Hello all you lovely people. Its been about a week since we have been home. Its a wonderful thing. Being back with our family has been incredible. So many sweet memories have already been made in just a week. Mike's brother got married, and tomorrow we are headed to another wedding. It's so wonderful to see life happening over on this side of the world.
So what is next? Well for the next month or so, we will be back and forth between families, just hanging out, resting, and enjoying just BEING with loved ones. No problems with that yet.
In September we will be making our next move. A World Race alumni couple will be starting a community house in Ohio. This is place for racers to go, before or after the race that desire to plug into community, be around people who will help them acclimate back to America that understand what the transition is like. There is more to it, but we will be moving in for a period of time to help them get the house going. Since we are not quite in the making of any new dreams of ours, we really want to help them out with their dream.
So off to Ohio for us.
We are also in need of $1,500 more support from the race. We have until mid August for supporters to still donate. So if the Lord is leading you, we still have a little time to raise that amount.
I feel so overwhelmed with your obedience to the Lord with your finances. God is thankful for your desire to help others. I am so thankful for that.
With one week left we have only $2,265 left to raise. I am so thankful for all the support that has come in this year. And I am so grateful for those who God will lay it on your hearts to help us with the rest of our support.
ONE WEEK! We are home. To be honest, I am exhausted. I cannot wait to spend time with my friends and family. I miss you all so much. This year has been WONDERFUL to say the least. I cannot wait to exchange stories of our lives this past year.
Months before I left for the World
Race I woke up from a VERY vivid dream. It was the type of dream that leaves
you with real emotions when you wake up. My dream was that I was in Cambodia.
In my dream I was in the slums of Cambodia. The dream was colorful and joyful,
at the same time heartbreaking. In my dream I had fallen in love with something
in the slums, that when I woke up, I was crying, wanting to go back so bad. My
heart was aching and longing for a love I found there.
Though I never knew to what extent
it all would really mean....
I have been in Cambodia this month,
working on a website for a ministry. I was reminded this month about my dream.
I was a little hopeless that my dream was really divine, and so I reminded God
about my slum dream. (If he didn't already know)
THE NEXT DAY, Heather told me that
there was a group going to slums from a church and I could join if I want. Of
course.
So off I went. Me and a few locals,
we walked into the slums with shampoo, first aid supplies, and fingernail
clippers. The children had open wounds, lice, scabies, and bodies needing
washing.
....LICE.... At first I began to hesitantly
wash each child's hair...Oh Lice... Then I remembered the first part of my
tattoo....'Unrestrained Compassion'...Ok God...What was more important? Me, possibly
getting lice, or these children being able to get a meaningful hair washing.
These children deserved to not be treated as though they were dirty and
untouchable. And that is because they are precious loved children of God. Who
doesn't love a good head massage along with a shampooing?
I was then able to clip their tiny
finger nails. They just held their hands so still, staring at me with sweet
eyes while I was making sure not to clip their skin.
The kids wanted to jump in my arms
and hug and spin around.....scabies..infections....Then I would remind myself....Unrestrained
Compassion....beautiful...precious...hug them tight...
We then gathered all the children on
a clean tarp as the Cambodian volunteers would proceed to teach them songs and
share bible stories. I decided to go sit
among the children, and that is when my dream started to unfold into reality; a
joyful and heartbreaking reality that came at my surprise, unexpected.
A young girl was holding and trying to control a crying
baby. The baby was maybe 7 months old. She looked scared amongst all the children
and noise. I held out my hands and the
young girl handed me the baby. I took
the baby and gently led her head into my shoulder. Within seconds, the baby
stopped crying and went limp in my arms as I rubbed her back. I thought she was
sleeping until I noticed her hand had a death grip on my shirt as though
telling me to never let her go. I moved her so I could look at her and touch
her face. The sweet thing had scabs all over her head.
I then started to sing some worship songs to her. I got to
one part of a song where it says, "Lift your head. Let your eyes fall into
mine." In that moment she fixed her eyes
on mine. It felt like hours after that. I
sang to her as everything else going on seemed to stop. I couldn't hear the other
noisy children. I just smiled and sang as she NEVER moved her eyes from mine.
There is this song that uses words to describe what Jesus
would be saying to us. I started to sing it to her. "You don't have to do a
thing, just sit and be with me a little longer, because I'm in love with you."
