...hanging onto hope.... falling into grace...

This is Wonderful as Loving Goes

2005-10-30T20:18:00.000-05:00

The Rumors are True!!!!

As of October 21st 2005 at approximately 11:30pm, we are engaged!! We shall no longer keep any of you in suspense as explode with joy and excitement and share with you all the illicit details of the night of all nights : ) Are you ready?

He Said:

So the night started out with us getting in the car to go to our nice romantic dinner. As we were pulling out I realized I forgot my cell phone(I needed my phone to call Gaz to get the setup in motion). So I say tell Sarah I have to go back to the house because I forgot something that I needed. So I took the chance to play her all night. I go back in the house to get my phone but I made it look like I was getting the ring so she would think I was going to ask her at dinner. I get back in the car and immediately she's asking me what was going on. She was saying I was acting very strange and she said I was making her very nervous. But I played it off as nothing. So we get to the restuarant and all night I'm playing as if I'm nervous. I keep checking my coat pocket and looking around at the server and playing like I'm going to ask her at the restuarant. So I start playing with her ring finger and she starts freaking out. I just play like I didn't know what I was doing. So it comes time to pay the bill and I'm asking Sarah if she wants dessert. She says no but I keep pushing the issue like something was going to happen at dessert. So she says yeah sure if you want some but I counteract it with a big fat NO! So as we're leaving I go to the washroom to call Gaz to see if all is set up the way I want it. Low and behold Drew and Cho haven't even gotten to the house yet! So I start freaking out. Now it's time to stall. So I come out and ask Sarah if she would like to take a nice ride along lakeshore with me. Off we go. We are driving for about an hour and then we decide to go home. By this time any hope Sarah had of this night being it was completely shattered. All this was the plan baby! We pull in the driveway and come in the house. There's nothing stirring not even a mouse...except of the faint glow of 100 candles flickering on the wall. And the beautiful sound of a cd made of her favorite love songs. Sarah by now is wondering what is going on. So I take her hand and say I have one more surprise up my sleeve and lead her down the stairs. We follow a trail of rose petals down stairs to the basement glowing with candles and resounding with love songs. Now her mind is blown and all I hear out of her mouth is the girly giggles and squeels. Sitting there was a bottle of champagne and a bouquet of flowers. I take her and we start dancing. As I try to break away to get the ring she grips me even tighter and squeels that she won't let me go. But I convince her to let me go. I pull the ring out and get down on one knee and ask her to marry me. She said no....just joking she definately said yes. I never doubted. But all the same I almost wet myself because I finally realized that the night you think about all your life has finally come.
I kept saying that it felt like Christmas when i was a kid. The best night of my life. It was the perfect night, nothing could have made it better. I'm forever going to remember that night. Always. I couldn't have written, edited and then re-written a better story.

She Said:

Oh to say he had me going is a gigantic understatement!!! And I quote "So I took the chance to play her all night" and that is exactly what he did....I was soo nervous from the moment he forgot "the ring" (a.k.a. the cellphone). So the night begins as we leave for dinner and as Billy said he pretended to forget an unmentionable object in the house...from that moment on I didn't quite know what to do with myself and my mind started going crazy as i was trying to prepare and brace myself for one of the biggest moments of my life...and as many of you know that is pretty impossible...it sent me on a wild goose chase guessing game that was on fast forward in my brain from the moment we left until the moment we got home...so as he ran back in the house I started picturing all the possible scenarios that lay before me...and I was convinced he was going to ask me at the restaurant. We begin driving and low and behold we hit traffic...8 o'clock on a friday night..only in Toronto...he starts getting worried about being late for dinner which is making me even more nervous than I already am...during our drive he asks me to turn off my cell phone which only increased my suspicions.....we finally get to the restaurant....we sit down for dinner, but he seems to not like the restaurant so then I'm getting all worried cause I'm thinking oh no he's going to ask me to marry him in the middle of this restaurant and he doesn't even like it....the waitress takes us to our sits and we sit down the retaurant is really busy and so there are tons of people very close to us and of course I start going through all the scenarios in my head of what are all the people aound us going to do if he gets down and asks me to marry him in front of everyone...and then I'm thinking what the heck am I going to do if he asks me in front of everyone...where is he going to get down on one knee cause there is not very much room around us....maybe he's given the ring to our waiter...Billy at this point is totally playing it all up and looking all anxious and scanning the restaurant constantly looking at our waiter looking around....running back and forth to the "washroom"....I'm asking him if he's okay because i'm slightly worried at this point and totally on edge....so we order and like any normal restaurant our waiter begins bringing our food...however I feel the need to thoroughly scan any and all plates that come to our table to make sure I don't accidentally ingest my so called engagement ring....eventually we make it through our meal with no mishaps until dessert time comes and Billy asks me if I want to order dessert...not wanting to have him spend gazillions of dollars i automatically say no but then quickly retract that

