My first Christmas...

This is my first Christmas...without my family. I think it is just now hitting me. I am flooded with memories of family traditions we use to have, before my parents split. It's hard not to think about those traditions and be sad that they will never happen again, until I start my own family, in which I have full intention on bringing them back. Although my parents have been split for over 4 years. Since that time I have spent Christmas with at least one family member and it has filled the void of not having the traditions. Christmas Eve consisted of a fondue meal. Everyone would participate in preparing the food. Cheese, Meats, and the best of all Chocolate. Afterward we would all open one Christmas present to enjoy the night before Christmas. In the morning, I as always would be the first one to wake up. And even though I was 22 and did not believe in Santa, my parents would still wait until my brother and I went to sleep to put the presents under the tree. My excitement at 22 was the same as if I was 7 years old believing Santa came and brought me all those presents. I'd go to my parents bedroom and wake them up, but after 22 years I learned my lesson and came to their bedroom with a nice hot cup of coffee, made to order :). We would spend the morning opening gifts for eachother, then dad would make his famous homemade apple pecan pancakes and afterward we would open our stockings (the best part). Each stocking would have a can of silly string in them, and once the last person was finished, there was a full blown silly string fight. This would end in a laughing mess. The rest of the day was spent enjoying eachother and our gifts. Then for dinner was my moms homemade lasagna, which is still the best lasagna I have ever tasted, and so says everyone else who has tried it. This will be my 4th Christmas without these traditions, and it hurts and anyone who has had a familiar family experience knows the feeling. Although, I am saddened, I am profoundly grateful that I had a family for 22 years that did this every Christmas, I know there are many who have never had a Christmas like mine. I am also grateful that I have beautiful friends to spend Christmas with this year and another year to celebrate my Savior.

Hold your family tight. Enjoy the dysfunction, that some may call family, you never know when you might lose it.

I hope you all have a beautiful Christmas...

TotalFinder

I haven't written in a while, however I will be writing a few things this coming week. Their are a few things that I have come to support and the first one I would like to share is "TotalFinder". One of my lab assistants brought this program to my attention and I would like to share it with all of you. You can find out all the information at the website: http://totalfinder.binaryage.com/ Below is a picture of what Total Finder would look like on your desktop. It allows you to have multiple tabs open at one time. Total finder is useful if you are wanting to easily move files as well as it has a copy and paste button written inside the program so you can make multiples of one file with just a click of a button. This has become a favorite addition to my desktop. I couldn't imagine having a mac without it.

Come up here...

It's been quite a while since, I last wrote on here. A little update. I am a few months well into my schooling. I am enjoying it a lot. Have learned a lot about graphic design and how to use Adobe photoshop and Illustrator to my advantage. It's funny to me when people ask me what I am studying and then want to spend majority of the conversation talking about web design and development. To which I am glad to do. However, for me what I am going to school for is just a means to an end. I enjoy design and creating new things. But, deep down I have come to realize that my desire is to see people come to know the Truth. To be apart of someones heart turning from darkness to light is the most fulfilling thing I have ever had the honor to be apart of. I have come to realize that my desire is to not only have God meet me where I am, but to bring me up to where He is. Like Moses in Exodus 24 when God told him to come up to Him on Mount Sinai and God revealed His heart to His people or John in Revelation 4 when God told him to come up to him and He would show Him what will happen after this. I believe it is when God meets us that He tends to our deepest needs, but it is when we go up to Him that He reveals His heart.

This week, I want to make a point to go up and meet Him, to hear His heart.

I hope you will do the same and find that your relationship with Him has only gotten closer.  And hopefully like this ridiculous picture, you will be able to take the escalator. ;-)

Blessings,
Nikki

1/365 Project

A few friends and I are participating in the 365 Project, which is where I will attempting to post a photo a day. Now, my friends are all very photography savy with there cool Canon and Nikon high tech camera. I however will proudly be sporting a Blackberry Tour. Maybe, sometime during the year I will advance to an IPhone or Android, but for now it will be my faithful Blackberry.

The reason is because I never take pictures and wish I had when all is said and done. This will allow me to look back on this year with fond memories and committing to something for a year is always a good discpline. I might not always get to post my pictures on my blog, but you can always check them out on my facebook.

1/365

It was my friend Carol Huston's birthday yesterday!

love.
Nikki

my God box

Last night I just so happen to be thinking about God. I was thinking about I have put God in this box called my perception. As a young one I am sure I thought God could do anything, but as I hit puberty and my sense of everything in the world is wonderful quickly faded I started putting God in this box. It started as a small box and then as I grew up year after year I would think "I am getting rid of my box!!" and I will from now on see God as a mystery (to which He is), but I wasn't getting rid of my box, I was just making a bigger box. my box contains silly little things that I use to take as absolute. One that I was thinking of specificly is that kissing for longer than 3 seconds is bad, or voting democrat is bad, or cursing is bad etc. etc. and because of my wonderful little co-dependant brain I believed every word of it was true.

We all grow up with these boxes and they are formed in the beginning by our parents and whatever they say is truth. But as we grow older, we break away from some of those truths and have our own. But of course, this doesn't happen until we are angry and bitter at our parents for being so closed-minded for a short period of time or maybe forever (everyone is different). I still put God in my box sometimes and every once in a while I get a burst of revelation that God is bigger than my perception.

He is a mystery.

2011 Blog update

If you have visited my site before you will notice that it has changed. You are used to seeing updates about my "acting career" to which I am at this moment in my life no longer pursuing. Only God knows what the future holds and I am fine with keeping it that way. Today, I am going to be attending school at Full Sail University Online getting a BA in Web Design & Developement. Please don't ask me why, but, if you must know then email me. I start Jan 31st. I will be updating this whenever I feel like it, which will hopefully happen at least once a month. If you would like to hear how I am doing with school or my perception on God, politics and entertainment feel free to tune in.

Rock on!

Nikki

words without action are meaningless.

My entire life, I have been a traveler. I was the child that couldn't wait to leave my town, state, even country. While others were home sick, I was soaking up every moment I had away from "normal life". I still have this mentality. I love to see new things, experience knew people and be apart of something that is not my norm. However, I am realizing today that I runaway. I runaway from life's issues, and I think if I change my circumstances or my geographic that somehow when I return, things will have changed, I will have changed. I look for experiences to change me. And while I am not saying that experiences can't change you. I am realizing that I try to address everything in my life besides the problem. I attempt to go around the mountain to avoid a treacherous hike. a painful recovery. "no pain, no gain". But without pain there is no victory. You can not have one without the other. And I believe until you feel your pain and let it go, you will not have victory. I have this tendency to hold on to pain, hurt, betrayal. Why? Because, it is something that I have power over. I have power over my anger and resentment and if I let that go, I become powerless. I also believe that freedom does not come without humility or freedom does not come without powerlessness. My freedom and victory will come from me letting go of my pride and letting the blood of Christ wash away my sin. Is it not so easy to say wash away my sin with your blood. I am tired of saying it. I want to believe it. I want to live it. I am tired of my words, of my unfulfilled promises that I make to God, others and myself. What good are words to the rebellious heart. I want to live in repentance. To walk in spirit filled obedience and submission to God.

but then again...these are just words.