Highlights of my 18th year….

• 
  Performed the Heimlich Maneuver for the first time. 
•  Advanced to a higher level in Ballet and Hip Hop
• Carved a pumpkin for the first time.
• Tasted Greek food for the first time.
• Graduated High School
• Participated in the One Thing young adult conference
• Made new wonderful friends.
• Able to do one let-one arm plank
• Open into a straddle split again after an injury
• Traveled to Mexico and saw my beautiful and wonderful friends again
• Met my two baby nephews
• Got my first driver’s licence
• Helped plan and organize Sunny’s Sweet Sixteen
• Was broken and put back together again
• Did make up for a big Nutcracker production
• Flew! Well, sort of. At this amusement park there was this ride called the slingshot where they pulled you back waaay far up, then you let yourself go, only attached to a cable.
  IT. WAS. AWESOME.
• Got to sled for the first time
• Did a snow-angel for the first time
• Got my first job
• Got to enjoy a wonderful visit from the cousins
• Went to see the lights be turned on at the Plaza during Thanksgiving
• Went to prom
• Got to see the the Christmas tree get lit up in this small town on the outskirts of the city
• Got to see an amazing fireworks display at Christmas in the Park
• Did 30 man push-ups in a row
• Helped take pictures at a children’s Summer Bible camp
• Was in a wonderful dance intensive
• Was able to hold my grandma’s hand and sing her a song for the last time till heaven
• Was in a dance performance for the end of my dance school year
• Went swing dancing for the first time
• Got a new guitar
• Were blessed with a new car!

And so many more beautiful things that I was able to experience in my 18th year!

AND THE HEAVEN’S REJOICE! BIRTHDAY MONTH!!!

W.O.W.
Feeling pretty amazed at myself right now.

I have broken tradition.

Shame on me.

Ever since I started this blog I don’t think I have ever missed a post on my birthday… till… this year.

Maybe part of it is that I am in denial *mental picture of clinging to a pole while being yanked by the feet.*

Yes my dear friends. I have been officially on this planet for 19 years now outside of my mama’s tummy. 

And that

is very strange.

The craziest thought (and the one that whenever people mention makes me cringe) is that next year… I’ll be… *gulp!* tw… twww… twwweenty….

*Stares at computer for a few moments and takes it all in.*

You know, I’ll be the first to admit, growing up is scary. It’s realization smacking you in the face waking you up to the reality of how short time really is and how important it is to LIVE every second. I will be honest with myself and with all of you that while I do like to think of myself as a happy person who loves life, I feel I haven’t really been LIVING to the maximum as I should.

Why?

Well, one word: life.

It’s been so busy, I feel like I wasn’t mentally prepared to what entering the workforce would mean. Picture a juggler with 20 plates in the air on a unicycle. Everything is going well till one of the kids in the audience drops a basket ball into the stage and it smacks right into the unicycle. Thank goodness, he regains his balance, but so focused on regaining his balance the plates fall and crash all around him. He loses the focus and the plates end up in an orchestra version of Humpty Dumpty.

WOW! THAT is such a perfect example of my life! *In awe of my metaphorical skills.*

But it’s the truth. For a while it was all work, drive, dance, rehearse for a modeling show, miscellaneous work here and there, prepare for this, prepare for that.

I was getting burned out.

I barely had time to finish THOSE things, and no time for things that truly mattered.

Thank God for breathers like today. I am stuck home, not being able to go to work because the roads were just too crazy from the snow.

I TRIED… but wasn’t successful at getting to work. Accidents everywhere… it was very ugly!

Okay, so back to my point. I have taken these past few days to really re-asses my priorities, to get my time back into my hands and manage it more wisely. To stop wasting time on silly things and start making time for things I love… like writing. Boiling down to being more organized and self-disciplined.

Well, that’s that for my moment of truth. I would appreciate your prayers on this for me and for the Lord’s continual guidance in my life.

Oh and speaking of living life at the moment: My wonderful friend Stephanie gave me the gift of an audio book for my birthday.
But not just any book.

A life changer.

If you haven’t gotten your hands on it yet, I recommend it greatly! It’s called ONE THOUSAND GIFTS click on this link for Ann’s blog. The story has been very different from how I imagined it would be, and to not spoil anything, i just will say GET IT! GET IT!

