Finals Fun: Day 1

So, I have a philosophy final tomorrow.

I'm fairly certain that my brain may explode between this and my ethics final. So, since my brain feels like it's leaking out my ears, I'm attempting to find the sparkle in the situation- by making punny philosophy jokes, of course! Finals fun, we've just begun. Let's start with some silly puns!

all pictures via

I think I'm going to make this a Finals Week series. Philosophy jokes today, ethics/theology jokes tomorrow...oh dear. (I apologize in advance if you aren't familiar with the fields of philosophy and religion. You guys have no idea what's coming for you. But, I'm sure it will be super educational and Google will become your best friend!)

Sunday Sparkle: Week 11-15

I've been taking pictures the last couple weeks and keeping up with my Project 52/Sunday Sparkle pictures, but I noticed that I apparently haven't been posting them here to share. So, it's time to play a little catch up on the blog for those that won't see my scrapbook (which is coming along marvelously, I'll do a post on that later) and who don't follow me on Instagram (but you should!). 

Week 11: 

Primary election day in the Great State of Alabama

Week 12:

Week 13:

Cupcake from Gigis.

I love crazy sock day.

Week 14:

I failed at the whole no- antihistamine thing. Allergy test had to be postponed.

Week 15:

Jellybeans

Term paper on Christian perfection

Sunday Sparkle- Week 10

Yummy dinners.



Bribery candy.



Watching sweet children on Wednesday nights.



Pretty pictures.

Sunday Sparkle- Week 9!

It's Sunday Sparkle time again! This project has been really fun so far. I'm still working at getting everything printed and placed in a scrapbook, but when I get a complete layout, I'll be sure and post pictures. After all, I really do want to be a crafty blogger...haha.

I don't have as many pictures from this week as from weeks past. I've been busy, and I'm hard at work getting my one dress project pictures up. So, just a few this week. As I blogged about here, monday night, my daddy and I went to PCC for the 72 Days for Freedom kickoff. It was super amazing and really encouraged me that we CAN make a difference in the problem of human trafficking. On the way over to Atlanta, we stopped at the Dwarf House in Newnan for dinner. I love gnomes, so naturally I like things like dwarfs and tiny doors, too. After the program, we had a candlelight thing by the hand from Passion. It was pretty neat.





I didn't take anymore pictures until Friday. That is when some crazy tornados came through. According to UAB research, most deaths from tornados are a result of head trauma, so you should wear a helmet. Des and I took this to heart.

Saturday night, my Dad found Jesus. As in, we were sitting around the table and dad said "I just found Jesus on the wall". Okay guys, bidding starts at 500. Who wants a wall with Jesus? (Haha. Kidding. Love my house). I added in an arrow so you can find him easier.



Tonight (yes, I'm including Sunday this week), I did my weekly grocery run with Kaitlyn. First, I wrote up my list. Then, I looked at the publix ad for this week and printed off some coupons. Everything was on my list that I got, except for some crackers. But, they were $1.49 for 2 boxes (Bogo at $3.49 plus a $2 coupon), and I will eat them, so I think it was a good deal. My "win" for the week was my vitamin d. My doctor said I should start taking it. So, I found one for $4.99 regular and I had a $3 off Publix coupon (from their booklet) and a $1 off coupon that was on the item. Winning. That means it was $0.99. Not too shabby, even if they weren't gummies. I also needed some Zyrtec, and they had a deal for the Publix brand. If you bought the 30 count (for $13), you got the 14 count free. So, I spent $13 for $23 worth of medicine. I think that counts for something! Overall, I saved $24 and spent $36 (pre-tax. It was 40 with tax) and was able to get what I needed for less. Yay!

Sunday Sparkle- Week 8

Just a few pictures from last week.

My allergies have come back with a vengeance. Tylenol PM has been a lifesaver the last few nights in regards to getting some sleep.




I think this was dinner Tuesday night. But, it may have been lunch. I feel like I have bagels in some way, shape, or form as part of every meal (sandwich, pizza, dessert).




I started my One Dress Project! I forgot to take a picture yesterday, but I'm pretty sure my days are running together. I need an easy way to add some color (with things I already have, per my "no purchasing clothes during Lent" thing). Any ideas?




Yummy cupcake. Daddy and I went by a cupcake place near campus after having lunch on Wednesday. I got a chocolate salted Carmel cupcake and it was deLISH.




I'm really enjoying this little Sparkle project. It is quite fun, and I'm still taking pictures! I like the low pressure (only one picture a week necessary!) and I like the fact that I'm documenting the little details that get lost and forgotten most of the time. Yessir. We're gonna make it.