decision thinking that oh no what if he's got it all planned to come out with the dessert and I've just said I don't want any..so quickly I add in oh sure I would love some dessert if you would like some dessert and he hums and hahs for a moment and then says nope I'm good ( i must preface dessert with the fact that he is sitting across the table telling me how much he loves me while playing with my ring finger so I am totally convinced that it's about to happen any moment...as he plays with my finger I should add that I kept losing my train of thought and trying to maintain normal coversation was getting quite difficult) so we get up to leave the restaurant and he says let's go for a ride by the lake....at this point I breathe a sigh of nervous relief because I am not sure that he is not going to ask me tonight and I shall enjoy a nice relaxed drive along the lake...so we drive...and then we drive some more...and then some more...then I start falling asleep and Billy seems tired too and tired of driving so we decide to head home...by now I am totally convinced that it's not happening tonight so I sleepily get out of the car and go into the house, all the lights are out except for a glow coming from the basement...and then I hear music and I turn around and say to Billy what is that music and he takes my hand and says I have a surprise up my sleeve so he leads me down the rose petal covered stairs and takes me into the basement that is completely covered in petals and candles and all of our favorite songs are playing he takes my hand asks me if I want to dance (at this point I TOTALLY know what's coming and so I begin laughing almost uncontrollably because that's what I do when I'm nervous) so we start dancing and I keep laughing and we are hugging but I was soo nervous so I didn't want him to go, I wouldn't let him stop dancing hahahaha.....he tells me he has to go for a second and he gets the ring (which he hid in a plant in my basement) and gets down on one knee and asks me to marry him and I said (to be exact) "I WILL" and then we jumped around and ran around the basement like little kids and he grabs this huge bouquet of flowers and champagne and then we danced some more....my parents were waiting up stairs so we ran up to tell them and then we called our families and then we came back down into the basement and layed on the floor full of flower petals and listened to our CD for the rest of the night...it was so beautiful and wonderful and perfect and everything we could have ever imagined that night to be...I have to say the CD was an awesome touch because now we get to listen to it over and over again and relive the night....the whole thing felt just like Christmas!

So that's the whole story..it was all very special and we are very excited!!!

Love Billy and Sarah

Blowing in the Wind

2005-08-29T23:07:00.000-04:00

Blowing in the Wind
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

Let the breeze come and carry me away....even if I float a million different directions you still know my destination and you never lose sight of me or where you are taking me....there is safety to be found in letting go....i will follow you anywhere God...cause where you are is where i want to be

Longing For Golden Sunsets

2005-07-26T22:51:00.000-04:00

Longing For Golden Sunsets
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

"If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."

C.S. Lewis

New Atmospheres

2005-07-15T23:02:00.000-04:00

New Atmospheres
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

Going up to new atmospheres.....heavenly places....new revelation....new perspective....God has given you the air...so FLY

Teach me Jesus...I wanna go with you to new places

Aerial View...

WE

2005-07-05T13:02:00.000-04:00

WE
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

wow...could it be the beginning of the L-word...only time will tell : )

And So It Begins

2005-06-14T11:16:00.000-04:00

And So It Begins
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

So Exciting, So Scary.....So Many Nice Things...

