Time Consuming

I kinda failed at the whole BEDD (Blog Every Day of December) thing so I think I'm just gonna post when I feel the need, or am just bored. See, I think I anticipated on doing like nothing because I was on holiday but things (mostly good) have been consuming my time. That sounds bad, but yeah I haven't actually felt 'bored' per say per se because I've actually found things to do.haha.

Things 'consuming' my time lately:

1) Laura.lol. Nah, jokes. It's been good actually hanging out with people these past few weeks (mhmm actually just her haha). I like the fact that I have friends who can come to my house at 8am, while I am still asleep and then just casually walk into my room, lie down and fall asleep too. I like that we spent 4 hours! yep making those Christmas shortbread cookies for youth (which were like the first to go haha), they were yummy! Thanks Laura :) I also like that I won in Monopoly (Phase 10 shall not be mentioned.lol)

On a side note, I feel really bad for not hanging out with other people. I mean, I made plans to hang out with other people and our plans fell through because of me both times. The first was when I was supposed to go to a prizegiving but had to go into school :O I know, in the holidays! and then the other was today when I was supposed to hang out with a friend and didn't cos' I forgot I was going to Rose's prizegiving. Yeah, so I feel kind of stink since I always make plans to hang out with heaps of people and then it never happens cos' I make too many plans.lol. Maybe I should just have a 'Hang out with Olivia' day with all of those people who I wanna hang out with these holidays.haha. Sounds like party time!! Yeah right.lol. Okay, so now I really don't know where this is going and I'm just gonna stop. Yep. Okay. Thanks. And sorry if you are reading this and I have 'snobbed' you- but I really haven't. Yeah, sorry. (I like that this 'side note' is longer than what I wrote for number 1)

2) Cleaning? I would like to say cleaning but as I type this, my room is a mess, there is laundry I need to do and well yeah I think I may need to just clear out my whole room ie. de-clutter. My plan for the holidays was that I would de-clutter the mess in my room and just sort it all out into an organised looking room. To be honest, I'm not that organised, though I wish I was. So yeah, maybe that's something I'll try to tackle tomorrow... or Thursday.

Hm, I've noticed that I like to blog when I should be doing other things ie. cleaning.lol. I guess I'm just the queen of procrastination. Not a good thing. MUST GET RID OF THAT TITLE.haha.

3) Sleep/laziness.haha. Yep, I've finally caught up on all the missed sleep throughout the year (though I don't think it works that way) and yeah sleeping in til early hours of the afternoon is just great. Though I probably should add that I've become slightly addicted to Youtube-ing. Maybe not addicted- but I do like Taylor Swift and Boyce Avenue songs. Yep. They're pretty awesome and there are other random things on Youtube too. I think sometimes, I can just sit there with nothing to do and just watch random videos all day.haha.

And I suppose I should share about the whole actsofkindness thing. Yeah, that hasn't really worked much either, considering I've been pretty lazy lately. But, wait there is one thing. Well, talking again about those Christmas cookies which I blogged about here, yeah me and Laura made them for youth tonight. And it was a very time consuming task. Like 4 hours as I said before to make and decorate those amazing cookies which I have no photos of :( Yeah sorry. So that counts, right? Oh and the other day an old PI man crashed into Dad's van (not badly) and I pretty much convinced/told Dad it was alright and let the guy off. There was minimal damage to our car and I just felt sorry for the guy. He reminded me of my grandparents.lol. Yeah so that was a quick update on that one anyway.

So yeah, I'm sorry for not following the whole BEDD thing. Really though, I kinda don't think anyone cares. So now, it's time to say goodbye. Bye. Fa. Okay time to sleep (or youtube). K bye.

Festive cookies.

So I don't really have anything interesting to blog about, so I've decided to share one of my new favourite recipes. I think it's more because they are shaped cool and I get to use my cookie cutters but yeah, you can decide why you think I like them.lol.

SHORTBREAD RECIPE

Ingredients

Serves: 36

250g (2 cups) plain flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

250g butter

125g (1/2 cup) caster sugar

Method:

Prep: 25 minutes

Cook: 15 minutes

1. Preheat oven to 160 C.

2. Sift together the flour, salt and baking powder. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the sifted dry ingredients and mix until combined together. Chill until dough is easy to handle, about 10 minutes.

3. On a lightly floured surface roll dough out to 5mm thick. Cut into desired shapes and place on ungreased baking sheets.

4. Bake in preheated oven for 10 to 15 minutes.

So yeah, it's a pretty easy recipe with lots of butter (luckily it was on special at New World!) and it's fun to make :)

ICING

Ingredients

Icing sugar

Hot water

Food colouring

Method:

1. Fill a bowl with icing sugar.

2. Carefully add drops of hot water and mix slowly. (Not too much or it will be too runny).

3. Separate icing into separate bowls.

4. Add food colouring to each bowl.

Yeah, I made this up myself.haha.

Kiwi ingenuity - use roll from
gladwrap as rolling pin.lol. 

Awesome Christmas cookie cutters!

Posing with the cookies before they go in.
I didn't let Rose make any though.

Before they go in. Yep.

Mmm.. they look good.

Lots of icing, lots of colours :)

My personalised 'O' shaped cookie.

Rose did this one. I was mad.lol.

Angels.

The best one.

