Music City Mayhem

Mayhem: A state of violent disorder or confusion; havoc.

That could be the one word to describe the Music City Bowl game last night in Nashville. It did not end well for Tennessee fans, and honestly, I don't want to recap it. But I had fun with Amy and Kory and company at the game. We had amazing seats (thanks Will) and good weather!

It was a LONG game and it got a little bit colder, but overall a great night for football! At least we had great new Tennessee headbands to wear!

The Mayhem started Wednesday night with Lauren and Jean and the Zac Brown Band concert. Such a fun night with some of favorite people!

I have had a fun week here in Music City..... Mayhem and all.

White Christmas

We had such a great Christmas. I am so thankful for such a wonderful family and for lots of time at home to spend with them. My work and school schedule worked out that I was able to spend the week before Christmas at home with my parents.

Here we are at Big Ed's pizza (my favorite)

And on Christmas Eve after our Christmas Eve service.

Amy, Kory, and Kaitlin made the long trip to Knoxville and it was so so much fun spending Christmas all together.

We even had a White Christmas!

Kaitlin got a circus tent from Santa. I am not sure who had more fun in the tent..... Kaitlin or Aunt Rachel!

Milestone

Kinda a big deal..... kinda.

Friends in Low Places

Garth Brooks is doing nine concerts in Nashville this week for flood relief. I had the privilege of going to the show on Friday night. It was absolutely amazing.

I went with Treydrienne and they were so much fun. I never knew Adrienne was such a country music fan!

Garth puts on such a great show. He is a great entertainer and we had awesome floor seats (thanks Trey!). Tricia came out and sang a few songs with Garth. She sang my favorite song "She's in Love With a Boy." Loved it.

The best part of the concert was the very end. We were lucky to go on the night that only had one concert. So Garth came out after the encore with just his guitar and took requests. I felt like I was the only one in the room. My friend Lindsay does a great job of explaining it.

As I was shopping in downtown Nashville on Saturday morning, I met lots of people from Florida, Minnesota, and Oklahoma. All of these people had come to see Garth in concert. They were all shopping downtown and supporting the businesses that were so badly hurt in the flood. Garth was helping Nashville so much more than just doing some benefit shows.

And look who I ran into..... Anna! I was so happy to see you!

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

I have some very mixed feelings about snow. I love it and it looks BEAUTIFUL covering everything. I like how the world seems quiet and peaceful when it snows. I like to feel "snowed in" and drink hot chocolate, bake cookies, and wear my snuggie while watching White Christmas on repeat.

I even kinda liked walking to work this morning. I liked having a reason to pull out all of my hats, scarves, and mittens. I kinda liked feeling like I was in New York City of Chicago for a little bit while I walked from my apartment to my office. Kinda.

My love for snow started to "melt" when I walked back to my apartment and realized that my pipes were frozen and we had no water. Also frozen? Me. I have on two pairs of socks plus my fuzzy boots and my feet are still cold. I can feel the 8 degree temperature blowing through my window.

Even though the weather outside is frightful, I had fun taking pictures on my way to work this morning!

YL Christmas

I love my Young Life family in Williamson County. I am so thankful for these amazing people who love and encourage me through the year. We got to have our Christmas party for leaders this weekend and it was great. It is just so fun for all of us to get to hang out and laugh together.

I had the best time catching up with Debbie. She is so great and it was fun to hang out. Debbie, I hope you are reading this! :)

Of course, it is like a tradition that Adrienne and I get a picture at everything we do! ha! We can file this under "what did we wear to the Christmas party last year."

Here is some of my YL team! We were missing a few boys, but we dominated in the Dirty Santa game! Love working with these people every week!

It was a great night of fun, food, and fellowship. So thankful for the YL community and for this season to celebrate!

Curb appeal

I seriously have the worst lucks with hubcaps. Such a random problem to have, but it seems that I can't keep them on my car. I have been a very frequent customer of Hubcap Annie since I moved to Nashville. Today marks my 5th new hubcap purchase.

I just wanted to post this picture of my latest hubcap problem. I hit a curb and the it ripped half of my hubcap off. Yikes.

If you could travel anywhere....where would you go?

I love those ice-breaker questions that ask things like "if you could go anywhere, where would you go visit?" It's fun to think of all the places you want to see and places you would visit. It's a fun game to play because its all fantasy and fun!

Well, I have to actually answer that question now.

At our company Christmas party, they had tons of awesome door prizes. People won gift cards, ipods, football tickets, and lots of exciting things. In almost four years of working at Symbion, I have never won anything. But this year was my lucky year. I won a plane ticket to anywhere in the US! (pause for dramatic excitement) !!!

Here is a picture of me and the plane ticket. ha!

This is one of my favorite pictures (below) because this is right when I started crying. I was REALLY excited.

It is so fun to think about all the places in the US that I have wanted to see! I have a list right now in my head of places that I want to go! I will write a whole new post when I decide where to go! Would love to hear any suggestions too!

Here are some other embarrassing pictures from our Christmas party that show how excited I was about this prize!

Am I clapping for myself here? Not sure...

Vandyland

This weekend was my first Vandy experience. It may been one of the most boring games to watch, but I will take lots of memories from this weekend's game against Vandy. I work with lots of Vanderbilt fans so there is always a little tension and trash-talking! But thankfully, we won so the trash-talking will have to wait till basketball season!

This game was fun to go with someone who knows so much about football. I had a great time with James and he made the game much more entertaining. Highlights from the game include UT fans cheering the most when we actually caught a punt return, having the "away" game with 80% Tennessee fans, and waiting 40 min for a Petro (how embarrassing) then running out of chili when we get up to the front of the line.

Go Vols!

Boys of Fall

I love football! This season has not been our best at UT, but on Saturday we looked AWESOME against Ole Miss! What a perfect day to go to a game with my sweet Dad! PERFECT weather, a big win, and a fun day with my date to the game.

I also ran into my new roommate at the game! Out of 100,000 seats, she sat right in front of me at the game!

UT unveiled this new statue of General Neyland. It is a beautiful statue to see in person and I loved hearing some great stories about Neyland.

Some fun facts about General Neyland:

• Neyland Stadium was not only named after The General, but he also helped design it.
• Neyland was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a coach in 1956
• He is famous for creating the seven Game Maxims of football that many coaches still use today
• He was not just famous for football, but was also a famous General as well
• My grandmother played cards with Mrs. Neyland often

I just love Tennessee. Go Vols!

Treydrienne

I adore weddings. I love the anticipation, the planning, and the love that leads unto the wedding day. This weekend I got to watch two of my friends get married. I am so so happy for them. It was a fun-filled weekend to celebrate Treydrienne!

Friday we had a great rehearsal and dinner at The Acorn. Yum!

Saturday we spent the whole day together getting ready and hanging out all together. I loved being with Adrienne and her sisters and all of her friends.

The ceremony was beautiful and so special. My favorite memory from the day was praying with Adrienne and all the bridesmaids and her mom right before we walked out. Such a special time that I know I wont forget.

The reception was so much fun! I danced all night and got to hang out with lots of my friends and sweet parents.

Congratulations Treydrienne!! So excited for y'all!

The End of an Era

I've been watching old Friends DVD's this week and one of the episodes is when Rachel moves out of Monica's apartment. They describe an Era as any significant amount of time. I find it ironic that is the only DVD that I have right now while I am moving, and have been watching it over and over.

I kinda feel like Rachel on Friends right now. I am actually fighting back tears as I write this post right now. I moved once again. No, this is not a joke. It's the end of an Era for me living with Adrienne. She gets married this weekend and I could not be more excited! But I am really going to miss being her roommate. I am going to miss watching all our favorite tv shows every night, and I am going to miss riding to church together on Sundays, and much much more.

We had a lot of fun last week. We both had a million things to do, but we had one last roommate date as I like to call it. Someone gave us tickets to the Predators game and we had the best time. We got dinner and went to the game and then watched one of our favorite tv shows. I am going to miss this. Here is us at the game. I think I said "We need to take a picture for the blog."

Now onto more moving, which I hate. You can read more about my thoughts on moving here and here.

Blue Barracudas

Monday night was Young Life All County Club. All the schools in Williamson County had Young Life Club together and it was so fun!

I had the great idea to dress up as a contestant from "Legends of the Hidden Temple." It was one of my favorite tv shows when I was in middle school. I was on the Blue Barracudas team!

Apparently no one else remembers this tv show which made my costume very lame. But all these freshmen girls (and other leaders) looked cute!

And of course, no YL blog post would be complete without a picture of my favorite roommate! She is looking cute as a Girl Scout!

Sharp Top Recap

Last weekend, Williamson County took over 400 kids to Sharp Top Cove, a Young Life Camp in Georgia. It was an amazing weekend, and I love being apart of this ministry. Sharp Top is a really special place for me because I went there many times when I was in high school. Our musical guest was Ryan Long, who also played at many YL camps that I went to as a high school student. It was really great for my heart to be at camp last weekend.

At first, I was a little disappointed with BA only taking 5 kids to camp. They always have a million things going on at school, so I was excited about the ones that got to come join us at camp. It gave me lots of special time with girls, and I am so thankful for that.

I was a bad photographer at Sharp Top and only took a few pictures. I did take about 100 pictures of my girls climbing up the pole of the ropes course. Not sure why I took a million of those, and none of us.

One of my friends asked me about my time at Sharp Top when I got back. I was trying to explain how sometimes at camp, we expect big things to happen. But for me, I saw God in the small things. This was her response " God works in the little ways, that turn into big ways. Sometimes we are looking for wow....bam... you know? I think sometimes we overlook his miracles when looking for His fireworks. " I just love that. I am so thankful that I get to walk with these sweet girls at BA and see God working in big and small ways.