Just me and Arty B runnning the race...

I have been fumbling through quiet times with God recently. I know God has been with me through these fumblings (which yes, I realize is not technically a word) because of the manna that he has provided through each day. But some days I still have felt my heart hardening to God and what he wants me to hear. I read in one of my books that after a loss or traumatic event in your life this is normal for you to harden your heart and turn from God. It is normal because it seems like he has turned from you and has abandoned you, but that is not the case. He is constant, and faithful, and has never failed me, so why at this point in heartache and hurt am I so apt to turn from him? How can I not consider all he has done for me and continue to be faithful to him? I look to people in the Bible that were challenged in their faith by the circumstances surrounding them. The list includes the greats like Noah, Moses, Abraham, and Joshua. These men were commended for their faithfulness to the path marked before them by God. Can you imagine being a part of a list like that?  In Hebrews 11, most of the verses begin with, "By faith..." and then gives a person's name and how they lived out their faith for God whether it was by almost sacrificing their son, or being ridiculed for building an ark, or by leaving the family they thought was theirs and being degraded like the family they actually were a part of. Can you imagine reading this and then all of a sudden it saying, "By faith Mandi..."

I know I have read through Hebrews before but this chapter stuck out to me this morning. What if this was being written about us? What would be next to your name? By faith Mandi kept pursuing Christ everyday no matter what hurt abounds her, or by faith Mandi loved those around her with the love and joy of Christ.  I would hope it would not read "Mandi quit, or Mandi lost faith, or Mandi hardened her heart" because this was not God's plan for me. He doesn't want me to lose faith because of my surroundings or the heartache I am going through. He wants me "..to run with perseverance the race marked before me, fixing my eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith" (Heb. 12:1)

I like that it reads "by faith", because it is very clear  just by reading through these peoples' stories that it is does not say "by his own strength Noah built an ark", or "by his own accord Abraham took his son Issac to sacrifice him". No it clearly says "by faith", because these people would not have done these things because they wanted to, but because of their faithfulness to God's plan. And that is how I am hoping to take these fumblings, by faith and by his mercy everyday. That by his mercy, joy and love everyday I can run the race marked before me. That I can look to my present circumstances and be content because I am running after a God who has great plans. As I went on my walk this morning, I happened to cross paths with Art Briles, if you don't know who this is, I am sorry we may not be able to be friends. He is Baylor's head football coach, so basically if you know me, you know this was a big deal. I love Art Briles and Baylor football. I was raised a Baylor fan and even through all the years of losing, I still had faith in my bears. (Thanks mainly to my granddaddy whose faith never wavered.) When Art Briles took the Baylor coaching job things were grim. Even his oldest daughter told him not to take the job because it was going to be rough. I will give you just a taste of the stats, the last time Baylor had had a winning season was 1995 and now we are a force to be reckoned with.  He is a present day example to me of living by faith. He faithfully and diligently worked towards something that at the time seemed dark and grim and transformed it into something amazing.

I know this may be a stretch for some, because people like Noah, Moses and Abraham are the beginning of our heritage, and their circumstances were way bigger than ours, but we are also a part of this lineage. We have been pushed in our faith just like those before us, and have to find faith in those circumstances. So how does your sentence end? By faith...

"Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. This is what the ancients were commended for." Hebrews 11:1