Hind-Sight

2005-06-01T21:00:00.000-04:00

Hind-Sight
Originally uploaded by xgraceaboundsx.

The Goodbye Song

2004-12-23T14:42:00.000-05:00

Yesterday was a very sad day for me...my wonderful friend Elinor had to go home to Sweden.
I shall miss her dearly...sometimes it feels soo hard to say goodbye to people cause it leaves you with this empty feeling inside that they once filled...Elinor has a big place in my heart so the empty feeling was that much bigger....she has meant so much to me over these last few months and has been a big gift from God in my life.

Elinor (cause i know you will read this) thank you for everything....for letting me cry and vent and scream and say things like freakers....haha....I will never forget the last 6 months...they have been "interesting" but having you there made a world of difference for me! I love you lots and you will be invaluably missed....

This is one of the things that makes living in Toronto and being part of a big international church really frustrating, you get to meet soo many incredible awesome people but as soon as you really get to know them they have to go somewhere and sometimes it starts to feel like I'm always the one staying....but this is my home, I don't have somewhere to go back to.....its starts to feel like a constant state of transition which in one respect I love because I love change but there is a part of me that really wants consistency right now...and around here that can seem so hard to find.

So I'm on a quest to find a balance between coming and going and loving and loosing...theres gotta be one somewhere

Love Sarah
xoxo

Hey My Name is Jonas...

2004-12-20T09:25:00.000-05:00

I am officially the proud owner of a beautifully brilliant red oranda goldfish named Jonah!

Jonah is so rad, my birthday was on friday so my Dad came to take me out on Saturday and he surprised me with my very first fish ever!! He gave me a tank and some food and everything to get started sooo me and Elinor spent most of the day getting Jonah's home ready!

On my birthday I also got to open my ipod that has been sitting patiently under my Christmas tree for a week now! Because it was my birthday present, my mom wouldn't let me open it until my actual birthday. Soooo I have had to sit and look at it for days....and now I can finally play with it!!

Also, my imac G5 came in on wednesday, this is the most money I have ever spent on one thing...but it's going to be well worth it!

This week has been full of changes....my new fish and my new computer, I moved back into my parents house, my birthday, and Elinor is moving back to Sweden on Wednesday....so much going on....plus Christmas

Sometimes it begins to feel like I'm watching a movie of my life as it flies by at a this stellar pace....watching events pass by and things happen and unhappen and before you know it a year has passed...sometimes I wonder if there were a soundtrack to my life what would it be...haha....I know that seems like a weird question but seriously, I think I associate a song with every moment of my day....I like it that way...music moves me...it would definitely have to be a 2 disc compilation...

One of my friends made me a CD for my birthday with Pilate and Coldplay Live interspersed ..that was nice....my friends also came over last night and made me dinner, that was also nice...thanks everyone for making me feel very special this weekend...you guys are rad...I lover you all...

xoxo
S.

Storybooks and Fairytales

2004-12-15T14:22:00.000-05:00

The Chapter has been written,
the story has been finished.

Never quite how I imagined,
but ending also leads to beginning.

I'll see you sometime, when all things have changed,
there 's a new dream breathing on the next page...

Love Sarah
xoxo

xfaithx

2004-12-13T13:59:00.000-05:00

"Faith, in the sense in which I am here using the word, is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods. For moods will change, whatever view your reason takes. I know that by experience."

Mere Christianity, book III, chapter 11, paragraph 5

C.S. Lewis

Another One to Add to the List

2004-12-13T09:02:00.000-05:00

This whole weekend has been soo rad! I had so much fun...

Last night a group of us went to a friends Christmas Party and spent the whole night laughing our heads off....the strange thing is that the 5 of us never really left eachother for the whole night..we literally sat in a corner and only talked to eachother....haha....none of us are usually that anti-social, but I guess we didn't really have it in us to go and make small talk with people we hardly knew.....that being said we still had soo much fun laughing and making stupid jokes the most memorable events of the night were:

1) Luke dressing up as Slash from Guns'n'Roses and standing at the bottom of the stairs trying to pick up chicks as they made their way into the basement (we actually video taped this event)

2) trying to come up with one liners that would integrate us into the very random groups of people huddling around the room.....hahaha....here's a couple, "hey what's your favorite number?? let me give you mine (you then proceed to write your phone number down)....or "hey I got my tractor out back wanna go for a ride and bail some hay"...(one of the guys we were with comes from the stix of Erie PA and every year his highschool had a day where you would drive your tractor to school instead of your car...hahahaha) soo lame....yet so funny....

