I Don't Wanna Stay Up All Night

Note to self: Do not go to school if you have not slept AT ALL the night before!

Today I nearly fell asleep in class. We had an assignment due at 8.30am this morning for Chemistry and if it wasn't for ANZAC day yesterday I probably wouldn't have got it done. The assignment was a titrations internal, so if you don't know what that means it was a type of experiment where I had to measure the concentration of oxygen at Hunua Falls, and to be honest I'm just glad it's over. It was probably one of the most strenuous, time consuming assignments I've had to do yet and it was only worth four flippin' credits. It was an assignment that I probably spent more time complaining about than any other, and my whole class would probably say the same. When I was in Australia in the holidays, I took my laptop and chem books over with good intentions of actually getting some work done, but obviously my lack of discipline, laziness and terrible time management got the better of me. I decided that I would just enjoy my holiday and suffer the consequences later, and suffer them I did. I spent literally ALL DAY yesterday doing it. That was starting the report and finishing it all in one day. There were times throughout the day when I cried and thought- stuff this, it's only 4 credits but then I had to tell myself to shut up and just do it. I started at 1pm (after waking up at 12pm.lol) and finished the whole report at five o'clock this morning. That's like 14 hours of stupid work! It took waaaaaay longer than I had expected. Anyway, the good thing is that I got it done and was one of the first to hand it in :) not sure if that counts for anything but yeah I'm just glad it's over. The thing I learnt today is to never pull a full on all nighter and then go to school the next/or well the same day. That was the worst idea ever. In the morning I was fine but it hit me by about 11am (luckily I had a free period) and I was so tired all day. My plan was to go to senior assembly and just 'rest my eyes' but as I was heading over to it, I was told I had a Pasikifa meeting with some uni people to talk about stuff that at that moment, I really didn't wanna hear about. My eyes wanted to close on me and my brain was not processing anything properly and I must have just looked so out of it. Got home at 5pm tonight, tried to do some work and fell asleep til about 9.30pm. Now, I'm awake and I can't sleep!! Not good. Not good at all. Worst part is now I feel sick. And tired. And I don't feel like going to school tomorrow...

RUS Challenge- 31 Days in Proverbs

Hello blogging world (or facebook people if you saw this through that :P)

So, I haven't blogged in a while simply because I've been so busy with school assignments and stuff that by the time I think of this, well actually, haven't thought about blogging in ages. So yeah.

Anyway, I thought a good way to get back into blogging would be to write about my RUS challenge. On Sunday at church, Pastor Stephen set us a challenge to read just one chapter (or part of a chapter) of Proverbs for each day of April (ie. 1st of April read Proverbs 1) and the first day of May and then as we read through it to ask God for something important from that chapter/part or whatever. Then to share it with someone whether it be through Facebook, texting, blogging or simply just joting it in a diary. I think mine will be a combination of all of these.

To be honest, I've kind of lacked in the whole reading my bible and have used my assignments as an excuse to not do it or think that it's okay. I found tonight, that after putting time aside to actually read my bible (yeah, I missed the first actual day lol) that I was very wrong about my idea that God was all good with my laziness to connect with Him. So I guess I'm excited for this challenge now and ready to see what God's gonna reveal to me over this time :)

Here's what God showed me tonight (I combined both Proverbs 1 and 2 since I missed yesterday)...

Day One- Proverbs One


Proverbs 1.7

Fear of the Lord is the foundation of true knowledge,    but fools despise wisdom and discipline.


Proverbs 1.33
But all who listen to me will live in peace,
    untroubled by fear of harm.


The 'fear' which is illustrated in verse 7 isn't one from which I should be afraid but more that we should acknowledge that God is sovereign over everything and knows how everything is gonna go. To fear the Lord is to give Him the respect and honour which He deserves, to be in awe of Him and to recognise that He is Lord of all. By doing this we learn how to live in his ways.


