Where's Waldo?

Well. Where have I been is more like it! I can't even come up with excuses for not blogging lately. I've just been gone everywhere!

The last few weeks I've been going to soccer practice. Note that last time I blogged I was going to volleyball practice??

Well. I played soccer from third grade on with the same girls, up until eighth grade where I played rec with my team, indoor two weeks after, classic a week later, and highschool just a few weeks after that! Mind you it starts to wear you out after awhile! So last year I made the switch to volleyball but the sport was never quite the same for me. So after discovering a brand new mysterious pair of cleats in the attic I'm back out on the field coming home once more covered in turf and bruises and I am loving it!

Additionally, the last few days have been filled with my procrastination. So here goes!

AP PROCRASTINATION SCHEDULE!

-Friday: Begin reading one of the two books which I have had all summer to read and start analyzing it. Handwrite out 'One-Pulse Words' short essay(Describe August 8th using only one syllable words).
-Saturday: Read 'Living Like Weasles' by Annie Dillard and follow through with the Summary, Translation, and set of 10 questions (Which took me 4 hours). Make sure to finish book started (Doing School) and start on Umbrella topics in relations to that. Read 'Z' story and write the responding 'E-E-Easy does it' short essay(One where you must describe elephant without using the letter E) Also print off e-mail from teacher due on the first day of school.
-Sunday: Read Jonathan Kozol's short story and do responding SOAPSS and DIDLS charts. Write 5 paragraph essay on Charity: Is it right for teachers to use as a bribe? Finish Umbrella topics response to 'Doing School' and read 'Eats, Shoots and Leaves' as well.
**NOTE on sunday- Don't forget- Target school shopping with mom and go and buy theme items for Freshman orientation on Tuesday.

Monday- Finish whatever I don't really do on days planned!!


Okay. It's my fault that I waited so long. I got the assignment in June. But what teenager wants to spend there summer reading about how humans should live like weasels and books on punctuation and why school is stressful?! Not me!

So here's what my day consisted of today.


(Two of these)


(Seven pages of this)


(And reading these!!)

However. Only 5 things left to be checked off!! :D



On a lighter note, we had our first football game on Friday night! Despite the fact that we lost it was just fun to be around so much energy and spirit again and see my boyfriend play! :]

I love getting dressed up for the gamesss!



Well. I'm off to go do more AP homework. Yayy for my procrastination!!!

Yeehaw!

My aunt and uncle hosted a wonderful 'Hoe Down' party in celebration of their 20th wedding anniversary. I have to admit-- me and the girls had quite a time starting up the line dancing!



I was also able to meet many cousins, second cousins, great aunts, uncles, etc. that I had never met before which was awesome! Though I'm fairly sure I missed out on like a family gene. I mean seriously- my hair is died blonde right now.. but amidst all these blondies I sure look like I have dark hair again!



Overall it was great getting to see so many family members and just spend hours dancing to a live band with everyone from my papa to my cousins! I can't wait for the next time we're able to get together again. :]



I'd blog more but I'm off to clean more house before our house warming tomorrow! Woop de doo!

I Promise

I'm not relapsing into my old blogging habits! I'm still here!

I've been at a hoe down, volleyball practice, babysitting, and my big camping trip for the year. Oh and hanging before me still is an upcoming party and a two packet AP assignment. AH.

So things will be a little out of order but in this post I'd like to share something very important.

Through NHS, I was asked to work at a benefit concert supporting finding a cure for JM. I went into this honestly having no idea what JM was or how we were connected with it.

The concert was amazing. And my heart goes out to the little boy named Mason who was able to attend. Mason has been battling JM for a few years now and has made some great steps recently. At the end of 2008 he could no longer control his wheelchair. Last night he was able to thank us for helping and was once again in control of his wheelchair. He's going home from the hospital in two days.

JM is Juvenile Myositis. It is a disease that affects muscle control, causes lung and heart problems, and severe fatigue. You can read up more on it at it's website- CureJM.com

There are also two heart warming songs located in the Right column. "Hope and Prayer" is sung by a girl I use to go to school with, and "Miracle" I heard preformed last night and it was very heart touching.

So here's to Mason, our hopes and prayers for this boy who is a living miracle.

View his story here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1T86xM3RFw

Pick me up!

Ah. Lovely Summer mornings. A light breeze coming from open windows and a soothing fan blowing in my ear. The perfect way to wake up. Oh wait. HA! This morning I was woken to a little boy throwing off the covers and climbing out of my bed. Wait a minute, isn't this the boy who normally sleeps in later than me?



It figures that the one morning he wakes up at 8 AM is the morning after he slept in my bed. And despite my love for my new bedroom, the many windows are a curse at those early hours in the morning. They let in a wee bit of light.



That's thrilling to wake up to! So. The combination of going to bed at near midnight and being woken up at 8 AM (Not enough sleep for a teenager!) leave me in dire need of a summer pick me up!!



(So I sleep in my Gryffindor shirt... shush.) Therefore the decision was quickly made. I needed to go get coffee. Ah coffee. Such a beauty, love, adoration. And as of lately my favorite is Dutch Bros! It's a drive thru and despite that it's a little farther than the Starbucks located around every corner, it's well worth it. The people that work there are energetic and funny and their coffee is cheap. Today they asked me a set of comical questions.



