2014.

Tonight at midnight, 2013 will be over.

And with it, so many memories.

Did the year fly by for anyone else? I feel like I was just ringing in 2013.

2013 was a good year for me. It started out a bit rough coming in from 2012, but in every way I am glad that 2013 happened.

Here's why:

1. I went on a cruise.

 

2. I swam with dolphins! 

3. I was forced to come out of my shell and sing in front of my entire music class.

4. I made an A on my 42-page Capstone project.

5. I turned into a rainbow at the Color Me Rad 5k.

6. I realized exactly why I want to be a teacher.

7. I started working on my teacher's certification and got a job substituting at my old school.

8. I discovered Veronica Mars (and bought the DVDs).

9. I graduated from college. 

10. I turned 20!

11. I took a cake decorating class. 

12. I had the best Thanksgiving and Christmas.

I also got to cross numbers 13, 31, and 56 off my bucket list, and I'm well on my way to crossing off number 11.

Some not so fun things that happened this year that turned out to be okay anyway:

• I almost died.
• I almost died again.
• My TV made life difficult.
• I was trapped in my house for 4 days.

That's pretty much it. The good definitely out-weighed the bad this year.

So, what does 2014 have in store? SO much and I'm so excited.

First and foremost, I will be completing the first part of my teacher's certification and will be able to start teaching full-time by the fall semester (!!!), Lord-willing.

I also have the opportunity to be a first grade assistant teacher for four weeks in January/February while the current assistant is out on maternity leave.

The Veronica Mars movie comes out on March 14th. I might have it written in really big capital letters in my planner. Maybe.

There may be a possibility for a family vacation in the spring, but I'm not getting my hopes up. More on that later.

I'll also be attending at least 6 weddings, give or take a few.

As far as resolutions go, I don't usually have any, but there are a few things this year I'd like to work on.

1. Having days off from work really throws off my routine because I think I can sleep in for as long as I want and then do nothing all day. This year, I am going to focus on getting into an everyday routine -- even on my days off -- and making the most of my free time. 
2. I would like to pay more attention to my finances and budget my spending more. I have been using Mint.com for awhile, but have more been adjusting my budgets according to my spending instead of the other way around. I currently don't have a lot of expenses to pay, so I think that's a good habit to go ahead and get into before it's too late and I'm broke.
3. Spend more time with God daily (this is pretty much going to be on my list every year).
4. Invest in others more. This is something I have been working a lot this year, and I want to continue to do this even more. I really am happier when I am focusing on others instead of myself.

I am also going to really focus on expanding my blog and readership this year, which I am excited about. It will be a lot of work but it is something I've been wanting to do for awhile (I even posted about it several months ago and then proceeded to do nothing about it, haha).  Feel free to spread the word if you know someone who might enjoy reading. :-)

I hope everyone has a fun and safe New Year's Eve tonight! What are your plans? I will be starting out the evening at a big party, and ending at a smaller get-together at my friend's new apartment. Looking forward to bringing in 2014 with all of my friends.

Happy New Year!

P.S. If it weren't for this post, I would have had 34 posts for the third year in a row. Seriously, I'm not trying to do this.

Actual Things 3rd Graders Said.

Over Thanksgiving, I was visiting family in Alabama which is why I have been absent from the blog. But more on that later.

Right now, I interrupt my usual posting to share with you some totally real, not at all exaggerated quotes from students in the third grade class I subbed for on Tuesday.

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Student 1: "Miss Holiday, how old are you?"
Me: "20."
Student 2: "It's rude to ask people how old they are."
Student 1: "That's only for old people!"

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Boy Student: "Miss Holiday, Girl Student wrote down on a piece of paper which boys like which girls and is showing it to everybody!"

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Girl Student: "Miss Holiday, Boy Student wrote "I will date Girl Student" on a piece of paper and I did NOT like that."

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Student 1: "I can date when I'm 16."
Student 2: "No you have to be 18 to date!"
Student 1: "My mom said I can date when I'm 16!"
Student 3: "Yeah, when you're in high school you can date as much as you want!"

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Boy Student 1: "Miss Holiday, Boy Student 2 wrote down on a piece of paper that he and I* were married and then he wrote that we were divorced."

