Fearfully and wonderfully made

Remember that dental school update I promised a little over a week ago? Well I'm just now getting around to it, haha. It's been a busy week, but a good one. I'm loving dental school so far. Orientation, in a nutshell, was good, but most of it consisted of boring info sessions, kinda like MASTER Plan at WKU. It was long, and our butts got tired of sitting down all day, haha. But our class really hit it off well, and I think we're gonna really enjoy the next 4 years together. UofL treated us to a Bats game after the last day of orientation, and that night, the sophomore's threw us a party to welcome us to dental school and to celebrate them being done for the rest of the summer. That was a fun experience, let me tell ya. I had been DD before, but only for like, 1 or 2 people at a time. This was a little different...try like, 5-6 haha. I got a little frustrated to be honest. Maybe stressed would fit better there. Either way, haha. But overall it was a fun night. :)

We started our first class officially on Monday- Gross Anatomy. I was a little anxious about seeing the cadavers for the first time. What are you supposed to expect when you're about to dissect a human body? There's really no way to prepare for that, haha. But, it wasn't as bad as I was expecting at all, and truth be told, I've really enjoyed working on them. If you know me, you know that I love seeing God reveal His glory to us in everyday life. Whether its the stars, the mountains, anything, seeing God's glory in our world fascinates me. You would not believe how incredible the human body is until you get a look inside of it. We've only gotten to see the muscles, nerves, and blood vessels of the arm and shoulder area so far, and I'm blown away. Everything fits together so perfectly. Every muscle has certain points of attachment so that they can perform their proper function. Every muscle consists of thousands of individual muscle fibers that align in the same direction. The entire upper limb (shoulder and arm) is attached to the rest of the body by one, small joint that consists of mostly cartilage. The nerves branch off and dive into muscles, they supply the entire body with info needed to keep the body working correctly. The blood vessels are so extensive that every muscle has adequate blood supply. The human body FASCINATES me. I took anatomy in high school and histology in undergrad, and I've always known that the human body is an incredible piece of work. But actually seeing it first hand in that kind of detail, and learning so much about it in class and in the lab...it really puts it into perspective for me. Everythings fits together so perfectly, and its all so intricately made. How can that be anything but a creation of the God of the universe?? It really speaks to me about the care and detail God puts into knitting us together while we're in the womb. I was talking about it with a girl from my class, and we were both just amazed at the glory God was showing us through those cadavers....as weird as that sounds, haha. But it's so true. We are all creations of a loving, powerful God, and we are all unique. No cadaver in that lab looks alike, and neither do we. God knows us inside and out, and if you ask me, that's pretty comforting and humbling.

I'm loving dental school...in case you missed that. :)

Red, white, and blue

4th of July is one of my favorite holidays. We are so blessed to live in such a great nation, despite all of her flaws. I love celebrating with fireworks, cookouts, and getting to spend time with family. I love seeing red, white, and blue everywhere you look and I love patriotic music. I saw a quote earlier on someone's Facebook status that I really liked. It said something along the lines that its pretty cool that we live in a country that celebrates its Independence Day with family, fireworks, etc. rather than showing our military might and force by parading our missiles in front of our leaders. I think that just shows what makes America special. Whether you're a democrat or republican, black or white, celebrating our freedom is something that we can all do together.

I'm especially grateful for our armed forces. I have the utmost respect for the men and women of our military who are willing to put their lives on the line, here and abroad, just to defend the freedoms that make America great. I think back to all of the wars that America has fought, and its the men and women who fought, died, and still serve that make me proud to be an American. In fact, one of my best friends is in ROTC and the National Guard and will most likely later serve in the Army- Tyler Brown, I'm proud of you and have nothing but respect and appreciation for you...love you brother.

More importantly, I'm grateful for the freedom that I have in Christ. Not only am I able to worship my God freely and openly, but I am free from the sin that separates me from my God. And someday because of that freedom, I'll be able to stand in God's presence and worship Him, and that will be so awesome. Thank you God for blessing me with such a great country to live in and with such great family and friends with which to celebrate. God bless America!!!