Tomorrow night, my Daddy and I are planning on going to Atlanta for the 72 Days of Freedom gathering they are having at Passion City Church. Gary Haugen (the head of IJM) is speaking and I am super pumped! Working at IJM would be a dream job, so hearing from the guy that runs it would be amazing! I'm excited and hope it works out. We're leaving tomorrow afternoon and then driving back after the service. I don't have class until 11 on Tuesday and we lose an hour going/ gain an hour on the way back, so things should work out that its not too late. I'm going to miss the Bachelor, but I can watch that online. Nobody tweet about it or spoil it? Haha. Yay!

Sunday Sparkle- Week 5

I have two blog posts that I've drafted over the past week that I need to post. I usually blog from my iPad using Blogpress, but something isn't working right with it. It keeps saying I have a network error (but I can get online and use any app but that one) and won't let me save my posts online. So, I need to figure out a way to export them from the app. No idea how that's going to work, but I'm hoping I don't lose 2-3 hours worth of blog work. So, in other words, new posts coming soon! I haven't given up blogging. I wish I could find the time to post more often. I have so many thoughts in my head to write about, but I never take the time to blog them. That seems a little silly, right?

Anyways, we're going to go onto Sunday Sparkle. I think it's neat to start out the week by blogging pictures from the previous week. While last week had it's ups and downs (hey-first test of the semester!), it was a yummy week. Meaning food is featured in all of my pictures. Haha. 

Last Sunday (a week ago!), my best friend and I had dinner at Zoe's (after shopping at Publix, of course!). I wasn't too hungry, so I just had the rice pilaf, a diet coke, and some chocolate cake. You can't go wrong if there's cake involved- that's my motto.

Monday night is Bachelor night. For real, this is my kind of television. I'm a little ashamed that I spend two hours a week watching this non-sense, but I immensely enjoy it because it doesn't use up any of my brain cells. Sometimes smart people need a brain break. That's what Bachelor is for me. I'm pretty sure I'd go insane without some kind of brain break thrown in my day.Of course, no "brain break" is complete without snackage. This weeks choice was oreos and milk. I won't mention how many I ate, but I had a bit of a tummy ache and learned that I shouldn't sit with a whole package. Girl has no self control when it comes to cookies.

Wednesday was a busy day. Because I'm really bad at planning these things out, I ended up having 60-something pages in one book to read, 30-something in another, and a book, James, and class notes to review for a Thursday test. Freak out commence. Thanks to a handy dandy calender, I can plan out every minute of my day. I stuck to it pretty good (I think). I added some blogging in (which was homework for my class), but other than that, I stuck to my homework and readings. Let's just say that I'm trying to do better with keeping up with my readings so that I don't have to wake up at 7:15 am again. Christian Ethics/Philosophy/Augustine isn't the most interesting thing in the world to read at that ungodly hour. Girl likes her sleep.

Yay! Sparkle!

I'm going to bed now (sleepy, sleepy) so that I can get up bright and early (8 am people!) to sit in a classroom and learn about stuff that I won't understand and that will hurt my brain. Ah, philosophy and ethics. I will not be sad when this semester is OVER! I'm also going to try and work on rescuing my posts from BlogPress, AND I have a video blog (thanks Annie!) that should be filmed/coming soon! Yay! Happy day. 

SUPER Sunday Sparkle- Week 4!

This is a SUPER Sunday Sparkle because I have tons of pictures. I started out with a goal of one picture per week, but I’ve taken more than one for most of the past few weeks! Project 52 doesn’t HAVE to just be a collection of 52 pictures if you’re playing by my rules. I think there can be a few extra thrown in there for good measure. :)
With all my free time this week, I’ve actually done my hair. Crazy, huh? One day this week (Honestly, I don’t remember these things) I put a bow in my hair. Yes. A Lady Gaga bow. I figured out how to do it months ago from some blog, somewhere…I don’t really remember. So, I was playing around and fixed my hair in a bow. While I thought it was super cute (and super Lauren-ish), I chickened out before wearing it to class. For some reason, I feel like I have to be super-psycho serious there. A a bow isn’t serious. It’s playful. I think I might wear it someday though.

On Friday, I did a sock bun in my hair. I like sock buns, because they keep my thick, frizzy hair all together when I go to sleep with wet hair and it dries funny. (I ditched the belt you see in the pictures before class. Something just didn’t look right). I think I tried to make a goal last week of dressing cute each day. I’m not sure I really passed though, because I think I wore Pajama Jeans one day.

I’ve had a hard week this past week (as you can tell from my last post). I don’t know why, but my emotions are ALL over the place. I’ve been struggling really hard to keep my head above water. But, in the midst of all of this, I’ve been immersing myself in scripture. I’ve been teaching my kids in Sunday School that the can turn to the Word to get help from God in any situation, and I’ve had to do that myself this week. Rather than throw a pity party, I’ve used the Word of God like a sword to kill and destroy all of the lies that Satan is throwing my way. I know that God must have a mighty, awesome plan if Satan is working THIS HARD to destroy me.

