Welcome to my class!

I graduated a few hours ago, so I thought it appropriate to share with you the cool things about my class. I'll just go in alphabetical order, well, what I think is alphabetical order.

William (also known as Chris)- Chris could be considered annoying, but it's more of a funny annoying. He runs (or used to run) Techno Tuesdays at Covenant, which was awesome cause we got to dance during lunch. He liked to steal and hide Katy's stuff during calculus class. Very humorous.

Joey- Joey's a pretty down-to-earth guy. He fixed up an old mustang and it's one of the coolest cars I've ever riden in. You would think it was new! Joey's one of those guys that can be funny without even trying. History class was pretty interesting with him!

Anna- Anna is one of those people that you think is shy and quiet, but then you get to know her and BAM, she's crazy! Well, funny crazy. AND SHE'S COMING WITH ME TO TRINITY NEXT YEAR!!! :D So psyched.

Jori- Jori doesn't care what people think of her. She is honest no matter what. She can be a little weird at times, but hey, that's okay!

Bailey- Bailey is probably the most "normal" person in our class. She talks a lot, takes a ton of pictures, and talks about Tyler (her boyfriend). That pretty much sums it up.

Megan- Megan is so cool. She writes blogs, works at KFC, plays piano like a boss, and can sing amazingly (although she won't admit it!). Oh! And her slam poems are awesome:) I'm gonna miss that chick.....

Caleb- Caleb's pretty chill. He's got an odd sense of humor that can make any Economics class fun. And he's super good at basketball.

Bryan- B-ry is probably the coolest guy in my class. He's obsessed with Bdubs and will yell "WINGS" any chance he gets. If there's not a guy at Trinity like Bryan, I'll probably have to transfer because nothing will be funny.

April Mary- Wow, what do I say about miss April Mary Hubers? Well, I've known her for forever, and we have like a million stories we could tell about the weird stuff we did as kids. She is creative, funny, confident, and will win in any debate she is thrown into(but in reality, SHE would be the one to start the arguement!). Love you, April! Glad we're gonna be trolls together next year:)

Bekka- Bekka is a very colorful person. She loves to laugh and has the whitest teeth I have ever seen. And her hair is gorgeous!

Brittney- Brittney's loud, obnoxious, and crazy. Seriously, if a room is quiet and she walks in, it will NOT be quiet anymore. She likes to live in the moment and enjoy life as much as she can.

Katy- I usually don't like identifying people as my "best friends," but if I had to pick one, Katy would probably be it. We laugh about the stupidest stuff together. We even had a Harry Potter marathon this past week just because we could! I'm sure Mrs. Zeldenrust hated us because we would never shut up!

Brandon- This guy was one of the class clowns. It's like he fed off of other people's laughter. He was my CNA buddy when we took the nurses aide class. It made it a little less dreadful!

Ashley- Ashley=Awkward. That's really the only word you can use! She even did a How-to speech on how to be awkward. Yeah, it's pretty bad. But so entertaining! She one of those friends that can make any bad day better.

Steve- Steve is insanely smart. Like "going to be an engineer and taking a crash course in calculus this summer" smart. But he's still pretty cool. I felt bad for him though because he was the only guy that would sit with us girls at lunch. And on many occasions our conversation drifted toward things like tampons and boobs. Yeah, I can't imagine how awkward that was for him. Let's just say he knew when each of us was on our period.....poor guy.....

Francisco- Fran is hilarious. He's good at baseball and wants to open his own business someday. And he's Puerto Rican, so you have a spanish question, you go right to him!

Ben- Ben is good friends with Bryan, which makes sense because they are very much alike. His laugh is very distinct, and he knows German, which is way cool! Except when you think he's about to hauk (hawk? no) a lougie right in front of you. And Ben always managed to get crazy good grades in physics, without studying! What the heck?!? It's like magic or something...

Sean- Sean is another class clown. Let's just say, if we had to name one kid as the worst behaved in the class, it would be Sean. He loves to laugh, pull pranks, and mess up girls' hair. He's quite the funny guy!

Mitch- Mitch is a soccer playing, girl liking, good at singing type of dude. He's funny and is usually the guy we pick on the most. Not in the mean way, he understands we're joking.