'Fallen angels' - Yep Laura broke them.haha.
Nah we accidently broke one each when pulling
them out of the tray.

Didn't get a close up of the trees but
they were the best. I like these cookies :)

The stars. And a black circle?

Laura's 'L' and my 'O' and a random
'l' letter to spell out 'LOL'.

What a mess.

At least I cleaned it up.lol.

Yeah, so if you are keen to bake, these are really easy. Just beware they can break easily if you don't pick them up carefully. These cookies are fun to make (when you're not extremely tired) and they taste good too. (As long as you haven't just had a giant chocolate chip cookie.lol)

BEDD Day 9: Complete.

I don't want to blog.

So tonight I feel tired. I do not want to blog, I just want to sleep and I know this goes against the whole Blog Every Day of December thing - given that it is supposed to be fun, exciting and interesting posts but right now, I'm not in the mood to type about something others may actually care about.

I'm sorry to set a negative tone, I'm just tired which is probably since I slept at 3am this morning and woke up at like 12pm. Yeah, it's a reasonable amount of time to sleep but I have bad sleeping patterns. Whatever, I don't why I'm tired, okay? I just am.lol.

On a more positive note, Laura was at my house over these past two days and I really liked that. Probably cos I like her. Yep, she's awesome :) but yeah we baked a lot.lol, played Phase 10 (2 too many times) and slept a lot.haha. Yeah, she hasn't sent me our photos so this post is a bit boring (I'm sorry.) but here are some on this post of hers --> This one. Yep, we had fun. And I have a new favourite song. I think.lol. Well it's awesome none the less.

Yep, I like this song. It's cute :) BEDD Day 8 complete. Goodnight x

When I was a kid..

When I was a kid, I loved everything about my Nana's house. It's where I grew up and is the place that reminds me of my childhood. It was the house right behind our own house (yep, my parents bought a house in front of Mum's parents house) and so I was pretty much always there.

I remember sleeping over at my Nana's house with all of the cousins and if I forgot my pajamas, Nana would just give me one of her shirts and it became my nightie. I miss those days. Yep, and I also remember staying up til like 10pm (and thinking it was super cool) and playing Crash Bandicoot and Tekken on our PlayStation and leaving it on the whole night because we didn't have a memory card.

I also remember making 'tents' in the lounge by tying sheets to the couches and chairs and pretty much whatever would hold it. Grandad would get so mad by all the mess we made but Nana would help us clean it up when we were finish- like 3 hours later. I wanna do that with my kids one day.

My favourite memory from that house though, had to be when me, Taneya and Luke? I think made a 'house' in the backyard. See, the thing was that Grandad had like a million old bricks in the backyard all piled up by the dog house. We always wanted to do something with them so obviously we decided to make our own house, yeah cos that's what we do. Anyway, I think we were like 8 or 9 years old or whatever so decided to 'glue' the bricks together with our own homemade glue (which was made from flour and water- yeah that annoyed Nana lol) and yeah ended up with a quite impressive 2m-ish by 2m-ish sized 'house'. I'm sure we even left space for windows and then put a tarpaulin on the top as a roof. That was all fun until Grandad got home from work, saw what we had done and pretty much yelled at us til we cried. From what I remember Nana helped us clean that up to.haha.

Yeah, I miss that house. My grandparents have since moved out from there and it is still hard sometimes to think I can't just rock up there at anytime I want. That house was my childhood but now I guess it is time to grow up :( Anyway, I'm glad I have those memories. Goodbye. (Sorry, bad way to end that post).

BEDD: Day 7 complete :) First week is over!lol. 

Free to worship for such a time as this.

Tonight, before youth I really wasn't in the mood to go to church, to worship God or do anything so when Dad told us to find our own way to youth, I was like 'hm, yeah I just won't go', unless Rose could find us a ride- it was like 7.15pm already by that stage. But then she found one, yeah her friends mum picked us up and so I was like okay I have to go now, right? Yep, so I went and when I got there I was sore and tired and still not in the mood to socialise with people. Sad right?

Anyway, my whole mood changed as soon as worship started. Worship does that. Well, God anyway. Cos' I realised that despite my circumstances, I was still gonna jump around like a crazy person, clap my hands and just be free in His presence. Yeah, I dunno, there are days when I can jump around and praise Him forever and then other times where I just take those opportunities for granted. So yeah, it was just good for me to put everything aside and just worship Him.

Anyway, then Paul was sharing about 'the cause' and it just so happened I was wearing my 'Created for His cause' camp shirt. Coincidence? Well, probably but yeah whatever. Yeah so he was just talking about stepping up for His (God's) cause and also not fighting alone. But to 'tag' God when we need Him, which is like all the time. (This is not how I planned to write this post but yeah whatever lol).

The best thing about it was that at the end we had a time of worship and all got prayed for. I got a cool prophecy about a garden with orange flowers, which was strange to me but yeah I guess God will reveal more about that and the person praying for me was saying that over summer there will be things I plant (ie. the flowers) that will attract people to the garden/kingdom so yeah pretty cool huh? And, it's all God :)

The other really cool thing was the dog tags which Karen and Paul gave us. They have the verse from Esther which says we have been called to this time, for this cause. Well, not exactly those words but that's how I read it and yeah it's cool cos' this has been a verse which I've stood by and used in all of my tough situations, and in the good times too. So yeah pretty much, God is the man. And you, yep you, have been called to where you are for a reason.