Listening in or tuning into his voice brings peace to all of your other worldly situations, such as exams or assignments or any dramas going on that are beyond my reach.

Through reading these passages I was convicted of what I had been doing, which was pretty much nothing, and urged to listen into the voice of God more. Sometimes, although it may sound dumb, I forget that God has all the solutions to my problems and if I spend more time with Him he'll reveal these solutions to me. After all, God is the solution :)

Day Two- Proverbs Two

Proverbs 2.1-2

My child, listen to what I say,

and treasure my commands,

Tune your ears to wisdom, and concentrate on understanding.

 and concentrate on understanding.

Proverbs 2.7

He grants a treasure of common sense to the honest.
    He is a shield to those who walk with integrity.

Proverbs 2.10

For wisdom will enter your heart
And knowledge will be pleasant to your soul

These were the verses which were highlighted to me as I read through the chapter. My understanding of them is that God was showing me that if I start to become more attentive to his word, and live with integrity then His voice will become clearer. This is particularly important for me, as sometimes I neglect that fact that a little white lie here and there is fine, like saying I spent all night doing an assignment but didn't fully finish when I'd been on Facebook for some of the night. I'm gonna make a better effort from now on to stop doing this and live my life with more integrity. Let's see how it goes.

Wow. Another long post :/ Oh well, excited for what God has in store for me over the next few days, weeks, months...

:D 

Taneya :)

I'm sorry to my readers (if there's any) for my lack of blogging in the past week or so. I've been meaning to post something but I got sick and stuff so didn't wanna sit on my laptop and write something that might not interest you. That's if in fact any of my posts are interesting... (In writing that last comment I kinda have to think about the amount of time I've spent on FB and stuff but that doesn't count, right?)

Something Good About My Day: NIGHT OF EMCEES @ MNL
So yeah, tonight we had a hip hop night at church where five different acts performed their style of hip hop and what not and it was actually really cool. Hip hop is usually not my kinda thing- given I can't rap, or write or dance or whatever.haha. But it was really cool. I loved it. And the best thing about it was that my cousin, Taneya, performed a Spoken Word piece. She is awesome. It was her first time performing onstage like that and she was just amazing. Others were great too. But yeah, for me it was cool seeing her up there doing what she does best :)

Here's a video of her performance. (Sorry for the cruddy as quality- took it off my phone.) Anyway, she's great so just watch it :D

Breaking the Pattern

School is drawing closer everyday. This revelation came to me when our NCEA results were released on Thursday. I'd like to say I've been somewhat busy with other stuff that I just haven't had time to blog but seriously, in all honesty I haven't been doing much. Holidays for some people are like 'whoo I'm free, no more school for a while' and yeah I guess this was me when my holidays started... in December. But now that's it's halfway through January and school starts in like 2 and a bit weeks (I think) I'm like man I really haven't done much with these holidays. Well I have but whatever. I've been on holiday for like 2 months and it's getting pretty boring. I've been doing the whole stay up late, wake up late, eat, breathe, sleep thing over and over and now I have to try and break that terrible pattern of sleep in order to prepare for the ridiculous loss of sleep I know I'll be experiencing as soon as February 1st starts. Well maybe not exactly that date but close enough. I mean, for the past few weeks I swear I've been sleeping at like 3am onwards and actually doing nothing in those crazyshouldbesleeping hours of the day. I sit on Youtube or Facebook if anyone interesting enough to talk to is online and do nothing. Pretty much this is me rambling about my lack of discipline in telling myself when to sleep. Yeah.

On to more positive news...

SGAMD (Something Good About My Day)- This morning I woke up, well it was like 2pm so this afternoon I woke up, ate some 2minute noodles, a few hours later had dinner and now I'm blogging in my room. What's good about this you say after I just said how lame and boring it normally is. Well I'm appreciating being on holiday and even though it's nearly over I'm glad that in these 2 months of the year that students are given freedom to do nothing, I've been able to sleep to my heart's content. Wow, that's lame, huh? Whatever.

