January Review

January wasn’t a horrible month.

• I came back to Chicago on the 4th and jumped back into my college life!
• The new girls moved onto my floor! They’re wonderful and I love them.
  
• I was hired on as a writer for the yearbook! The staff all has iPhones and MacBooks so I totally fit in. :)
• On the first day of classes, my stomach apparently decided that mutiny was the best option. I made it through classes and meetings before spending the rest of the day/night throwing up.
• I found this quote: “Your story has power. Fear says, ‘Hide your story.’ Hope says, ‘Tell your story.’” Love it!
  
• The semester started with newspaper articles, yearbook pieces, website events, and papers to write. The first two weeks of the semester overwhelmed me with the amount of writing I had to get done.
• Insomnia became contagious in Smith 512. Heidi and I both quite sleeping. Not by choice.
• My admiration of pinterest was furthered with the insomnia. I have things pinned for all occasions!
  
• It snowed!! There was lots of snow on January 20th. I dragged Heidi out in it to get frozen yogurt with me.
  
• I fell in love with my Creative Non-Fiction Writing class. It might be one of the best and most enjoyable classes I’ve taken at Moody!
  
• Emma and I started working out together way too early on Tuesday and Thursday mornings.
• I spent a Sunday afternoon with some friends from Iowa that I hadn’t seen in 10 years.
• Liz and I decided that we should do a radio show. It’s called Scrabble. Follow us on twitter @MCRScrabble
• About a month into consistently not sleeping well, I called my doctor and was diagnosed with chronic insomnia. Lovely? Not so much.
• I started consistently craving chocolate chip cookies.
  
• I went to the Shedd Aquarium for the first time!
  
• The yearbook staff took a group picture. We all wore all black and did model poses. When I get the photos, they’ll be posted! They’re bound to be entertaining and humorous.

Radio Show. What?

Liz and I have a radio show on the Moody Campus Radio. It's called Scrabble. We're both random people and have lots of unrelated things to talk about so I guess a late night radio show is a good place to do that.

I talked with my mom a week into the semester and told her how busy I was between the yearbook, newspaper, and the website. She jokingly made a comment about my lack of involvement in radio. Well, here I am! Co-hosting a radio segment with Liz.

We have some fun ideas. We’re still working on implementing them. We'll eventually get it figured out.

Here’s the link if you’re feeling brave and want to listen. Monday nights from 10pm - 12am!

Creative Writing Prompt

My creative non-fiction writing class is working on adding relevant details in the brief essays we’re starting to work on. The exercise is to describe a moment in time with six detailed sentences. I had fun writing about this memory with friends and wanted to share it!


Without Details:

I wore a dress and had no where to clip my wireless pack. I played guitar on Christmas Eve. I dropped my guitar picks during one of the songs. I couldn't pick them up. Rusty picked them up for me. Tom laughed at us.

With Details:

I usually wear jeans and a nice top with ballet flats, but for this performance I decided to go with a red and brown flowered dress with matching brown boots, giving nothing for my wireless guitar pack to clip onto except an inconveniently placed belt at my waist. Standing on the large stage in the middle of the auditorium of my church with my acoustic guitar on, happily situated between my two electric guitar players and surrounded by the rest of the band, was where I found myself on the evening of Christmas Eve. During an upbeat heavy-on-electric-guitar instrumental song, I clumsily dropped my guitar pick as well as the two backup ones waiting on my music stand and could not appropriately bend down in my dress, which fell just above my knee, with my guitar on to retrieve them. I looked left to Rusty before sadly glancing down at the pile of brightly colored plastic picks scattered around my brown boots, littering the dark carpet covering the stage. He took a few steps to where I was stationed and danced his way down to the floor while holding his light blue and white Fender Stratocaster and gathered the wayward picks and placed them back in my hand, all while we struggled to hold back laughter. Right off stage, Pastor Tom, who is familiar my occasional uncoordinated tendencies, was watching Rusty and I while laughing, not in a disapproving or critical way, but in a way that displayed the joy, humor, and normalcy he found in the situation.

Shedd Aquarium

Dawn, Emma, and I went to the Shedd Aquarium this morning! It was the first time for all of us and it was great!

I'm a big fan of the ocean and it’s inhabitants. (It’s possible that I’ve watched The Little Mermaid a few too many times.) Living in Northern California, I've been to the Monterey Bay Aquarium numerous times and have my favorite exhibits there. The Shedd Aquarium is really different! It has fish and water animals from all around the world and from different bodies of waters.

I didn’t bring my camera with me, but I did have my phone. So please excuse the blurriness of a few of them!

River Habitat

We decided that these were giant goldfish with an attitude.

The iguana was just hanging out on the rock looking over the entire habitat. What a life!

