Fear and Trust

Then David said to Solomon his son, “Be strong and courageous and do it. Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed, for the Lord God, even my God, is with you. He will not leave you or forsake you, until all the work for the service of the house of the Lord is finished.

   1 Chronicles 28:20

  There are so many things I'm afraid of. People are close to the top of the list. I am afraid of what people think of me. I'm afraid to be who I am in front of some people because I'm afraid they won't like me or think I'm stupid. But God is the only one I need to worry about liking me and He's already said He loves me. He made me. "You are He who took me from my mother's womb."(Psalm 71:6) He knows me and all of my problems and worries and fears. And He loves me.  

   Some decisions scare me. Like college. That's a couple years away, but I've found out how quickly years go by. Besides that, I am not one to wait until the last minute to make a decision. (Sometimes anyway....:)) I like to know where I'm going to be at what time.  Anyway, I've just been thinking about college more lately.  Obviously I've never had this decision to make before and it's scary just thinking about it. I know I want to take a photography course, but I don't know where God wants me. And then I read "Do not be afraid and do not be dismayed, for the Lord God, even my God, is with you."

   God tells us over and over not to be afraid. "Do not be afraid" "Fear not" "Do not fear" "You shall not be afraid" and yet we worry and are scared and act like God can't handle whatever we're going through. Everybody does it. We're human. And He loves us in spite of that. He said that He would "not leave you or forsake you". He will and is helping us through this lack of trust. 

  So when I walk into a room full of people or make a big decision, God's right there with me. "For the Lord God, even my God, is with you." And I can trust Him. He can take care of the world, so who am I to say He can't take care of me?

So Many Hobbies

  I have dreamed of playing the violin since I was about six years old. I used to grab two hangers and pretend to play the violin. Years later, I watched the girls who played at the church I attended and dreamed of joining them.

  One of the girls I watched became my violin teacher. I finally got to learn the names of the notes, where to find them on the violin, and how to string them together to form melodies. I lived for my violin lessons.

  I eventually rented a better violin, as the one I started out with just wasn't cutting it. The one I am renting still isn't perfect, but compared to my first violin, it is definitely an improvement. :) 

 You now know about one of my favorite hobbies. (Don't you feel special? :)) But I have so many more.

• Photography is something that I would love to learn more about. I hope to eventually have my own photography business.

• Art is another hobby that I hope to learn more about. I would absolutely love to take painting lessons.

• And, yes, I count writing as a hobby too. I don't know what will become of this hobby, but I guess I'll find out as I get older and hopefully figure myself out a little bit. ;)

  There are more "hobbies" such as styling hair, trying out new make up, and, of course, fashion is something I adore. :)

  I often feel overwhelmed thinking about all the things I want to try, or the things I want to improve on. So I end up leaving them all in a heap until one of my "creative days" come along and I pick up the violin, camera, pencil, or paint brush up and try to do something with it. Then I get frustrated that I don't have the things I need, or want, to finish, and, most of the time, I give up. 

  Lately I've started trying to work with what I have and not give up as easily. And, as far as violin goes, my fingers are paying dearly. ;) 

 I don't know what will happen in the future with my hobbies, or anything for that matter. Only God knows that. But I can't wait to find out. :)

Thanks for stopping by!

A Plan

 One of my mom's close friends lost her husband to cancer earlier this year. Her kids lost their dad. And ya know what? That doesn't seem right. Matter of fact, a lot of things don't make sense to me. But it helps to know that God is on the throne.

  Yes, I realize that you have probably heard that phrase at least a hundred times in your life and it is losing meaning. But if you just step back, step back from all of the things that are tearing you to pieces, and look at Him, it really helps to know that Someone is in control right now. And in the midst of chaos, it helps to look around you. To look at the trees that shade you from from the sun that reaches it's long scorching rays to earth. To look at the flowers that are right outside your door lending their beauty to the world that they might bring you a little joy on this chaotic day. If you just look at them and realize how carefully and wonderfully God created those things and many more, don't you think that He has a plan for your life?

photo from: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/67061481924211094/

  He didn't die for the trees or the flowers, He died for you. And yet He put so much love into those creations. Can you imagine how much He loves us? I believe that He loves us more than enough to have a plan for our lives and to not just let random things happen to us.

So yes, God is on the throne. 

He has everything under control.

