Fun Post: July favorites

Here we are, in the beginning of a new month!

WHAT?!!? *hyperventilates*

Ok, I'm good now. ;P Seriously though, this year has gone by SO fast!! Somehow even when there aren't any huge plans in place at the beginning of the summer, it does seem to really fill up quickly! :) Here are some things I've been up to this past month:

Reading...
Wings of the Wind, by Connilyn Cossette. This was the third book in the "Out of Egypt" series by this author, and I thoroughly enjoyed all of them!! They follow the journeys of different young women throughout the quest from Egypt to the Promised Land. I read the first two, and this one hadn't come out yet, so I had an impatient couple of months of anticipation for it. ;) I am way too cheap to buy books on their first release, so I always wait till the library gets them, which adds a bit of time as well. This book was worth the wait! Mrs. Cossette is one of my favorite authors now! :)

An Assembly Such As This and Duty and Desire, by Pamela Aidan. My friend Jenny recommended this trilogy to me, and I'm now into the third book. This lady wrote a series about one of the most famous literary characters of all time, Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. :O Trying to write in the style of Jane Austen is a pretty tall order to fill, but Pamela Aidan does a marvelously good job of it!! There have been many times as I've been reading this series that I've totally forgotten that they weren't written by Jane Austen! She writes in a style so similar to her, and of course stays true to the original Pride and Prejudice, while filling in details and silent places (of which there are many), with her own story of Mr. Darcy. And let's face it...who didn't wish to know a little more about Mr. Darcy? ;P There are a lot of long spaces in P&P where we don't really know what's going on with him, (such as when he is in town during the time that Jane is also in town. What is he doing?! ;) Anyway, there is a bit of true to the period language, which is annoying, but there isn't too much of it. Just a caution for young readers. :)

 I am currently in the middle of around 6 other books as well, but I am not sure if I can endorse all of them yet, so I'll save some for next month's favorites post. ;) On my reading list for the very near future is One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. I have heard SO much about that book and I'm really looking forward to reading it. 

Visiting...
My grandparents in Salem, Oregon. We had such a lovely time with them, though it always feels a bit too short. ;) Both of our lives are so crazy, we don't get to see them but a couple times a year, so we try to enjoy every minute of it! We went to a park and a carousel, (and I got Oma to ride the carousel with me, which was super fun!!! :). We had our cousins over for a very jam packed evening of fun...I have 16 cousins on that side, though only 12 live in Salem. Counting our family's kids, there were 20 kids, and including the adults, there were 27 people there. ;D Like I said, pretty full place, especially since my grandparents' house isn't that huge. We always have tons of fun though. We went on a few nice walks, and shopped at Costco, and went to the Salem YMCA...I like our Y here in Wenatchee a lot better, but that's beside the point. ;P On our last night, we had a huge dinner out on the back porch, and then played ladder ball for a long time. I absolutely love that game!! It was such a blessing to be able to spend some time with them. :)

Camping...
For the first time in 7 or 8 years!! I hadn't been camping in forever, but while some of the kids were at church camp, we got the opportunity to have a free night's stay at a campground about half an hour away. We had a blast floating around in a shallow part of the river, playing volleyball, roasting marshmallows on the grill (absolutely no campfires are allowed here during fire season), and waking up at 5:15 when it got light. ;P One thing that was SO cool was that the tent my dad bought last year has a mesh top, so I could see the stars as I was falling asleep. <3

Listening to...
The Planet Earth II soundtrack. It's on Spotify, so I love listening to it as I work. (It's on YT too, but then I can't  turn off my phone while it plays. ;P) Some of my favorite songs from it are Planet Earth II Suite/Main Theme, Garden of Ice, Starlings, and Flight over the Alps. You should go listen to at least those ones on YouTube. Like right now. Look, I'll even give you a link to the playlist!!!! LINK THAT YOU SHOULD REALLY CLICK ON. Can you tell that I just absolutely love this music? ;P

Taking pictures of...
Tons of stuff. ;P I got an iPhone 6 Plus for a very good price this past month (yes, I switched over from Android very reluctantly. No, I am not a full on Apple maniac. ;P) I admit they have some advantages for sure, but there are some things I really miss about Android, such as haptic feedback and the back button. ANYway, moving along... ;D One thing I love about my new phone is how good the camera is!! It has been really fun being able to take good pictures, and I've enjoyed playing around with editing on Snapseed. I'm not a photographer by any means, but having a nicer camera is sure fun!! :)

Thrilling with excitement about...
My upcoming missions trip to Fiji and Samoa in November!!!! I've refrained from saying anything on here about this until I was sure, but it does look like The Lord is working things out so I can go both to Fiji for the missions trip with my church, and afterwards to go back to Samoa with my dear friend Abby for a visit!!! She and I are sooo excited about both of these incredible opportunities, and would appreciate your prayers as we prepare for it. I have a fundraiser page that gives some more details about the trip, you can view that here.

Hiking...
In an area I never knew had hiking trails! Last week a church member took us up to Mission Ridge, about 20 minutes from my house, and we hiked up to two sparkling lakes in the mountains. It was an amazing time to go, because all the wildflowers were in full bloom. I have almost never seen any place so beautiful in my life, and I've been a lot of places! It was so peaceful and quiet. Some parts of the woods were bright and sunshine could reach to the forest floor, making tiny ferns and plants reach through the layers of pine needles. Other areas were dark and still, with black beards of lichen on the trees. When we got to the lakes, it looked like a painting with the trees mirrored in the perfectly glassy water and flowers of every color lining the banks. I saw a tiny snake with patterns like a fancy necktie gliding along the top of the water. On the way down, I gathered an armload of wildflowers, and you'd never be able to tell where I picked them, they were so profuse. It was such a stunningly breathtaking display of creation. 