After I sang those words something shifted in me. It was the
most intense feeling I have ever experienced. I don't know what this is like,
but I felt like I had just given birth to this child. Like she was my own. Like
we belonged to each other. I kept telling her to stay with me a little longer.
I started to cry, I never wanted to let her go. It was pain to think that it is
illegal to adopt from Cambodia. Who was her mother? Why do I feel this way? For
what reason? The love between us was so powerful. I never connect with children like this except
my nephew. But even my nephew isn't MINE, this child felt like she was mine.
As her little sister took her from me and started to walk
away, the little baby looked at me over her sister's shoulder until she couldn't
see me anymore. It felt like my child was being taken from me. The only thing that
prevented me from taking her, was that fact that it's illegal to take children.
HA.
But it actually physically hurt my body trying not to break
down in tears. It wasn't the time to let it out as the other children were ready
for my attention.
I came home to Michael and let it out, for a long time. I
just cried and realized that my dream came to a very intense reality. More than
I had expected it to be like.
God feels how I did. I asked God for his heart. This is how
he feels for each of us. It is painful for him when we walk away from him. He
desires us so much because we actually DO belong to him. He wants us to sit and
be with him a little longer. I know it was a feeling from the Lord to show me
how he felt for me and for you. He wants those who do not know him to come into
his arms, and he wants those who think they know him to come and BE with him
and do more than just acknowledge him; but to instead look intensely in his
eyes and in his love because he wants you to know how much he loves you, just
as I wanted that baby to know how much I loved her, just like parents want
their children to really know how much they love them. JESUS LOVES YOU.
(unfortunately I have no pictures of the baby. But here are a few pictures)
We each only know our own body. We know how much sleep we need, we know how
much exercise we need, we know the portion sizes we should eat, and the foods
that don't sit right for us; so I can
really only speak from what I know of myself, but I feel that this applies to
us all.
It's truth about the race, that often we have little space to
exercise, when you are with a contact (hello Africa) often there is no other
choice but rice and potatoes, and then more carbohydrates; each carb ready to
make you sluggish and want to take a nap rather then play with the children.
In the beginning of the race, I gave up all hopes to stay
healthy. It was an expectation that was realistic, but on the flip side has the
potential to cause and has caused laziness in taking care of ones body, or as
God calls it, our temple, His temple.
My contact in Israel asked me when my best time with the
Lord was. I told him that it was after a good hard run. I often felt guilty that I couldn't
concentrate on my time with Jesus if I hadn't exercised or ate healthy foods in
a while; but then I realized, that taking care of my body to its fullest
potential was a way to take care of His temple, often drawing me to hear the
Lord more clearly. It makes sense. It is all relative, for me it is a 6 mile
run, or for a 90 year old it might be a walk of 15 feet. You get it.
Back to the point.....
Laziness. I have realized
from being on the race, that we DO have more control over our health then we
believe, and I think deep down we all know that. Back home, there is no excuse
but to use self-discipline and get on the running trail or treadmill. Expecting
the race to take most hopes of health away, we CAN and tend to use that as an
excuse to not be self-disciplined.
Obviously there is a limit, as one needs to get used to the
heat shock of Asia, but RACERS, we have more control than we think and as I
mentioned, we know it.
PLEASE.
Shower when you can, floss your teeth (that's for me), buy
EVERY good smelling soap type product you can find, (ok, not everything like my
husband does), exercise if that's what you do back home even if you only have
room for pushups and yoga moves, do not stay up on the computer till three in the
morning and then say your too tired for ministry the next day. SLEEP. GET YOUR SLEEP. (ok, sleep is hard with constant African noise, but you can try) You
CAN find fruit at markets and eat veggies if you are not stuck with planned
meals by contacts.
We can lose energy by not taking care of ourselves, energy
that we could have been used for good.
So let's not use the World Race as an excuse to not use our
will power and self discipline. Let's take care of our bodies to each
individual health potential. It's not about staying 'thin' but about staying healthy.
We are temples and representations of our Lord and Savior. No
more excuses. There is PLENTY of time on the race to exercise and many
opportunities to eat foreign fruit and veggies along the way. If you go to
Vietnam there are free workouts in the park. It is really fun. =) =) So have
fun with it. It's possible. We have a few that have missed only few days of a
hardcore workout this year. You could
miss great opportunities like working out at an Olympic stadium for free in Cambodia, which
I get to do with my brother Tres tomorrow morning. So excited.
God says if he trusts us with little he will trust us with
much. The one thing that he has trusted each and every one of us with is our
own bodies. So show him he can trust you with your body, take responsibility,
and take care of it.