Starfish!

These fish were larger than they looked.

I really enjoyed all the little poisonous dart frogs!

Emma was excited about the fish.

Overall, the turtles were our favorite.

My big conclusion of the morning: I’m never going to the Amazon. NEVER! The monster fish, bugs as big as my hand, and mainly the gigantic snakes were HORRIFYING. First, why are these things in an aquarium anyways? And second, how did they get them in their habitat? Moving a giant anaconda seems like it would be the worst job ever. Seriously.

Yearbooks and Websites and Newspapers.

OH MY!


I’m busy this semester. I'm doing lots of writing for things other than classes! And, ironically, I don’t feel like writing very much about it. But I did want to share because it's exciting!


Yearbook. I’m writing profile pieces, captions, and group and event descriptions for the last few deadlines of the yearbook.

Website. www.moodystandard.com Check it out! I post all of the Chi-Town event updates.

Newspaper. I’m no longer writing bunches of articles each issue, just some random ones here and there. I still love it though and want to be a journalist.

Last Semester Here!

Annnddd I’m back in the swing of this “being a student” thing! I just finished my second week of the semester.

I’m happy to be back in Chicago. Kind of. The weather is a little sketch. The snow today was beautiful though!

The new girls are moved onto my floor and seem to be settling in nicely! A few days before classes started I got a really bad cold. And then classes started. And then I started working for the Moody yearbook. And then I got the stomach flu. And then I had lots of homework. And then... and then... and then... So here I am. Two weeks into the semester and I’m finally feeling on top of my schedule.

I know I’ve said numerous times that I wasn’t going to be one of those overly-emotional people who facebooks/tweets/blogs about every little last part of their time at school coming to a close. Quite frankly, those people bug me. BUT, I will say that I am finishing up my time here and I’m excited for the next piece of my adventure! I’ll write more about that later.

I don’t want to jump ahead too far though. So, for the next 4 months I’m focusing on loving the 39 girls on my floor, writing as much as I can, succeeding in my classes, and enjoying my last little bit of time in Chicago before graduating!

Woo-hoo! The end is in sight!

Out of these ashes, rise.

I love this song by Shawn McDonald. Rise. Do you have a song that you can play on repeat for hours? Or what about a song that makes it on every playlist? Well, Rise is that song for me.




(chorus)
Yes I will rise
Out of these ashes rise
From this trouble I have found
And this rubble on the ground
I will rise

Cause He Who is in me
Is greater than I will ever be
And I will rise

For you lovers of miserable weather...

*ahem* Alicia & Jodi. It snowed today and I had to go outside to get to work so I took a few pictures for you both!

Christmas Break Phone Photo Blast.

I end up with some of the most random and wonderful photos on my phone. So I thought I'd be nice and share!

My phone is apparently giving me options. I just got more confused.

Vi attempting to feed herself with a straw.

My mom and the happy little girl!

Beautiful little girls in the back of my car.

First off, my phone calls me "Princess" because it keeps mispronouncing "Andrea". And it added Alicia as my best friend!

This was a nasty shelf so I took a picture.

Ginger!

I made the most delicious guacamole one afternoon.

Frozen Yogurt with Trina and Alicia.

Rehearsing "Winter Snow" for Christmas morning! There was, conveniently enough, a snowflake ornament lodged in the piano that worked with what we were singing.

Did you get two pillow pets for Christmas? I think not.

Here's to You!

I realized at about 5pm on December 31st that I only had a few hours to finish reading through the Bible, to run a lot more miles, to call/send emails to a lot of people, to get better at not over scheduling my life, and to master the Bb-F-Dm-C chord progression on guitar.

So, to avoid inevitably failing, this year I decided not to make any resolutions. Life changes so quickly and I feel like I set myself up for failure when I make any massive plans. Regardless, I’m looking forward to this new year and the adventures to come!

There are songs to write, books to read, guitar strings to break in, photos to take, blogs to post, friends to laugh with, and new places to explore! I’m thankful to have another year to experience God’s grace and His perfect timing.

And I love this song by Brooke Fraser about enjoying life and it’s circumstances.


Here’s to You
by Brooke Fraser

Cheers to the furrows on our brow
To each hard-won victory
Cheers to the losses that grew us up
Killed our pride, and filled our cup

Cheers to the friendships well worn in
That time nor distance alter
Here's to the sleepers we'll see again
Find company in memoria

Open your mouth and sing out your song
Life is short as the day is long
I can't leave you my body
But I'll leave you a tune
This is my legacy
Cheers to you

Cheers to the passing of our youth
And the death of lust not one day
A toast to the lessons not yet learned
And to the trials that will teach them


Happy New Year!