Cool story

Not much time to update on life right now, I'll try to do that again soon. But I just came across this really cool story on CNN about the Chilean miners. The Jesus Film, which is affiliated with Campus Crusade for Christ who we work with, was able to send down some things to the miners to encourage them. Such an awesome story, check it out here.

:)

Erin

Fall Faves

So I'm totally copying other bloggers right now. Two of my friends, Nichole and Haley periodically post some "favorites" in life at the moment. In light of fall FINALLY being here, thought I'd post some of my Fall faves...

(1) Hot Apple Blasts at Carribou: I could have looked up the calories in it, but then it would no longer be a fav. I'm sure its awful for me. But on a crisp day, there's nothing like that caramel apple cider. Man, I wish I had one right now. Let's be honest, I'm probably going to get one in the morning.

(2) All things pumpkin: Fall is awesome because it means it is socially acceptable to bust out the canned pumpkin and start baking. And I already have. Made pumpkin dip this weekend and IT IS DELISH. Here is the recipe in case you want to try it (thanks to Jeanette for passing it along!):

3/4 c cream cheese (6 oz.)

1/2 c brown sugar

1/2 c canned pumpkin

2 tsp maple syrup

1/2 tsp cinnamon

Put first 3 ingredients in bowl and beat with mixer really well until cream cheese lumps are out. Add syrup and cinnamon and beat until smooth. Cover and chill for 30 min. Serve with apples or ginger snaps.

(3) Good TV: With the exception of So You Think You Can Dance and the occasional Bachelor/Bachelorette, summer TV leaves a lot to be desired. So fun that the good shows are back! Liz Lemon, Michael Scott, Jeff Probst, Heidi Klum and many others...I have missed thee.

(4) Football: Haha, no not really football in and of itself. (Although, side note, I did join a fantasy football league this weekend!) But there's nothing like a nice fall day in Kenan stadium (especially when we can actually win). And really just all of campus in the fall is so beautiful, I love getting to walk around campus this time of year.

(5) November and December are close-ish: October is really great, but it also means November and December aren't that far away. And that means time with family, fun traditions, getting to decorate and that my bday is just around the corner.

Welcome fall, I'm glad you're here!

Other recent happenings

Ok, I've finally recovered from the blob and can now update on other recent happenings in the Smith household. This will probably be random as I'm trying to update you on a month's worth of stuff. Here we go...

In August we started up another year at UNC...my 8th here on staff. I really cannot believe it's been that long. I guess I'm not blending in with the college students as much anymore since one of them called me middle-aged last year. Yea, funny story, ask me sometime! Then at fall retreat a few weeks a girl asked what year I was and I told her I was on staff. "Yea, I thought you looked older" she said. Ok, I got it guys, I don't look 22 anymore, huh?!

Anyways, its been a great start of school so far. Lots of fun students around and I'm getting to work with my girls from last year who are SENIORS now. Crazy! It's always a blitz the first month or so and although we love it, it's nice we finally have some time to breathe again.

A few weeks ago we got to go to Kansas for a long weekend to celebrate Josh's parents 40th wedding anniversary! I hadn't seen most of his family since Christmas (too long!!) so it was really great to be with them again. We celebrated the anniversary with a great dinner out, Josh got to hit up a Kansas State game with his bros, I got some shopping in with my sister in laws which was so fun and we got to see our super cute nephews and nieces. That was a long sentence. Anyways yes, cute nieces and nephews. Two of my favorite kid moments of the weekend. My niece Ella had her bday party while we were there and she LOVES princesses. Duh, what 4 year old girl doesnt?! Anyways, she got a card that when she opened it had a song from Little Mermaid. She gasped really loud and looked like she was going to cry from excitement. One of the cutest things ever. Ok second cute story was when we were out to dinner for the anniversary. We gave Josh's parents their present which was this cool picture that had their wedding pic and each of their kids' wedding pics on it. Props to my bro in law for a great gift. Anyways, super-cute nephew Ike, after Josh's mom opened the present and was thanking us, exclaimed, "I KNEW you would LOVE it Granny!!" Presh!

So, trip to KS was a great time and ended too quick! While we were there we took some family pictures. I don't know how to put them up here (or even if I am allowed to) since we went through a photographer but here's a link to check them out if you want:

www.plazaphotography.com/galleries/Smith/

Hmm, what else has been going on lately. Oh, Josh decided in August that he wanted to run a half marathon (when i was typing just now i typed "we wanted to run a marathon" by accident. noooooooo!!!! definitely not true!). So he's been training for that. I'm so proud of how disciplined he's been- he's already up to 7 miles! He's running in November at the Outer Banks so I'm excited to go watch (yes, definitely just watch) his race!

Well I can't think of anything else exciting and am also getting sleepy so Seacrest Out. Sorry no pics this time. You can just refer to our pic on the right side at the top of the blog if youre really wanting a pic I guess!

