o, christmas tree (and also a technique of the week)

i think i do a post like this every year. only this year, i'm not going to show you any other decorations than the tree. mainly because my computer is having trouble downloading pictures from my camera, so i have to download them onto luke's computer and then save them on a jump drive and then transfer them onto my computer. and that's just a hassle. so, since we already had the christmas pics on my computer, we'll stick to those. so, here is our cute little christmas tree.

we decided to get one that we could chop down ourselves while we were visiting the teaters in the mountains. luke wanted a tall one and i wanted a fat one. this was the one that we found.

unfortunately, it would not fit in our rental car. so luke and dad t. handily strapped it on top.

it kind of hung over the back of the car...

when we finally got it inside we realized that it was just a bit too tall.

but it was nothing that our saw couldn't handle!

we had to cut off a lot of the lower branches to get it to fit in the tree stand. so it's not so plump anymore...

getting ready to put the lights up, i realized that this would be a pretty awesome time to test out what changing the shutter speed can do...so, here is the technique of the week.

shutter speed. this would also be the "Tv" setting on a camera (my camera at least. and probably a lot of cameras). Tv stands for "Time value" and it controls how long the shutter stays open, and how much light gets in. in daylight or using a flash, in order to get perfect exposure, the setting will be incredibly fast--like 1/250--which means that the shutter is open for 1/250th of a second. when the setting is more dimly lit or darker, the shutter speed will be slower, like 1/2, which means the shutter stays open for a half a second (the "night" setting is on point-and-shoot cameras slows the shutter speed, fyi). this allows more light to get in, but it also means that if the subject you are photographing moves, or if your hand moves, the picture will turn out blurry (unless you have a tripod). the "Tv" mode of a dslr camera will manually set all the settings (iso, aperture, etc) except for shutter speed. it will then adjust the other settings as you adjust the shutter speed in order to achieve perfect exposure. so, here are the examples:

the first picture used the flash, so the shutter speed was faster at 1/60. you can see that the lights in luke's hand are still.

so then i turned off the flash, and set my shutter speed much slower--to 1/25. the result was kind of cool, but you could still see most of the lights going across the picture in kind of a jerky movement, i think this is because the shutter wasn't open long enough to get the lights going around in a full circle.

so then i slowed it to 1/4 and received almost the desired effect (plus luke moved around a little bit too much in the background, so the background appears blurry as well).

so, i finally slowed the speed down to 1/2 and this was the outcome:

then i slowed it down to stay open for a full second. the difference wasn't that huge:

so we went back to 1/2, and both held the lights on each end and swung them around the room, which i thought ended up pretty awesome:


but, we had a job to do. and luke was anxious to finish the task at hand. so he started putting my toy on the tree.

and he was ever so patient with me while i continued to snap pictures (i think i say this in a lot of my picture posts, but i mean it all the time: he is a good man).

All the lights are finished!

time for angela to grace us with her presence, yet again (only this year with new wings...hopefully these ones will actually stay on...). angela is the angel i made for our tree our first christmas, when we weren't even sure we would be able to afford a tree. i think, for me, she is a gentle reminder of humility, simplicity and contentedness. of how it was, how we aim to be, and what (at least the simplicity, but hopefully the humility and contentedness, too) we will return to in the upcoming years. if i have anything to say about it, angela will grace our tree every year that we have a tree.

luke sometimes (okay, well more than sometimes...) gets goofy with the camera. but i kind of liked this goofy picture:

and then we finished decorating the rest of the tree (i like this little pine cone angel):

all finished!

happy beginning of the christmas season, everyone! may you encounter the incarnate Jesus in His fullness, and recognize the grace and hope of the salvation He offers this Advent.