*Please note, these are both BOY students....

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Everyone: "WHAT DOES THE FOX SAY?! DE DEE DO DO DAH DO DE DAH!  WA PA PA WA PA PAPA POW! RING DING RING A DING A RING DING!"

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Third grade is the new junior high, y'all.

Hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.

I Just Can't Catch a Break.

Y'all know how I love my TV shows. (If you don't, see my last post). Well, I'm currently kind of in between shows because I finished Veronica Mars (in ONE WEEK, ladies and gentlemen. I'm not sure if that's a talent or an illness, but it's impressive either way) and I am waiting to borrow the DVDs of my next show -- Downton Abbey -- from a friend.

I'm super excited about Downton Abbey. I've heard it's amazing. Hopefully I will be getting the DVDs on Friday. That should occupy me for a few days at least.

As I was saying, I'm in between shows. I'm kinda watching New Girl on Netflix, which is pretty funny but I haven't gotten hooked on it yet so I'm not spending every spare moment watching it. Plus I'm almost done because there's only one season on Netflix. Though I do have a free two weeks of Hulu Plus I've been saving. I'll have to look into that.

ANYWAY. I'm also watching regular TV. Like today I discovered we have the game show channel again. I love me some game shows.

I got tired of watching game shows (mainly because I can't play along with Minute to Win It), so I was flipping through channels and came across a show that I used to watch with my family ALL THE TIME but haven't in a few years -- So You Think You Can Dance. I know nothing about dancing but I enjoy watching it so I got excited and started watching.

For some unknown reason that cannot be explained by anything other than an act of God because it makes absolutely no sense, it has been raining all day. In Texas. In AUGUST. Rain in the summer is not a normal thing here.

But everything is bigger in Texas, so we don't just get "rain." No, we get the whole shebang. The whole lightninging, thundering, pouring, LOST-SATELLITE-SIGNALING shebang.

After the first dance the satellite decided I watch too much TV (true, but not for the TV to decide) and dropped its signal. And I sat on the couch in silence for the next ten minutes staring at a signal-less TV.

And THEN, something magical happened. It started searching for a signal. A box popped up that said "Searching for signal. This should not take more than 5 minutes."

And TEN (not five) minutes later, it came back! *happy dance*

For a whole five minutes, and then it changed the channel because TOO MANY THINGS WERE RECORDING.

 How I was feeling at this point. Minus the wheat field.

And I'm like, are you kidding me? All I wanted to do was watch a nice dance show and Dish Network was not cooperating.

So I canceled some recordings and fixed it so that I could watch my dance show, thank you very much. Because it was really important. Because, like...yeah. It just was.

And then I ate some snickerdoodle blondies to make up for the hard hour I had. Because I DESERVED IT, dang it.

OH MY GOSH. I just realized it's Tuesday. No wonder the whole world was against me today.*

*The whole world being the TV. Obviously.

Awkward Moment #324.

I made up that number. It's really probably a lot higher than 324.

So classes started back up today. Well, they started yesterday, but I'm only taking Tuesday/Thursday classes so for me, they started today. Anyway.

I'm taking four classes, from 9:30-3:30. No breaks in between for lunch (that is called poor planning, people), but since today was mainly just going over the syllabus, I got out of almost all my classes 45 minutes early.

After my 11:00 class which I got out of about 11:40, I was starving, so I decided to head over to the University Center for lunch. I got Chickfila. It was yummy.

Anyway.

It's always really awkward trying to find seating in there. Because all the tables are usually occupied by multiple people...it's really hard to find one seat that's appropriately spaced from the other groups at the same table. But eventually I found one and sat down to enjoy my lunch.

Anyway.

I was facing another table, and a guy sat down on the side facing me with a Subway sandwich. While he was eating, I happened to notice a piece of lettuce stuck to his lip. So naturally, I did what anyone would do in this situation: I stared at it.

I wanted to see if it would fall off or if it was going to stay stuck there. So I'm staring at this guy for like, I don't know, a minute, when suddenly, he looks up. Right at me.

I quickly avert my gaze.

I turn my head slightly to look back down at my food, and out of my peripheral vision I see this guy smiling and waving at me.

