i never really started examining my anxiety until tonight.
i was talking with a girl at work about my weird dreams...how they've been getting worse and worse.
she told me that if you thought about it...it's my anxiety shwoing through each of my dreams. i find this odd. and slightly saddening because i like sleep but because of my dreams i seem to have been not sleeping the best lately...which is why i am tired all the time. sooo time for me to try to sleep tonight and not be anxious.

Don't fret or worry. Instead of worrying, pray. Let petitions and praises shape your worries into prayers, letting God know your concerns. Before you know it, a sense of God's wholeness, everything coming together for good, will come and settle you down. It's wonderful what happens when Christ displaces worry at the center of your life.- PHILIPPIANS 4:6-7

school will be done in 3 weeks...and that includes exams.

part of me is very excited for this little part of my life and another part is just stressed. 

i have so much to do in the next 3 weeks! papers, papers, PAPERS galore! 

yesterday was easter. 

and i was sad. i woke up sad and crying, not weeping but silent tears. i couldn't help it. once again, i spent a holiday as the only sister in my family. it's so weird going from holidays with 4 others girls and then you're the only girl with 3 brothers at one family function...it's confusing but it makes me sad sometimes. 

so that's how i woke up on easter. 

then during church dad sang. it was nice to hear him and jen sing in church again. the song just made me cry. 

with dad going through his heart stuff...again...

this was the first verse...and that's when the hurt in my heart started. 

"There's a peace I've come to know 

Though my heart and flesh may fail
There's an anchor for my soul
I can say "It is well" 

....

"And I will rise when He calls my name
No more sorrow, no more pain
I will rise on eagles' wings
Before my God fall on my knees
And rise
I will rise"

no more sorrow, no more pain...

and then i cried. a lot. silently. in church. 

and then the service was over and i'm trying to wipe the tears and the snot from my nose. 

oh dear. i was a mess. 

then we went to the pope's house and after that i sat on my computer all night. that was WONDERFUL. 

yay

oh family. i love them, even if they drive me nuts sometimes. 

so my heart is still hurting sometimes but i will rise. 

come what may, 

teia 

tonight i was talking with a friend and we got on the topic of what i wanted to do with my life.
i'm laying in my bed at school. last year when i applied for school i said i wanted to go into
art education. so i'm going to cuw for art education at this point. but i can't help but wonder
if this is what i really want. i'm not sure if that's right. am i supposed to be questioning what i want to
do with the rest of my life? does everyone always question if what they pick it's the right thing?

i struggle with that every day. does everyone question what they have chosen or what they are choosing?
but then my friend did something that not many people do. he asked me, what do you wanna do?
i told him that i am like a 5 year old who changes their mind every 5 minutes. they wanna be a doctor,
and a mom and they choose many different things...

but what do i want to do?
what do i want to be when i grow up?
it sounds ridiculous that i would still be asking myself this question but here's the thing.
i have many dreams and things i want to do when i grow up.
i want to bake. i want to teach. i want to keep doing art. i want to keep working in the
restaurant business. i want to own a bakery. i want to write. i want to take pictures.
i want to grow up. i want to be able to be a mom one day. i want to be happy and serve Him.

this past week and a half i've been struggling with being happy too.
it sounds ridiculousbecause i'm blessed. i have a job and am in school.
i have  a family and many friends.
i just keep blaming it on being stressed but i am.
i'm ready for summer to be here. warm weather. sunshine. and other things.
but today it snowed.

alright i must stop rambling.
im very tired. and trying to watch good will hunting.
-teia

oh march. it's finally here and then today it snowed, again. i'm not too happy about that, however, it might be because the last time i remember the weather being like this was 3 years ago. zoe was born on a friday and there was a HUGE snowstorm that day...on the 22nd of march! so maybe i'm just remembering that and it's hitting me hard this year.

lately, every day seems to be getting harder instead of easier. i remember that my one sister is in heaven and then the other is in NC. it's very hard right now.
i'm not sure what it is. i think i'm just missing them a lot right now. and i think kellen is too. i know that everyone else is. but it's the three big kids...and we're not together. last night at work i almost started crying because i realized how much i hate change. and it's too late to stop everything from changing now. isabel's married and going to have a baby. kellen's going to graduate and then move off to school in the next few months. and then who knows when we'll be together next.
this is life.

