Ho Ho Ho

If this doesn't make you laugh then there's something wrong with you.

The Fat Guy Made It!

Well Christmas finally came to our house. I'd have to say it's one of the best we've ever had.

What is Christmas without pajamas? Our family also has a tradition of getting Bibles. This is no ordinary Bible though. It's side-by-side spanish and english. I LOVE IT! I can even read some of the spanish now! So exciting!

Jaclyn gave me Crocs!!!! I laugh at myself I do. I remember when I first saw them back in highschool when they first came out. This guy had them in bright yellow and we all made fun of them and told him they were the ugliest things. I remember thinking I didn't know how anybody could like them. Since then I've apparently changed my mind. And of course I have to get them in a bright color. I love this color lately. Sad to say I own quite a bit of it. We don't know what's wrong with me.

I like to make myself look stupid. What can I say? But I had to keep with tradition and take a worm picture in my new sleeping bag. I was so excited. I've needed one for so long. and it's RED! Another very favorite color. Can you tell?

Ryan hit and absolute Jack Pot with his presents to Jaclyn. See how happy she is?! But Dad took the cake. Just in case you don't realize it he's laying on a dog bed. It's really just a big pillow that he can lay on, (Pillows would have to be in his top three favorite things in the world) but the sad truth is that it does happen to be a dog bed. Hey it was on his list! The other thing is a brand new BB gun. Let me just say, aside from the pumping part it is way too much fun.

Stayed tuned there's much more to come. Christmas only just started. I happen to know there's more pictures out there floating around. Like target practice for instance.

Chef Extraordinaire

While most of you are most likely mourning the loss of Christmas and the fact that all your presents are open I still happen to have Christmas ahead of me. Since Jaclyn didn't get home until today We've pushed it back until tomorrow with Christmas dinner on Thursday and family coming Friday. In other words we've decided to party all week.

Last year I got in a cookie baking frenzy, this year it's just a frenzy. I've spent the last two evenings baking. I wonder at times why my family lets me do these things. It's amazing to me I haven't killed myself. You think I'm kidding! For instance, I picked up a pot off the stove and went to pour out it's contents. To help myself with this task I grabbed the bottom of the pot...let me remind you I had just taken it off of the stove.

Poor Dad tried to enter the kitchen but left covered in broken up candy cane. I had been smashing it for a recipe and am still finding it attached to my clothes and on kitchen appliances. Add the flour and sugar and nuts and you might as well eat the kitchen floor. I can't help that I'm a messy cook.

Speaking of mess I was reminded why I hate making fudge. flour in your hair is one thing but marshmallows are entirely too much.

But to make a long and messy story short, on today's menu we have: peanut butter fudge, white chocolate mint candy, granola bar thingys, butterscotch cookies, Chex mix, and sherbet all awaiting your fattening. Come back Thursday for Christmas dinner topped with Heath Bar Cake.

Goodness... I'm going to have to waddle back to school. Thank goodness for company.

Christmas Present

It's now officially been about a week since I got home. I'm still coughing my head off which is driving me nuts... But other then that, it's been fairly relaxing. Haven't spent an entire day doing nothing yet but that really is a good thing. I've done tons of shopping. Been to every mall within a 45 minute radius (that would be three) and then some free standing stores and an outlet mall. I love shopping during Christmas even though I despise shopping in general. Everybody is so much more happy. Ok maybe some are rather greedy. But the kids! The kids are great. "Can I see santa? I want this for Christmas, and this, and this and this! Can we open presents tonight? just one? pullleeeze?" (ok maybe the last one was me)

Last weekend Mom, Dad, and I went to New Bern. It's like a small Williamsburg, complete with a palace. They put on quite the Christmas show Saturday night. There's Senora Bella that does stunts (like juggling fire on a slack rope) and carol singers and fife and drums and ball room/country dancing! Did I mention the endless cider and ginger cookies? (definately not sick for that part) And then the governors wife and cook get in a fight in the palace. (ooops I wasn't supposed to say anything.) For the record the cook should have won. Rich pushy people...

We'll come back to that...