Typical week in the life as seen through my planner. Yes, dear. I schedule TV watching in my planner. Don’t want to miss The Bachelor, Dance Moms, or Toddlers and Tiaras, do we? This week was pretty light work wise, but things are heating up for this week. I’ve got a test on Thursday and midterms are coming up FAST. Eek. I know it’s only January, but when finals start Mid-April, there’s not a lot of playtime. Got to study-udy-udy!

 

This precious picture is my darling youngest brother. For some reason, he decided to dress up today for church (I’m saving my other picture from today for next week, but this one seemed to go better with last week). He’s sure cute, isn’t he? Sorry ladies, he’s not single and ready to mingle. :)

And THAT concludes SUPER Sunday Sparkle for Week 4!

Looking for Sparkle.

Honestly, I was going to post a "pity party" post about my life. That was the total plan for the post. It just seems like things keep hitting a brick wall just about the time that I figure things out. Honestly, right now I'm struggling.

Yes, I'm only taking 12 hours (4 classes) this semester. But, I'm completely lost in two of the four classes. As in, I have no idea what we're talking about. I mean, I read the material multiple times. I think I understand it. Then, I go to class and take a quiz and I fail it. FAIL IT. I mean, you get a 65 for putting your name on the piece of paper. I write a page and a half and do what I think is a great job- and I still get no credit for my work and get a 65. It's incredibly frustrating and happening in BOTH classes I have with this professor. I mean, I love the guy. He's old and amazing and super brilliant. But, I'm just not getting what I'm doing wrong. I did fine last semester in my Theology class with the same kind of quizzes. But, for some reason, Philosophy and Ethics are kicking my butt. In addition, I have this pride thing where I really don't want to end up with two "C"s this semester. It will KILL my GPA, and I just recovered (somewhat) from my two "C"s Freshman year. At this point, it would pretty much end my hopes of grad school, seeing as I'm going to have to get a scholarship for that. I'm frustrated that I'm putting hours in doing reading, highlighting, and outlining and getting NOTHING in return. At this point, I'm about ready to throw in the towel.

I'm not trying to complain (okay, actually I am. I just need to vent and really this is all I have), but I'm incredibly lonely this semester. I feel like I'm not the only one struggling with this (because I've read so many other blog friends' posts about how they have this same problem this term), but it doesn't make things better. Last semester, I was hardly on campus. I was always running to class, or church, or home or whatever. I was struggling to stay on top of everything. There was no time. This led to me not being the friend I needed to be. But this semester, here I am with no job. Okay, that's kind of a lie. I work Wednesday nights for a few hours watching Preschoolers. But, that's really not something that requires any prep time and it takes about three hours for dinner plus kid-watching. I have an enormous amount of time. While this does give me time to stay up to date on my homework, it's mostly reading. That doesn't take forever. I feel like I'm always sitting around twiddling my thumbs. I've tried to spend time with friends and stuff, but they're always busy with other people. I mean, I don't expect to be everything, but if I make plans with someone- that's normally something that I look forward to all day. Then, when people cancel on me- I get disappointed. I've learned to just not expect anything. I'm not trying to be a downer, because I know that I brought this on myself last semester, but it just gets lonely. It's quiet around here. I'm normally in my pajamas by dinner time, and in bed watching a movie shortly thereafter. I'm tired of being boring- I want to do something exciting. But, it just feels like there's nobody around. I miss spending all day with my friends. I miss having lunch together and dinner with people. I mean, I'm seriously pitiful. I'm going to make a great cat lady someday.

I'm at a complete loss of what to do with my life. I just have this feeling that grad school isn't going to work out. For some reason, going into massive amounts of debt to work in a church seems crazy. I don't know why most of these churches want master's degrees or a degree from seminary. I mean, they're not going to pay you enough to live on- much less pay back student loans. At the same time as all of this, several of my dream jobs have openings. I'm not talking about tiara tester or footie pajama model- I'm talking reality here. Yet, since I'm not graduating until December, I'm thinking that they don't want to wait 11 months to get me. I'm freaking out about my future, even though I know that I made a New Year's Goal not to. Freaking out. I know God has a plan for my life- but he needs to get with the program and realize that my "cat lady" tendencies aren't going to pay the bills. And that I really don't want to work retail, restaurant, or call center. I'd like to put my college degree to use. I've only worked for the past four years on it, for crying out loud!

