Hi, I'm Nicholas // Scholarship Competitions Are Hard

Did I mention that I competed for money last Saturday? No? Well, I did.  As a senior in high school, I'm currently behind the game (as usual) and still trying to figure out where (or if) I want to go to college next year.  I've applied to schools with 3,000 students and schools with 40,000 students and considered running away for a gap year in Africa to avoid making a decision do mission work.  I've yet to make a decision or even to lean noticeably in any one direction, so I'm keeping my options really diverse and wide open.

I'm quickly learning that "keeping my options open" involves making sure that all of the schools I apply to want give me a ton of money, because college is sinfully expensive.  I mean, from what I understand, you could mortgage pretty much your entire life and still not have enough dollars to get yourself a degree. Thus, hours upon hours of essay writing, online form filling outing, and whirlwind trips to various colleges to interview with faculty and charm their wallets empty. 

I've spend several weekends firmly planted on my couch, doing college things and drinking literally pitchers full of Crystal Light lemonade and eating cheese / caramel popcorn for every meal.  That's one way of doing it, and very effective, especially when you include the cheese / caramel popcorn (crack.) Last weekend, however, the money-making strategy was to drive across the state to Grand Valley, where, among other things, we were supposed to interview with two faculty members and leave such a lasting impression that they just couldn't resist handing us a free college experience.

 

I don't know about you, but events that could potentially influence MY ENTIRE LIFE, forever, make me kind of nervous.  After a big, fancy lunch spent listening to overzealous parents talk about strategies for making a good impression on our interviewers (people form their opinion of you in the first five seconds they know you, apparently, and you should always have a question when they ask, "Any questions?), us victims  students were divided into groups and herded towards different areas of the campus. As my guide brought a group of about ten scholarship hopefuls, including me, to our appointed interview spots, my palm started sweating profusely.  Just my right hand, the one you use to shake the hands of people who have lots of money to give you.  Sweaty palms are off-putting, so I wiped it off on my pants leg and tried to hear our guide over the sound of my pounding heart as she called off a name at each door, dropping a student off with his or her interviewers.  As each person was called and went into an office to try and get money, the group got smaller and I got more nervous. 

I Promise I'm More Socially Awkward Than You // Sadie Hawkins Throwback

This week is a pretty exciting one.  No, you're not missing a national holiday or any big news, sorry.  Generally, there's not much going on. In my high school version of life, though, things couldn't get much more festive, and I absolutely love it when things are festive.  It's Sadies Week where I go to school, which means that there's a dance on Saturday and that the intervening time is going to be spent dressing up for themed days, competing in school-wide assemblies, and making last-minute plans for Sadie Hawkins.  I can't wait. 

By my fourth time through, I'm counting on Sadie Hawkins being kind of a walk in the park.  I'm planning on hanging out with some of my closest friends before and after and bringing a date that I know I like being around, both of which usually help things to go pretty smoothly.  I'm planning on keeping awkward moments to a minimum and enjoying myself, which you'd think would be a given.  If you were to stalk back through my Facebook timeline (like I may have just done), however, it would tell you a different story.  Apparently, I like to subject myself to unnecessarily difficult / awkward situations, especially when the first weekend in February rolls around every year.  In honor of finally getting Sadie's right, let's take a walk down memory lane and take a look at all the ways I've gotten it wrong.  It's okay to laugh. 

Please enjoy this 8th grade webcam selfie.  #nofilter.

Freshman Year // February, 2012

My first ever Sadie Hawkins started out a little rough - as in, from the moment I asked my date to the dance.  After a lot of thinking and Google searching (to absolutely no avail - thanks, Google) I'd decided to put the poor kid through a rigorous scavenger hunt involving an extensive tour of the school and as many friends and teachers as I could possibly involve.  Everything went well until the last teacher dropped the ball and forgot the tell him to go to the courtyard, where I was waiting to pop the invitation.  End result: I was forced to duck inside, motion for him to come meet me, and go back out to my post to act like nothing had gone wrong.  He said yes with an audience of at least fourteen excited freshman girls watching it all through the huge cafeteria windows.  

The actual dance was mostly uneventful, if you don't bring up a close call involving our waitress and a butter knife when we were out to dinner before hand. So I don't usually bring that up. 

Most of the pictures turned out like this, so that's fun.

Sophomore Year // February, 2013

I think I succeeded at being awkward the best this year.  For reasons that I will never understand, I decided to ask a boy who I'd only ever talked to once in my life to go with me.  Bad. No. Ugh, I cringe just writing about it. I mean, physical pain. The things I do for this blog, I tell ya. Since I'd rarely talked to him before, I sought outside intelligence in the form of the school gossip, who told me he'd say yes, which he did.  So far, so good. 

There's a tradition at my high school of matching t-shirts with your date to Sadie Hawkins.  I had plans to go T-shirt shopping with my date after school the Friday before Sadie's, but we ended up having a snow day, which turned into my dad driving me around on really unsafe roads in search of a shirt to wear at almost the last minute.  It was an endless cycle of rocking our minivan back and forth to get it out of the snow, driving to the next store, tearing through every T-shirt rack with reckless intensity, frantically taking pictures of every possible candidate and sending them to a carefully chosen jury of friends, loved ones, and certified fashion experts, and leaving in my wake a store that looked like it had endured war rather than an emotionally unstable teenage girl.  