The lovely vistors center which I know you all wish to see. (Ok so maybe just the sign) But I'm in it so it's definately worth the viewing.

mmm Hershey's... Why am I sick again? Let's pretend I'm not.

This is the view from our hotel room balcony. Lucky huh?

Apparently the pigeons like it too because they had church there Sunday morning. This is about half of them.

Back to the Palace (much prettier on the inside). The final event was fireworks, complete with the governor trying to sing carols that he didn't know. Rather funny really. Before the show a poor lady next to me became quite distraught because we were sitting on some stairs and there were people in front of her standing, "blocking the view." Perhaps where she comes from fireworks don't make it to the sky.

All things considered it was quite a nice weekend. Most Christmas fun I've had yet!

Today Dad and I went to the history museum. One of the workers there I guess was bored and wanted to talk. In fact he wouldn't let me go. Our main topic of conversation was College. He gave me the impression that he'd like to go but had never been. But one thing will always stick in my mind. He asked me "are you a Christian?" When I told him that I was he said, "I knew you were! You have that glow." I've always heard that if I'm a Christian I am supposed to have one but always thought that was something people just said. Either way it made me feel kinda special...and very aware of my face. So much so that I think I completely lost the rest of the conversation. Am I glowing now? How about now? What do I look like when I'm glowing exactly?

Hopefully nothing like this. Anyway... Until next time, Merry Christmas Ya'll!

Still Holding Strong

So you remember how I am the champion of Rabbit Rabbit? Well I would like to add that yes, I still currently am.

One gentleman took my challenge seriously and formed The Supreme Order of the Rabbit Regime for Organized Warfare" (or something like that) abbreviated to The Regime or SORROW. Since then we've taken this game to a whole new level. The Regime (who is definaletly losing due to what he calls cell phone trouble) has made himself into a facious dictator and even has a MySpace dedicated to his rule.

http://profile.myspace.com/the_regime


I know we're weird but if this is what it takes to win then so be it. Anybody else want to join? Next step is to turn a whole country against me I guess. This means an awful lot of sleepless 1st day of the months.

Back from the dead...hopefully

Lucky for you this blog will not contain any pictures. My flu face is not Kodak approved.

I've been sick then not sick then sick again since before Thanksgiving. Well this Tuesday afternoon I started to get a cough that just got worse and worse. I was sitting in Barnes and Nobles studying for and oral exam in spanish when suddenly the flu hit me like a tun of bricks. Forget studying. I barely made it driving home and got right in to bed. If I thought the pain and agony was bad then I didn't know what I was getting into.

Wednesday I took the morning off but studied for the exam and made it down to Miller to take it. My professor said I did rather well so guess that's good. Even made it to Government to take the quiz (which my professor refused to touch...). After which I came back and died. I'll spare you all the horrible details.

Thursday the same thing.. Ok in the morning but about 2 I started to get achy again. by five I was out. at 7 I took my temp and it was at 102.4. I called Jaclyn at work, luckily she was heading home. She came and took me to her house. By now I was at 103. I cannot explain to you how much I wanted a bullet in the head. I couldn't even breath.

So to make matters worse...er better my mother and my sister concocted a "new" form of torture called a hot and cold half bath to get my temp down. Let me explain. Since Jaclyn's hot water doesn't get hot enough she boiled pot after pot of water and threw it in the tub with me until I broke out in a sweat. Personally I think this is revenge left over from childhood. I don't understand. I wasn't THAT bratty of a little sister.

Ok ok, so maybe it was a neccessary evil but I think I'd almost rather just live with the temp cause it only took it down two degrees after which it promptly shot back up again. All that for nothing.

Finally sometime Friday afternoon my fever broke. PRAISE THE LORD!!! Oh the difference a few degrees in body temperature can make. I still feel pretty awful but it isn't THAT.

So maybe tomorrow i will enter the world again. Can't say that I've missed it. All that awaits me is five finals...come to think of it I'll probably want another bullet in the head come monday morning. Guess you can't win.