frost and hope

i originally walked down to the mountain-side garden on the chilly sunday morning in order to take this picture of my father-in-law's wheelbarrow:


but as i leaned in to take the picture i was completely taken in by the frost and the different designs it created on the grass and the leaves. so i used the opportunity to use the manual focus on my camera, as well as play around with the different color features. i wasn't planning on taking these, so i don't have any of the data written down (hence, no "technique of the week"), but i was so excited about how beautifully these pictures turned out (not to brag), that i wanted to share them. so here they are:

monochromatic vs. color

manual re-focusing

on another note, recently, i have been so glad that psalms such as psalm 13 exist. psalms that remind us that even david felt forgotten, and that though it is sometimes hard, God is still worthy of our praise.

we went to an advent prayer meeting tonight at an intentional community about a mile from our apartment. we talked about hope. i'm ready for hope.

turkey trot 10k!

this morning jenny, liz and i woke up early, donned our new turkey trot technical t-shirts and some leggings, and headed down to quantico (with our trusty driver/photographer/all around great guy, luke) to run the turkey trot 10k. we had a lot of fun! and while we didn't finish quite as fast as the winner (who runs a 10k in 31 minutes?! he was literally passing us on the end of his last mile while we were passing the 3 mile mark...), we made decent time and had fun while we were doing it. it's hard to imagine that this time last year i was so sick i couldn't eat rice and avacado, and i could hardly even run for 3 minutes straight...anyways, here are some pictures for you to enjoy:

walking to the race course!

feeling strong before we start.

but we were also a bit scared.

dancin' to the music.

sisters before a 10k!

and we're off!

lots of characters (including a whole chick-fil-a cow family) around to see us run!

halfway through mile 5! almost done!

luke got pictures of all three of us completely off the ground coming up to the finish line (click to make larger)...

me.

liz.

jenny.

all done!

sisters after a 10k!

we were making the 10k. because that's what we ran.

giggles.

we were acting like turkeys since we just trotted like them.

don't worry little turkeys. they say you won't be eaten on thursday because you are the "breeders".
the wonderful photographer. and my husband (of course).

hooray! and in case i don't "see" you again before then--happy thanksgiving!

living.

judge me not, ye naysayers of everything christmas pre-thanksgiving. tuesday i received some less than awesome news, and promptly walked home from dc central kitchen and strung up twinkle-lights haphazardly through our kitchen, turned off all the lights in our apartment, and did the dishes by christmas-light. i needed something happy.

this was a really hard week. and i've had a headache for most of it. today i was supposed to do my last run before the 10k on saturday morning, but instead i came home with a pounding headache and proceeded to drink hot chocolate with mini marshmallows--filling the cup with marshmallows as i drank the hot chocolate down, to the point where i'm pretty sure there were more marshmallows in the cup than hot chocolate. and i watched 30 rock. and ate wheat thins.

i will probably regret this decision on saturday morning.

last friday we were asked by the international director of servants if we would consider taking all of 2011 as a "preparation year" for going abroad, and postpone our moving until early 2012. honestly, this didn't really come as a shock to me. in fact, after orientation, i wasn't really sure that i would be ready to go "as soon as possible" like luke and i had originally wanted. but hearing somebody else ask me to do it frustrated me. i feel stuck and unsure and purposeless. and, honestly, pretty hopeless and useless. i don't really understand what God has going for me at this point, or why He wants me here. what is taking so long in getting this process moving, and why, in the mean time, i haven't been able to land a job here. i'm tired and weary and restless.

i am currently reading two books right now--the practice of the presence of God by brother lawrence, and the city of joy by dominique lapierre. tuesday morning i read from both of these books an idea that struck me right in the heart.

that what i do should be solely for God and not for anything else.

i know that this idea does not seem that revolutionary. but consider brother lawrence's words on the subject:

i engaged in a religious life only for the love of God, and i have endeavored to act only for Him; whatever becomes of me, whether i be lost or saved, i will always continue to act purely for the love of God. i shall have this good at least, that till death i shall have done all that is in me to love Him.

