thankfulness

i stole this from LT's blog....i LOVE lists and i also have so much to be thankful for, so i knew this would be fun to do!

my ABC's of THANKSGIVING

Abraham Lincoln. he was a very good man...wish we still had a President like him.

my Beach House. coming home to the beach is consistently the best part of my day.

Christmas. both for the festivities and for the reason we celebrate it.

The Davidsons- my Virginia Beach family (and best friends)

Erik. the most amazing boyfriend in the entire world. (even though he refuses to read my blog)

Food. any and all.

God. He's so good to me.

the Hollands. I have the coolest family.

my Immune System...it fought off MONO...and won.

Juris Doctor (J.D.)---> my official title/degree in only year and a half!

Kids. i love everything about them.

Lentz Bergethon, LLP....my law firm. they make work exciting.

Music. worshiping, running, driving, sleeping, studying...it is vital for every activity in my life.

New Beginnings.

Ozark. that place changed my life.

Panera. one of the only reasons i made it through my first year of law school (free wifi, unlimited coffee, french onion soup)

Queso. (see also, F and T)

Regent Law School. good professors, beautiful campus, encouraging classmates.
Seasons. i love the way everything changes every once in a while.

TEXAS. my future domicile.

U. if you are reading this, there is a good chance we're close friends....so thank U for being in my life.

Vegas...Starkvegas, that is.

Winter Clothes. i LOVE dressing warm in cold weather- boots, coats, sweats, scarves, etc.

X-rays. It found my appendicitis last year (just in time, so that i didn't die of a ruptured appendix!) it's a stretch i know...but i'm still thankful for it!

Younglife. my girls are SO AWESOME.

Zzzzzs...although rare with my schedule, i love it when i actually get more than like 5 hours of sleep at a time.

happy thanksgiving, everyone! gobble gobble.

i'm alive, in case anyone cares...

imagine the scene:

i wake up on a miserable thursday morning (as in, the weather outside was miserable), with one thing on my mind- i have to finish a massive research brief before this day is over, and i still haven't packed for NYC, and we are leaving at the crack of down the next day. as i grab my phone to turn the alarm off, i notice that i have 5 new emails- each informing me that school is cancelled---due to the huge storm is currently hitting Virginia Beach. my first thoughts: SWEET, no school, i can spend all day on my paper! my second thoughts: wait, what storm?? Fast forward 30 minutes...sitting on my bed, papers spread all over the place, laptop open...ready to knock this paper out. and BAM- our power goes out. Now what!? No big deal, I have a Mac- these things have an incredible battery life...I should be good for at least a couple more hours before i have to move to another location. Fast forward 15 more minutes...my roommates bust into my room and inform me that we have to EVACUATE my house/the beach within the next hour or else we wont be able to make it out at all the rest of the weekend (due to heavy wind/flooding...., i live ON the beach....the waves were enormous at that point). SERIOUSLY, is this really happening!? all i can think about is finishing this stupid paper, and i still have to pack for the entire weekend before i leave the house- within the hour! I get up, shove all of my books/papers into my bag, grab every suitcase i own and throw almost every jacket, sweater, scarf, boots, and pair of jeans in my closet into them. Pretty sure i set a world record both for "the most clothes fit into a suitcase for one weekend" and the time in which i did it. So i get all 7 bags (seriously) down my 4 flights of stairs, move my car to the garage, and James finally pulls up to get me (he has an SUV and didn't want me driving my car on the roads in the crazy weather) all before our "evacuation time" has elapsed...craziest hour of my life i think. we make it safely to the Lodge- which fortunately had power the entire day- and i can FINALLY sit still and and work my paper! As the day goes on, the backyard of the Lodge begins to flood (as in, the docks were floating around IN the yard) and the boys spend all day wading out into the yard...just to "check the water level" (as if they can't tell just by looking out the window?!) Around dinner time, we think we should brave the storm because we are hungry and there is no food in the house. We get in James's SUV, pass VERY slowly through the raging waters flooding into the road from the lake-which Ryan happily stripped down to his boxers to wade out into to check the actual depth-and we MAKE IT OUT!! we are so proud of ourselves.....we fought the Nor'easter....and we have conquered it.

our victory dinner was held at "Just George's," my new favorite restaurant in VB.

so i finished my paper late that night, re-packed my clothes for NYC before going to bed, and we were able to safely make it out of the city around 8:30 am the next morning (after the bridges opened up again). we arrived in the Big Apple about 10 hours later (due to traffic and a GPS malfunction), ready for a much needed vacation from Virginia Beach and the Nor'easter!!

