Day 154: Final Lesson Plans

After weeks, days, hours and hours and hours, I have finally completed all of my lesson plans for the semester! This is my final lesson plan project for my Social Studies content class. It has 4 lesson plans chocked full of concrete actions, maps, timelines, songs and lyrics. It is about 70 pages long! Hopefully, I'll get to use this lesson in my own classroom of 8th graders!

Day 153: Refrigerator Snowman

To be festive, one of my roommates Ariel placed this lovely Snowman in our fridge. Every time the door is opened the Snowman starts talking to you...and it freakin scares me EVERY TIME! Even though I know it's in there. I love this little guy, and he cheers me up....but he still throws me off every time. He will sing you a song about shutting the door to keep the cold in! Love it:)

Day 152: Jesus Christ is President

I saw this awesome car today! It was a beautiful reminder of who is truly in charge. 
So many people lately have been so distressed about Obama being reelected, while others have rejoiced because they think he is going to save our country. 
Everybody just needs to breathe. 
I'm not getting into anything political here! Whether Obama or Romney had won, Jesus Christ would still be our Lord and Savior! Whether you agree with our President or not, we still must turn our eyes to God because He is what our lives should be about!
We are not living in our true Home right now. These matters are so trivial compared to our eternal life with God. If we are putting all of our attention on politics, then we have just taken our attention off of God. If God is our number one priority, everything else will fall into place.

Day 151: Christmas Decorations

Christmas is my FAVORITE holiday!! For many reasons! One of those reasons is the decorations! So, in my room I hung up some colorful Christmas lights and a mini light-up Christmas tree! 
It always feels so festive in my room now!!

Day 150: Family Photo Shoot

We're sending out Christmas cards this year!! So today we had a family photo shoot! After a ton of pictures, we have chosen this one as our favorite :)
We don't like to get super fancy. Just something simple to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!
Hope you enjoy!

Day 149: Christmas Vacation!!

Tonight we watched one of Dad's favorite Christmas movies....Christmas Vacation! So...obviously Dad was very excited when we watched it :) Let the Christmas cheer begin!

This is easily one of my favorite pictures ever.

Day 148: Birthday, Grandma, and Christmas Tree

Okay...I'm breaking my rules. But, today was too eventful to put only one picture up!
Here is my brother blowing out his candles! Today was his 19th birthday. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CALEB!!!!

A couple of the cousins had left by now, but here is a picture of the grandkids with Grandma! Me, Sarah, Grandma, Caleb, and Leanne! Such a fun Thanksgiving!

All night long the girls have been decorating the house! Here's our lovely tree:) The majority of the ornaments on the tree are homemade ornaments that we created when we were younger. Some are falling apart, but we never have the heart to throw them away. This tree holds so many memories! 

32 Days until Christmas!!

Day 147: HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

This should be on a Thanksgiving advertisement! My Aunt Ann with her sweet potato casserole. DELICIOUS. This picture definitely reminds me of Thanksgiving!! 
I'm thankful for my family and this wonderful food that we were blessed with! 

Day 146: To Grandma's House we go

We've loaded up the car and the girls headed to Grandma's! We are ready for a 3 hour drive!! Sarah took a little nap and jammed to some music, while mom and I got to catch up for a few hours. It was a great drive!

Day 145: Sister Reunion

After weeks of being apart, we were reunited. Shockingly and out of character, we took a LOT of pictures together. This is one of the best ones. 
We sent pictures to each daily as a countdown to when we'd get to see each other. We're pretty much best friends.

Day 144: Pumpkin Bread

Sumner and I both LOVE pumpkin bread!! So, when we saw Pumpkin Bread mixes half off in Lifetime, we had to get a couple! So, we made one for our sonflowers' group and one for Ms. Kara, who hosted our incredible girls' retreat! It was just a small thank you for everything she's done with us since she's started working at the UCSC.
It was ALMOST the best pumpkin bread I ever had. haha. Ok, that's not true...but we still did a pretty good job!

Day 143: Cracker Barrel with Ash

Finally, after months and months, Ashlei and I got to go to Cracker Barrel (with our lovely friend, Regina)! When she lived here, we used to go all the time and have long, wonderful conversations about boys and how our life is going. She is so encouraging and it's always a blessing when I get to spend time with her.
Also, this is our usual picture. We can't take a normal picture. Smiling is lame.

Day 142: WAY past our bedtime

In my earlier years of college, I would stay up until 3 or 4 every night. Now....I try to go to bed around 10 or 11. Waking up for a 7:45 practicum is TOUGH if I don't get a good night's sleep. Sumner's the same way! We're kind of like old people. At the girls' retreat, we stayed up until after 2:00! So I had to post a picture of us being rebels. 

Day 141: Girls' Retreat: In the Raw

For our girls' retreat, we did facials! It was a wonderful spa night. We 5 girls chose the oatmeal mask. Little did we know, our faces would like someone threw up on them! Taking it off was extremely difficult, but after all was said and done, our faces were pretty smooth:)

Day 140: BREAKING DAWN PART 2

Tonight was the end of the wonderful Twilight Saga. We don't care about you haters. We love this series, and it a part of our life has ended tonight!! 

Although I have extremely mixed feelings about the movie, it was a very good ending!

Here is mine and Bree's last picture at a Twilight "midnight" premiere!

Day 139: CHAMPIONSHIP SHIRT!

Tonight, I got an Intramural Championship shirt for Flag Football! This is the UCSC girls' 4th year in a row as champions!! Awesome, right??

P.S. I didn't actually play flag football...or earn this shirt at all. Court just had extras so she gave me one...HOWEVER, when people see me wear the shirt, I will wear it like a true CHAMPION. 

Day 138: Perfect start to my morning

My alarm went off at 6:00 this morning, to wake up, jump in the shower, and get ready for practicum. Well, as soon as I woke up, my roomie, Ariel, knocked on my door and asked me to take her to clinicals since her car wouldn't defrost. Being the awesome friend that I am, I took her to the hospital (only after she scraped my windshield off with a wooden spoon). When I got back to my apt, I didn't really have time to take a shower, so I decided to start my morning with God's Word and prayer. It would such an encouraging start to my day. 
It's crazy though, how Satan attacks on days when he knows you are trying to get closer to God. But, with more dedication and time, I know that making this my morning routine will always benefit my days. 

I chose Proverbs 31 because of No Makeup November. So, many girls recently, my self included, who are doing NMN have been so focused on their looks, on their natural beauty, but I feel like we're missing the point. I believe this month has caused us to focus on our physical appearance, more than our heart and our attitude.
This verse plainly tells us what kind of woman we need to focus on being: "Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised."
This month, as we keep our face uncovered, we need to take our focus off of our outside, and turn our eyes to our insides. God only cares about what's going on with our heart. 
We, women, need to strive to be God-fearing women!

Day 137: TWILIGHT- Night 1

Tonight is Night ONE of our Twilight marathon!
Premiere of Breaking Dawn Part 2 is Thursday night! 
To all you haters out there...WE DO NOT CARE. We are SO excited for the premiere! We are preparing our mind and our hearts for Thursday night:) 

Day 136: CHAPSTICK

I'm a chapstick fanatic! Especially during the winter. I usually opt for Burt's Bees (which is incredible), but taking a cheaper route, here's GREEN APPLE chapstick ... only 98 cents!! 
I repeat GREEN APPLE!! I'm loving it:)

Day 135: Rugby!

I've missed watching my brother play Rugby, so when I was at my friend's apt, we saw a rugby game in the field behind their apartment...so we decided to go outside and creep a little on the players! HA!
The bush adds to the creepiness of the picture...but I was too afraid to get any closer and get hit by the ball.

Day 134: Beautiful November day

How could you not love running outside with weather like this??
I had to stop and take a picture of God's breathtaking beauty!

Day 133: UCSC hoodies

FINALLY!! My 4th year at the UCSC and we got hoodies!! I love them so much:) 
Check them out!

Day 132: Some skit practice

Some of us from the UCSC have something awesome planned for the end of November! Get excited...we've been rehearsing!!

Day 131: You don't know what you've got until it's gone.

