I took my husband out on the town!

"What did you do when you took him out on the town?" you might be asking.

Let me fill you in.

When I heard about the Joyce Meyer conference going on in San Jose this weekend, I thought "Wow, Daniel would LOVE to go to that." And when I heard that Darlene Zschech from Hillsong would be leading worship, I thought "Oh man. If we DON'T go to the conference, Daniel will probably be so upset that he missed it. It's in his best interest that I suck it up and take him to the conference."

So, being the lovely wife that I am, I suffered through the Joyce Meyer conference for the sake of my husband's utmost happiness and enjoyment.

Something tells me you're not buying all this...am I right?

Okay okay. So I like Joyce Meyer, but when I found out that Darlene Zschech was going to lead worship, I was like "oh my gosh. I HAVE to go to this conference!" And I'm kind of hesitant to ask women to things of this nature because I've found that a lot of women don't enjoy conferences. So I thought I'd take Daniel. I am exposed. He graciously went with me to the conference last night...it was so good he actually suggested that we come back this morning, which we did!

Like I said before, I like Joyce Meyer. But this weekend I was thoroughly impressed with her, actually. She did an amazing job of speaking practical, simple truth and entertaining her audience as well. She's really funny and fun to listen to in person.

And I was soooo interested to see how Darlene Zschech leads worship. She's a female vocalist worship leader (no instrument), which is how I like to lead worship as well and did at Trinity. I've never gotten to see another female worship leader lead as just a vocalist, and I was so excited to see how she does it. I did notice a lot of things about her that I believe are important in a worship leader, and probably the thing I noticed the most about her was that she wasn't performing. She was worshiping. And there is a huge difference. And she invited the Spirit into the room and created an environment that made it easy to feel the freedom to worship as we chose. It was really amazing. I've never worshiped like that in a large arena full of people and felt like it was so intimate. God was definitely in that place!!! It was the same thing this morning as well. I was so thankful for the opportunity to go and I was also grateful to Daniel for coming with me---and it blessed me that he wanted to come back!


And Joyce did say she welcomed men at her conferences....Daniel was a little afraid he'd be the only guy there. Not the case. And his masculinity is protected :)

Afterwards, I had the biggest craving for the Quesadilla Explosion salad from Chili's. Weird, huh? It's so good and I hadn't had one since Texas. It was a Chili's night. For those of you who get sick of Chili's, don't take it for granted. There will come a day when all you'll want is Chili's.

So, that's our newest news...I must run to the kitchen at camp. We have a group up here and it's pasta night! It doesn't really matter what it is, actually. It's free.

Magic Band of Mountain Brothers

Are you confused by the title of this post? Well, don't be. It's merely a compilation of the newest things going on in Proffitteer-land.

Daniel and I went on a marriage vision retreat this past weekend--Marriage Today has a vision booklet and encourages couples to go on a vision retreat once a year. In honor of our 6 month anniversary of marriage (woohoo!! ha) We went on our inaugural retreat.

Now, normally when you think of "retreat", you picture a serene setting, like the woods maybe, and a small cabin or a hotel or whatever....someplace quiet.

In case you are unaware, Daniel and I live in the woods at a retreat center. But were we going to stay perched in our cabin in the woods in order to maintain the quiet stillness that is typically a retreat?

no way jose.

We went to Six Flags Magic Mountain! It's down south on the outskirts of LA...I knew early on in life that I would need to marry a man who enjoyed roller coasters as much as I do. One time when I was in 7th or 8th grade, my dad and I caught a red-eye to Dallas and spent the day at Six Flags riding roller coaster after roller coaster...then we flew home that night. SOOOOO FUN! That's one of my favorite memories.
Now fast-forward 12 or so years to married, grown-up, mature Bree and her mature, grown-up husband Daniel.

