Blogging Moments

Today has been a very long day and still more hours left.  I was trying to think of something to write about so I started to read my old blogs.  The one that I really wanted to read again was my last post... my camp post!  I loved camp so much that I wish I was back there.  I wanted to pack camp up and put it in my pocket for when I need it the most!  I started to read other posts and I was so happy and proud of some of the things I wrote... I kind of inspired myself (haha)!

Do you ever write in a journal, on a blog, on a piece of paper even just a sentence and you go back weeks, months, or years later and inspire yourself because you think to yourself: "Where did I come up with that? That's a good point!"  Anything like that?  Yeah, I just did that.  The one thing that I wrote on my blog that stands out to me 'til this day is my 'quote' on the top of my page under Butter Moments.  It reads: Follow me while I walk the path that God has provided me.  I'm not sure why, but I don't even know how I came up with that!

As I look back and read my blogs over the past few months I realize that that line is perfect for what my blog is all about.  I love and want to help other around me by my mistakes, my insecurities and my faults because those are the things that help me get through my next task in life.  I hope that you have enjoyed following my blog and you continue reading them.  I believe this is one of many tasks in life I am suppose to do to teach people the word of God.

Camp Inspiration

I'm so glad I get to blog again.  This is the first time in about 2 weeks that I get to tell you how camp was.

I was offered to go to my youth groups camp to be a videographer by my youth minister.  The day before I was becoming very nervous and anxious for the week to come.  As I was beginning to pack my equipment and planning for all the videos I had been asked to do, I kept thinking, "What if no one enjoys my videos?"  The reason I started my freelance business was to help people to have memories to keep forever.

The week began off amazing!!  Monday passed... a bunch of compliments.  Tuesday passed... I was pumped for the rest of the weeks videos.  Then, the day I was dreading the most... the day that all my equipment decided that they didn't want to cooperate with me.  I started to loose faith in my work, I didn't want to show my video that night because it had glitches all over the video.  As we sat down at worship to have our lesson, sing, and watch the video I found myself not singing, fidgeting more than usual, and just not paying attention.  I was so nervous that my video was going to look horrible.  The last thing I wanted to happen was to disappoint, be embarrassed, or to fail the others of what they had been looking forward to that day.  When the video started I sat there rocking back and forth then the video started glitching(spelling?) and I got up and left the room.  As I stood out in the hall, I heard my video keep playing so I walked back in.  When my logo popped up, the kids of 130 or more gave me an applause I didn't think I deserved.  Actually, I don't even think I heard or listened to them clapping because I was so upset about my video not going the way I had planned.  After worship, one of the youth ministers asked me to stand up so every one could applaud me once again for the work I had done so far.  That was when I had realized that I meant something to those kids even when my technology goes against me.

It was finally Friday and I had stayed up til 4:00 that morning to finish the end of the week video.  I got 3 hours of sleep, but I felt good as new (when I had woken up).  I started to burn the DVD when I was at breakfast and it was 15 minutes before our ceremony and it had finished.  The only thing was that it wouldn't play for me and had glitches all over the DVD.  I couldn't let that run, especially the video that mattered the most.  Not only the kids would be there but their parents would be too.  It was 15 minutes before the ceremony and I had to burn another DVD on the way there.  I also had to make a speech and didn't prepare that either because I was so frustrated with my DVD not working with me again.  I knew I had to keep a cool because of how I felt from the first time something went wrong.  So 10 minutes before my speech my 2nd DVD had finished burning and nothing was wrong with it!  Even though it said it burned fine I was still nervous.  As I was saying my speech, my voice kept cracking because I was so nervous about my DVD working correctly.  Finished my speech and my video began to play.  Twenty minutes after and it was over!  Nothing wrong, went as planned, and it was all over!  Lack of sleep paid off and my week had been better than ever!!

I was so inspired and loved by what people had said to me about my videos.  It made me realize that I am changing peoples lives and how they look at their life's memories.  I learned to keep your faith even through the struggles of my business.