Until next time...

Erin

Hmm...I wonder why my back hurts?

This past weekend we went on UNC's annual Fall Retreat. Good ol' Camp Dixie in the bustling metropolis of Fayetteville, NC. This weekend is always a highlight of the year for me as it's a fun time of meeting lots of new students. This year we had 240 students attend! The theme of the weekend was "Real Life" and our speaker (the college pastor at the Summit church) talked about how Jesus alone offers real life, verses the "so-called life" we often settle for. Side note: every time he referenced the "so-called life" I of course pictured Jered Leto and Claire Danes (there used to be a show named that in the 90s.) At one point he asked if anyone had ever heard of the TV show and I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who raised my hand. What a tragedy.

Ok, I digress. It was a great weekend with lots of fun students. "Erin, but why is your back hurting?" you 5 readers out there may be wondering from the title of this post. Camp Dixie may be best known for a little something called "The Blob." The blob is this huge inflatable "pillow of air" (I just asked Josh how he'd describe it and that's what he came up with...) in the lake. How it works is that someone sits at the end of the "pillow of air" and someone else jumps on the back of it shooting the person up in the air and into the lake.

So I've been to Camp Dixie like 5 times by now. Every year I see people do the blob and every year I think it's a bad idea. This year was different. I really don't know what came over me but as I was sitting there watching students go, I was like, I really need to try this. So I grabbed Josh (yea, that was my first mistake) and we climbed the ladder to blob it up. You're really only supposed to have 60 lbs difference between the blobber and blobbee (??) but we just went for it anyways. 130 lbs difference is no big deal right?!

Thankfully there was a student video-ing so you can relieve this moment with me. It was so hilarious...well let's be honest, scary at the time but hilarious looking back on it.

I think my favorite parts are (1) the screams of the people watching and taping (2) how I decide to run in place when I'm midair like that was going to accomplish anything. So, needless to say, that is why the back is hurting since Saturday. Maybe a little blob whiplash?! Totally worth it to have that video though! I think I'll suggest Camp Dixie puts an age limit on the blog...29 is too old!

The rest of our summer

Well, I did it again. I let a month pass before I updated the blog. Not a great start for this new blogger. But, I'll try to make up for it by catching you up on all we've been up to since I last posted.

First of all, we're back from Sweden. We got back in late June and spent a few weeks just enjoying being back in our little casa. We really did love our time in Sweden, but there's nothing like being back in our home, sweet home. The jet lag was a little rougher coming back than going there. I think for at least the first week we crashed each night around 9:00 and woke up around 6 or so. I was hoping that I'd suddenly become a morning person who would always wake up at 6. But, nope, that didn't stick at all.

About a week after we got back, Josh headed to Kansas for a wedding. I didn't go this trip because we're both going in September and it was such a short trip this time. Josh's friend Jeremiah got married and he had a great time getting to see friends in Manhattan (the Kansas one, that is) for a few days. And he got to see the fam while there too, so it was a great trip. I can't wait to see everyone when we go back in September! Here's are a few pics.

In July we were supposed to go to a big family reunion with my mom's side of the family. It was in Gulf Shores, AL so alas, we did not go due to the oil spill. We ended up going with part of the family to Cape May, NJ instead. Although I didn't see Snooky or The Situation, we still had a great time. Ok, I've actually never seen Jersey Shore and who knows if I even spelled those names right. Anyways, we got to see some family we don't get to see very often and had a great time hanging at the beach and exploring the cute little town. Here's the fam we got to see...

We drove to NJ and stopped in Baltimore on both the way up and back. We even got to take a tour of Camden Yards while we were there! Here is Josh, my mom and I at the Inner Harbor of Baltimore.

After our beach trip, we spent some time at home and in Charlotte working on support and getting things ready for the school year to start. It seems like usually we don't have much time at home in the summer because of summer projects and conferences. So this summer was really great getting to have so much time after Sweden to actually be at home. We got to do some fun summer things like going to a Durham Bulls game, spending some time at our neighborhood pool, checking out some new restaurants and hitting up the Carrboro farmer's market. That last one was a fun adventure. We brought a plastic bag with us to carry our stuff home and I'm surprised we made it out of there alive, not being "green"and all! Should probably bring a tote bag next time.

We ended our summer with a trip to North Myrtle Beach with my dad and stepmom. Ah, we love going there! We ate great seafood, had some chill time on the beach and good time with the fam. Josh even got to utilize his techie skills loading and hooking up their new TV. While he was doing that I was being super helpful watching the finale of the Bachelorette. Sorry fam :) I have no pictures from this trip. Envision a tent set up on the beach, 4 chairs under it, lots of books and magazines and me taking a nap. That's pretty much what it looked like.

So that's what we've been up to since Sweden. Congrats on making it through this long update! Hopefully I'll keep you up to date a little more regularly from now on!

