book review: Glass Castle.

I had to take a lot of deep breaths while reading this book. It's an amazing story of resilience and brokeness and family. There are just so many things one can learn from this woman's childhood. Not even sure how to start telling someone why I love the book or why they should read it. After every few pages, I would just look up and say "Really?". There are just so many things that surprised me and startled me and made me sad and happy and hopeful and lost and upset. It definitely stretched my perspective on the type of people that live around me and made me very grateful for the life, parents, and childhood that I had! I really hope you get the chance to read this book. It is definitely my favorite book that I have ever read... no joke.

Embraced New York.

Just got back a week ago from my mission trip to New York.. It was so crazy! The city was so amazing.. I'm in love with it. There were so many people of all different backgrounds everywhere! There were so many different smells (good and bad) and noises and so many things that take your attention. We were able to visit all the boros except for Staten Island. They were all so different. I think Manhattan may have been my favorite. I liked the energy in TimeSquare and I also really liked Harlem. Not really sure where to begin with the trip. It wasn't exactly what I expected. We were able to do a lot of "behind the scenes" serving which isn't what we are use to with mission trips. Normally we are constantly with kids and people. But I think it was a good stretching opportunity for our group. I know I definitely was surprised and God used it to teach me some good things. One of my very favorite sites we helped with was a place called "God's Love, We Deliver". It's an organization that delivers hot and frozen meals daily to people that are unable to leave their homes and make meals for themselves due to an illness (HIV/Aids, MS, cancers, Alzheimers.. etc.) It all started with one lady just taking notice of a neighbor who had Aids and she just started doing his grocery shopping and cooking for him. Now the organzation serves 14,000 meals A WEEK!!!! This gives me so much hope. God is so much bigger than I ever give him credit. So in a very small summary, that was New York. I can't wait to go back!!