Well, that's my class. My old class anyway. I hope I won't miss them too much when I leave. But I have a feeling I will.

Congrats, Class of 2013!!! It was an honor to have experienced all those years with you:)

As we get older....

Okay, I wrote this a few days ago, so just go back in time when you read it! :)


As we get older we....

1. Appreciate our siblings more. Now my family usually understands when I'm joking and vice versa. I'm glad that we can now hold a civil conversation without it ending in an arguement. Except our conversations end up about sex usually. And I have no idea why!

2. Somehow get smarter...usually:) Sure, I've learned a lot in school, but I've also learned about life in general. Not to mention how to take care of the ol' folks in the nursing home! Even Caleb has gained a little common sense. Shocker;)

3. Move on. I graduate in three days. I'll be taking my nurse's aid test in two days. Talk about stress! This fall I'm going to college. All this change is really crashing down right now! "Movin' on up. Movin' on up...to the east siiide!" Okay, maybe you don't know that song, but whatevs.

4. Are thankful for the people that we used to not appreciate. Good example: teachers. At first, we don't like them because they give us a crap ton of homework and seem really annoying. But now, I'm thankful for all the work they do for us. Being a teacher is one of the jobs that seem rather unenjoyable to me. I'm glad there are people in the world willing to put up with hormonal teenagers crammed into a small school building.

5. We get more mature, well, for the most part. Everyone enjoys a good laugh, but I've even seen my brothers get more mature. And that's saying a lot! I love those guys:) I still lose it sometimes, but I think I've learned how to handle certain situations more easily.

Wait...it's over???

Freshman year: Am I done yet?

Sophmore year: Can I go to college now?

Junior year: Seriously, this is taking forever!

Senior year: Come on. Is it over yet???

And now: Umm, yes. It is over.

Uh, okay! Woo hoo, I'm done with high school FOREVER!!!! I graduate this Friday, I have a summer job, I'm gonna go to open houses and have an awesome time! Yes, my friends. It is over.

Wow. I'm not sure if I like that. Change is a really scary thing! I've gone to Covenant for four years, seen the same people, zoned out during the same teacher's lectures, eaten lunch in the same cafeteria.

What do I do now?

I go to college, that's what I do.

I have to make new friends? Yes.
I have to take new classes? Yes.
I have to live in a dorm? Yes.
Am I ready for this? Yes!!!

High school is done, but I don't think it's hit me yet. I know I haven't seen my friends for the last time, or walked out of Covenant forever. But it's still a strange feeling. Next fall I will be living in Palos Heights, Illinios, attending Trinity Christian College, and studying nursing and spanish. That's a lot of change at once! But I know that I can handle it.

High school is over, yes. But now I get to move on to bigger and better things.

Writer's Block

I have to write a short story for composition class this weekend. Seems easy, right?

NOT WHEN YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT TO WRITE ABOUT!!!!!!!!!!

Grr....I hate having writer's block. And it's even worse because I can write about almost anything I want for this paper! And yet I still can't think of anything...

Any ideas? I'm pretty much at a loss right now. Well, time to stare at the computer screen some more, pondering the vast amounts of topics I could include in my story.....and yet writing absolutely none of them.

Beauty...a size?

Sometimes I turn the news on while I'm doing homework because background noise helps me focus.

A story came on, and people were pacing in front of an Abercrombie store. I was intrigued, so I looked up. Turns out people, mostly women, were protesting the fact that that store and others were making clothes in mostly small sizes.

Don't these stores know that people come in a lot of different shapes and sizes? Don't they know that beauty isn't just being "eye-catching" on the outside?

I think that store needed a little reminder of this. Go protesters! (as long as you don't get arrested or anything)

This particular story made me slighty angry because, let's face it, I'm part of the "bigger" population. Why do stores find the need to make it more difficult for common people to shop? The only reason I can think of for making only smaller sizes is to encourage the population to get in shape, but honestly, is that gonna happen any time soon? Oh, America, why are you so messed up....

I believe women should feel empowered to look and feel their best, whatever size they are. The goal of clothing stores is to sell clothes that appeal to the population. And, in fact, some of the population is slighty larger than your average mannequin (is that spelled right? idk).

Moral of the story: rebel against your favorite clothing store if they aren't making clothes that you
a) fit in to or b) that you like. Okay, not really:) But you see my point.

WE-ARE-FAMILY!!!

Guess my mom was right. As us kids get older, we grow to appreciate each other more. After Mom opened her present I made her and everyone had checked it out, Nichole said something to the effect of every year I seem even more cool. Whoa! That felt good to here, especially from a sister I'm not particularly close to. Which will probably change soon since she, Greg, and Micah moved back down to DeMotte! Yay:D

WE ARE FAAAMILY!!! I GOT ALL MY SISTAS WITH ME-E-E...

I love that song, and it seems so fitting to scream it through the house on a beautiful mother's day. I just hope the bonding moments we had today, don't require a holiday to occur.

Here's to a joyfilled day enjoyed with family:) Blessings on all the mothers in the world!

Spring into Action!

 

I wish my birthday was in the spring because it's my favorite season! While the weather wasn't the best today, it was still a great time to get outside and plant some geraniums.

 

(Here's last year's tomato plants)

 

When I woke up this morning, I looked outside our kitchen window at our front lawn. You know what I saw? The greenest grass I've seen in a looong time. And that made me really happy:)

 

Can't wait to lie (or lay?) on our grass and look up at the trees backed by a beautiful blue sky.

 

I love how all the yard work, time, and effort we put into our yard in the spring gives us wonderful results in the summer. I guess you could say that photography is sort of a hobby of mine, and I'm definitely a sucker for plants!

 

I don't really know where I'm going with this blog post. I guess I'm just super excited for the beauty of spring and summer:)

 



Guatemala Adventure: Part 1&1/2

2-25-13, Friday

Who knew shopping, walking, and chilling in Antigua would wear us out almost as much as a work day! We woke up at five and left at exactly six. A lot of us were pretty rushed and I forgot my shoes! We have this "no shoes" rule in our room to keep it clean, and before we left I was walking in flip-flops and socks. Well, silly me, walked on the bus rockin the whole sandle/sock style. What a tourist I am.

Anywho, food in Antigua requires more than the 20-25 quetzales most of us had saved. But shopping in the market is so much fun! Spanish wasn't much of a problem with the vendors, but sometimes bartering proved to be quite difficult. There was this one crabby lady that had the coolest earrings in her shop that no one else had and I wanted them so bad! Yeah, I had to give in. But it's so cool thinking about the prices in American dollars. Stuff here can be really inexpensive!

It's amazing to be exposed to this culture. At Casa Bernabe, we are super excluded, it's kind of all you see. But antigua was really cool. Stone streets, bright buildings, hand-made crafts to admire. It's just so different, I love it!

It was interesting to get a tour of a cathedral because we had extra time. Sure, he spoke english, but his accent was so thick that we only got 30% of the information. Kinda strage, but it was a really cool cathedral ruin sight thingy. Til we went in the pitch black basement with holes and puddles. Yeah, shouldn't have forgotten my shoes!

TOO MANY CHOICES!!!

You know what's intimidating, but in a good way? Movie stores! I walked into Movie Madness after school today with probably seven or eight movies in mind. Watch out, fellas, here comes the ADD!!!

Problem 1: I didn't know which type of movie I wanted to watch this evening, which would have narrowed it down a ton! Funny? Dramatic? Serious? Heartfelt? Gah! THERE WERE JUST TOO MANY OPTIONS!!!!!!!

Problem 2: I made the mistake of asking a few friends what movies I should see. That practically tripled my original list!

But the cool thing was, I got two movies for $3.64! That seems like a really great price to me, but I have no idea if it is. Go Movie Madness!

Any way, after walking around the store a few times, I decided on Silver Linings Playbook and Baby Mama. I've heard good things about both, I like the actors in each of them, and in a few hours I'll hopefully have decided on which one I want to watch! I guess the other movies I want to see will just have to wait.

Okay, this paragraph is completely random, but I'm listening to some seventies smooth jazz music right now, and it is far better than our pop music today! *Sigh*, our world is getting so messed up......It's amazing what cool music you discover when writing a research paper on music of the 20th century.......:)

Spoiled

I have a brother that complains because he can't have facebook yet.