Christmas Under Construction

Desmond was the precher for SMC this weekend so last minute (as in friday afternoon at 3) I made the decission to have everybody over to my sisters house. Yes I asked first!!! Here we all are devouring my amazing cooking. No signs of food poisoning yet. And for the record, if there is, it's Grace's fault.

After lunch we decided to go for a walk, but being the adults we were we (desmond really) started a game of tag.

It was rather treacherous because we weren't just playing on an open field. No, we tackled the imagination station. The picture on the right is of everybody sitting on the bouncy train that didn't bounce. Since it was hard to get to, we thought we were pretty smart. In the end, Jason came after us and we did the domino effect falling through the tires. Luckily I was in the middle and just passed my "it" to the next domino that I was on top of. Worked really nicely actually. My body might tell you otherwise.

Grace never seemed to be "it" so she took some time for gymnastics. When she finally got tagged though, she went for the boys. You can see she cornered them nicely.

One poor kid, that wasn't a member of our party, snapped his shin in half jumping off the railing. You think I'm kidding. It was the most horrible thing I've ever seen. Legs weren't mad to make an L shape anywhere but the knee.

We'll skip Saturday night and go straight to Sunday night. Dorm openhouse. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get the mistletoe up in time for all the guys, but we managed. Even Waddlesworth got festive. 100 points (yes 100 points grant, not that you read this) to the first person to guess what I used for a tree skirt. (Jaclyn, you don't count)

Speaking of trees, I was thinking about this tradition during vespers Friday night. Who thinks up this idea to drag a tree INSIDE. Trees are outdoor pets! And honestly they really don't accent the rug. Then we give it a skirt, add jewelry (gotta be an SDA who thought that one up.) and add fire hazards. When I mentioned these thoughts to a smart Korean friend of mine, she told me a tad of it's actually history so I looked it up. If what I was imagining was odd, I wasn't even at second base. The first tree owners hung them upside down. Definately accents a SPOT on the rug. And then they added candles! This is called an upside down bonfire. Anyway, just a few thoughts on O Tannenbaum.

Where was I?

Oh yeah, speaking of fire, did I mention we had a fire drill (for the second time today. The first one being at 1 am) during the middle of open house?

Since our room wasn't extremely decorated we resorted to more creative measures. Last year I started a tradition of writing a story on our mirror, one word at a time. Well everybody that entered our room was ordered to comply. We actually had people telling other people to go to "the mirror story room." It's great to be famous. Anyway, here's what we ended up with...

Unfortunately days after her kidneys imploded, unsightly rashes devoured some delectable deodorized warts, crashing upon partially hydrogenated desperados. Hotties united their disorders to define what tater tots would do a dance if splattered into a big bug, but terrorists and snowmen all danced over the roof top with ducks who moo.

Gross huh? You should see some of our other ones. We even have done them in poetry. Currently we are working on one that has to go down the alphabet. I'm unsure of the subject really but we'll say that it has something to do with kangaroos in love with newts having quintuplets, and oh their's some jesuits somewhere in there too. Crazy Christmas people.

We'll close with some priceless candids or me and my crazy American (she only looks Taiwanese) roomio.

Don't Choke On The Tofu Turkey

The most wonderful thing about Thanksgiving is that it gives you enough time to finally go home. I hadn't been home since August so it was rather nice. It's liek clock work every time. Dad's always there at the door to give us a hug and then haul in our luggage. Don't tell him but we've added bricks just for fun. (KIDDING! who do you think I am?) I'd been sick (wait I still am) with a sore throat and had been secretly hoping that Mom had stuck with tradition and made Minestrone. She sure did! Three bowls went down in nothing flat. So amazing. And that was only the first half hour.

This is Thanksgiving dinner in the making.

Sometime long ago I remember Dad buying a Need For Speed game. Yeah I'm still hooked. This is me beating every car in sight, dodging cops, and having 16 accidents a minute, but living to tell the story. Is this good for me or what!?!

Go back even farther and you'll find this stool. If I wasn't sitting on this stool watching Grandma cook, I was using it to grab one of those mason jars out the cubbards or fighting with Jaclyn and Lindsey about who should get to sit on it at meal times. I love this stool. Lindsey wrote me saying how much she missed Grandma this Thanksgiving. So, so true.

