It's hard to see but this is me trying to smile.  :)

Why is it that most girls like weak, "sensitive" guys? 

This was the question a friend posed to me earlier this afternoon. I found it a fascinating question simply because it made two claims that I really don't believe to be true. First of all I'm not sure if "most girls" are attracted to weak young men. Secondly he paired weak with "sensitive," as if the two were a bad thing. I currently don't have the brain power to really attack either of these two claims (I have a headache), however I want to add one thought to the second claim: "sensitive" should not be paired with weak. Just because a young man is capable of being gentle and kind to others should discredit his strength. I know very few guys who can be strong and "sensitive" at the same time. I think it a very commendable quality. About as high as drive. (For those of you who know me I respect drive more than most qualities).

Enough about that. Life hasn't changed much since I last posted. Still working on school almost all the time. That is when I'm not trying to convert a darn aiff wave file into an mp3. :P Which by the way I ended up sending successfully in a file all it's own.

Thanksgiving was lovely. There about a little less than 50 people, and more food than I have ever seen. I can honestly say it was one of the best thanksgivings. I could bore you with all the details, but I'll save you. ;) :) Let's just say there was lots of music, lots of ping pong, and tons of happiness. :)

I continue to have a headache. The origin is unknown but I suspect it's still part of my thanksgiving hangover. Other than that and a sore throat plus a little tiredness, I'm doing wonderfully well.

Last point of business, the Portland trip: It's kind of driving me crazy. One day it's on, another it's off. At this point my mom and I may or may not be heading up there the weekend of the 12th to do last minute shopping. The Phelps might come with us, but that hasn't been confirmed. I'll try to keep y'all updated on that.

I really wish I had more to say other than just relaying events of my life. In a way it seems so.... menial. I don't know if that's the right word, but it seemed to fit.

Anyway, I am amazed at the Lord's forgiveness. That's been a real issue for me lately. I know that God forgives all sin. I know that it is arrogant to think that there exists a sin too big for God to forgive. I know that I am not saved by works but through faith. However, I am confused since a child of God shall be known by their fruit. So how can I be a child of God if I make a conscious decision to choose sin over God's will? However, this borders on assuming that God can't forgive my sin because of the condition in which it was made, which I already know is arrogant to assume..... yeah, that was a bit of a ramble. Anywho. Slowly plugging away. If you have any thoughts I'd love to hear them. :)

Well that's all.

God is good.

Goodnight.

"I search frantically. Running up to the loft, checking all the dressing rooms. Checking them again. She had been right by me less than 30 seconds ago. Running out into the dimly lit auditorium I see a tiny blonde head poking up from behind the seat. My heart slows I quickly make my way through the rows and take the small girl in my arms. "Darling, what's wrong?" "They laughed at me" ::laughing softly:: "That's because you said something funny love. You were funny. It's a good thing." ::forlornly:: "It is?" Me: ::nods:: Her: ::jumping up:: "I want to go say something funny again!" <3 <3 <3 <3

Wow............. So I failed. So very sorry. Not that I have a huge adoring fan base who has missed my absence, but a girl can dream. Not. ::laughs:: Wow. I'm out of it.

So I figured I would split this into three sections: Past, Present, and Future


Past: Quick summary of all the colleges.

The house we stayed while at E&H

Emory & Henry had a gorgeous campus. It was raining but it was still completely stunning. The tour guide was adorable, and the teachers that I spoke with were incredibly smart. One of the professors I spoke with actually has written/edited one of the main law books that Yale and Harvard etc. require their law students to study. However, the students weren't appealing, and the general feel just wasn't right for me.

On the Annapolis Wharf

St. John's is situated in Annapolis, the cutest town I have ever seen in my life. There

Paying hommage to my uncle <3

are not words to describe how perfect Annapolis was. It was just darling!!! The college itself was incredible. It was gorgeous, perfect student-teacher ratio (there are 400 students enrolled), the classes are incredible and all lecture based, and the teachers are more like tutors. After visiting there, I knew no other school would compare as far as the check-list of what I wanted went. However, again, something didn't feel quite right. It might have been the students, but I'm not specifically sure.