Oh and I would like to mention that I am actually happy to go back to school. Nerd, huh? The reason I think I'm saying this is because getting my results with the Merit endorsement and Merits and Excellences for English and Maths has actually got me thinking I can do it. I can actually get good marks for those things when I genuinely try. And as much as the letmesleep part of me is saying *cue long dramatic sound effects* nooooooooo, I'm actually kind of looking forward to getting back into a routine where my days aren't just spent in bed. I'm looking forward to the challenges, adventures and just all of the cool things about this year that I know lie ahead. And I know that 2 months from now, I may read this and think 'why the heck would you say that!?' but to that future me- get over yourself, enjoy your 7th form year and stop being lazy. Do that History assignment you should be doing, and the Chemistry homework you left til late at night. Stop procrastinating. Join a group. Be awesome. Have fun. And right now well I seriously hope I'm not like that again but if I am, well then yeah. Nah, I won't be.

Okay bye :)

Today Was A Good Day

I know I've already posted like just before but I wanted to write another post to stop the previous one from being super long and boring for readers. I do that a lot. Writing and saying too much. So yeah, second post of the day. Anyway what this blog is about...

Laura (my friend) is doing another blogging project similar to BEDD and is calling it SGAED (Something Good About Every Day) where for the rest of January she is going to blog about something positive in her day. Read more about it here. And while reading this on her blog I thought I could do something similar to it. But, I'm not gonna commit to everyday so I'm calling it SGAMD (Something Good About My Day) yeah both are ugly to read as it's acronym but yeah whatever.

I'm am writing this for yesterday (the 7th of Jan) since I haven't slept yet and it's still that day to me.

Today was a good day. See the thing is I've been needing new bras, and shoes, and clothes etc etc and whenever I try to look on my own I never leave with the things I needed. Other stuff yes, but not the things I need so when I got an email last night (being the 6th) from Dressmart about there sale for Puma sports shoes and Bendon bras it was exactly what I needed. Anyway, I convinced Mum to take us and that was all good and well. Until we got there. It took a while to find the right shoes at Puma because I have awkwardly big (long and wide) feet. So hard to find the right shoe to fit. In the end we found a pair that were size 11! Ridiculous right? But they were great. Nice too. They are white and pink. Best thing about it is that they were only $50 reduced from $100. Bargain hunters :) The other frustrating thing was finding a bra that fit. I hate having a large bust because it means I have to buy expensive bras. And it's just not nice. My mum tells me I should be happy with them cos some people pay to have a bigger bust. I don't know why the heck they do..? Yeah so we couldn't find any in Bendon but after a while Mum helped me find the stuff I needed in like Bras n Things or somethings like that. Yeah my Mum is amazing. I honestly don't know what I'd do without her.

New fav shop: Jeanswest. I like the dresses in there and today I brought two cardigans for $40. They are really cool. Originally they were $50 each so I saved like $60! Score. I also signed up to their customer loyalty membership thingy ma bob. Pretty much so I could get a free $10 voucher off my next purchase :)

Another thing that made my day so great was that Dad shouted us to the movies. We went and saw Tower Heist with Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy in it. It was an awesome movie. So funny. I loved it. And being the little kid I am, while my Mum was buying the tickets i asked her for coins to play on the skill tester machines and she just happened to have spare coins. Yay! So me and my sisters went into the arcade room and spent our $2 each.lol. Mine was wasted on a game I lost at but my Dad won an Eeyore toy and gave it to me so I sat in the cinema with my popcorn and my Eeyore toy. Yeah, I'm cool.

So today was a good day. That's all.

2012!

So I haven't blogged in like a month, and the last time I did post something was to say I'd given up in the whole BEDD (Blog Every Day of December) thing. To be honest that was unrealistic for me and I should've thought that through before committing to it. Anywho, since 2012 has come around oh so quickly I thought I'd just write a blog and tell you (my maybe one/two readers) about my goals or somewhat ambitions for the year.