Do I wave back? Do I acknowledge him? What do I do?

Well, I'll tell you what I did.

I mustered up some courage and eked out a very, VERY timid smile that you would only notice if you were looking for it really, REALLY hard.

And then he starts to get up. And I'm FREAKING out.

This is essentially what went through my head: Oh my gosh he's getting up. Oh my gosh. Is he coming over here? Don't look. Whatever you do don't look. Oh my gosh. Does he think you were trying to communicate interest? How do I explain to him that I was staring at him because he had a piece of lettuce stuck to his lip? This is going to be soooo awkward.

Anyway.

He gets up. And as he's doing so, he's saying something, but I can't tell what. And he starts walking...and he's getting closer and closer...

And he completely ignores me as he walks by and joins his friends at a different table.

Apparently, when I was staring at the lettuce on his lip, some friends of his at another table spotted him and yelled his name, which is why he looked up. And then the whole time he was smiling and waving at them, not me. Which hopefully means he didn't notice me smiling.

So I guess it wasn't really an awkward moment...but it almost was.

I felt awkward, at least.

REALLY awkward.

Moral of the story: don't stare at lettuce on strangers' lips.

Nineteen.

That's how many years I've been alive, as of yesterday.

You may think it's pretty impressive that I've survived 19 years. But 19 really isn't all that impressive; it's the age in between the onset of adulthood and an entirely new decade. It's almost as bad as 17: the age between the age of legal driving and the onset of adulthood.

My birthday was pretty good. I mean, there was no way it was going to even slightly compare to my 18th birthday, but considering the circumstances, it was pretty good.

The circumstances being, despite it being my birthday, I still had to engage in my everyday life. Meaning school, work, and growth group.

I got up at 6:30 am to go to my 8:00 speech class. The best thing that happened in that class was that I did not have to do my impromptu speech yesterday--that would have been a terrible start to my day.

Oh, and my dad went out and bought donuts for breakfast! :D

Then I went to my logic class, where I got my test back. I got a 92! Happy birthday to me!

After school, I went to Starbucks to claim my free drink of choice with the birthday coupon they sent me. I got a venti double chocolatey chip frappucino, because no, I don't like coffee.

Then I got to work where I found a beautiful arrangement of flowers on my desk from my parents! For the next hour and a half, though, it felt like it wasn't my birthday anymore, until I got my present from the company. (What they do for birthdays is give you a $25 gift card to the place of your choice and pass around a card for everyone to sign). To be completely honest, I like cards more than presents...I think I read through what everyone wrote like three times before I even noticed the gift card attached to it. haha

I asked for an Amazon gift card, which I will probably be using to buy Christmas presents.

When I got home, I had a couple more gifts waiting from me for my parents. The main one was one I knew was coming, because I had straight up asked for it: tickets to see Les Miserables at the Bass Hall!

Guys, this is the broadway cast in my very own town. Guys, this is on my bucket list. Guys! It's on Saturday!! IMSOEXCITEDIJUSTCANTHIDEIT.

Anyway, my mom also made me a book full of my prom pictures and two recipe books, one of my dessert recipes on Pinterest (and some others) and the cookbook we used at HEART which is incredible.

We went to Steak 'n' Shake last night, which isn't my favorite restaurant but we went to my favorite one the night before. Steak 'n' Shake is really good though, and it has milkshakes.

Then I went to growth group, which is like a discipleship group/book study. We had our launch party yesterday, so that was fun getting to know people better and learn about how the group is going to work.

And then I came home and went to bed.

Overall, pretty good day.

Oh! And then there was the party going on on my Facebook wall.

Guys, this is the reason I love Facebook. Do you know how much I love birthdays? More than Christmas. I'll talk about why some other time, but birthdays are like my favorite thing ever. Not just mine. Anyone's.

Anyway, when I woke up at 6:30, I already had 11 people write on my wall. By noon, I had over 30. And by the end of the day, about 60 people had wished me a happy birthday, on Facebook alone.

That's not counting the text messages, phone calls, and the people who signed my card at work.

And now I'm sad because it's all over...though I do still have Les Mis to look forward to! :D :D :D

The Class of '012.

Yes, I did realize I wrote "'012". I did that on purpose. "Class of '12" sounds like it's missing a syllable.

