Merry Christmas!!

Just wishing everyone a very merry Christmas! I hope it truly is wonderful for you!

Hooray! Finished at last! Now it is just the eternally long wait until Sunday evening...

Snow!!!

Yay! It's finally snowing, and I'm talking to Sophie! This really is a wonderful day, and only 12 days left! Hooray!

Passport

Woo hoo! I got my passport in the mail yesterday which means I can now visit Sophie in England. And I guess I could visit other places in the world too if I wanted because according to the packet that came with it, with my U.S. passport, the world is mine...hee hee! I wonder if they'd allow me to visit Antarctica to study penguin dances...that would be pretty awesome!

Woo hoo! I can now officially listen to Christmas music without being pummeled by a ferocious crowd of loonies who think it's a crime to listen to it before Thanksgiving! (I started in July!)

Thanksgiving

So, today is Thanksgiving, and I have so very, very much to be thankful for. First and foremost is the single most important thing ever--that God in His infinite love and mercy chose to sacrifice His perfect son Jesus Christ so that each and every one of us could have a hope of salvation from the life of sin and misery that we deserve. He paid the ultimate price so that we could have the opportunity to spend eternity with Him, and I am so very grateful for that. I could never, ever even come close to thanking Him enough for that. And beyond that, He went even further by blessing me with the wonderful life that I have been given. He has placed so many fantastic people in my life, and has given me amazing talents. I am so thankful for my amazing family--my mother and father, my two sisters, my step-mother and step-siblings, my grandparents, and all my other wonderful relatives, and all of my spectacular friends--the list of which would be nearly endless--who have always been there through it all, through times of great joy and times of great sorrow. Every single one of you has been a huge encouragement to me in everything I do, and I am so very grateful to have you in my life. I love you all so very much! I am also thankful for the gifts that God has given me, and I pray that in everything I do I will use them to His glory. I have been given so very much, and as I said before, I can never truly show enough thanks for all of it, but I want to do the best I possibly can. May you all have a blessed day full of cheer and wonder and thanksgiving for the bountiful blessings that we have received!

Praise of the Peoples

So, tonight was the second ever Praise of the Peoples where we all get together at a church with people from all over the world and just have an awesome time worshiping the wondrous God that we serve in a variety of languages. I went last year, and it was an amazing experience, so I had been extremely excited about it, but I spent the whole day doing Christmas shopping, and had gotten very little sleep the night before since we had to take Christen to the emergency room, so though I was very anxious to go, I was extremely exhausted and really in a rather un-Weston-like mood. Besides that, last year, Sophie and Amy were here to celebrate with us, so I was already beginning to miss her quite a lot before we even left. Anyways, Christen noticed that I wasn't quite myself and got me some hot chocolate before we went in to help cheer me up again, and that did a great deal of good. Chocolate certainly can do some rather marvellous things...hee hee. Anyways, so I was feeling quite a bit better, and when we started to sing, it was a joyous sound, but I still couldn't help missing Sophie a lot--what can I say, I love her--so I did have some tears flowing for a few minutes, but it is very difficult to remain sad when you are in the presence of God. It was awesome. And then, I got yet another amazing surprise as I glanced at the program and saw that my calc III recitation teacher, Xiaojing Zhang was going to be delivering a message about worship in China. This was a completely awesome revelation. I had always enjoyed having her as my recitaton teacher. She just always seemed so kind and willing to help out in any way she could, which is rare in a college classroom setting. I had her my freshman year for calc I and was overjoyed when I found out that she was my teacher for calc III as well. Up to this point though, I had no idea about her great faith in God. It is always a wonderful occasion when you discover that someone you know is devoted to passionately serving God. I went up to her afterward and thanked her for everything, and she in turn stated how very happy she was to see me there. She said it filled her with great joy to look out into the crowd and see the faces of some of her students in the crowd, and we both exclaimed about what an awesome God we serve. Wow! God is so much more wonderful than we will ever be able to understand here on Earth, and He never ceases to amaze me. Thank You so very much for that Lord! Anyways, she is part of the Chinese Christian Fellowship here at K-State, so I think I am going to go check it out at some point, so I'm very excited about that. Well, I will once again be putting on the blue shirt and serving as an usher tomorrow morning, and since had a large lack of sleep last night, I suppose I should be going to sleep now. I hoe you all have an immensly magnificent day tomorrow!