End of Project

As a new blogger I'd hoped I wouldn't let it go a month without posting. But here we are already back from Sweden and I'm just now posting about it. I think part of why it has taken so long is because it's hard to sum up our time in Sweden. We had a great summer there. Uppsala is beautiful. The pace of life is so refreshing. We loved biking and walking everywhere (well, most days we did). We had a great summer with 23 awesome students. It was an interesting summer getting to talk with Swedes about who God is, many of whom had never thought much about Him existing.

But in many ways it was also a hard summer. It was hard to see a country where everyone had everything they needed physically but lacked so much. Sweden is spiritually a very hard and dark place, which is sad considering how centuries ago it was one of the largest missionary-sending nations. The focal point of Uppsala is a giant cathedral (we've had pics of it on earlier posts)...anytime you got turned around you could see the church and orient yourself again. A city and even country that used to be so centered on Christ now sees Him as irrelevant to their lives. It was hard to see that reality and the hopelessness and lack of purpose students there lived with.

We were so thankful for the opportunity to spend this summer in Sweden. Here's a little update on what we did our last few weeks there:

Like we've mentioned before, there are some long-term staff with Campus Crusade that live in Sweden. So the last week we were there, it was crucial for us to connect our new friends we met with the long-term staff. Each of us wrote letters to friends we made and gave them to the staff team, who will be able to follow up with them later. We're excited to hear how the conversations continue to go as the staff team meets with our friends later.

We spent our last day there doing lots of packing and picking up last minute souvenirs we wanted (I bought tons of candy bars and bags of tea as presents! Glad we had enough space somehow for all of it!). It was so fun to have one last day to walk around the city that had been our home for the summer. Then we had one last dinner with the other staff couple we were with. Here's a picture of some of us at lunch the last day...

The last day we also had a photo shoot at domkyran, the church at the heart of town. Here's one of the ones of our whole group:

Friday, June 18th we packed up and headed to Munich to begin our debrief. We were there for 3 nights, spending time with our team and sharing what we'd learned this summer. We each had a rock we were given and wrote one word that summarized our summer on it. It was so cool to hear what God taught each of the students. One shared the word "power" because they had seen God's power in new ways. One shared "simple" because God had showed him how simple and beautiful the Gospel is, not only to those he was ministering to, but in his own life as well. I wrote "intimacy" on mine because this was a summer when I found new depth and intimacy with my relationship with God. It's so neat because I was praying (and had others praying for me) that I would simply fall in love with Jesus again this summer and not be so fixated on the to-dos of ministry. It was so neat to see how God answered that this summer. We also talked some as a team about how to transition well after project. It was a great last few days with our team overseas.

One of the highlights for me was our day trip to Austria! It was only an hour and a half train ride so we figured we'd better take advantage of it and go. That is probably the most beautiful place I have ever been. Old, gorgeous buildings, cobblestone streets, rolling hills..it really was amazing! I decided to go with some of the students on the Sound of Music tour. I've never seen the movie (I know, I know...I need to see it) but it was so cool to ride around and see the countryside. I took some pics but don't have them on me now, so I'll have to post them later.

The most random part of our debrief was that on our Sound of Music tour, Jim Caviezel was on our bus (he was Jesus in "Passion of the Christ" and is in a bunch of other movies like "Frequency" and "Count of Monte Cristo")! It was definitely him and he was there with his family. We didn't get his autograph but we did sneek a picture or two of him. We couldn't believe of all the places to see a celeb it would be in Salzburg, Austria!

On June 22nd we left our hostel, carried our 4 bags each of luggage to the train station (stressful!), and headed to the airport to head back to America. It was quite the adventure making sure we didnt lose anyone from one place to the next. By the time we got to our gate, we only had 20 minutes to spare so we definitely cut it close! 9 hours later (whew, so long on a plane!) we landed back in America.

We so loved our time in Sweden and will never forget it! Thanks for keeping up with our travels on here! We'll keep blogging but just about our life here in the USA! Until next time...

Erin

A while ago

Forever ago we went to Stockholm for the day. I'm just now getting around to posting some pics from the trip. It's only a 40 minute train ride and is such a beautiful city to visit. Here's Jen (the other staff girl) and I on the train:

And we didn't realize this until later but Josh snapped this great pic of us...

This pic cracks me up everytime I look at it. We look so mad to be on the train.

Anyways, once we got to Stockholm we walked around, did a little shopping and enjoyed eating at different restaurants (the ones in Uppsala are getting a little old now). It was a fun free day with our team! Here are some pics:

There was some national event going on the day we were there, so they had a huge band playing outside of the royal palace.

For dinner that night we went to a nice restaurant we had been to back in October when we were here with our UNC staff team for the vision trip. I opted for some amazing pesto pasta and Josh thought some reindeer sounded good. Yep, reindeer meat. Here's a pic of it

So that was our day in Stockholm! Blog again soon!

Erin