I heart Saturday mornings and...

I heart MAIL: I love swinging the door open at the end of a day to see whats fallen through the mail slot. I look forward to that moment everyday! Sometimes I wake up and say, "Bri, do you think we will get any fun mail today!?" I don't know what my deal is with the mail...I even wave to every mail carrier that I see when I am out and about. I feel a connection with them:) The best is after we've been away for awhile and there is a pile waiting for us when we return, like this:

This is the mail we received after being away in Colorado for 7 weeks! Can you even imagine how excited I was!
I heart weddings! It's SO fun to see people get married that you know will LOVE eachother well and live to bring God glory together! Here are 2 recent examples of this:


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2 weddings already in 2010!

I heart all animals with long noses(P.S. I don't know why I just do!):






I heart AMERICAN IDOL! I seriously get so pumped up about it!(I've been asking around A LOT and still haven't found anyone else that is in to it!) Brian calls the finale of American Idol, "Brooke's superbowl" That's how intense I get. I bawled/screamed with joy when Kris Allen made it to the top 2 last season. And, i'm sure you can imagine what happened when he won. I know it's a little crazy! (I just love to see people go for their dream!) WOO. But, this year i'm not really able to watch it because of different responsibilties on Tues & Wed nights....so, Brian and I went to a thrift store the other night and bought a VHS player for $2.99 so we could tape both nights!(Brian really gets into AI with me too which makes it even more fun).


I think that's enough hearts for now!

A & A

Brian and I are pretty excited about Saturday(January 30, 2010)! It's the day that 2 of our very dear friends will marry each other! YAY! We've been waiting so long for this day to come and it is finally so CLOSE.

Brian and Adam have been best buds forever!! Here's Brian and Adam the summer after freshman year doing who knows what:


Here's Adam giving the toast at our wedding:


April and I met in 2005 and have been great friends ever since. We even got to hang out together 2 summers in East Asia. Here we are in East Asia in 2006 at a Starbucks of course:


and here we are in 2008:


A little over a year ago Adam & April MET and fell in love. This picture was taken exactly one year ago to their wedding date! (This is the night before their official 1st date!)


This weekend we will celebrate them and thank God that He brought them together!

We love you, Adam & April!

Outback Steakhouse.

A couple weeks ago when the mail came we received a wonderful surprise. A very sweet couple had sent us a $50 giftcard to Outback. Huge blessing. We were SO thrilled because just that morning we were talking about wanting to go out and do something special together.

We made all our plans that afternoon around the dinner location: Outback Steakhouse. Throughout our afternoon of Christmas shopping we kept saying, "I can't believe we get to be treated to Outback tonight!!" After an *exhausting* afternoon of shopping we finally arrive at Outback. As we are walking into the restaurant Brian asks me if I have the gift card on me and I assure him that I do. I had been glancing at it most of the day with excitement! We sit down and order our Dr. Peppers and I decide to pull the glourious gift card out for us to look at again. It wasn't there this time. I dug through my purse as my heart was breaking. Where on earth did our gift card go? I tearfully looked at Brian and said, "Our giftcard GONE!". He takes my purse and looks for himself (usually he finds what I have assumed is lost and gone forever). Not this time. Brian runs to the car to see if it's in there. I tell our waitress the scenario that is going down. She doesn't care...but when Brian returns with a super sad look on his face I tell her that we need to go and find the lost gift card(I assure her we will be back). That means retrace every step we took during our Christmas shopping "outing" is my word for it "nightmare" is Brian's word for it. We get in the car, I cry really hard...mostly because I thought we were about to have a SWEET dinner and get to have our special date. Instead, we are both bummed and somewhat hopeless about finding our beloved giftcard. We regroup and map out a plan:

Brooke will go to Target(every aisle!)
Brooke will then run across the parking lot
to Macys and look in every section we were in.
(which I think was every section but childrens and furniture)

Brian will go to Barnes and Noble and JCP and look through all the parking lots.

We break and go to our seperate destinations. We looked in EVERY little spot. I even had the Target customer service guy page every person on the floor about our lost giftcard. He wasn't happy to do it... but I was pretty happy to hear on the speakers, "Attention Target guests and Employees has anyone seen an Outback giftcard laying on the floor?" Sadly, nothing.
Run to Macys. nothing.
call Brian. He has found nothing.
I retrace his steps in B & N becauseI thought maybe it would be there. nothing. An Hour and a half has gone by at this point.