A Very Wonderful Day Indeed

Today has been a most wonderful Saturday! It was very nice and relaxing, and I actually managed to accomplish quite a lot, so that made it very pleasant indeed, but, what really made it so utterly fantastic was the fact that I got to talk to Sophie on MSN during a large majority of it. She is amazing in every way and never ceases putting a huge goofy grin on my face, regardless of the circumstances, and I am so very glad that I can make her smile too. So as you can imagine I was in quite a joyous mood all day long, and indeed am still grinning like a Cheshire cat. I do miss her like crazy though and am extremely excited for Christmas. Tonight I watched the movie Happy Feet along with a Veggie Tales movie about Esther which though wonderful, only caused me to miss her more. Only 43, nearly 42 days left....hee hee! Yay!! Thank you God so very, very much for letting me meet her! You are awesome! Alright, well, I suppose I should be getting to bed now as I am filling in for someone as an usher again tomorrow morning at church.

Just Something to Make You Smile...

Well, this just kinda sums up what I've been feeling lately. Hee hee, I hope that it makes somebody grin...

What a Wonderful and Glorious God We Serve

Well, today I was in Wal-Mart doing some grocery shopping, and this mother passed by with a little boy in her cart and he wasn't very happy about being there. But, as I passed by, I suddenly saw him start to get this big grin on his face and exclaim, "Mommy, mommy, did you see him! Look, Look, it's Superman!" Then I heard her staring to laugh, so I figured I'd turn around and wave. Oh, it was wonderful to see the excitement on the little boy's face and his huge smile, and the mother's relief at her little boy's sudden change in temper and her smile of gratitude. Now, I really didn't do anything special, it was all a God thing. I actually was not going to wear my Superman shirt today, but I just changed my mind at the last moment. Oh, it is just amazing to see how God works, sometimes something so simple as that can make a big difference in someone's life, and I just thank Him so much for the opportunity to be a part of it. We serve such a wonderful and caring God who goes to great measures to bring us closer to Him, and I am just so thankful for that, and so happy that I can play a part in sharing His awesome all surpassing love with others. I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed day in the Lord!

Two Decades

Well, today I am officially two decades old! I must admit that it really is quite hard to believe. But, it has been a wonderful journey, and I thank God for allowing me to take it, and for walking there beside me every step of the way, through the good times and the bad. And I thank everyone whom I have met along the way for helping me to get to where I am today. You are all very wonderful, and I love you very much. I pray that God's blessings will abundantly fill all of your lives, far surpassing anything you could ever possibly imagine! So, it has been an amazing twenty years, and I am very excited to continue this extraordinary adventure. Who really knows what is going to happen next? I guess we will just have to wait and see. Well, have a glorious day in the Lord today, and once again, a huge thank you to everyone who has helped to guide me to where I am today. You are loved more than I myself could ever possibly hope to show!

I Got My Blue Shirt!

Well, I turned in my schedule for being an usher at the church this morning and got my official blue usher shirt. They said I could start next weekend, so that should be quite an exciting new adventure. According to the team manual I got, an usher is supposed to be the hands, face, and heart of the church service. It is our responsibility to make people feel welcome and comfortable in our church family. Seems to me like yet another excellent opportunity to "make everything glorious" by extending God's love and compassion to all the newcomers at our church. I am very excited to embark on this new ministry endeavor!

The Mysterious Black Magic of Mathematics

Okay, so I must admit that after tonight's Calculus 3 homework, I am officially flabbergasted. Usually, I am at least able to grasp the concept and understand the worked out problems, but tonight's problems were just utterly ridiculous. I looked through some of the solutions, and numbers and variables would just suddenly disappear and others would appear with no apparent reason or explanation. I would get the first two or three lines of equations worked out correctly, but then the next fifteen made absolutely no sense whatsoever. I was seriously contemplating just writing "insert black mathmagic here" and then poof, putting down the answer. Oh, I remember back in high school watching "Donald Duck in Mathmagic Land" every year in Mr. Butler's class. Perhaps old Donald could provide some explanation to the mysterious black magic of mathematics? Or if I could only find Mr. Molleker, the Master of Gibberish himself. I tell you, I think that he could probably prove anything. He actually showed us a mathematical proof for why 1+1=1. Rather insane, but then again, I think you have to be a tad bit on the loony side to be a mathematician. I guess I'm not quite crazy enough for that. Well, only one more semester of math after this, and I'll be done forever with that subject, so I guess I can look forward to that at least.