When we woke up on Magic Mountain morning, we could hardly contain ourselves. And by the time we got to the park, I was getting antsy because too many people were taking the Magic Mountain exit, which meant there would be competition for the amazing AMAZING roller coasters. And by the time we got through the gate and the clock struck 10:04, I was anxious because the park was supposed to open at 10 am SHARP. It said it online. And you should have seen Daniel and I sprint through the gate to the premier ride of the year...the X2.

It's a roller coaster that is supposedly 5 dimensions. Not only are you corkscrewing and flipping like a normal roller coaster, but your individual seat is also flipping. So really you have no idea what's going on. AND there are speakers by your head so you get to listen to a commentary the whole time, and at one point the ride shoots flame and you feel a burst of heat radiate across your face.

There was a lot of hype about this ride. It was cool, but not my favorite.

The amazing thing was that because all the people in the park spent their whole day waiting in line for the X2, there were no other people on any other roller coasters! So the rest of the day Daniel and I spent riding coaster after coaster in the blistering heat. We were sweaty, we were tired, and it was glorious.

Now you may be thinking that sounds like fun and all, but what about the retreat? Don't worry...in the booklet it specifically says "have fun"...so we did. But we were very intentional about sitting down and writing visions for our marriage in every area possible, from finances to children to housework. And it was exhausting, but incredibly beneficial.

Since we were so close to LA and I'd never been there, Daniel took me through his old stomping grounds during grad school.

I have to say, TV makes LA look pretty good. LA makes LA look really gross.
There was trash and graffiti everywhere, and the haze was so thick you couldn't read the names of the businesses occupying downtown. It amazes me that it's such a hotspot for entertainment and seems so glamorous, because it doesn't have a glamorous package. Plus, on Sunday afternoon all 6 lanes of the freeway were jammed with people...ALL SIX LANES. It was stressful!!

From there we drove on up to Santa Barbara. Talk about a glamorous package: Santa Barbara is beautiful! It was a lot slower-paced than LA, and it was clean and well-taken care of and just...well, beautiful! We stayed there one night and then headed back on Monday afternoon! It was a really great weekend--great to see things I hadn't seen, ride roller coasters, be away with camp, and create more vision for our marriage!

So that's the first part of the strange title. Get it? Magic Mountain.

The second part is what we've been doing in our wind-down time after the Future Life Retreat is done for the day....we've been watching Band of Brothers. If you've never heard of it, it's a miniseries HBO did about the 101st Airborne during WWII--more specifically, E-Company of the airborne. It's sooooooo good. I'm not usually a war-movie buff, but this is an actual true story of the Normandy invasion and beyond during WWII. It's kind of graphic, and really long--there are 10 hour-long parts to it. But if you haven't seen it or heard of it, net-flix it, buy it, borrow it, beg for it, don't steal it though. But get it. And watch it. It's so good.

So, that's where we sit currently!

In other news, I've been leading worship for the retreats going on up here. In case I didn't say it already, Future Life Retreats are 6 fall retreats where private Christian schools bring their kids up for a few days and we run them through a camp-like program. It's been so refreshing to be back leading worship. It's so different---I've had to learn to set up all the sound equipment and run sound (NEVER done that before) and I type up the power points and get them ready (never done that before either). That has been interesting. I thought I knew a lot about power point. but it turns out that's a lie. ha.

I've really really missed leading worship though since I've been out here, so it's amazing to get back into it. I really do feel the most alive whenever I'm leading worship. I just love it and I love creating an environment where people are able to freely worship God. I love to worship God and I love inviting people to do that with me. Did I mention I just love it? And it's interesting because in the last 6 months of transition and really discovering more of who I am, I feel I've become a different worship leader--more myself, more vulnerable, more purposeful. Those things make the difficulty in transition more powerful, because I realize how beneficial it's been....

Anyways, that's what's new in our world! Daniel's birthday is coming up. He'll be 26! That's so old. It's also his first birthday since we've been married. He really went all out for mine. I don't know how I'm going to top that, but believe you me, I will try.

lots of love!