3) making a tableau in the middle of the dance floor where we all stood still and moved only one part of our bodies in different formations.....

4) thinking about all the sick names of cities we know in the US (and one in Canada) and how the heck they got their names...followed by Tina, Joy and I trying to prove how American we can be by reciting all 51 states...Tina definitely won that challenge

such small things but so much amusement...Luke and Josh being the true Americans that they are also spent a portion of the evening analyzing Canadian Gangsta clothing styles as they watched people at the party...haa

The entire weekend was so fun and relaxed and there was so much laughing...Joy and I decided that this one goes down as one of our more memorable weekends not only for all the fun but for all the random things that happened....

xoxo
Sarah.

Truth Be Known...

2004-12-11T23:42:00.000-05:00

I've come to the place where I can publicly admit that sometimes I really suck at blogging and emailing. I go through phases when I am so on top of my blogging game...writing little poems and quips at every opportunity, and then I go through lulls......the lull for me consists of trying to think of something witty to write about, it becomes too much for me to bear and the thought of writing a continuous stream of serious blogs haunts me at every corner....okay maybe not every corner...but come on who wants to write a serious blog all the time??

So here's my next attempt at getting off the bench and back into the game..

Me and Joy got to hang out last nite with very very old dear friends....it was soo awesome to connect with people again and hear about how lives have changed over the last few years....most of our conversations started with "hey! hey! remember when this happened"..usually these kind of stories are rad.....and you finally get to hear what everyone was really thinking at these distant memorable events.....i guess it becomes safe to say cause time has far enough removed you from permanent embarrassment of speaking your mind.....but, then you come across a few stories that really you don't want people remembering...there weren't too many of those last night but I accidentally blurted one out about Joy and was reminded that we have a lot of remember when's that should never be brought up in large groups of people....alas, it seems we are forever learning the lesson of things better left unsaid...

I loved every moment of our evening last night...somehow reminiscing seems to awaken things in your heart like dreams and hopes that have kinda slipped through the cracks...it was so cool...

we didn't get to sleep until 5am and for some sick and twisted reason that I have yet to identify... at 8 am I was wide awake...this made me very sleepy tonight and I tried my best but I couldn't keep awake for our Bourne Identity and Bourne Supremacy movie night..I caught glimpses here and there...but I definitely missed some important parts..... I love espionage....

okay I think this is it, as I am falling asleep again...

Love Sarah.

Wedding Wonderland

2004-09-09T13:11:00.000-04:00

so it has officially happened and i am sooo excited and happy and glad and blissful! my very beautiful room-mate and my very favorite scots-man, (AJ and Alyn) are getting married on january 15th!

this of course has thrown our house into complete wedding frenzy
.....cakes...dresses...pictures...websites....snowflakes....so many details!

it has also marked the beginning of what has been affectionately termed..PROJECT HOT BOD, or as AJ calls it...B.B.W.N. (Buff Before the Wedding Night), the mission is to walk every night @ 10:00 pm with the girlies from the neighborhood and cheer AJ on in her quest! so far we have been fairly consistent and i look forward to seeing our results come january...hahahaa....

this new development has also caused sheba and i to realize that everything we sit on, eat on, cook with, and play with, predominately belongs to AJ and will sadly leave with her...this leaves us with much more space than we had before.....actually the kitchen and living room will pretty much be empty...hahaa....

it's not soo bad though, sheba and i are kind of excited in a way cause this means lots of home decorating and putting into practice the endless hours of watching and absorbing all the cool and cheap ideas we have learned from trading spaces .......like how to recover value village furniture and how to refinish old dressers and how to hang shelves.....the options are endless....we are going to become weekend warriors tackling home improvement @ every corner, making paige davis and ty pennington and all other design on a dime hero's so proud......

i will miss aj enormously, but who are we kidding getting married is gonna be wayyy more exciting than living with us.... hahahaa....

