I love Robin McKinley's Books!

Don't go get all excited that I will actually start writing a blog again.  I just really want to win a sign book from my favorite author so...
Do you love fantasy author Robin Mckinley's books!?
Shadows is coming out on September 26!

Tweet, Facebook or blog about to win a signed copy of Shadows
Robin's Blog
Shadows

YES.... I know it has been like nine months since I wrote (but hey read my thingy ma jiger under my blog's name...) SOOOO lets see...what has happened? Not much really just getting used to being married and stuff.
Still working at the bank. Though we moved from Frisco (thank God) where we were renting with two other guys as roommates. Don't get me wrong they are both good guys but they are still two guys I have no relation to so it was nice to get out of that situation. We moved to Patti and Justin's house for a month, I think, and from there to Leadville which is where we are now. But next month we are moving to PA and Gabe is going back to school. So yeah that is the exciting news (or frightening :) of our lives right now... Nothing more...
No I am not pregnant for all you people who are expecting me to be! :\ And we don't plan on it at least till Gabe is out of school...that is four years!
Welllll... I guess that is all for now. We don't have a computer at the moment and so I am using my parents and we need to head back up to Leadville before it gets too late. Maybe when we get one I will get more consistant with my writing...maybe not... *shrugs*

Sooooo.... I haven't posted in a bit.... I guess since Gabe and I started dating ... kind of sort of ... and since then a LOT!!! has happened in my life. Like a TON literally!

Ok so maybe not a lot but one big thing which changes bunches of other little ones and then one little one.

So I will start with the little one. I got my "first real job" (as Joel would say) I am now working at a bank in Frisco which I think I am really going to enjoy once I get past the training.... I have been working there now for like two or three weeks and it has only been web based training! YUCK!!! It kills you after like five hours of staring at computer and stuffing your head full of bank info. But I really like all the people I work with. It is all girls (which means lots of chocolate :D :P) and they are all lots of fun to be around. I think I am going to enjoy the work and the customers as well. So that is my new little piece of news in my life. :D

The other one that changes bunches of little things is a bit more surprising ...... soooo..... I will tell you the likkle changes firth... :P I have moved to a house in Frisco...which is nice.... I have a new P.O. Box ... (which if you want it text me of call me or sumtin) I may be getting a new phone number but I will let you know on that.... ummmm... what else has changed???? Oh, I have a new name.... sooooo... yeah.. you probably figured it out already but... Gabriel and I got married on June first so in five days we will be married a month!!! (By the way my new name in Marie Christine Hipple) It has been an interesting almost month trying to keep it quiet at first so I could tell certan people but then it got and everybady seemed to hear about it so now I don't know who needs to be told and who doesn't....sooo.... if you hadn't heard yet... I AM SOO SORRY or if you heard from someone else I AM also SOO SORRY!!!! But yeah that is my big news. :D (awkward :P)

Bored, bored , bored, bored!
Ummmmmmmm............
I don't know what to write...
I am bored!
Cause it is Saturday and I am not working and I am waiting for my mother to finish sometin and then we are going to coffee....
BUT right now I am sitting in the house waiting and waiting...
I woke up too early this morning :/
On days I don't have anything to do until the afternoon I am supossed to sleep late so I don't just sit around the house for hours on end with nothing to do!!! Cause yeah I am BORED!
Idea I will make a Kefer shake if I can find some fruit and ice :/
Cause the Kefer is still warm...
Oh well I will make some anyway... its better than snacking on stuff....
Wellllll... so.... yeah..... :D

How can we be so blind!!!
How can we ignore the problems in the world?
We are so focused on perfection in our lives and living sinless lives here in the USA where we are safe and yet we ignore the true sin and hell that is going on in Africa and all over the world.
I am now watching a movie called Invisible Children http://www.invisiblechildren.com it is about the children in Uganda and other neighboring countries in Africa who are forced to become soldiers at the ages of 5 - 12. They are torchered not only physically but mentally and emotionally. They live their lives in constant fear. Hiding from the rebels and the government and anyone else who may bring more suffering to their already torn apart lives. This goes on all over the world and we sit in our nice homes, offices, churches, buildings talking about how we can take the gosple to the lost, but is what is the gosple? It is the good news! Who needs the good news more than these children? And since when has talking about strategies to reach the world worked! It takes doing it! Loving those who need to be loved. Being there for the hurting and broken. Stop talking!!! And get off your lazy buts America! Do something about it!! "Those who are given much are required much!" Or don't we listen to the Bible anymore?

