Monday, February 23, 2009

HAPPY BIRTHDAY BUCKAROO!!!!!!!

This day marks the 15th year of the day that Mr. David Gary Gaston was born into this world! The earth trembled a bit that day as a fiery red head with energy to burn took his place in history. We are so thankful to call him brother, son, friend, "David!" or, as some new folks might - "Duncle". Whatever you call him I know that this kid has left an indelible mark on our lives. So to honor that sentiment, let's give a few of the highlights of the past 15 years of freckled goodness. I'll toss a few out there and please, for blog's sake, please add some of your own personal gems. Oh and by the way, Happy Birthday David! We love you so much and are so proud of the young man your turning into. Now go puck those chin hairs and have a great day!
  • the time I tooted and blamed it on you (thanks for covering for me)
  • the time we came in the house and you were hanging from the banister holding on for dear life
  • doing the "dolphin dive" in the pool with ya
  • walking along the Trinity Trail and seeing an Ewok in the bushes
  • assassinating our own teammates on online gaming
  • the time you shaved your legs at Gerald and Brendas
Ok so I've got the ball rolling here......keep 'em comin'!

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Where..

...Should we eat tomorrow?

Tough Crowd

You guys are a TOUGH crowd. I thought all the picking on me was going to just be a family gathering thing, but evidently it's going to cross over into the blogging world also! ;)

Anyways, I think most of you want to hear all the details on London, so here it goes!

I left on a Thursday morning. Larissa was fabulous and came to pick me up in her adorable new SUV. We got there without hitting any traffic, and then I zipped right through security leaving me with about two hours to wait before my plane took off. To be entirely honest with you guys, I wasn't thrilled about the idea of sitting alone with nothing to do for two hours, but it turned out great! A friend I hadn't talked to in ages randomly called me and we wound up talking for almost the entire wait, and then my plane began boarding early!

I wound up landed my favorite seat on the plane - emergency exit window seat. I was so excited! AND to make it even better the plane was pretty empty so I ended up with just one other person sharing my row, and God is so cool becuase he sat a very cool believer named Carolyn next to me! Carolyn and her husband are involved with church planting and ministry in Boston - where we are sending a team to help with the opening of a new church planting connected with NETS this Fall. She had been in the DFW area for a conference that dealt with different aspects of church planting, ministry development, church connectivity, etc... She also has a daughter who is about my age who is involved in ministering to the homeless and inner city youth in Boston. We wound up talking for nearly the entire plane ride which was very fun and I learned a TON about what God is doing up in the Boston/ New England area!

We landed in North Carolina about forty minutes ahead of schedule, which left me with a nearly SIX hour layover! The time actually went by a lot faster than I thought it would which was really great! I went and found the gate I was supposed to be flying out of, and then popped over to the Starbucks where I wound up chatting with the barista (baristo?) for a little while - this was the first of MANY times people would try to guess where I was from - he guessed Canada, which definitely wasn't the strangest guess I had during my trip! He then taught me about the Americano, the "skinny", and a few other drinks and gave me a little phamplet that explains a TON about the million different ways you can create your "personal Starbucks beverage". I knew there were a lot of ways you could make Starbucks coffee, but I had no idea there were as many ways as there are, and I would guess that the phamplet only covers part of them! We wound up chatting about work, school, life... for a while and then after that I just settled in, talked to a few people on the phone, and then had a really great quiet time. Since I've been so busy lately it was really nice to have time to really study what I was (Esther) for more than half an hour and just have time to think about everything that has been going on in my life! Then for some reason the area my gate was in was completely dead! I felt like I was in the Terminal for a while which was a little creepy for a few minutes, because I was completely alone in this HUGE space, but on the bright side I was really able to spread out and not feel like I had to have my luggage and purse glued to me the entire time like I did when tons of people were around.

My plane to London also didn't fill up the entire way, so I had another trip where I got the window seat and only one other person on my row. This time the lady who shared my row with me was there on a girls weekend with her two best friends, and they were going to visit her daughter who was studying abroad. These girls were hillarious and kept telling me I made them feel incredibly cool for talking to them which cracked me up because I really think anyone would chat with them! They were so excited about their trip and were possibly the most organized group I have ever seen. They had every minute of their trip scheduled down to the minute. I felt SO bad for them on Monday when it began snowing like crazy, because I'm sure that threw their schedule off a LOT!

Since I ended up with my own row after we all reorganized and moved around, I was able to get a little sleep on the plane which was really great since I normally can't sleep on planes at all. We landed early in London where the sun was just rising and a beautiful day was there to greet us!

More on Day One in London to come...

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Worth the wait

I think a lot of things that are worthwhile in life are worth waiting for, BUT I do apologize for making you guys wait THIS long for a post. Although you do all know that I'm just a phone call away (or just around the corner!) so you don't have to wait for a blog post to hear about things! ;O)

London was fabulous! It was an adventure from the very beginning and I still can't believe how much we managed to see and do while I was there! I just finished my last Twisted bar today and feel like I may need to go back to get some more before too long... :) I still can't believe I was there and am back already, but it was very fun and I decided it is going to take either a REALLY long post, or multiple posts to write about it all, so get excited about more to come soon...!

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Question?

Why has our blog become a base for abunch of cheap spin offs to spin off from (Katie, Ashliegh, Lizzie, Katie, Stephanie) It's not like our original blog is overflowing or anything. Post here and let your own blogs die and long painfull death like the original is (Or was, sorda) suffering itself.

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

EPIC WIN

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ur0LENvY5TE

Monday, February 9, 2009

Something to blog about...

SOOO today I was at dance and fell out of this partner flippy thingy and I think I might have broken my nose. It hurts and is kind of purple and blue, but dad thinks it will be okay. it is just very painful! but luckly no work tonight!

and now no one can complain about not hearing about it. I blogged. =)

and now im going to go find ice and be lazy since I have found a good excuse!
I love you all! and I am fabulous besides the whole nose issue. but hopefully it will not stay weird colored for long and everything will be alright!

-Lizzy

Thursday, February 5, 2009

PROBABLY

I thought I'd throw a post onto this blog since it's the new hip thing to do...everyone fell prey to the threat of not getting to babysit Maylee- now Clint has us wrapped around his little finger- although we all know who's finger he's wrapped around...

Steph came to visit this weekend, and I was so exhausted after all of the super long fun days we had that I fell asleep at 8:30 the day she left and slept until 9 the next morning. We definitely touristed the town up until we dropped. Monday the entire city of London shut down because of three inches of snow (a laughable concept in New York). It was really pretty though- and pretty fun to watch stephanie attempt to walk in it...Okay that's a little mean, but you all know you might have at least smiled at it...

Classes are about to get into the thick of it- we have midterms in two weeks and essays and projects are abounding, but all the same London is turning out to be one of the best experiences I've ever had! I absolutely love the class sizes, and while it demands more work from me, I'm actually learning the material. Getting out of my soccer bubble in New York has really forced me to meet new people around here in London, and that has been really great too! I haven't met too many people from London, but I have met a lot of people from NYU that I would probably never have met had I not come here.

Collin facebook chatted me last night and he brought up something entirely novel to me (although I guess I should have seen it earlier...) It was like he said it and I was like Oh, wow. Yeah...that's definitely true. He said when he came to the UK it seemed very dark spritually- in addittion to being dark in the weather sense. As soon as he said it I kind of laughed (though I had to admit that it was entirely true..) But isn't it funny that God took me from being a stubborn kid in Texas where being a Christian is normal, and I didn't really want it, to London where it is about the weirdest thing these people can think of, and now I am more on fire about it than ever before? Who said God doesn't have a sense of humor.

I brought this up because I wanted people to pray for this city- and me in it. Literally the buses declare that there is no God. "There probably is no God, so stop worrying and enjoy your life." When I read it, I laughed, because it said probably. It was as if God would not allow them to declare that he didn't exist...I read an article abuot it and they said they put the probably in there so that they didn't sound dogmatic, I beg to differ.

This city is fun, people are nice, but Collin is right- it's dark...so, I guess it shouldn't be all that hard to be a light right? The candles always do shine brightest on christmas eve when Ken shuts the lights off.

I'm cooking tacos on Saturday when Raquel is coming in from Oxford- should bea fun weekend :-D

Hope everything is going well in Cowtown, and you're all adjusting the cold...Bundle miss Maylee up and give her a hug for me!