1. Does your van ever end?

2. It seats HOW many people?!

Ah the joy of seeing the boy working there lean out the window to hand my my White Mocha Freeze, pause, and look back to see that my car (which I was sitting in by myself) took up their entire painted Drive Thru lines.

Oh the wonders of coffee and how it can make you go from drab to fab!



Disclaimer- Coffee does not cause fixed hair and a change into nicer clothing. However it can cause hyperactivity which can also cause confidence boosts. WOOOOOOOOOO!

Summer lovin' !!

I spent the day today at my summer "job"-- the sweetest thing alive. I get to spend a few days each week babysitting two kids at the perfect ages for fun activities! While the morning hours are exhausting to wake up to, the afternoon ones are exhausting to come home from. However well worth it.

Today, after sitting around and reading at their house until the kids woke up, we made blueberry pancakes with their massive amount of blueberries. I've never been a huge blueberry fan but those pancakes were good! And due to my miscalculation of how much batter I was pouring into the pan I managed to make a big fluffy pancake the size of the plates we were using, which had us laughing for a while. I'm pretty sure the boy managed to eat about a third of it.

Afterwards, we went on a bike ride around the neighborhoods and wound up going at least two miles. Okay okay, it's not a ton, but hey- that's some nice excersise for the day. Made me feel rather accomplished actually. And after that we swam in their pool for awhile. I'm actually starting to achieve a rather decent tan. Which, considering I got my mama's skin tone, is a big thing for me.

So now, after a little nap to make up for the energy I spent today, I'm off to hangout with my boyfriend. I'm loving summer '09. :]

Small things.

I spent the evening tonight at the dinner table for 2 hours with my family and our company; my little brother Patrick's godparents. The best part of it? We spent the entire time uninterrupted by the advances in modern technology. No cell phones, no TV on, etc.

Now in my mother's defense- we do sit down for homecooked meals quite often. In general though, someone is impatient to get up and go do something and that person is generally me! It's part of being a teenager, I always have somewhere to go. Tonight though, we had the young kids sitting in the kitchen, and us adults (which while I am not legally, I've entered the age where I can sit at the big kids table at Thanksgiving) sitting in our nice dining room. And it was nice having no one in a hurry to leave. We were able to discuss everything from boys to moving to prospective colleges in mine and Will's future.

After the death of my older brother and uncle, I constantly reminded myself that I needed to view the smaller things in life with more detail. I believe that I'm finally maturing enough to be able to truly appreciate those things. Maybe not in the full, but to a much higher extent then I would have experienced just a few years ago.

So this weekend I will be far away in a place where a cell phone tower doesn't exist and I think it will be good for me to spend a few quality days with my entire family- extended and all! I'm greatly looking forward to seeing my cousins and Aunt T and Uncle C from the east coast! As well as my cousins K and R along with their adorable daughter and son.

I'm excited for a weekend made for enjoying the little things in life that I haven't been paying attention to in my whirlwind of highschool.



My beautiful Ethiopian cousin I'll be seeing in just three short days!

Change

I have come to see as good.



From wild and crazy:







To a little more mature:







Calm down. I'm still the same wild child I always have been. My first sleepover in this new house?











Oh and while I'm blogging, since I don't seem to much-- Any other raving Harry Potter lunatics out there? I had forgotten my longtime "boyfriend" until the new movie came out and my love has began once again. Ah the boy with the messy dark hair and glasses. Though I was always partial to Sirius Black myself. ;) I remember long hours spent curled up with those books. I'm telling you. I could read more than one in a day--and I did so more than once.



My Aunt T began my obsession back in Kindergarden and I began reading them myself a year later. And mind you, it was love after that first page turn. My books went everywhere with me. At least one on every vacation, every sleepover, every camp, etc. They hold my tears, my laughter, and probably some food crumbs from many years ago. My bedroom was full of posters, calendars, and lifesize cardboard cut outs that most likely I pretended to kiss.



It grew to be not only a book series that I read, but my childhood. I spent afternoons on the playground acting out the stories with my best friends, pretending that the swings were our broomsticks. I was always Hermione of course, as I did have the bushy hair.



I felt dissapointment upon reaching the age of 11 and not receiving my letter to Hogwarts. If I recall my Pajama pants created static with my comforter that night and I thought I was a witch. Oh the mind of an 11 year old.



And then, slowly, as years went on the love softly faded. Middle school introduced a whole new world and distracted me from what was once my life. Though there was still a fan written story my friend Abby and I composed together. Shall I share the link??




Then the love diminished. High School entered me into a whirlwind of boys, drama, love, heartbreak, friends, laughter, and essential craziness which I still face on a day to day basis. While I did attend the midnight book release of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows, it just wasn't the same love as I once held inside my heart.



So upon waiting in line for the release of Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince movie, I felt excitement growing in my chest in a way that hadn't been present for a very long time. I was pleased with the movie- While it left out much(which can only be expected), the new director balanced things very well and showed character growth just as the book did. And after the movie, I came home and unpacked my books which are falling out of their covers due to love. Each has rips and tears and notes written inside and just make me smile looking at them.



Harry Potter was the love of my childhood. :]





(Book release)











(Movie)







So here's to childhood loves!







(Yes that's book 7 :P)