  And so, in the middle of this crazy life, when things are ripping your heart out, and you don't know that good could possibly come out of this, God has a plan for your life. And He is right there hurting with you. It is so nice to know that He sees the end, and that He's right here helping us through this. 

Because He has a plan.

Scared...and Thankful

  Honestly, sometimes I don't know why I have a public blog. It scares me to think of someone reading what I write. I love reading other people's blogs, and seeing cute blogs kinda makes me want to create one myself. But when it comes to clicking "publish".... Yeah. That's what scares me. Probably the main reason I am posting right now is because I want to do my best to show others how good God is.

  Recently I went through something that hurt me...a lot. Maybe not physically, but definitely emotionally. Something that didn't make sense at first, but I'm glad I had to go through it. Because of the hurt, God was able to help me come closer to Him. I realized that He was showing me that He really is my Best Friend.  I love knowing that He is there, waiting for me to talk to Him. And that He will never let me down like humans do, whether we mean to let each other down or not. Looking back on my life, it's amazing seeing how He was working. And then sometimes, I look at something and I don't know if I will ever know why it happened unless He tells me why in Heaven. But that's ok. 'Cause He has shown me enough to know that He is always with me, no matter what, and that He really is working everything out for my good.

  I'm getting ready to click publish because I hope, that in some way, reading a little bit about my experience will help you believe that God is with you all of the time.

Thank you for stopping by, and hopefully ignoring all of the mistakes. :)

Snapshots of Snow

  The past month has been pretty exciting seeing that we've have had our first "real" snows since we've been here (we've lived here for about 2 1/2 years) about 2-3 weeks apart!

We've been enjoying snow days, hot chocolate, and snow cream while we cheer the USA teams on at the Olympics.  (So proud that we took the gold in ice dancing, by the way! :)) Since we are homeschooled we still did some school while we enjoyed watching the snow, but, much thanks to mom, she made it easy for us. :)

  The first time it snowed was my dog, Snickers', first time to walk in snow. Let's just say he wasn't impressed. Especially when I put some snow on him to take a picture. It's probably a good thing I didn't know what he was thinking. ;)

We were very thankful to see snow again and really enjoyed it, but as you can tell from the picture, we didn't have much on the ground. My poor little brother was trying to make snowballs to throw at us, but ended up throwing more mud and pine needles

than snow. Poor boy. Maybe sometime we can spend the winter up north where he can throw real snowballs till his little heart's content.

 That was the first snow. The second time was more like it. We didn't get as much as they were expecting, but at least it covered the ground except where the wind had blown it bare. :) After the snow was finished coming down, freezing rain decided to chase after it making us afraid we were going to lose power. (When you don't have a fireplace, candlelight kinda looses it's appeal, ya know?) Thankfully we did not lose power and after the fact I was happy it came. The snow/ice mixture made for some mean snowballs! And we were able to make a small←(I'm lazy) snowman, even if we didn't have the right stuff for his face and he ended up looking very unique.

   I just wanted to stop in and let you know that I have not totally forgotten about this blog, and to tell you about my life recently. I had planned to write more (my life has been a little bit more than snow!), but you know how that goes. Too many words for so little time to write them in. ;) So I guess that's it for now. Thanks for stopping by!

About This Blog

 First of all I want to say "Thank you!" for taking the time to stop by and check my blog out!  I hope you will visit again soon, when I have a normal post up. :) Until then, here is a little bit about this blog.

  I started a blog when I was about 11-12 and have started another one since then, but I have never been extremely consistent with my blogging. One reason I haven't been very good at keeping up with my blogs is that they were both private so no one really read them. I guess I didn't see the point in working on posts that no one was going to read. That is why this blog came to be. I decided to make a public blog so that I know that people will at least be able to read it and that gives me a reason to post. :) But I didn't just create a blog so that people can read what I have to say. I want to blog so that I can work on my writing skills. I love writing and I think that this blog will help me work on it.

  The plans for this blog?   I plan for this blog to be where I share my thoughts, my ideas, eventually my photography, and just my everyday life.

 
Why is the title "Life in a Snapshot"?  I titled my blog Life in a Snapshot because I plan on this blog being where I share about my life. And the snapshot part? Well, that is because I absolutely love photography. And because I hope to share some of my photography on here. :)


And that's all there is to it! Nothing exciting or anything, but I'm glad I'm finally getting back into blogging a little more. :) I hope you will visit again sometime!