The Music in my Head

   I have always been a lover of music. When I was really little, I would rock out on my Mickey mouse record player like a champ and a little after that I would proudly carry around my case of cassette tapes decorated with stickers. The way I've played music has changed over the years, but my love for it has only grown.
    Music is usually closely connected to a memory for me. I love how songwriters can say what I'm thinking or feeling in such a creative way. To this day, if I hear "Wide Open Spaces" by the Dixie Chicks, I think of the first moments in my car alone after I got my driver's license...because that is the first song I played. It's like that with so many songs. Familiar music starts playing and I'm taken back to moments. Even the title of the blog is taken from the Matt Wertz song lyric..."Everything in Between."
   I also stamp certain anticipated moments or big events with a song. Usually, anticipated events in my life make me think of certain songs. Sometimes this turns into making playlist...like for road trips...and sometimes, it just means playing a certain song to get ready. My time in Vancouver is almost over (like I leave tomorrow!), and of course my mind browses through the music in my head.
  Today, it settle on a song by Needtobreathe called Keep Your Eyes Open. The lyrics are below:

If you could soldier on

Headstrong into the storm
I’ll be here waiting on the other side
Don’t look back
The road is long
The first days of the war are gone
Take back your former throne and turn the tide

Cause if you never leave home, never let go
You’ll never make it to the great unknown till you
Keep your eyes open, my love
So tell me you’re strong, tell me you see
I need to hear it, can you promise me to
Keep your eyes open, my love

Just past the circumstance
The first light, a second chance
No child could ever dance the way you do, oh
Tear down the prison walls
Don’t start the curtain call
Your chains will never fall until you do

Cause if you never leave home, never let go
You’ll never make it to the great unknown till you
Keep your eyes open, my love
So show me your fire, show me your heart
You know I’ll never let you fall apart if you
Keep your eyes open, my love

Open up your eyes
The weight is unbroken
Open up your eyes
Keep your eyes open

Don’t let the night become the day
Don’t take the darkness to the grave
I know pain is just a place
The will has been broken
Don’t let the fear become the hate
Don’t take the sadness to the grave
I know the fight is on the way
When the sides have been chosen

Cause if you never leave home, never let go
You’ll never make it to the great unknown
Open up your eyes
Keep your eyes open
So tell me you’re strong, tell me you see
I need to hear it, can you promise me to
Keep your eyes open, my love
So show me your fire, show me your heart
You know I’ll never let you fall apart if you
Keep your eyes open, my love

  So here's to a new place, new people, new lessons, new ways to be stretched and changed and made better.  Here's to keeping my eyes open for it....and knowing through it all that He will not let me fall apart....because He is the one holding me together....see ya on the flip side!!

Here's the Music Video

Remember that time we hiked for 8 hours?!?!?

    So growing up I was never really a hiker. Vacations were spent mostly at the beach rather than the mountains...and I still would rather have it that way (judge me if you will...I'm a beach girl and proud of it). I've never been against hiking. When friends have wanted to go, I've always been up to the challenge, but I'm not the person who looks for places to hike everywhere she goes.
    Well if you're living in Vancouver...hiking is everywhere...and there are amazing things to see while you're doing it. There are pretty famous hikes here and one of the best ones happens on the Chief.

 

If you look closely, you can see 3 different peaks that kind of look like stair steps...simple right?? I mean hikes are just casual walks through the woods and every now and then you might have to go up hill, right?? Man I was so wrong. As in the words of Honey badger (ask someone if you don't get the reference), the Chief don't play!! And it doesn't care that you have been doing Insanity regularly...it's gonna kick your but anyways...and its gonna have fun doing it. 

                                               

 The hike is pretty much straight up and like climbing stairs that were designed for a giant. At the really intense parts...there are chains and latters to help you up the mountain. I had no idea what I was in for. We did all three peaks...because after all...only wimps do less!! There may have been a couple times where I wanted to sit down, cross my arms, and say "I'm not going any further," but thankfully I kept putting on foot in front of the other....and it led to views like this:

 And this one!! I'm sitting (or trying not to die) on peak one and looking at peak 2 and 3

 

We even made a new friend...

 

 By about hour 6-7...it just gets comical that you have been walking and climbing for so long, but when you get to the top of that last peak you pretty much feel like this: