Typical

Hello Blogging Friends...

Today has been a pretty typical Monday. I started off the morning by hitting the snooze button several times. Jumped out of bed at 7:50 and raced to the CRISIS Center. Hung up two garbage bags full of clothes. Went back home and got dressed in my "work attire." Came to work and read the Waco Tribune Herald looking for mention of any of our churches. Went and got my fingerprints taken (see previous blog). Mailed out some postcards about an upcoming pastors conference. And now I'm talking to you. I kind of like days like today - no worries, no anxiety, no excitement...just kinda cruising along.

After work Aaron and I are heading to the pool - Working full time has turned me kind of pasty. I used to be a sun slave...seriously. Life guarding for 7+ years makes you crave sunlight and chlorine. I used to spend my summers rocking a one piece and reeking of sweat and chlorine. And I loved every minute of it - weird I know.

An interesting thing I learned this weekend...
I used to be a little bit embarrassed by how Aaron and I met. I mean, I still kind of cringe when I think about how "shady" we used to be, but as of this weekend I don't feel quite as bad.

See Aaron and I met my freshman year while I had another boyfriend. I don't want to go into the whole story here, but lets just say that its not exactly the story I want to tell the sweet old lady in church when she asks how we met.

This weekend I talked to TWO ministers who both met their wives in shady ways. One of them met his wife at a frat party. See, another girl was hitting on him and he wanted to get away, so he went up to his "future wife" and started hitting on her instead. The other minister I talked to met his wife over tequila shots at 2:00 in the morning. They were friends that had crushes on each other and so they would hang out all night and talk over tequila.

Now don't get me wrong...I'm not justifying the way Aaron and I met. Its just nice to know that we are not alone in our shady stories. Good thing God changes people!

Rachael "the shadester" Johnson

FREEEEZE Tag??!!!

So..there is this game going on all over the blogging world. Its sort of like tag and you are supposed to get tagged by someone before you can play..but you know me, I like to be included, so this time I just "tagged" myself.

Hey - I like games, what can I say....

Here are the Rules:
1. Post the rules.
2.List 8 random facts or habits about yourself
3.If you are tagged, you must post the rules and 8 random facts or habits about yourself
4.After you post, tag someone, and let them know they must read your blog for the rules

Random things about me:

1. I love to sleep. Now some of you may think that you like to sleep, but none of you enjoy it as much as I do. I literally JUMP into bed every night with a huge grin on my face and the earlier I get in there the better.

2. I love it when Aaron calls me Little Frizzer, Rach.E. J., RJ, and Beauty Queen. I never had much of a nickname growing up, so I think its great when people make them up for me now.

3. I'm a huge taste tester...Not for free samples or anything. Instead I taste test things that grow out in the wild (berries, mushrooms, leaves, grass) I'm probably going to die from this silly little habit someday, but I mean can a teenie tiny bite really kill you.

4. I'm an akward hug giver. I'm one of those people that likes to give and receive hugs but only if I know you. Its really hard for me to tell whether I should handshake or hug...especially with women because handshakes are sort of akward with women.

5. I am obsessed with my family - I like to hangout with them more than I like hanging out with anybody in the whole world (my family includes Aarons family too)

6. Reading is a passion of mine. My favorite book is Gone With the Wind and I've probably read it about seven times. I'm currently reading the final Harry Potter. I don't feel like spending $30 on the book, so I usually just head over to Barnes and Noble a couple times a week and read it there.

7. I tried to grow a garden - most of the flowers died, but a lone squash plant survived

8. I clap at random times...usually when I get really excited which is all the time. Sometimes I even hop up and down while I'm clapping...yeah I'm really cool

Okay so there are the random facts about me - Tag you are all it!

RJ

Feds on Wed.

Today Aaron and I were supposed to get finger printed by the FBI. They ended up cancelling the appointment, so that means I've got a few more days to try and hide all the shady stuff in my past. Just Kidding - but you never know what they could dig up. I mean Rob and Sara Whittle might really big Rico and Sulena Galvez - Colombian Drug Lords. Actually my dad could never pass for a Colombian anything, but my mom could....see who knows? So, anyways yeah, Aaron and I are going to have an investigation done on our personal history to see if we are fit foster parents. Yikes!!!!

In other news - One of my best friends is getting MARRIED!!!!! Okay, so she actually isn't even engaged, but they did have THE TALK last night. Which means, that they are on the road to marriage. Wow! Besides all my normal prayers, I'm going to start praying for lots of money so that I can go to their fabulous destination wedding. They haven't said that they wanted a destination wedding, but just in case - I better be ready. As of right now, all I can afford is Galveston and I'm not sure if that really counts as a "destination"...its more a litter filled beach that I might be the only one brave enough to get in the water.

That's all I got for today

Peace to my homies....
RJ

Oh yeah - Aaron took his Greek final today (Yes - Greek is for Geeks and Aaron)

A Town Baby

Aaron and I just got back from a great weekend in Amarillo... I'm not sure that Texas gets any better than Amarillo. Haylie and Chris (my sister in law and now NEW brother in law) got married this weekend at First Baptist Amarillo. It was a weekend full of family, food, bowling, dancing, swimming, and lots of other fun. Oh and a lot of dresses!!!!

