i love sushi

i tried sushi with a few friends about a month ago after a seahawk game in belltown at wasabi, and it has been my new obsession ever since.

not sure how i lived in seattle for a year with sushi restaurants all around me with out trying.. i even have seattle's best chiso right next to my work.

tonight while out with friends, we had a smorgisborg of sushi, it was very good.

here are some of my favorites

spicy crab
spider roll
spicy tuna
edamame
albacore tataki

sushi is actually very healthy for you. you are eating the "good" fish of the sea. (expect if you have the crab, which i did) and by eating it raw you are keeping all the good nutrients inside. it has a concentrate of fresh fish, rice, and vegetables. also is a great way to get your fish oils.

fish oils are one of the many supplements i take, the benefits are almost endless...here are a few i can think of off the top of my head...

lower cholesterol
helps with pain and inflammation
better brain function and intelligence
reduces the risk of brain, breast and colon cancer
helps clear skin and keeps hair healthy and strong

(just make sure you get "good" fish oils if you are going to buy a vitamin form. some fish oils can be contracted from fish from the bottom of the ocean which is full of mercury, and completely cancels out any good benefits you would get from the oils)

autumn thoughts

it's fall and i love it! i forgot how much i love this season. all the pretty colors and the crisp morning air...it's love!

this past weekend my sister, brother in law and niece came to visit...she is growing up so fast i can't believe it...she is crawling, gives kisses, and is staring to talk. if you ask her what a puppy says she goes "ruff" pretty smart for being 10 months! she loved peter parker...every time he came around she laughed and flirted with him...he wasn't to sure about her though...i think she scared him.

monday night our community group went to the new mars hill campus in wedgewood to serve. (it isn't open quite yet, but soon) we put books on the book shelf, cleaned the rooms for the fire marshall, washed windows, and my favorite thing...we got to spray paint! kristen came, and finally go to meet some of the people i talk about so much...i am glad i have another sheltonion in seattle!

i really love my community group, we are all so close, like a family and i love it! one of the guys that goes colin, we actually went to elementary school together! what a small world! he is hilarious i really get along with him. a couple of the girls i have gotten to know are kelsey and rachel, both are just awesome girls and it is such a blessing to have good friends.

i start the gospel classes to become a mars hill member next week. i am very excited...this will make it so i am not limited to what i can do to serve in the church. also i believe next friday will be my first time serving with wyld life at whitman middle school...i am not completely sure what it will look like. but i know i will be witnessing to kids, telling them about jesus, how cool mars hill is, and how they need to come to crux, (the junior high youth group). i am really excited for this..it has been a couple months in the making...but it feels like finally after all the paper work, counseling, meeting...it is going to pay off!

tonight i get to go see the sketch for my tattoo at super genius, then hopefully set up my appointment for early october...it was a bit more expensive then i thought, so i have been saving. which also gave me more time to make sure i really wanted it...i am getting the words "refine me" (also the name of my blog) which means refining myself to the lord, and purifying my heart. david gave me a whole new way to look at the words and it's meaning, now i am even more excited...i liked his explanation better then mine actually. but i am sure my tattoo experience will be a whole blog in itself.

jane the healer from hawaii

So this week at community group, one of the guys richard brought his wife and a friend...

before i go on let me give you some back ground on richard...he has cancer and is only in seattle to get treatment, and lives in southern oregon. he didn't know that our community group was a 20 something age group. he is 50 or so. but after he came he loved us and continues to come back. (or something like that, i may have some of the facts wrong there) but this week richards wife was visiting him with a friend. the friend is from hawaii named jane a healer...

and this is where my story beings,
before we start reading the word, we do and "ice breaker" where everyone goes around the room and shares a piece of scripture that spoke to them that week. so we begin going around the room when it becomes jane's turn...

she doesn't start sharing scripture oh no, she starts explaining how she is a healer, i think this is cool (at first)...i am all about all natural healing remedies. However she then starts explaining how she is sent from God as a energy. she says that she has a strong energy with the light of God, and sometimes electronics don't work around her. (interesting i think, getting a little concerned at this point) so we continue to listen start glancing around the room to what everyone else is thinking. after explaining her energy flow, she starts telling us how she can see 50 billion years into the past and into the future. (how does she believe she is sent from God then...i have no clue) she then begins to tell us she had a dream about seattle and needs to share it with us. by this time taylor our community group leader, i was sitting next to him, and i could sense he was getting a little uncomfortable...how was he going to get the conversation back to god, with our offending this women?

jane continues to tell us how she dreamt a turtle was on her head and how the turtle was scared and caught in a net...(or something like that i was a little distracted so i don't quite remember the whole story). she then explains what all this means. basically what i got from it is that she thinks seattle is going to be destroyed along with everyone who lives here and very soon she adds. jane went on talking for about a half hour...no one quite knew what to do. then she started to tell us how the rapture is going to happen in 2012. finally taylor told her that was enough and we come to her worship god. (thank goodness)

but that isn't then end...

we start discussing Philippians 2, where paul talks about respecting leaders because they are all sent from God. jane seemed very interested in this, and she asked us who our leader is. taylor answers Jesus. (plain and simple right? no.) she then re-phrases her question and asks who preaches to us...we say mark. somehow from that she thinks that we worship him now and not jesus...(what a cliché most people who don’t know mars hill think we worship mark too) finally richard told jane that she either needed to just listen and be quite or step out side...

after we are done discussing we get into our prayer groups (the girls like to pray together and we send the boys down stairs) so jane stayed upstairs with us. before we started praying she tells us she has a son whose wife just left him with their two kids and how he needs a new mate. she then asked all of the girls if we have a male mate..(ha) as she gets to me i say “no”. and she asks "why are you a lesbian?" (fantastic)

this was the one of the strangest things i have ever encountered. i was talking with david, who lives in hawaii, and he said that the island jane is from (moliki?) are a lot of people like her. after i was talking to my friend colin and he said she might be back next week, and how we should try to witness to her. and that is what richard is trying to do. but honestly i am not sure if i want her back. she brought a bad vibe and i didn't really feel gods presence with her around...nor did i feel comfortable around her. i know we as “christians” are supposed to love people especially people like jane...and i do. but does that mean we invite her into our homes and let her talk falsely to us? it is hard to witness to someone like that. right?

so this is my life

rock for sudan, i think, went very well. it was different from last year for sure. but the crowd it drew to the church was quite interesting. and what a great door opener to this years YOUth church...i am happy to say that the t-shirt making went very well! we made at least 25-30. lots of people brought their own from home, so we had left overs. and like wes said, it is funny to see how excited people get about making their own shirts (i am one of them). speaking of wes, him and kat are officially engaged! i am so happy for the both of them! Congrats!

lately i have been wanting to get a long board, just for the heck of it. and friday while having dinner with wes and kat, i noticed that wes had one sitting in his corner. so i was casually talking about how i think it would be a fun, taking the long board around green lake just sounds like fun. apparently they found the long board in a parking lot a couple of weeks ago and were looking for someone to give it to...aka ME! i am pretty excited...now kristen you need to get one maybe we will find one in a parking lot for you. i will make sure to keep my eyes open! that way i don't look like a complete fool by myself. either that or my friend david said he could help me.

last night i went back to the community group brian and i used to attend in ballard. it was nice to be welcomed back by everyone, and meet the new people who have joined. right now we are reading through philippians (right now mars hill is just finishing up nehemiah and after that they will be going through philippians, so i think all the community groups are getting acquainted with it?) i haven't spent much time in philippians, but what i read so far has really hit home. last night we read philippians 2: 1-18 and discussed humility and how we are all called to be humble. but how the world sees being humble as weak, and not confident. we also talked about how we as "Christians" can be humble in our work and in everything we do. but what was interesting to me was that if i try to explain humbleness to a non-Christian it is to some point, pointless. isn't it something that they wouldn't understand? why should they be humble? i should be humble because Jesus called me to be, but if a person doesn't know Jesus then to them it would seems pointless. right?

i met a couple of new girls at the group and tomorrow we are all going to go help kat pick out her wedding dress, it shall be fun!

i finally ordered my invisible children bracelet last week, i will be getting the black sunday one, i think everyone should have one...support the cause, and get a sweet bracelet!

also the action design's cd came out today...however NO record store in seattle carries it or ever heard of them, sad. the sonic boom guy is going to try to order it for me, but he said it was a long shot? however because i work in fremont if they can order it i get a 10% discount! sweet!

no tomatoes please, rock for sudan

friday after work i met kristin, becky, and a couple of their friends, we went to dinner at "red mill burgers" (yum) in ballard, and then we went to the "q cafe" to watch lower lights burning, a guy named shane, and one of the singers from pale pacific. i had never been to this cafe before. it reminded me of the old veristas cafe shop in oly. i really never heard any music from the pale before until friday. now it is the only thing that has played on my ipod since. then kristin and i drove back to shelton....it was nice to talk to her, and i am glad god brought her into my life when he did.

it was so nice to be home for a wee bit, to see everyone, and hang out with new and old friends. my family and i went out to our property on the canal and sat on our dock. i really just enjoyed sitting out there doing nothing. after we went to dinner at robin hood, my all time favorite restaurant in shelton! the chef who used to work at steven's now works out at red robbin, and to make a long story short my mom and me would have lunch every friday at steven's and order the "salmon salad" it comes with tomatoes...i hate tomatoes. i would always ask for "no tomatoes" and every time kern (the chef) would come out giving me crap for changing his recipe. one time when i was getting close to moving to seattle kern hid a HUGE tomato under my salmon. it was pretty funny. so this weekend when we were at "robbin hood" i told the waitress to tell kern that "no tomatoes was here" he said it took him about 10 seconds to realize it was me. he came out and said hello, it was fun. my halibut with a ginger crusted sauce was amazing! if you live in shelton or are passing by go there!

on sunday i decided to have kristin, becky, elisabeth, alex, and molly over for a girls night. it was lots of fun. many things happen when you get that many girls together at one time. but i must say my dad was a trooper. he even bbq for us and didn't complain about the noise once. even though he had to wake up at 5.

i enjoyed spending time with people i love this weekend. but mostly my dad. it was nice to see how much he cares. though i know his heart is hurting for me, and i wish it didn't. he prayed with me, helped my with my budget, and we did a bible study. it was just nice. i am lucky to have a dad who cares too much.

this weekend is the second "rock for sudan" my friend sara puts it on to help raise money for a missionary named charity in sudan, read more here. i am pretty excited for this year! you should go! my friend wes is going to come down with me saturday and help with t-shirt making. if you attended this summers art night, then you should be familiar with this. if not come and found out more!! there will be blank t-shirts for guys and girls along with stencils from the invisible children web site. people will also have a chance to design their own stencils. also come listen to some great music and support a local missionary!

09.08.07


The Mary Celeste

Truce

Slowly We Survive

Elijah Grindstaff