TOP 10!

We have exactly one month from today until we are back home! CRAZY! I truly cannot believe how quickly the time is passing. I definitely don't feel like I've lived here for 2.5 months! The thought of moving home in a month makes me almost want to cry, because I've absolutely loved every second of my time here. Therefore, to help me get super excited about moving home... I created a list in one of my classes & decided to make a blog of it. Hope you enjoy :)

TOP TEN REASONS I’M EXCITED TO MOVE BACK TO THE STATES:

[[this excludes the obvious: family & friends!]]

The Village Church!! I absolutely love learning stories about our Savior’s life, His perfect love for me, and worshipping Him wholeheartedly. I admire Matt Chandler and am eager to see him preach again. What makes attending the Village at night so special is the fact that I get to go with two of my most precious friends: Emily & Megan. After church we always stop by Starbucks and spend hours chatting about Jesus’ work in our lives. We typically make a scene from laughing too much. Nothing beats Sunday nights with those girls.

TEXAS. It might seem shocking… but my love for Texas has only grown while I’ve been abroad!! I love country music, Texas weather, cowboy boots, bluebonnets, kids playing in the neighborhood, and southern living.

Full usage of my cell phone. It honestly hasn’t been that bad, promise! But there have been multiple instances when I just want to text / call someone real quick or look something up on the Internet && that hasn’t been an option. The convenience the iPhone brings to our lives is absolutely astonishing – couldn’t be more grateful for that little piece of technology.

"to go" cups! You never realize how much you cherish those portable drinks until you are deprived of them. I will be just about the happiest girl on the planet when I can take a drink with me, wherever I decide to go!

I'm ready for my spelling ability to come back!! I used to feel like I was pretty good at spelling, until I moved to Italy & any spelling ability I had vanished! I don't know if it's because for the first 6 weeks I had to think, write, read, and test in the Italian language, or if it's due to my lack of text messaging.... either way, I'm deeply frustrated with this issue and can't wait to be able to spell again! :)

A variety of toiletries!! That seems pretty silly, but anyone who has lived with me before knows that I love having multiple toothpastes, face washes, moisturizers, shampoos, hair products, etc. I get tired of the same product easily & need to switch it up.

To be able to walk down the street while smiling at anyone & everyone. I’ve pretty much mastered the fake half smile and have learned to walk with my head down. People in Italy don’t say hi to strangers and think it’s crazy to smile at someone you don’t know. Especially being girls, I’ve found it’s just easier and more pleasant to not make eye contact or smile at most people.

To not feel like an animal at the zoo anymore!!! It’s a rare occasion that we walk 10 steps without being completely, entirely starred down. We consider it our lucky day when we walk by people without getting any comments. It will be nice to be just another face in the crowd again.

NO LANGUAGE BARRIER!!! woo - hooo!! I definitely have a new found appreciation for people trying to live in the U.S. without knowing English. We're practically all-stars at getting by in our small town with italian phrases & hand gestures... but it's just not the same. I miss the small talk that comes with being able to say more than simple phrases.

my pretty little car. I cannot even wait for the opportunity to just hop in my car whenever my heart desires. I will love not having to deal with public transportation. Don't get me wrong; public transportation has been the best thing that ever happened to Europe. It's made traveling a thousand times easier than I could ever imagine. Butttt -- trains are yucky.

Living Water.

one of my very favorite parts of our traveling adventures is the simple fact that we are able to witness God's beauty like never before. The Lord has been gracious to use His creation as a sweet reminder of His promises.

"Your love, O Lord, reaches the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, your justice like the great deep. O Lord, you preserve both man and beast. How priceless is your unfailing love." - Psalm 36:5-7

"As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God." – Psalm 42:1

“Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be white as snow…. “ – Isaiah 1:18

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.” – John 4: 13-14

a cheerful heart is good medicine. - Proverbs 17:22

Goodness. I honestly don’t even know where to begin. Our spring break adventure consisted of the FAB 5 traveling 3 countries in 10 days. It all started out by meeting two of our very best friends in Paris!! We truly couldn’t be more thankful for them, the joy they bring to our lives, their refreshing words and promises of God’s truth, and ability to make us laugh until we cry. I truly could never thank Mel Mel & KT180 enough for all the "good medicine" they gave us over break. I love my friends more than life !

Here’s a glimpse of some of my very favorite moments:

[ Paris, France ]

Louvre Museum: even though it's the largest museum in the world -- we like to make our own art & photos.

Eiffel Tower: absolutely massive & beautiful structure.

Arc de Triomphe: kkg lovin’ all across the world !

Palace of Versailles: i absolutely adore my best friends! couldn't resist the 'jump' pic & got it on the 1st try!! :)

Disneyland Paris: nothing beats “the happiest place on earth”.. especially with your best friends!

