it's not as easy as willing it all to be right

Oh life. Why so confusing?

saying hey-oh, baby lets go

Yesterday was my birthday. I am 21!

The most important thing about my birthday is that it SNOWED.



It's the first time since we moved here that it's snowed on my birthday. On Saturday my parents gave me my first birthday present and I also saw my first snow driving over the pass to visit a friend. It has felt like Christmas ever since. I wish I knew what it is about this season that makes it so impossible to be unhappy. Is it just all the good associations, or do cold weather and corny Christmas music really have the powers to bestow joy on their own? Who knows.

On my sixteenth birthday I got a copy of Stepping Heavenward from my mom, which is now my all time favorite book. It's the fictional journal of a girl growing up in the 1800's beginning on HER sixteenth birthday. I've read it almost every year since then, and yesterday I just happened to be at the part where Katy turns twenty one. I always like to compare myself to Katy because we are very similar in temperment and she sets a really good example while still managing to be almost painfully realalistic. It's both encouraging and inspiring. I feel like I'm living her life, just in a different time period. Except that she gets married the day after her twenty first birthday, and today I'm... well, not getting married. :-P

Also, I got a camera for my birthday! So now I can make picture posts.



Of course, this makes it far too tempting to dress up in all the new hair things I also got for my birthday and take pictures of myself.



This is a bad habit to get into, I'm afraid.

when the post has lyrics, what do you put in the title?

With the exception of about three artists up until now, I've never been one for albums or one-band playlists. Until now. This week I am a two sided coin, with Boys Like Girls on one side and Carbon Leaf on the other. Today I lay Carbon-Leaf-side-up.

I've been trying to write poetry and/or lyrics for the last several months, all to no avail. These guys do it so much better.

live a life less ordinary
live a life extrordinary with me
live a life less sedetary
live a life revolutionary with me

well I hate to be a bother
but it's you and there's no other
I do believe
you can call me nieve
but I know me very well
at least as far as I can tell
and I know what I need

This is what I wish I had- the simple candor to say exactly what I mean without being cliche or trite or pretentious.

if I could name you in this song
would it make you smile and sing along?
this is the goal:
to get into your soul
if I could make you dance for joy
could that be the second chance decoy
the burning hand
I would need
to help you understand?

Maybe someday I'll get there. Funny how helpful the words of others can be!

at last

UPDATE ON COSTA RICA STUFF:

I am excited.

Yay! I've been dreading this for so long, and lately it's like God has been pealing away those layers of resistance. There have been many, many reasons why I've been not wanting to go, but I think the main one is that I just got too comfortable in the life I have now. Which is in many ways a blessing, but I'm beginning to feel restless again. And weather I feel like it or not when the time to leave comes, I know this will be good for me.

I have been realizing lately how much growing up I still have left to do. For a long time I thought I'd arrived at adulthood and wouldn't really change much more ever again. I was so happy to be gliding along living at this platou. And then things started going wildly downhill, and the world started spinning, and now BAM- all of my faults have been shaken to the surface, and I've got at least another six months of weeding to do.

Now I'm questioning weather you ever really "arrive." But I guess I'm kind of glad. What I thought was a platou may have very well been more of a rut. Life would be so borring if we ever stopped growing, changing- comming to hate everything about ourselves and starting over again from scratch.

I just put together a budget for myself of everything I could possibly need or want between now and when I get back from Costa Rica at the end of next October. I tried to be generous, putting in spending money and lots of padding in case things don't go exactly as planned. Then I calculated how much money I could reasonably be expected to earn working a regular job starting in early December, along with working for Aunt Amy (babysitting) and the money I've already earned. As it turns out, I'll only need to fundraise $176. I can do that! Even if I don't get a job till January, I can fundraise more and go from there.

Tambien, mi espanol es MUCH bueno! I really enjoy it. The language barrier has been a huge fear for me, and now I don't even worry about it.

So. That's the latest! Thanks for listening and for all of your constant support- please keep praying that I will grow in grace and that God would pave the way for me to go if it's His will!

There is a vegtable at the end of this post.

I have been LOVING life.

It has something to do with working as hard as I did the last two weeks and having pretty much nothing on my plate this week... I've never apreciated sleeping in and sitting around doing nothing so much.

Things I've been enjoying:

-this beautiful rain
-boots, scarves, and sweaters
-hot drinks
-sleep
-cooking
-working out
-movies
-coloring and overall being artistic

Of course, this isn't all there is to life, and it's not like I really deserve a break yet. But I do think I tend to take the quiet times forgranted in my perpetual rush for significance and the next big thing. After all, heaven won't have all these dramatic ups and downs, ins and outs, will it? I look forward to the time when work and recreation will all be simple and straightforward, not tied up in alterior motives and concerns.

THIS JUST IN: There is a whole zuccini in my purse that I forgot to eat earlier. Jooooooooooy!

every little thing's//gonna be alright

Confused?

Yep, I'm going back to my old blog name. Every time I see Jelly Beans I think, "Like my blog!" and then I realize my blog isn't named that anymore, and it makes me sad.

But not anymore!

Also, I imported all the old posts from my other blog to this one. So now this blog is five years old. =-0 Wow!

Last but not least...



Awww.

every time I turn around//I'm looking up, you're looking down

So, I have been working here, at this hole-in-the-wall doctor's office in Tacoma with pale blue walls, for nine days now. Tomorrow makes ten! When the Physical Therapist called me, I had no idea that there were actually as many as three physical therapists plus one assistant, a hand therapist, and a massage therapist working at one time here. They all have busy schedules chalk full of apointments, and at the end of each one they throw paper work at me. I never even got trained!

As it turns out, the guy who hired me for these two weeks thought I had a degree and a lot more experience than I actually do. I'm wondering what providence of God this might be leading towards, other than the near-sighted benefit of a pay check. It has sparked an interest in me for medical office work, which is funny because a few ladies at church have been trying to push me in this direction for a while now and it always sounded borrrrring. But it's not! It's a dynamic job with lots of aspects to it. I love talking to the customers in the waiting room. It's an oporotunity to serve, because some of them are SO lonely and just need someone to talk to. I have met some of the most interesting people in the most unlikely of disguises lately... sometimes you wonder how people ended up the way they are when they have so much going for them.

But I don't know. It's not much school and it would guarentee me a steady pay check and good hours, but it would always only be a contingency plan and I think I'd just be upset if I ended up doing it long-term. I've been thinking all day it might be good for me to narrow down exactly what the REAL plan is. Humm. That sounds too serious.

On to fresher topics! I have officially broken my record for going without going without coffee. See how I did that? Now it sounds like an accomplishment! I have had coffee every day since two Sundays ago. And maybe even furthur- at this point I just don't remember. But see how happy I am? I have no regrets! I use explination marks! I meant to say exclamation, but I don't really care!

Anyway. I have to go.