Unexpected Visit Home for Christmas

This time I am writing from Illinois. I am back home however I leave today (Christmas Day) to go back to Colorado. I was not expecting to come back home however with the recent shootings that took place at my school I decided that I needed to come back home to be with family and rest.

Because of the shootings my school graduated a week early, and therefore I was home on December 15th. And like I said I go back to Denver today. I am going back to Denver to go on tour with a band that was created by 9 people (including my band leader/school assistant). We are called Trillium - which comes from a flower that blooms in the West Coast, which is where we will be touring. Here is some more information about the purpose of the tour and where our band name originated from.

Trillium
A group of students taking our passion on tour, using the abilities God has given us to impact our generation. Through our music, through our words, through the passion God has stirred for the youth of this nation. Our name is taken from a small flower found in Ontario Canada, Oregon, and North West California. The name Trillium was given to this plant because all of its parts comes in groups of 3. The flower is also unique because it only blooms every seven years. The significance of naming our band Trillium is that our focus and goal as a band is to plant seeds into the lives of our generation. Seeds that will have deep roots, and bloom in Gods perfect timing.

We will be leaving Colorado on December 30th and heading to Arizona. Then we will continue to travel in 15 passenger van, with a small trailer for our equipment, to southern California making stops at just about every major city and we will continue traveling north. We are even going into Canada for a few days - then making our way back down to Colorado. I am not sure about the specific dates right now as to where and when we will be in specific places. We will return to Denver around Valentine's Day.

I am so excited for this tour and just to see how God is going each person in our group personally and to see and hear stories of how God worked and used us all together.

Well, I am sending this last email for a while. I do not know when I will be able to write again, but I hope it's not too long. I hope you all have a Wonderful Christmas and a Blessed New Year! Thank you all for your support - you have been so wonderful to me this past year and I am truly blessed to have you in my life.

4th SOW entry: the shooting

December 13, 2007

Hello Everyone,

I am sure you've heard the news about the 2 Colorado attacks by a lone gun man. And I am writing you to tell you that I am OK... however to keep praying for me as I go through the grieving process. I am going to tell you a bit of my side of the story and then let the things in the news complete the story. If you'd like

The 1st shooting took place in Arvada, Colorado - where my dorm is. At the time I was not there, however I could have been. A bunch of people in my school went out bowling after a Christmas banquet. 4 staff members were shot and 2 of the 4 were killed. This action took place in a common area of the building, in a hallway, in between the boys in my school bedroom and "the war room" (which is a room that myself and many other people in my school hung out). Our curfew is usually at 11:30pm and at Midnight we need to be in bed with the lights out. However, because most of my school was out bowling - we did not get back by curfew. So, as we were on our way back to the base/dorm at 12:30am we got a phone from another student in my school who called saying to not come back because there had been shooting. So we immediately went to my school leaders house. We then got up to date phone calls from school leaders who were at the hospitals and let us know about the conditions with the 4 people that were shot. In between phone call updates, we prayed for the victims, quietly sang worship songs, and simply just comforted each other.

From there we were not allowed back to the base/dorm until the investigation was completed. Which did not happen until Tuesday late afternoon.Therefore, we stayed at my school leaders house for a couple of nights.

I'll let you watch the rest in a news video link I've found about the events on the night. I've also found the Rocky Mountain News to be the most accurate in telling details and not emphasizing on non-important details. Things have been crazy here ... and graduation is 1 week sooner than planed due to the recent events. Then after Christmas is outreach to the West Coast. Please pray for continue protection.

Thank you all for your thoughts, prayers, concerns, e-mails, phone calls, and love.

I love you all VERY much.