The Three Musketeers Reunited

So, it just got confirmed to me the other day that the three musketeers (Me, Andrew VonFeldt, and Ezra Hallman) are back together once again. Since most of you don't know the story, I shall explain. Back in our high school days, Andrew, Ezra, and I were the best of friends, and we pretty much did everything together. We had all sorts of extraordinary adventures as I'm sure you can probably imagine. Anyways, in band our freshman year, we had elections at the end of the year for Most Improved Band Member, and for the first time in history there was a three way tie between the three of us, so we got introduced as the three musketeers, or the three stooges if you prefer. So, we all ended up going to K-State, but we were all in different majors. Ezra was in General Engineering and Andrew was in Physics, while I am in Architectural Engineering. Ezra had been planning to switch to Architectural for quite a while, so that much was expected, but Andrew was thinking towards Electrical Engineering, but I just heard that they were both now switching into Architectural Engineering. Oh what fun this shall be! It should be quite the adventure with the three of us back together again.

More Childhood Memories

Today in Engineering Physics, we began discussing some of Newton's Laws of motion and such, and it reminded me of one of my trademark childhood memories that I totally forgot to mention in my earlier post. Anyways, as a child, I obviously knew very little about physics, and therefore found myself attempting to defy many physical properties. I especially enjoyed trying to defy gravity, which brings me to the story. Anyways, one day I was outside riding my tricycle when I got a brilliant idea, or at least it seemed like one at the moment. I somehow gathered that if I could ride my tricycle fast enough off of the edge of something, I would be able to hover in the air, and therefore, I would be that much closer to actually flying. But, rather than being a normal person and trying to go off of some stairs or something like that, I decided to go from outside in our driveway through the basement window so over about a six foot drop. Also, opening the window apparently slipped my mind in the excitement of the whole endeavor, so in the end, I rode my tricycle at breakneck speed up the driveway only to go crashing through the closed basement window. Luckily, I didn't actually go through the window myself, so there were no injuries, only a broken window. Yeah, definitely not the smartest thing I ever did, but still a rather hilarious memory looking back. I also always wanted to try parachuting off the roof with a bed sheet, but fortunately for me, my parents kept the ladder well out of my reach. Maybe things haven't changed that much after all...hee hee!

More Kitchen Fun

So, you got to see a bit of a demonstration of my amazing cooking skills in action in the Chi Alpha video. Well, tonight, I got the wonderful pleasure of washing a couple of the remnant dishes left over from dinner. Alex had made us all some delicious spaghetti and garlic bread, so I was quite happy, and I decided to to have some fun while still accomplishing the task at hand. So, after washing the few dishes that were left, I poured some extra dish soap into the sink and filled it nice and full. I then proceeded to give myself a bubble beard and a nice bubble hat. I then walked out into the living room for everyone to see, and they all got a good chuckle out of that. This whole adventure gave me another wonderful idea which I am very excited to try out. Paul has been complaining recently about the kitchen floor needing to be mopped, so I thought it would be loads of fun to attach some sponges or something of the sort to my feet and mop the floor that way. Of course this would be very interesting and entertaining to watch due to my lack of balance, so I think Paul is going to record the whole thing once I find some time to actually attempt it. Now I just need to find some nice size 13 sponges to fit my gigantic Hobbit feet. Oh what fun that should be.