Manna

There are a lot of ways I could write this post, and I am not sure what the best way is but I am going to write from today. Because that is what I am learning in all of this, that grief is a day by day process and that God gives you what you need for that day. As some of you may or may not know, Ryan and I suffered the greatest loss you can as parents. On April 16, after some complications we lost our twins, Doak and Bexar. There is no easy way to type that, because that was not what I expected my first blog post about them to contain. I could get into the details of that day, but that is a day that will never make sense to me and I have already relived too many times in my head. So yes this post is about grief and heartache but it also is about faith, hope and the renewed strength we receive every day from God.We have been poured over with thoughts, prayers, packages, and we can not thank all of our family and friends enough for this support. In all of this we received a book called "Hope" by Nancy Guthrie. In just the first two pages, I was already comforted with a simple word, manna.  I have heard about manna a hundred times in vacation bible schools, in sermons and working in a church but the way Nancy talks about manna is exactly what I needed to hear. To quote her, "...just as the children of Israel were dependent on God to provide manna to sustain them every day while they wandered in the wilderness, I had to depend on God to give me the manna I needed every day to sustain me as I grieved my loss...And the thing about the manna God provided to the Israelites was that they couldn't store it up." And this is true for me, every day I need something new to get me up and get me going. It is all straight from Christ, whether it be his voice, a text from a friend, a letter from family, or a sweet smile from Ryan, it is my manna. I am going to be honest with you, there are days when I wake up and don't feel like being okay, talking to God or even smiling, but God puts something in my way to remind me that he is with me and there is hope. He gives me manna fresh and new every day, just like his grace and mercy. He says in Lamentations 3, "I will never forget this awful time, as I grieve over my loss^. Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this: The faithful love of the Lord never ends! His mercies never cease. Great is his faithfulness; his mercies begin afresh each morning." I am strengthened day to day by Christ and his faithfulness. I am comforted knowing that he is in the trenches of this heartache with us, he says in Isaiah 41,"So do not fear, for I am with you, do not be dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you and help you; I will uphold you with my righteous right hand." So all there is, is to have faith, hope and know that God's plan in all this may seem fuzzy.  It may hurt like the dickens some days, and there will be things that take us right back to April 16th, but there is manna. There is hope and that is what I cling to today. 

 Ryan and I can not thank our family and friends enough for the way that you have surrounded us over these past weeks and continue to do as we walk through this together. I thank you for every text, phone call, letter, email, package, card, and visit. You have been our manna from God, and we thank you.

March Madness

It's a funny thing about New Years resolutions, you get all excited about them and then two and half months go by and you remember you actually made a New Years resolution. I have obviously already failed at one of my New Years resolutions, so let's not even get into my other ones. Not to make excuses but we have not had a lot going on here, just a lot of snow, school and work! So I am back in blogging action to update you on what is going on up here.

For President's day weekend I got to head back to Texas for Meredith's baby shower. It was so much fun! I got to spend a few days in Beaumont with Meredith and Cade before we headed to Boerne for the shower. I spent most of my days playing fetch with Dexter and it was wonderful! I can not wait to throw the ball all day this summer. The shower was so wonderful, and it was fun to see all of the little baby stuff. Meredith is the cutest little pregnant lady! This is such an exciting time for our family, this is the first baby of the granddaughters! I don't know if Channing will be able to handle all of the  smocked dresses, monogrammed clothes, love, hugs, and kisses that are headed her way!

I also got to go by Oak Hills to see some of my favorite people, it had been way too long! I loved being home, not only did I get to see family, friends, and Sallie, I got to eat Mexican food, and even a hamburger from Alamo Springs. Is it sad that my life revolves around my meals? Oh well!

For Christmas, Veronica gave us tickets to go watch Baylor play West Virginia in Morgantown. The drive to Morgantown was only three hours and was beautiful! Morgantown was a very interesting place, but it was fun to see West Virginia's campus. We parked right next to the arena, and one of the trees on the walk had a sweater on, it was covered in yarn. It was so cool!

The game was really fun, and all of the fans were super nice! When we were walking around the arena a lot of the fans asked if we drove all the way from Texas, and we told them no we are not that good of fans. Thanks Veronica for the tickets it was so fun to watch the bears win all the way up here!

As I said before, we have had a lot of snow and a crazy winter! The last snow was so bad that my center closed for the day, and Ryan did not have school so we got to stay in and watch movies! We even ventured out in the cold for a minute so I could build a snowman, it was a lot harder task than people make it look. I think there are special gloves to make a snowman because I could not make it work, so instead we found snow balls that were made by the snow plow. We stacked them to build our special baby snowman on a bench!

