Spring Break

So my plans still aren't set for spring break... and it begins tomorrow. Now that's what I call procrastination. Or lack of interesting things to do.

I was hoping to take part in Extreme Makeover Home Edition out in eastern NC..but apparently its too late to sign up or something... that baffles me because I feel like they need just about as many people as they could ever ask for. Oh well. If I get to help, I will.

If this falls through though, you better believe I'm not staying in Greenville for long. The mountains are calling me home. I haven't been home since Jan 4th or something like that.... so its due time. But honestly-one of the things I miss the most about home is the beauty all around me. I miss seeing elevation changes for goodness sakes!!

Flatness is not that intriguing. Show me some hillsides and valleys... let me see towering mountains in the distance...as I'm driving down the road, let me get lost in what lies ahead.

Anyone up for a hike next week?

This was taken in Haywood County, NC. So yes. I love the NC mountains. :)

Free time

I tend to make to-do lists while not listening in my classes. I always seem to have about 386 things on each list. Some little, some normal, some major. I try to refer back to it throughout my day and try to get as many things checked off during free time as possible. Unfortunately I often don't have much free time, so the things that don't happen every day don't get done for a long time. Today I was making a list in 3290 and really didn't see much time in my day to get these things done.
But amazingly everything else for the rest of my day disappeared!
-My group project meeting got moved
-Normal babysitting was canceled
-Babysitting for ECU Coach's Wives' Night Out was canceled
-I was reminded we didn't have bible study this week

Wow! So I was able to fit in some important things!
-Got ice cream with 2 girls from SCHS--one of which I just met then and there. (She came with a girl I already knew)
-Went and visited my previous campus minister, Kerri, and held her little 1 month old baby
-Chatted with the lovely Sara Jennings at her apt
-Got dinner and caught up on life with CJ
-Cleaned my room

And now I am about to do my summer staff application.
Ah, its SO nice, and SO rare for me to have free time. I need to cherish it. And I do love updating a blog. :)

Out of the mouths of babes

I love hearing the comments that come out of the mouths of kids! They can be soo funny and a wonderful source of continuous entertainment. This week I got a few good doses of laughter from the boys I babysit. Here are a few that truly made my days:

I called Jennie, an amazing woman on my YL team, to wish her a happy birthday. I ended up leaving a message on her voicemail, and in the midst of it said that I had tried to get Flo-Rida to come perform for her, but he was all booked. (She loves some Flo-Rida). After I hung up, Mac (9 years old) says, "How did you get Flo-Rida's phone number? I laughed and said that I was just joking when I said that. He said, "Oh (pause.....) Will SHE know that its a joke?"

The next day (when the dictionary incident occured--see previous entry) Mac was asking me if I could help him on his homework once we got home. This is normal since I help him most days, but the way he asked me wasn't..."Miss Baird, are you like a dicitionary?" "Umm..what do you mean like a dictionary." "You know, are you like a dictionary, do you know a lot of stuff?"

Precious precious.

Seriously Pitt County??

So maybe I was just spoiled with what I felt like was a very solid preparation for college...
Sure I will be partial to my alma mater of good old Shelby High (especially compared to nasty Crest... :0) Love you roomie) but I legitimately feel like I got a solid education through what was the Shelby City School system and later joined to become the Cleveland County School system. I always enjoyed school; and felt that it was preparing me well for later ventures in education (minus calculus and AP chem which I knew wouldn't help with anything).
But thinking back to elementary school, I really enjoyed learning and enjoyed my teachers. Now that I am babysitting a boy in 4th grade, I can't help but compare our educations at that age...and there seems to be little to compare, but A LOT to contrast. Granted its a different time and his days would focus on xbox and killing people on call of duty, when you take that out of the picture, his schooling is very much subpar. He's a bright kid when you sit and talk with him, but when he does his homework, he knows nothing. He can't read a passage and then tell me what its about. He can't think of creative sentences for his spelling words. It scares me on how little he is being challenged. I feel that if his teacher wants him to write a sentence with the word revive, she needs to take off points if he writes: My friend was revived. That doesn't show any thought or effort!! But he gets away with it. My reason for writing an entire blog post on this subject is because of what happened yesterday. He didn't know the meaning of a word, so I suggested that he looked it up in the dictionary. He got the dictionary and then came back to me 5 minutes later saying he couldn't find the word. In fact, he wasn't able to find any of his 6 spelling words in the dictionary. THE KID IS IN 4th GRADE AND HASN'T BEEN TAUGHT HOW TO USE A DICTIONARY!!! Heaven forbid! He said that he has yet to learn how to do that in school.. but later said, actually, they taught him 2 years ago, but he hasn't used one since.
Come on Pitt County. Please prepare your kids to make it through the school system without using their parents as crutches. College is going to crush them.

Katie started it.

The lovely Katie Smith has tagged me in a blog ordeal dealio thing where you post the fourth picture in your fourth album and say something about it. I have done so because she tagged me. (Which I feel very honored for because she could only choose 2 people and I know she's a popular gal.)
Sorry its not more exciting... its just my face... but its my face surrounded by LONG curly hair. This was during the year that I was growing my hair out for locks of love and I would take pictures to document the process.... not for anyone else to see... but oh well, guess that's changing now. This was taken August 31st, 2007. I straightened it this day to also see how long it was straight. I got it all chopped off in late November.
I guess I can tie this into my weekend plans... I am getting a hair cut on Saturday. Happy Valentine's Day Aaron! You get my short hair back. :)


And I tag Kristen and Blair.

Psalm 62

Psalm 62:2 Truly he is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken.

This was part of my devotional this morning, and I have already seen it working. Mondays are usually the most hectic days of my week... and this one was shaping up to be even more hectic with usual with a lot of last minute complications with club... but God is steadfast and always by our sides. To show me that he will not let me be shaken or thrown down like a leaning wall or tottering fence (v. 3) he has given me the day off from babysitting.. freeing up 2.5 hours, and let me out of Neuroscience 30 minutes early to get things done here.

Verse 2 is repeated in verse 6.. just to remind us and emphasize that nothing will bring us down with God as our rock.

Trust in him at all times, you people; pour out your hearts to him, for God is our refuge. (62:8)

A day with....

ALI JO!

Today has been a crazy day. Long.. and it had an early start...let me walk you through it.

I woke up at 6:15 to take a shower and get dressed to head out the door at 6:45. You see I had to be at the Young Life office at 7am to carpool to Raleigh. Young Life had our regional leader and committee training day. I got to see SO many lovely people that I have met throughout the years in young life...and of course they are such fun people. The day was so rejuvenating and wonderful. Exactly what the doctor ordered. Fellowship coupled with lessons of our ministry is a combo you just can not go wrong with. :)

On the way home Ali Jo and I chatted a lot and per usual with her, it was so so wonderful. We had decided the previous day that we would go to the basketball game tonight, so we added in plans for cooking dinner too! We fixed up some pasta with mixed in veggies. So delish. :) We headed to the game against UCF...which we WON. Go Pirates. The game was loads of fun. Sitting with all sorts of different friends and just loving life each second. Now we will say that UCF has some poor sports on their team and they should learn to play a little less... elbow-y. Haha.

Since we got SOO hot during the game, Ali and I decided we were going to get milkshakes from cookout after the game. We brought Aaron along for that fun as well. Now I'm at home for a shake of a lambs tail before heading over to 202 with guess who.... ALI.

I love this girl and she is such a blessing to me. I love how whereever our conversation ended, we can pick back up on life no matter how long it is between our dates and hangouts. I just wanted to share how blessed my life was today being able to be with her from 6:45am to now.. with only about 2 hours without her within my reach.