I leave B & N with a deep sadness. I know it's strange because it's just a giftcard. But we were SO pumped about this giftcard. I had been praying too during this whole thing that some how some way we would find it, that God would just guide our steps. But then again who wouldn't take a $50 giftcard that they found?

by this point Brian's phone is dead. He is somewhere in JCP looking. I decide to wait for him outside- it wasn't too cold and there were pretty Christmas decorations out and a Huge Christmas tree. I walk around it and listen to the music that's playing for all the people walking by. And as the music starts to build(i'm not even kidding about the music building) I see in the blessed distance our giftcard. Can you even believe it? I take off skipping and grab it and stare at it in disbelief. I think I even pumped the air with my fist. I immediately take off RUNNNNING to JCP with the biggest smile on my face. I ran through about 17 different sections before spotting Brian. There were probably 50 Christmas shoppers between me and Bri but I yelled. "BRIAN, LOOOOOOOK!" I threw the giftcard in the air....everyone looking at us. Brian just starts shaking his head and meets me in the mens shoes dept. I fill him in on all that had just happened. We celebrated and thanked God for the giftcard that was once lost but was now found! It was a good moment.

I'm thankful that God cares about the little things in our lives- He will even direct us back to lost giftcards.

We returned to Outback and our waitress and had a great date night!

Celebrating Semester ONE!

It has been a great semester of trusting God to start campus ministries in the Tidewater area! We are SO thankful for all God did. Here are a few highlights!



When we work, we work. When we pray, God works." -Hudson Taylor(Spent 51 years sharing Christ in China)

new mornings.

I wanted to chat for a little bit about why my blog is called, "Each Morning is New." It really just goes straight back to Lamentations 3:22-24,
22 Because of the LORD's great love we are not consumed,
for his compassions never fail.

23 They are new every morning;
great is your faithfulness.

24 I say to myself, "The LORD is my portion;
therefore I will wait for him."

Or

God's loyal love couldn't have run out,
his merciful love couldn't have dried up.
They're created new every morning.
How great your faithfulness!
I'm sticking with God (I say it over and over).
(Message version)

Where would we be without this LOVE and without this MERCY? It's there for us every morning which is basically saying every day that there is a day- God is for you, God loves you. There hasn't been a day yet that didn't come with a morning. There hasn't been a day yet that God wasn't for us and wanting to be involved in our day-to-day lives. That's comforting.

Also, I love that each new day really holds a new story. Like yesterday when I woke up I knew generally the plan for the day but I didn't know that I would get to spend part of my night on the phone with a dear friend in NYC or that later that night I would get to hear from a friend that's in East Asia, or that while I was at Sam's Club I would get to talk to an elderly man about life while we were both in the *long* pharmacy line, or that my husband was going to take me out to a fun dinner!

So, the blog title reminds me of these simple yet profound truths. And, it makes me want to make the most of each day that He gives me. It's my hearts desire to start off each morning with a simple prayer--"God, today is a new day from you. Help me to make the most of these hours you've given me today. Help me see people the way you see them and love them the way you love them. I don't want to get caught up doing things that don't matter." I've found that when I do that the day is more full & rich & purposeful. Without question.

things i love, lately....

*Have you heard of Francis Chan? He is the pastor of Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley, CA. He also wrote Crazy Love and Forgotten God. The second one I just finished reading- it was excellent. excellent. For the past 2 months I have taken Francis with me on my morning walks(via the ipod of course). His sermons are all straight Bible teaching and have really spurred me on. He also talks a lot about how living for yourself will get you no where. Put a couple Francis Chan talks on your IPOD- it will encourage your heart to live more boldly for Christ.

*Today is Oct 31st and it's 82 degrees. i love that.

*I love reunions:


I got to spend the evening of my birthday with some very special women. I was so thankful. That same evening I got to spend time with my favorite Japanese couple and their baby:

*Retreating with our staff team. We spent 2 cloudy days at a lake house but it was SO much fun:













*1 Peter Chapter One. So much good stuff just in one chapter. I love it.

*Saturday mornings to read blogs with a latte. Since I love paper products I love this blog: http://parcelpost.wordpress.com/ among many others.

Dog Days of October.

So, about 3 weeks ago I was scanning through a local Va Beach newspaper while waiting for a friend to arrive for our coffee date. To my surprise I saw a small ad that said, "DACHSHUND BEAUTY PAGEANT OCTOBER 17th on 24th ST VA BEACH." WHAT? REALLY? As you can imagine this was amazing news to me. So, I immediately circled the day on the calendar and began the count down.

I just love dachshunds.

Brian and I arrived about an hour before the pageant started(I wasn't sure what to expect so I just wanted to make sure I could get as close to these pups as possible!) When we arrived there were probably 4 dachshunds already there(with their owners, you know). Over the next 40 or so minutes 20 other dachshunds strolled in(most of them wearing cute little outfits). I was in absolute heaven. There was one point that all the cuteness got so intense that I shed a tear.

Here is a glimpse into this blessed day:






















Here are the the pageant judges:


Each dog and owner had to come onto the stage and share the dogs name and show any special tricks that the dog could do:






Here's the dogs waiting to hear who will be the winner!


And, here are the winners: 1st place is the far left. She was fancy! She could jump hoops and twirl!

Needless to say- it was a great afternoon. Oh and about half way through this event Brian leans over to me and says, "did you notice that that we are the only ones here that actually just came to watch- everyone else has a dog involved in this thing!?" ha. good times. just supporting the community events, you know.