Why Should We Grow?

Growing In Christ

(In Picture: My best friend ,Ashley League, and her boyfriend, Trent Deans)

This past week I was feeling doubt with myself... not just about life but about who I am as a whole.  I always tend to compare myself to my friends, celebrities, models, and just the people around me.  I look at their hair, clothes, shoes, look, body features then look at mine and I say "Why can't I just look like them?" It becomes devastating to my esteem and confidence and sometimes it takes a toll on my friendships and relationships I've built up.  To be honest, I don't think there's a lot wrong with my look when I just look at myself and no one else.  My friends love me for how I look and am as a person.  Why do I even care what others think? (good question!)

Before I move on to what I really want you to hear me out on, I want to let you think about how you perceive yourself.  Ask yourself if you compare yourself to everyone else.  If the answer is yes and you always compare yourself to others then I want to give you some information that I believe is very helpful.

Yesterday, my preacher started the sermon with "We have a responsibility"!  At first I was puzzled but slowly became eager to hear what the lesson was going to be about.  He then stated we needed to begin with the ending in mind.  I was quickly confused again.

We began to read a bunch of scriptures from Ephesians and talking about how we always compare ourselves to others and I just kept nodding my head because I couldn't help but agree to everything he was saying.
- Reading a bunch of scriptures never helps me understand what I'm reading or talking about, but when I discuss it or hear it I know exactly what it means.
- Or when I'm just listening to a lecture or a lesson from someone, I don't comprehend much of what their saying because I need to see it in text and hear it to know what's going on.

During this sermon my preacher was teaching us the one thing that stuck with me since is: Don't measure yourself to others, measure yourself to Christ.  To do that is the only way you will grow not only in yourself but in Christ.

My preacher had an outline for us (like he always does--- SOOO helpful!) and he listed expectations on how we can grow in Christ and reasons as to why we should grow.

Expectations:
- Service (Ephesians 4:12)
- Unity (Ephesians 4:13a)(Ephesians 4:3)
- Faith (Ephesians 4:13b)
- Knowledge (Ephesians 4:13c)

Why Grow?
- So you won't be infants.
- So you won't be tossed back and forth.
- So you won't be deceived. (Colossians 2:8)(2 Corinthians 10:5)

The sermon has left us with the question of "How is All of this Possible?" and to this day I am still amazing by what God has given us, proven to us, and dealt with... he is truly and AMAZING God!

Click the link and like us today!

AE Production is a company that has inspired me!  It's my freelance business that keeps me going daily on what I love to do.  My passion!  I encourage others because of my company that I started, it makes me feel alive and free.  I want people to have the passion and love that I have for my freelance work.

I would love for you to "like" my company on Facebook.  If you can click this link- AE Productions.

Father's Day: Earthly and Heavenly Father

Last night as I bury my head in my pillow crying, I ask God to help me through this rough patch in my life.  I began to look for answers as to why I felt so upset and found myself looking at my nightstand that holds books I had read from school and bible classes.  After a few glances at them I realized that God was telling me that there was something in those books that I needed to read.

[Around the middle of March I had moved back home, quit my job, and lost a lot of friends.  If it were up to me at that moment in time I would have chosen to like my job, my living environment would be up to my standards, and I would have a bunch of friends that were loyal to me.]  After all of this I felt as if I had very little left in my life... so I thought.  When I moved back I began to feel lonely and hopeless about what I was suppose to do with my life.  As I read these books it kept talking about men and relationships and guarding your heart and I was just so confused.  I thought to myself why would God want me to be reading these books... maybe I misunderstood what God wanted me to read.  I closed the book and looked at the cover and then it hit me, "Captivating"!  The feeling of loneliness was gone, I felt loved and captivated by Him.  Like a little girl with no worries of the world, I felt peace with myself.

Looking back at about 3 months ago now, I wouldn't have changed a thing.  Although I am living with my parents (which is a big step back for me and where I was in my life for 8 months) I am very blessed to have them to help me live my life in the best and healthiest way possible.  Not only am I blessed for having a loving family but I have an eternal love from God that makes me feel captivated by Him daily.