This is me being connected with all of the other Merry Tofu Turkiers. Texting: just another way to never leave your friends behind.

Before...

And after... Taking you back again to Grandma's house where we always watched "White Christmas." Yeah most might say that it's a pansy movie but I grew up with it and happen to love it. So you know how when you were a kid you "skated" around the house after watching the winter olympics? Yeah well college girls can do that too. Rosemary Clooney and Vera Ellen got us in the mood for big dresses.

Why I am posting this picture is beyond me. Nobody should have to see me like that. This is self incrimination! But since this Thanksgiving was apparently a walk down memory lane...here's another one. Every Friday night almost, Mom would put our hair in these curlers to curl overnight. Not that my hair needs anymore curl, but I thought it would be fun to see what it did. The problem is how do you sleep? On your face? Don't try it. The lack of air is a definate problem.

So I've finally posted a blog. I'm sure you've all grown tired of me doing nothing. I'll get around to it one day. And I know that you can see half of the same pictures on Jaclyn's blog but that's what happens when you are in the same place at once. Her's doesn't have MY comments so I'm sure it's definately worth it.

Weird...I know

I'd forgotten I had this picture on my camera. I found it too priceless to not put up even though it's about two weeks old.

Jennifer is now a Mary Kay consultant so she hosted a party for all of us girls. We're getting silken hands. See what it does to you?

Trick or Treat

This weekend fall and the festivities were fully out.

Grace and I took some pictures by the trees at Spalding Elementary.

Pre-Costume party we had tons of fun blowing up fifty billion balloons. I just wanted to sit in them. I was pretty dizzy anyway.

After years of desperate search, I've finally found my man! Only problem is that it looks like I might have a little competition.

Hands down, my favorite costume of the night. Only Caleb...

Doesn't Landon make a wonderful girl?

Well Robert was better... This guy went totally ALL OUT. Tell me his cleavage does not look real. He even went for some major heels AND if I remember correctly, shaved his legs. Honestly, he was just scary. I wanted to run away.

By now you may be wondering what I looked like.. wouldn't you love to know!? I can't get the good pictures off of my phone so... oh well. I was rather scary myself anyway.

Sunday night was SA Fall Festival and this was my station. Pumpkin Carving! I cleaned like 30 of those suckers out and I'd have to say that I got pretty good at it. I am the pumkin carving pumba! Can you find me in that picture?

Grace, me, and Laquina eating some of the AMAZING refreshments. Laquina is having a baked potato. Yeah that was all me. (ok and a few other people) We prepared like 500 of those things that morning. My favorite part was the fresh apple cider. I have never had something so good in my life.

Thoughts from a tired mind.

Sometimes I find myself counting wasted time in minutes. If I'm standing in line too long, I'm thinking about how much homework I could have done instead. If I eat lunch fast enough I can have it done between the cafe and my room. yahda yahda yahda. And then there are the times when I have so much to do but I get in my own way. For instance....

Mission was to get to my sisters to drop off my laundry. I'd just gotten off work, lunch was nasty so I thought I'd go to CK's. I get in my room can't find my book bag. I'd left it at work. Walking out through the main lobby to my car, I realize that I'd forgotten my keys. Go back to my room grab them and some CD's for my sister. After walking halfway out to my car I remember that I had decided that I'll go get my book bag first which was in the other direction. Half way to work I remember I didn't get my laundry which was the whole purpose for this trip anyway! 30 minutes later I'd finally made it to my sisters.