Katie

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

first things first...HAPPY BIRTHDAY LARISSA AND ASHLEIGH!!!!!!!!!!

also steph is home safely so thats very good too. im still waiting for my detailed stories but I must wait for her friend to leave first before I can hound her for every little detail...
for my life....
Dance=Stress. LOTS of things to learn before march 25 and 26. LOTS!!!
so my time is consumed with homework/studying, work, and rehearsals. in my free time I try to just sit and be lazy so my body has a break from the maddness...or I am rehearsing everything so I am ready for ACDFA...and of course March 25/26 performances.
along with that ive been getting sick lately...so I ended up skipping some of my dance classes today, so now i'll be even more behind...but thats okay.
Greatfully my teachers are very nice people and understand everthing. so mark your calanders...MARCH 25 and 26...they are the same show on 2 different days so hopefully ya'll can make one or both! =)
also....
I think I deserved to be raised on the babysitting list. 1st I posted the day of, and apologize for neglecting this! and 2nd I would do anything for that sweet little girl. that's gotta count for something! =) not to mention I was the first babysitter for Maylee...so Larissa obviously believes in me more than clint! but I still do LOVE YOU both very much!

now I am going to sleep...
I love you all.

-Lizzy

My turn

Ok

Oh the craziness!!

So upon reading Clint's post, I had three thoughts: one, Clint is crazy!! Also, two, I can't lose babysitting privileges before I've gotten them!!! Three, why do I find out things so late? AKA Steph leaving for London and Katie's letter that didn't go to my e-mail (funny enough it said that I am out of the loop =p)
Clint said post about your sorority, so I will do that. Our sorority started the semester with a BANG. Our first day of school was also first day of rush (rush= meeting potential pledges while having fun events such as a scavenger hunt or worship night, and giving both sides a chance to get to know each other and see if it's something they'd want to be a part of). After rush, we had meetings to decide how many pledges we wished to take and if we should take a lot or a little. Typically, a spring class is small (mine was 5 girls) and this time around we have 11 pledges. I also got assigned the role of big sister to one of the pledges, whose name is Anne McHattie. She's really sweet and hopefully I can help her through this stressful time known as pledging.
Matt's car issue is another topic I want to bring up. He finally got the call that the mechanic in Waco will not be able to fix his car. They are towing the car up and the mechanic will mail a check for a refund on what Matt already paid. The mechanics in Fort Worth said it would be an estimated 8,000 dollars to repair it!! So Matt and his Dad determined they would either sell it for scraps or whatever they can do, and split the remaining car payments between the two of them. Matt will be buying hopefully this Thursday or Saturday. It's bad but it's good too because this could have been resolved a long time ago, but he will have less to pay off overall. There's always a silver linning, well at least if you look long enough for it.
Tomorrow is my birthday and next week is promising to be a bit stressful because I will start working in the school's preschool for one class and tutoring for another class. My monday's have increased from 9:30-5:30 for school to 8:00-5:30, and Wednesday will become 8 to 8:30pm with approximately 3 hour gap overall in the day... so please pray that the transition is easy and I don't get overwhelmed because this is all neccessary in order to graduate with my teaching degree...
Love, love, love you all and I especially enjoyed opening my e-mail and receiving a beautiful picture of Larissa and Maylee. Hopefully my babysitting privileges have now been reinstated.
~Ashleigh

UPDATING = LOVE

So the Gastons are dropping the ball and it's making me and Lil Miss crosseyed! We all have very busy lives but come on! I have two jobs, a newborn, a wife who I smother, two dogs (ok, one dog and a rat) and still I find time to blog and share my life. Ashleigh is finding out that Stephie is leaving for London a day before she leaves. C'mon folks! Share your lives! I've seen all of you type and its ridiculous how fast you all are. It looks like you're swatting ants on the keyboard. Use your gift of type.

What's the most recent paintball excursion David? What's the scoop with your sorority Ash? London Steph? Who's this Jason character? Matt, what's with the car situation (that could be a novel)? Liz, what's going on with school? Try posting a list of recitals for your college dance group! So we can attend. And oh Mr. Gary, completely snubbing the blog? Being a spectator? That's not setting a good blog example for your kiddos. Ha!

So let's get this thang moving! People want to know what's up with you! I'm planning to teach Miss Maylee to read using this blog.

IN EFFECT: ALL BABYSITTING WILL BE DENIED PENDING SOMEONE POSTS ON THE GASTON BLOG!!!! (I realize this doesn't really effect Lizzo because she's so far down on the list but your rank will go up Liz if you do post)
In brotherly love,
Clintagious