VIDEO

My birthday was pretty fantastic, actually I wouldn’t just say birthDAY, since it was more like birthWEEK. It was such a fun time! I enjoyed it so much!
It started Friday when at work people kept wishing me a happy birthday and I had a delicious lemon cake baked just for me–WHAAAT? Of course I shared!….*eyes dart away.*

Then on Saturday *tooot!* the big day I woke up and got ready for interpreting class and as I was doing my breakfast my parent’s sang happy birthday to me. Awww! To my dismay my sisters were being meanies and didn’t wish me happy birthday. Oh, except Sunny, she actually remembered! 🙂

Actually of all my brothers and sisters, only three wished me happy birthday. Tsk, tsk. Naughty! What is facebook for??? hahahah!

Later that afternoon it was rainy and we had plans of going out to eat, but decided to wait till Sunday to be with friends. So instead we went to… THE MOVIES! Always fun!

Then we tried to find this salsa dancing place which with all the lights, rain, traffic and four girls yelling directions in the back seat, ended in a total fail. Hehehe, poor dad! It was funny!… afterwards…

Later that week, my parents gave me the wonderful gift of sending me to a SPA! My very first time, very exciting! IT WAS FABULOUS!!! So relaxing. Best gift ever.

Then the next Saturday (SEE WHAT I MEAN???) I had my birthday party which was a BLAST! It’s so funny seeing American’s reaction to a latin party, it completely blows their minds which is pretty funny. Most of them consider a “Party” eating, playing card games, eating, hanging out, eating… maybe watch a  movie….

eating…

HEH! Kidding, I don’t think eating should be in there as many times.

So when we come in with all the noise, the music, the games, the sillies, the great food, the crazy-free fun… it helps them be a little crazy and free too.

The theme of my party this year was HAT CRAZE FIESTA! So basically everybody arrived with a hat of their choice and prizes were given to Craziest, Most Funny, Most original, and Most classy. We all had a bunch of fun!

So that is a little of what I’ve been up to. It was a memorable 19th birthday for sure!

Am I excited about this new year?

YOU BET! BRING IT!

Not only for Valentine’s day!

To all you single ladies out there, 

I just want to remind you what a special and incredible woman you are! Don’t ever listen to the lies of popular opinion that you are somehow “less” or a loser if you don’t have a boyfriend/husband. Don’t EVER feel ashamed of being single. You are the daughter of the King of Kings and you are his greatest love first and foremost. So stand tall and smile today because you are worth so much more than all the gold in the world! Don’t ever feel you need a guy to “complete” you, because if you are not compete in yourself and in God, no guy will be able to do that for you. He will compliment you, but will never be able to truly “complete” you–only you and God can do that!
I know for sure God has an amazing man in store for you that will love Him even more than he loves you (which believe me, is always a good thing!) 
Take this time being single as a blessing from the Lord to pursue Him in a deeper way and know Jesus fully. “Seek first the kingdom of God and all these other things will be added unto you!” 
You rock ladies! 
Happy Valentines day!! Xoxo

Greatest grammer news of the day!

Most of What You Think You Know About Grammar is Wrong

And ending sentences with a preposition is nothing worth worrying about By Patricia T. O’Conner and Stewart Kellarman, Smithsonian magazine, February 2013 You’ve probably heard the old story about the pedant who dared to tinker with Winston Churchill’s writing because the great man had ended a sentence with a preposition. Churchill’s scribbled response: “This is the sort of English up with which I will not put.”

It’s a great story, but it’s a myth. And so is that so-called grammar rule about ending sentences with prepositions. If that previous sentence bugs you, by the way, you’ve bought into another myth. No, there’s nothing wrong with starting a sentence with a conjunction, either. But perhaps the biggest grammar myth of all is the infamous taboo against splitting an infinitive, as in “to boldly go.” The truth is that you can’t split an infinitive: Since “to” isn’t part of the infinitive, there’s nothing to split. Great writers—including Chaucer, Shakespeare, Donne and Wordsworth—have been inserting adverbs between “to” and infinitives since the 1200s.

Where did these phony rules originate, and why do they persist?

For some of them, we can blame misguided Latinists who tried to impose the rules of their favorite language on English. Anglican bishop Robert Lowth popularized the prohibition against ending a sentence with a preposition in his 1762 book, A Short Introduction to English Grammar; while Henry Alford, a dean of Canterbury Cathedral, was principally responsible for the infinitive taboo, with his publication of A Plea for the Queen’s English in 1864.