time for some class thing now.
comewhat may.
teia

most of the time when we talk, we forget how much it affects the person who is listening. how they will respond to it and how they will either forget the words spoken or take it and live by those words through the rest of your life. there are some words i remember and can't help but to think of now and more often than not. they are hurtful and heartbreaking. they were said years and years ago but when it comes down to it. they were meaningless at the time and were meant no harm. yet here i am, years and years later and when someone tries to compliment me on that one thing i can't help but just flat out disagree. part of that disagreeing is me not always knowing how to respond to compliments and the other part is those hurtful words creep into my mind, making me realize that i truly believe the words. words i know i shouldn't believe because they were said without thinking. words that someone who is not a part of my life anymore said those years ago.
i know most of the time i don't think about what i say. but when it's something that can possibly hurt someone i hold my thoughts back. i try. because i could never leave someone with haunting words like the words that have haunted me for so long.

so now i'm going to sing my heart out. whether or not i'm good. if people can hear me or not, i do not care because i'm made the way i am. and if music is the only outlet for me then i will continue to listen and sing...to Him.

thoughts for this day. :)

....oh and the Packers won SuperBowl XLV
comewhatmay...

i guess i can't say the worst part about birthdays. but the saddest part is definitely the end of the day. you realize how blessed you are to have great friends and family who love you..but at the end of the day, after the party and the singing, it's just another day. just a day that's supposed to be all about you but when it comes down to it, it's another day that's just not too special.

i love birthdays. i'm not sure what it is about them but i do. i think it's knowing how many i've been through and how many people i've seen have so many or so little birthdays that i realize they are a gift and we must cherish our years.

so as i have my 4 minutes left of my first day being 20 i just sit here and dwell on these things which have been in my mind all day.

those things and how i miss my sisters and i miss my friends who live far away. i'm so blessed and have been with a great day and yet i feel like there was something missing, someone...or maybe more than one person.

time for me to get some rest and enjoy being 20...cause it's just begun.

I'm trading my sorrow

I'm trading my shame

I'm laying it down for the joy of the Lord

I'm trading my sickness

I'm trading my pain

I'm laying it down for the joy of the Lord

And we say yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord

Yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord

Yes Lord yes Lord yes yes Lord Amen

I'm pressed but not crushed persecuted not abandoned

Struck down but not destroyed

I'm blessed beyond the curse for his promise will endure

And his joy's gonna be my strength

Though the sorrow may last for the night

His joy comes with the morning

-----

Christmas break is all about family. That's the thought keeps going through my head. 

We sit at the dining room table together, whether or not we're eating dinner. Last night I came home with some friends and looked at the dining room table and there were the 4 little kids sitting, doing homework or drawing pictures. I'll wake up in the morning and get ready and get on my computer, right next to dad and his "office" there's something about just sitting next to each other. Most of the time we don't talk or have a regular conversation...it's just knowing we're in the same room as each other. it's, comforting.

I'm in love alrightttt with my crazy, beautiful life.
and I'd love it even MORE if i could get some free
SHUTTERFLY christmas cards!

wink, wink.
love this place! i always end up getting my posters and cheap prints here! it's greatt!

out of everything that i need right now besides God, family and friends, it's definitely being able to write. I've had the writing itch the past few weeks. i've been reading blogs about families and faith and just other's daily lives. i'm not quite sure right now what i will be writing about most of the time. it will probably be my thoughts on the day and my daily living. nothing too exciting.
i just  know that this is something i started a long time ago and it's something that i need to keep going...for more reasons than one.

so it's very late. i must get some sleep sometime today.
come what may...
teia

Two years ago on easter was the day after zoe was born. being in church that day i couldn't help but just balling at the end of the service. we were so unsure of everything that was to come in the future. the baby girl had been born the day before and had stopped breathing two times since..."in christ alone, my hope is found, he is my light, my strength, my song..." this easter we were in church again and i'm still unsure of what's going to happen. i know he's holding us all but sometimes it's a little hard to see that through the mess of a world we live in. questions were answered in the two years and then many new ones were formed.

it's not that i try and forget what january/february were like it's more like it hits me in waves. when i sit and think about how in one week i heard about zoe and was attempting to deal with that and then after her funeral i went through it again...that hurts. i can't think about it.

Yesterday was Zoe's birthday.
I didn't know how I was supposed to feel about the day. Was I supposed to be upset about it? Act like it was a normal day? Something was definitely different..I knew I was suppsoed to be celebrating and I was acting like it was a normal day...and it definitely wasn't. I realized that it would've been the beginning of the "terrible two's". Although Zoe would never be terrible in her two's. She would've been Zoe. Always doing her own thing and just fighting her way through.

I didn't really want to cry yesterday but then i twisted my knee for the second time in a week. and i felt helpless. I just want it to go away. I want all the hurt to go away. My knee's hurting and my heart's. It is all just too hard sometimes. I started crying for my knee at first and then I realized it didn't really hurt. I was just crying. I was crying for feeling helpless because I can't help the fact that my knee just does it's own thing. I was crying because i needed zoe yesterday. I was crying for the little things i've learned the past few days and weeks that i didn't cry about when i learned of them. I cried for the dreams that i had last week..the dreams i had two different nights about the funerals.
---

Two of my previous teachers are going to have a baby within the next 24 hours. I am so happy for them and will just have them on my mind for the next few days. Baby. When isabel, kellen and i were little we always used to pray together each night. When there was a baby on the way we were always praying for a safe pregnancy and healthy baby and healthy mom. I never realized what it was like to have an un-healthy baby or where something went terribly wrong until Zoe. I guess I always took that prayer for granted. I never realized that a baby could be very sick. I don't know why it never hit me but then it did...
I pray for the Staub family- a healthy baby and healthy mom.


praying is all i can do right now for all the hurt in this world. but i can also pray and rejoice for the new, small things that make this world seem worth living for.

come what may...
teia

In the past four weeks, Sundays have basically been deemed the hardest day, with Mondays coming in a close second. There's something about getting up for church and getting there that makes it difficult each week. It might be the fact that it was one of the only times that we were always ALL going. It was one of the only times that the family was all at the same place at the same time. It took a group effort to get there- pack the diaper bag, wash the bottles, make sure everyone else was fed and ready to go. Shoes, socks, coats and ready to go out the door.

The other weekend one of the retired pastors was giving a sermon on God Calling. I'm not even sure what the sermon really was past that point because I listened to the intro and I was gone in my own little world. I was remembering the weeks where we would walk into church 10 minutes late because Dad and Jen were tired, tired, tired from staying up all night with the baby. I was thinking about the time where majority of the family was in Green Bay for the weekend. It wasn't a holiday but I'm not sure why everyone was there. We were all sitting in church listening to GrandpaDu and I was sitting there thinking about how majority of the people sitting in the service were just our family members. And then when GrandpaDu was going to eventually call up the kids for the kids sermon- I realized that there were going to probably be only two kids that weren't in the Bat family. Sure enough, GrandpaDu called up the kids for the kids sermon and we all sat down at the front of the church and he laughed and told the whole congregation that most of the kids were his own grandkids. It made it so special to me. It's probably one of the last times I went up for a kids sermon but I'm so glad that I did. I won't ever forget it.

God Calling. The pastor talked about how when God is calling you He doesn't use the phone- you can't check your caller ID and ignore the call.

Tears were streaming down my face partway through the sermon, remembering all the wonderful times I had with Zoe and GrandpaDu...sometimes tears are inevitable, whether you want them or not.

Everyday I struggle with what is God's calling for me? What does He want me to do for Him? What's ahead in my future? Will it be a fraction of what Zoe or GrandpaDu accomplished while living on this earth for 22 months or 77 years? I struggle with it so much because I feel like I haven't started and I'm 19.

Isabel brought up a good question to me tonight. Dad and Jen are with the boys in Green Bay for the night celebrating a cousin's birthday and just to be there with family as tomorrow (well, technically today...) would've been GrandpaDu's birthday. Isabel said to me, "do you think it's ironic that one month ago we were home alone and now here we are again?"
I didn't even think about it before. But then as I was sitting in the empty, quiet house...I realized something about it was familiar, in an awful way.

I used to like being able to have the house to myself for a couple of hours. Just to take in the quiet and absorb it. Within the two weeks after the crazy week...I learned that I hate quiet. I just can't handle it anymore. There's a silence about this quiet that I don't like. It's the quiet that you realize something big is missing, even if it was something small...like a baby girl. It's the quiet that you don't know whether to break with some noise or just keep it the same way...

I miss the little noises.

come what may...
teia

People have always said that I have a lot of people in my family- which is true. They are always asking how I can live with so many kids. Aren't they loud and crazy? :) -True but i love it.

When you get to a like 3 or 4 kids running around the house after that if you keep adding more to the mix it doesn't seem like that many. It's probably just how my brain works because we've had so many kids always at Omi and GrandpaDu's and here. The worst part is when you take away one person it seems like there is this huge hole. If someone isn't home for dinner it feels like you're missing 5 people instead of 1. This case is different... You wait and wait for those noises you're so used to and they don't come. Each morning I get ready in the bathroom and for months when I got ready I could hear the oxygen machine making it's noises. Dad said it sounded like Darth Vader. And when I was getting ready the other morning and I thought I heard it again. I stopped what I was doing and listened more carefully only to realize that Dad was walking around the house with the same rhythm as the sound that I'd grown accustomed to hearing. Or at night you could always hear Dad walking around finding a snack to help him stay awake while watching Zoe and feeding her. You could hear her making her cooing noises and fussing. Sometimes at night when everyone else is sleeping I still think I hear it.