Thisisn't me judging, and this is not meant to
cause anyone to feel guilty. This is me just realizing. Being in month 11, I hope this can help future and current racers. Love you all.
I have seen a pattern in my blogging. I tend to blog when
I've had an amazing revelation, when I feel on top of the world. I write about
other people, how passionate I feel, and how AMAZING the World Race has been.
All those blogs are very true and very significant. But I have failed to show
the big picture.
There are moments that I haven't mentioned; like the moments
I wanted to get in a taxi and go straight to the airport to fly home, the
moment I literally pulled my hair out, the moments I had to scream in my
pillow, the moments I doubted, the moments I cried until my eyes swelled, the
moments I judged, the moments I believed I wasn't good enough for anything, the
moments I went weeks without reading the bible or praying, the moments I stayed
in bed lifeless and defeated. These are what a majority of the race really was.
The REAL things that shaped me to be who I have become and have defined a part
of my race.
So here it is - as much as I can do in writing.
In the back of my mind, I figured that traveling the world
would be this epic adventure where all my bad habits and insecurities would go
away. Where I would actually finish a
journal, want to get out of bed every morning, have an adventure everyday, and would
always feel cute in warn skirts and t-shirts. Why wouldn't I think that? All I
saw about missions were the beautiful photos of a pretty girl holding five
African children and videos with bone chilling music and the perfect moments.
I was wrong, in so
many ways.
This year has been a time of painful growth. I didn't always
feel alive, but instead, my insecurities that did not stay at home crippled me
more than ever and my journals remain almost blank. Tanzania and Israel are two
National Geographic countries, but while I was there, I hardly wanted to leave
my room.
I have been constantly surrounded by an incredible group of
people who were going through the same process in their own ways, but it wasn't
always easy. We argue, swear at each other, disagree, say the wrong things, compare ourselves, and
make the wrong decisions, of course never hating each other at the end. These
moments make you want to scream or actually scream, they have made me want to
pack my bags and adios Africa to isolate myself in my own air conditioned
space.
I look at the beautiful pictures I am in from the race, and
tell myself that I look so happy, but if only people new what that day was
really like.
There are many downer moments. Like when I thought I would
dance in the street with the kids in Africa, but instead get annoyed that they
are following me every where I go and make every run anything but peaceful by
yelling "Mzungu. Mzungu. How are you? How are you?"
Or my first day of Squad Leading, we were In Israel. I was
so stressed out with trying to figure out how to organize 42 people on a tour,
that I actually made a scene and yelled at my husband for the first time, in the
streets of Jerusalem (the HOLY land), threatening to get in a taxi to go home,
and then later telling him that I need therapy. HAHAHA. Ok. that's funny.
Then in Tanzania, when Tamica and I (us two squad lead with
my husband Mike) told Mike that we both wanted to quit being Squad Leaders.
I thought that every run I went on was going to be beautiful
and glorious. Wrong again. Not fun to have men stare you down all the time and
try to touch you while you are running. A few times I ran straight home to cry.
Or our flooded tent and the time in rural Africa when Mike
was having asthma problems and I had to make a paper fan and fan him down for
three hours in the middle of the night in our not-so-cute-anymore grass hut.
Or remember how I thought that I was always going to feel
pretty? Not when I have to eat rice and starches every day, have no mirror, or
a regular exercise schedule--- trying to fight those insecure feelings over and
over again.
I always thought that having great travel stories would be
great. Not in the moment when I am almost in tears from fear of the bus rolling
and then having to march myself up to the front to give the driver some "SLOW
DOWN" lessons. Or getting of the bus to
have 30 taxi drivers grabbing and pulling me in the middle of the night with
only Tamica around to show I wasn't alone.
It's those moments. Those moments I lay in bed, lifeless,
telling myself I'm not good enough. I cannot do this anymore. I wasn't meant
for this. I want my mom. I hate this. I'm such an awful wife. AIM doesn't think
I'm great. I'm not in shape anymore. No one on the race thinks they can relate
to me because I am married and don't have a "bad" past. More lies and more
lies, I would, and sometimes still tell myself. It's those moments I forgot to
mention.
I could write on an on.....