In Latin, sentences don’t end in prepositions, and an infinitive is one word that can’t be divided. But in a Germanic language like English, as linguists have pointed out, it’s perfectly normal to end a sentence with a preposition and has been since Anglo-Saxon times. And in English, an infinitive is also one word. The “to” is merely a prepositional marker. That’s why it’s so natural to let English adverbs fall where they may, sometimes between “to” and a verb.

We can’t blame Latinists, however, for the false prohibition against beginning a sentence with a conjunction, since the Romans did it too (Et tu, Brute?). The linguist Arnold Zwicky has speculated that well-meaning English teachers may have come up with this one to break students of incessantly starting every sentence with “and.” The truth is that conjunctions are legitimately used to join words, phrases, clauses, sentences—and even paragraphs.

Perhaps these “rules” persist because they are so easy to remember, and the “errors” are so easy to spot. Ironically, this is a case where the clueless guy who’s never heard of a preposition or a conjunction or an infinitive is more likely to be right.

As bloggers at Grammarphobia.com and former New York Times editors, we’ve seen otherwise reasonable, highly educated people turn their writing upside down to sidestep imaginary errors. There’s a simple test that usually exposes a phony rule of grammar: If it makes your English stilted and unnatural, it’s probably a fraud.

 

 

 

WAZZZAM! I knew I could do that! 😉

Something I read and found interesting.

The Habit of Starting

By Leo Babauta, ETR, Jan. 23, 2013 The biggest reason people fail at creating and sticking to new habits is that they don’t keep doing it.

That seems obvious: if you don’t keep doing a habit, it won’t really become a habit. So what’s the solution to this obvious problem? Find a way to keep doing it.

When you look at it this way, the key to forming a habit is not how much you do of the habit each day (exercise for 30 minutes, write 1,000 words, etc.), but whether you do it at all. So the key is just getting started.

Let me emphasize that: the key to forming a habit is starting each day.

What do I mean by starting? If you want to form the habit of meditation, just get your butt on the cushion each day. If you want to form the habit of running, just lace up your shoes and get out the door. If you want to form the habit of writing, just sit down, close everything else on your computer, and start typing.

Form the habit of starting, and you’ll get good at forming habits.

Form the habit of starting—easier said than done, right? What happens when you wake up and don’t feel like doing yoga or your 60-minute workout DVD?

Let’s first take a look at why you don’t feel like starting. It’s usually for one or both of these reasons:

1. You are comfortable with what you’re doing, and the habit is less comfortable (it’s too hard). We cling to the comfortable.

2. It’s too difficult to get started—to do the habit, you have to get a bunch of equipment out of your garage, or drive 20 minutes to the gym, or go get a bunch of ingredients, etc.

Those are the main two reasons, and really they’re the same thing.

So the solution is to make it easier and more comfortable to do the habit, and easier to get started. Some ways to do that:

• Focus on the smallest thing—just getting started. You don’t have to do even 5 minutes—just start. That’s so easy it’s hard to say no.

• Prepare everything you need to get started earlier. So if you need some equipment, get it ready well before you have to start, like the evening before, or in the morning if you have to do it in the afternoon, or at least an hour before. Then when it’s time to start, there is no barrier.

• Make the habit something you can do where you are, instead of having to drive there.

• If you have to drive or walk somewhere, have someone meet you there. Then you’re less likely to stay home (or at work), and more likely to go—and going there is the same thing as getting started. This works because you’re making it less comfortable to not start—the idea of leaving a friend waiting for you at the gym or park is not a comfortable one.

• Tell people you’re going to do the habit of starting your habit every day for 30 days. Having this kind of accountability motivates you to get started, and makes it less comfortable not to start.

• Start with the easiest version of the habit, so that it’s easy to start. For example, if you want to form the habit of reading, don’t start with Joyce, but with Grisham or Stephen King or whoever you find fun and easy to read.

• Make it as easy as possible to start, and hard to not start. Tell yourself that all you have to do is lace up your shoes and get out the door, and you’ll have a hard time saying no. Once you’ve started, you’ll feel good and probably want to continue.

Winter!

*Sees that condemning look of condemnation in your eyes of…(can’t think of any other condemning word.)…*
*Tries to come up with a good excuse for not posting*
……

…….

Alright so in my defense, who isn’t busy during the last month of the year and the first month of the year. I actually have some VERY good excuses for you guys, but since you probably want to shut me up already I’ll go ahead to the next step: PICTURES!
Yes!
You heard me right!
PICTURES!