[ Cork, Ireland ]

Blarney Castle: love love love.

[ Dublin, Ireland ]

St. Patrick’s Day: never thought I'd be in Dublin on St. Patrick's day, quite crazy. A bit more family oriented during the day than I had imagined.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral: loved learning the history of St. Patrick and his importance in bringing Christianity to Ireland. we spent lots of time pretending to be leprechauns & searching for gold.

Guinness Storehouse: who knew creating beer was so complicated? at least it was a really cool museum !

[ Barcelona, Spain ]

BornBike: best experience ever in Spain. perfect weather, wonderful tour guide, & beautiful barcelona !

Fountain of Montijuic: pretty water & light show... guess what colors appeared together?? pink & yellow -- HopeForTheCure!! even in Spain, we're excited to return to the States for the 3DAY.

Worth It All.

“I’m desperate in seeking, frantic believing
that the sight of Your face

is all that I need

I will say to You

It’s gonna be worth it
It’s gonna be worth it
It’s gonna be worth it all

I believe this”
- Rita Springer

This week hasn't been the easiest here in Italy due to multiple random things … but the song “Worth It All” has truly been playing on repeat in my head for days.

Natalie, Toni, and I have definitely been stretched in multiple aspects of our walk with the Lord recently. Sometimes we get a little discouraged for believing in Jesus and trying to live a life that glorifies Him, granted that feeling lasts all of about .3 seconds – but needless to say, we haven’t felt that way at home in a very very long time. We are very thankful for these opportunities to grow. We are proud to be who we are, daughters of the most-high King.

“Blessed are you when people insult you, persecute you, and falsely say all kinds of evil against you because of me. Rejoice and be glad, because great is your reward in heaven, for in the same way they persecuted the prophets who were before you.” – Matthew 5:11-12

“Rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed. If you are insulted because of the name of Christ, you are blessed, for the Spirit of glory and of God rests on you.” – 1 Peter 4:13-14

[[ Most Important ]]—we are frantically trying to finish all the details for our fantastic spring break trip!! Being a travel agent and making sure we have every detail figured out really isn’t a cakewalk. Katie Ross & Melissa Hays (two of our very best friends) are traveling Europe with us. We are going to Paris, Cork /Dublin, and Barcelona. I will be able to see my sister / Tally in Cork and we will also be in Dublin on St. Patrick’s Day. I can’t even believe the best vacation of my entire life is starting in less than a week!

Also, my right knee has been hurting since our second week here. I’m not exactly sure what is wrong with it; obviously it’s not an emergency. I’m just veryyy ready for the pain to go away. It’s hard to really expect much improvement considering we walk everywhere. The walk to school is 30 minutes. On Tuesday / Wednesday we spend 2 hours walking to and from school and obviously we travel a lot during the weekend. Sooo... If you think of it, I would really appreciate prayers for my knee to heal :)

In spite of all the madness, the Lord’s mercy and love for us continues to prevail over every circumstance.

• I bought my 4th pair of shoes this week. They are silver Nike high tops. According to Kirk, they are "cinderella high tops" ha. We definitely needed a more practical shoe for traveling. Thank you foot locker.
• We traveled to Pisa for our art history class on Friday. Although, I’m by no means an art or history buff – my love for learning about it is growing. The biblical history with each story Kirk tells us about a piece of art or baptistery / cathedral is phenomenal. We serve a mighty King.
• Toni and I were able to sit in a coffee shop with our sweet friend, Karmen, for a couple hours on Friday! This time consisted of some of our favorite activities: drinking cappuccino, talking about Jesus, communicating with workers in English, and laughing.
• We hiked around Cortona on Saturday. It’s the location of the film “Under The Tuscan Sun” and I’m not jokin’ when I say it was absolutely beautiful. One of the prettiest / sunniest days we’ve had yet. It made my heart so happy to be outside, in the sunshine, with some of my favorite people. We even had a half way normal sandwich for lunch – yayyy!
• Today, Sunday, we were able to sleep in, which our bodies desperately needed…. considering starting tomorrow until after spring break we will be going nonstop.
• This afternoon, we went to get coffee with our sweet neighbor, Carlo, and his friend Mirko. They were even kind enough to buy our drinks!! They took use to this Café we haven’t tried yet and were lucky enough to walk around on the roof. The top level was closed today, but since we are “American tourists” they made an exception! :)

Tonight we will go to bed with extremely happy hearts, knowing that our God is worth it all. Every trial, hardship, good & bad experience is worth it all. Living a life for Him is worth it all. Wouldn’t want it any other way. I pray that our actions and words glorify Him every day. Honored to serve a loving and caring creator.

“Be exalted, O God, above the heavens; let your glory be over all the earth.” -Psalm 57:5

“May all who seek you rejoice and be glad in you; may those who love your salvation always say, “Let God be exalted!” – Psalm 70:4

His,

callyn.