I have friends that play games on iphones or send pictures of their faces to their friends across the cafeteria.

I have a family that lives in a house with a refrigerator, air conditioning, heat, an oven, a computer, two TVs, and enough rooms to go around.

I go to a school that is setting me up for a descent future.

I have an actual church building to go to every Sunday.

I have everything I could possibly need!

And yet...

I complain when the power goes out.

I'm jealous of my friends' cool phones.

I complain about homework.

Sometimes I don't like going to church.

On some days, I'm crabby because I don't get exactly what I want.

People in our nation are super spoiled. And even more so now than even a decade or so ago. Now before you start yelling at me about poverty and stuff, just hear me out! Just think of all the random stuff we have in our houses that we don't even use. It's ridiculous! I know I don't have room to judge others, I'm guilty of this too, but I think is a problem we need to learn to overcome. However, I doubt that this change will ever happen, which is really sad to think about...

Just a thought I wanted to share. There are so many problems we can see in our nation and right now, and it's sad that whatever we do may not messure up to anything. Wow. Depressing...

7

I wrote this as a post on our composition class blog/ning site, but I decided I'd put it on this blog too:) Enjoy!

7 minutes. 7 minutes to write a ning.

Oh, the things you could do in 7 minutes. I think of Mr. Vandermolen saying, "you could do five questions on your spelling assignment!"

I think of guys in jr. high saying, "i can run a mile in 7 minutes!"

What can I do in 7 minutes? Give a friend some encouragement? Get halfway through a physics problem? Play a song on the piano, or saxophone even? Read a Psalm? Walk around my school three times because it's so small?

And what if we double it to 14 minutes? Then 28. And so on! What could we do then?

Why is time such a curious topic? We all seem to be running out of it everyday. "I wish that days were 30 hours, or 40, or 50!" But then we would still be running out of time.

Oops, 3 more minutes. Hmm, 3 minutes. What can I do in 3 minutes? Give a friend some encouragement? Get halfway through a physics problem? Play a song on the.................

Busybusybumblebee:)

It seems that our business (busyness?idk) comes in waves. Last month, I wasn't UBER busy. Sure, there was service week and other things, but not too bad. This month, I feel completely and utterly drained of all possible energies.

Earlier this evening I was working on a five page research paper for history class. Not just any paper, but the one that counts as our FINAL. Yeah, big deal. We also have to do a presentation on it. Ugh!

Anywho, I worked on this paper for a solid three hours and only got one page done. No exaggeration there. At all! Sad, right? I could just blame the classic senioritis, but it's not his(or her?) fault.

And you know what I did to make this month even worse? I volunteered to be class speaker at graduation(which I really did want to do), but I also volunteered to talk about service week in next week's chapel! WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF??? I really have no idea....

I'm graduating in less than a month, and the homework and other school crap just keeps coming...ugh. I'm sorry, but this blog is really just a big ole' rant:(

Also, I take my CNA test the day before graduation. That's another thing to add to my list!

Guess I'm just a busybusybumblebee:)

Guatemalan Adventure!

I'm not going to consider going to Guatemala a "trip of a lifetime." Why? Because I hope that that trip won't be the end of my travels. I loved Guatemala! I know I can't take you there, but I hope that by sharing what I experienced with you, you can sort of understand how impactful this trip was. I know there was a blog written during the week, but I kept a journal so that I might be able to share things from my perspective. I'm not a very good writer, but it's straight from my heart, so don't mock my silly grammer mistakes. Also, we aren't aloud to mention kids names, so if it seems like I'm forgetting names, I'm really not. I hope you enjoy!

4-20-13, Saturday
This trip is definitely full of new experiences. I got to finally experience my first plane ride! It was super exhilarating and nerve-racking, especially during take-off. Landing was pretty meh, but take-off was like "holy crap, I'm gonna die of excitement." We had a two hour flight to Miami and then a two hour and twenty minute flight to Guatemala City. We threw our stuff on the bus  and hopped on. This was the best hour-long bus ride of my life! Driving in Latin America is absolutely insane, I love it. It was a stick-shift bus and was super bumpy and crazy. Let's just say I'm thankful we're alive right now! Casa Bernabe is incredible. The kids just hand all over you like monkeys on banana trees. Speaking spanish with people isn't proving to be too difficult. I don't know what tomorrow holds in store, but I'm sure God has fantastic plans for us.