With that I say happy Father's Day to my earthly father, Scott Butler, and my heavenly Father!  You comfort me daily and provide the knowledge to get me through my daily walk!

Testing Your Faith

I hope that you understand what I write about.  A lot of the times I am all over the place with my words but that's how my brain thinks.  I apologize for this ahead of time and I can always try to write again... I hope you enjoy! :)

The other night my old roommate, Katheryn Cansino, and I visited an old friend for a few hours.  We ended up talking to my friend (we'll call him Cody) for two hours about our faith and Christianity.  Now long story short, we had our own opinions, stories, and different views on a bunch of topics, but the one thing that bothered me was that I felt everything Cody was saying about the bible was negative.  I will give him the plus of knowing the bible forwards and backwards and things to back up what he was saying... it was just disappointing to me to hear someone say like "why did God let this happen?", "why did he let Paul get into this?", etc.

Maybe he was right about everything but for me, the bible gives you stories for you to understand the power of God, no matter how bad any situation can be.  Cody kept saying all of these horrible things that happened to Paul, Adam, Moses, etc and I just kept saying to him that even though there are all of those things you have to hear the good in everything.

I personally believe that those small verses are more powerful than all those stories he kept talking about.  Honestly, you have to be able to see the good and the help God provides us in order to stay true to him.  We should think about all situations in our life and how God is there through good and bad.  He will never give you something that you can't handle.  I use to always think about this phrase I heard once: "I wish God didn't trust me so much."  I've learned that I have to be able to trust God.

Moments like these in your life is making you test your faith, see how strong your faith and trust really is.  I could have been persuaded by what Cody had told me all along but I knew what I believed in.  No he probably wasn't wrong but I don't think that he completely understood what we were trying to let him understand.

Today is the first day...

I woke up hoping there was a change today.  I was right!  Ever since I moved out of Abilene I haven't been feeling like myself.  Maybe it was the fact that my life wasn't going anywhere and things fell down the drain quickly, or I wonder if it was because of the things I was told by others.  No, I shouldn't let what people say bother me but I couldn't help it!


I remember I was on my way to Mississippi when I was told that someone wouldn't date me because I didn't work out and that I wasn't "in shape".  [I've always wanted to be able to go jogging every other day or something, but with my back I just can't do a lot.]  The next day, at my grandmother's house, I was in the bathroom upstairs brushing my teeth when I noticed a scale by the bath tub.  So I decided to weigh myself and see what the scale said and I was 10 lbs over what a girl my age and height needs to be.  Those words and numbers hit me... to the point where I stopped eating three meals a day (or even just two meals).


When I got home I told my mom that I was going on a diet.  I gave her an outline of things that I would eat for a week and little did I know she joined my diet too!  The next morning my mom and I got up, went for a walk at 8:30 a.m., cooked eggs (no milk to scramble the eggs in! MY FAVORITE!), and went shopping.  After a week I had lost 6 pounds but didn't feel too much better about my weight as I thought I should have.  Yeah the scale said I lost 6 lbs. but did I feel like I did? NO!


A few days later I got back into eating 2-3 meals a day with snacking in the middle of it.  I just felt hopeless for making myself feel good about my body.  Of course, I then gained a few pounds back... which wasn't making anything better.


All I could think was "exercise isn't going to make me feel good! Cheerleading never did and I had an intense work out 3-4 days a week because of that!"


Two weeks ago I decided to give exercising another chance.  The only reason I was doing this was because in the back of my mind I was thinking about that guy telling me he wouldn't date me or anyone else who didn't work out.  Yes, I'm stupid for letting what a guy says get to me but it's pushing me to do this and to me that's a good thing!  So my parents signed my brother and me up for Cooper's Fitness Center with them for the summer.  I am so excited to have my brother along my side because I know that he'll go when he can with me (always good to have a work out buddy).