Read the one before this first. :D


Through this time I began to pull back from the church and people cause that is what I do when I am contiplating something new in my life. When I am learning something new, I am not a normal girl. I need my space to think it through before I talk about it or it just sounds wrong and I can't express it well. So I began to pull back from everyone but Jennifer and so the whole church thinks I am going crazy and losing my faith and junk, and then suddenly this new kid appears in church named Gabriel. Well... according to his myspace he has a girlfriend and he is 17 years old. Sounds safe enough to try to be friends with a guy. So I started hanging out with him a lot and myspacing him and emailing him and come to find out this guy is really cool and fun to hang out with and stuph. Well... we are friends for awhile and surprise his myspace lied!!! His girlfriend and him had broke up like a couple months before I met him! And uh oh I liked him a lot!! But this later fact I ignored and decide ok well... maybe we will date and I can practice dating and see what its like and stuff. So we started in a relationship I will call either special friendship (Adam's) or friends with bennefits (Jennifer's and Jon's) cause at this time I was a part of internship where we won't supposed to date. Well... after awhile of this Gabe said don't you think we should talk to your parents. I was like ummm...no thats ok. But he insisted and so I agreed. But I also told him I was not ready to be commited to someone completely cause I was scared of that word, but he still wanted to go ahead with talking to my parents. Soooo... I decided I needed to talk to my mom first. We had talked a couple weeks before and I was like no I don't like him enough to get into a relationship, but after this talk she understood what was going on spiritually in my life and it helped her calm down (which seems to happen every time I talk to someone), but now I thought it would be good for us to talk again before he asked them to be in a relationship with me. I am not sure why but I thought it would smooth things over, but somehow it worked. Though my parents did not give us permission to date they really liked Gabe ( they didn't really know him before) So we continued as 'special friends' and the thought that in two months we would be official or whatever you want to call it.
But a couple weeks later (I must have drank to much coffee or something emotionally snapped in my head.) I was babysitting and I just had this extream fear bombard(sp?)me that Gabe was going to leave me and not really want me and junk like that. I really need to talk to someone, but Jennifer's phone was broken and Claudia was at a movie and I couldn't think of anyone elso but Gabriel. So reluctantly I text him to see where he was. He answered (of course he wonderful about that :) But when I didn't answer that, he call but I didn't answer his call either (yea I know the stereotipical girl response that I hate but hey sorry I was an emotional mess.) So he texted me and called me again and finally I answered. I told him something was wrong, but didn't want to talk about it over the phone. So we decide to meet after I finished babysitting.
We went to the prayerroom and I told him all my feelings of abandonment and that it was nothing he did cause it was all inside my head. And I cried a lot. (I hate crying in front of anyone and usually hold it in until I am alone.) But then after awhile of emotional time :/ I told Gabe I was ready to commit to him and I was tried of this 'special friends' thing. So we were already planning to get together with my parents that Saturday so we decided to tell them we couldn't honestly wait anymore. That went amazingly well and they were like ok well we want to talk to Gabriel's parents first and ask him a bit more questions. Then the next day Mike called my mom and they talked for a long time and he told her some of his concerns. Then my parents called Gabe's parents that night and asked them a lot of questions some concerning Mike's questions and concerns. And the next week my mom and I went out to coffee and though she still had some questions for Gabe she said after they quizzed him that night they would tell him we could enter into a relationship. I went away from that conversation walking on clouds and the happiest girl alive. And since then it has been a dream.
There is a lot I need to learn about relationship and junk but God is teaching me so much about his character through this relationship and about myself. He is showing me what it means to love and be loved. He is teaching me more and more about faith in people and him. He has given me a joy and happiness that I have never felt before ever!! (or al least that I can remember) He has given me this peace that no matter what happens he will take care of it and guide us through.
So that is Marie's life in nutshell from the last nine months to a year. I am so thankful to God for everything he is doing in my life and for friends like Jennifer and Jacque. And for my parents who are there to support us yet still ask the hard questions. Wow...that sounded like an acknowledgement thingy from a cd. :/

Wow...

I was reading my journal yesterday during work and stuff cause... yeah.... I was kind of bored :P
And I was writing a 'my life in the last year' thingy in my journal ( which I didn't finish :/ ) but anywho...
A lot has happened in the last year! :O Like a lot. a lot *nods*
Like I haven't been out of the country since November. :O yeah...I know not normal for Marie! But the funny thing is I am ok with that at this point of my life... yeah... weird....

Another thing is I have been going through this time of questioning my convictions and even like my world veiw and stuff. Which is to say: I am wondering if everything I have believed is reallly someone else's belief and now I need to reexamen my life and change some stuff... and yeah stuff like is everything that I thought the church is really what she is suposssed to be? And yes our actions show where our heart is but which actions are a bad show and who decides that? And what if certain actions make some think you are falling away and others think you are drawing closer and you feel closer to God than you have ever felt? And why does the American church shut out anything that has the potential to hurt someone when pain and sorrow sometime strengthens us better than protection and isolation? And how could I be so dumb to see being a Christian as a person who was constantly struggling against sin when we have already concured(sp?) sin through Jesus? And why the heck have I never understood that the reason we are called Christians is because we are to follow Jesus aka. CHRIST only and not church leaders and peers? (not saying there is a time and a place to follow good Godly leaders. Like Joel said Saturday night, there is a time we need the examples and to want to be just like another person. But like Nancy Black said, it is all part of growing up to pull away from each of those head figures in our lives and learn how to live our lives as us.) And...yeah... so these are thoughts that have been flying through my head and then like I realized that a lot of these things all come down to one thing: What Would Jesus Do? (sorry for the cliches but it works :/ :) How would Jesus live this part of my life? How would Jesus respond to this? But these types of questions lead to more questions like. How do we know what Jesus would do? And my pastor/youth leader/parents/friends/whoever says that Jesus would do it this way but I don't see that in the Bible and I wonder if that is true? Then I realized WOOOOOH!! that is my problem. All those things don't really matter what matters is the heart. If your eyes are fixed on Jesus and you are living endrenched in his word and prayer, then he will teach you about those things. Live life as a river if you just let the river (Jesus) just guide you even in the rough times, you will be fine, but if you try to avoid the hard times or go back or take side trips things will take a lot longer and could become more difficult. This is going to be really long to I am going to cut it in to pieces. This is the first part. :D