Then there's just the long days. Today was a 6:45-11 day. AKA long. to give you more perspective I took probably about an hour total of time off. It was work by eight, study, class, quick lunch, study madly for a test, classes, back to work. Work was soooo busy. I wanted to shoot myself. Because of a few issues that we're dealing with I ended up in a meeting (getting nothing done) and we're going to have another one tomorrow. Forcing myself to leave things undone, I left work by five and ate lunch as I walked to my room. stared at the cealing for 5 minutes and then to Jaclyns to do laundry and homework. 6:30 went to committee meeting number one. 7 senate started. After senate I walked between three committee meetings trying to catch the main points of each. I think I did pretty well. Up to my sisters again to grab my books and then to the music building. I'm required to listen to music for an hour for each period of music. Great! I can do two things at once. Fill the paper out as fast as possible and then read other homework while the music is playing. Back up to my sisters to grab laundry, go to my room to put it away and then I'm off to worship to get some credit. Oh great she says it's going to go long. And it was. Almost and hour instead of the usual thirty.

Where am I going with all this? I promise I'm not just whining. As it turned out the speaker was GREAT. For a brief moment she touched on making things our idols. We've all heard it before, but after today it struck me a new. I talked to God for about 5 minutes today. Somewhere in between classes probably. Oh and I probably yelled at him for help with my spanish test. The world would say that I'm doing great. Being really prestigious. I signed up for three service things today! Ooooh brownie points to me. But really I've lost sight of what truly matters. It's so easy to get off on what the world expects because its right infront of me. And even if it weren't, I'm such an over achiever. A good friend once said to me "I'd talk to you (on MSN instant messenger) but you are always set to away!" Those words kept running through my head today since the worlds "online" hardly saw the light of day. Why isn't taking time for ourselves allowed? But more importantly, why don't I give my day to God and let him fix the mess that has become my life?

Together Again

I have a large family. Mom says its about 65. This weekend, quite a few of us got together at Prince William Forrest. When one says that they are going to a family reuion there's an imediate stigma of "yuk." But really this had to be the greatest family reunion ever.

Jaclyn and I drove the 8 1/2 hours from TN to VA. Got a little bored, and even stopped to see the view but made it faster then the predicted mapquest timing. Is that bad?

The facilities consited of a big mess hall and quite a few cabins. The kitchen was huge, which we needed for such a large group.




Mom and I take on the English Muffins. It's called toasting in bulk.












This is my Uncle Kit witha slight Mohawk. Note to self: never give him a bell to wake everybody up MOM, he might not stop cause he enjoys it too much.

New favorite family memory-Jumping over a wall with him, my aunt and my cousin to get to our car in a possessed parking garage.

These were the cabins. No way of keeping the absolute fridged air out. Very primative but TOTALLY cool. Despite the mice in the wall... I wanted to be a kid again cause my imagination was running wild. But did I mention it was cold? At time I thought I might freeze. Showers were the utmost torture. Probably cause I always got up too late to get a warm one. The fire in the mess hall was the best place to be.

Lindsey and I won the family tree contest. Reward= getting to tell everybody else the answers. (for the record, WARD CHEATED OFF OUR PAPERS!) As you can see we had a little bit of fun with it.







Here are the first cousins... Well a little over half of us anyway. I find it really sad that I don't see these people very much. When I spent time talking with them I remembered just how wonderful they really are. Lindsey and I were instantly inseparable again, just like when we were little. Ward kept saying, "here come the twins." Which brings me to another new favorite memory-Lindsey and I pushing him in a wheel barrow and then visa versa. Oh, and did I mention I got Brent to drink carob! Muah ha hah! It was SOOOO hard to say goodbye cause who knows when I'll see them again.



Uncle Ronnie ran the games. This particular one we were supposed to untangle ourselves. It was really the easiest thing in the world to do except that Dale thought it would be funny to tell us we had to spin clockwise twice and make loops. Yeah whatever. I TRUSTED YOU! This was a moment of exasperation. Am I crying or laughing? Probably both.






Then there was the mummy wrap. We SOOO won. It was rigged because the ref was the grandfater the of the team that won.


I had so much fun I can't begin to describe it all on here or even if I was talking to you. I love my family I do. I love that it's big and I love the people that make it up. I just wish Grandma was still here to see it.

So anyway, there's a few in short cause I've come back late to undone homework. :( Plus I'm missing quite a few pictures that reside on Dad's camera. So maybe I'll get those on here later. Don't laugh, it's not impossible, even for busy me.