Hopeful

2004-09-02T17:17:00.001-04:00

Earth's fairest flowers grow not on sunny plain,

But where some vast upheaval tore in twain

The smiling land.

After the whirlwind's devastating blast

And molten lava, fire, and ashes fall,

God's still small voice breathes healing over all.

From broken rocks and fern clad chasms deep,

Flow living waters as from hearts that weep,

There in the afterglow soft dews distill

and angels tend God's plants when night falls still,

An the Beloved passing by the way

Will gather lilies at the break of day.

J.H.D. (From the book "Streams in the Desert")

Come On Understanding Visit Me For Once Today

2004-09-01T17:04:00.000-04:00

so you know those days...the ones when you are sooo frustrated with everything and yet you cant for the life of you pinpoint the specific thing thats driving you to the brink of exploding (in my case exploding would mean crying, although i would like to learn how to yell hahaha), yup thats the kind of day im having...im ready for a change....and maybe a new job, i dearly love the people i work with and the environment in which i work, but theres a deeper layer of me that is desperatley wanting to get creative again.....ive been looking at different photographers websites and its lighting me up inside...i cant wait to get really into shooting again and designing and being artistic...its only been a few months, but to my heart it feels like eternity....so i think thats whats frustrating me is the lull in the middle of stepping out of and stepping into....your at the beginning of the race waiting for the bell to ring and you keep falling into false starts cause your filled with so much anticiaption and excitement and you can see the finish line which causes those few seconds of waiting to feel like forever when really they are only mere seconds.....but to the people watching the race it seems like its over in flash, i guess its all about perspective...Lord please show me yours.....

So Beautifully Truthful

2004-08-27T14:35:00.000-04:00

Psalm 33

13The LORD looks down from heaven
and sees the whole human race.

14From his throne he observes
all who live on the earth.

15 He made their hearts,
so he understands everything they do.
NLT

20We're depending on GOD;he's everything we need.

21What's more, our hearts brim with joysince
we've taken for our own his holy name.

22Love us, GOD, with all you've got--
that's what we're depending on.
MSG

The Lord created our hearts...he understands everything about them..even when we dont....

Better Left Unsaid

2004-08-27T09:41:00.000-04:00

Oh I know it has been ridiculously long since my last post and to try and fit everything from the last two months or even longer into one blog entry would be very impossible....alas......maybe I should try and do more frequent smaller posts.....

I went to spend the weekend at my nana's house waaayyyyy up north......im talking way.....civilization ends and then begins again in the little town of Timmins ( I know what your thinking, that name sounds familiar, that's because Shania Twain is this citys claim to fame) ....its like driving into a different space and time....the city is surrounded by miles and miles of bush, and nobody wants to leave....my nana is the bestest...shes definitely not your typical grandma...a little rougher around the edges....she likes to have a shanty (drink consisting of half a beer and half a 7up) everyday at 4pm and she definitely tells it like it is...i think the climax (also known as the most traumatizing part) of the weekend came when I was doing my aunts hair, my mom and my grandma were watching and they began to discuss their sex lives amongst eachother.....MY 72 YR OLD GRANDMA...talking about her sex life with my MOM and my aunt......as if it isnt bad enough hearing about your parents but your grandma....there are lines that are meant to never be crossed and things i just never needed to know that will now never leave me......hahaaa.....overall it was a very fun trip, I think the older I get the more I start to appreciate different things about my family that I never understood before, they are soo real...and I love them for it.

another really exciting thing is happening in me i didnt even see it happening..that is the exciting part!! I went away to honduras and I had an amazing time and the Lord really revealed alot of things to me on that trip but there wasnt one really big moment where i thought ah hah this is going to change me.....but the Lord is soo funny like that.....cause I'm home now and I feel really different....nothing around me is different , but my heart feels different....I feel safer and its the most incredible thing, I feel so much more peace when making decisions, even the little ones, which is a really big deal for me.....the Lord is so amazing to me.....i will try and post again soon...