...but this is a blog of hope. Not of complaining. It's
hopeful because here I am. In my last month of the race, fully in God's will,
loving each K squader, still struggling, but in this moment, stronger than
before. More secure in who I am than ever before. Still knowing that those moments will still come and feel just as hard, but certain they always end. More certain that those trials
teach us something, mold us into who we are suppose to be, make us more aware
of grace. God has taught me I don't have to be perfect. I can mess up, and in
it, let the mess ups humble me so that he can become greater.
So that's it, the core of my trip. It's about kingdom, but
always about some extent of painful growth. Yeah, it lasted the entire year,
with its ups and downs. But I wouldn't trade those moments in for anything. I
am a different person than last year, and I hope I can say the same thing every
year, as God puts me in more and more situations that will stretch my character
and my dependence on him.
There is this country song that goes something like, "Everybody
wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to go now." It's popular, we have probably all heard it. Well.
It is a bunch of crap.
There are MILLIONS and adding, of people all over the world
who desperately wish they could be in heaven. Even a place to sleep would feel
like heaven to most.... For a trafficked child, a night where there are not men
having sex with them all night long and they didn't have to sleep alone in a cold
cement room, or didn't have their eye gouged out when they ask for a break, would feel
like heaven.
My heart is ripping out of my chest in pain. CHURCH! PLEASE! CHURCH! There is a crisis. CHURCH CHURCH CHURCH.
Many people have said to me before I left on the race, "You
are just going to travel the world and make people convert to your religion." Tell that to the little orphan, the trafficked child, the lonely prostitute,
who is desperate to have someone come and tell them something different.
Someone to come and not buy them for sex. But someone to tell them that there
is this man named Jesus, who bought them back, by dying for you on the cross.
To tell them there is a loving father in heaven that is going to hold you in is arms, and he
will use the church, his people to hold you.There is a man named Jesus who won't
use you for sex, but use you for a grand purpose and he wants to heal you. And
he wants to tell you that you are beautiful and that you are written on the
palm of his hand and in the book of LIFE. There is a man named Jesus, who is
here, in us, to bring you out of darkness and into a marvelous light, who is
bringing you out of death and calling you into life. He has sent us, the
church, the Christians, because he loves you.
"You just want to convert them to your religion"..... It's converting them out of darkness
and into light.
So IM begging you, for the people that are too weak to beg
you, and probably can't even imagine being rescued even if they begged. Can we
be the generation that doesn't sit quiet? But is loud. Has a voice. Fights for
those who can't. Can we be the generation that dreams the impossible, because
we can do all things through Christ who strengthens us? Can we be the
generation that doesn't live in an attitude of SELF, but live in a self-giving
attitude? Can we be the generation that doesn't go to college to find the job
that makes the most money, but to go to college to make a difference? Let's do
this. It doesn't mean we all need to go travel to the other side of the world.
But it does mean to search out those people that so desperately want to be in
heaven. It might be the rich in money,
but poor in spirits, lonely white person at your 9 to 5 whose spouse cheated on them, or it
might be the lonely orphan in Africa. Everyone needs Jesus. Everyone has hurts and fears.
To all my family and friends. To anyone who reads this. If
you could just watch one video that I post thus far, please let it be this one.
I have a heart for human trafficking. I
was able to experience the sex industry in Thailand, just able to scratch the
surface of its twisted ways.
BUT PLEASE times a million, I am asking you to watch this short
trailer for a full-length film on human trafficking that should come out internationally
in the next few years. It's about the raw painful TRUTH but also about the HOPE.
Her eyes were open to
the fact that right down in the depths of her own heart she really had but one
passionate desire, not for the things that the Shepherd had promised, but for
Himself. All she wanted was to be allowed to follow him forever. -Hinds Feet on High Places-
This blog may be very full of a lot of emotion and attempts
to explain everything in words. I'm pretty high right now on Jesus and I can
hardly control myself from bursting with expressions of joy.
In my latest blog I wrote that my greatest desire was to love
the people that have never felt love. While that is still true to an extent, I'm going to edit that, andwill say that it is not my hearts
greatest desire.
Here it is. My
greatest desire is Jesus himself. I'm sitting here reading scripture like I
never have before. Every verse is making me feel like I've just gone up into
heaven. Jesus is pouring revelation on
me like never before.
So.......Jesus Himself......... I heard a pastor say something to this
effect....You hear so often, "Come to Jesus, and he will make your life happy.
Come to Jesus and you will get the job of your dreams, the husband/wife you
want, the house, the car, the tingles."
....BUT PEOPLE...Come
to Jesus and you get JESUS....Jesus Himself. Eternal life with JESUS. Honestly. There should
be no other incentives to come to Jesus other than to have JESUS.