From Beaver Boy to Superman

A friend of mine from high school recently mentioned something about how quickly the years have passed by, and how much things have changed since the jolly old days of our childhood. Anyways, it just got me thinking a bit about my earlier years and some of my crazy adventures back then, and well, since Paul and Sophie both agree that I had some rather beaver like qualities back then, I figured I'd refer to myself as Beaver Boy to add to the laughs. So, here are some of the random memories I was able to recall. Maybe you will enjoy hearing some of them. Well, when I was probably two or three, I kept having a strange nightmare about a train coming through my bedroom window, a train driven by none other than the Boogieman. Anyways, for months afterwards, I was always terrified of trains coming through my window, until I got myself a train engineer's cap and a whistle to protect myself with. I also remember my favorite book being "Johnny Tractor." I actually managed to convince my parents that I could read because I had heard it read so many times that I'd memorized it; however, they figured it out when they found I was holding the book upside-down. I remeber my cousin Jeremy who is a year older than me, and how we used to be mortal enemies. I actually shoved a shovel full of mud in his mouth one time, if you can believe that. We are really very good friends now though. Then there was Steimy, our gigantic dog that I would share my cookies with. My Dad says he would hand me a cookie and I would always walk over to my toddler gate and break half off to throw to the dog. Then there was Fluffy, my short lived pet rabbit. We were very good friends. It was a sad day when I woke up to find out that Fluffy had overheated while outside. Luckily I had Andrew there to keep me company. Neither of us can really remember how or when we met each other. It seems to me he just poofed out of nowhere, and has been here ever since. God definitely knew what he was doing there! Ahh, we had some grand adventures back then, and we still do today. I remember the days of playing Ninja Turtles in his basement, and our adventures elephant hunting. We were pretty mischievious back then too, not that that is too difficult to imagine. Think of two Will Thomas's putting their minds together...Yikes, I don't know that the world could handle that!

Anyways, I have plenty more memories, some wonderful, some terribly sad, but obviously it would take a lifetime to list them all. And yes, a great deal has changed since those joyous days of youth, some seemingly for the better, some seemingly for the worst, but looking back, one thing has remained constant, and that one thing is the only thing that truly matters, the love and faithfulness of Jesus Christ and the sacrifice He made for us on the cross. I still just marvel at how awesome our God is, and how perfect his plan is, and how no matter where I was in life, he was always there, guiding me exactly where I needed to be, as long as I was willing to follow. Wow! What a devoted and loving God we serve, to continually seek after each and every one of us, and to sacrifice everything for us, even in our extreme stubborness. Anyways, I am so very thankful to Him for everything, and I could never be even close to where I am today without Him. So be encouraged my friends and know that we serve a God whose unconditional love surpasses anything we could ever even begin to comprehend, and that if we but put our full trust in Him, he will provide, and guide us to something more amazing than we could possibly imagine for ourselves. Hey, have a splendtacular weekend! May you find great joy in all that you do, and may no misery come your way, but if it does, remeber who is in control, and know that God will lead you through!

Chi Alpha Video 1 - Gameday Alternatives

So, we finally finished making our first video for Chi Alpha. We decided to do it based on the idea of finding things to do on gameday if you don't have tickets to the game. So, basically it is Paul and me doing a bunch of crazy, ridiculous things to keep ourselves entertained. Hopefully it will entertain everyone else as well. So I hope you enjoy it, and I hope it brings some cheer to your day!

Chocolate Cake, Calculus, & Ridiculous Physics Problems

So, I'm sitting here working on some homework gibberish for Calc 3 and Engineering Physics 1 while eating some delicious chocolate cake left over from the international student welcome thing. I am also wondering why the physics department is so incredibly ridiculous. I mean one of my problems seriously says "A startled armadillo leaps upward, rising .544 m in the first .200 s, what is its initial speed as it leaves the ground?" Another one reads "A hoodlum throws a stone vertically downward with an initial speed of 12 m/s from the roof of a building, 30 m above ground, how long does it take the stone to reach the ground?" Really, who came up with these problems? I mean, they are all fairly simple to solve, but it is very hard to take them seriously when they ask things like that. It is funny, but incredibly ridiculous. Crazy physicists! Oh well! I guess it will keep things interesting at least. Well, I suppose I should get some sleep now and refresh myself for classes tomorrow.

A Bit of an Explanation

So, Sophie convinced me to start my own blog so that she could read all of my random thoughts and adventures and such, and since she is without a doubt the most brilliant and amazing person I have ever know, I most certainly agreed to do it. So, after spending several days debating what on earth to call it, I finally decided upon Making Everything Glorious, and this is why. Well, I really must give most of the credit to a two year old named Eriana, who's favorite song is Everything Glorious by David Crowder Band. Anyways, she was singing it the other day, and it got me thinking about just how awesome God truly is. Then as I pondered a title, I began thinking about how since we are reflections of God and His glory by serving Him and His kingdom, we should be making everything around us glorious also by allowing Him to work through us. So anyways, I wanted my title to be something positive and uplifting while also a bit convicting in the times when maybe I'm not doing all I can to further His Kingdom. So, may we shine forth as brilliant beacons of hope, piercing through the deepest darkness and spreading God's glory to the edges of the Earth. May you have a blessed and most glorious day!