Chilling. Literally. ;) :)

Hillsdale was next, and while it had a bigger campus, an old fashioned library, and a bell tower on top of their admissions building, the school reminded me too much of my high school, just a lot more advanced.


Patrick Henry College. Oh wow. I can't even begin to describe how wonderful it was the. The students, the teachers. The campus is tiny, but then so is the number of students (400) so there really isn't a problem. I met Tamara Black and Betsy Reich. I absolutely adore them both. This was the school I decided on. I seriously can't WAIT to go. Almost.... I'll explain in a bit. :)

Present: 

It's A Wonderful Life just closed tonight. My official duties? Kid wrangler. I had the pleasure of watching two ten year-old boys, a seven year-old girl, and a little blonde (mentioned above) five year-old. It was heaven for me. No doubt, my hands were full, and there were several times when I came to rehearsal completely worn out, but when you have four little children tugging at you, the youngest looking at you with those beautiful brown eyes saying "I want to pway cops and wobbers" you just can't resist.

School is really intense right now. In the past couple days I finished Killer Angels, I've read several of Abraham Lincoln's speeches, and just finished The Communist Manifesto. I'm charging through physics and pre-calc like none other, and have been fine tuning my essay for english. The good news is I have three books left in history (The Treaty of Versailles, Mein Kampf, and The Great Gatsby), two more meetings for Pre-Calc, three for Physics, and my english ends at the end of the semester, so I should be done with school about a week before Christmas, which brings me to....

Future: 


I'M GOING TO COLLEGE IN JANUARY!!!!!!!  I'm officially scared. For the first time in my life I'm actually nervous about something. This isn't like the tiny little butterflies I get before speaking to a large group of butterflies, or even like the nervous stomach flips I get before taking a test. This is straight on fear. The Lord is behind me though, giving me the strength to make it through each day. If I try to look to the future, I become overwhelmed, but If I look to each day, it's just enough. If you know me really well you'll know how huuuuge that is for me. :)

Went to the State Capitol in MD, just for funsies. :)

Thanksgiving is going to be awesome! I'm making a bunch of desserts, and we are going to go to the Kruses house. The AGK clan will all be there, along with another family from Christ Covenant Church. There's going to be about 50 people. ::grins:: I'm soooo excited.


A Portland trip is near in my future. At one point everything had been finalized, but now I'm actually not sure what is going to happen. The different options are as follows. ONE: Mom, Mrs. Phelps, Dev, Bren, and I all drive up to Portland on thursdayish, maybe take some senior pictures, hang out, complete the circle (Dev and I + our moms went to Portland when I was in 7th grade for a "becoming a young woman" retreat thing, just by ourselves). Etc. Then we go to church sunday morning, and drive home after. TWO: Mom and I go up by ourselves on Friday eveningish, do some shopping on Saturday for college stuff (cause Medford is lame and doesn't have a "linens & things" or "Bed, Bath, and Beyond").
Then we go to church sunday morning, and drive home after. THREE: Daniel and I drive up Saturday morning, have some last sister-brother bonding time. Then we go to church sunday morning, and drive home after.

We're not sure which church we would go to. While we'd like to go to a certain one, we aren't sure if it's allowed, but we can't exactly make any calls, literally and figuratively. So that is in real limbo. The dates are either going to be the weekend of the 12th, or the weekend of the 19th. I don't know if it matters, but we'll see.

Waiting behind a gorgeous church in Annapolis

So. That was a lot. :) But that's what happens when I go this long without posting. My life is kinda crazy as usual but it goes on. I cry out to God for strength.

"Bless the Lord oh my soul and all that is within me. Bless His holy name." -Psalm 1:103

"I got you down! And it killed you! And you're dead!" -Justine (7 yr. old)

"Me: I want to see my.... my.... my.... whatever he is" "Your fella?" -Doty  

This was taken a few days ago, but I figured I would post it anyway. :)

Warning: It's just me talking for about 5 minutes about the few days preceding the day I took this.