Esther 4:14

New International Version (NIV)

¹⁴ For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”


BEDD: Day 6 complete.

Setting up the Tree!

Yay! It's nearly Christmas time :) And so December means putting up the tree and all the decorations and just enjoying the holidays (well for those of us on holiday now anyway) so yeah I thought it would be cool to blog about our Christmas and the traditions we have.

Yep, so if you know me and my family you'll know that we've had our old Christmas tree since before Aimee was born. That's like 20 years! So finally Mum and Dad decided to buy a new one, and of course Rose picked it and it's so tall (like 7ft) that it nearly touches the ceiling. Anyway, I love it. I mean, it's Christmas! Who couldn't love this time of year?

New Christmas tree!

Yep, so last night when Mum and Dad brought it home, me and Rose set up the decorations ready to go on the tree. It's kind of a tradition, I guess to put them in colour co-ordinated piles. Yep, weird I know but ever since we were kids and Christmas time came around, Mum would make us put all of the decorations into colour piles and then she would put them on the tree so that there wouldn't be clumps of one red here, then clumps of gold there or whatever.haha.

Colour co-ordinated decorations.

And yep so below are some of my favourite decorations. They are photo frames which Mum bought a few years ago and put pics of all the grandchildren into them. I think it was cos' we were low on decorations and needed some new ones.lol. Yeah, I have other favourites too but they wouldn't upload properly :(

Cool photo decorations Mum
made a few years back.

Yep, and I think the next photo is a tree which we got from someone else and Mum decided to make it a Pasifika tree with the angels made out of the tapa cloth stuff and had only gold and green decorations. It's pretty cute actually. I like it.

Our 'island' tree.

And, finally there is no Christmas without the nativity set. Of course, the whole reason for Christmas is because of Jesus' birth so yeah I like this set. And it's from Jerusalem.. I think.haha. Anyway, yeah it's pretty awesome!

Our nativity set from Jerusalem :)

And yeah so this is like my 3rd post about Christmas already and it's only the 5th of December. Hm, well guess I just need to go out more this week, month etc. Ok, well bye for now.

:)

Fear.

FEAR: 

noun a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil,pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid. Synonyms: foreboding,apprehension, consternation, dismay, dread, terror, fright,panic, horror, trepidation, qualm. Antonyms: courage,security, calm, intrepidity.

Fear. It grips us and stops us from doing the things we wanna do. It could be a fear of spiders that stops you from showering, or it may be a fear of small spaces that won't let you go in an elevator, or it may be something worse like a fear of failure which just stops you from doing anything cos' you don't wanna fail at it. Yep, fears are horrible things. They are often caused by past experiences and make you afraid to do something.

But, if you look at the definition of fear, then see the antonyms of fear, you'll see the words COURAGE, SECURITY, CALM and INTREPIDITY. These are the kind of words that remind me of God. Yep because God says in his word that we have been given all of these things through Him!

2 Timothy 1:7 (NKJV)

For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

1 John 4:4 (NKJV)

You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

Yep, so pretty much God has given me everything I need to overcome my fears and now I am fearless through Him! Greater is He that is in me than he who is in the world so nothing can stop me from doing anything now. Thanks God :)

Day four of BEDD complete.

Proud to be Me.

I like being who I am. I have many flaws but I'm still happy with who God made me to be. Sure there are times when I hate the fact that I can't do certain things (or that I do certain things) but for the majority of the time I'm happy to be who I am. I like the fact that I have an amazing family and that they love me very much. I know of a lot of people who don't have a family as close as mine but I'm glad that I have them because they are part of who I am. I like that I am Samoan and that even though only a quarter, I like that I know some of the traditions and that I grew up pretty much with my nana teaching me songs and recipes and stuff. Yeah, I don't like that I can't speak Samoan but maybe one day I'll learn it. I like that I go to AGGS and that I've been blessed with heaps of amazing friends there. Only one year left in high school :O oh gosh. I also like the fact that I am a Christian and that I go to MNL. Yep, cos of I wasn't a Christian I really don't know where the heck I would be. I would not have the amazing friends I do have and most of all, wouldn't have an awesome relationship with my God. It's pretty much been through Christ that I've been able to accept who I am, flaws and all and appreciate all the things I've been given. Sounds cheesy or cliche-ish but whatever, I love you God. Thank you for making me, well me. I love you :)

Day Three of BEDD done.

Tribute to Ms Anisi

Shouldn't I be on holiday? Well apparently no.

Last night I got home from the BE.LOVED event and pretty much went straight to bed. That was at like 10pm. I mean, what 17 year old girl goes to bed that early after just finishing exams and is now supposedly on holiday. Well, me and that was because I was planning on going to Steffi's end of year assembly. Seriously, when your 8 year old cousin personally asks you to come, you have to, right? And so I was all set to go at 8am until I woke up and saw a text from my dean asking to come into school for a farewell for Ms Anisi (Samoan teacher at AGGS) so I was pretty much torn between which one to go to. Cousin's assembly or teacher's farewell?

I love my cousin but I decided to go into school especially given that I've just been named a prefect for 2012 and Ms Anisi probably played a big part in that. So yeah if you don't know her, she's pretty much an awesome as teacher. She is the kind of teacher that most students fear or try to avoid unless you're in her good books (which was me) or you just get to know her. Until this year, she was just that for me. A scary teacher who yelled at us when we didn't sing the school song loud enough or if we had incorrect uniform. But this year, I got to know her better. She started up the Pasifika initiatives at AGGS and has supported Pasifika students at AGGS ever since she started teaching at the school, and from what I understand, she started teaching at AGGS as a BT(beginning teacher) and has been there ever since. Now she's joining the likes of Ms Hayes (one of my favourite teachers who left last year- also mentioned in this post.) and Ms Todd at MAGS :( So to you Ms Anisi, we say good bye but as the saying goes 'Once an AGGS girl, always an AGGS girl!' We love you miss. Thanks for everything you have done for AGGS, especially to our PI girls. You will be missed!

So yeah I guess I'm not really on holiday yet, but today was a good day, and even though I missed Steffi's assembly it was still great to hear that she got an honours award. Whoo! Go Steffi!! :) So a good day all round.

Day Two of BEDD complete. No official 'act' that I can think of that I've done today but hm maybe that'll come later in the day. Ok goodbye for now.

It's December!!!!!!!!!!

So yeah, if you can't tell I'm pretty much loving the fact that it's December. Because December means Christmas is just around the corner and also summer is (hopefully) coming. I should be cleaning my room but I got distracted. As usual.haha. I never learn do I?

Well, I saw on Laura's blog that she's doing this thing called Blog Every Day of December (BEDD) and since I'm not doing anything this month, well, I thought I'd join her. I may not be the most committed but I'll try, and now realising that I will be away on the 17th, 18th and 19th I feel this may not work, but hey, I'll figure something out, okay? Okay. Cool.

And yeah since December is a month of giving (well, really just Christmas but yeah whatever) I thought I'd also try to do one nice thing for someone in each day of December. (And because I'm cool I wanna name it- so it'll be called my actsofkindness) I love hearing about how people are so blessed by just little things people do for them, and to be honest, I love receiving stuff myself, so yeah why not, right? Well, I'm not too sure exactly how this is going to work but I'm thinking it'll be like me doing small things like baking for someone, or babysitting for free, or just doing stuff that they will benefit from. Yeah so my plan is to do things that will bless other people without spending all of my money (because I have none!) and yeah I hope this works. First of all, I am putting up our Christmas tree! but Rose wanted to put the star on the top so maybe I'll let her do that and yeah I guess helping at the women's BE.LOVED event tonight counts, right? So I wrote this earlier today then went to put up the tree- FAIL. Not all the parts were there so no tree up yet :( but I did help at the women's event so I guess that counts.lol. (Except for leaving slightly early before clean-up, yeah sorry people. Hey, I'm not perfect haha)

HAPPY DECEMBER!!!

(Please don't take offence or think I am trying to make myself look good by doing this act of kindness thing, but please rather take this as an opportunity to do something cool too. And in saying that, I want to make this kind of anonymous but that may change slightly on what exactly the 'act' is. If it's something I feel to share to encourage you to do the same, or whatever, please take it just as that- encouragement cos' it's something that I just thought would be cool to do in the month of giving, yeah sweet as. Thanks!)

Exams are over!

So now that exams are over, I'm freeeeeeeeee! No more uniform. No more school work. (Well at least 'til Feb.) And summer is coming! So now it's time to well clean my room, put up the Christmas tree!! :D (I love Christmas!) and pretty much well do nothing much. 

This is what I did this afternoon. Yep, cos I'm cool.
(Note to self: Buy new nail polish colours!)

Blogging without a Computer

Okay, so last night I was lying in bed and really just couldn't sleep. It was like midnight, and I suddenly had all of these thoughts that I wanted to write about. I grabbed my laptop but then it died and my dad was using the charger. Hm, so I grabbed my notebook and started writing away. Just to let you know, it filled up about twelve pages in my notebook. Yeah, I know. I write alot okay. Don't judge me.haha.

This is somewhat how the midnight rambling went...

There are many other things I could be doing right now, like sleeping? (haha, yeah it's like midnight). So anyway, this may become just another pointless rant about nothing but here I go. Why is it that whenever I want to write on my Blogger, I can't think of any relevant or cool things to say that might interest my readers, but when I'm lying in bed, all tucked up and warm, I suddenly want to blog. What a shame my laptop isn't free. Oh well to the notebook it is. Wow, okay this is already accumulating to nothing and I've only just begun. Okay now I've forgotten what was on my mind... Yeah okay well here goes...

Here's a few notes on my 'Life after Fasting', just one of the things I wanted to write about. Recently I've been  doing my Level Two NCEA exams (and at the moment I should be studying) but yeah to be honest they've actually been quite good exams. Like not too stressful or anything like that. Hm, is that a bad thing? Great, now I have a sore hand from writing instead of typing. *flips onto next page of notebook* Ew, there is a bug on this page. Okay well now it's gone. Back to the important stuff I was talking about. Anyway, over the period of the 21 Day Fast I decided to fast from TV and Facebook. I pretty much added in Blogger as well given that it was becoming another distraction for me, but yeah here's just a few things I learnt and a few things God showed and is still showing me...