After about two weeks of exercising I have lost about 6 or 7 pounds (with a little bit of dieting) and have felt better than ever!  Even better than I did when I was in competitive cheerleading.




It's swimsuit season and I'm feeling great (not amazing, but getting there) and I'm excited to feel this way!

My Growing Passion

My passion for my business is growing!  I am very pleased with what I have done and very proud of myself (not to toot my horn but toot toot! haha :] )

I would love for you to check it out at my website AE Productions>Gallery>Photos>Couples

My best friend and her boyfriend, Ashley League and Trent Deans, were kind enough to start my couples Gallery!!  Gotta love a good friend like her.

What do we do when we have all of this?

This morning our preacher had an awesome lesson for us today.  We talked about being filled with the spirit, and we had a lot of scriptures in Ephesians.  He started talking to us about God's power through us can only be limited by the Spirit's glory in your body.  I was curious about this sermon because at first I became confused about the beginning.  [but isn't that what makes you want to listen?]  When we read Ephesians 1:13 "...having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit" I began to process his thoughts and then it hit me that every believer has a "mark".

Our preacher decided to give us a "map" of how his brain began to process all of his thoughts into words from scriptures all throughout Ephesians.  He told us that there are internal and external things to this map, but that center circle, the middle thought was to "Be filled with the Spirit" (Ephesians 5:18).

The Internal things or thoughts he had were:
- Wisdom (Ephesians 1:17): To have the wisdom of the Spirit as in praying by yourself.   To have that control to pray for a long long time and to give yourself to the Lord in your prayers.
- Access (Ephesians 2:18, 6:18): We have that access to God that others might not have (as in atheists, or those whom don't pray to OUR God).  We should use that 'gift' we have, that 'access' we have to God...so use it!
- Awareness (Ephesians 3:5): We are aware of what we have with God, that maybe the younger generations don't understand yet.
- Protection (Ephesians 6:17): God has given us protection by other actions towards us.


Now: What do we do when we have all of this?

The External things or thoughts he had were:
- Intimacy (Ephesians 2:19-22): The way you show the external things to others, the way you let people in and out of your heart.
- Unity (Ephesians 4:3): The fact that you use those internal thoughts and emotions to other makes us come together as a unity of the Lord.
- Character (Ephesians 4:29-32): The person you become with the emotions and thoughts.
- Power (Ephesians 3:16): That power you are given to show everyone God and to use all of the internal characteristics.


I love the fact that these lessons are an amazing way for me to try and show other's about God!

Survivor: Whose out?

How many of you watch Survivor?


Well this is the last survivor for the season I believe and I completely overheard something I shouldn't have yet.  For those of you who haven't seen it yet... don't read this blog because I will be discussing who got put on the jury.






There were four on Redemption Island and three are now out of the game.  Matt, Mike and Grant were beaten by Andrea only because it was using a technique called 'balancing'.  Of course the only girl (who I personally didn't want to win) won this challenge and is now back in the game.  Are you kidding me?!??


Matt has been in this game since the beginning.  He was voted out to Redemption Island early on, beating every contestant that came his way to Redemption Island.  Matt is now out of the game and has become one of the members on the jury.  It amazed me to see how strong his faith was, even through the times when he wanted to give up.  He never stopped praying and letting God take control of every situation.  When he got out of the game he said something about how his God has taken him as far as He wanted him to go.  Matt's faith is very powerful to me... he IS my role model because what he has done to show his Christianity on Survivor.  I was rooting for Matt and hoped that he would win the whole thing.  Even though Matt seems disappointed that he is out of the game, he seems very content with how far he got.


My heart has gotten so much closer to God because of him... I would be absolutely blessed If I ever got the chance to meet him because he is my hero and role model!  That is my wish for today!

New "Business"

Hey everyone, I am just posting a little update for all my blog viewers to let them know about how I have expanded from AE Photography to AE Productions.  :)  My website was aephotography101.webs.com but now it is aeproductions101.webs.com!  Yes it's the same website but make sure you type it correctly!