Going out...
To the park every weekend for outreach. Wenatchee has a massive amount of public parks, and one in particular usually has a lot of people walking around in the evening during the weekends. We have been going every Friday night and Saturday morning to witness to people, and have had some really good conversations. Besides getting to walk through the beautiful riverfront park! I love Wenatchee. :)

Insanely happy with...
My new rolltop writing desk that I bought on Craigslist. I love it SO. MUCH. Ahh!! I could just sit there all day!! ;D

Thankful for...
The perfection of summer evenings--When it's been hot during the day, and then it cools off, but the ground is still holding some of the heat, so it's the most comfortable weather there could ever be for watching the sunset...just wow. :O Kombucha. Old tv shows. Snail mail from friends. Unexpected letters telling me a poem I entered in an online contest went to the semi finals and they are going to publish it in an anthology?! Cookie dough. Having church in the park with a BBQ and potluck afterwards. Playing Settlers of Catan with the kids. Singing "Prince of Egypt" songs at the top of my lungs. ;P (That movie was my childhood, ok??) SUMMER. 


Well, this post turned out to be a long one, so if you're still hanging out with me at this point, congratulations and thank you!! :D I hope each and every one of you is having a lovely summer! <3 Love,
Mykaela

He's Got the Whole World in His Hands!

Psalm 104:24-30 O LORD, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches. So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts. There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein. These wait all upon thee; that thou mayest give them their meat in due season. That thou givest them they gather: thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good. Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth.

This passage has always been beautiful to me. Small and great beasts, from the tiny ant all the way to the staggeringly large whale shark or elephant...they all look to God their Maker for sustenance and life. Even the dumb animals know to rely upon The Lord! 

I've thought about this a lot this past week... My family and I have been watching a documentary series about the different areas of the earth, (deserts, mountains, jungles, etc.), and the millions of species of creatures that inhabit them. Our planet is absolutely astounding, you guys. Newsflash, I know. ;) But seriously, I'd like to take a minute to talk about a couple of the things I've recently learned about these animals:

• There is a frog that lives in the jungle, called the Glass Frog...it is microscopically tiny, no bigger than your fingernail. Its skin is translucent, making the internal organs of the frog visible from the outside. The male frog has to guard its eggs for over two months from the literally hundreds of different predators that would love a mouthful of frog eggs for lunch. He will fight off wasps his own size, kicking at them with tiny hind legs, always sticking by his eggs so at least some of them get a chance to hatch. Unbelievable.
• A particular type of beetle (I can't recall the name), lives in the Namibian deserts, where daytime temperatures can top 125 degrees Fahrenheit. The only water in this incredibly stark environment is found in the mists that sweep the tops of the dunes every morning for a scant period of time. This beetle will climb to the top of the dune every single day, and using its body, distill water from the air. Special grooves in the beetle's body channel the water down to the mouth...it will distill and drink a quarter of its bodyweight before the mists disappear. Oh and by the way, the height of the dune, compared to the beetle, would be like a human climbing 3 Mt. Everests. Just think on that for a minute. 
• There are chameleons that will sit at the bottom of the sand dunes, waiting for the aforementioned beetles because they KNOW THAT THE BEETLES COMING DOWN ARE JUICIER THAN THE ONES GOING UP.  Okay, I'm sorry guys, this is just incredible to me?!?! 
• Galapagos marine iguanas are born under the sand a little way inland from the ocean edge. The very instant that they emerge from underground, Racer Snakes (you guessed it--they're really fast), attack. Hoping to make a meal of a baby iguana, they will set up ambushes to catch it as it flees toward the safety of the beach. The tiny iguanas KNOW, even 2 minutes after they are born, that the snakes cannot see very well. They know that the snakes can detect movement, so they freeze. Once it is practically on top of the iguana, the snake will finally realize what's going on, but by this time the baby is off and running again. Sometimes the iguanas will make it to the beach...sometimes the racer snakes get a meal.
• A bird called the Sandgrouse will fly 120 miles round trip every single day for 2 months....in order to get water for its babies. And how does it carry the water? It flies 60 miles to a water hole, where there are certain hawks that wait specifically to kill and eat sandgrouse. While dodging the talons of the hawks, it will land in the shallow puddle of water and wait while special feathers on it's underside soak up the water. It is a time consuming and extremely dangerous process. After he has soaked up as much as he can (about half his body weight if I remember right), he begins the 60 mile trek back to his family, where the chicks are waiting to drink the water from his feathers.  :O

This is a tiny, tiny sampling of some of the unbelievable creatures out there. Anyone who thinks that there is not a God who perfectly designed these animals for their specific habitat is simply delusional. Or insane. "Willingly ignorant", as The Bible puts it. The instincts that God has built into these creatures are so amazing!!! If He cares enough about a black beetle to give it perfect water grooves, or if He cares enough about an iguana to give it preinstalled knowledge about racer snakes...I think He can take care of you and me. In fact, I am positive that He can. :) 

Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. But the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows. 

God provides for the smallest of animals, so why do we have so much trouble trusting Him with our lives? Even more sobering question: We are willing to trust God with our eternal destiny after death...so why can't we let Him take care of things while we are alive? I hope some of these things made you think today. We serve a gracious, mighty, and perfectly faithful God Who will never fail to provide for us. Just look at the way he takes care of the rest of creation! Fear not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows. :)

Mykaela