He is small and looked a little evil, but we loved him all the same. The snow is fun for just a minute and then you throw snowballs and you get wet and it is not fun anymore.

Last weekend was absolutely beautiful, it was in the mid -sixties, so we went on an adventure. We walked over to Teddy Roosevelt National Park and wandered around there for most of the afternoon. It was so nice to be outside in the sunshine and not have to be bundled up!  Then we got ready for our little spring breakers to come! Klare and Colton headed here Monday night to spend their spring break with us. It was so much fun to have them here and get to show them DC. We did a lot of walking around to all the monuments, the White House, the zoo, Georgetown, and all of the museums. We spent our evenings watching Chopped, playing games, and just being goofy. We love when people come to visit. I get to use all my Nancy skills- getting the house ready, making sure everyone is well fed, entertained and cared for while they are in our home, and I love that! And Ryan gets to point out things and tell their history, and share all of the cool things he has learned while being in his program. I think he also liked having a guy here to watch and talk sports with, which was also a relief for me ;).

 Klare trying to "hold up" the Washington monument

 Colty trying to catch a squirrel

 Our National Treasure picture for Nancy

 

The weather was beautiful again today, but the forecast says 4-6 inches of snow again tomorrow... pray that this won't happen. I don't know if I can handle the cold much longer, even though it gives me a great reason to sing "Do You Want To Build a Snowman?" from Frozen. Don't you worry Ryan sings with me, which is just one of the many reasons I love him more every day. I don't know if I love him more for that, that he makes up his own lyrics to the tune of it, or that this morning we sat around and read cookbooks together? His is Smoke and Pickles, it is all about southern comfort food with a Korean twist, and mine is Pioneer Woman's new holiday cookbook. It may seem silly, but it just made me love him more. I can not believe that we have been married for ten months! Time is just flying by and before I know it Ryan will be in Atlanta for his internship and I will be in Beaumont with sweet baby Channing, Meredith, Cade, Dexter and Tootsa.  But for now we will sip our Arnold Palmers, watch the bears win the Big XII tournament and pray the snow does not come!

Cheers!

New Year, Better Blogger

So as 2014 begins I have decided that one my many resolutions should be to be a better blogger. I hope that this resolution will actually last compared to some of my other ones, but we shall see! So here it goes, kicking off 2014 with a fun blog post, and hopefully better eating habits. December was a very fun month for us, I don't even know where to start! Ryan finished his first semester of grad school, and he did so well. He got all A's, made some very fun friends, and got the internship of his dreams at the College Football Hall of Fame this summer. We got to see Handel's Messiah performed at the National Cathedral on a snowy evening. It was picturesque. The cathedral was beautifully decorated and it was the perfect start to the Christmas season.

We celebrated Ryan's 24th birthday and his finals being over at our favorite restaurant, Founding Farmers. Celebrating all of these things for the first time as a married couple are very fun. It is exciting to think that Ryan and I will get to celebrate many more birthdays, Christmases, Thanksgivings and more together. We also had a very exciting visit from Sarah! It was so fun having her here, and getting to show her our little life here. Ryan took her everywhere! They visited all the Smithsonian museums, monuments, and then I got to go with them on many other adventures. We visited the Capitol, the White House, the Kennedy Center to see Elf, the Holocaust museum, Arlington Cemetery,  and the Zoo Lights at the National Zoo.

On the day she left we made a quick run over to one of favorite places in DC so far, Georgetown. We obviously got Georgetown cupcakes, and went over to see the beautiful campus. Sarah's visit was full of lots of laughing, lots of food, lots of stumbling, and touristy times! It was great!

Only a few days after Sarah left, we headed back to Texas! We got to San Antonio around 9, and got a fancy Christmas Eve dinner at Sonic. It was the only place open in all of Boerne, but Ryan and I were very excited about it.  There is not one close to us, so this was a Christmas present in and of itself. We went to Christmas Eve service at First United Methodist and then went to the Sprayberry's house to wrap our presents and sleep. Ellie was so excited to see us, and snuggled right in between us that night. Christmas day was so busy, but so much fun! We spent Christmas morning and Christmas lunch with the Sprayberrys, and then headed to the creek house for Person/ Moran family "Christmas Eve". We spent the night at my parents house and woke up to do "Christmas morning" with everybody and then had Christmas dinner there. The rest of our time in Boerne was so fun just getting to hang out with family, and friends.

It was a perfect end to our year. I can not wait to see what 2014 has in store for us. We have a lot to be excited for! We have a niece on the way in April and can't wait until she is here, Ryan's internship, and so much more! Hopefully I have caught yall up and that it won't be long before I write again! Love yall and until next time...

Cheers!

Flying Machines and NFL Teams

Hola amigos, hope this edition of Sweat Tea with the Sprayberrys finds everyone in good health and good company.  Since our last post we have done many things and seen many faces.  These experiences included Red Bull Flugtag (German for ‘Fly Day’), a Redskins game and general good times.

First, Flugtag.  Flugtag is one of those things you see on TV, laugh at and secretly hope for the chance to one day participate.  Well as any good competitor knows, the first step to participation is scouting.  You need a feel for what gameday looks and feels like.  We now officially have that experience.  After a trip on the metro to National Harbor, we found some seats on the grassy knoll overlooking the Potomac.  In front of us was an ‘official’ Flugtag Flight Deck, raised 30 feet above the water (also lots of emergency boats, always a good sign).  The event was attended by about 10,000 people and without much in the way of designated walkways, there was a bit of frustration constantly dealing with people filtering up and down the hillside.  However, all of that was forgotten as soon as the first team launched off the ramp.  Judged for a pre-flight skit, music and distance most of the hand built machines didn’t make it further than 20 feet.  The themes and costumes were just as entertaining as the machines themselves.  It was announced teams spent anywhere from $400 to upwards of $2,500 on their vehicles ($2,500 to crash into the river, some people….).  Among our favorites teams were Made in ‘Murica and Viking Army SC.  I’ll post some links of their flight video below.  Another team that we found particularly interesting was a group of seniors at Temple University who built their replica of a Wright Brother’s glider for their senior project (it didn’t do so hot).

1^st Place: The Harvest Bureau (video is towards the bottom of the page)

http://redbullflugtagusa.com/page/teams/view_team/981/harvest_bureau

2^nd Place: Viking Army SC

http://redbullflugtagusa.com/page/teams/view_team/125/viking_army_sc

3^rd Place: Duck Hunt

http://redbullflugtagusa.com/page/teams/view_team/777/duck_hunt

People’s Choice: Made in ‘Murica

http://redbullflugtagusa.com/page/teams/view_team/537/made_in_murica

            After that event filled Saturday, we had another busy day Sunday going to see the Redskins try to keep from an 0-3 start against the Detroit Lions.  This Metro ride took us further east than either of us had ever been in the city.  Most Metro trips take us about 10-15 minutes, probably the longest we had been on was probably a little over 20, but the trip to FedEx Field was almost 40!  Sometimes when we stay in our little bubble we forget how far the DC Metroplex spreads out.  Back to the game, we have to give a big shout out to Carole and Charles Tucker for our awesome wedding present; it was cool to go see RGIII and the Redskins.  I had no idea how big the Redskins were up here.  One of the first questions people ask me when they find out I’m from Texas is, “Are you a Cowboys fan?  Cause you can’t be one anymore.”  Needless to say, they’re intense.  We made our trip to the stadium with all the other people decked out in their Redskins gear, us in our Baylor gear.  The stadium was not what we expected it’s very…multicolored…from the outside.  But inside it was pretty cool and our seats were great.  RGIII played ok but we got to see another native Texan play really well (Matthew Stafford) and we got to see Megatron (Calvin Johnson) who’s my favorite.  It was an entertaining experience that we won’t soon forget.

