April 26, 2010

Dinero

Why does money have to be so important? I mean, it really shouldn't be, but the less you have of it, the more you place importance on it. And not necessarily place importance on the money you have, but on the money you save, or don't spend.



Recently, I have been going to quite a bit of effort to save as much as possible on groceries and household items. I got a super cute coupon organizer off ebay (shown above), and I have bookmarked several websites that tell me how I can save a lot of money! It's really awesome how much I can save, but it's a lot of work. Whew! I've also been trying out the different area grocery stores, to see which is cheaper. I was originally shopping at Food Lion, but their produce and meat sections are less than desirable. Harris Teeter is quite nice, but too expensive. Today, I tried out Walmart, and Aldi is next, but Walmart is the current winner.

We really go to great lengths to save money. Chris tries to only get his comic books off of ebay, and I get 99% of my clothes from Carolina Thrift - and only on half-off Mondays. :) We really can't complain, though. We have extremely low rent, no car payments, and friends with extra meals at school. Given that big changes don't occur, and that we can keep fairly steady jobs, our goal is to get all of our college loans paid off by the time I graduate from grad school (3 years from now). That is a very ambitious goal, but we are very anti-debt.

God is very gracious, and I would not even be close to being justified if I said we were struggling, because we are not. God, through many generous people, has blessed us with an abundance.

April 19, 2010

Ordinary Beauty



This weekend I went on our church's women's retreat to Ocean Isle, NC. It was a beautiful weekend, spent with beautiful women. We learned to see God's plan and purpose for our lives in the everyday, ordinary things. As we're washing dishes, cooking, folding clothes, writing papers, taking tests (all of which I do plenty of), we shouldn't be thinking "God, I will do something great for you, if you'll just give me something great to do." We so often take the world's definitions of "success" and "accomplishment" instead of God's perspective. Often times it is those small, everyday things that equal greatness in God's eyes.




This is quite mind-boggling to me, since I have pretty much been an over-achiever my whole life. This is not something that I am proud of, because it often means that I put my achievements over and above Christ. To even think that my calling in life might be something that I find very plain and ordinary shakes me up a little bit. Especially as a college student, I'm surrounded by "be all that you can be" and "aim for success" (which, translated, means make lots of money).

So there is pride and greatness in washing dishes? Maybe not in the task itself, but in the attitude in which I do it, and the way in which I serve my husband. I want to grow as a woman of love- as someone who wants to fulfill her grand purpose in life, even when she doesn't think it's so grand. Whew. That's going to take a little getting-used-to. :)

As far as the retreat goes, we had an amazing time! A group of us got inducted into the crazy animal club for running into and swimming in the freezing ocean!



When you're a part of the crazy animal club, you get animal crackers!

April 15, 2010

Ministry

I came to the realization the other day, that quite a bit of my time is spent doing ministry-type stuff. I mean, not that it's bad, but it's just rather interesting. For the first time, I really feel like my life is more focused on Christ - not because I'm really good at focusing my life, but because the amount of time spent with other strong Christians and doing ministry stuff is kinda forcing me to have God at the forefront of my mind more often. It's a good feeling!

Thursdays are usually my most Jesus-work day. I have 3 different discipleship hours, and Bible Study in the evening. I get discipled by April, on staff with Campus Crusade, and I get to disciple two amazing ladies, Leeann and Heather. I really super enjoy hanging out with them and talking to them every Thursday. We hang out more than just Thursdays, but these discipleships are especially wonderful! Here is a picture of them:



Aren't they gorgeous? Even as I am challenging them and trying to help them grow as Christian women ("try" is the key word here), they are challenging me and helping me to grow as well. They truly are a blessing!

Although it is sometimes frustrating and tiresome, I truly enjoy working with Campus Crusade for Christ, and helping out at church. I really don't know what I would do without the call to further the Gospel. There truly is nothing better than knowing Christ and attempting to fathom the indescribable power of His Grace.

Now that I think of it, I will most likely be doing ministry work for the rest of my life. I might as well make it my career. If I'm not able to proclaim Christ and offer hope to those in need, then what am I doing? Thankfully, God created a passion in me for nonprofit work, and called me to major in Nonprofit Leadership & Management. With my husband Chris majoring in Religion and minoring in Psychology and Philosophy, I think we can work out some sort of ministry between the two of us. :) It never ceases to amaze me how we complement each other and balance each other out.

We're willing to go where God wants to take us, so don't be surpised if we suddenly end up doing something crazy, like moving to Ghana or something. The Jesus life is usually the crazy life, so watch out! Here I come! :)

April 13, 2010

Time? What time?

So when we first got married, we seemed to have so much more free time. I mean, our schedules really weren't that different, and I'm not sure how we did it, but we would spend hours together- watching movies, taking naps, having date-nights, etc. Suddenly, the loads of together-time has disappeared! If anyone happens to find it, let me know.

This is what today looked like: Good morning, baby. Hop in the shower, and I'll fix breakfast. Here's an egg-and-cheese bagel for the road, off to prayer meeting. Ok, you go work on your paper I'm going for a run, and then to run errands, and then to continue basically running for the rest of the day. Hey, here's lunch, I'm off to discipleship. Hope your class went well- I'll start dinner in a few minutes, as soon as I'm done with these emails. Oh, you suddenly have an intramural game at 6:30? Well, here's dinner to-go and I'll see you at Campus Crusade tonight. Will I make it to bed before 12 tonight? Probably not.

We still make time to be together, and we still have weekly date nights, although some dates it might be pushing it to call it a date. Well, I guess it's a date if you're in school, working, and trying to scrape in $700 a month. I really can't complain- God has truly blessed us in so many ways.

I am slowly learning to schedule my life around meal planning and preparation. My selfishness is always a battle, since I never seem to want to do the dishes, or anything else for that matter. But God (and Chris) are very patient with me, and I'm getting better. Promise!

April 2, 2010

New Beginnings

So, I've decided that a good way to keep people up to date on what is going on with the new Meriwether couple is to create a blog. It's also a nice way for me to reflect on things and maintain a good perspective.


Unfortunately, at the moment, I need to get some work done - this is probably a new form of procrastination - so I can't type much. Sometime this weekend I will post something good.


For now, here is a picture from Chris and my wedding: