Family Ties

So within this past month there have been many people that have gone and many people that have come. Meaning my life is like a roller-coaster. Meeting new people while saying goodbye to good friends. You know when you meet people, everyone has a name (bare with me...) that you call them by. I always introduce myself as Courtney, as you do... We all have nicknames and only when you get to know the person or feel comfortable with that person you'll call them by something else. I'm sure we all have nicknames that  our families call us, our friends and random people. For me, the reason I am writing about this is because I find it funny. Majority of people call me Courtney unless if I'm home then the nicknames go on and on, but here it's generally just Courtney. There is only one person on the face of the planet that calls me Courtney Renee and that would be my mother, either when I'm in trouble or when I'm being a goof -- Someone just started using that here, it makes me laugh. Really only people that call me Court is my mom and my brother. I give people a funny look when they call me it. A few months ago people started calling me that here. I was a bit taken back because I thought it was my mom or bro but it wasn't. I got used to it and I like it because I'm glad people are comfortable enough to call me that! Well now that there are new people straight off the boat they are calling me that as well. In my head I'm going "Hmmf, that's interesting." It's not that I don't like it, I just find it interesting.
Last night we were up real late because all the staff shared their testimonies. It was sweet because we can all get to know each other a bit better and it makes us more of a family with some background understanding. I was about to fall asleep though just because we started at 7:30 and we had a lot of people to get through along with dessert. It was alright though because they made me coffee and I drank it and I didn't fall asleep. Although when it came to me I was real jittery from the coffee and shared my testimony in 3.5minutes. I hold the record for fastest testimony, it's not a race but I couldn't help my jitters. I forgot to bring pictures except for what were an my itouch which was only a picture of Cameron and I - to add to that it was a goofy face picture, well what can I say you gotta go with what you got. They all said he's a cutie pie with his blue eyes, then with my almost black eyes I don't know if they believed that he is my brother but anyways, enough said about that.
So this past week with being school staff I am finding that this season I am going to need to be more organized and on top of things. When I shared my testimony last night though I did get a revelation that all the things I said I didn't want to do growing up like being an entrepreneur, a missionary, living in a different country are all things I said in 4th grade and I've done all those. Things I said later in life like not going to Asia because I don't have a heart for it, I have gone and been and want to go back. I really thing God has this massive sense of humor and until we get the joke we can laugh about it. Thinking about that today, I said to myself God just likes to see me squirm and be uncomfortable, which when I thought again it is so true! We really shouldn't be comfortable we should be constantly growing! So to get back on track, training for school staff while being kitchen manager/head chef... hhmm... or in other words "School staff on LOAN." I enjoy it though it's going to be a great learning experience and I'm super stoked for the students to get here. I don't know what the future holds but I'm excited to find out! It's going to be a good season full of love, life and new things. I can feel it!