1) When I put my 'pleasures' aside, it gives God room to work and actually just be King in my life.

- I realised (and actually it wasn't until the fast was over) that the time I had wasted watching rubbish TV and spending countless hours on Facebook was just stopping me from spending time with God and just being in His presence.

2) God wants a closer relationship with me.

- He created me for a plan and a purpose, so if he did that then I think I should love on Him. He made me unique, beautiful, talented and so blessed so why shouldn't I praise Him!? So yeah, in youth recently, we've had people sharing their testimonies or their Life with Jesus and that's just it. LIFE WITH JESUS. So anyway, yeah it's been really cool hearing people's testimonies and actually realising that God has changed these people for the better. It's funny how you can look at someone and think you know their whole life until they tell you and you're like 'woah, I so didn't think they were like that!' Hm, guess that just shows God's glory, yeah? He's pretty awesome. So forgiving and loving. Remember the whole 'forgive and forget' line. Well, I realised over this time, that God is the only one who can ever truly live by this line. It's so easy as humans to believe that our sins can never be truly forgiven but God just forgives and forgets them as soon as we ask. I love that about Him. He loves.cares.and ADORES you and me!

3) Book of JOY!

- If I'm being completely honest, I'll let you know that I'm not the greatest at keeping up with my daily Bible reading but over the fasting period, I found a lot more time to read my Bible and an interesting book which showed up was Philippians. I did one of those 'God, give me a page number and I flick to it' kind of things and it was a page number like page 1346 or something. The page which I turned to just happened to be the first page of Philippians, so I started reading it. Yeah so Philippians was a book written by Paul in the Bible and he wrote it from a jail cell. Now, you're probably like how is this a Book of Joy? Well, despite his circumstances, Paul still rejoiced and praised God. Why? Well, it's because he knew Jesus and he belonged to him. To Christ. Well yeah, I think it's easy to kind of just feel like a loner or a loser in tough circumstances but hey! REMEMBER you are a child of God who has great plans laid ahead for your life. Phillipians 3.13-14 says... ¹³ Brothers and sisters, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, ¹⁴ I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus. This verse talks about forgetting the past and pressing on toward the GOAL! That means the greater purpose and plan He has for your life! And I won't post it but Philippians 4 is also an amazing chapter to read. It's just amazing! This chapter begins with Paul telling us to just rejoice in our circumstances, cos He (God) is Lord!, then it carries on to give great insight into how we can be joyful or happy or whatever you wanna call it. I think for me Philippians 4.6 sums it all up for me.. it says ⁶ Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. An example of this is how I've prayed for all of my exams and so far they've been great and that's given me even more reason to praise and thank God for everything. The last thing is at the end of this chapter cos in Philippians 4.13 it says ¹³ I can do all this through him who gives me strength. What a powerful statement. That means despite my past failures and all of my current circumstances, I can still do ALL things through Christ who takes me from strength to strength. Isn't that just amazing? Well that's God for ya! :)


So yeah, to conclude this random yet hopefully enjoyable look into my crazy head, I would just like to leave you with one thought. Just one. Yeah okay, here it goes...


Do not look upon your circumstances to define who you are or what you should or will become. God created YOU! for a purpose. Put your trust in Him and He will show you the way :) Yep so that's me.. oh and here's a verse which I found to fit what I wrote about...

¹⁷ Though the fig tree does not bud
   and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails
   and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
   and no cattle in the stalls,
¹⁸ yet I will rejoice in the LORD,
   I will be joyful in God my Savior.

Habakkuk 3:17-18

Technology and Trends

(Sorry, lame title. Couldn't think of what to name it. Whatever. Okay, just read the post now. Thanks :D)

I was watching A Cinderella Story with Aimee and there was a part that set us off in this whole random thing. I dunno we haven't watched it in a while and yeah besides the fact that it's one of my favs, it was funny 'analysing' it.

So do you ever think about the future? Like when you'll have kids and stuff. I dunno, it seems kinds weird to think about that but hmm, guess that's what girls do, huh? Or at least me.

Yeah so we were talking about what this movie would be like if our kids, in like 20 years watched this.

Like when Sam texts LOL meaning laugh out loud in response to Austin's text about the teacher, she genuinely means LOL, and isn't just saying it to fill a text message. Haha. Imagine nowadays, hypothetically if you were texting your crush or whatever and said LOL and that was all you said. They'd most probably be like 'lame, haha' - then no reply... hahaha. But more to the point of this post, imagine if in 20 years our kids saw this text and they would be like 'huh? what does that mean - oh that's not funny' ... or whatever, it sounded cooler in my head.lol :P

Or you know like 'what is that thing?' referring to a typically cool cellphone when this film was made.

The second thing I picked up on was the computers. I mean, you barely even see these anymore!? So like will kids know what computers are since technology is changing ever so quickly. I mean, 15-20 years ago we didn't have all the things we do today so what's it gonna be like in another decade or two. Hm, these poor kids are not gonna understand some of the best films ever made.haha. Maybe that's a bit far but whatever.

So yeah, that was my rambling on about one of my favourite movies and just for you here's our favourite part of the movie. Aimee likes it for the lights and candles (wow, new information!) and I like it for those things and her dress and yeah it's just so cute. Maybe that's why I've always wanted to go to a masquerade ball..? Oh well, I love it!