Sooo....I'm graduated! That wonderful day that you all heard me talk about way too much...it finally came! I graduated Tuesday, May 22nd, and boy does it feel grand. Cue the music... "I feeeeeeel good! *duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh* I knew that I would! *duh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh nuh*"

 But in all seriousness, I am so glad it is over. It has been so stressful the last several weeks, as you may have guessed from my lack of presence in the blogosphere. I have pictures, which I know you are dying to see...but if I put them in this post, this post is literally going to be a mile long...so, I will dedicate a separate post to them later, but here's a preview:

Oh yeah, things got crazy.

So, you may be wondering...now what? I think the question most commonly heard by new graduates is "So, what are your plans for your future?" Ah, the future. I am a future person. I have my wedding planned. Heck, I have my funeral planned. (Have I mentioned I'm a planner?) I like to think ahead. However...my future is kind of hard to explain....

"I'm going to be enrolling full time at UTA in the fall, because I was valedictorian and have a scholarship I can only use if I enroll full time. However, I'm also going to be testing out of various courses through CLEP and DSST and also taking some online courses. Then I will take all the credits from UTA, the testing, and the online courses and transfer them to this random state college in New Jersey that you've probably never heard of called Thomas Edison and receiving my diploma from there with a degree in liberal studies. My goal is to finish in two years, then go on to get my teacher's certification."

That's the true answer to that question. But what I actually say is,

"I'm going to UTA."

It saves a lot of time and I don't have to answer a gazillion questions about why I'm doing it that way or how we heard about the college or the tests or whatever. Occasionally, people ask about my major, to which I say "liberal studies" and then pray that they don't know that UTA doesn't have a liberal studies program because that just brings up a whole bunch of other questions that I really don't want to answer.

In the much nearer future, however, I have some exciting things going on as well. For instance, I am leaving in the morning to go to San Antonio with some of my best friends for about a week. We're going to Fiesta Texas, Sea World, and Schlitterbahn while we're down there. We're also planning on a fancy dinner at an expensive steakhouse and dessert in a revolving tower overlooking the city. Can't wait! :)

(Don't worry...we have parents going with us, they just won't be hovering.)

Then, a few days after I get back, I am leaving for 3 weeks to go live in/renovate a house with a bunch of other girls from my youth group. We will also be learning life skills like cooking, cleaning, budgeting, laundry, etc. It should be a lot of fun, though it will definitely be challenging as well. So just a heads up...I will be MIA for most of June as I can't bring a phone, a computer, or anything like that with me.

July, I plan on working more, and doing some school (I already have 27 hours! That's almost a year of college...and I just graduated! Woohoo!). Hopefully I'll still have some time for fun though...I don't want to be the boring person who works all the time... :) Anyway, I'm bringing my laptop to San Antonio so you may be hearing from me there. I am definitely most excited for Sea World. When I was little I wanted to be a marine biologist, because I love dolphins so much. Haha, can't wait!

 Oh, on a side note...my phone and charger mysteriously moved outlets last night. My parents said they didn't do it. I have come to the conclusion that someone in my family is a sleepwalker, and I intend to find out who. The culprit will NOT get away with this...unless of course it's me, in which case I forgive myself.

The Texting Mannequin.

Soooo....I don't know if anyone's noticed, but I've been kind of MIA recently. The last couple weeks have been CRAZY. Reason being, the week before Thanksgiving is the week that all the teachers decide to make big projects/tests due. And due to my play being the week before, I was already behind. And then I've actually been surprisingly busy this week preparing for Thanksgiving. But now Thanksgiving is over and I actually have some time to accomplish some of the things on my "To Do Over Thanksgiving Break" list that has been slowly gathering dust...

Anyway, Thanksgiving yesterday was AWESOME. But I'll post about that tomorrow or Sunday, because I have another story I want to tell right now, and I like my blog to be in chronological order.


This is a totally random story from Tuesday but I want to share it because it's kind of hilarious. It was really awkward/frightening/embarrassing at the time, but now it's just funny. :-) haha, I will try to do it justice.