God Bless Italy.

[[sorry my words are so jumbled. My mind is kind of all over the place tonight!]]

I absolutely love America. I really am quite obsessed with just about every aspect of our country. But the past week or so I have been feeling an overwhelming amount of American pride. I miss the stars & stripes. If I could wear red, white, and blue every day for the rest of my life – I would!!! I thoroughly enjoy southern accents and prefer them to Italian accents any day. My heart seriously races when I see an American flag over here. It might just be the south that I’m obsessed with, but either way, I feel so fortunate to live in America. Thank you Jesus for a country founded on biblical truths and a history of leaders who turned to God & His word for guidance.

Although I do love America with my whole heart, traveling is something I also really love. I like meeting new people, seeing the different architectural structures & scenery that isn’t available in the states. Italy is not the only other country and culture I’ve visited, but it’s the first culture I’ve actually had to fully submerse myself into. I’ve had to become a part of the culture – not just get by for a week or two. By trying to fit in to the Italian culture, my eyes have been opened to multiple aspects that I do not like, or necessarily agree with. Those specific parts of their culture were really starting to weigh me down. With each passing day, I found myself praising the Lord more and more for allowing me to call the states my home.

After realizing that I would make myself miserable by allowing those things to eat at me, I began praying for new perspective about their culture. I desperately wanted my heart to have a better outlook on living in Italy. For goodness sakes – IT’S ITALY! I’m pretty good at putting my girl pants on, mentally talking myself thorough situations, and dealing with it. But that was the last thing I wanted for this trip, to just “get through it”. This weekend was exactly what I needed. My soul feels incredibly refreshed, like I’m back in the ‘honeymoon’ phase of being in Italy, but it’s not a phase any more.

We took a field trip with our art history to class to Siena. We traveled by bus, allowing us to be still for over an hour and completely take in the absolutely breath taking and captivating country we live in. it was the Tuscany we’ve all seen in movies and dreamt of coming to see. The reality of God’s presence in every nation and every corner of the Earth became all the more evident. I arrived to Siena with an extremely happy heart after listening to music of God’s goodness and viewing His strikingly beautiful creation.

While in Siena, these two boys walked into the same museum as our class and joined on with our lecture. At first you can imagine the confusion we were all experiencing as we saw these boys intently listening to Kirk bestow immense amounts of knowledge on us, but I they were just eager for guidance through the museum – especially in English! The boys were from Georgia and one of them asked me where I was from. Needless to say, “Denton” was the key word and his immediate response was “have you heard of Matt Chandler?” It was quite possibly the closest to home I’ve felt the entire trip. I’m half way across the world, in Siena, in a museum, & met a boy from the states who listens to Matt! I felt like it was kind of the Lord’s way of reminding me He is with me every step of the way, He knew exactly when I needed encouragement. Praise Jesus for sweet reminders of His love for me & His people.

After Siena, we spent our weekend in Rome. Oh my landddsss -- absolutely astonishing city! There really is no way my words could ever do it justice. Walking through the Sistine chapel, Vatican Museum, and St. Peter’s Basilica as a believer in Jesus Christ truly was life changing. Being able to see the exact spot that Peter was crucified made the reality and weight of Christ being a human being, once living on the same earth we do, a thousand times more real. It was kind of mind blowing to think how many hundreds of thousands of people visit the Vatican every year, perhaps they don’t believe in Jesus – but there’s no way to walk through those buildings and just simply see art -- all created about the same man, Jesus. Multiple artists created those works of art for God’s glory without receiving any payment. Simply Amazing.

My love for Jesus grows deeper and deeper with every day & experience we have. Even though Italy is no America– it’s definitely stirring my heart for the Lord. There’s something unique about being taken back in history and knowing that that's the same God we serve today. Can't help but Praise Jesus every step of the way!

My new perspective is also teaching me to enjoy eating gelato with my best friends, treasure long talks on the train getting to know other OU students, embrace being a college student by staying in hostels & receiving discounts, and fully feel the presence of the Lord every step of our journey here in Italia.

lovin' Italy more each day,

callyn.

Hope For The Cure.

[[This post has nothing to do with Italy]]

I know that anyone who reads this blog cares about my life and wants to know what’s going on. A huge part of my life, as almost anyone knows, is supporting breast cancer awareness.

This past November, my dream of walking in the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer 3-Day for the Cure came true!!!! Toni and I raised $4,800 and walked side by side for 60 miles. This event surpassed every expectation I had and truly was the single best weekend of my entire life. During the first day, we asked these sweet women to take our photo and had no idea that we would soon be great friends with all of them. They were apart of the team called “The Hopefuls” and welcomed us to their team with open arms. One of the women, Stephanie, was a two-time breast cancer survivor and the epitome of a fighter.

