Note To Self...Worth the Wait

When I originally started writing this blog post, it was still winter and snow was eclipsing much of my surroundings. Today, it's supposed to be close to 80 degrees and I couldn't be happier!

As the snow fell gently that winter day onto the ground outside, I was listening to the great Alison Krauss. Listening to her makes me remember when I first started getting into bluegrass music and how I was fortunate enough to see her and Union Station perform at Detroit's Fox Theater in 2011 with my dad.

The craze started back in 2008 when a guy that I was dating at the time introduced me to the band Nickel Creek, who was founded by Alison Krauss. No...not Nickel Back (my mom gets the two bands confused all the time ;o)
I love this next sentence because, at the time, I had to write it in past tense!
The band consisted of three members, Chris Thile (lead vocals), Sara & brother Sean Watkins. Unfortunately the year before I discovered Nickel Creek, they had broken up and went their separate ways creatively. 

Chris Thile formed his own band, Punch Brothers, and Sara & brother Sean Watkins launched their own group under Sara's name. Fortunately in 2009 while living in Washington, D.C. I was able to see Sara and Sean perform at the 930 Club.

Both Sara Watkins and Alison Krauss concerts were unlike any concert I had ever been to. There is a totally different atmosphere and respect for this genre of music. Before that, I had been to many country music concerts where the norm is to stand, dance and "yee-haw" my way through the concerts. This was not the case for these types of concerts...here it was required that you sit and listen quietly to the song and held your applause until the very last note faded away and became a memory...

I willingly followed these rules of the house and grasped to eat song knowing this would be as close as I'd ever get to actually hearing remnants of Nickel Creek. That was my thought of course, until early March of this year, that is.

Finding out that my all time favorite band had reunited after seven years of being on their own, thrilled me to no end!!! What was even more exciting was that they were putting out a new album on April 1st (which, btw is epic), just in time for my birthday month! Oh the joy!
Thinking that was all that would be of Nickel Creek reuniting, I was content. Then one day as I was reading Nickel Creek twitter updates (because Twitter is Awesome), I found out that they were going on tour for their new album and that they were coming to my city!!!

I'm reading a book by Max Lucado right now, and today he wrote about how when God blesses His children, He blesses them abundantly. He makes "their cup overflow" with blessings. I sure felt that way when all of this happened. July cannot come soon enough...but if history proves itself true, some things are worth the wait. Check out some of their music below and let me know what you think!

-A

Love of Mine

Hayloft

Note to Self...Say "Yes" to God

There is the popular TV show, "Say Yes to the Dress!" on TLC and when I get the rare chance to watch it (no, I don't have cable) I get sucked in for an hour or two without even realizing the time has flown by. On the show you see all types of brides and all types of friends and family of the bride all giving their opinion ("helping") on what wedding gown the bride should pick. On more than a few episodes, I've seen the bride pick a gown that she doesn't actually love only to please her entourage and she ends up saying yes to something she may regret later on. I've also seen many episodes when the dress fits just right and the bride says yes without any hesitation or pending regret. I have had occasions in my life where I've had to decide if I was saying yes to a situation to please myself, others or saying yes to God when He prompted me to do something. Here are a few examples...

If you know me, I am not a morning person. One particular morning a few weeks ago, I had a prompting to get myself and a friend a coffee from the well known franchise with the green and white mermaid on their cups before I headed into work. I had that feeling that my friend would need the coffee more than I did (don't worry, I still planned on getting myself one, too) and that it would help her get through the day. But in order to do this I would of had to get up earlier than normal and well, truth be told, I chose to hit the snooze button one more time rather than go and get the coffee...

About six months ago, I decided that if I was going to stay here on this side of the state, then I needed to start giving back to the community. I felt the prompting to start volunteering somewhere and so I signed up to a volunteer website that matches people with local organizations that need volunteers. That's when I was connected with Grace Hospice. I read over their mission statement and decided that I would inquire within the local hospice and see what it was that they needed done. I connected with the volunteer coordinator and after extensive training, background, drug and TB testings, I will soon start giving back to my community in a unique way - all because I said yes to that prompting. 

As you can see it's be about a month since I've written anything for my blog. It's not that the ideas haven't been flowing, they have! It's just that I lost the ambition and courage to actually hit the submit ("yes") key. It was ironic because I would read other blogs and see some of my ideas that I had in draft mode published and making a great impact in the blog community. 

These are just a few of the examples of when I have said yes and when I have said no. The day I said no to getting a coffee for my friend stands out in my mind because when I got to work that day, she told me this story...
She had taken the time to stop at the cafe and ran into one of our other co workers. When my friend got to the counter to pay for her coffee she was delighted to find out that the co worker that she ran into had already paid for her coffee! As I sat there and listened to her tell me that story it hit me...that's the thing with God and His promptings - He gives us the opportunity to be used by Him to show His love to others by these types of acts. We have the choice to say yes or no. If we say no, then He will use someone else to fulfill His will. I said no that day, but I am glad someone else said yes. :)

What are you feeling lead to do? Will you say "yes" to God? I'd love to hear from you in the comments below!

-A