Never let the fear of striking out, keep you from playing the game.

To be called a Princess...

It's always great being reminded of who you are. It is so easy to get 'lost in the crowd' or feel alone and scared because every second person you see is dealing with things whether they show it or not. Lately I've been thinking, gosh I really don't wanna grow up. I just want to be a child with no responsibilities, with nothing holding me back from just being a kid. I don't wanna think about my future and what I'm gonna do for the rest of my life because it seems too hard. Tonight Paul shared his testimony at youth and it was really inspiring for me. It's funny how you can look at someone and think you know everything about them until they talk about their lives and you realise that you were wrong. See, I thought Paul was pretty much like Stephen, with everything together and what not but when he shared about his youth and it reminded me of my own life. I mean, I don't steal things and I'm not a rebellious child but I could relate to some of the things he was sharing about.

Here's some of my favourite parts from tonight...

1. God sees the individual, not the crowd. And it's funny that this is the thing to stand out for me because I've heard this all my life and I've known it, but not actually heard it till now, if you understand what I mean. Sandra was talking about it in lifegroup tonight and she was saying how in our generation it's so easy to feel like one of the crowd, because that's who we wanna be. It's like we don't wanna to stand out and be an 'individual' because that's tough and it's easier to blend in but even when we do this, God still sees us and loves us the same.

2. God loves me as I am. Paul also shared about how he forced himself to be the best rugby player because that's what got his father's attention, and for me I kind of felt like I've always tried to be the best at school work because that's all I can do. I hated getting bad marks from test papers and still do that I would often end up crying and I was reminded tonight that all those tears were for nothing because God accepts me for who I am. He loves me, not because I am perfect but because I am his child, his daughter and he sees me as I am. As me.

3. I am his princess! Going into this year as a youth group leader, God gave me a vision of women of God as princesses by his side and through all of the crap that's been going on in my life I forgot about who He was. God reminded me that I am his precious daughter and that he will provide everything I need. I think the vision he gave me was something I needed to grasp first and I know that through all of my troubles he is with me. Right by my side. I am his precious daughter. His loved one. His PRINCESS!

When Boredom Strikes...

So I actually have no idea where this post will go but meh I haven't blogged in a while so here we go...

Ever notice that when 'holidays' swing by there is always someone who is like "Mum, what are we doing today? I'm bored." then minutes later is like "Mum, we never do anything. It's the holidays!!" Well, this was me a few years ago and is still currently Rose (my little sister) but I've come to realise over the past few holiday breaks that boredom is a-okay. I think I would much rather be bored in my holidays than have to do piles of homework and stuff for school. This is because these 'holidays' are not actually a holiday, it is more like a two week study break in which I am suppose to revise a years worth of content for all six of my subjects to prepare myself for the mind draining, boring exams in November which pretty much determine my future (since NCEA Level Two is the most important part of my education as school likes to tell me). So that is enough of my rambling on about school and stuff. Yeah.

Now what have I actually been up to..

Well, there is this girl called Uli who I've been hanging out with. She is from Germany and is doing a world trip and New Zealand was one of her places to come to. Cool huh? Yeah. So on Saturday, Aimee and I took her into town to see the Sky Tower which overlooks Auckland City.

 So this is me, my sister Aimee on the left and Uli in the middle waiting for the train. I had to take the photo which is why I look weird. Haha.

 Up in the Sky Tower. Standing on the glass. Everyone takes this photo, right?

 I think Aimee misses London a bit...

Me and Uli in the Sky Tower.

So yeah that was pretty fun. We also tried to go to the waterfront - like where 'The Cloud' is but we chose the wrong time to go. It was like 5.30pm so everyone going to watch the France vs. England game was lining up and yeah people were drinking and smoking so we left.

What else have I been up to? Well, of course I've been watching the rugby. Yeah I watched the All Blacks vs. Argentina game. It was lame. Hardly any tries so yeah not much to cheer for. Best thing about the rugby this past weekend though was watching Mum watch Australia vs. South Africa and not saying a word. She couldn't choose a team to cheer for so for the whole 80 minutes it was quiet. Hahahaha. Love you Mum. PS. Let's hope the AB's beat Aussie and get to the finals! We didn't have the RWC here for nothing, did we? (Actually I don't care but whatever it would be nice to win.)

And on a final note, I should be using my time more productively - like getting off Facebook and Blogger. Time to knuckle down and get some study done. Oh well I'll get back to you on that one...

Good bye for now :)

I Love Him!

So today was just one of those days. Everything was going good (well I thought it was) until I ended up in tears at school. To cut a long story short there I'm fine and was just things I had to deal with alone. Hmm the joys of school and everything all coming in at once! The sad thing was the only person I wanted to talk to was the girl who is on a plane to England which is hours away. I knew Aimee had gone through all the stuff I was dealing with right there and then and all I wanted to do was run and tell her about everything that happened in my day. (Why is it that when I have one problem the one person I wanna talk to isn't here!? - not that I miss her or anything..) But today I learned and remembered how great and how awesome God is. He's my man. My rock. My shelter in the storm. It took talking to Philly and Brittany about that stuff to bring it all to light. Our quick meeting led to something more than we all expected. Ha, I love how God gives me these AMAZING women to encourage and keep me going!!