It seems to be that when January 1st comes around, everyone is talking about New Years Resolutions and what they are gonna do to make there life a whole lot better for the next year. Or the year that they are now in, I think. Yeah, so I didn't really wanna think of any resolutions as in the past I've failed to live up to these ridiculous goals of mine. Sometimes I must think I'm superwoman or something. Anyway, I guess over the last week or so I have been pondering over some 'resolution' like ambitions.

Last year, I went through I lot of stuff. And it taught me things about myself that I needed to learn. Cliche-ish but whatever. So I guess they are based off of these experiences I faced in 2011.

1) To appreciate myself more - Meaning to put myself first (sometimes) and treated myself with the respect/happiness/whateverelseshouldgohere I need. I'm learning to love me. I used to hate the way I looked. My hair. My arms. My legs. And the list goes on.. so yeah this made me really genuinely hate photos. I'd be all keen for a photo then would look at it and think 'ew I look so gross' etc etc. But yeah I think I'm learning to deal with these flaws and I actually like some of the photos that I used to hate now. Yep, so if you see me dissing myself, hit me okay. (Lol, not actually... or maybe haha)

2) Procrastinate less - The reason I say less is because I know I still will procrastinate against stuff but yeah it'll help me do it less. I hope. Pretty much last year (2011) I wasted a lot of time on Facebook or Youtube or just being a bum in my room when I should've been doing homework things or cleaning at home etc. and not that my grades were bad (I hope) but I know they could've been better. I'm talking about internal grades here. I only got like 6 excellence credits and the rest were merit so I was bummed. I hope my externals were good. *fingers crossed* Yep and so in procrastinating less I hope I can get an endorsement for NCEA Level 3 or at least get what I need to get to uni in 2013! (That's scary to think that uni is only pretty much a year from now!!)

3) Get closer to God - it's kinda scary to put this up here cos to be honest for the past few months I feel like I've been sort of disconnected from Him and it's because I've been putting up walls that shut Him out somewhat. It's like I know so much about His word that I could and have been faking it. It's making me cry. I really do miss being close to God. It's hard coming back to Him with everything but I know He loves me. It's funny because He gives me little hints and reminders of how much He cares and this is a whole other post so I'll stop but yeah pretty much He's the man.

4) To be a good role model - Year 13 is obviously gonna bring a lot of pressure with school and stuff but one of my other goals is to be a good role model to the younger girls at AGGS especially Rose since she's starting this year. I want to set a good example to others that will follow after me because I know that last year I probably didn't take my leadership roles too seriously and could've been better. I wanna be the kind of leader that other girls look up to but can also just relate to. I'm not the super intelligent dux-type student but I try hard in my subjects and aim for the best. That's all I can do. I also wanna make sure I stay humble. I realised that I probably talked about becoming a prefect too much last month and yeah that's not how I want this year to be. Yeah so I just wanna be a good leader. Hopefully it all goes well.

5) New Year, New Me - Mum is gonna help me re-do my room which is cool and exciting. And I now have a new desk which is gonna help the procrastinating thing I hope. Another thing she helped me with today was a de-clutter of my wardrobe. I threw a lot of clothes out and have nearly organised everything. Just need to buy a few more things. I wanna lose weight.lol. Yep last resolution, always the same. But I'm determined to at least get to a healthy weight and maybe a nice size figure for the ball.lol. That's my Mum's inspiration to me. And yeah I just wanna do it. Not just for the ball. Let's hope it works. (Gonna add this here cos I don't want six resolutions - to spend less on food and other random things and save more for Aussie in April!)

So yep, feel free to keep me accountable to these goals of mine. Hopefully they will go as planned if not better.

Yay for a new year. For 2012. Year 13. Everything.

Goodbye :)

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!