here’s my hallelujah.

The good, the bad, & everything in between.

" I will give thanks to you, Lord, with all my heart; I will tell of all your wonderful deeds." 
                         - Psalm 9:1 

What’s up fam, friends, and strangers reading this! Welcome to yet another one of my creative outlets. Little Alexa would have never thought she’d be one start a blog, but here we are. I’m nearing the end of my college years, and can truthfully say that I have lead a life thus far that is filled with a handful of crazy weird, crazy fun stories that don’t make sense sometimes, and all I want is more people to laugh about it with me. It’s been a few weeks that I’ve been encouraged by many a friend to do this, so the wheels in the brain have been turning, brainstorming how exactly I wanted to craft this little collection of thoughts. One of the first things that came to mind was the contrast between the few places I have been able to establish an internet presence and the stacks on stacks on stacks of journals I’ve been scribbling in since I was a little girl. Documenting my days both publicly and privately has easily become intertwined in my daily routine. This somewhat stemmed from my thirteen year old self daring herself to be one of those people that started a youtube channel before it was ever remotely socially acceptable because tiny little squares on instagram were simply not doing her memories enough justice. The videography business I recently created also caters towards capturing life on film in its fullness, except filtered through a posture of service. In the same ways that I share highlights on my social media, I want to start inviting others into bits and pieces of my journals, quiet times, and prayers. Because if I’ve learned anything through constantly revisiting my scattered brain dumps, it’s that it leaves me in a posture of worship every single time.

“Cause all that I have is a Hallelujah

Brandon Lake

Just a few of my college journals.

For those of you who may not know me in real life, I am finishing up my last year of studying architecture at the University of Florida, in Northern Italy. My major is something that, most recently, has felt like more of a chore than a joy to me. Which is quite funny, considering the reason my youtube channel gained even the tiniest bit of traction is due to my videos centered around architecture. However, this reality also brings about feelings of defeat, as I try to address my mom’s frustration when she asks what the point of these past four years even was. This past semester specifically, I caught myself complaining about wanting to be finished more than reflecting on how far I’ve come and everything that I have gained from this program. My crazy talented friends Marla and Sydney have reminded me of all of the beauty this degree holds just through their honest passion towards both their grad school applications and the New York skyscraper we spent four months designing. Their genuine celebration of my recent life path change and a visit from an architecture grad turned Army lieutenant as one of our Keynote speakers this fall helped me process how important checking architecture on my UF Preview packet May of 2018 actually was. I could expound on this another time, but a couple of things that I have truly gained from it all are my love for writing and my stubbornness in questioning anything and everything about the way we engage with the world. Studying architecture has equipped me with the ability to put the past four years of my life to words.

I pray that through my lived experiences and lessons learned, you start to slowly piece together why I always say that life with Jesus is beyond worth it. It’s something I can’t exactly give justice to through a simple instagram caption or even over a lunch conversation in the Plaza of the Americas because His grace and goodness are constantly being weaved in and out of my everyday. I can never not be wowed by how God moves in even the little things. It’s a kind of love I never had the eyes to see until I realized the immense lack I would wake up to everyday. I pray that by reading my blog, you start to understand why my faith in God is one of the most important things about me. Before I put my own self in the story of the gospel and really soaked in what Jesus did for someone like me (a wretched soul who did nothing to deserve any of it), I would live my days in ways I deemed sufficient for those 24 hours, but would always walk away not quite satisfied. At that point in my life, I had a pretty strong head knowledge of the gospel from my Christian school I grew up in for half of my life but I never actually wanted it for myself. I didn’t think church or religion was something I would need to actively participate in to feel like I’ve made it in this life. But because I was both curious and stubborn enough to see why people wouldn’t stop talking about this “good good Father,” I found something that was worth questioning and has remained worthy enough to reshape the way I go about my days. What I found four years ago, was life.

“Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it.”

matthew 10:39

So the heart behind this blog is this: to throw up even more praises to our beloved Savior. Each semester, my sentimental self always felt compelled to gather a bunch of clips to shower love on the people who meant the world to me those past few months on my youtube channel. I always wondered how I’d cap off my senior year in video form, but found myself hitting a wall. Since I’m about to enter an entirely new chapter of life, I’ve naturally been in major introspective mode. Something that I kept rereading in my journals from this past year was the phrase “for the Kingdom.” Slowly, it hit me that the least I could do at the end of my four years at university is share how much Jesus brought me to this point in my life where I can run towards that charge most genuinely. Sifting through the good AND the bad of 2021, I’m able to walk away finally starting to understand what it feels like to believe that Jesus, alone, is enough. Jireh. He has allowed me to walk through so much in my college career that gives me no other choice but to praise Him. So here’s my end of semester hurrah! It’s a middle ground between the good (my instagram, youtube, vsco, etc…) and the bad (everything I process on paper, in prayer, and at the piano).

It’s the stories that fill up my coffee date conversations and voice memo updates.

It’s the ways God moves in my mundane.

It’s everything in between.