But to the more important, more interesting part of this post - I wanna remind you (my reader) and myself of just how great God is. Youth tonight was just something else. I love how God just led us through worship for the whole night! I definitely had things broken off my life. All the tears were nothing because my God, yip, he reminded me of how much he loves me! He showed me that it's not all about the bible reading and prayer time and all the 'religious stuff' but just having a relationship with Him! He reminded me to just love Him because he loves me (and you) soooooo much! I feel so peaceful, so free (sounds like a cliche) but oh well it's what I feel and you can say what ya like. I found myself tonight just not caring about other things like usually set me off on an angry rampage but just so happy about everything!!

I LOVE GOD!! He's so amazing, so spectacular, so awesome, so powerful, so mighty and just so absolutely great! Words truly can't explain what He is. I love Him. I love Him. I do.

A Survey that I Copied from Another Blog

So I saw this survey/quiz thing on Laura's blog and thought it would be fun to do the same. I should be doing other stuff like the dishes and homework but meh whatever. If you wanna do it too, I think you should. It's a good time waster :P

If your doctor told you TODAY that you were pregnant, what would you say? 
Hahahahahaha. Wrong patient man, wrong patient.

Do you trust all of your friends? 
Well it depends on who the person is. There are people I can share my entire world with and then others who just get glimpses. Trust is a big thing I guess.

Would you move to another state or country to be with the one you love? 
Hmmm, no. Well, it depends on where this place is. But to be honest I'm content just where I am in my beautiful little NZ in the comfort of my house with the warm and cozy heat pump :) 

Do you believe everything happens for a reason?
Do I? Well I dunno. Am I supposed to?

Can you make a dollar in change right now? 
Umm, if you count the money raised for VSA bracelets in my wallet then yes, but technically that's not mine. (so I guess no because my own money adds up to 30cents).

Which one of your friends do you think would make the best doctor? 
Laura :D Cos she's super smart at science so could easily get into 'med' school and yeah.

Are you afraid of falling in love? 
No. Cos I know that whatever happens God has the right man for me. And when that day comes many years from now, I'm sure I will be ready. But still that's years away..

Whats your most favorite scar? 
Well I don't know if it's my 'favourite' scar but I love how like two days before the ball I got a massive scar/scratch on my foot! I always seem to be hurting myself before important things. (Luckily I had a long dress).

When was the last time you flew in a plane? 

January 2011 - Coming back from Australia! Ahh, I want to be on a plane again, to somewhere like America or Europe or something. I love travelling!

What did the last text message you sent say? 

"Im on the bus. Il call ya wen I get hme."

What features do you find most attractive in the preferred sex? 
Eyes. I dunno maybe that's cos it's the thing I like most about myself. Is that weird?

What features do you find least attractive in the preferred sex? 
Lack of personal hygiene eg. greasy hair

Fill in the blank. I love         
God. Travelling. Getting good results from horrible exams. Chocolate.

What is a goal you would like to accomplish in the near future? 
Pass NCEA Level Two with an Endorsement (and maybe get a course endorsement in Chemistry and Biology)

If you were to wake up from being in a coma for an extended time who would you call? 

Mum and Dad.

Would you make a good parent?

Heck yeah. But really not at sixteen. 

Where was your default picture taken? 
At my Nana Barbara and Poppa Ian's house.

Honestly, whats on your mind right now? 
This quiz/survey thing is taking too long.

If you could go back in time and change something, what would it be? 
There are many things but if I could pick one thing right now it would be something  like going back to when I did my history assignments at the beginning of the year  and spend more time on them so I could get an E! Oh well merits are good too :)

Did you buy something today? 
Yep, a chocolate bar and tuna pasta salad.

Last person to see you cry? 
No idea.

Who made you cry? 
Myself? Got too stressed over stupid things.

What was the last TV show you watched? 
Currently watching some random TV show on TV2. *checks TVNZ for programme title* - Mad Love. I'm watching it but not really watching it.

What are your plans for the weekend? 
Glee 3D! Church. Sleep. (Make up study plan). Clean my room. Maybe some baking...  I think I try to pack to many things into 2 days.

If your significant other asked you to marry them TODAY what would you say? 

Given that I'm sixteen, do not have a 'significant other' and am still in school - no. But if I did have a 'significant other' I think the answer would still be NO. Hey I'm sixteen, who is ever ready for marriage at my age? I certainly hope no one thinks so haha.

Term Three - Day One

So all of the school students dreaded today and I know why. I too was tired, bored and wanted to be back in bed. My day consisted of waking up at 6.10am(ish) and leaving for the bus by 7.00am! (Some thing I haven't done in a while). After that followed the usual classes at school then home time :) (this is a very short version of my day, I could go on and on but I don't want to and it's not that interesting anyway)

Everything was actually okay until Period 4. That's when I had Economics and to my surprise I got to class and my workbook (which I'm pretty sure I left in class over the holidays) was gone. Yep, everyone else's books were there but mine had somehow disappeared in those two short weeks :/ Then in Period 5 I walked into History instead of Chem. I think I was really tired. (Lucky no one was in the class when I walked in).

But there is an upside of my boring story. My friend brought me a bracelet back from Fiji and I really like it. Thanks Christal, you made my day :) Oh, and seeing all my friends after the holidays.lol. Now it's time to prepare a study schedule... Mock exams are in Week 7...

