Thursday, May 20, 2010

I hope you don't mind that I put down in words...

Today is my ONE year anniversary of living in Bellingham. So naturally, it's a good day. I cannot believe how fast time has whirled past me! Wasn't I just in Iowa, hating every minute of it? Wasn't I just packing twenty boxes to ship here? I guess that's the funny thing about time. It goes by so fast when you aren't thinking about it...or you are enjoying everything in the meantime. Which is exactly what I have been doing. Sure, I have had a few hiccups every now and again but the whole experience in Bellingham cannot thoroughly be summed up in words. This picture above is the fabulous South Hill Apartment complex. I live there! You can even see my blinds that are closed in the front. I cannot believe how lucky I was to find this place. Everyone is so kind...well, everyone I know. Don't get mad at me but I don't actually know some of my neighbors. Oops! Either way, the place is located in the cutest neighborhood flooding with children and gorgeous houses! Not to mention it's a two block walk to campus. How convenient! I've loved this place...even if my walls are completely bare and my kitchen is the size of a yoga mat. I've survived! There are worse things...really.
The view behind my building is alright...I guess. It makes it extremely difficult to not be thankful.
I have had several visitors over the past year! I am so glad that my family and friends have been able to see this glorious place. Sure beats those cornfields! Unless you prefer cornfields to mountains, then that statement doesn't pertain to you. You should also seriously reflect about that point of view.
The weather last summer was phenomenal. Almost unreal. If I had a penny for every beautiful sunset, I'd be rich. God's beauty folks.
The experiences I have had here significantly affected my lifestyle and way I see things now. Certainly for the better. I am so thankful for everything that has happened to me in the past year. I have met incredibly people that I will never forget and cannot wait to spend more time with as well as meet more people! School has been...an experience. Mostly fantastic but I cannot lie, it has also been the culprit of some of my worst experiences. But, let's not dwell on that. I'm surrounded by (some) family and friends and therefore, life is great. Don't worry, I miss my family and friends at home. I'm lucky I can travel home every so often to give them hugs and laugh until my belly hurts. There you have it. One year down. Many to go! The Pacific Northwest is not going to get rid of me that fast! They can try, but I put up a pretty good fight.

Finally, I'd like to thank my brother John for coming up with the name of this blog. Not only is it clever and witty in the same way that John's personality is, but it's literally true. Bellingham has saved me. I would have never thought I'd be here several years ago but taking a cross-country leap of faith has made the biggest impact on my life. So thanks John. Thanks, Bellingham.

Best,
Anne



Sunday, May 16, 2010

May I have another weekend, please?


This weekend has been jam packed with obligation after obligation. I wouldn't go ahead and say that it has been terrible but I wouldn't say that it has been fun either. It's okay because that happens every once in awhile. Homework, studying, researching have been piling up in school. I have been extremely busy trying to tackle all of those thrilling tasks. It's especially a blast when the weather is 65 outside and sunny! Saturday was my busiest of days. I woke up at six a.m. and got ready to help set up a garage sale. Our Community Health class has a community service project this quarter. We have to raise $1000 jars of baby food or $1000 dollars for the Food 4 Tots program at the Food Bank. It's incredible how many jars of food babies go through in a week and they are certainly in need of them. We have been doing a number of services but yesterday was the garage sale. I didn't have anything to contribute unfortunately, but I helped set everything up and used my immaculate upper body strength (HA!) to carry desks, tables, bags, microwaves and more. We had way more stuff than I thought we would have! I haven't been to a garage sale in awhile, so I forgot about crazy garage sale goers. Example: A lady walked up at 8am asking if we had books. We had a smallish pile with some textbooks in the mix. All of a sudden she pulls out her hand held scanner and goes through each book and the bar codes to check the prices. Um, excuse me! This is for the children. Can you just pay a dollar per book without seeing what other people are asking for it? She ended up reluctantly shelling out a few dollars. I'm sure she had other motives for those books. Then, another lady (probably her garage sale competition) came looking at the books. She pulled out a scanner TOO! Who are these people? She kindly told us that one of the textbooks we were asking 10 dollars for were going for $9.95 online. Thanks, lady. We ended up making over $500 yesterday! It was successful!

After learning about the garage sale crowd, I headed straight to CPR/First Aid training! I couldn't wait to spend five hours inside on such a fantastically beautiful day! I haven't been CPR certified since high school so I had forgotten a lot of the information but it was much easier to learn this time. I'm older, wiser, and you know...that helps. I can also do those chest compressions like a pro! 1 and 2 and 3 and 4....and 30. Two breaths. Repeat. Currently knocking on wood (or what looks like wood) so that I don't have to give CPR to anyone! Eee! After an exhausting five hours, I headed home. I planned to go for a run but thought I wouldn't make it without a quick nap. The time was 3:30pm. Alarm set for 5:00 pm. Woke up at 7 pm. Oops! How did that happen? Then it was time to catch up on shows that I missed this week, laundry and all of that homework I hadn't had a chance to get to yet. Oh life...

Now it's Sunday and I have a full day of homework and studying with a little Zumba! in between. More on Zumba later...I can talk about that forever. I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and continues to enjoy the rest of it!

Best,
Anne