My Final Post of 2010

It's hard to believe its already the end of 2010. Its been a year of changes and with its ups and downs. I started blogging mainly to hopefully make a difference to someone out there reading. My life and most times is rather dull and God willing the year 2011 will find me all sorts of places doing all sorts of things. I type this to you as I sit alone in my apartment. I could have been with my family, if I didn't have to babysit-which wound up not happening anyways, which is unfortunate. So I feel that I could have stayed and enjoyed some more time with the fam. Anyways, a recap of my year:

I'm still in college and had finished another year in May. I stayed in South Carolina and took a summer class and it gave me the opportunity to do some exploring around here. In April, God took home my cousin Rebecca who had been battling cancer. She was an amazing person here on earth, and she has made a huge impact on her community. She started a fund, Cure With Hope which is raising money for Mass General children's cancer ward. Right after she passed I went up to Boston to visit my sister and brother-in-law and we went to visit my aunt and uncle. I very much love the city of Boston. I need to spend more time to see everything, but I got to see quite a bit. I journeyed to MLC for probably my last time in May to see many of my friends graduate. I was sad that it wasn't me, but hey got to roll with the punches. My brother graduated from highschool in early June and is now attending Kansas University. My parents moved to Florida right after my brother graduated. I was blessed to finally get a job at the end of August and now am a babysitter for a pretty great kid. For Thanksgiving I went to North Carolina to my aunt and uncles cabin. It was nice to get a little break from school and the chaos that is. In my previous post I mentioned my Christmas break and its getting close to coming to an end. I'm happy yet not looking forward to starting classes. The sooner they start the sooner I get done.

Well that was a short version of the major events that happened this year. I hope next year is full of amazing opportunities and wonderful surprises. I hope I can cross some things off my bucket list. So this is so long 2010 and hello 2011!

Christmas Break

I have been on Christmas break now since Dec 9th. It has been a very much needed break and very relaxing. I road tripped back to Wisconsin to visit friends and family. Although I was sick for the first 3 days and was limited to what I could do! I did a lot of shopping and hanging out with my best friend Amber. I also went to visit my grandparents and a few other friends. I unfortunately was not able to visit everyone I had hoped, mainly because my stay in WI was limited and I had to be back in FL by the 23rd. But I did have a great time regardless. I also got to meet some new people!

My brother and I drove 21 hrs straight to get to FL. It was a long trip and it had its normal bumps...traffic, not great weather, bathroom stops and gas fill-ups. We ate as unhealthy as any person could, fast food all day. We finally arrived around 1 am on the 23rd. After a much needed shower I was off to bed.


Christmas Eve came and we went out to dinner at a sushi place and then we went to church...arriving late as is usual for my family. Christmas Day came and went, it didn't even feel that we had Christmas. On top of that the weather was near 70 definately not our typical Christmas weather. We did skype with my sister and brother-in-law and that at least made it feel that we had more family here. I did get a lot of gifts but the best one by far was getting a Wii system. Although, I'm happy with the material gifts I received, I am more happy of the birth of Jesus. His birth means so much: soon it will be his death and ressurrection that we ponder and thank him for.


The next few days will mainly consist of more relaxation. I will be returning to South Carolina on Thursday and will continue babysitting again. Classes start Jan 10th...which is crazy, but I am ready to get this last semester (keep fingers crossed) underway. Of course I will still have summer class, but I'm ok with that. It gives me more time to look for a job and travel the southeast before I move for good!

Amber and I with Sprecher man

With the Grinch

Making Christmas cookies

Blue Christmas

There is nothing like the sound of Elvis's voice! The lyrics I guess should be sad, because who would want to be away from someone they love or care about during the holidays? Any person would have a blue christmas. But unfortunately in this time with a war going on, there are a lot of people who will be having a 'blue' christmas. They may not necessarily be alone, but heck if your spouse was overseas during the holidays, that can't be very fun! Even though I love the beat and sound of the song, I would certainly not want to have a blue christmas!

O Christmas Tree

I decided since many people have advent calendars and countdowns to Christmas that perhaps I could briefly talk about a Christmas Carol/song everyday until Christmas. Today is O Christmas Tree otherwise known in German as O Tannenbaum. I'm not a big fan of this song, but it is quite popular on the radio. It is about this time of the year most people are cutting down trees or bringing out the fake ones from the basement and putting them up. Decorating the tree with lights and garland as well as ornaments begins over the next few weeks as well! I'm going to miss this years tree picking. I miss the family bundling up and driving to the Christmas tree farm and we'd walk for what seemed like hours around the place trying to find a tree. Most of the time we would walk through a foot of snow and be completely frozen by the time we are done. We'd probably complained and hated it, but I look back and wouldn't take back any of those times. They were so much fun! The family together finding a tree that will only last for a few weeks. I always looked forward to sipping on hot cocoa after the fact and then sitting by a warm fire afterwards.

The tree is a symbol of life to me. We continue to grow and learn through the whole year, we don't stop and die when the weather changes. The tree is always green, even through the cold and snow.

Today I went to a Christmas shop and they had a whole bunch of fake trees decorated in different themes: SEC football teams, beach, snowflakes, marshmallow figures, seasame street and sock monkey's just to name a few. I love how creative people can be with their trees. It reminded me of a time back in grade school when we took a field trip to the museum and they had trees decorated from countries around the world. It was pretty neat to see how another country would decorate. Its funny/interesting to see that Christmas is a world holiday and we all celebrate it. Usually I just think about people in the states and that they are the only people who do this. We may all have different decorations and traditions, but yet we still sit around a tree. Its practically the centerpiece of Christmas (except that Christ is!)

So if you are decorating a tree...have fun and be creative and remember people on the other side of the world are doing the same thing!

Photo is not mine!