The End. (I'm off to bed now so I don't end up in the wrong class again.)

Healing Hands...

As a child you always get asked "What do you wanna be when you grow up?" and the typical response is something like "I want to be a teacher. Or maybe a doctor. Or maybe a firefighter etc". As a child there are so many options. Life just seems to be so kick back and easy as you play dress-ups and pretend to be a million things at once.

Well as a child I always wanted to be a teacher because I thought it was the coolest job in the world. Hey, my mum was a teacher, so I grew up loving school and am probably still the 'teacher's pet kind of student'. But it wasn't until maybe last year that things started to sink in. I was like.. 'hey, after a few years in this place I actually have to go on and do something with my life.' Teachers, doing their job would ask us the question "So what do you want to do when you finish school?" and I was like "yeah I know what I want to do, teaching, right?". I thought about it and was like yeah I can see myself doing that. I'd spent some time in Stacey-Anne's classroom with the kids in her class, and I loved it so I thought "Hey, this could be cool for me." 

But then God showed me through a prophecy that teaching was not what He had planned for me. A guy came to youth group one night in the middle to end of last year, I can't remember exactly, and prophesied over a few people. I was one of them and while I was standing there the guy prayed for me and said that God had great plans for me. He said he saw broken legs being healed and other sicknesses being healed because of me. When I heard this I was like "Huh? Are you sure that's for me? I thought I was gonna be a teacher?" but no haha - God always has other plans, doesn't He? So I took this prophecy and thought about what it meant for me. I think, being so naive about things then I just 'shelved the prophecy' and carried on in my clueless search for career options.

It's funny how God works because at the end of last year at our senior prize giving I got an award. Not many Year 11 students go to this prize giving but I went because I was getting a certificate thing for the 'top of the class' kind of thing (in history, HEALTH and SCIENCE just by coincidence and that's all I thought I was getting) until my name was called for one of the special awards. It was a new one called the "Healthcare Heroes Award" sponsored by an organisation called the Pasifika Medical Association which aims to promote health careers for Pacific Island people. Yes. I know if you are reading this and didn't know I was Samoan, I am. But still I was the 'white girl' going up to receive this Pasifika award. It was quite overwhelming but funny at the same time because through it I won a $100 book voucher (which I still haven't spent) and lots of other books including Science study guides. (I recently found out that I got nominated for this award by my old academic dean - Ms Hayes, who is at MAGS now. But this is my random shout out to her. Thanks Ms Hayes. Even though you will never read my blog you are cool :P) So here, God showed me again how I was going to go into a job related to healthcare and stuff. He's cool, huh?

So because I had 'shelved the prophecy' from last year and kind of gone on my own way, God had to remind me of the things He wanted me to see and know. I went to Elevate '11 earlier in February and kind of asked God to show me how this year was going to pan out for me. It's funny how stubborn I am and was then because while we were there I got another prophecy that I would see cancer patients healed. Like seriously!? I know. I just had to laugh at the words coming out of the preacher's mouth because I was like "Ok God. I get the point. I need to act on this prophecy you gave me last year (and the other signs you gave like the award, right?)" Well needless to say I was and am still stubborn but I'm on my way to something good. I figured  from these prophecies and subtle hints from Him that I was going to go into 'medicine' or healthcare or something but still things were and are still are hard comprehend.

More importantly, lately (as in the past few weeks, not last month or year) God's put on my heart the importance of our spiritual gifts and using them for His glory. I know I have a gift of healing (obviously if I'm going to be a doctor) but this was something which I never took notice of. I always used to give my mum head massages etc. and she said it would always take away her headaches and stuff. She told me I had 'healing hands' and I guess at a young age I never thought anything of it. Another of my 'spiritual gifts' was helping people. I love helping others understand things and teaching them new ways of doing things etc. God was and has been revealing to me these gifts I have to use for his glory. So I was sharing with my life group girls last week about this topic and they thought it was cool too, then tonight at youth Sunia brought it up again when he spoke about ministering to one another through our gifts. I thought it was awesome how God was showing me these same things that He was sharing with others around me. God is good isn't He?

I think the next part for me is just where faith steps in. I know that God is good and that if He gave me the whole picture at once I would freak out and probably go my own way again. God knows how things will pan for me and He said in Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have you. To give you a future and a hope." and everyday I choose to stand on this truth, knowing that my God, who loves me and only wants the best for me is standing right by my side cheering me on in everything I do!

(To my faithful readers, if there are any, I'm sorry for making this a long post it's just been something I've wanted to share and if I've told you in person then I'm sorry for saying it again and again. But hey it's just something I wanted to share.)

My First Blog

Hello world,

So here it is. My first blog. I actually had planned back in January to start a blog and post a lot on it. It was kind of a 'new years resolution' kinda thing, if that counts as one but yeah that idea went out the door when 'Miss Intern of the Year' decided to make one just before I did. And I hate looking like I copy her. Grr. Just because she is older. Now I'm going off on my own tangent. I don't know what the heck I'm supposed to write on here but yeah. Actually the real reason I made a blog was because of my brother. Tuioleloto Laura Toailoa. Yeah we're cool.haha. So I don't know if I'll use this blog and post as often as I'd like to but yeah whatever. Goodbye for now.