Playing Catch-Up

Hello my friends!!

I know, I know, it's been too long. At first it was because nothing that interesting was happening (well except for a spray tan that left me darker than I've ever been in my life...) but don't worry, after nearly a month, I have plenty of fun happenings to report :)

I went home to Ohio for a week over Easter which was wonderful! Except for the part where I had a major cold... which quickly became laryngitis. Oh, then I had to get my wisdom teeth all removed :/ It's alright though, I'm just glad that I was home for all of that and could be taken care of by my sweet parents.

Ohio was filled with family events, church, ice cream dates with my sister, recovery, amazing home cooked meals, and a little thrift shopping. But I did, for the first time, actually miss the city and especially my friends here.

Back in New York, I jumped right back into work at Hill Country. Arriving on a Thursday afternoon (after many delays and what ended up being a 16-hour bus trip) and heading into work that night.

Last weekend I felt like I was living at HC. After working there 8 months I finally had my New Hire Orientation (a 3 1/2 hour event, it did include pastries from our sister restaurant so that made it worth it). It wouldn't have been so delayed except the last orientation was scheduled on the same day Hurricane Sandy rolled into town...

I'd taken my laptop into Manhattan and got to relax at the wonderful Birch Coffee, a new favorite spot of mine, between orientation and the time I actually went into work.

Friday morning, there was a semi-secret concert by Brad Paisley at HC. NashFM, the first country radio station in NYC has been hosting a few little events in our downstairs area and let me tell you, when I picked up the phone my first day back from Easter to hear a guest wanting to make reservations for after the Brad Paisley concert, I got pretty excited! I woke up early and headed into HC once again, and got to watch Mr. Paisley live and up close, playing for just a couple hundred people, packed into the club level of HC. What a great perk of my job, no?

I had another fun, cultural experience on Saturday. My friend Mindy is part of the company at Elisa Monte Dance which had their 32nd Anniversary Season Gala last weekend. After some schedule shuffling, Selina and I, as well as some other HCers who we saw there, were able to go out and support our girl! It was an awesome show.

I'd never been to a dance gala like that or seen much modern dance. I was in awe of the grace and synchronization of the dancers as well as the abilities and endurance of a well-trained human body.  My dance repertoire is mostly fun and I hadn't experienced pieces that held so much emotion and stirred up feelings like these did.

My latest new experience was last night -- I went to my first Broadway show!! My high school always has a senior trip to NYC (I didn't actually go on the trip my senior year, having gone to France the summer before and not having the money for both. Oh well, I thought, NYC is close enough to Ohio, I know I'll make it there someday... Little did I know that 3 years later I'd be living here!) and lucky for me, one of the chaperons is not a fan of the Broadway show part of the trip, and gave me his ticket! Yay!

Yesterday morning I found out there were two tickets up for grabs if I could find a friend who wanted to join me, so I called on Samantha who also had never been to a Broadway show! I have to admit I was a little skeptical of seeing Spider-Man: Turn Out the Lights on Broadway... I mean, it's action-packed Spider-Man! And what, now he's gonna sing? But it was great! It took me a bit to get into it but by the end I was loving and very impressed with the stunts and special effects. They stayed true to the comic book nature of the story as well as bringing in the musicality and choreography of Broadway.

It was a nice night (loving this warm, spring weather!!) and we kept it true to New York form. Grabbing dessert at Roxy Delicatessen in Times Square before hitting up the Broadway show then finishing the night by meeting up with Selina for supper (at 11 o'clock at night... we run on a different time schedule than most) in Koreatown.

I hope your last few weeks have been just as delightfully eventful as mine! And I'll really try to do better at consistency... TTFN :)

Happy Friday :)

I'm heading home to Ohio for a week over Easter and I couldn't be much more excited!! I've made a list of all the foods I want while I'm there, have appointments made, tickets bought, list of things I need to take there and bring back with me, lists of what I've just gotta do while I'm there..

Today I stocked up on some travel-snack-junk food (buy one, get one free mini boxes of Cheez-It and Oreos, say what?!) I also went to the library and stocked up on new books for the trip as well as my time at home since I'll probably be getting my wisdom teeth taken out and have plenty of down time. All I need is one of those travel neck pillows (something I've been wanting for the last couple years and need to just hurry up and buy!) and I'll be all set!

