Good Byes

I'm not very good at good byes. Especially permanent ones. One of our 6th graders, Carson, had his last night at church tonight. His dad is in the military and they are being relocated to Italy. We had a little going away party with cake. And Amy and I made him a little photo album with pictures from the past couple of years. He will be missed!

Sometimes...

Work seems to never end. Just 20 more minutes...

One of My Favorite Things

I love when I am at church and am suddenly surrounded by 4 or 5 6th grade girls who want to tell me all about well... everything. School, boys, siblings, sports, friends or lack there of. I love that they feel comfortable enough to tell me about problems they are having at school and in life. Whether it be that they just changed schools and have no friends and are made fun of by other kids at school. Or about the boy who asked them to be his girlfriend and then "broke up" with her 2 days later and asked her friend out instead (oh middle school romance). Or about the soon to be step mom that they aren't sure about having take the place of a mother who passed away to cancer a few years ago.
I just enjoy being a person that they feel they can share stuff with. And that they WANT to share things with.
The fact that most of them are almost my height (1 very much taller) also makes it secretly kind of funny to me when I am part of their "circle".
What cool kids.

I Almost Had Something Exciting To Say

Today I had at least 3 different things I was thinking about blogging. And now I can't remember any of them.

But I DO know that they were definitely more exciting than the last few posts :) Oh and look to the right. I FINALLY put a new profile picture up. So this is how I look now instead of 4 years ago :)

AND (I'm sure all of you know this already)... but YAY for Corrie and getting engaged!! I just got a picture message from her with her engagement ring. CRAZY!

First Test

Tomorrow I have my first "midterm" of the semester. After that it pretty much doesn't slow down test-wise. Boo to that.

There's only one class I really don't like this semester. It's called "Operations Management" and involves alot of math, which I wasn't expecting. It's an upper division pre-requisite so I didn't really have a choice in taking it. I know that we need Operations Managers in this world or businesses really wouldn't run smoothly and would waste alot of money, but I am not going to be one that's for sure!

I discovered a new website. And by discover I mean Cerise told me about it. It's called Slacker.com and it's basically a radio website. Except you pick the kind of music you want to listen to (I usually go with Alternative), instead of a specific station. There are no commercials, and you can skip up to 6 songs I believe in an hour. Although it is legitimately good music so I never even need to skip all 6. It's my favorite online music site by FAR. :)

The Weekend

I went home this past weekend for my dad's birthday (which is actually this Thursday but last weekend was when I could get away). I took the train instead of driving. I like taking the train. I've takin it a few times before when I was carless or scared to drive my car that far. Even though it takes a little longer than driving, although on a Friday afternoon that could be argued to the contrary, it's nice to not have to drive. I can get some homework done and not waste gas... all that good stuff.

While I was home we took a tour of Cal Poly Pomona for my sister. Yes she is off to college next year. It was actually a really nice campus with many cool programs and such. I don't think it was a school my sister had been particularly interested in, but after this tour it became one of her top schools. She's already received most of her acceptance letters, now it's just a matter of her deciding where she wants to go.

We hung out as a family. Went to Claim Jumper for birthday dinner on Sunday night. Did the traditional cake and presents. We put 49 candles on my dads cake and kind of melted off the frosting.

I didn't get President's day off, however I didn't have class on Monday until 7pm, so I was able to hang out at home until Monday. My mom and I went on a nice long walk on Saturday. I got to see one of the main family's I used to babysit for which was very nice but definitely made me feel old since the youngest is now 13!

And that was my weekend. I enjoy my chances to go visit home more and more now since the chances tend to be fewer and more far between.

If you want to NOT have a normal schedule...

Be a college student... Some days I only have a few things to do. Other days I go nonstop from 8am-11pm. And my body hates me for giving up caffeine. Although not as much as the first day where I felt like I was detoxing from a drug!

"Free Hugs"

So I want to preface this by saying that nothing that we did was for our own benefit. And I'm not trying to talk us up. I just want to share what turned out to be a really cool experience.

FIRST watch the video:



Inspired by the video and the fact that it seemed such an easy thing to do, Amy and I decided to go give out "Free Hugs" in downtown San Diego last night. We stuck with the purpose of the Free Hugs Campaign, that sometimes all people need is a hug. Most people that we met were pretty skeptical, expecting us to sell something. To be honest, we didn't try to. If people would ask a specific question if we believed in Jesus or were Christians we of course wouldn't lie to them. But for the most part we just told people we were giving out free hugs because sometimes people just needed a hug. Others asked if it was a class project, or some kind of sorority initiation. They had a hard time believing that 2 girls in their 20's would spend their Friday night giving out hugs.

The reactions were kind of all over the place. There were a few people who already saw the video and were excited to give us a hug. But mostly we got weird looks. MOST people figured we were trying to sell them something and would only give us a hug or smile once they realized we really were just out to give hugs. We hugged everyone, young and old, tall and short, smelly and not. We had one older man that seemed really impressed with what we were doing. He told me that he really appreciated the random kindness because you never know what can happen in life. Earlier in the week his friend was killed in a car accident. He stood and kind of watched for a distance for awhile and then wrote us a really cheesy poem on a prescription paper:

"I see you make a diffence
You show you really care
I see you make a difference
In the smiles and hugs you share
I see you make a difference to people short and tall
I see you make a difference
When most don't care at all"

We hugged a man who we realized afterwards was kind of fuming. He apparently had just come out of a really bad argument with someone and said the hug was really nice and it was helping him to calm down to just talk to a stranger. We heard a lot of people saying that what we were doing was really appreciated, either that they really needed a hug, or just that it was nice. Most people left us smiling. Some people hugged each other even if they didn't hug us.

All in all we guessed that we hugged about 200 people. A ton of people took pictures with us because they thought it was fun. I was physically picked up 5 times and spun around 3 of those times, haha. We honestly didn't know what to expect. It was pretty uncomfortable at first, and we were asked to move once because the owner of a club didn't like us right outside. But we just moved down a couple of blocks without a problem.

So if you feel like passing out a little love and maybe making a strangers day a little bit better, I highly recommend going out and giving some free hugs!

Getting Old

Last night at my soccer game on a 30+ women's league I managed to pull a muscle in my leg, and hurt my knee. Not to mention the fact that I was totally exhausted after.

Man I'm getting old!

Ash Wednesday and Lent

This is my first year observing Lent and last night was my first Ash Wednesday service. I am excited to work on preparing my heart for this coming up easter. Just working on praying and focusing on God and working on understanding what this season is all about. Trying in some minor way to grasp what it means that Jesus actually sacrificed his own life so that we may live.

As much as I am looking forward to this Lent season I didn't feel like my heart was very prepared for yesterday's service. I just didn't feel like I was completely sincere in all of the prayers. I want to be, I just am not yet. It's what I want to focus and work on in the coming weeks. Hopefully by the time Easter comes around I won't be in that place anymore.

On a lighter note I am giving up Soda and "buying unhealthy fast food". Which doesn't mean I am giving up fast food altogether because that's just not feasible in my life. But I am going to to buy only healthier things on the menu. Is anyone else giving anything up?