The weekend was SO wonderful- tons of sight-seeing, eating, walking, laughing, and hang-time with some of my favorite people in the world. I'm already ready to go back- hopefully next time, the preparation for the trip wont be quite so stressful!

i heart november.

november has always been my favorite month of the year, mainly because of my birthday (the 22nd) and thanksgiving, but november this year has been/will continue to be exceptionally great. Every single weekend of this month holds something exciting for me. Beginning with this past weekend- the first full weekend of the month- all of the Younglife schools from Virginia Beach went on Fall Weekend in Rockbridge, VA. It was THE BEST weekend- there were beautiful mountains and trees all around the (really fine) camp, i got tons of hang-time with my high school girls, had some pretty amazing conversations, and ate way more than any human being should. I got about seven hours of sleep-TOTAL-the entire weekend and ZERO amount of school work done, but it was so worth it. Now for the only sucky part of the month- I have a huge research brief due on Friday that I still have SO much to get done on, but I know it will all work out- it always does.

Then onto the next fun weekend- I am going to New York City this weekend!! I have never been before, and I had been telling some of my friends that I really wanted to go one weekend for my birthday since it's only about a 6 and 1/2 hour drive from VB. Well, wouldn't ya know it, Erik just happened to already be going this weekend anyway to attend the Queens Film Festival- how convenient! He wrote a screenplay a while back and submitted it to the Film Festival, and he got chosen as a FINALIST- which means he gets 10 free V.I.P. passes to the Festival/after-parties in NYC. Not only did he give me and some of our friends the passes, but he got us two hotel rooms IN Times Square for the weekend! I cant even concentrate on life right now because I am so excited...He wont find out if he won or not until the awards ceremony on Sunday, but I have read over it some and I think he has a really good shot at winning something. Baller.

To continue my best-month-of-my-life streak, the very next weekend is my birthday! As most of you know, my birthday celebrations last at LEAST a week...my amazing friends have already started planning a huge party and Erik is coming too!! I have talked E into running in a 5K (to benefit adoption) at Regent that Saturday morning, which I am sure we will make into quite a show. I should probably start training for that. nah.

And of course, to finish off the best month ever, THANKSGIVING is the following week! Although I will be studying most of the weekend, I am going to be participating in any and all food-related events all over Va Beach and watching football whenever I can...especially the Egg Bowl. GTHOM.

so i say this with as much enthusiasm as possible.....HAPPY NOVEMBER!!!!!!

what's that smell?

yes, i was a skunk for halloween.

it was the best/worst idea for a costume ever. best because it is just so funny- i mean that's not a typical costume that runs through one's head in trying to decide what to be for halloween. and worst because for whatever reason, the weather decided to be all crazy and it was 80-ish degrees all day and night. i was BURNING UP in that thing. i took it half-way off after about 30 minutes of dancing (mostly because that dancing was to Miley Cirus-on repeat-and i was literally jumping up and down for a straight half hour) but managed to keep it somewhat on for most of the night just because i didnt want to not have a costume on at our party. We had the party at the Lodge, the now-annual Halloween party location for Regent students. There was a really good mix of all of the classes from our school there, and even some randoms that didnt go to Regent. An overall successful night. Ryan did manage to sprain his ankle at some point during our "Party in the USA" dance-off, and he has been milking his injury all week by hobbling around school on crutches, trying to find compassionate girls to feel sorry for him. I have zero compassion because he keeps telling people I caused the injury. Really, Ryan? whatever.

but back to my costume...the best part was the time-released airwick air freshener we attached to my back....we set it to "poof" every 10 minutes. I think I got light-headed smelling the vanilla scent that followed me around everywhere all night. i dropped it about 8 times throughout the night (mostly while dancing) and so we had to fix it alot, but I came in the house the next day to help clean up, and as soon as I saw it laying on floor in the corner, it poofed! good to know it's still keeping the Lodge smelling nice- it sure did need it!

fixing the "poofer," as it was affectionately called all night.