I may have gone two months without an update. To all of you reading- ahem, Joy Chance-I apologize. So, a quick recap.

November: normal college-y things, tutoring, and Thanksgiving travels, which included Lake Forest Ranch, Birmingham, Gatlinburg, and Nashville.









December: finals, home, baby cousin Riley was born, surprise Nashville visit, family time, Christmas, and more recently, snow!

october

Hannah came for Follies weekend...we went to Cafe Du Monde.


I went home for my Dad's 50th surprise birthday party last weekend.


Tonight I cooked with my friend Kate.

You shake your head
What is so hard to believe
When you are in your bed
I sing over you the sweetest things
Because oh, my love, it does not tire
I'm awake when the moon is full
And I know the times when you feel lost
And you just aren't sure
Lo and behold,
My love hasn't grown cold for you
You could steal away in the middle of the night
And hide in the light of day
While you cloak yourself in the darkest lies
But oh, my love, it swims in the deepest oceans of fear
And as soon as you lower your head
I AM here
If only you could see how heaven stills when you speak
I know all your days
And I have wrapped you in mystery
And oh, my love for you is as wide as the galaxies
Just hold out your hand and close your eyes
And come, be with Me
-My Love Hasn't Grown Cold - Bethany Dillow

"Therefore I am now going to allure her; I will lead her into the desert and speak tenderly to her. There I will give her back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt. 'In that day,' declares the LORD, 'you will call Me "my Husband"; you will no longer call Me "my master." ' " Hosea 2:14-16

Philadelphia and other things

Hello!
Things are going fine here in Clinton. Classes are in full swing at the halfway point of the semester. My tests come in waves, so that gets a little crazy. This next week is going to be really intense for me. I have tests & papers in all of my classes between this week and next week. This weekend is homecoming, and with Swannanoa I have a lot to do. We have follies, which is our dance/skit that we have been practicing for every night from 9-12. I'm just excited it's finally here. Hannah is coming to stay with me this weekend, so I'm looking forward to that also.
I went to Philadelphia this weekend with Blake's mom and got to visit with him. It was so wonderful. We got to see a lot of the city, which was just awesome. His campus at Eastern is very beautiful and it was neat to see where he lives and goes to school. It was a short trip, but well worth it.

To elaborate...

...on my last blog:
I did get a car. It is a 1995 white Honda civic, manual transmission. It is an adventure learning to drive that sucker. I have yet to detroy anything (or anyone). I did stall out on a speed bump today. It was quite humorous.

So OK, I should probably explain this just for future reference: rush. Since Sept. 7th, I've been participating in general rush. At MC, in place of fraternities & sororities, we have clubs (for guys) & tribes (for girls). It's a really neat aspect of the social life here. I went back & forth for a while in my decision of whether to rush or not. I think I made the right decision so I am now happy that I did. Saturday I found out that I got the tribe I pref'd (basically the one I wanted & chose), which is Swannanoa or ST. So now that general rush is over, I will be a pledge in ST, which adds to the craziness of the semester, but makes it so much fun.

Classes are going well. I have 4 tests this week...so I've been studying my brains out this weekend (namely, today). I feel prepared but you never know. I also start my babysitting-ish job tomorrow, which I'm looking forward to. And I'll be going home for the 1st time this weekend. So that'll be good.

I got a car.

don't cry over spilled coffee

Ha. So let me tell you a story:
Friday morning I woke up by my alarm (Sigur Ros-Hoppipolla) at 7:00, just like every other morning. This gives me a solid hour to shower, get ready, eat breakfast, and get to class approximately 2 minutes early. So I wake up, right...and man I stayed up super late/early the night/morning before, so I just wanted to lay down for a second. Who knew a second could really mean 50 minutes. I opened my puffy eyes at 7:50am and flung myself out of bed, grabbed my shampoo bottle & flip flops, turned my coffee maker on, and sprinted to the bathroom. Now this morning, I was praising the Lord for handicapped showers with detachable shower heads. I took a mini shower, because I knew the necessity was just washing my hair...so of course I needn't bother with the rest. Well, turns out that you can't always aim well with that handy shower head, so I was wet. To say the least. I ran bag into my dorm, changed my tshirt, slipped on my Chacos, grabbed my thermos of coffee, and put it in the side pocket of my backpack. I set that down on the floor to grab my phone, and turned around to my backpack sitting in a puddle of coffee. At 7:56...great. I moved my sopping wet bag over and cleaned up the mess, only to turn around & find that I had made the same mistake...and spilled by coffee again. I cleaned that mess up, grabbed my stuff, and ran out the door. So...not a huge deal right? Only, added to that, I spill coffee all over myself on a regular basis. Like today, I spilled it all over the floor in my English class. That was smooth. But I did not cry.