now the sky could be blue..

...i don't mind/but without you it's a waste of time...

the picnic happened!
and i played strawberry swing while eating a delicious ham on wheat sandwich!

i need a perfect day

People moving all the time
Inside a perfect straight line
Don't you wanna curve away
It's such it's such a perfect day

So I have declared a need for a picnic. As soon as this drowsy, gray weather blows through, I am going to grab my siblings and some fixings and eat out in the backyard. I'm NOT an outdoorsy person at all, but I want a change of pace and something thing new. Spring Break is a time for new things, right!? I'll bring my laptop and I can play this song by Coldplay.

I honestly am ready for school to start again. I'm not being too productive at home. I enjoy my family and even the chores?? But I like living a more scheduled life :)

and the beat goes on

I like bullet points so here it goes:

• God was gracious and I finished this semester with all A's!! He is very good :)




• Summer school will start in a week or so and I will be taking a computer class and world literature(yay!) class. I'm not looking forward to the computer one, but world lit should prove to be interesting :)




• My little brother graduated!!! Check it out at Allyson's blog! Congratulations, Chris!




• Chris and I will be going to the University of Houston this fall! He in Engineering(Chemical, I believe?) and I will be getting my Political Science degree!




• I think you should go check out Allyson's blog. She has become quite the photographer!




• Work is going well, I am now working with Junior Kumon, which is another department of Kumon that works with preschoolers through I love it! It's a challenge working with some of the more rambunctious ones, but one that I enjoy. I can't wait to have my own kids to teach :) I am sad that I will not be able to continue into the fall, but I've loved (almost) every moment there :)



• The family has been gardening!! They've got some squash, peppers, tomatoes and a host of other yummy stuff out there!



• In three days, Allyson and I are leaving for Next! I will be updating my blog from my phone :) So check back for updates! Pray that God would do a mighty work there!!

That's all for now! I'll be back soon! :)

confidence?

So, my coolest birthday present so far was given to me today...on the way home from church.

My mom was feeling sleepy to I offered to drive home. Usually my mother closely watches how I drive, making sure I'm not endangering lives or other things that some one with only a few years of driving experience may be prone to do.

Well, today...(course it could have been cause she was so tired)....she fell asleep! Now, even she sorta woke up, realized and said "hey, I went to sleep with Adrienne driving". I just grinned :)

I think she may have confidence in my driving ability.

Maybe I am growing up :)

My familyyy!!

Check out my lovely family! I need to find a picture with my dad in it too :)

Taylor Grace!

Allyson Janell!

Mom and Mikey!




Chris :)

Pictures Courtesy of Allyson :)

Now that's enough of that!

Yeah, I have a really awesome sister, who keeps me on my toes about my blogging and has been getting on me about my extreme lack of posting...

So Allyson, this first post of 2009 goes to you!

Where to start? What about the end of this past semester?

So finals week was tough, but totally worth it as I came out with A's in all my classes! Glory to God!

Next up was Christmas Break and my Government II winter-minimester!

It was so wonderful to see friends home from college. (I will elaborate more on this on another post). Christmas was pretty fun, lots of goodies and good people!

The Winter mini-mester was pretty tough!! I found out yesterday though, I got an A in the class! I was pretty excited to say the least. Even though everything came alright in the end, I think I can truly say I'll never do that again!

New Years was great fun as we spent the Eve with Copples and the Pauls. It wonderful to ring in the New Year with them! We also had a great "pre-New Years Eve" party with some dear friends from high school, more to come in later posts!

Mom had foot surgery on December 30th, everything went well. Though her foot is pretty bandaged up, she's been getting around pretty well on her crutches.

The break seemed so short! I'm currently getting ready for the Spring Semester in which I will be taking 16 Hours. It's going to keep me busy, but I'm looking forward to the challenge and new classes! I always get excited at the beginning of the semester(of course); there's something wonderful about a fresh, new semester. Oh, and guess what?! Allyson will be joining Chris and I at Cy-Fair this semester! I'm really excited for her! She'll be taking English 1301 and I'm pretty sure I can speak for her in saying that she's really excited!
This is my last "real" semester at Cy-Fair. If all goes as planned, I will have only 5 hours left until I get my Associates of Arts. I plan on getting those last few hours done in the first summer session. So I'm on track to be at UH next fall and hopefully living on campus!

So this has been a swift and sadly needed update of my blog. More post will most certainly be coming soon with pictures and the like!

Happy New Year!!!

Love, Adrienne Renea

among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved.

-Ephesians 2:3-5

"Can I take Your Picture?"

So we have a budding photographer in our house.
Allyson just got a new camera, which you can read about on her blog.