So, my "non pity party" post turned into one. Drats. I was trying to avoid that. I was trying to stay positive- but it's hard. I know that I have a "great life". I don't want to be lectured about that. But, sometimes it's hard to keep going. It's hard to not want to quit. It's frustrating when you work so hard (on homework, friendships, and life goals) and they aren't working out like you planned. Yesterday, Nicole tweeted something about how life is changing, and sometimes it's hard (I don't remember the exact quote). Somehow, I was able to pull out, "Life changes are good! It means we're actually living. If you didn't grow and change, you wouldn't be where you are today!" I'm not sure how I got that out- because honestly, I've been feeling pretty crummy. I'm not too fond of the changes that life is throwing at me. I end up yelling at God. I end up throwing things. And I end up taking a lot of bubble baths. But, sometimes we need to take the time to relax. To realize how far we've come- and how hard times have brought us good things. Sometimes we need to look for the sparkle in our lives, even when we don't feel particularly sparkly at the moment.

Sunday Sparkle- Week 3

A little late this week (it's kind of Tuesday), but I just remembered to post this! Fun, fun.




A fun little present for a friend. She and I are going to be going through Grace for the Good Girl together for the next few weeks and I am so excited. Of course I had to wrap the book in some computer paper and stick an Erin Condren label on it.




Another one of my friends turned 22 last Friday and I had to make her this little piece of birthday cake. She's a sweet Catholic girl, so I had to make her a holy family cake. Complete with a snow globe. Yes, it's that amazing. :)

And that's the sparkle from last week. Yay! (So, I'm typing this up on my iPad and it just autocorrected "yay" to "thistle". So, from now on, I think I'm going to say "Thistle!" when I get excited from now on. End of story. Winning. Anyone catch that Bachelor reference just then?)

Sunday Sparkle-Week 2

There was lots of exciting Sparkle in my week.

I'm not really great at only taking one picture a week. Mostly because I have so much time on my hands. 12 hours isn't my favorite course load. I mean, yes...I AM taking Philosophy and Ethics. Those are hard. But, this overachiever is spending way too much time watching TV. I need to get a hobby. :)

Without further adieu, here's my Sunday Sparkle.

I've already vlogged about the incredibleness known as the Pasta Boat. Changed my life forever.



I finally got some more command strips and finished hanging my pictures in my room. Yay, pretty!





I have this verse on my whiteboard by my door. I've had it up since Christmas, because I think I need to be reminded of this sometimes! It reminds me that I need to find joy in my present situation- where I am at right now. God has a meaning and purpose for me being RIGHT HERE. I am perfectly posited to do good work for His name right here.

one word. one verse.

Last January, I declared 2011 the year of change. At that point in time, I was about to move into a new dorm room with a roommate that I had never met at a new college with a new major. That's a lot of change going on at once. As I look back at the past year, I changed so much- and I think it was a good kind of change. I've made so many new friends. I've grown deeper in my relationship with God. While I vent about my college all the time- secretly I really love it. I love my new major. Over the past year, I've learned that change can be a good thing.

So, when it came time to pick my one word for 2012, it was kind of hard. I mean, change fit last year- and it still fits now. My life feels at times like it's in a constant state of chaos due to all the changes I face. But, I wanted a new word for the new year. So, for this year, I picked

I know, it seems like a silly word. Sparkle reminds me of so many things, and that's why I'm picking it. It comes from Philippians 2:14-15 where Paul tells the Phillipians to "Do everything without complaining or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a crooked and depraved generation, in which you shine like stars in the universe." Sparkle just sounds prettier than shine.

I want to sparkle this year. I want to be that princess (the child of God) that I talk about becoming and I want to dwell in the presence of the King. I want to sparkle this year and let my personality shine through. I want to sparkle and show people the love of Jesus. Finally, I want to find all the sparkle in my life. Seeing as Project 365 is kind of hard (though I lasted 2 whole months last year!), I'm going to try a Project 52. One picture (at least!) a week that shows the sparkle in my life. It may be finding joy in things that I would normally complain or argue about...or they might just be things that make me smile each week. It's about focusing on the sparkle in my life and how I can sparkle in the world I live in.

Last year, I also tried to memorize 2 scriptures a month. While I'd love to say that I'm going to do that again, I just don't see it happening. So, in an effort to simplify, I'm committing to one verse at a time (well, it's actually four this time). I'm going to work at my own pace and work with the scriptures that I come across rather than rushing into things and overcommitting myself. To start with, I'm going to work on Jeremiah 29:11-14. I'll write a little more on why this one tomorrow, but for now, I want to just share the word with you.

For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back from captivity.I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the LORD, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

I think that passage is just beautiful. God WILL provide a future for us! Even when the economy is down and we don't know how we are EVER going to find a job in this job market, HE has a plan that is greater than we could ever imagine!