Caroline

Today is my baby sister’s 22^nd Birthday.

To even type that feels strange……22??????????????

I remember the day she was born. Vividly.

Actually, I remember before she was born. And I prayed every night for God to send me a little sister.

About a year later, I got my wish.

Caroline Elizabeth Nanney was born.

Since she is the baby, she got lots of love from the 3 of us. I remember going to see her for the first time in the hospital and we all had to wear masks because the three of us (me, Clint, and Brian) had just gotten over a bad case of the Chicken Pox!!!

Caroline was a feisty little baby. She had a strawberry blonde curl on the top of her head—much like Cindy Loo Hoo.

As she grew, her little personality came out more and for her entire childhood, she was such a tom-boy!

She once made the front page of the paper holding a recycling bin and walking barefoot down the street.

She hated to wear dresses; she hated to have her hair brushed. She would have MUCH preferred to live outside if she could.

She loved horsing around with her brothers. Not so much with her girly sister;)

As she continued to grow, I watched her change from a child to a teenager who became obsessed with fashion! She went from a tom-boy to a model over night!

I remember when she grew taller than me. Not cool as the oldest;)

Caroline has always been exceptionally strong-willed. She knows what she wants and watch out, cause she’s gonna get it.

Caroline has always known how to behave—in public, in social situations…..she had the maturity of an adult early on.

As I’ve watched her grow and change over the past 22 years—now a mama to her own little one, a lot of her has changed, but a lot has stayed the same.

She’s still my baby sister but she’s also now a strong woman; A courageous and brave woman; compassionate, kind, and thoughtful.

I am so grateful to you, baby sister. You’ve taught me a lot about life. You’ve enhanced my life in ways you’ll never know. You bring so much joy to us all.

You are my heart.

Happy Birthday, baby girl! I pray that this year will be the best one yet! I look forward to another 22 years of being your big sister;)

I love you!

easter by pictures

if you can’t tell, our family has a blast; With each other; With life; and with friends.

I’m so grateful for my siblings and my nephew. I can’t imagine life without any one of them. I love that we’re growing up and yet that we are still the same 4 kids who love being silly and laughing together.

I love being a part of the Nanney Family. 

what easter means to me

Easter is such a special day to so many people and for so many different reasons. The number one reason (for professing Bible believing Christians) is that today is what gives meaning to life. If you follow and believe the Bible, today means that we get to keep living after we die—we will live eternally because Christ has arisen!

I don’t talk much about religion on my blog. I don’t feel very comfortable doing that. and sometimes i feel uncomfortable reading about on others blogs….just for me, I’ve been though so many different seasons of differing religions that I used to find it very offensive. But now I try to practice acceptance of you and your beliefs—whatever they may be. And in turn, I ask kindly that you do the same towards myself and others;)

And I’m certainly not going to get into any lengthy discussion on this forum about religion and all of that—but today, for many reasons, is very special for me.

One reason being that my Mother made this holiday the most important and celebrated holiday of the entire year—to her, it is the MOST IMPORTANT. and I knew from the time I was about 18 months old, that today was not about the Easter Bunny (although we DID do the Easter Bunny routine…..we still do it, infact) but it was about the fact that someone loved me enough to die for me—so that I may have eternal life.

I highlighted that last sentence because I believe strongly that it shaped and molded me to become the person that I am today.

Because I believed it.

I grew up with an internal belief that God is good.

And that I am loved. Not just by my parents but by the creator of the universe.

I grew up believing that because He died and loved me, that my life’s purpose was to love others.

I think this did several things for me as a child and as a growing adult---it gave me a firm sense of self. It gave me a positive and optimistic out look on life. It gave me a sense of purpose and passion. It gave me an unshakable self-esteem. It taught me to be compassionate and to open to Grace. It taught me how to love unconditionally.

The list could go on.

It’s taken me years to be able to write this and be public about an issue of this stature—but I am So thankful to my Mother and Father for instilling in me the belief that not only am I loved and wanted, but that I am loved unconditionally—and wanted more than I could ever imagine.

I think most people live their entire lives searching for those two things—somebody to love them and somebody to want them.

To say I am blessed is an understatement.

Another reason I love easter—almost as much as the first, is that I love candy. And every easter, I eat as much candy as I can possibly fit in my tummy. today was no exception;)

I also love that easter symbolizes life and death—being dead to our old selves and awakening to the new. For me, it’s about transformation—winter is over and spring has arrived. It’s a time of reflection…of purification….of taking a deeper look in. Deciding what’s important, making small changes to bring more peace and harmony into my life.

And always for me, easter is about humility—about unselfishness. And I know I have a long road to hoe, but it’s a road worth traveling on. Life IS difficult—no one said it would be easy (I think those are lyrics to many songs. Ha!) but easter reminds me that we can do it! It reminds me to love more, to be more compassionate; to think more of others and less of myself; to give more of myself to others; to live with honor and respect for myself and others.

I hope each and every one of you that reads this has had a blessed Easter.

I usually don’t do posts this long or wordy or personal, but I can’t get the pictures downloaded to post! Ha! Working on that now! My time in Meridian with my family was awesome and I captured some great pics! Will post them soon.

