A few things I love and experienced over spring break:

* My dad and Mr. Harts Sunday School class
* all the people in the previously mentioned Sunday school class
* my mom's baked chicken
* pineapple
* Hannah and Patrick (and cheese)
* my mom's fudge!
* my brother's sense of humor
* cribbage
* Mrs. Shelton's Swedish pancakes
* finishing crossword puzzles with Jared
* long talks
* boggle
* my sisters
* long walks
* the Taylors (family and house)
* Mary's delight
* rummy
* UNC winning
* Leeland and Casting Crowns
* wearing dresses and skirts
* matching Jared
* chinatown
* flowers!
* getting to use my awesome vase
* wonderful family
* great friends
* sweet Jared

* oh and no classes :D

Remember this movie?

youtube song

We heard the tale since we were young,
Heard the songs that have been sung,
About an evil spell.

Someone beautiful is cursed
We feel sad through every verse
Til a kiss and all is well

The message that no one can teach
Is clearer to someone like me

There is no curse or evil spell
That's worse than one we give ourselves
There is no sorceror as cruel,
As the proud and angry fool.

And yet, we cry life isn't fair
Beneath our cries the truth is there

A power that will break the spell
We should know very well
Is locked within ourselves

Yet we'd rather blame,
And curse our faith and change
We run from everyone to hide from the pain
And all the shame

The story long we knew it well
About a wretched evil spell
A power that will break this curse
Oh I know all too well
Is locked within myself

I'm getting a new ring!!

This is from the order of the engineer. All I have to do is sign the pledge below, which is just common sense. The words in the pledge in square brackets are optional. But I really like the last set in brackets, "in humility and with the need for Divine guidence." I think that is great. The order gives out these rings, they are made of steel and worn on the fifth finger of your working hand, to remind engineers to think about the cost of their work. This started in Canada when a bridge collapsed because of bad engineering and shortcuts. They cut up pieces of the bridge to start making the rings. I like it. It comes in at the end of April! woohoo.

I am an Engineer, in my profession I take deep pride. To it I owe solemn obligations. Since the Stone Age, human progress has been spurred by the engineering genius. Engineers have made usable Nature’s vast resources of material and energy for Humanity's [Mankind’s] benefit. Engineers have vitalized and turned to practical use the principles of science and the means of technology. Were it not for this heritage of accumulated experience, my efforts would be feeble.

As an Engineer, I pledge to practice integrity and fair dealing, tolerance and respect, and to uphold devotion to the standards and the dignity of my profession, conscious always that my skill carries with it the obligation to serve humanity by making the best use of Earth’s precious wealth.

As an Engineer[, in humility and with the need for Divine guidance,] I shall participate in none but honest enterprises. When needed, my skill and knowledge shall be given without reservation for the public good. In the performance of duty and in fidelity to my profession, I shall give the utmost.

UNC beat Duke!

Tyler became only the 3rd junior ever to score 2000 points.

On senior night.

Sweet!!

#1

I banned myself from facebook to study for midterms. It is amazing how much work I have done in just the last day that I have not allowed myself to go to facebook.
So far I have:
* written four cards,
* did the crossword puzzle,
* journalled twice,
* did homework for next week,
* read two and a half chapters of a book (not for school),
* did extra work on our project report,
* and I studied for the FE exam.

And that is just the first 24 hours of being banned from facebook. I am trying to go an entire week. I wonder what else I will add to that list? This should be fun. I like getting things accomplished.

Tonight I decided that I like lentil stew (made by Joe). He makes the chili too. They are both good, especially when we have Trader Joe's cornbread! I also am becoming a huge fan or Good Friends Kashi cerael mixed with Trader Joe's Vanillia Almond Clusters. I am becoming my Dad and mixing ceraels. The Kashi would be to branish for me without the clusters. heh. Jared told me that I should always eat breakfast. So I eat a banana and a bowl of cerael most mornings before I rush out the door. I love having 10 and 11 o'clock classes. It is the best. I get up between 6:30 and 7:00 and have the whole morning to do whatever I want. It is so great.

And I am a HUGE fan of the elliptical machine at the gym ever since I figure out how to read and workout. It is like the best thing since sliced bread. And finally, we sang this song at RUF last night and I remembered how much I loved it and the Newsboys. :)

There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave He rose again
And as He stands in victory
Sin's curse has lost its grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Brought with the precious blood of Christ

We've all had a good laugh at me being misquoted in the Diamondback. I answered a whole list of questions and of the list of things they pulled out to phrases and stuck them in. I don't know what is funnier, the quote itself or how they described me.

"I like the stained glass windows," added Faith Harr, a senior mechanical engineering and regular member of the congregation. "It's classy."

We aren't really sure if I am a senior mechanical engineering major or a senior regular member of the congregation. Because if it is the second one, it is even funnier because I specifically told the reporter that I hadn't attended the church yet this year because I had been going home on Sundays. But somehow that translated into a regular member. We've been having a lot of fun with this article.

Thanks, Anna!
I hope you can use at least one of them for your photography class.
My sister is SO talented!
I am so proud of all my siblings.
And I am so happy, I have a new dress!!

This is the program that I have been asked to join and been accepted into for this year and next year. I've spent the last few months trying to narrow down a professor to work with... I have it narrowed down to two or three now. My top choice does not have funding right now to take me on in his lab. So that leaves the other two or I could TA and get my funding that way and do research for free. So, I sort of need to be making a decision sometime soon... please, pray for wisdom. And what the paragraph below doesn't mention is that:
1. I will get my masters in one year.
2. I don't have to take the GRE.
3. I get paid salary. :D
There are other cools things about the program, but those are just the few that stick out. I might also add that I get to play with really cool stuff and work with really smart people and learn all sorts of new things. Oh, and I don't have to write a thesis if I don't want to... hmmm... But then I have to take more classes... so it is either 5 more classes and 9 hours of reseach or 8 more classes and no research.

ENME Joint B.S./M.S. Degree Program

The combined Bachelor's/Master's Degree (B.S./M.S.) Program is available only to current University of Maryland undergraduate students. The minimum requirements for acceptance into the Combined B.S./M.S. program are:

At least a 3.70 G.P.A.
No more than 30 credits of ENME courses remaining for B.S.
No more than 6 credits of CORE requirements remaining for B.S.
At least 3 letters of recommendation
An essay or statement of purpose

This is the research I am thinking about doing. It is probably my second favorite. This is a link to a blog that one of the professors runs. I am going to add it to my blog list as well, but if you want to do some really interesting reading, go here now!! heh.

Yesterday Jared and I celebrated our 29th month anniversary. I thought it was pretty neat that we celebrated our 29th month, in a February, during leap year (so it had 29 days...). It is probably just my insane love of numbers that thought that was cool. Ha.

Oh and for all of you who are married... go run up to your husband and tell him how adorable he is to you and give him a huge hug! I think one of the best things about being married is going to be the freedom to run up to my husband whenever I feel like it and give him a huge hug and tell him how handsome and attractive he is to me. I think that will be great!! So for all of you married people who have the freedom to do that now, go do it!! Living with my best friend is also another great benefit that I look forward to. *sigh* I could come up with a bunch of other things, but I have to get to class. I have been thinking lately that I would really enjoy getting to cook every night, but while I am in school I come home so tired I don't feel like doing anything. ha. Maybe... someday.