            Other side notes, we have to give a BIG thank you to Grandmommy and Granddaddy for sending us a package from Stockdale with fresh vegetables.  We had bell peppers, jalapenos, banana peppers, okra and pecans.  We’ve already used lots of our supply and they have all been delicious.  Also we found out we are going to become (the best) Aunt and Uncle to baby Bernsen.  Congratulations to Cade and Meredith that is so exciting!  Work for Mandi has been good and school has been great for me, just finished my first round of papers last week.  During my spare time I wander around the mall and the different Smithsonian buildings and have seen all sorts of cool things.  Until next time, we hope y’all are all doing alright without us!

This has been a special edition of Sweet Tea with the Sprayberrys produced by Ryan and edited by Mandi (she probably took out some original content).

Cheers! 

(P.S. this was written a while ago, I am very sorry that I have been so bad about posting! There will be a more recent post very soon! :] -Mandi)

Busy busy busy....

It has been a busy two or three weeks! I apologize for my flaky blogging, I am trying! There is so much to tell...where to begin? Well, the weekend before Labor Day we flew up to Boston and met up with Jana, Ray, Mashelle, Nic and Rand. It was incredible! Neither Ryan or I had ever been to Boston so it was an awesome experience. We packed a lot into two days, but it was so fun. We got there late Friday night, so we just went to sleep when we got there, but didn't stop Saturday or Sunday. We started at Harvard and the Cambridge area. It was beautiful. We spent time walking around in Harvard's Museum of Natural History, it was wonderful! The rest of the weekend was filled with stops along the freedom trail, incredible food, and so much fun with Ray, Jana and Mashelle! Here are some of my favorite pictures from the weekend!

 Incredible lobster rolls

Fenway Park

 Ray found the ivy!

 Harvard

 Jana and Mashelle on the swan boat

 The Old North Church (where Paul Revere hung the lanterns)

The day after we got back from Boston, Ryan finally started school! He has been such a trooper at home cleaning and making dinner while I have been at work, so it was so exciting that he finally got to start doing his classwork and getting out of the house. It is nice finally getting in a rhythm of both working and him having class and homework.  He is working hard and loving his classes! 
Last weekend we went to Charlottesville, VA to the University of Virginia campus. Saturday, we went to the campus and walked around before the game and it was beautiful.  Many of the buildings on campus were designed by Thomas Jefferson, so it was amazing seeing all of those. The football stadium was beautiful and the fans were all so nice, we decided to adopt them as our team while we live here. It was nice being at a college football game since we can't be at Floyd Casey cheering on the Bears. The next day we headed over to Monticello, and spent the day wandering around there. It was incredible, and I highly recommend it. The grounds around the actual house were amazing! We walked around the garden for a long time looking at all of the vegetables and taking pictures for Granddaddy.  The house was also designed by Thomas Jefferson, and it was stunning. We fell in love with this area of Virginia, everywhere we went was just beautiful.

 Church on UVA Campus

 UVA has the second most collegiate secret societies (behind Yale) there signs can be found painted on campus

 Thomas Jefferson's Rotunda

 Patios on dorms surrounding the Lawn

 Inside the Rotunda

 A view of the Lawn from the Rotunda

 White Squash at Monticello (for Granddaddy)

 Monticello (look familiar? Its on the nickel!)

Honestly, I knew marriage was going to be great because I would get to be with my best friend and we would just love each other and all would be wonderful, but it has been so much better than I ever thought it was going to be. I love being married to Ryan, I love how much we laugh and how silly we can be. I love getting to start and end my day with him.  It is so incredible that I get to live every day with my best friend. I can't believe we have already lived here two months, it has gone by so quickly. But I guess time flies when you are having fun, and we are having so much fun! Today we started our kickball league. We play every Sunday on the National Mall in between the Washington Monument and WWII Memorial, life really doesn't get much better than this. We miss our families and friends so much, but we are so blessed to be here.  Now that we are in more of a rhythm with school and work, hopefully I will be better about the blog posts :)  But until next time, we love you all and miss you bunches...

Cheers!