It is my friend Justins Birthday.....

Happy birthday Justin poem.....

you are fun you are cool

I bet your glad you did the school

writing this I feel like a fool

you dress real nice
are you sure you werent on miami vice?
(if you were we wont hold it against you)
sometimes when you dress like a girl...
thats weird...hahaha..
happy birthday

I'm Back!

2004-06-23T18:19:00.000-04:00

so..I never really left, but it must have seemed like that since its taken me so long to post since my last entry.
alas, I am at work tonite and mostly everyone has gone home for the day except for Dallas (my bosses son), he is sitting here hanging with me right now which is greatly aiding in my battle to hasten time!
I had the most amazing experience today, I logged into the collective itunes network and found the most wonderful surprise......are you ready....my fearless union leader Nathan Wright had uploaded The Cure and Duran Duran for all to enjoy! So Nathan this is my deepest thank you...although I think Sarah Dailey might state the opposite...it made the afternoon quite enjoyable for me! It actually put me in a really silly mood full of lots of silly emails and dance moves....it has casued great anticiaption to rise up in my heart and I shall look forward to coming into work now for months to come..hahaha.....I have even more exciting news but it will have to wait until tomorrow....

Love Sarah

2004-05-25T18:15:00.000-04:00

okay so its been way too long since ive written last....i have yet to for
m the blogging habit...i guess i still have some time....i think they say (im not really sure who "they" refers to, i guess the collective group that spreads random knowledge?) that it takes somewhere between 21 to 30 days to form a habit .so im going to attempt to maintain a farely updated blog.

another habit i would really like to form is writing down my dreams.....i have been having the craziest coolest dreams lately, recently one of the girls in my cell came to me and asked me for some guidance about something and i really wasnt sure what to tell her and a few nites later the Lord gave me this dream, in the dream i went to my cell leaders and asked them what they thought and then i went back and talked to this girl...it wa so cool though cause i already dop dream alot but it is moslty symbolism and this one was so practical, the Lord showed me so specifically and it really reminded me of the importance of taking note of what is happening in our sleeping hours.....seriously it seems like every nite in the last two months i am having vivid dreams about all kinds of incredible stuff and i would really like to start researching them, not all of them i understand but i would like to. John Paul Jackson writes lots of good books on this and he shows you how to journal them in different ways that can help you make sense of your dreams.

tonite i am going to the goodbye party of one of my really good friends mark
and i am really excited for him but at the same time a little sad...he has been such an incredible friend to me..one of those friends that doesnt let you run away from stuff even though thats all you desperately want to do, i have appreciated him so much for it though...i know hes about to leap into a new incredible season in his life and i can hardley wait to see where the Father is going to take him....i was talking with another friend tonite about how in order for the new to come we need to let the old die....i think so often we try to hang on to what is in the past and we prevent the Lord from giving us the promise that he so wants us to have....or we hang on to what we think things should look like instead of moving forward and trusting that the Lord has everything under control...Father i am ready to let go of the old and to trust you enough to bring the new whatever it might look like in every area of my life....i am ready to enter the new season with you and to let the old one finish.....i feel very excited inside and i think its because more and more im starting to understand what it really means to trust the Father and it is bringing me so much freedom!

yup so thats me for this week...hopefully i will be back sooner than later....

love sarah

2004-05-04T18:49:00.000-04:00

okay okay so I have fallen captive to the online diary disease....here is my very first post....

I am at work with Johnny Long and I am watching as people are beginning to fill this place with the expectation of change that seems to preceed every conference we hold.....the anticipation of meeting with God and hearing his voice and watching him take the parts of our lives that have been deemed totally hopeless and making them into promises fulfilled....it's breath taking to watch...the transformation that happens....it reminds me of just how much I need the Lord....for everything....there is so much hope stirring, its contagious and I want to absorb every bit of it.....father plant it in my heart.....

Jeremiah 29:11
Love Sarah