My favorite hymn of the week:

Isaac Watts meets igrace

(P.S. the verses are his, the chorus is igrace's)

(P.P.S. Michael W. Smith also sings this song, you may have heard it from him)

When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of Glory died
My Richest gain I count but loss
And pour contempt on all my pride

See from His head His hands His feet
Sorrow and love mingled down
Did e'er such love and sorrow meet
Or thorns compose so rich a crown

Oh the wonderful cross
Bides me come and die and find
that I may truly live
Oh the wonderful cross
All who gather here by grace
draw here and bless your name

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.

Were the whole realm of nature mine
That were and an off'ring far too small
Love so amazing so divine
Demands my soul my life my all

Oh the wonderful cross
Bids me come and die and find
that I may truly live
Oh the wonderful cross
All who gather here by grace
draw here and bless your name

His dying crimson, like a robe,
Spreads o’er His body on the tree;
Then I am dead to all the globe,
And all the globe is dead to me.

Life so amazing, so divine
Demands my soul. my life, my all
and the beauty and the shame
in the glory of His name
Oh the wonderful cross

Oh the wonderful cross
Bids me come and die and find
that I may truly live
Oh the wonderful cross
All who gather here by grace
draw here and bless your name

The GrandiHowards have to be some of the sweetest people ever.

I came down to breakfast this morning and Mary says, "Faith guess what we..."
Joe says, "no, no, no, Mary don't tell her." He looks at me. "Why do you use Dove soap?"
Me - "Ahhh, because it doesn't make my skin as dry."
Joe - "Well, you should look around upstairs and try to find a surprise for you."
Mary - "That is a much more interesting way of telling her."
Joe - "Mary insisted that we buy you something at Cosco yesterday."

So I went upstairs and looked and there is 14 bars of Dove soap. Like I could ever go through all of that in the next three months. Crazy sweet people. I love them so much!! One bar would have been enough to make me happy. :D

Hi.

I am so uncreative when school is going. I just feel like listing all the things I do each day and boring you all with the details of my life.

So I was going to leave you with this part and save the best for last, but for anyone that only skims and doesn't read the bottom part, here is the best part. I really enjoyed this reading from Spurgeon's Morning and Evening a few days ago. It was made all the better by the song at the end. It is a great hymn that I have had the chance to sing three times already this semester!! I have sung the old version at Mrs. Howard's church and the new version at RUF. Either one is awesome and you should find it somewhere and listen to it. It is my hymn of the semester so far. heh. So it was awesome to have this in my devotions one evening. It made me smile. I've never noticed the song in there before. Good stuff. :)

“There is therefore now no condemnation.”
Romans 8:1
Come, my soul, think thou of this. Believing in Jesus, thou art actually and effectually cleared from guilt; thou art led out of thy prison. Thou art no more in fetters as a bond-slave; thou art delivered now from the bondage of the law; thou art freed from sin, and canst walk at large as a freeman; thy Saviour’s blood has procured thy full discharge. Thou hast a right now to approach thy Father’s throne. No flames of vengeance are there to scare thee now; no fiery sword; justice cannot smite the innocent. Thy disabilities are taken away: thou wast once unable to see thy Father’s face: thou canst see it now. Thou couldst not speak with him: but now thou hast access with boldness. Once there was a fear of hell upon thee; but thou hast no fear of it now, for how can there be punishment for the guiltless? He who believeth is not condemned, and cannot be punished. And more than all, the privileges thou mightst have enjoyed, if thou hadst never sinned, are thine now that thou art justified. All the blessings which thou wouldst have had if thou hadst kept the law, and more, are thine, because Christ has kept it for thee. All the love and the acceptance which perfect obedience could have obtained of God, belong to thee, because Christ was perfectly obedient on thy behalf, and hath imputed all his merits to thy account, that thou mightst be exceeding rich through him, who for thy sake became exceeding poor. Oh! how great the debt of love and gratitude thou owest to thy Saviour!

“A debtor to mercy alone,
Of covenant mercy I sing;
Nor fear with thy righteousness on,
My person and offerings to bring:
The terrors of law and of God,
With me can have nothing to do;
My Saviour’s obedience and blood
Hide all my transgressions from view.”

Yesterday and today I spend all my free hours tracking down where I could get 1) blueprints to the freshman dorms and 2) the figures to how much water they each use. Now why would I want to know that you ask...? Well, I have this paper due on Monday that needs both of those things. I can't write it without the information found in both of these things. So, today at 3:45 I finally got directed to the blueprint archives building (which is in this weird creepy little run down building on like a random part of the campus). I arrived at 3:50 (you say, this is nice... well, not really because you see parking is free at four, you have to pay at 3:50, if you can find a free meter). I found a free meter and paid and walked to the building. This place was crazy. It was a room full of flatfiles. And each flatfile was STUFFED with every drawing that had ever been made of every building on campus. It sort of looked like this picture below. The right hand set would have another row behind them facing the other way that you could walk around in the middle of the room. On the far right was two copiers, a scanner, two desks, and a few tables to spread drawings out on.


And none of them matched, just like in this picture. So I thumbed through they files looking for plumbing diagrams from three of the freshman dorms AND I found them. Each of them was eight pages long. So 3*8=24. I thought for sure that it was going to cost me a fortune to get these copied and I would be stuck in this little messy office for hours copying down the figures I needed. But when I asked the girl working there she told me I could copy up to 25 pages for free. YES!!! So I did. And I am very happy. You can ask Jared because I called him afterward talking a mile a minute like I do when I am really really really excited about something.

These drawings are so neat too. They are all really old and hand drawn. They are beautiful. Engineering used to be such an art. I'm sort of sad that we don't get to learn how to draft and draw such awesome blueprints. Computers have taken away the beauty of blueprints. They all look roughly the same now. I know, it is easier and all, but it just looks so much cooler this way.

So, I still have to track down the water data, but I am halfway there. I've been through 11 different people so far in tracking the water data. I think I may go visit the office of something in person tomorrow if I can track down who would keep such records... And I get to come home this weekend for the women's retreat (where I am rooming with my mother and second mother!!! They are so sweet to include me).

Oh, and I have decided that I like vegetable spaghetti better then meated spaghetti. I like it with zucchini in it. Yum yum yum.

And one more last thing: this bridge in Dubai is going to be neat. Sorry for the vast number of photos. They are all stuck together and I don't feel like editing them. I really only wanted the top one. Oh well.

So I was sitting in my 2 o'clock class and listening to the professor lecture about boolean algebra and exclusive or and nor and nand gates. It was all nice and exciting, but I kept thinking about how I was going to miss that dress rehearsal because of this stupid meeting on Friday morning that I had to stay in College Park for. It was really bothering me because it made me sad and I know it was disappointing to Jared. So about half way through class the idea pops into my head, hey, why don't you drive home tonight, pick up Jared in Centerville and then the ride isn't as boring and go to his play tonight. So I called my dependable mother; I always call her in matters such as coming home because she always says yes. ha. So that is what I did. I went home for the dress rehearsal; no change of clothes or anything. Just me and a few schoolbooks and a box of frosted mini wheats.

* I left school at 3:20 pm.
* Picked Jared up at 4:30 pm at the Queenstown Outlets (where he gave me a dark chocolate Harry and Dave's chocolate bar... oh yum!!).
* Dropped Jared off at 5:40 pm.
* Got home at 6 pm.
* Ate dinner and talked to my family until 7:15 pm.
* Left for the play at 7:30 pm.
* Watched the play from 8 - 10:15 pm.
* Got home again and did my homework from 10:30 - 12:30 am.
* Went to bed at 1 am.
* My alarm went off at 5:45 am.
* Took a shower until 6:00 am.
* I arrived at Chicken Man to meet Jared at 6:30 am.
* He arrived at 6:40 am.
* I dropped him off in Centerville at 7:50 am.
* Parked in College Park at 8:50 am.
* Went to my meeting from 9:00 - 11:40 am.
* Drove to the Howards packed my bags for the weekend.

I have class now and then I am leaving for home again at 3 pm. So that was my last 24 hours. How were yours? Oh, and Charlie's Aunt is hilarious!! Matt is the strangest, but yet funniest old woman you will see in a long while. Buy your tickets today and go see the show. It is worth the drive. Of course when part of the drive is with someone you really like, then it makes it all the better. It was so much easier getting up this morning really early and with no sleep knowing that I was going to see Jared in a few minutes!

And I am having Chipotle for lunch today!! What a great day. You can't get much better then Chipotle, home, Jared, my family, and Charlie's Aunt all in one day.

Just in case you weren't planning on coming to Charlie's Aunt... This picture alone should make you want to come. I found this online today. :D I laughed outloud. This is amazing!

And if Matt in a dress isn't enough for some of you... Jared is wearing a tux! And boy does he look incredibly handsome!! However, in honor of Valentine's Day, let me declare that he is all mine and you all can't have him. And I can say that today because I can be all sappy on valentine's day. :D Too bad I haven't spent any of our three valentine's days together. Poor Jared. Someday maybe... ANYHOW, GO SEE THE PLAY!! It will be amazing.

New travel destination thanks to the grandihowards - The Canadian Rockies, especially Banff and Jasper. Man, oh man. They showed me photos tonight from their trip. AMAZING! The water is turquoise and the mountains are amazing and there are all these waterfalls everywhere. Isn't it wonderful how God created the world in so many different forms and colors? They were showing me pictures and I couldn't believe some of them were real. It is incredible. I just need to get my passport now so I can start traveling to some of these wonderful places.

This is the first picture that I found. There are better ones. The Howards have better ones. But I have homework to finish so I grabbed this one.

For Mrs. Huntington:

I found these on Washington Post's website.
Annie and Anna could come up some time and take pictures of it, but they probably find trees pretty boring. heh.

Grandipop is in the middle of this photo. Doesn't he have a great smile? I love that face. He is great. It is a whole lot of fun living with the Howards. Oh and that reminds me, I need to pick him up a copy of the diamondback so he can do the crossword puzzle. I always almost forget and have to walk back to engineering and get him one. heh. Anyhow, I included this picture because I love when Joe laughs like this and you all need to experience it sometime. :D

So, say you have class at 2 on Fridays. Also, say that one of your good friends has had a rough work week and has been sick and not feeling so great. Now say he is working in Centreville, Md (no, not CentERville, Md because that is near Rockville Md and is much closer to me). You google or mapquest or yahoo map the trip and it is only 1 hour and 11 minutes. Next you think about how much you hate driving. But you decide that when you wake up on Friday morning you are going to drive down and surprise this friend and eat lunch with him at 11:30. Then when you wake up it is raining, but not really that hard, so you decide to make the trip. The way down is pretty nice, just a little misty, but the way back is awful and it starts pouring and is windy. Would you still take the trip? Was I crazy to take this trip down to Centreville? heh.

I don't really think so. You only live once.

I think I would have regretted not going more than going. :) Plus, it only took an hour to get down there on the way down and it was an hour and fifteen minutes on the way back. I got back to campus at 1:40 and walked right to class with about five minutes to spare. It was kinda funny, all the accidents were on the opposite side of the road both coming and going. It was nice. I would have been in so much trouble if the accidents had happened on my side of travel.

And another thing, there is just something about coming over that bay bridge that just says HOME to me. It is a great feeling to be on the Eastern Shore. Oh and the lady at the bridge was so nice on Friday. She was actually friendly and nice (which is funny because it was all rainy and nasty outside, you'd think she'd be even grumpier than normal). Anyhow, it was a nice trip. I encourage you to do things out of the ordinary sometimes. I like adventures. It adds a little fun to life.

So I've decided that I feel sorry for people that live in dorms during college and not with great people like the Howards. Not only do they cook me meal and clean the house and buy me stuff, but they also take me really interesting places and introduce me to many neat friends of theirs, who all have very interesting stories to tell.

Today, I came home from church around 12 and Joe tells me to get ready because we are going to see the biggest White Oak in Maryland and that it is on the farm of one of his friends. So I jump in the car with Pamala, Joe, little Joe, Jasper, and Mary and we all head up to the Rockvilleish area. I am not quite sure where we ended up, we headed up 270 for a while and then ended up in the most lovely place with rolling hills and driving through small little towns with cute little general stores. We passed a lot of big farms and houses and gorgeous houses. And we came to this HUGE farm that is across the road from this mountain called Sugarloaf Mountain. The land is beautiful!! I love rolling hills and trees!!! They are so amazing. Well, anyhow, this farm is huge and amazing as well. It used to be a dairy farm and now is an orchard and a farmhouse (with a wrap around porch (I dream that someday I will own a house with a wrap around porch, or at least a pretty decent size porch in the front of the house...it is a nice dream. I also dream I live on a farm like this that tucked away in a bunch of rolling hills and ponds and trees)).

We walked down a big hill and over some water and around a few fields (where on a few other hills this man has built two guest houses for his kids when they come to stay with him - beautiful). And around into this open area with this big White Oak tree with two chairs under it and a lovely view. Man, it is was so nice. It was like one of those settings that you read about in a book where the main character goes to read or think. It was great. I can't even describe it.

So this man and his wife own this farm. He grew up in Harlem after his parents moved here from Italy (so yes, he has major personal space issues and since he went to College park, he adored me and hung on my arm and got really closed to my face and talked to me a lot). So his mom always wanted to live in the country, but she ended up dying in Harlem and never got to move to the country. So this guy got in to construction and earned a bit of money and ended up buying this farm and he named it Stella's Dream (after his mother). He was the funniest little old man. He loved to talk and he greets you with a giant hug and a kiss. It was a very entertaining day. His wife was very sweet as well. She was really laid back and nice.

So this had been family week at the Howards. I normally see a few family members here or there and not very many of them. The Howards are normally going places and visiting people. Well, in the first week that I have been here I have seen a member of every family's but the Cambridge Howards. Pamela and her two boys have been staying here all weekend (and boy is Jasper a handful). Yesterday Melinda and Kevin came for lunch. Today Vernon and Emily and their two boys came with two of Michaels boys. And tonight David is coming over for the super bowl. So Kate and Damien, you all should stop by and make my week complete (although I saw you last Sunday.... so I can just say in the last eight days instead of the last week).

So yes, I feel sorry for people that live in dorms and eat dinner food. I meet the neatest people and eat the most interesting foods. Yesterday I got to try this Greek dish and a few days ago it was Ethiopian food. And the new intern (who lives in the basement) is a vegetarian, so Joe keeps making fun of me for not eating my salads, but I tell him that John can eat them all now because he likes that sort of stuff. ha ha. Life is always an adventure around here. I am really going to miss this place when I leave. It has been a fun two years. :)

Oh and Mom and Dad, you have to come see this tree sometime this semester. Joe really wants you to. So plan to come up one of these Saturdays, please.

First off, I was scared to death to take these two graduate classes this semester. I hate doing things that I have never done before when I don't think I will be any good at them. Plus I didn't know how the professors would be or what the work load would be or if the lectures would be boring or... well anything. I took a graduate class last semester as an undergrad and was terribly bored (not by the content, I liked that, but the professor would put me to sleep every day). Anyhow, so enter this year where I sign up to take two grad classes as a grad (meaning I have to do all the work that a grad student would do, meaning one extra project). Both of my professors so far have been incredible!! I love the classes and I love the material even more than last year. I am still a little bit scared of the workload, but I think it should be okay.

My first class is ENME695 - Reliability Engineering. What is that? We study what reliability is. Why in the world would you study that? Well, because companies need to know how and when a product is going to fail before they put it on the market so that can predict warranties and stuff like that. Let's start with a definition: Reliability is the ability of a product to properly function within specified performance limits, for a specified period of time, under the life cycle application conditions. So we have to learn how to perdict that specified period of time and what kind of conditions the product is being put through. Wow, this sounds boring. I'm not bored. Today we bent paper clips until they broke and saw that we all use differnt forces when bending them and that unless we have standarized tests we really can't perdict reliable results. So there is a class of 22 students and we all had to break three different paper clips. It was great. It wasn't like one of those dumb labs where we all stand around and dumbly stare at each other, but the professor kept lecturing as we played with the pc.

We also studied the bathtub curve in great detail today. What is that? A curve that looks like a bathtub. A good example is the human life. When you are first born you have a higher chance to survive the next day, if you have survived the previous day. So you get stronger as you get older. If you die early on it is called infant mortality or in engineering, early failure. So the rate is really high that you will die when really young, but then decreases and flatten out to a straight line as you steady out in the middle of your life. The only deaths that occure during the middle of the life are what we call random or chance failures (they are unexplained acts of God or things that we can't perdict). Finally we get to later life where your chances of dying are increasing. So the curve goes back up. We call these types of failures wearout failures. So the curve looks like a bathtub if you picture the whole thing. Products follow the same curve. There are some products that never work or die early on because of defect in the product. Some will stop working because of random things that can't be explain, but most will last until the end and wearout.

My second class is ENME808Z. It is the second part to the class I took last year. The work in this class is going to be crazy, but I love the professor. I need to talk to him about doing grad work with him. I talked to him last semester, but he suggested talking to his grad students, other professors, and watching him lecture before I made a decision. I haven't met anyone else that I admire more in the ME department. Plus, he lets us out of class early because he says it is stupid to lecture for the full time period if you can cover everything in less time. So yesterday we were only in class for 50 minutes instead of the full hour and 15 minutes.

Anyhow, I have homework to do. Pray I have wisdom about what to do next year. So basically pray that doors will be closed if they are supposed to be closed. It is greatly appreciated. Thanks!

For Hayley.

This will always be a fond memory for me. My parents had gone away for a few days and the Taylor parents were watching us. They let Sarah, Hayley, and I sleep downstairs in the den and stay up late to watch the final US gymnastic performances. It was so excited!! The first video is of Kerri Strug (who has a funny voice, but you don't get to hear it here) and the second one is of Dominique Moceanu. I used to be a big Shannon Miller fan too, but I thought this performance by Dominique Moceanu was much more interesting that Shannon's. So that is why I posted it. I was watching some of her other stuff on youtube Saturday and was very impressed.

Anna has a new blog.

* Go look at her photos for her class.

I like Saxon Math. I found this article about people not using Saxon math because there is objectionable content in it... I don't remember anything objectionable in them. Here is the article link to the questionable problems and here is the article link about these problems. I don't see what the big fuse is all about. I included a few of the questions people had problems with below. Comments? Does your family have problems mentioning gnomes, fairies, elves, or Greek gods? I always found the Greek god stories entertaining and I love fairy tales. They are good clean fun. Let kids use their imagination. What I love about Saxon is how it includes chemistry and physics problems without telling you. When I started taking real chemistry and physics I found that I already knew how to do some of the problems because I had done them as word problems in Saxon. Now, what is my problem with Saxon, I wish I had read the lessons and actually tried to understand them instead of just diving on in to the material. I think it would have been a lot better if I had learned to read textbooks way back then. But of course, that is my fault and not Saxon maths fault. I like math. I hope at least a few of my children like math someday. :)

Set 12, problem 2. Mickey saw 14 gnomes in the forest and 23 gnomes in the valley. How many gnomes did Mickey see?

Set 13.2. At first thirty-five fairies were flying about. Later twenty-seven more fairies began to fly about. In all, how many fairies were flying about?

Set 32.1. Just before high noon, Nancy saw seventy-eight elves playing in the valley. At high noon, there were only forty-two elves playing in the valley. How many elves had left the valley by high noon?

Set 32.2. According to the ancient Greeks, dryads were tree fairies. Penelope went one way and saw forty-six dryads. Perseus went the other way and saw some more dryads. Altogether they saw seventy-three dryads. How many dryads did Perseus see?

Set 41.3. When Linda looked the first time, she saw 211 elves frolicking in the glen. When she looked the second time, there were 272 elves frolicking in the glen. How many more elves did she see the second time?

Set 93.2. The shoemaker's wife made each of the 12 elves a pair of pants and 2 shirts. How many pieces of clothing did she make?

Set 102.12. The Fairy Queen flew 820 miles in 5 hours. How far did she fly in 1 hour?

Two things:

1. I had the craziest dream last night. It was so real and disappointing when I woke up. I got an invitation to a shower for Linnea Taylor (whether she was Linnea Taylor yet, I don't know and neither do I know what the shower was for). So my family is in our van heading down the bypass to the old Taylors house, but when we get to the front of the neighborhood, suddenly I am riding my bike. I ride my bike all the way through the neighborhood. I even catch myself thinking, now should I turn right and go the way that we always used to drive in or should I go left towards the Andersons. I went right and road past the court with the old hippie van and around the curve that follows that and came to the Taylors house. The weird thing about this dream is how real everything was. It looked just like the old neighborhood, nothing was changed. It was crazy.

I park my bike in the garage where we used to keep the bikes and I walk into the mudroom and through the den and into the kitchen where I am greeted my Mrs. Shelton. I guess I was early or something because no one else had arrived yet. Mrs. Shelton is showing me around the house and showing me how she painted this and hung these new curtains. As I am touring the house a few of my siblings appear and they are commenting about how nice the rooms look and how different they are from before. I hope to find out that the Sheltons have bought the house, just Pastor and Mrs. Shelton, I don't know where the rest of the kids are. We (my siblings and I are teasing each other that it looks so much better than when we stayed there and how there aren't sleeping bags all unfolded all over the place and toys everywhere. One of us even remarks about how the parrot isn't there in the corner of the school room anymore) walk around and then head downstairs where I guess we start the party or whatever we were doing there. The dream sort of ends there. But it was so weird and real. Usually in a dream details are out of place, like the rooms aren't the right size or in the right location, but everything was the same, just the walls were different colors. Oh and one more thing, the kitchen was now dark green with black molding and dark wood cabinets. Mrs. Shelton was thinking of changing that because the people who owned the house before them had changed it to this and she didn't really like it. So yeah. Strange dream. It made me miss the Taylors old house. heh.

2. I just looked up my graduation information at Salisbury today. The website says, "SPRING COMMENCEMENT IS SATURDAY, MAY 17, 2008 AT 10 A.M. AND 2 P.M. AT THE WICOMICO YOUTH & CIVIC CENTER." Well, that is all well and good, but then I remembered this from the University of Maryland website, " 15-21: Final Exam, College Commencment - 22, 23".

So how is it that both universities are in the University of Maryland school system and are supposed to have the same schedule, but somehow, Salisbury expects me to come home when I have a final on Friday, Saturday, and Monday and graduate on Saturday. It isn't even possible. :) Silly school system. I guess I now have an excuse not to walk at SU. I didn't really want to have to sit through two graduations. I'm not mad, just curious, how they claim to have the same schedule, but don't.

New Jared and Matt Song from a rally at Clemson yesterday.

JARED AND MATT make the front page of the Daily Times!!!

story

Today I am featuring a post by Matt Robins. He wrote this on facebook. But I thought I would steal it for all of you that are not on facebook or are not friends of his on facebook. I was going to post about this, but Matt says it better than I would. Lastly, I would just like to say how EXCITED I am about this!!!! I am so proud of you both!
- Faith


Matt and Jared go on the road with Huckabee in S.C.!!!!!
by Matt Robins

"So as some of you may know, I have been making support video song parodies with my idk bff Jared Shelton for the Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee. They can be found at my youtube address:

http://www.youtube.com/RobinsMatt

When we started these things it was sort of just for fun and at the reccomendation of his girlfriend's (Faith Harr) sister (Sarah Harr) but then we got so much positive feedback (and a little bit of e-fame) that we started making more. We have recorded four (though I've written more) and three of them actually got on Huckabee's campaign blog. That, we thought, was as far as this would go and were perfectly happy with it. We were wrong.

Yesterday Mike's son David got in contact with us and even spoke a bit on the phone with Jared (because he's signed up on the website and had his info listed) and we were invited to go on the road with Team Huckabee in South Carolina for three rally stops where we would kick off the events by performing live one or more of our parodies!!!!! And possibly with the Huckster himself, as he's quite the accomplished bassist!!!! And CHUCK FREAKING NORRIS will be there!!!

Of course we accepted. They're reimbursing us for all gas used, paying for our hotel room which will be right with everyone in their campaign, and we'll get to just hang out with everyone!

Regardless of your own political standing, this is like NATIONAL exposure! Big things could come of this.

WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So we leave Wednesday morning and will be sure to take a TON of pictures and make some sort of blog or something to chronicle our journey, though we're both very bad at doing that sort of thing. We'll keep y'all posted regardless. :-P "

Edit: Matt and Jared have a new song!!! Watch it below the Huckabee video. :D

And yet another two reasons to LOVE Huckabee...
Watch this video about Huckabee and marriage and then Matt and Jared singing and love Huckabee too.
Clearly, I heart Huckabee!!!

I say that my favorite ice cream is Turkey Hill Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup, second only to their choco mint chip. However, many years ago they made an ice cream called Choco Malt Chip. It was the most amazing ice cream ever, if you let it sit out for a while and get all melted around the edges. It was a special flavor that Turkey Hill made one summer and then never made it again (I first had it early that summer at the Huntingtons and then Mom and I were obsessed with it all summer until they didn't sell it anymore... then we were sad). Anyhow, I open my freezer today and what do I find?!? Choco Malt Chip ice cream!! I am so excited!! Run to your nearest store and buy some (just not Walmart because they don't sell Turkey Hill ice cream). Spoon yourselves out a bowl and then let it sit for a while (or put it in the mircrowave for five or ten seconds) and then enjoy (it is better in the summer when it melts by itself, but enjoy it now while you can)!

Happy New Year and Happy New Ice Cream!!

*Edit: After a day of thinking about it, I have decided that Choco Malt Chip is the best ice cream if it is melted, but I think Chocolate Peanut Butter Cup is the best overall!! But I have to think about it a little bit more... heh.

News for the week:

* I started back to work today.

* My music appreciation class starts tomorrow.

* Georgia won the Sugar Bowl.

* Tomorrow is the Iowa Caucas.

* I didn't even stay up until Midnight on New Year's Eve. I was so tired.

Go watch Matt and Jared sing.

:)

I am SO excited!!!

Front Cover

I'm taking a break between my two exams today to eat Chick-fil-A and tell you all that Laura Dye is amazing (she was Stef's wedding photographer)... If you want to see the final book she put together for the wedding, go here. It is incredible. Great job, Laura! Also, more cool points for Laura because her husband's name is Jared, which is one of the coolest names ever! heh.

Happy People

I love the one of Stef and Leslie.

So cute.

And I love the one of Stef playing the piano because it reminds me of some random fun that we last had together. I think that is why I love the one of all the bridesmaids trying to catch goldfish. I was hungry, we were in a nursey, anyone who has seen me at church knows I normally get goldfish between services. :)

This is one of my favorite hymns! I hope you all enjoy it as well. I may have posted it before, but I am posting it again because it keeps going through my head. We sang this at RUF the week that my Grandmother died. I was crying during the last verse. It had never hit me before that we are free from the fear and dread of the tomb. We leave this world and we are ever before his glorious face. How wonderful is that? That being said, the third verse is the one that I relate to the most. It is easy to forget that God has given you the gifts that you have. Well, maybe not forget, but take for granted... Anyhow, I love this song. I hope to have you all hear all these great hymns sometime. They are wonderful old pieces of music.

Jesus, I Come

1. Out of my bondage, sorrow and night,
Jesus, I come; Jesus I come.
Into Thy freedom, gladness and light,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
Out of my sickness into Thy health,
Out of my wanting and into Thy wealth,
Out of my sin and into Thyself,
Jesus, I come to Thee.

2. Out of my shameful failure and loss,
Jesus, I come; Jesus, I come.
Into the glorious gain of Thy cross,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
Out of earth’s sorrows into Thy balm,
Out of life’s storms and into Thy calm,
Out of distress into jubilant psalm,
Jesus, I come to Thee.

3. Out of unrest and arrogant pride,
Jesus, I come; Jesus, I come.
Into Thy blessed will to abide,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
Out of myself to dwell in Thy love,
Out of despair into raptures above,
Upward forever on wings like a dove,
Jesus, I come to Thee.

4. Out of the fear and dread of the tomb,
Jesus, I come; Jesus, I come.
Into the joy and light of Thy home,
Jesus, I come to Thee.
Out of the depths of ruin untold,
Into the peace of Thy sheltering fold,
Ever Thy glorious face to behold,
Jesus, I come to Thee.

If you want to hear the first and second and third verses... click here.

Oh and Mom, if you need another Christmas present, I want the Igrace V cd.

You can buy it here.

That is the fifth cd. It is great!

Combo number three looks really awesome as well, but that could wait for my birthday. Or buy it now and give me the other three cds for my birthday and the fifth one for Christmas. :D

Love love love.

You can even listen to some of it there.

Joe and Mary took me on a study break tonight. I was in my room all day studying until they came home tonight and took me out to see the Mormon Tabernacle lights. They were pretty neat (the fact that they were LED lights there was neat). The visitor center there is sort of creepy because it is like Christian with a bunch of weird stuff mixed in. It is just weird. But seeing LED lights was really awesome!
Then on the way home we road by a few decorated Christmas houses down on the edge of DC. Yes, I was in DC tonight!! :D You know that makes me happy. I love DC. It is so interesting. So then Joe decided that we were really close to the actual Silver Spring in Silver Spring. So we drove over there and Mary and I had to get out and go look at the actual Silver Spring. It was really small. heh. But I have seen it now! Good history lesson mixed in there with the fun.
Then Joe had us fun in giant and we each picked out our favorite ice cream because the house was getting a little low on ice cream. All we have had for the last few weeks has been vanilla. I love chocolate and mint chocolate. My absolute favorite is chocolate peanut butter by turkey hill. Actually it is chocolate malt by Turkey Hill, but that was a special summer flavor that they had many years ago. So the actual flavor that they still make, that I love, is chocolate peanut butter. But that chocolate malt was amazing!!! It was perfect right when it had been sitting out for a while and was getting soft and melty. Yum. The first time I ever had it was at the Huntingtons!! Woohoo!
So that was my evening. I love the Howards. Joe and Mary make my life so much fun. I love living with them. Life gets so interesting and fun. :) I wish I had more free time to do stuff with them. I need to see the Botanical Gardens Christmas display. But there is no time before I leave, maybe sometime between Christmas and New Years... I don't know.
Anyhow, I hope you are all making time for fun activities and not sticking your head in a book. :) See you all in Salisbury in six days!!!

I woke up at 5:30 am. It was dark. I took a shower and got dressed. It was still dark. I made my breakfast and left the house. It was still dark. I drove to campus and walked across campus in the dark. It is so hard to get moving when it is dark outside. I like to sleep when it is dark. I don't mind getting up early, if it is light outside or if at least becomes light during sometime during the whole morning routine. First exam in an hour and a half. So in three and a half hours, I will only have three more exams until home!!!

I love plays!!! Joe and Mary (actually Mary couldn't go because she was caroling with the church, but I was Joe's date - Jared agreed to share me for the night - heh) took me to see this with hundreds of their grandchildren (well, not quite that many, but there are a lot of them). Although, I think Salisbury Christian did just as good of a job, this was quite delightful as well. :) I need to go to more plays... which reminds me, I can't wait to see Charley's Aunt! I love the theatre!! I also realized how sad Fiddler is - the whole play is rather bittersweet.

This is a thank you to Hayley and Sarah, as well, for the coolest birthday present ever for my twentieth birthday! Phantom was the most awesome play I have ever seen!! Thank you thank you thank you. I still rave to people about it.

I love snow!

However, I don't love walking around in it without my snow boots (which I left at home because I said that it never snows in December) on all the ice that is all over the sidewalks. I wish they had cancelled class either today or yesterday. It is such a mess out there. We got about five inches of snow. It snowed ALL day yesterday, from the moment I got up until when I got home last night. It is so pretty. I feel all Christmasy. :)

Love Hayley!!

Love good friends.

Love good food and wacky resturants.

Love chai tea.

Love laugter.

Love Laughing Stock!

YAY!! What a great study break. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Hayley for coming to visit me and going out to dinner with me. What fun. I can't wait until our next adventure! ;) You have put me in such a good mood during this crazy week.

Thanks so much!

A few things before this week starts:

* Hayley is coming to College Park tomorrow!! We are having dinner. I am so excited because then I have something to look forward to all day! Woohoo.

* Two, the sermon was really good today. I will try to get around to typing up a few notes. I'm a little typed out right now and I still have one more report to write.

* Three, I have two projects due tomorrow and one on Wednesday. I have been running computer simulation after computer simulation for the last three weeks, but I hadn't done any writing for the projects until Wednesday night. I started Wednesday night and wrote until Friday night. Seriously, it was all I did. I wrote 53 pages of material and formatted 51 pages of excel spreadsheets. It was insane. Today my heat transfer group put our project together. The report was 51 pages in entirety. I wrote at least half of those. My HVAC project I have written on my own. It tops out at 28 pages. I just finished the conclusion. I am so proud of it. haha. I am so glad it is finished.

* Four, Mary makes amazing ginger cookies. They are flat like ginger snaps, but they are chewy like regular cookies. I have eaten so many. I need to get the recipe. They are amazing!!

* Five, Maryland soccer is disappointing. They scored twice in the first half. It was 30 some degrees last night. The entire night they were pounding away at the other teams goal, but couldn't get anything else to go in. It was chilly. I needed more than four layers. With only two and a half minutes left they let the other team score and the they let them score again with only 30 seconds left. It was freezing. I should have brought a blanket. So they went into overtime. I should have brought two blankets. No one scored and they went into a second overtime and I was all excited because I love shootouts (as long as I am not in them). I couldn't feel my feet. But the other team scored with a minute left. I hobbled out to the car because my feet hurt so much. It was cold. The guy behind us laughed like this, "ck ck ck ck ck". It made us laugh. I LOVE SOCCER!!

* Six, I have finished two of my three homework sets due this week. I don't know when I will finish the last one . It is due Tuesday at five.

* Seven, I can't wait until Wednesday. Then I will be done all my projects. WOOHOO! Almost as exciting as Hayley coming to visit (in case you forgot, see point one).

Bedtime.

EDIT: Apparently I also have a lab due this week. I just checked my email before going to bed and he sent an email out two minutes ago that assigned a lab this week. The report is to be written during class and handed in. Craziness. I love the professor, but he really does demand a lot. I love heat transfer too.

I told Jared that I want to see this play called Charley's Aunt in February. I've been looking forward to it for a while. Well, Sunday he tells me that is he going to audition because he knows I have wanted to see him act for a while. Today he tells me that he got the part of Charley!!! YAY!! Hey Jared, this could be part of my Christmas gift, if you want. :D

So people, PLAN this on to your calenders. I promise that it will be funny! It is British humor! I love British humor.

CONGRATULATION JARED!

Friday Feb. 15 2008
8:00 pm
Saturday Feb. 16 2008
8:00 pm
Sunday Feb. 17 2008
2:00 pm

Friday Feb. 22 2008
8:00 pm
Saturday Feb. 23 2008
8:00 pm
Sunday Feb. 24 2008
2:00 pm

Website.

Go once, go twice, go every night!!
It is going to be awesome!

edit: Matt Robins is going to be playing the guy that has to dress up like Charley's Aunt so it should be funny. One more reason to come. Matt Robins in a dress... And plenty of fake British Accents!!!

Give Gifts!!

or you can donate money to the family goat gift...

talk to Mom about that one.

You know you are in the final days of the semester when your professors all start writing so fast and you realize that you are holding your breath while you try to copy everything down. You also know it is the end of the semester when you learn an entire of semester of linear algebra in one class (because you were already "supposed" learn it, even though it isn't a required class, but the professor thinks it is a good tool for everyone to use... basically he says, "you will need to learn this by the final, it doesn't matter if you have never taken linear algebra, there will be questions about this on the final." ) .

Hooray for the end of the semester! These are the days of madness. Two projects are due Monday and one on Wednesday along with a project report presentation. I don't even want to look at the assigned homework, it is rather depressing.

If you get a chance, please say a prayer that I keep a good attitude about the end of the semester. I always seem to let the stress level get me down and taking five classes this semester instead of four is crazy, especially since they are all upper levels. Or feel free to drop me comments in the next three weeks reminding me to rejoice and have joy!

Oh, and one last thing... Stephanie (Hornor) Keith is one of the greatest people to get my mind off school. She called me last night and had me laughing so hard that I was crying about old memories and crazy things that we had done together. Wow! I love that girl so much!! So thank God for Steffy. I miss her so. She was always good for coming up with crazy and fun ways to distract me from doing my schoolwork.

John Newton

By faith in Christ I walk with God,
With Heav’n, my journey’s end, in view;
Supported by His staff and rod,
My road is safe and pleasant too.

I travel through a desert wide
Where many round me blindly stray;
But He vouchsafes to be my Guide,
And will not let me miss my way.

Though snares and dangers throng my path,
And earth and hell my course withstand;
I triumph over all by faith,
Guarded by His almighty hand.

The wilderness affords no food,
But God for my support prepares;
Provides me every needful good,
And frees my soul from wants and cares.

With Him sweet converse I maintain,
Great as He is I dare be free;
I tell Him all my grief and pain,
And He reveals His love to me.

Some cordial from His Word He brings,
Whene’er my feeble spirit faints;
At once my soul revives and sings,
And yields no more to sad complaints.

I pity all that worldlings talk
Of pleasures that will quickly end;
Be this my choice, O Lord, to walk
With Thee, my Guide, my Guard, my Friend.

Field greens

Mandarin oranges

walnuts

blue cheese

I bought a salad today.

I ate a salad today.

Thank you Howards.

I love blue cheese!

See these wonderful candles...

I saw these at the Huntington's house many many months ago and I commented how I loved them and I would love to buy them from Mrs. Huntintons shop when she got more in. That was quite a while ago. I love these candles because they remind me of Dr. Suess. I don't know what it is. Maybe they look like little stripped stockings on the funny little people in the books. But anyhow, I love them very much.

So today I go over there for thanksgiving and Mrs. Huntington tells me that she has a present for me. And she gives me these wonderful wonderful candles!!! I can't wait to have a house to put them out in. They are so fun and lovely. I am so happy. :D

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!


Ana Candles.

I went over to the Shelton's for dinner last night and Mrs. Shelton and Jared had a wonderful surprise for me... Mrs. Shelton made me Swedish pancakes!!! Woohoo! After over two years, I have finally gotten to eat her Swedish pancakes and boy are they good. Plus, as an added bonus, Hannah was there and I got to see her too!! YAY! Oh yum they were good, with nice warm peaches!!

Jared says I should be a food critic because I care about how my food tastes so much. haha. Well, if I was a food critic, I'd rate these among my top favorites. However, mostly everything My Mom, Mrs. Taylor, and Mrs. Shelton make are in my top favorites. ha. Anyhow, it was such a lovely surprise! Thanks guys. :D

I am going to see this tomorrow with my family! Yes, that means that I am going home tomorrow after my last class. Woohoo! Ps. Jared says this is getting Oscar buzz because of the main actress's job in the movie. Sarah showed me the trailer many weeks ago and she has been talking about going tomorrow for a while. I am very excited!!

More proof that I am a huge nerd...
Last Undergrad semester schedule!!

For a more complete explaination...
I am taking:

* ENES220 - Mechanics of Materials; (3 credits)

Stress and deformation of solids-rods, beams, shafts, columns, tanks, and other structural, machine and vehicle members. Topics include stress transformation using Mohr's circle; shear and moment diagrams; derivation of elastic curves; and Euler's buckling formula. Design problems related to this material are given in lab.

I should have taken this class a long time ago, but I didn't. So I was supposed to test out of it this semester, but that didn't guarentee an A and it was way too good of a chance to boast my GPA. So this class is what I take to pad my grade. I'm a sad little nerd when this is what I take for an easy class. HA. But I need it to graduate.

* ENME472 - Integrated Product and Process Development; (3 credits)

Integration of product development with the development process. Design strategies. Product architecture. Design for manufacturing. Selection of materials. Design for assembly. Basically, all that means is SENIOR PROJECT. This class is supposed to be a ton of work. But this is the class I have been looking forward to the ost because you get to design your own project and actually make it and market it. How sweet is that?!?

* ENME695 - Failure Mechanisms and Reliability; (3 credits)

This course will present classical reliability concepts and definitions based on statistical analysis of observed failure distributions. Techniques to improve reliability, based on the study of root-cause failure mechanisms, will be presented; based on knowledge of the life-cycle loadprofile, product architecture and material properties. Techniques toprev ent operational failures through robust design and manufacturing practices will be discussed. Students will gain the fundamentals and skills in the field of reliability as it directly pertains to the designand the manufacture of electrical, mechanical, andelectomechanical products.

Ummm, I don't really know how to explain all that. Think computer chips, then think about the plastic casing around them and then boards they sit on... yeah, this class is about how those type of things fail. It is a grad class. It should be fun.

* ENME808X - Advanced Topics in Mechanical Engineering: Engineering Decision Making; (3 credits)
I don't have a clue what this is about... I am thinking about swapping it out for:
ENME808Z Advanced Topics in Mechanical Engineering: Design in Electronic Product Development; (3 credits) it is just so much paperwork!!

New things on the links:

* Hucks Army (join) - haha
* I brought Krissy up to her own spot because she is posting again and has been for a while, I just keep forgetting to more her up. So she is now at the spot for Robins.
* I finally updated Hannah and Rachel Townsends new blogs. Check them out under links.
* I added Carolyn Webster.

If you all want anything else, let me know. I might try to get some last names up there so it is a little less confusing. But who knows... not before finals. Also, maybe a new design, maybe, if I find time.

Happy Birthday to my dear sister, Sarah!!

I love you!!!!

So my car was about five minutes from being towed tonight. Yeah, I sort of forgot there was a basketball game and I needed to more my car 3 hours before the game. I remembered at 5pm (the game was at 8). I was on the phone with Dad when I remembered. So I ran out to my car, got there are 5:15 and saw three tow trucks towing away cars in the lot next to mine. Pheww. It is a 75 dollar parking ticket and an 80 dollar towing fee if they have to tow you before a game. Plus, who knows where in the world your car gets towed to.

