we have our young adult service in the evening, and had some time here before Mike headed out to Soma. I stayed home for the evening and had a couple girls over that I don't see very often and made a girl's night of it. We had so much fun and laughed a lot! I've made the decision that more girl's nights are needed!

Balance

It seems that balance in life can be hard to come by. I feel as if the past couple of weeks my life has been off balance. Some weeks I'm spending more time in the Word than others, other weeks I'm working more in my business and then there are weeks where I'm spending more time developing my friendships. These are all great, but how do you balance it? I can only imagine the chaos that we would be experienceing if Mike and I had kids at this point. It's about all I can do to make sure that I'm cooking enough food to keep my man full!!! No, it's not that bad, but I get so busy throughout the day that sometimes I forget that I need to cook dinner--and enough of it so there is at least enough for a couple lunches and/or dinners. I don't know what I'll do if we have a bunch of boys--how will I keep them full??? Thankfully I don't have to worry about that now and I'll have some time time to learn to cook for larger quantities. Not only do I feel as if the the formentined areas of my life are out of balance--I don't even have a regualar time to clean our house! I do my best to pick up as I go, although this week that idea has flown out the window. I'm starting to recognize how great, and vital, a regualr routine is. It's not that I don't have any sort of routine, but it needs to be more defined and purposeful. The most important being, intentional time with God each day. If I'm not being intentional and making time with God a top priority, then often times it doesn't happen. I know it's all a work in progress and thankfully I'm wanting to learn how to balance my life more. I guess another word for balance is time management. I cringe at this short phrase because it's not always been a strong area for me. Thankfully I will always be learning and I have a gracious God to keep teaching me how to be more effective with my time and what things need to be a priority. With that, I'm off to make some ice cream batter so that first thing in the morning I can put it in my kitchen aid freeze bowl for homemade ice cream!!! We're having company over for dessert tomorrow night!!! Wahoo!

Stepping Out in Faith

I've been doing a lot of prayer and pondering over the last week. I have an awesome opportunity to bless those around me, women in particular, through my Mary Kay business. I have found that the things that stretch and grow you are things that are worth doing. My business is one of those things. I'm constantly being stretched out of my comfort zone and often times I fight it. This time though, there isn't time or room to fight the urge to run from being stretched. In fact, I'm applying a principle that I've known about, but I'm really learning through a Bible study I'm leading with a of couple girls. The study is Beth Moore's "Believing God". One of the things that has been sticking to my brain is this act of believing God. This word believing is a present-active participle, which calls me to continually believe God through each and every circumstance. It's not that I don't believe Him or the Truth, but am I truly living out this concept of continually believing Him--for all my needs? I have come to the conclusion that I havn't been present-active participle believing nearly as much as I'd like to. Where am I stepping out in faith and taking that big leap that I know God has asked me to make? Well, I've made a big leap, and taken myself out of an area in which I am comfortable. I'm putting myself out there, being bold and asking people to help me with a challenge I've been given. My challenge is to have a $2,000 week!!! I have not done this before, and it excites me to step up to this challenge!!! I know I have the capability to reach this goal, but it is not something that I can do on my own or out of my own strength. It requires me to believe and trust God that as I work for His glory and do my best to bless others through my business, that He will provide the results. My job, is to joyfully do the effort. My deadline for this 2k week is this Saturday at 5pm. What I am asking is if you would please consider helping me to reach my goal and share my goal with family, friends, neighbors and co-workers. All you have to do is sign onto my website: www.marykay.com/danielledearborn and make your selections. Also, be thinking of your mother's--Mother's day is coming up and I do complementary gift wrapping! Other occasions that you might consider are birthdays, anniversaries & I love you gifts--gift wrapping is included in those as well. I so appreciate your willingness to help me with this challenge and when you do, you will receive a gift from me! Remember orders need to be in by Saturday at 5pm!!! Are you taking that step out in faith and present-active participle believing God? I sure hope so!!! Philippians 4:13 "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me."