This type of quiet is nothing you can explain to others so I'm not even sure why I'm trying but right now it's all I can think about...

and praying.

random thoughts...

it's the new year! 2010!
over the past few days i've been thinking a lot. and i've been meaning to post and just haven't found the right words or "time".

random thought #1:
thoughts about the fall have crossed my mind. thoughts about my family and friends. thoughts about time, in general. so many things have just been floating around in this head of mine.
usually i'm able to share these thoughts with various co-workers/friends but today was different. today was a very quiet day. i didn't really talk to anyone outside of my house. no texting, no facebook chatting. i talked to minte via Gmail chat but other than that, it was very quiet. and of course once i am quiet on a day like today not many thoughts are crossing my mind. usually my mind is racing when i am speaking to other people but when i am quiet, so is my brain. it's weird how that works out sometimes.

random thought #2:
the other day at work a friend and i were talking about time. the more i thought about time, the more i became confused and more amazed. we knew what we wanted to say to each other about time we just weren't sure how to get our points across. in the end however, we figured out what the other person was saying.

random thought #3:
months ago, i was yelled at by a friend about how i wasn't an open person. how i never shared my thoughts or feelings and how that made it really hard for our friendship. i guess i didn't realize it. in a way i was somewhat happy that my friend revealed this to me so i could work on it. now however, i fear that i took it the complete opposite level. i tell friends almost anything that comes to mind. sometimes, especially lately, it's become like word vomit. i can't stop it. i think it was a trust issue and i've been really working on trust lately. i've been getting better at it but now i think i just talk just to talk. i don't want to be one of those people but i think i might be. now if i'm quiet at work they assume something is wrong, when in reality i just need to think and take some time to stop and listen to what's going on around me.

random thought #4:
this year i have come up with a few goals for myself:
-get my website up and running and tell people!
-make change in the world. i'm still figuring this part out but we'll see what happens. haha
-listen. i need to work on my listening skills. i know this might sound silly but sometimes i think that things just go right through my head. sometimes i'd like to listen to things and absorb the entire thing a little more.
-stop. be still. -i'm not sure if there needs to be an explanation about this.
-figure out school. how frustrating this one can be. one moment i'm set on a thought and the next couple of days i really struggle with my decision.

random thought#5:
oh school. i keep telling people that i wish the whole thing would just drop in my lap and i would know what is going on. i still don't know what is going on next year. i have a feeling but not entirely sure right now. i don't want to pick something and realize it was a huge mistake but i'm afraid that if i choose the opposite then that will be a mistake. i'm not really sure if that makes sense but i don't want to screw this plan up. i know that i can change schools if i need to but like i told isabel today, i am sick of moving. i'd like to keep the moving to a minimum if that is possible. haha

random thought #6:
i wish i would've worked on trust years ago. i think it would've made my whole high school experience that much more worth while. right now i've been really working on trust and i love it. i love being able to tell people my thoughts without worrying about them talking about me. i guess i still worry about being talked about behind my back but i think that i am able to handle it easier now.

random thought #7:
i love the people at my work. :) as weird as it sounds, these people that i've worked with throughout the past few years have become a HUGE part of my life. one girl last summer started calling us all her family of misfits. it's true in a way. each person that i work with has changed my life so greatly and i am SO thankful for each and every one of them. i feel like i've known these people my entire life but some i've only known for less than a year and others have been with me from day 1. it's awesome because right now some of my closest friends are from work. one person i've known for only 1.5 yrs and the other i've known for 8 months! yet i feel so comfortable around these people and i don't know what i would do without them through this time.

random thought #8:
i have so many dreams. like hopes and dreams as opposed to sleeping dreams -although i have a lot of those too. :) i have so many dreams and i'm afraid to share them with people (back to the trust thing). it's partially because some of my friends will think i am ridiculous and others i'm not sure how they will react to it. maybe that's what freaks me out, is not knowing the end result.

random thought #9:
i've been thinking about love lately and i love love. but part of me hates it also. i think i'm afraid of love because of the hurt factor. i don't want to be hurt by love but i know that is a part of it. you can't really have love without some hurt. at least that's what i think right now. i know i had other thoughts on love...but i can't really remember them right now.

1 a.m. = time to read and then sleep. possibly more random thoughts to follow....

come what may..
teia

wishing all my family, friends and strangers Happy New Year's!
Hope you have a good one. Ta ta to 2009!
God Bless,
teia

lately i've been having dreams about grandpadu.
like multiple dreams. last night i know i had one about him. i just don't remember what it is right now.

a few nights ago i had a dream that we had gone to their old house. about half of their things were still at the old house and the other half was at the new. it was just how they lived- in the two houses. but they spent the majority of the time at their old house. it seemed like a cure for grandpadu. whenever he was at the new house he was sick and not doing well but while he was at the old house he seemed to be his old self.

when i woke up the next day i started to tell dad and jen about my dream and realized why i had had a dream like that. and dad confirmed it the same time i had my realization. the last time we had seen grandpadu "fine" and not sick like he is now was when they still lived in the old house. subconciously i must have been thinking about it but i hadn't put two and two together otherwise.

most of the time i have dreams and they don't make much sense but then there are other dreams where i can remember them clearly and it's like trying to get in my head and make me realize something.

for thanksgiving we went spent half of the time at with the pope's and the other half with omi and grandpadu. we ended up spending the night at omi and grandpadu's. i didn't really get to talk to grandpadu much but on friday before we all left to get our christmas tree i said bye to grandpadu. i said, "bye grandpadu. see you soon." he was staring off into the distance and said, "i hope so."
in the past few weeks this conversation has been playing over and over in my head. it has become something that i will always remember. i've struggled with deciding whether or not to write it. the exchange of these few sentences has changed meaning in the past few weeks also. at first it meant i'll see you soon here- on earth. but then the changing maybe has warped a bit into. i'll see you soon- in heaven. either way we both meant this conversation i hope both -on earth and in heaven- are true.
He hasn't taken either grandpadu or me (obviously) yet but when He does, "i'll see you soon."

i try to explain to others the friendships i've had and how each person has brought an awesome and different perspective into my life.
every once in a while i think they get it and other times i think they are just nodding their head and smiling just to make me feel good.

each of my friends have shown me the endless measures of love, they have shown me what it means to love life and friends and...music.

my family has shown me that also but in such a different way.

if there is one thing my friends and i have in common it is the love of music. all different types of music. they've grown accustomed to my music and i, theirs. josh and kristin have shown me to love soundtracks featuring john williams, michael giacchino and hans zimmer, along with many others. erin has showed me how to appreciate many different songs on the radio i wouldn't have given a second glance.

if only they knew how much of an impact they have had on my life so far and will have in the future...

comewhat may...
teia

sometimes i wish missing wasn't even possible.

then there'd be no crying and hurt.
although on the other end it makes the reunion usually so much better.

basically right now i think missing others sucks. cause it ends up being lot of crap where you say you can't wait to hang out and how you miss the "good old times.."
majority of the time, i think i'm the only person actually missing the "good old times" and really needing to hang out with someone.

...i need a friend who can hang out all the time and talk...

if you know of someone who won't leave me ...let me know...cause i could really use my old friends right now even though they are all across the country and one isn't even a friend anymore. well i'm not sure. i hope we are. i just don't know.

ok i'm tired and a mess. i think this means sleep is needed.

comewhat may...
teia

Last night I was able to go to the first choir concert of the year at LWLHS. surprisingly enough it was somewhat hard to go to. I walked in and there was all the acapella people talking in the hallway getting ready to walk in and getting all lined up...or as close to it as possible. We sat down and I was able to watch chorale sing a few songs and then it was the band. At one point Ethan turned to me and said, "what movie is this from?" i told him i wasn't sure...hmm. I think i'll have to look that one up or even just ask Mr. Staub. Then acapella came up and sang and they were good. I was so glad to be able to hear them. I turn to deirdre and minte and told them how weird it was to be sitting down at one of the concerts because the last time i had sat through a concert at LW was probably 6 years ago for their christmas concert. It was before mr. staub and before they decided to have the concerts in the gym.

Of all the things I miss the most about high school and just school in general right now it's choir. I miss being able to warm up and the feeling of accomplishment after we finish a song perfectly. I miss being able to judge the song as a member of the choir and remembering that next time I need to fix little parts here and there. I loved being an alto. haha. I loved being able to listen to the clashes and what weird songs we get to sing or what spirituals we're doing for this concert.

I talked to Mr. Staub after the concert and it was so nice to talk to him. We talked about random things for just a few minutes but I am so glad I did.

For four years choir was one of the biggest parts of my life. We had choir tour, great friends, crazy drama and stories from the different churches we sang at throughout the year and through every tour. We had a wonderful director who I can't even begin to thank how choir changed my life and my perspective on music. I am so thankful.

Maybe in the future I can join some type of choir where I do sing again. I'm not the greatest or anything but maybe. But nothing will change the way I felt about LW's 4 years and how being in that choir changed my life.