So then I had to drive it to another parking lot because I had a meeting a 6:30 (I guess that should say have a meeting). And so I started out at 5 from the Kim builing (where I was supposed to be at 6:30 for my meeting) and Dad was in Milford, DE. I walked out to my car and moved it maybe three tenths of a mile... maybe... in the same amount of time it took for my Dad to drive from Milford to Salisbury. Seriously. That is how bad traffic is on campus and why I walk everywhere.

So praise God that they started with the other parking lots and not mine when they started towing cars!!! Woohoo. It would have been a mess to try to get that all sorted out in the rain. Blah. Praise God for watching out for me. More proof that I don't have everything under control and I am in serious need of him. heh.

Go to the seven minute mark of this movie and hear Mike Huckabee quote Martin Luther!! He says, "And in the words of Martin Luther, ' here I stand, I can do no other' and I will not take that back!" w00t.

Mike Huckabee: "For the past ten months or eleven months people have been writing my political obituary. But what they fail to understand is that the American people are looking for a president, not a fund-raiser for the United Way."

Brit Hume: In other words, says Mike Huckabee, "Look out Mitt Romney. You may have more money, but I'm coming after you in the polls," and the polls are supporting that.

See the black line? That is Mike Huckabee in the poles since July. He's taken off with practically no TV ads or no financial support. Check out what he believes at his website!!

Second Midterms are OVER for this semester!!!!

Now I just have three projects and five finals and I am through!

Exciting... eh?

Now I am going to go be a hobo and take a nap in my car.

Today marks a huge day in my undergraduate career. It is something I have never done before in all nine other semesters of my schooling. Today I will not be turning in homework for the first time ever in my life! *gasp* Yes, but before you all go into fits and think the world is ending, let me explain. In the class that I am skipping turning in homework, I get to drop one homework, and since I already have 20/20 or 19/20s on all the homeworks and since I had one exam yesterday and two tomorrow and since I had a lab report due today, I thought the time would be better spent on studying. So celebrate with me the freedom of not having to turn in a homework set. WOOHOO! This is very exciting. I've gotta get back to studying for my exams. Right now I am waiting for my professor to show up so we can go through some questions I have about the exam. He said he would be in at 8. So I have been sitting outside his door since 7:50. heh. I can't wait to be able to sleep this weekend. In other news, I don't feel as sick today as I have in a few days. Maybe I am getting better. We'll have to see.

I heart Huckabee!

Do you??

blog

army

website

He's up into third place this week!!

He has come from zero support to now 13% of voters!!

And since Jared was the only one to take a picture of me while I was home... this is in memory of home (see my kitchen in the background). Woohoo! This is after finishing off yet another delicious cream puff made by Mom. Thanks Dad for picking me up and to Mom for making me so many good foods!! And to Uncle Bill and Aunt Suzanne for saving my life. :D

This was in my shower this morning.
It looked even scarier without my glasses on.
I didn't care how cold the tiles were outside the tub after seeing this.

I am home for the first time in over 30 days (I think 35 is the official number).
It is good to be home.

There'll be scary ghost stories and tales of the glory of Christmas's long long ago...

They are playing Christmas music all day long on my favorite radio station!! AWESOMENESS!! I am in such a good mood all of the sudden. heh. I love Christmas music. I just want to sit in my car for the rest of the day and listen to it. :D That is probably not a valid excuse for missing class. heh. Sing all you citizens of heaven above!!


Joseph's Lullaby - Mercy Me.

Go to sleep my Son
This manger for your bed
You have a long road before You
Rest Your little head

Can You feel the weight of Your glory?
Do You understand the price?
Or does the Father guard Your heart for now
So You can sleep tonight?

Go to sleep my Son
Go and chase Your dreams
This world can wait for one more moment
Go and sleep in peace

I believe the glory of Heaven
Is lying in my arms tonight
But Lord, I ask that He for just this moment
Simply be my child

Go to sleep my Son
Baby, close Your eyes
Soon enough You'll save the day
But for now, dear Child of mine
Oh my Jesus, Sleep tight

I am completely healthy except for a virus (common cold) and high blood pressure (125/82 ... it is supposed to be under 120/80). So she gave me this list of things to do to reduce my blood pressure:
* stop smoking
* stop drinking
* lose weight
* eat healthy

Let's look at this list shall we... I don't smoke, I don't drink. My Mom will worry about me if I lose weight. I eat three vegetables at dinner and at least three fruits between breakfast and lunch. I eat whole grain foods with nothing added to them. I drink skim milk and water. I live with the Howard's where everything is bought from Trader Joe's or is equally healthy. I really don't think I can do anything on the list. There were some other things on the list that were equally absurd, but I don't remember. So anyhow, I need to lower my blood pressure. Anyhow suggestions?!? heh. It is like my big joke right now. I even had a salad with dinner last night. Woohoo salads!! (it was the strawberry, orange, walnut, and Gorgonzola cheese salad... YUM YUM YUM).

Now if I could stop feeling tired and get rid of these spots on the back of my tounge and this annoyings runny nose, cough, and sneeze that I have had for two weeks. Maybe it has something to do with my high blood pressure...

Mom, you should be proud of me. I just got blood taken and I didn't freak out. They took blood to see if it was mono, otherwise she said it is probably a cold. I'm so tired though. It is weird. I slept from 9:20 last night to 7:20 this morning. Yes, that is ten hours of sleep. Anyhow, I can't wait to come home this weekend and rest up a bit.

In other news, my parents, Hope, and Jared came up to visit me on Saturday. We went to lunch at Chipotle (my favorite mexican resturant up here) and went to DC and hiked the Billy Goat Trail on the C and O canal. It was awesome! I had a blast. I am so glad they came. I hadn't seen Hope or Jared in over 30 days. It was a really nice day.

Back to studying. Midterms on Thursday and next Monday.

Two of the greatest joys of my life:
1. Playing sports in the rain
2. Changing into dry comfy clothes afterwards.

What more can you ask for? Maybe a cup of hot apple cidar or hot chocolate. But those are just extras. They just are so wonderful and they go together, hand in hand. It is awesome! Andrew and Chris Ahn taught Michelle and I how to frolf today. I was pretty awful. But the fun part was being outside in the pouring rain playing a sport!! Oh how I miss playing games outside with friends. Then we went puddle jumping and to our RUF flag football game, but it was cancelled. So we decided to play anyhow. It was pouring. It was AMAZING! I would have rather been playing soccer, but football is cool too. I'm just not as good at it. Anyhow, this post is really just to declare how much I love sports and being outside and how even greater it is when it is pouring down rain. Woohoo! I'm soaked. Seriously, it is raining so hard outside. It is perfect muddy sport playing weather. Go outside now and find something to throw or kick around. It will improve your mood! :D

I love this set of photos!!
Classy bridesmaids.

See more by Laura and Jared Dye!

I've always loved the jumping photo!!

I want it done at my wedding.

Fun.

So I totally just took an hour nap in my car while it was raining outside between classes. It was prefectly wonderful. I love sleeping with rain pouring down on the roof. I even have a blanket in my car now for whenever I feel like sleeping.