So, Tuesday my friend and I were shopping at Forever 21. We were trying on some clothes in the dressing room, but I got done first. So I was looking at the clothes right outside the dressing room while waiting for her.

I knew there was a mannequin nearby and as I was looking at a dress on one of the racks, I saw it out of the corner of my eye. I sort of did a double-take, because I noticed something I didn't notice before. The mannequin was looking at something in its hands.

Was the mannequin texting? It sure looked like it. Wow, I thought. They really have our generation nailed. I wasn't quite sure how a texting mannequin would help sell clothes, but hey, I'm not their marketer. What do I know?

Then I looked again. Was that a real cell phone the mannequin had? It sure looked like it. That's weird that they would actually buy a real cell phone for a fake person...

So I got a little closer. And closer, and closer, and closer...until I was right up next to it, just staring at the cell phone.

And then it turned and looked at me.

OH MY GOSH. Oh my gosh oh my gosh oh my gosh. It was a real person! Holy crap, it was a real person. A real person that I was standing about 2 inches away from. Staring at their cell phone. I wanted to die.

As soon as she looked at me, my reflexes kicked in. I have never turned around and pretended to be interested in an ugly piece of clothing so fast in my life. Seriously. It was almost ninja-like.

I was so mortified, and the girl gave me weird looks the rest of the time I was in the store. But I don't really blame her. I would have done the same thing.

Like that one time, when I was in the girls' bathroom at a restaurant washing my hands and a man walked in. (Yes, you read right, a MAN.) I gave him weird looks every time I saw him, too. Well, actually, I just cracked up laughing. But same difference.

Anyway, that story was probably A LOT funnier in person. And to me. But I thought I'd share it anyway. :-) And look out in a few days for stories from Thanksgiving!

The Craziest Tuesday Night...

So, I've been wanting to start a blog for awhile now, and last night I finally got around to it. I signed up, picked a title, designed my layout...everything was looking good. Then I went to go write my first post, and realized that I had absolutely nothing to say. So, for 24 hours now, my blog has been sitting here, empty and alone, waiting for a story. And tonight, it finally gets one.

I am not a fan of Tuesdays. It's my busiest day of the week, and nothing exciting ever happens. Tuesday is for me what Monday is for most people. I hate Tuesdays, that's all there is to it.

Today was going like a normal Tuesday. Too much to do and no time to do it. Nothing exciting. Just boring old Tuesday. That all changed with one phone call.

I was out to dinner with my mom and dad, when my mom's phone rang. It was my aunt calling to inform us that my grandparents had been in a major car accident on I-20 and Park Springs. They had been traveling home from Alabama. They made it 12 hours with no problems, but couldn't make the last 15 minutes.

Several phone calls later, we finally got the whole story. It had been storming pretty badly, and some cars lost control. We don't know where it started, but an 18-wheeler swerved to try to get out of the way, lost control, and almost hit my grandparents. At the last minute, my grandma swerved, and ended up hitting another car, and everything snowballed. The result was a 52 car pile-up.

That's right: 52.

According to my grandpa, it's a good thing Grandma swerved. If she hadn't, they would have gone right under the 18-wheeler and been "decapitated."

So, after my grandparents were brought to safety at a church across the street, they called us and we set off to go pick them up. My parents almost left me at home, but I refused to be left out of the adventure. The traffic was crazy, and because all the roads were closed, we had a hard time finding the church. But, finally, after much crazy driving, frustration, and stress, we found them.

My grandparents were ok, just shaken. The car was in a ditch, not totaled, but it was going to be awhile before they could move it out of the way. They got interviewed for NBC News, but didn't make it on tv, unfortunately. That would have been so cool.

The poor people behind the accident. Westbound 20 is a PARKING LOT. It's been over 4 hours now and they're still stuck.

Anyway, it was easily the most excitement I've had in awhile. I felt like a detective--first, having to solve the mystery of finding the church my grandparents were at, and second, being at the scene of the crime. Is it bad to have enjoyed the night so much? I knew my grandparents were ok, so I found no need to worry. I loved every minute of my little adventure. Who knew a Tuesday night could hold so much excitement and suspense?

And now I'm at home, drinking a chocolate milkshake, and finally getting to write my first blog post! Could the night get any better?

Click here to see the official news story.