I'm just a little emotional right now...

The day I wathced Tamara go back home was one of the saddest days of my life.
As I watched her walk up the stairs that led to her terminal, her back to my face, my heart sunk in a sea of heartbreak and sadness. I so longed to hold her again and tell her that it was all going to be okay as she looked at me, with her eyes full of hope, her smile filled with joy, her hands filled with luggage. It killed me so to see her like this. I can't begin to express the pain that we both felt on this day.
Just kidding! But seriously, it sucked.
I was just being dramatic!
I think we have a good month before we get to see each other again.
Hopefully it wont be miserable! I guess we'll see!
It hasn't been too bad so far. I've been without her a full 30 minutes and I'm doing pretty good!
haha! Just kidding again!
This weekend, on a scale of Failure and Success was without a doubt a Succession!
I enjoyed every minute of it!
I'm sure she would tell you the same, except for the part where she got locked out of her room one night and had to sleep up in my car until morning.
I don't imagine that was the best.
You can ask her how she felt.

In & Out with Tamara

One of my favorite combo's.

For other favorite combo's
click the links below!

link #1!
link #2!
link #3!
link #4!
link #5!
link #6!
link #7!
link #8!
link #9!
link #10!

One Of My Top 10 Favorite Days

Tamara and I ditched the rest of the kids on Sunday and went out on an
adventure through Murrita.
Some of the places were similar to the places
that Chris and I had traveled to on our adventure day
and some were different.

During our traveling, I made Tamara be my model
and we took a lot of pictures!

This flower that we picked shriveled up in about 15 minutes after we had taken it.
It was a bit sad.
It's been sitting in my car all shriveled up since.

We Love Each other.

The night before, we went to the beach with Mat, Chris, Anthony, Katie, Heidi and Jesse but it was cold. So after all of this, Tamara and I went back to Oceanside and it was still cold. So we did what any other cold person who wanted to spend time on the beach would do!
We got fries, onion rings and shakes from Ruby's!

Registring for Wedding gifts!

Probably one of the funnest things ever.
Every man should have the opportunity to register for
wedding gifts with his fiance.
As you can see in the picture above,
we're hoping for spider man bed sheets!
We also registered for a ton of other amazing things.
Most of which, nobody will care to buy us!
But it was a great time anyway.

This was at Target.
(Just throwing that out there)

"I will redeem the out of the hand of the awesome!"

Tamara and Heidi both came out for the weekend!
Basically it was a little while back, but 3 of my blogs didn't post from
my phone so I'm going to talk about it like it just happened!

Adventures in Murrieta

Chris and I were hanging out the other day and decided to go to the gas station for some slushy goodness. After we bought our tasty treats we left the station and from my car, we saw the top of a smoke cloud. Chris and I really had nothing to do for the rest of the day so we figured we'd go find it!
But when I pulled out into the road, we noticed that the fire was on the opposite side of the mountain. We were losing hope because we thought the only way to the other side was to drive around the mountain by taking the 215.
While we were talking about it, we remembered that there were several houses upon the hilltops, so logically, there must be roads that lead you through the mountains.
So we set off on our adventure.
It took us a decent amount of time to get up there, but the drive was great.
We saw a whole new side of Murrieta.
Beautiful houses, trees, fruits, people, trampolines, and air...
We'd discovered a whole new world.
And as you can see from the picture below, we found our fire!



I'm not sure how close I was planning on getting to it, but we only stopped and turned around once we drove through a multitude of cops and one media man.
We turned around and began to head home.

As we were heading up to our fire,
we noticed a few other places that would be nice to stop on the way.
The roads were windy and I was driving to fast, so I rolled my car.

Just Kidding!
But one of our stops led us to a car that had been rolled. I really felt like solving a mystery,
but the day did not seem to provide the rest of my dreams.

We also figured we'd get in some rock climbing and we scaled about a 20 foot wall!
Intense right?
Don't judge.

So after we had our fill, we got back into my car and headed back.
We also picked some lemons while I was still driving, and they smelled great.
But there were several ants on them....

I guess this pictures just to show that my car is still good...

LOVE146

1. Trafficking in persons in modern-day slavery, involving victims who are forced, defrauded or coerced into labor or sexual exploitation.

2. It is estimated that 2 children are Sold every minute.

3. The United Nations Children's Fund now believes that the number of children trafficked annually is around 1.2 million as of 2006.

4. The U.N. and other experts estimate the total market value of illicit human trafficking at roughly $32 Billion.

This makes trafficking in persons the 2nd most lucrative crime in the world.

5. It is estimated that at least 27 Million People are currently enslaved around the world. 

This is more than double the number of Africans enslaved during the Trans-Atlantic slave trade.

-

This honestly hit me really hard today and I've been praying about it since. I think that most people in the United States are oblivious to this crime that is taking place because we live in a land where we're so comfortable.

We don't deal with these sorts of things on a daily basis.

But as humans, we need to be aware of this.

And as Christians, this should be on the top of our list to bring before our Sovereign God who knows and sees all.

God has the tendency to bring things up to us when He desires that we intercede.

I'm not saying all this so you'll log onto their website and donate,

but if you're feeling led to, have at it!

They need the money!

But they also need prayer.

God is so much more powerful than money.

If it comes to your mind, don't just get sad about the issue and brush it off.

Take the time to bring it before God.

He is faithful to hear us when we call out to Him.

If you're a Christian, His Spirit is inside of you and hopefully stirring up a compassion in your heart for these children.

If you're not a Christian,

Jesus Christ loves you more than you'll ever know, and He has the power to not only save the lives of these children, but your life as well.

You might not think your life is in danger of anything and therefore does not need to be saved, but I can assure you it does. 

Christ died for us because we are all sinners.

And 3 days later, He defeated death by raising Himself from the dead

so that we may conquer death one day and spend eternity with Him in Heaven!

The bible is very clear about what will happen to those on the day of their judgement

who do not know Him.

You can live your life to the best of your ability and come off as a 'good person'

but I can also tell you that your definition of 'good'

is extremely different than His.

You may even have questions as to how the Lord of all the earth would allow something like this trafficking to happen.

Answer:

I don't know.

But I do know that God is good.

God is just.

He is working all things together for good for those who love Him.

And He Loves Us.

If you don't have a relationship with Jesus Christ,

and somehow you got to my blog and are reading it,

and you either want to know more about Him

or you want to know Him,

feel free to ask me!

I'd be more than happy to tell you about what He has done in my life,

and what He can do in yours.

To the rest of you who have been saved,

remember this blog the next time you pray.

Bring this before God knowing that He has the ability 

to bring this slavery to an end.

"See that no one repays anyone evil for evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone. Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."

1 Thessalonians 5:15-18

Love146 has initiated two core program areas 

to combat the issue of child sex slavery and exploitation:

Aftercare and Prevention

To learn more about this,

visit the website:

www.love146.org/