So all this talk about getting rich or whatever when coming
to Jesus. Paul made it clear in the book of Colossians. "The Glorious RICHES of
this mystery, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory." - The riches we receive
are CHRIST in US.
So I was reading in the book of John. Yeah, I want Jesus in my heart, but I was more fully grasping how much Jesus DESPERATELY wants to be in our
hearts. I was reading a prayer that Jesus prayed for people. He said something
to the effect of,
"Hey Father God. So you gave me all your Glory and power here
on earth. But I love these people so much that I gave all that Glory and Power
to them. Oh yeah, and these people on earth, I really want them to be where I
am where ever I go. And I love them so much that I had to let them know who you
are. And when I come back to heaven, can the love you have for me go to them, and
then can I still be with them?"
Basically
Jesus came to this earth and couldn't get enough of us. And asked Father God up
in heaven if he could always be with us or he would miss us.
My heart is thumping.
JESUS HIMSELF. The
bible tells us that the Lord will give good gifts to those who love him. But
seriously. He gave us Jesus. No other good gift could ever be better than Jesus
himself.
I am so in love with my Savior. I am actually feeling him
and hearing his voice. It's not a made up feeling or emotion. It's just
something I cannot describe.
Today I was on a date with my sweet Madeline. She told me
that God has taught her this year that he isn't just up there and she is down
here. US and HIM together, as one. Him
and Us living in the Kingdom of Love. Scripture tells us that he has brought us
out of darkness and into the marvelous light. Experiencing that marvelous light
is almost too marvelous for my tiny little mind and heart to grasp sometimes.
There is a girls blog I read. Right when she graduated High
School she followed the Lords call, and moved to Africa all by herself. Who can imagine? At 18 delivering babies in
villages, having a village want to kill you but instead feeding all of them, by the age of 21 years adopting 14 children and feeding way more, sleeping on floors of hospitals, killing chickens
for dinner, praying over blind people and they see, giving stitches. And really
I cannot put into words her life.....
....The point being.....One of her young children asked her one
day. "Mommy, If Jesus comes into my heart, will my heart explode?"
My Answer to her
question: Well, yes, it just might. It just might explode with joy and all
these other unknown feelings and fountains of life, that sometimes you won't
even know what else to do but want to be with Jesus more.
I will be ending with another perfect quote from "Hinds Feet
on High Places." It's just explaining the state I'm in currently.
"Sometimes her eyes
filled with tears of pure joy and her heart seemed so full of ecstasy that she
could hardly bear it."
JESUS. JUST JESUS HIMSELF.
So Here is a hilarious video to watch. It has nothing to do at all with my blog. I mean. I guess kinda. Its from the race. It's just for some laughs and fun. Just wanting to share some epic world race moments. I might add some of these to the rest of my blogs as these videos are being uploaded as we are coming to an end. This is from Team Redeemed.
Yesterday I was sitting in an alley in Vietnam. There are
many great air conditioned spots to go sit and read, but that's not where the
general locals seem to go.I was sitting there reading, and singing for
who ever wanted to listen. Then the Love of God poured out on me so strongly,
and was filling me up so much, that I felt like my heart was going to explode
if I didn't give that love away. I asked God to send me children to give the
love to. Of course, why would he not send his own little children to be loved
on, and three minutes later there were three street children surrounding me. I
got to spend ten minutes of sharing laughter, tickles, and Mikes oreos.....That
entire scenario is about a JOY that God has put in me that is so inexpressible that
it almost becomes frustrating at times to try to express, because it is so not
natural human joy, but so heaven-God joy. See? There really isn't many ways to
explain it because it cannot be expressed with human terms.
So that is the start to what God has been teaching me these
past few days.
And moving on to help me piece it all together...
I go back to America in five weeks. I am so ready to see my family and friends. I
CANNOT WAIT. I want to sleep on a blanket outside and walk barefoot outside. I
want to make the best salad in the world, and to go rollerblading. I want to
see American open fields and rolling hills and drink lemonade while wearing a
machine dried sundress. I want to paint
with my sister and play piano. I want to sit on the couch or carpet with my mom
and dad in the mornings and drink a hot drink and read. I want to go on a
really long, uninterrupted run at Stony Creek and pick wild flowers with
Stefanie. I want to meet all my friends new babies and hear about their
weddings, and help my sister with her garden, and hear my nephew talk who wasn't
even crawling when I left.