i realized as i read this, and as i read the prayer of a young priest in the slums of kolkata in the book city of joy which simply stated "Lord, i am here for You, not for me, not for others, but for You", that at present, i am not living only for the love of God. i am loving God for the religious life, for the benefits of not feeling frustrated, purposeless, etc. i want to go abroad in part for God, but in part for myself, and in part for others.

you see, our obedience to God (if we are Christians) should not be a means to an end. it should be an end in itself. and i don't treat it as such. i love God for what He can give me, rather than for what He has already given me. how many of us are christians so that we will go to heaven, rather than so we can obey God and help bring heaven to earth? how many of us follow God so that He will give us healing and grace, rather than loving God and allowing Him to heal and give grace through us? i know that i often strive to figure out what God wants from me--not because i love Him, but because i think that unless i figure out the perfect way to serve Him i will be unhappy and He will not bless me.

do i have the courage to love God simply (and yet, so complex...) because He is God? moreover, do i have the courage to endeavor to act only for Him?

so, yes, it was a hard week. and though i have come out of it feeling pretty beat up, i enter into this with praise, weak as it may be. for there is a Redeemer who loves me. and He is teaching me to serve Him for the sole reason that there is no response to perfect love other than love. and when we live out of love, there is no turning back.

interesting thought.

Our friend Craig posted this on facebook:

"Check this out: no electricity, lining up for cold food, scooping up toilet waste and disposing of it elsewhere, fear of danger from either fire or flood??? So in other words 3 days of life on a broken cruise ship was actually similar to daily life for the 1 billion people living in slums..."

Why does the "cruise ship nightmare" gathers news stories when those living in these conditions (only worse, and it is their life....) go unnoticed and ignored?

kingdom come

"are you ready for the kingdom of God to come?" he asked me, looking up at me with tired eyes and a big smile.

"oh, sir, you don't even know," i replied. for this week was one of those weeks. the kind of week where i cling to the promises of revelation--that Christ will make all things new, and that there will be a new heaven and a new earth. where nothing will be the same as it is right now.

even though the conversation with Leroy quickly went from a deep theological question to a monologue on why the kingdom of God will arrive in 2012, questions like these during hard weeks make me realize how much truth is spoken into my life in the least expected places...this question helped me to articulate my entire week. a week in which i encountered great brokenness--both mine and others--without much sign of redemption in the future. this week i long for the day when the poor and disabled will be exalted rather than discarded and marginalized, where the sick will be made new, where the mentally handicapped will talk with Jesus and where the drug addicts will experience true joy instead of fading highs. and on this day that is set aside to honor the courage of men an women like my grandfather--and rightly so, for they have great courage--we look to the day when peace will reign, and long for the peace to reign on earth right now.

when Jesus taught us to pray, He included in His prayer His longing for His Father's will to be done, and for His Father's Kingdom to come--on earth as it is in heaven. i have been thinking about this prayer often--what would it look like for His Kingdom to come now--on earth as it is in Heaven. is this a prayer for the future, or for the present? if we look at the other things mentioned in this prayer, they are things we want now--our daily bread, to be forgiven of our sins, to be delivered from evil--if the rest of the prayer is for the present, then doesn't it make sense that the beginning is as well? so what would it look like if all of us, as christians, prayed that God would use us to help bring His Kingdom to earth--prayed that in their lives His will would be done, as it is in heaven. do we have the courage to pray that prayer? and what would it look like in your life, home and community.

while we were at orientation, the song that we sang most often was called "may your kingdom come". i'm going to end with these lyrics that i have been praying all week--and i invite you to pray them with me. but be forewarned--this is not an easy prayer, and it may come with great cost. for when we pray for His Kingdom to come, we lose our own desires and are bound up in His. and life can never be the same.

for the hungry, we cry out for Your mercy
for the hurting, we cry out for Your mercy

come, Jesus, come

may Your Kingdom come on earth as it is in Heaven

come, Lord, come

for the warring, we cry out for Your mercy
for the dying, we cry out for Your mercy

come, Jesus, come