FBC Amarillo might be the prettiest baptist church in the history of baptist churches. It was designed by an Austrian prince and is absolutely stunning. Haylie looked absolutely gorgeous, so between her and the church...I don't think there has ever been a prettier wedding or a prettier bride. Aaron officiated the ceremony and I am VERY proud of him. He is such a natural - God really has blessed him with the gift of preaching. It was so cool for him to stand up in a pastoral role in front of his whole hometown!!!

We spent a ton of time with Aaron's family...we don't really get to see them other than holidays and weddings, so it was fun spending an entire weekend with them. I have a new "favorite" family member - Her name is Olya and she is the girlfriend of one of Aaron's cousins. She is from Belarus, but lives in Canada and she is awesome. We had a great time out on the dance floor...When we went to Grahams (classy I know), she even danced in one of the cages - Don't worry, I did not join her for that one.....yikes! This was her first time in America and her first wedding to go to and I'm pretty sure that she loved every minute of it.

Haylie and Chris are now living it up in St. Martin and let tell you that I'm pretty jealous....I hate the real world. I sort of wish that my life was made up of honeymoons and Christmas vacations....

RJ

Weekend Recap

Hello everyone...

Austin was awesome... a big group of us went to dinner at a taco place in Westlake. It was really cool having Aaron's friends and my friends in the same place. (I think the only other time that has happened with such a large group was at our wedding). After dinner, my friends headed off to other adventures and Aaron and I hit 6th Street with some of his friends. I LOVE 6th Street. Not for the bars or anything like that - but just for the people watching. We ended up at a chill bar on the very end of 6th. We all sat around a table (made of a HUGE tree stump) and talked until about 2:00 AM.

It was pretty cool for Don Vanderslice to come and hangout. Back in the day, he was the youth minister at FBC Amarillo. Now he pastors a church called Mosaic. Oh and if you ever want to go to Mosaic, be aware that they don't have Sunday morning services. Random, I know - but I was sorely disappointed that I didn't get to his church.

Aaron and I spent all day Saturday at foster parent training. The Bair Foundation is awesome. If you ever consider becoming a foster parent, you need to check them out. We learned some pretty terrible statistics...like 1 in every 4 girls in the USA has been sexually abused. Aaron and I underwent a harsh reality check when we realized that our future foster child will most likely have suffered some kinds of sexual abuse. I mean, we realized that sexual abuse could be a possibility...but for it to be the norm (yikes!).

Sunday Aaron baptized two of our youth...Ramiro and Shelly. It was incredible!!!!

Today Aaron and I are trying to figure out how to get a fire extinguisher installed in our house...yeah we love becoming foster parents.

Roadtrip

Okay so let me be really honest.... I hate blogging. I'm not really that great at sharing my feelings online. I mean lets face it, I'm not really a sappy sentimental person. Oh well. But I really do like lettting everyone know what's going on. So with that being said, I'm going to start doing a better job at this whole blog thing (no matter how nerdy Aaron thinks it is).

So a lot has happened since the YEC, but who wants to read about me droning on and on about the past. Instead, I'll focus on the here and now. Aaron and I are headed down to Austin tonight to catch up with a ton of old friends. Jaime B and Amelia D are two of my high school best friends that now live in Austin. I'm so pumped to see them and I get to hang out wit Gerald (amelia's boyfriend). Hopefully he likes me and Aaron because we are a MAJOR part of Meals life. We are also going to hang out with two of Aaron's high school friends..Jonathan and Andrew. All in all it should be a great weekend.

Not too much else is going on in our lives - I mean we stay insanely busy, but I guess that's the way we like it. Next weekend we are headed to AMARILLO for Haylie's wedding. Amarillo just happens to be one of my favorite places in the whole world. I know its dry, dusty, and smells like cow poop, but its really cool to hang out where Aaron grew up.

Oh by the way...Aaron and I are in the process of filling out applications to become foster parents. I know that most of you are thinking, "what the heck - that is so random!" But it really is something that we have been praying about for a long time. We are really excited / slightly overwhelmed with paperwork.

Well that's all for now - pace (peace)

YEC Weekend

This past weekend was a whirlwind of activity after activity....Aaron and I took 20 kids to the Youth Evangelism Conference in Dallas. None of the kids had ever been to anything like it before....Shane and Shane led worship and my old preacher, JR Vassar was one of the speakers. I also ran into an old friend that went with me to China! The YEC was awesome, but we didn't stop there. We all went to see Evan Almighty (two thumbs up), went out on the boat and did a LOT of tubing, swam, played tons of ping pong, and went to Hurricane Harbor! On Sunday we took the group to Lake Pointe for church...

Sunday afternoon (while the gang was at HH) I was a hostess for my great friend Katharine's baby shower. She is having a little girl and they are going to call her Hannah. The shower was wonderful and I was able to see three of my very best friends all at once!

Needless to say..I am still more than a little tired. But, it was all worth it in the end. Our youth group became really close and a few of the girls really opened their hearts to me. Aaron and I have been praying that God would really start doing great things in our group and that he would use us to do it. I can already see changes taking place!!!

Tomorrow Aaron, Dalton, and I are heading to Fort Worth to visit Aaron's sister Haylie and her fiance Chris. We are all going to go to a Ranger's game and then check out their new house. Hooray for the 4th of July!