*Music of wonder starts playing*

So Windy actually owns pictures?
Yes. I do. I just never post them on my blog because it takes so long and I’m lazy.
Just kidding, that’s not really the reason.

Well. No… it… actually is.

But, I decided I wanted to be extra nice to you guys, it being a new year and all, so here  you go! (Feeling pretty giving at the moment.)

*smugness*

So how about we start with our first snowfall?

WOW!

WordPress has improved a lot! There goes my excuse, this was actually really fast! haha

NEXT!

There is something magical about the first snowfall! 🙂

Our funny looking snowman! We had to make him lying down because the snow wasn’t packing up for a regular stand-up snowman. 

 

 

I love this shot. The sun smiled at me for a precious few seconds through the clouds allowing for this!

My beautiful sister Annie

Funny looking fuzzy things 🙂

Now for Christmas!
It was… different for sure but it was a precious time. And celebrating Christmas eve with my grandpa was so special.

Crazy faces! Crazy sisters. Freaked out grandpa! hahaha

By the time Christmas came around our tree wasn’t in it’s full glory anymore but it was THE most beautiful tree we ever had. You can’t completely appreciate it here.

And the fragrance!..

Mmmmmh!

I will post soon about my work adventures. It has been a pretty good starting week so far and I love the people I work with.

Definitely blessed!

To be continued then!

See ya!

All things are made new.

It’s amazing how God can completely change your life

over

and over again.

You think you know Him, then He shows you a greater and even more amazing part of Himself. You think you know how to pray, and you realize you have only been scratching the surface. You think you life is going alright and something happens that flips your world upside down. You think that maybe you’re doing okay on your own. That maybe you don’t need God as much or you simply forget Him a little.
Then it happens.
You crawl back wounded into His arms that were open for you all along; you ask Him to carry you, and he does.
You wonder how you could ever think that on your own it was enough.

If nothing else, life is full of lessons. It’s a constant learning environment–do I thank the Lord for that! Simply realizing that you are made clean every single day–all of yesterday’s anger, hurtful words, mistakes, mess-upps–it leaves you in awe because it’s gone.

And it fills  you with joy, realizing that you always have room for improvement. That you don’t have to let past mistakes, circumstances or tragic events bring you down forever. You can face them and say, “In Jesus name I have become totally and completely clean.” While they are there for our own good–our personal reality checks–because they make us realize how much of a mess we are without Jesus, they don’t have to be an obstacle as long as we bring them to Jesus’ feet, asking Him to put together the broken pieces.
To heal.
To restore.
To make new.

Happy first of January!

At the dawn of 2013!
Lord, help me to be a better person this year. To be kinder, more loving, attentive to others feelings and needs. Help me to be a helping hand, a compassionate ear to listen, to hold my tongue when I should and speak truth even when it hurts. Help me to be wiser, knowing when to speak, and when to be silent. Help me to trust in you, even if circumstances are difficult or everything is pointing in a negative direction. Guide me and help me learn to control my negative emotion and to constantly see you in other people–even those who are hard to get along with–and forgive others even when I feel forgiveness should not be mine to give. Teach me to say sorry, even when I don’t feel I was in error. Give me your love, strength, mercy, compassion and understanding. Show me how to not only follow your footsteps but to re-print them and re-step on them.
In all my actions, words or deeds, help me be just a little bit more like You. 
Amen.

Christmas

Christmas is more than a day at the end of the year,
More than a season of joy and good cheer,
Christmas is really God’s pattern for living
To be followed all year by unselfish giving…

For the holiday season awakens good cheer
And draws us closer to those we hold dear,
And we open our hearts and find it is good
To live among men as we always should…

But as soon as the tinsel is stripped from the tree
The spirit of Christmas fades silently
Into the background of daily routine
And is lost in the whirl of life’s busy scene,
And all unawares, we miss and forgo
The greatest blessing that mankind can know…

For if we lived Christmas each day, as we should,
And made it our aim to always do good,
We’d find the lost key to meaningful living
That comes not from getting, but from unselfish giving.
And we’d know the great joy of Peace upon earth,
Which was the real purpose of our Saviour’s birth.
For in the Glad Tidings of the first Christmas night,
God showed us the Way and the Truth and the Light!
—Helen Steiner Rice

A great idea to do for Christmas!

random acts of Christmas kindness. RACK.

CHECK IT OUT! 😉