Well, I suppose it's time to post again. :) Probably the biggest piece of news is that I have my plane ticket to go home! I'm planning to be there on Dec. 23rd! I'm trying very hard not to get excited about it too soon, because if I do the time until then will seem too long. :) However I'm also going to miss the people out here soooo much, and so my feelings are quite mixed up right now. I really want to be careful to "be here" for the rest of my term, do my work well, join in socially as much as possible etc. so that when I leave they will miss me. :)
We have been very busy the last while. We spent one weekend putting out Christmas stuff at the two stores. That was fun but it kept us completely occupied for a while. We got to work at the normal time on Fri. and didn't get home again until somewhere around 11pm. The Pueblo staff joined us in Cañon fro supper at the store, and then we put out all the Christmas stuff. Then on Sat. we repeated the schedule except us Cañon people went to Pueblo! Then we didn't get home until closer to 12am! :) The next week (I think) we went to a concert on Wed. and didn't get back until near 12am again. So I had quite a few late nights there. :)
It was a Chris Tomlin and Louie Giglio concert. I enjoy Chris Tomlin's music well enough, but it was VERY loud. There was good worship in there though and the Louie Giglio part was wonderful! He was speaking about how all creation is praising God all the time. He had some recordings of the sounds made by several different stars and also some whale sounds. He put them all together and let us hear a part of the music the God hears. Then he said , "I don't know what they're saying, but I think it might be something like this..." then he added Chris Tomlin's song "How Great is Our God". It was quite impressive, and of course we all sang along, so we were singing with the stars and the whales! :) I think there will be a DVD of the concert, and the "talk" released on Nov. 15th if anyone is interested. :)
This last weekend some of us girls attended ladies conference. Some of the topics were "Trust or Control", "Fear or Love", and a couple about an intimate relationship with Christ. The messages were very good and I took lots of notes, however I haven't taken the time to process them yet. The decor was on a beach theme, and the people who decorated it were very creative and put lots of time into little details! The food and fellowship were very good too! It was a refreshing break from my "everyday" schedule, and I am very grateful to all the people who made it possible!
Thank you fro taking the time to read my "boring" post, I hope you were able to find enjoyment in it. :)
“May God bless you with discomfort
At easy answers, half-truths, and superficial relationships,
So that you may live deep within your heart.
May God bless you with anger
At injustice, oppression and exploitation of people,
So that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.
May God bless you with tears
To shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger, and war,
So that you may reach out your hand to comfort them
And turn their pain into joy.
And may God bless you with enough foolishness
To believe that you can make a difference in the world,
So that you can do what others claim cannot be done
To bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.
Amen.”
- A Franciscan Blessing

Here I am Again...

I did warn you that I wouldn't post very often didn't I? :) There hasn't been too much out of the ordinary happening over the last three months. I did have company; Melisa Martin was here for one evening. It was nice to see someone from "home" :) even though the visit wasn't very long :(
I have decided that I definitely like doing "linens" better than "shoes and accessories", and the Cañon store isn't too bad once you get used to it. :) I also enjoy getting to know some more people better than I would have if I had stayed on at Pueblo; and I still get to see the Pueblo people too!
Besides having company, I also took a trip! There is a family out here that needed someone to help with food for a wedding, someone who wouldn't mind missing the wedding and all the visiting at the reception. I had spent a fair amount of time visiting with their oldest daughter, who was at IGo with Dru, and so they asked me. The wedding was in Wyoming so I can now add that state to my list of states that I've been in. :) I really enjoyed the time I was able to spend with the Jason Yoders. They have 2 young girls and a 6 year old boy, they all seemed to accept me immediately and I really enjoyed the opportunity to play with some little ones again. This was truly a blessing from the Lord since I have been greatly missing my "little ones", it's hard to go from having 12 younger siblings that love you and love to play with you to not having any little ones that are really comfortable with you.
God has been teaching me so much lately, sometimes it feels like I hardly have time to process one new thought before another one comes along. I want to be sure not to cheapen what He is giving me by not taking the time to realize each thing. It's hard to glorify God for all that He's doing in my life if I don't even take the time to sort through it all and realize what's there; and I really do want to glorify Him!
Well I don't know what else to write so I guess I'll go work on pictures. May the Lord bless you with an ever deepening understanding of Himself!

Well, I'm back! :) Sorry it took so long.

A lot has changed since I last wrote. I am now working in the Linen Department in the store we have in Cañon City. Some new people came and therefore there was some switching around. This has changed my schedule somewhat because I don't leave for work now until 7:30, I still get up at the same time almost every day, it just means that I have more time in the morning. :) I also get home about 10 - 15 minutes earlier. I would get home probably 1/2 an hour or more earlier, but we just started staying open until 5:30pm in Cañon so it's later till we get home too.
Another change was that I moved into a room of my own. I no longer have a roommate, and I'm at the other end of the house. I have never had a room of my own before, and it's kinda fun to have a place to decorate however I want to. :) Obviously I can't dramatically change the room, like paint or anything, because it's not really mine, but it's amazing how much you can change a room just by changing the decorations!
Softball season has started, so we go to the games to cheer for our team at least once a week now. It's kind of fun, I've never been much involved in sports of any kind, but if you know the people on one team and not the other, it can get exciting to see them win. :) So far they've played 3 games and won every time!
I also should let you know about the rodeo. There was one here in Cañon that we all went to and it was interesting to see what it was like. It got a bit long and boring, and there were scary parts when someone would get bucked off, but over all it was interesting, I don't think I would go again though.
Besides what I've told you already life seems basically "normal". I continue to feel like the Lord is teaching me many things. Mainly that I need to grow in love, and become less selfish and more focused on others, which will naturally come about if I love others more. Please continue to pray that I will be able to know what God wants me to do next in His time. I want to be able to recognize His voice and joyfully follow His will, no matter what it is. I could stay out here longer, but it's possible that God has other plans for me right now. I just want to know Him better and be sure to hear the calling He has for my life, and to walk in it.
So, that's the end of this post. I would have more pics, but my camera is broken, I hope I can get it fixed soon. Please feel free to leave any questions or comments! :)