Safe in San Fransisco! I'll try to post some point tomorrow evening when I get home, or by Monday at some point. :) :)

Tribute to Uncle Clint! <3

Well, this is going to be another straight forward update:

Saturday we hit the road at about 11:30 and made it to Gaithersburg, Maryland by 6ish. We stopped for starbucks which was nice. However:

I got a caramel frap. I haven't had one of those for quite some time and my stomach had a minor meltdown. All that to say, I won't be having any for a while. :P :)

Sunday we woke up and went to Covenant Life: Josh Harris's church and listened to an excellent message on "Being sober-minded and self-controlled for the sake of your prayers." The worship was gorgeous and everyone was incredibly friendly. :) After church we drove about 45 minutes to Annapolis. I absolutely adore Annapolis. It's a darling darling town! We're staying in a hotel that was established in 1776. I could go on and on about how cute it is, but I'll spare you. :) Tomorrow we visit St. John's!!!!

That's all for now. :)

Tonight isn't a story as much of a..... I don't know. You tell me. :)

The parking lot is dark. Quite ominous in fact. However I'm not scared. With tall strong guys around me, and girls to distract me, the walk to my car isn't as terrifying. The street lamps cast a warm glow, covering the black road with small patches of soft yellow. On any other night, with any other crowd, that splotched road would be a frightening sight. However, this isn't any other night. This tonight. Tonight, in one hand I have the much smaller and a bit pudgier hand of a little blonde blue-eyed little five-year boy who skips gaily beside me. In the other hand I hold the precious fingers of a sweet dirty-blonde blue-eyed seven-year old girl. I love the adorable way they talk over each other in an attempt to get and keep my attention. Of course I can never forget the beautiful little six-year old girl with the huge smile who always wants to sit on my lap. I can't remember her name, but she has the prettiest long brown hair, and the most beautiful big brown eyes. I can't wait to have my own precious girl with brown eyes. 

I really like this picture :)

That was a bit longer than I intended, but the darlings were extra sweet tonight. :)

Today.

Yeah. Enough said.

This morning I ran about frantically, trying to get ready to leave tonight. I packed, cleaned a tiny bit, and was on and off the phone with a few colleges finalizing details. French was lovely as always.

J'ai pense que il serait amusant ecrire ce en francais, mais J'ai ensuite decide de ne pas, parce que... alors..... ouais..... :)

Great, now I'll be thinking of how to say this whole thing in french. I must concentrate! :)

Ummm, speech went well. I gave my DI and got a lot of good feedback. I also realized I have a ton more to do with it. :-/ I gave a card in apologetics: The omniscience of God. I have a tendency to get carried away with my analogies, which is good as far as not being short on time, but there's so much to say about the the Lord and so much to communicate in such a short time that I can't allow myself to get carried away. Thank goodness evangelizing isn't like that. :)

As far as amusing things that happened: I love my mother dearly, but we are both human and today we got off on the wrong foot and it escalated to us losing our footing. We both apologized and are as right as rain, however my mother's apology text was quite hilarious. Half way through she accidentally turned the caps on and couldn't figure how to turn them off, so the last half of her message looked like this: 

"It didn't hit me till I saw the laundry room wasn't done yet, THEN I REALIZED HOW MUCH I WOULD HAVE TO DO. I'M SORRY AND I DON'T KNOW HOW TO TURN THE CAPS OFF. I CAN'T WAIT FOR OUR TRIP. FORGIVE ME.  :)"

My response:

I LOVE YOU. :)

We're awesome. :)

Speaking of which, I had a talk with the apologetics coach, someone whom I highly respect, and he advised me to go to Hillsdale cause it's a more advanced PHC. I also discovered something about myself. Bear with me, or if you don't want to, just skip past this part. :)

Me - emo makeup + glasses. :)

I'm someone who usually knows what I want. If I tell you I'm confused, the truth is I'm just scared to tell you what I want cause I'm scared you'll take it the wrong way. Very seldom does it take long for me to make a decision, whether for or against doing whatever Is I want or don't want to do. This is just who I am. I can't remember ever being torn over something for more than a week. I may have had to wait for something, but I've always known what I wanted. Now, for some reason this whole college thing was been really stressing me out not to mention it's been incredibly overwhelming. I couldn't understand this. I mean, yeah, it's a big decision, but I can handle tough decisions, and I'm not overwhelmed too easily. Normally. Then I realized, that I've been torn about what college I want to go to for almost two months. Not just waiting for an acceptance, but completely unable to make a decision. I don't know what I want, and THAT is what has been so overwhelming.