For the past couple of weeks, she's been taking pictures of everything, very good ones, I might add. I thought I'd show off some of them:

A different view of the tree in our front yard:

Some unique lighting:

Beautiful Friends:

the lovely photographer:

Piano Recital

Taylor and Michael had a piano recital not too long ago.

Their musical lineup included:

Old McDonald

Sing, Bird, Sing

Jogging Dog and several other pieces.

Here are the students:

With their teacher:

Duets:

Allyson, the proud teacher applauds her students:

The "Ike" Story Part IV

Needless to say we were happy to come home to all our amenities. We spent the rest of the day watching the news and this.

Sunday, my Great Aunt Doris and my(actually she's my mom's first cousin) cousin Jennifer and her little girl, Jordan came over. This was their first experience of a hurricane.

Cousin Jennifer just moved here from Chicago and was now unfortunately without power. So they came and spent the night. I had never seen my little cousin, Jordan before they moved here and now I'm totally in love with the little tyke!


It was great spending time with them.

White Skirts

Who can resist a pretty white skirt?

Con mi mama y mis hermanas

(trying to practice my spanish!)

How did you spend your Sabbath?

Happy Birthday, Dear Sister!

Allyson is 17 today!

Happy Birthday, girlfriend! I Love you!

Summer Daze

How's Summer treatin' ya? I love wearing shorts and summery dresses!

This summer I am taking some classes at the college. I have an 8 am speech class and a history class online. I take my class on campus four days a week for two hours. It's been pretty neat, I don't LOVE public speaking, but I find enjoyment in it sometimes :c) I'm also working which I'm really enjoying. Sadly, some of my co-workers are leaving for college and summer vacation, I'm going miss them! We've been training several new people and they're a lot of fun and I'm looking forward to working with them.

Taylor and Michael have been enjoying their summer. They love the water and despite Michael's reluctance to put his head under the water, they both try to go swimming as much as possible! They went swimming three times this week! I still think the smaller schoolwork load is their favorite part of summer :c)

Allyson and Chris have been busy this summer too! They are both volunteering at a local hospital four hours a week. They get a chance to experience and working and different parts of the hospital from the ER to the Maternity center. Allyson has really enjoyed working the the Maternity area, she's gotten the chance to hold some newborns! Chris is also taking a class at the college. He says his English 1302 class is pretty easy. Allyson has also been blogging, check her out!

I'm looking forward to this weekend. I want to catch up on some reading and I get to hang out with some friends from church on Saturday. What are you up to this weekend?

Much Love,

Adrienne Renea

Why do you boast of evil, O mighty man? The steadfast love of God endures all the day.

- Psalm 52:1

Hello!

So I haven't done any real "updating" blogging in a while so here goes:

Graduation things are coming together: we've got invitations coming in. They look like this ---------->


This Friday, Mrs. Axelson will be taking my senior pictures along with Kiana and Cassia, who are graduating this year.
Allyson is sitting next to me brainstorming ideas for the reception after the graduation and scrapbooking. She likes planning and she comes up with some creative ideas!


March madness has been very entertaining. I was rooting for both Memphis and Texas in the Sweet Sixteen, momentaily forgetting if they both won, they would have to play each other! Happily, they both won! Unfortunantly, I had to choose between the "home team" : Texas or my Dad's favorite and my Mom's alma mater: Memphis. Well Memphis won out quite easily, I've been a fan of theirs for several years and there are personal ties. So today I proudly wore my Memphis basketball jersey as Texas was soundly beat by the Memphis Tigers!


On another note, Allyson's favorite team(I admit, I had a soft spot for them too!) and Tournament Cinderella story, Davidson, narrowly lost to Kansas. It's been a great tournament and it contunially is a testament to the fact that NCAA basketball is much more exciting than NBA!

Chris has been cooking around here. He really into finding new things to cook and bake! Last month he made a Peanut Butter Cheesecake. It was fabulous! It tasted like something from The Cheesecake Factory! For the Superbowl he made a wonderful beef stew and a couple of weeks ago, baked some pork chops. He's become quite a chef! For dinner today he made roasted chicken, mint and onion peas, and roasted potatoe wedges. Ah, it was good! Great Job, Chris!


School and work are going well. English homework is kinda heavy, but all our smaller assignments will culminate in to a big portfolio/research paper at the end of the semester. Only 5 weeks 'til Finals!!! YAAY!


I'm loving my job. It's so wonderful to work with kids. Every work day brings some interesting happenings and its so rewarding to see kids learn! My co-worker are awesome and they make any rough days, smooth. I look forward to one day having kids of my own to teach!


Well there's always some kind of homework assignment due, so I better hop to it and go find out what's coming up for the week!


Christ is the Great Light of the World! He has opened our eyes and given us new life! Hallelujah!


