WOW! What an amazing weekend. Friday after work, I went to Abilene to spend time with Anthony. It was amazing, more than I could have asked. I think we are going to enjoy being married soon. We have 61 days until our big day. We (I) have a lot to do before then. I wish we weren't so far apart right now. I can only get over about once a few weeks. These last few weeks have been once a week but I don't think it will be again for 2 weeks. We are going to enjoy spending more time together than we have been recently. I fixed him supper Friday night after shopping and then we stayed at his parents house so we weren't at his house overnight. Saturday was wonderful. We went back to our house and he made me breakfast. We did laundry together and then went shopping for meals Sat and Sun. We did more laundry, dishes, playing XBOX, more chores, went to a party for the Christian Church's VBS, spent oodles of time together. We both agree that is what we will like the most about getting married, not having to wait until I am free from work for a few days to go see him. (Everything else that comes with being married will just be an added bonus :D) We just want to spend time together. We have been apart for almost 4 years now and want to be together. His car is not reliable to get him to Salina or my house. It is difficult for the car to accelerate and sputters when it does. We don't know what is wrong with it and because it's a Saturn, we'll have to go to Topeka or Wichita to a dealer to get it worked on. We (he) don't have time to do that. We're hoping it doesn't need a new transmittion, cause that will be $3000 easy. I think he's gonna sell it to his parents for $750 for his sister's first car and he'll just ride his bike to work and back and just use my car when we need to go places. That won't be able to happen until after we get married in 61 days. I'm ready for it to happen now. We both need new bikes so we can ride around and save on gas $$$$$$. Anywho, this weekend was amazing. It was so hard to leave last night. I was able to go back today because my parents went to Junction City with my grandparents and they dropped Andrew and I off and we spent the afternoon and evening playing XBOX and being together. I made supper again. I am really enjoying that. He helped me last night and I learned a new recipe for making Taco Salad. Boy was it delicious!!! I just miss spending time with that boy. We had a nice long chat Friday night before bed. I miss those. They just don't happen over the phone. For those of you that actually still read this, please pray for us (me) because these next 61 days are going to be hard and they can't go quick enough. I'm tired of wedding planning and ready to just get married. I love him so much and just want to be with him. If we could elope and/or push the wedding sooner, we probably would, but we can't so we won't. Pray that we can spend more quality time together.

Whelp, it's now one week and one day until Spring Break for us. I can't wait. I am so ready to leave now. I'm supposed to be writing a comparison paper of one live deaf person and one dead deaf person, but here I sit (actually recline) on my bed writing another journal entry. Oh well, thus is live. It's a gorgeous day outside and I'd rather be home or walking around the woods admiring nature with the one I love. Oh well, I get to see him in a week and one day. So, about 9 days :o) I can't wait. There is still so much to do before I leave though. Tomorrow we're meeting at a coffee house to have a guest speaker in culture class and then driving to Deaf Missions for Visuals class (which is my favorite). We're learning about videography, I think. Then we'll have lunch and then have a party/review for the Elementary children. We're slowly trying to plan it. We're all, to some degree, stressed, some more than others. The one that is stressed out the most has a master's degree and I'm wondering what kind of work she had to do because I'm sure it was more stressful than this. Me, it's not too bad. I only complain that it's bad and it's my own fault. My stress is spelled p-r-o-c-r-a-s-t-i-n-a-t-i-o-n. I'd rather sleep or enjoy myself than really sit down to do homework during the day. I'm more of a night homeworker. We had no classes today, that was nice. Emily and I interviewed Chad for the "live deaf person" part of the comparison paper this afternoon. I slept in, okay only a little. Emily and I went and worked out about 9:00 this morning. It was a good workout. I ran on the eliptical machine for 5 minutes, biked on the recumbent for 30 minutes in "weight loss" mode (meaning up and down hills) and then did pull-ups with weights about 50 reps to work off my "jiggle" under my arms. Hopefully I'll be able to keep it up to some degree. I've got less than 5 months to fit into my wedding dress. I should, hopefully. Anyway, wedding stuff is coming up. We've got to start making the invitations over Spring break so they can be sent out the middle to end of May. Anyway, my body right now is having a fight. It's trying to decide either to take a nap or do homework. Maybe I should listen to one of them. Tata for now. Write again later.

I think that Xanga is starting to come back to me. Mostly because Facebook doesn't work here at school. Anyway, I like the fact that I can journal again. I was able to with facebook but I always felt bad not tagging people and just posting it. Here I can just post it and though some of you have subscribed to this, may or may not read it. It's fine with me. I'm just glad the computer listens.

School is tough. There is lots to do here. Teaching kids, writing lessons to teach kids, classes to learn how to write lessons to teach kids, deaf ministry classes, classes to learn how to start a deaf ministry, interpreting, class to learn how to better interpret, on top of that, we are expected to go to lots of events and Bible studies with Deaf people to experience the interaction with them. All of this is on top of the loads of homework that they give us. I'm not really complaining but I just feel drained. You can only squeeze a sponge so much before it starts to fall apart. There comes a time when it needs to be stuck back in the water to absorb the water again. I kind of feel like that sponge. We give and give and give and I don't feel like I'm getting much. It helped today because I was interpreting at a hearing church but that's only gonna be maybe twice a month. I love the deaf church but I am a woman of music. I love using the singing gift that God has given me to bless others and to worship him. I don't have the chance to do it here much, except in the confines of my room. My personal spiritual life it not where I want it because at the end of the day I am just wiped out and the morning I am groggy and not really coherant. I am truly trying. Pray for me. I'm struggling.

I am also torn between here, where I know God has called me to be right now, and home, where my heart wants to be with the people that I love. There is a lot going on at home that makes me want to be there with my family. Anthony lost his cable job the beginning of January and really needs people around him right now that can lift his spirits back up. His ego is at an all-time low right now. He needs some great Christian men around to help him be the man God wants him to be. I made an unexpected trip home in Jan, nothing bad but needed to talk to him, and we had an amazing conversation. He got out a lot of frustrations about work and himself and I got to talk about what was going on in my life up here. We aren't the best at communicating over the phone. I love talking on the phone and could do it all day but he's more of a face to face kind of guy. That is why I went home. He recently found out that his parents are making him move into the house we are renovating in March. That wasn't the original plan. The plan was to keep working on the house when they could and sometime this summer I would find a job in Abilene to make the transition smoother and would move into the house. He would join me after our big day. :D (Only 6 more months :o). We're gonna have to figure out something when the time comes this summer. With his layoff, that drastically dropped his income and the money needed to work on the house. Also, we aren't able to have a nice honeymoon like we wanted. We were in the process of booking a cruise when this all happened. I really want to spend my honeymoon somewhere close to the beach. I think he wants the same. My dream is to go to Florida, somewhere close to the beach and close to Orlando. That way we can spend time at the beach and go to Disney World there in Orlando. They also have a place called "Holy Land Experience" there in Orlando. They have recreated Jerusalem at the time of Jesus with different skits and shows and places. I visited there during a sign language convention last April. I would love to go back and spend more time there. With a very, very limited income, we don't know what we're going to do. The talk is to stay home for the honeymoon and then save up to go on an Alaskan Cruise with his family the next year (close to our 1 year anniversary). That would be ideal but I don't want to be on my honeymoon near my family. Even just going to Kansas City would be great. Or Wichita, OKC, or somewhere like that with stuff to do. I guess we'll see how it all turns out. I got some money back from OCC but I also have to remember that come November 18, 2008, my student loans are due, as are my parents'. I have about $15,000 in school loans that is gonna take a while to pay off. Anthony jokes about living on rice and beans but it's not really a joke. It might be a reality.

Well, for those of you who are reading this, I could go on and on about the things on my heart and mind right now but I a 3,000 word paper due on Tuesday afternoon and I've only written less that 1,000. I might need to get on that.

More soul bearing later. Thanks for listening (reading). God Bless You.

Amandita