This may get confusing because I changed all of my information on the website to say Productions but I am currently not using that website.  I will be changing it back to Photography so that can be linked back and forth between my productions and photography website... yes confusing I know, but in the end it will make sense.


Just bare with me while I figure out the "construction" of my websites.


Make sure you are going to the AE Productions website :). Thanks for your cooperation.

W.W.W.W.W.

WE WANT WHAT WE WANT can mean I, me, or myself.  Something that "we" want, "we" feel like "we" have to have it.  Everyone can be selfish, it's who we are or have made ourselves become.  Jesus' desire for His BODY is to be selfless but we sometimes are inadequate of that knowledge. "We" can always be swayed which makes us very weak or powerless of something that we "want". Jesus asked us to be a unity, ONE BODY, to live life through him.  We don't usually think about that in our daily lives.  We go about our day and whatever happens happens... forget about evening services, use foul language, actions that don't show Jesus to others.  We do those things because "We Want What We Want".

Two Sunday's ago our preacher did a sermon that made me think about all of this and I would like to share some of the notes we made during service:

1. Goal
His Note: Attitudes we should have about becoming a unity: Humility, Patience, Gentleness, Forebearing (Ephesians 4:2)
My Thoughts: I think that we should be all of the attitudes listed above, but I know that a lot of the time no one feels this way.  I can honestly say that I have very little patience and I personally need to work on it.  There's always room for improvement and time to ask God to help you.

2. We will we do as the body?

1. His Note: We will demonstrate oneness through His presence lived out in our midst. (John 14:16 & 20)

My Thoughts: We all need to live though his presence.  I have trouble doing that because I do what I want to do and I don't think about the say W.W.J.D. (What Would Jesus Do?) and I know that I need to work on that.

2. His Note: We will be a witness to the world. (John 17:21b, 23b)

My Thoughts: Being a witness to the world is one tough thing to do.  It is always easier said then done. Now I'm trying to think of something that I can do to be a witness for God! :)

3. His Note: We will reflect His glory! (John 17:22)

My Thoughts: Reflecting His glory?  I know I am no perfect Christian and I know I try everyday but don't you think it's a lot to ask from God to reflect something that's His?  I shouldn't even question what He asks us to do, but I don't even know where to begin to reflect His glory.  I guess I'll figure it out soon.

I hope that you can take this lesson I learned and take it to heart.  I may be confused but maybe you aren't about reflecting His glory.  Leave a comment to express your thoughts with me :).

Holding your tongue is a piece of work...

...and I sure as heck have figured that out the hard way.  No matter how old you are there will ALWAYS be some type of drama.  Can't avoid it, so might as well be in it and say nothing to keep it up.  I don't mean be in the talking behind someone's back "in it", I'm just saying that if you are apart of drama that deals with you then you have to be in the drama.  All you can do is take the high road and hold your tongue.  I feel some days that's like a job you should get paid for.  I mean seriously, sometimes I literally bite my tongue because I want to say something so bad but I know that if I do then it's all just going to go down the highway past 20 18-wheelers and almost killing yourself 15 out of those 20 trucks.  Probably a bad simile but oh well, made sense to me.  Anyways, my lesson that I've learned from the past few days is that holding your tongue and killing people with kindness make YOU feel better in the long run rather than just being a jerk to someone who does you wrong.



When you are tempted-
"Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trails of many kinds"
James 1:2

WhY am I up This Late!?!?

There are so many reasons why the phrase "you never know what you had till you lose it" can be put into perspective.

I'm going to talk about the obvious one, the boyfriend or girlfriend.

Sometimes what you have is better than you think. Happened to me. Now I lost it and never realized how much it hurts when you've fallen for someone is. I hate that I'm confused because I don't think that he really wanted too be done, yet he said we were. All I can say is that I'm sorry for what I've done but you can't really say too much because we weren't really together... I apologize for everything I did to you. I'm not going to take back the things I hate about why you and I aren't more than...

This is why I am up this late... for the fact that I can't fall asleep, my heart is torn...