I was reading my Out of the Dust book for my lesson plans and I stumbled upon a great lesson that I could apply to MY life! The girl in this book always tried so hard in school to make her Ma proud. She made great grades, did well on projects, came home and told her mom, hoping to get praised, and her mom always told her, "I knew you could", which provided very little comfort for her.
Her mom ended up passing away while giving childbirth. This excerpt from the book tells about how the girl's class did well on the state tests and she wished she could tell her mom. She just wanted to hear "I knew you could" from her mom, because it would be enough to just hear her voice.
We need to be grateful for the time we have with our family and friends! Don't take any moment, any word for granted. 

Day 130: No Makeup November UPDATES

As I'm going through this "No Makeup November" process, I wanted to kinda keep a journal or something to keep track of how everything's going. So, I've started to write on my mirror everyday. So, by the end of the month, by whole mirror should be covered with writing. If you can't tell in the picture, here's what each day says:
Day 1- lazy
Day 2-Satan attacked
Day 3- Indifferent
Day 4- "Needed" to wear make up church!
           -felt like I looked dead
Day 5-(first day of practicum)
         felt like I was making a bad first impression....but I didn't feel ugly

I used makeup to cover up flaws and make me feel beautiful. I didn't like dressing up without putting makeup on. Now, I can't let makeup enhance my beauty or define my beauty. It all comes from the HEART. 

Day 129: LESSON PLAN, LESSON PLAN, LESSON PLAN

 Now that I'm getting further into the Education program, I've got SO many more lesson plans to work on. So, basically, this is my life! Lesson plan after lesson plan after lesson plan! 

Day 128: Out of the Dust

I've got 7th grade language arts lesson plans due in one of my classes soon. So, I've decided to use this novel for my lessons. It's based on the Great Depression.
I'm so excited to read this book and create my lesson plans!

Day 127: October Baby

This is a very great story! Check it out! I won't give anything away, but I will simply say, it's a beautiful story about adoption!
Watch it!!

Day 126: No Makeup November

This is a picture of some of the UCSC girls doing No Makeup November. We are excited and nervous!! 
We want to take a whole month to stop covering up the natural beauty that God gave us. Although make-up isn't bad, we don't want to keep thinking that make-up enhances our beauty; there is no need to change how we look to "make us look better". 
I don't wear make up a lot...but I do wear it whenever I get dressed up or whenever I want to feel prettier. Instead of covering myself with make-up, I need to cover my heart with God's word!
We are so excited to begin this journey with each other and with God!

Day 125: NERDS- Finished product

The finished product: We were Wonka Nerds!! We painted the poster board and free handed the letters! This is probably my favorite Halloween costume ever:)

Day 124: Pre-Halloween costume

Bree and I have been working on our costume for Halloween...so excited!!!!! 

Day 123: TWINSIES

At Sonflowers, Sumner and I showed up with almost identical hats, so of course we had to take a picture:) Love you!!

Day 122: Family picture

During the summer, James, Seth, and I took an awesome, spontaneous family photo. It makes me laugh every time I see it! So, we decided to recreate this photo at the retreat!! It is just as amazing! 

Day 121: Bracelet reminder!

One of my sweet girls made me a bracelet at the OCYG retreat. The theme was A.D.D. : A Divine Distraction. Every time I look at this bracelet, I am reminded of how often we get distracted. This is a reminder to me to slow down, stop, and just listen to my God. 

Day 120: BEAUTIFUL Friday morning

Friday mornings are typically pretty rough for me. I have an 8:00am class, and it's 3 hours long...so I usually reluctantly get out of bed, slowly make my way to class, always in a bad mood. This morning, when I left my apartment, I saw this beautiful sky. This was God reminding me how I'm just blessed to have woken up. Seeing this creation completely turned my attitude from negative to positive!! Thank you, God, for constant reminders of how much You love me!

Day 119: TTU Fall Fun Party

SUCH A FUN NIGHT!! Tech was having a little Halloween party with pumpkin carving, dinner, dancing, and a photo booth! This is a picture of Christy, Bree, and I at the photobooth....SO SO fun!! We absolutely loved doing this.