I recognize that these are all good gifts from the Lord.
Even lately he has been showing me how much he loves me and wants to give me
such good gifts, and wants me to enjoy every little part of my life. The picnics
and the rollerblades.
Although, he is balancing me out. I have never felt his love
so strongly and a desire to do all of those things in America so strongly, but
at the same time, that feeling of my heart exploding for the lost and the
broken has been stronger than it ever has before. Last night as I was trying to sleep I felt like I could hardly stay in my skin. I had such a desire to go
find the worst of the worst situation. Like a home of sick and dying people,
who have no one to clean them or to make them laugh, and I could do those
things for them. It felt like an addiction
I couldn't satisfy in the moment.
Still piecing this together.
So I know it is the season of life to go home. To enjoy all
those things that I so GREATLY miss, and to enjoy my family and friends
probably more than I ever have before. But I have grown to realize my greatest
joy and desire. It's not to be able to
have clean pretty skirts and wild flowers all the time. I have a NEED and a
DESIRE to give my love to the hurting and the people who do not know love. Yes, my family and friends are priority to me
and deserve and need just as much love as anyone else in the world, BUT I ask
the Lord to keep bringing me the "least of these." I ask God to continue to send
me to the place that no one has yet gone, and no one yet has felt love and
where my skirts might get dirty. I want to be exhausted by the end of the day
helping and loving people, because there is this inexpressible non-human joy
that I have for that, that will far out weigh being able to peacefully
rollerblade around Stony Creek any time that I want. It's God's heart in mine. Working for the Lord
means laboring in love. Working for the Lord is my greatest joy. And when God puts love and passion in my
heart, it cannot be held in or my heart just might explode.
Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flows springs of life.
Proverbs 4:23
For the eyes of the Lord range throughout the earth to strengthen those whose
Michael and I have about $3,600 to raise in the six weeks we have left on the race.
Without a doubt, I believe that God will provide that amount for us in six weeks. He always has provided for me in all my 24 years and I don't doubt his provision on this year either.
So if you would love to donate. And if God puts it on your heart, you can find out how by clicking on the "support me" link on my blog page. It allows you to donate by internet or by mail.
If you don't know us, you can contact me on the "contact me" link on my blog page, and I would love to share anything you want to know. I love meeting new people.
Posted in NICOLE THAYER by Denise Bickel on 5/19/2010
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR NICOLE
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU
So Its my sisters Nicoles 26th BiRtHdAy today. AND SHE IS AMAZING. And I am just going to tell you all the really amazing and funny things about her.
Well, as you see in the picture below. She is really pretty. And that is her husband Eric, and he also thinks she is really pretty. And he would probably admit that she is an amazing wife and he would be lost without her.
In the picture below it is obvious that she makes really cute babies. This is my nephew Zechariah. And as you can also see, he is really blessed to have a really fun mom, who lets him paint messy before he can walk. Nicole is so Creative. Oh yeah, and she is gonna have another baby too.
* Nicole is the best HOST ever. She would go crazy if she didn't have people to feed and take care of and make comfortable. She has a special gift of getting you to stay at her house for three meals when you insist that you only can stay for five minutes. Im serious. I don't know how she does it.
*Nicole has one heck of a voice. Dang can that girl sing.
*Nicole is the kind of girl that wears stilettos and likes designer purses, but plays on fantasy football leagues and wins, and than when her one year old son is sick, turns on "Breakfast at Tiffany's" for him to watch.
*Nicole is the one that will try to make you laugh at the most inappropriate times. Like when dad is doing devotions, in the middle of a sermon, during a wedding rehearsal, etc.
*Nicole can engage any one in conversation and make them feel comfortable. She can talk for hours on her garden, herbs, and organic meals or talk about wanting to go to Haiti after the earthquake.
*Nicole is brilliant. One of the most intelligent people I have ever known.
*Nicole likes to say things like, "My son is eating earthworms now...........Those poor earthworms."
*Nicole really loves Jesus a ton. And it's really inspiring.
* Nicole goes to THE MOST dangerous part of Detroit. (Detroit is the most dangerous city in America) And she feeds people and makes friends there.
* Nicole is MY sister, and I'm really PROUD of that.
p.s. Nicole, I love you so much. Happy Birthday. I am going to do my best to try to find you the designer purse and dipper bag you wanted for your birthday. =) =)
Worshiping Fingernail Clipping
