School iPads

Although they are very cantankerous, the school has done something I like! They have the sophomore AP History and Language classes iPads! We only get to keep them for the school year, but I have come seriously attached!  There are so many things I can do on it.  Sometimes it can be a distraction, especially with the kids who aren't focused on getting good grades, but I use it for educational purposes all the time!  However, here are some things I have done using the app Noteability.

This is a collage of one of our biggest races of the season, Jesse Owens in Oakville, Alabama.  On our way there, we had some adventures at the space museum.  I screamed my head off on the space shot.  I was totally unprepared for that stomach-dropping feeling as we shot up into the sky!  Dinner was never-ending pasta bowl with soup at Olive Garden!

The next day was filled with new PRs for almost the entire team!  Including me!  I got down to 18:05.  The team also won for the second year in a row!  Up at the top left is my cousin, Jonathan, and me!  He lives in Alabama, and this race is about the only time, besides sometimes on Thanksgiving, that I get to see him and his parents.

I was so excited after the weekend of Bristol Cross (race) and Camp Your Face Off, I went a little digital-scrapbook-crazy.  This is from the first night!  I'm also working on a post for that, so this is just a photo overview.  These are from my first night there, Saturday.

This is Sunday morning.  It was Joy's birthday!  I had a great time fellowshipping with these lovely people.

As you can see, we looked lovely as we woke up.  Cassie had been there since the beginning on Friday night, so she had two nights in a row in the tent.  I hadn't taken a shower since Friday night and had sweat a ton, outside literally all day Saturday, racing, watching races, then at the retreat.  I was looking and smelling fresh.  The breakfast buffet of the day was a hodgepodge of everything: pancakes, bacon, fruit, yogurt, cereal, milk, candy...you name it!  Of course, I also had coffee.

I spent well over an hour in Bible study, too, catching up on what I had missed as well as digging into the new info for the day.  It was a beautiful, refreshing morning by the lake!  Later, we had the leader share time, lunch, and finished things off with the Amazing Race! 

Here is a collage from one of my favorite races, Bristol Cross, which is at the beautiful Steele Creek Park. 

I have been told many times that I look like in smiling while I run, and some pictures I found of me from this race are great proof!  I just laughed and laughed looking at these. 

This collage is just a little bit about me and my running. 

I also use my iPad for educational purposes!  This is my home screen with my Thanksgiving background. The two AP teachers send us assignments, notes, and other information daily.  It is a great way to get us all involved and informed, in and out of school.

These iPads make assignments so much easier!  Here, I can take the online instructions for my computer class projects and have them by my side as I work, keeping me from having to go back and forth between open windows. 

I also use it almost every day in math class to take pictures of our homework. My textbook is WAY too big and heavy, and I have enough to carry around as it is. 

Here is that app I mentioned earlier, Noteability. You can create folders and arrange them any way you like. As you can see, I use it for entertainment as well as school notes, outlines, and assignments we do in and out of class. 

I am so thankful to have this thing to help me through this year!  

Sleepless Morning=Blessing in Disguise

I was discouraged when I woke up this morning from a great night's sleep despite the fact that I was in a tent, because I still had 3 hours before we had to be awake.

It is the Sunday morning of Camp Your Face Off, my church's fall youth retreat.  I didn't get there until around 6:00 Saturday evening because of a cross country meet in Bristol.  I was upset because I had to miss all the fun on Friday night and then the service on Saturday morning, so laying there with all kinds of thoughts was not good.  I now feel bad for taking the service the night before for granted, but after being awake for an hour, it hit me.  God convicted me big time.  I was being so selfish right then.  I felt like I was wasting my time.  All these scriptures and notes I looked back at opened my eyes to see the sin I had inside me at that very moment.  To be honest, I felt so stupid.  God humbled me this morning.  On a beautiful morning, I had some time to myself to be humbled before anyone was awake.  Almost in tears, I pulled out my Bible and my notes from the previous night.  The speaker, Jay, read from Galations 5:1, 16-25.  I was feeling that war that he spoke of inside me like crazy.  Those conflicting thoughts are evidence of Christ in me.  "For the sinful nature desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the sinful nature.  They are in conflict with one another, so that you do not do what you want." (vs 17)  I then found a verse falling out of a page I had written on a notesheet.  It was 1 John 2:15-17, "Do not love the world or anything in the world.  If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.  For everything in the world-the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does-comes not from the Father but from the world.  The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever."  Holy cow, that's no coincidence.  This is exactly what I was doing.  I was upset for one thing because one of my guy friends didn't ask me about how the cross country meet went.  The reason I wanted him to ask was so he could hear how "great" I did.  Selfish.  I also wanted to do the fun things at CYFO that I wanted to do.  It's not about me!  It's about fellowship and learning about and praising God!  I just had the best day and was planning on the weekend just getting better, and there I was miserable.  I needed a renewed spirit.  God woke me up this morning to open my eyes to things I needed to change.  This weekend was still a blessing, and He had things for me to learn. After some praying and reading in Galatians where we had been this weekend, Hebrews where we were in our regular study, and looking up verses I still want to look into, I found a new light to the day.  Next week's chapter in Hebrews was titled A Sabbath-Rest for the People of God.  Again...whoa.  God's word never fails.