Love, Adrienne Renea

Announcing.....

My sister, Allyson's blog!
In Such A Way

"Happy Birthday to you...."

Happy Birthday, Mommy!

I love you!

Happy Monday!

After two weeks of school, I think I've finally got the hang of my schedule. Honors English is making me rethink my studying/ homework scheduling, but other than that, it feels a lot like last semester!

This semester, I have a new Spanish teacher. I end up being very disappointed with the teacher I had last semester, she was very passionate about the Spanish language, but wasn't a patient teacher. Over the last couple of weeks I've been able to observe the methods and teaching ideas of my new teacher and I'm really excited about learning Spanish in the less-stressful environment of her class. Spanish is her second language and she's a lot more understanding when you don't immediately "get it". We did some review from last semester and I really was happy about how much I still understood after almost a month of not studying it. Another neat thing is my class mates: a friend from my history co-op is also in the class, Allison(not to be confused with my sister!) is also a dual-credit student, I'm so excited to have her to hang out with! Also there are another girl that I was friends with from last semester who is also in the class.

Honors English is lots of homework, but I LOVE the in-class discussions! We've been working through some essays on education and I'm learning so much. The class is very small, only 9 students and it's really motivating to be in a class where I'm challenged! The most surprising part of class is the fact that there are 2 other dual-credit home schooled students! 1/3 of the class is home schooled! Needless to say I'm very comfortable in the class. :c)

Chris is also doing well in his class. He has the same teacher as I did last semester and he's already starting to work on his first major paper!

In other things...

Allyson is training for the Rodeo Run. This race is one of the events that kicks off the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo. She'll be running the 5K, we also have some friends from church( including Melissa!) running in the 10K! Good luck guys!

Track season is starting up for Allyson, so she plans on doing a lot of running this spring!

Today, Chris informed me that they were planning to build a Starbucks in the Randalls were he works! I'm soooo excited. Right now, there is no Starbucks on the way to school and I would have to go waaaay out of my way to get to one. This is very convenient!
Starbucks is a favorite of mines, but I try not indulge too often.

as far as the east is from the west,
so far has He removed our transgressions from us.

- Psalm 103:12

Be blessed!

Love, Adrienne Renea

Spectacles!

Check out Mikey's new specs!

"Everything looks really big!" - Michael

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, Friends! I pray that God blesses you and yours as you reflect on His amazing grace and the birth of our Beautiful Savior!

Love,

Greg, Brenda, Adrienne, Allyson, Chris, Taylor and Michael

Isaiah 9:6-7:

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Of the increase of his government and peace
there will be no end.
He will reign on David's throne
and over his kingdom,
establishing and upholding it
with justice and righteousness
from that time on and forever.
The zeal of the LORD Almighty
will accomplish this.

What's Going On?

It's been awhile:

1. Finals have come and gone! English was easy and no studying was necessary. Spanish involved a lot of studying and I'm sure I didn't study enough! The exams themselves were not that hard. In the end, I have an A in English and a B in Spanish. I'm hoping to get the Spanish grade up to an A next semester!

2. We're registered for spring '08 classes...yes, you heard correctly, "we"! Chris will be joining me at Cy-Fair in the spring to take English 1301! He's registered and eager to work! I will be taking Honors English 1302 and Beginning Spanish II. I'm really looking forward to the Honors English class. The instructor is really nice and it looks to be a interesting class! The way my class schedule is structure, I'll be going from school,and straight to work. Tuesday and Thursday will be busy days!

3. Christmas is here!

Our Christmas Tree:


The Nativity


Allyson and I attended a Christmas Party last Wednesday:


Alison and Allyson:


I so enjoy relating to many of my friends who I haven't seen much of since school started. We've got a couple of more parties coming up, so look forward to more pictures!

I always use the holiday break as an excuse to catch up on movies I haven't had time to see at the theater and on DVD. Last Saturday I went to see August Rush with Sarah and Mrs. Myers. It was a really good. Music lovers would appreciate it, especially. I'm looking forward to seeing National Treasure: Book of Secrets and The Great Debaters. Movies are always a great time to eat an extraordinary amount of candy :c)

I'm really excited about seeing the
Fraziers this Sunday! It will be so wonderful to see how big the boys have grown and hear more about living in India.

I hope everyone is enjoying all the excitements of Christmas!
Love much,
Adrienne Renea

Happy Anniversary!

Yesterday was my parent's 25th anniversary! YaY!
They celebrated with a nice dinner at Babin's Seafood House.




Congratulations Mom and Dad!

1 Corinthians 13

Love is patient; love is kind.
Love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way: it is not irritable or resentful;
it does not rejoice in wrong doing, but rejoices in truth.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
And now faith, hope, and love abide,
and the greatest of these is love.