A Day in My Life

5:20am Beep, beep, beep
I usually get up 4-8 minutes later. :) I make my bed before climbing down, because I don't like to get up and down more than necessary. :)
6:00am
By this time I'm usually dressed and ready to fix breakfast. I eat while I'm having some alone time with God.
6:20-6:30am
I pack lunch, brush my teeth etc.
6:40-6:50am
I usually have some time to call my family before the guys come to pick us up for work. :)
7:00-7:05am "Oh, the guys are here, love you, bye!"
Then I run inside, put the phone away, grab my stuff and get in the van.
7:10-7:45 or 8:00am
Most days we have several stops to get others on the way to work. When we arrive we have devotions for 15 or 20 min.
8:20-8:45am
Clock in and start work. First I put out my carts. When we price things they go into a cart, which is left in the back room until the person responsible for that aisle takes it out to the shelf. I'm responsible for shoes, hats, socks, purses, bags belts, "fancy" scarves, etc, as well as the carts with luggage, vases, jars, and baskets.
9:30-10:30am
Unless I have a lot of carts I'm usually back in my corner beginning to sort, and/or price my "shoes & accessories"
12:15pm
It's lunch time! After I eat I head outside for a walk and some prayer time.
1:00pm
Back to work. Sometimes I run the register, either in the morning or the afternoon, but usually just on Thursday and/or Friday. There are enough other people to do it the rest of the days, and I'm not needed there every week either.
5:00pm
It's time to go home! Most days we have stops on the way home too. When we get home Tue. - Thurs. supper is practically ready, the other days we have to get our own. After we eat we either do whatever is planned for the night or just do whatever we need to do. Tue. night is houshold meeting, Wed night is "Date night with God", Thurs. is prayer & praise, Fri. is v-ball, and Sat. is usually a "free night".
9:00pm
If possible I start getting ready for bed, shower, quiet time, etc. Sometimes the event of the night keeps me up later, and sometimes I just lose track of time.
10:00
Goodnight!

Next time I'll try to tell you what I do on my day off. :)

Sight Seeing

Last Mon. some of us girls went to "The Garden of The Gods" near Colorado Springs. The park was/is very pretty! https://picasaweb.google.com/maidservantlattin/GardenOfTheGodsEtc?authkey=Gv1sRgCPqlvvu9_NuDLQ#
We had a lot of fun walking around and seeing all the different rock shapes, and colors. The rocks were mostly red, but there were some that were more white. I also enjoyed seeing the birds that were around there. I think they probably have nests there, there are many "holes" or small caves in the rocks. After we were done at the park we went to "Old Colorado City" there are many small shops along the streets there. Some of them were boring, but most of them had some really neat stuff! Here's another link to pics https://picasaweb.google.com/maidservantlattin/FunStuff?authkey=Gv1sRgCP3Ass3p97zFXA#
This week we (some of the guys were along too) went to Red Rock Canyon and climbed on the rocks, and took pics, and just had fun! :) After that we went to lunch at Big Daddy's. The food was very good! :) We had a lot of fun today too, but I'm not quite ready to post pictures yet.
That's all for now, I need to get some other things done, I'll try to make a better post next time. :)

Trip to Denver and SOS from the Colorado point of View

I had a wonderful time in Denver with the Petersons! We went to The Denver Museum of Nature and Science. We didn't go through and look at everything because we thought we only had about 2 1/2 hours, but they showed me some very nice and interesting things!
Here's the link to the pictures I took while there.
https://picasaweb.google.com/maidservantlattin/VisitWithKatieDale?authkey=Gv1sRgCJCozPPMz678ag# We had left the museum and were heading back to the prison to meet my ride back home, when my phone rang; it was one of the ladies asking if I wanted to stay longer! They had somehow miscalculated the number of people that would need to ride back in the big van, and the small van needed to stay for several hours longer. So we went to the Peterson residence, then we walked over to the school to fetch their 2 boys. When we got back to the house we just sat around and talked! We also called Mama and made her jealous because she wasn't able to be with us! :) Anyway I had a good time, and felt very blessed by the extended visit.
It was kind of hard to be here for SOS. I knew that everyone was up there having fun and working hard, and getting stressed, and some of them not feeling well, and seeing all our friends, and I wasn't able to be a part of that or help with anything! However, I was able to pray, and also had opportunities to ask others to pray too. I know that it made a difference, I'll just have to wait to hear what the difference was. I might even need to wait until I get to heaven, but I know that God heard us, and I hope it was a blessing to those that were involved in everything to know that we were praying!
I don't really feel like I have much to add here, it's hard to think of what might interest you when it's just "life as usual" for me! If you would leave comments and ask questions it would help! :)

Animals of Colorado

I decided to write about the animals I've seen. This won't be a long post because it's getting late, but I hope it's interesting! I've seen rabbits, a prairie dog, at least that's what they said it was, mule deer, and antelope. I've also seen several kinds of cacti, there are some pics of the cacti on my picasa account. https://picasaweb.google.com/maidservantlattin/SceneryEtc?authkey=Gv1sRgCKzD9onjhOG0Xw#
I had a really good time with Charity, and I'm planning to work on Monday again so that I can go to Denver on Wednesday and meet some friends I haven't seen in about 17 years! I'll let you know about it when I get time. :)