4-21-13, Sunday
What do you know? The pastor used Jeremiah 29:11 in his sermon! We all loved the service and most of us could understand most of it without the translator. The singing was awesome, and they were nice enough to put the words on the screen and sing some in English. It was so awesome because, during greeting, I got like, seven hugs.

I love it so much. We haven't started any work yet, but I still feel like I want to come back some day.

It's so funny how many girls are asking about boys! Fran and Mitch have some girlies that really like them. I'm surprised at how easy it is to talk to the kids, I love it! Now I'm watching Liz, April, Sean, Jori, and Caleb play cards while betting with oreos and nutter-butters.

4-22-13, Monday
This was quite an excellent first day of work. We ate breakfast then headed outside to tear up a road only to put it back together again. We were basically swinging pick-axes, shoveling rocks and dirt, hauling stuff in wheel barrows, and some of us got to play with the kids in the baby house, or pull weeds in the garden.

I felt kind of awkward with my spanish today because the house parents talked so fast! (And I was totally out of it.) I also met (yeah, insert name here), a super bossy kinda bratty girl, (insert another name aqui), a trouble maker, (you guessed it, next name!), an adorably clingy little guy, (hit me with another name please), a cute developmentally challenged boy, his sister (cutie-pa-tuty!!!) the cutest and lightest little one year old ever, (so-and-so?), an adorable little trouble maker, and (last name guys!), a cute little girl, yet again.

4-23-13, Tuesday
More road work today. A little before lunch, a few of us went to help in the garden. Hauling up cauliflower and broccoli plants really takes it our of ya! I hate how, throughout the day, I think of such great things to write in my journal, but I seriously forget all of them! One highlight of my day was smelling like rotten broccoli. It was pretty great. I love all the random inside jokes our class is making up. It's so much fun! I can't believe I'm in Guatemala.

4-24-13, Wednesday
It's extremely difficult to write right now, considering the fact that our hands are the most tired part of our bodies. We're still working on the road and making good progress, but with only one and a half work days left, I don't think we'll finish. the people in the garden are getting frustrated because Tony, the boss man of the garden, wants everything perfect. I guess the guys aren't good at planting corn in straight rows, which doesn't suprise me, and Tony is always sure to let them know. But I guess it's his fault cause he wanted only boys in the first place, for some odd reason.

Clint had five or six of us girls putting cement between the blocks, which he said would take three hours, but really only took one! Then we were pick-axing, shoveling, and pounding more cement, which of course exhausted our hands. And now my hand-writing is atrocious! (Is that how you spell it?) Class dynamics are starting to show. Of course people are going to get upset with each other or only like their clique, but seriously, this is getting ridiculous. Whatevs! We get to go to Antigua tomorrow! But for now: a nap and then back to work.

Hey, guys! Yeah, I don't know why I said that. I'm in a really hyper, crazy mood right now. I worked my butt off today shovelling, pounding cement, and picking up rocks, clay cement, everything! Except gold. I didn't find any gold. I was singing to myself in the shower like the whole time. And it was cold! But on purpose cause I liked it:) And I could barely peel my jeans off cause I was so sweaty! It was so cool. Okay, not really. K', I'm gonna go now cause I have extremely sore hands.

Wow! That "going-away-party-program-thingy was awesome. I almost started crying, and that's really saying something! Most of the groups did a dance or made us a really cool card. It made me love these kids even more. I could definitely tell that Casa Bernabe was extremely thankful for all of our work. It was so cute, (my friend, whom I can't name) sat by me and was holding another little girl. And that girl just sat there fiddling with my water bottle. It was also hilarious when Tony started chucking chocolate everywhere. The room was an instant mad-house! And a lot of people got pegged inthe face with chocolate. Chairs were being pushed over. I don't know how the little kids survived! Well, time for some itch cream and some sleep. Tomorrow, we're up at five to head to Antigua!

This is only the first 2/3 of my journal. The rest is coming soon! Thanks for reading:)