In the meantime, I'm going to enjoy New York and all it offers :) Tonight I'm going out for a late supper with a friend. I said I was craving mac n cheese and she suggested a couple places that specialize in and only serve mac n cheese, because stuff like that happens in the city! (Hehe, it still kindof amazes and ahhs me). And later meeting up with some friends at a ping pong lounge place.. Should be a fun night :)

My Year in Review

Happy New Year everyone!

I love journaling.

Usually.

Sometimes, I get really distracted and can't write, no matter how many awesome things I have to say. I'll literally just sit, pen in hand, and stare into space, usually thinking through the words I want to write but my hand can't keep up with my mind and the words are lost....

But usually journaling is very therapeutic for me. It's how I put my thoughts together and record memories. And one of the best rewards is going back through old journals and remembering fun or hard times and seeing how God pulled me through situations that seemed earth-shattering at the time.

Some days I like to pull out an old journal and flip through to see what I was doing on that date (or around that date...) one year ago. At the end of the year, I like to flip through my journal from the past year and see how my thinking has changed or look at all the things I went through, all the fun times I had, and how things ended up. Plus, there are so many beautiful journals out there, how could you not want to write and fill it's pages?!

I usually go through one journal a year but this year was a big year for me and I went through two! Since it was such a big year I wanted to share some of the big adventures :) and hopefully encourage you to look over your year!

2012
January: Felt real old, like an actual grown-up, turning 20!
Spent my birthday on a college visit :P but with one of my besties!
Visited home twice!
Got my first internship at Doric Concrete Vaults (designing tombstones ;)

February: Hmm lots of ups and downs in that month....

March: Spring Break! at home... it was fun though!
Dressed as Tinker Bell for Pick-a-Date
Played Cobweb (rocker fairy!) in Hesston's 80's style Midsummer Night's Dream

April: When the schedule became - class, lay out, Sonic :)
Was offered internship in Brooklyn at Resource

May: Got my helix triple pierced
Graduated from Hesston
Said goodbye to all my friends :(

June: Becca graduated!
Visited New York City for the first time.... and moved there 2 weeks later :)
Road trip to Iowa! For Jodi's wedding
Started web design internship at Resource Magazine

July: Celebrated the 4th on the roof with popcorn and chocolate covered strawberries
Used my days off to visit free museums and attractions
Saw Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh
Had my first visitors! Gingeriches
Boob Auction...

August: Started working at Hill Country BBQ Market as a hostess
Visit from Wendy!
Moved Becca to college

September: Decided to move back to Ohio at Thanksgiving.... yeah that didn't actually happen
Internship at Resource ended
Visit from EMUers

October: Started graphic design internship at WeSell.com
Extra time = gone (working every day)
Hurricane Sandy

November: Granny passed away - went home
Emily's wedding in Indy
Thanksgiving at Hesston!
First Black Friday shopping experience

December: Worked 60 hours every week
Home for one week at Christmas
Visitors! Mom, Dad, Becca, Grandpa

My resolution: Start a new adventure :)

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas!

Home, sweet home :)

After working 60 hours each of the last 2 weeks, I am finally home and ready for a break! In typical fashion, I took a Greyhound last night at 11 out of New York, expecting to arrive in Columbus at 11 this morning. Well the bus that I was transferring to in Pittsburgh was running late, it was also coming from New York but was supposed to leave an hour before us and hadn't left when we did... After a 2 1/2 hour delay in Pittsburgh we were on our way again!

I was able to sleep on and off during the trip and was amazed that every time I opened my eyes, the scenery was more an more white! It was in the low 40's in New York and the more east I got the worse the weather became! I got in around 1:45, two hours and 40 minutes later than anticipated, and was happily reunited with my family :)

On the way home the roads were bad and the snow continued to fall and blow. Right in front of us, a man in a 4-wheel Dodge slide into a deep ditch. We pulled over and helped him get a tow and were reminded to drive slow and be wary. We passed another car being pulled out of a ditch on our own road later.

Once we were home, we were ready to settle in for the evening and enjoy being together again. I'm very excited to have this break from work and stress (hopefully) while taking care of a few things I need to do here. But most of all, I'm thrilled to be back with my family and ready to pick up on all our Christmas traditions and make new ones. It finally feels like Christmas to me :)