The Scrapbook Project

I have this fear that once I go to college, I'll forget all of high school. Not really, but I want a way of bottling up moments in my life and revisiting them whenever I want to. So, over the past years (meaning my whole life), I've been sort of a hoarder. 

Paper scraps, ticket stubs, letters, etc. I keep them all. I always meant to put them to use, and attempted several times with memory boxes or photo albums, but it never went anywhere. 

During one of my Walmart escapades, I saw a blank scrapbook. On an impulse, I decided to get it. Two months later ;), I had the pictures printed. 

Two day, a stack of newspaper, 100 photos, and countless random papers later I was done. 

Because I want to remember. 

I want to remember watching my sister dance around on stage as an elephant it' or a munchkin. I want to remember making cookies with my siblings during Christmas break. I want to remember going to the movies with my friends and being the only ones left in the theater because we're talking. 

Something I catch myself doing is spending too much time trying to preserve memories. So much so that I forget to live and make more memories. 

That's my new goal. To just live. 

Just live. 

We're Big Kids Now

This weekend, I stayed over at my dear best friend's house. I managed to drive by their new house a grand total of 3x before finally pulling in. I got to cuddle with a puppy. I got locked in one of the hallways of the high school. But none of those topped one of the greatest adventures in teenage girl history.

We had to get to musical rehearsal at the high school.

Her mom left right before us in a different vehicle.

It wasn't until she was just leaving the driveway that we realized we weren't going anywhere.

My dad's truck was stuck in the snow. The wheels just spun and spun. And spun.

We tried laying pine branches under the tires for traction. Then the rubber mats from inside the truck. No use.

Poor Georgi pushed the vehicle. No use. 

Drive then reverse. Drive then reverse. No use.

'I'll go get a snowmobile and try hooking it up to pull'

-five minutes later-

'Uhm...it won't start...'

-sigh-

I called my dad, but I didn't want him to come get us at this point, so after I hung up, we tried yet again to simply put the poor truck in reverse and push.

Same result.

By now, half an hour or more has passed and I was getting discouraged.

Then Georgi came around with her dad's (as she calls it touchy) truck. Now all we needed was something to attach the two trucks. Unfortunately, my dad's truck had no hitch on the back, just two little metal loops below and behind the bumper. 

After scouring her garage, Georgi came out with an old harness. (Note to camp kids - for those of you who have ever doubted the harnesses that are used for the high ropes course - pay attention) 

The hooks on the harness didn't exactly fit in the holes my dad's truck, but with a mixture of balancing and God's humor, we managed to get the hook seemingly secure.

There I was in my dad's truck and Georgi in her dad's truck.

It worked!

It was one of the most exciting moments in my lifetime. We screamed and hugged and acted like teenage girls. But that's the point! Two teenage girls fixed a car problem and didn't die. In my friend's words:

I finally feel grown-up, like a big kid!

My Future & Stuff | Rambling

When I was younger, I watched my older cousins graduate. They seemed so old to me, as if they 

had their whole life together and planned out perfectly. I have a distinct memory of sitting in my 

closet after a graduation party trying to count up the years until it was my turn to graduate. I was 

maybe 8 or 9. Ten years ago, 2015 was a lifetime away. 

I was also terrified of the idea of graduating and going off to college, so finding out that I didn't 

need to think about it for so long was a major relief. 

Now it's actually here. And I'm not terrified anymore. I'm excited for the future. I'm excited 

for change. I'm going to graduate this year. I've been doing the same thing every school year 

(meaning school at home. I've had a different curriculum every year, sometimes more than one 

a year, so in that sense my school wasn't the same ;) ) and this coming fall will be completely 

different. Do I know what I'm doing? Nope. I in no way have my life planned out. I don't know if 

I'm going to college, I don't know what I'm doing this summer. All I know if that it's going to be 

different and out of my control. 

Trust is necessary for sanity during change. Whether I stay home for a year and take classes at our 

local college while working, or if I end up at my dream college in the fall, it will all be a part of 

the plan the God has in store for me. 

The most exciting part of all of this is that I have no way of knowing what the future has in store. 

My future is a mystery that's gradually unfolding before me and outside of my plans for myself. 

It's taken me a long time to accept this fact, but with that acceptance comes a feeling of security. 

Knowing I don't have as much control as I'd like to think I do is scary, even though it's what's 

actually best. If I knew everything that's going to happen, my life would lose excitement and I would lose motivation. 

There's that icebreaker question that goes something like 'If you found a book of your life, would you read to the end?' and I used to think that I would, but now I wouldn't. I'd probably read up until where I am now, to see how accurate this book is, and then freak out about how much or little is left, but I wouldn't want to know how it ends. I wouldn't even want to know what happens in the chapter after my current one. I want to live it instead of obsessing over it.

Us and Our Excellent Adventure - part two -

We made the most of our morning at the hotel. We played games, watched cable, went swimming, and even managed to make breakfast in time. It was fantastic. 

Happy to be here. 

Sad to leave. 

We went home and rested for a while before heading off the grandma and grandpa's for New Year's Eve. It was surprisingly difficult to find a countdown after 11pm. We spent the last moments of 2014 watching old Disney shows, including High School Musical 3 (which made me embarrassingly sentimental). 

As soon as we finished counting down to 2015, Grace and Henry went straight to bed, exhausted from our mini adventure.