Stephanie completely amazed me every step of the way. She was nothing less than bold and beautiful. Her trust, faith, and hope in our Savior was so evident – she didn’t even have to say she loved Jesus without us knowing there was something very striking about her life. She's one of those people you're automatically drawn to. She never once complained about the pain of walking, always had a smile on her face, and was proud to be a survivor. She has been an incredible inspiration to my life and I can only pray that if I am ever faced with a trial as great as hers, that I would handle it with such grace and dignity as she has.

A couple days ago Stephanie went in for a biopsy and found out her breast cancer has returned. Of course she has been incredibly positive about the situation. She said “I know this is just another time in my life for God to continue His work in me. His ways are so much greater than mine and I will look to Him for a continued healing! It’s time to pick up those pink boxing gloves again”

I am writing this on behalf of Stephanie and her sweet family. Please pray for a miraculous healing, sustainable joy during this hardship, unshakable peace, and for her to feel our sweet Saviors arms wrapped tightly around her. Can’t wait for her to be a 3x survivor !!!!!

hope for the cure,

callyn.

praying for the cure, always.

Transformed Heart.

Okay, so I have a confession. I haven’t updated in forever because I haven’t exactly been able to process the past week very well. My heart was really heavy & I wasn’t able to identify the cause. It wasn’t necessarily that I was home sick or desperately missed anything specific from the states – I was just being shaken to the core about my life. At first I just tried to push it aside, look for the positive in every situation and know that the Lord had me here for a purpose. Once that didn’t really work, I moved to step b -- pro-actively trying to figure out what was wrong instead of ignoring it.

With all of that said, we traveled to Venice this weekend [incredible weekend / beautiful beyond words city], so I had a lot of time to think about what was going on during our travels…

I feel like this decision to study abroad is extremely selfish and it is absolutely driving me crazy. This entire semester is about me. My parents are paying thousands of dollars to ship me off to explore Europe / further my education. They don’t get to see all the pretty buildings, churches, or experience these once in a lifetime adventures – just me.

I know that my parents want nothing me than for me to be here and are very excited I have this opportunity, but at the same time, it makes me sick to think of their sacrifices for this little self-centered trip. Most of the time I would rather be at home raising awareness for breast cancer / LOVE146 or spending time with my Make A Wish kids. My heart desires to make a difference in people’s lives, I want to be apart of history in the making and know that I’m not an ignorant American that didn’t help make the world a better place. I want my life to be a bold statement of trust and faith in our Savior. I’ve discovered one of my favorite things about Susan G Komen, LOVE146, Make A Wish and any non-profit organization is that they prove there is still goodness in the world. It is easy to get swallowed up by the natural disasters, broken lives, and evil that surrounds us without taking a stand against it.

We’ve been in Italy for 17 days and the reality of how quickly time will pass is setting in. For the most part, regretfully, this trip has been exactly what it sounds like, “all about callyn”, and I’m not going to live like that any longer. The Lord has convicted me that my days are extremely fleeting and I’m in Italy with these 32 other OU students to make a difference. Although I’m not in the states able to pour my time into non-profit organizations – I have the opportunity to boldly love 32 other people who are my “family” for the next few months. I came into this situation knowing this was my calling for the semester, but I never thought about how I would be stripped of every other thing I typically spread my time between. This trip isn’t about traveling to beautiful cities, seeing historical art, and it’s definitely not about learning the Italian language (thankfully!)--- because if it was, I would be nothing less than miserable. Those things don’t make my heart happy – but fiercely loving God’s people for exactly who they are & where they are is one of my greatest joys. My desire is to be a light in this country and show people the life changing love & mercy of my perfect Savior.

My heavy heart originated from the fact that I felt like I wasn’t changing the world – I was just being of the world. My heart’s desire is to entirely invest myself into something / someone greater than myself. I want to leave Italy with a transformed life and not because of some phenomenal art I saw – but because I saw the hand of Christ work in mighty ways.

I’m thankful that Jesus has opened my eyes and ears to my selfish ways. He loves me enough to restore my heart. I’m grateful that He makes all things new and daily gives me a new perspective on my life. He hasn’t forgotten about my heart’s desire while I’m in Italy. His purpose and ways are higher than mine and I cannot even wait to see where He takes me this semester.

transformed by His love,

callyn.

Psalm 107:8 – “Let them give thanks to the Lord for His lovingkindness.”

PS: don't forget to be reading Nat & Toni's blogs! :) I'm so thankful for their incredible abilities to document this trip so perfectly. They, by far, have been the biggest blessings of this semester and I'm so thankful we are able to walk down this spiritual / emotional journey together while in Italy. Praise Jesus for their faithfulness, love, and selflessness as friends to me. I'm insanely lucky.