Until then,

Sweet Dreams!

Jennifer

Hackers and Sickness

Hello, Friends! It’s been a minute since I’ve blogged. It seems that life continues to get crazier and crazier the deeper into Spring we get.

Saturday, My Gmail account (and thus, my blogger account) were hacked! The hacker sent out messages to most of my contacts saying that I had been mugged in London and needed them to send money to help get me back to the States. YIKES! It took me 2 days to recover my account. Thus far, I have no explanation as to how I was hacked or why. So, word to the wise—change your password every few months!

Monday after school I came down with a very violent virus. I went from feeling decent to feeling like I wanted to die within 3 hours! My temp spiked to 103 and I had aches and chills like nobody’s business! I took some phenegran and when I awoke, I knew my fever had broke. Needless to say, I spent all of Tuesday on the couch sleeping. I literally slept ALL. DAY. LONG.

I woke up today feeling much better but still weak and exhausted.

Whew. Glad that is over with. I hate being sick. Especially when my mama isn’t here!

The next few weeks are going to be the busiest of my whole semester. 

With work, Relay for Life, a 4^th Physics test, AND a comprehensive Physics Final……I won’t have much time to do anything but the task at hand. I honestly can not wait for May 5^th to get here—I will be done with Physics, Relay will be over, and I’ll have almost a full month to enjoy myself before Grad school starts! Whoo-hoo!!!

I just wanted to drop in and say hello! I have not forgotten about my infamous blog! Nor my bloggers! My oh My do I have a lot of blogs to catch up on!

I hope everyone has a blessed Easter!

I’ll be traveling to Meridian late Saturday night after work to dye eggs with my family...A Nanney family tradition!

All my love!

Jen

Get busy living, or get busy dying

"Get Busy Living or Get Busy Dying"

Monday night, Scotta used the above quote from Shawshank Redemption for our yoga class.

It was funny because I had caught the tail end of Shawshank Redemption on the tele the other evening and stopped dead in my tracks when Morgan Freeman’s character said those words at the end of the movie…”Get Busy Living or Get Busy Dying”.

I find that I’m either doing one or the other.

I’m either busy aligning my life with the Divine

Or

I’m aligning my life to the Self—the Selfish part of the Self.

Either I’m busy setting goals and taking steps toward them

Or

I’m wallowing in self-pity, falling a little and little more into the abysmal darkness that is procrastination.

Either I am spreading the message of hope and and love

Or

I’m spreading negativity with sarcasm and belittlement.

I’m either running toward the light

Or

Away from the light.

I spent almost a decade staying busy destroying myself; Self-sabotaging myself; moving farther and farther away from my true self. I spent that decade staying very busy dying.

Today I am so grateful that there is a solution and that I’m living in it right this second.

I’m so glad that today I’m busying LIVING. Making my dreams come true, Taking the higher path, Opening more and more to Grace and less and less to Despair.

I find that I’m either moving forward or backward. There is no middle ground with me. Complacency is not middle ground, complacency is moving backward.

On this Tuesday, I can say with confidence that I am moving forward.

What about you?

Are you busy living

Or

Are you busy dying

?

Watch your thoughts; they become words. Watch your words; they become actions. Watch your actions; they become habits. Watch your habits; they become character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny.
Frank Outlaw  

Family Day

Yesterday I got my first official taste of grad school. UMC held “Family Day” for the OT class of 2014. I can not believe I just typed 2014. It feels alien-ish.

My mom and dad came over. And my brother Clint joined in as well! We got to meet our whole class. I think there are about 35 of us. and I think that I am the oldest. ha! We were introduced to the staff and team at UMC that will help us through these next 3 years. We also toured the campus seeing where I will be in class come May. The only thing I kept thinking was, “I can not believe I’ve made a 3 year commitment. WHAT AM I DOING???”. But then it was always followed with, “That’s right, Jennifer…this is what normal people do..they make commitments and keep them.”. Oh yeah. I almost forgot;)

For as studious and Type A as I am, there is a fairly LARGE part of me that is absolutely and totally carefree. That part of me wants to just travel the world, have no schedule, no plan…..not worry about bills, laundry, work, or what day it is.

But, I know I’ve made the right decision. And in 3 years when I am working and making my own money, I CAN travel the world…..and worry less about bills....but I’ll probably still have to do laundry;)

After we finished the family day, my dad came over and hung my pictures on the wall! It sort of made my new place “official” in my mind;) My dad is so awesome….and so is my mom. I hope one day I have a marriage as strong as theirs. And are as unselfish as they are. And that I love my kids as much as they love me and my siblings. I know I’ve said it before, but I know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I would not be where I am today without them and their support. My success is largely due to them. And there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t thank God for them and ask Him to bless them 10 fold.

Here are some pictures of our lovely Friday together;)

and then today, I worked from 10-7. I packed my own lunch (with about 7 points, I believe)

and I exchanged a dress for this cool shirt.

Man, I’m not going to miss working retail, but I am going to miss the clothes at Anthropologie. None compare.

Time for a little R&R before I hit the books in the morning for Physics.

Goodnight, bloggers.

Goodnight, moon.