So yeah. :) I leave tomorrow at 8 and we drive 6 hours to San Fransico. I get to see my awesome cousins, and I get to crash one more night before insanity breaks free. :) I'll make sure to keep you all up to date. :) Love you all dearly. :)

P.S. Special thanks to Natalie Emmons. You make me feel so loved. :) You are such a dear sweet friend, and the Lord truly has blessed me with your friendship. God bless you.

And God bless you all. :)

I guess I'm starting to have some kind of format started. If anyone has ideas or anything you want me to add, do tell me. :)

Whirring in my ears, the smell of sugar and vanilla permeates the room. Thoughts creep into my head. One by one they threaten to over power my concentration. A quick squeeze of the eyes, a quickening of the beater, and I'm back among the clanging pots, and the steady streaming of cream colored richness into the silver encasement. Then it's into the monsters raging mouth we go. Well I don't. :) The monster has taken a nip at me time and again, but then so have the walls, and the floors, and the carpets. :) However, I am forever grateful to the monster because it takes my humble creations and turns them into masterpieces. I love escaping into what I think of as the simple pleasures and small comforts. Of baking. :)

The only problem with posting every day is that there is little to say that hasn't already been said. I mean I could make my entire post like the short stories I write in the beginning, but no one wants to read an entire post that is the exaggeration, personification, and dramatization of simple menial tasks..... I imagine... If any of you think otherwise comment, if not, we're keeping the menials to a minimum.

To think, in 72 hours I will be in D.C!!! Thousands of miles from Oregon, and possibly my future home. Everything is changing so fast. Sometimes.... I feel like I'm alone. Here I am, in my life, and people are coming in and out, and things are happening and being forgotten, and everything is moving, and I'm alone. I mean, I have my family, but I only have them for a little longer. I have my friends, but I've come to learn that they come and go faster than the weather changes in Medford (It was hot today :P). However, as I get lost in these musings I suddenly realize that I have it all backwards.


God is the one standing firm as everyone else is flickering in and out of existence. When we become comfortable in life, and settle back I think we begin to forget how fragile life. Our lives only last a second in the scheme of things. I know that one day I will spend eternity with the Lord, and it's comforting that eternity will be, more than anything I can begin to imagine. However I can't help but shrink in terror. I would much rather be the thing that stands firm, not the thing that flickers for a second and then is gone. However, wasn't this the first sin? We have always wanted to be God.... I'm beginning to ramble. The point is to always keep things in perspective, and cling to God. He's the one with the firm footing. :)

This is totally me! Minus the blonde hair and the dress. Although, I do want a dress like that. :)

Super excited for the concert. :) Meg and I and one other girl are going to do a concert. I'm going to showcase some of my songs, Meg is gonna do her broadway thing, and Maddie, the other girl, is going to do her celtic thing. :) We're gonna sing a few duets and a few trios. It's going to be super awesome. It'll be the weekend after the Clarion tournament. More information on that coming when we have things more set in stone. Hillary Hall (the one who is organizing us) thinks that we can fill the house and ahve standing room only (There are about 100 chairs, so that would be really awesome). Lin, I think I remember you saying you would bring a van full of people down. Can you still do that? ;) :)

Still getting ready for the trip. I was supposed to pack, but I was too tired and was thinking too much so I decided to make a Boston Cream Pie. It was really yummy. :)

I think that's quite enough for now... Almost. :)

This made me smile. :)

"::points the camera at me:: This is Belle. She's not part of our family. But she is part of our family. She's part of our future family. *awkward pause as the adorable seven-year old realizes what she said and blushes."

 This made me smile and blush. :)

"Director: (different Belle) Belle is invaluable Young man: *Makes faces at my friend* Director: What's so funny young man? Young man: (in front of several) I'm going to marry someone named Belle. Director: (to my friend) Is she nice? Friend: She's an angel."

I am so not, but my friend was a dear for saying so. :P :)

obSERVE: I'm having a hard time keeping my eyes open, and my head hurts.
ANalyze: I must be tired.
DEduce: I should sleep

(Bones reference)

Ok, wow, I need to sleep. Night. :)

Love you all dearly. <3 (thanks for the follow Kate. :) )