By the time we'd seen (and wrecked) more than enough boutiques, custom T-shirt stands, and department stores for both of us, my dad and I were both ready to get home and decided that this store would be our last stop, even if they didn't sell T-shirts at all.  (Don't worry; they had T-shirts.  I didn't have to go to Sadie Hawkins shirtless.)  I'd just begun my usual unfolding - and - rejecting number when I found it.  The shirt.  It was black, and said "YOLO" on it, except one of the Os had been replaced with a peanut butter cup.  Why was this shirt perfect, you ask? Well, it just so happened that my date was allergic to peanut butter.  Like, deathly allergic.  Please tell me you see the irony in that?  Sadistic? Maybe.  But funny.  A Reese's cup was definitely a YOLO kind of thing for him, and my deranged, overworked brain found that hilarious.  

I have not other photographic evidence of the YOLO shirt, because it hurts too much.  Special thanks to Photo Grid for helping me to protect my friends' identities.

Also, the shirts only came in girls' cuts, AKA short sleeves, a much slimmer fit, and a lower neckline.  I bought him an extra large, but the feminine-ness was still painfully obvious. He commented at one point that if he hadn't had a shirt on underneath, I'd be able to see cleavage.  He was probably right.  So, there's that. 

To make matters worse, he didn't get the joke. Not even close. 

Did I mention that bowling comes invariably with school dances?  I'd like to think that I've gotten more mature when it comes to bowling, but the truth is that I usually get frustrated after my fifth gutter ball and start pouting, because what competition is fun when you're not winning?

Junior Year // February 2014

Actually, last year may have been my most successful Sadie Hawkins yet.  I actually knew my date and we had a good time and I was wise enough to buy mens t-shirts. The only awkward thing that came into play there was the fact that I volunteered us to go out before the dance with a friend and his date, who he didn't know very well at all, for moral support.  You guys, never, ever, ever let me volunteer myself to help make your social situation less awkward.  If you need someone to stand silently in the kitchen with your date, petting your dog and making the occasional completely irrelevant, off-the-wall comment while you talk to your date's parents and siblings your own parents and siblings all at once,  I'm your girl.  If you need someone to actually make the encounter smoother and less stressful, please pick someone else.  Please. 

Senior Year // February 2015

Who knows.  With Sadie's two days away, I'm planning on bringing a date but have get to ask him, buy t-shirts, or even make plans for how to ask him.  I'd say that there's a lot of potential for good / embarrassing stories in that.  

I'll let you know how it goes!

Allie

Alright, spill it.  Any embarrassing school dance stories?  I'd even be open to made up ones, if you think it would make me feel less alone.  

P.S. Linking up with Nicolefor Treat Yo'self Thursday! 

The Time I Got Trapped in the Meijer Bathroom // Survival 101

Pre-post half hearted apology note:  Meijer, I'm sorry that you struggle with bathroom maintenance.  I'm sure that, most of the time, your bathrooms are well cared for and prepared to be used; I probably just came at a bad time.  Please don't take this personally. 

I generally choose not to believe most of what I hear about public restrooms because, well, sometimes I have to go.  When I'm in public.  And if I knew everything there is to know about public restrooms AND BELIEVED IT, I'd probably never use one again, which would add a lot of unnecessary discomfort to my life.  I choose not to believe that I can get diseases from the toilet seat or that the soap dispenser is teeming with germs, and, as of today, what I do or don't know hasn't hurt me.  Most of the time, I'd recommend ignoring most unreasonable warnings and just going to the bathroom.

And then yesterday happened.  No, I didn't get a deadly disease from the toilet seat - that warning can still be ignored.  I just got trapped inside the bathroom stall.  Let me explain.

I had just stopped at my local Meijer to buy some produce.  Dun dun duuuuuuun.  I'd had a bottle of water and cup of coffee on the way (it's a 10-minute drive - don't ask me how that happened) and so obviously the bathroom had to come first.  I headed to the very clearly marked bathroom, which was otherwise unoccupied giving me free reign to choose the absolute cleanest, most sanitary stall available.  It wasn't until it was too late that I realized I had made the wrong choice.  My stall was out of toilet paper. 




I was trapped!  What was I supposed to do?  It was every bit as horrible as it sounds.  I asked out loud if there was anyone else in the bathroom, hoping that someone else had come in or had been hiding when I first arrived.  Nope.  I tried to send a text to my friend who was at Meijer with me.  Did you know that T-Mobile doesn't cover the Meijer bathroom?  No again.  I started considering other options.  Would it be better to crawl under the divider between the two stalls or to make a mad dash around the outside?  Maybe I could reach far enough to grab some toilet paper from the stall next to me. 


Fortunately, just as I was preparing to execute my best plan of action (run into the stall next to me as quickly as possible seemed like the winner so far) my text miraculously sent and my friend came and saved the day.  We decided that there is most definitely a market for travel-sized toiled paper in case of emergency, thanks to our school janitor and Meijer.  Next time you use a public restroom, don't worry about how gross it is; worry about whether you'll be able to get out or not! Or bring a friend.  You're welcome.


Allie

The Petsmart Police // Fish Tales

Sometimes in life, you just need something to live for; something to keep you going and to make you excited to jump out of bed every morning.  For the last few weeks, the prospect of getting to have a pet fish to keep at school has been that something for me, and I'm only exaggerating a little.  From the day that my physics teacher threw out the idea,  I've been thinking about the kind of fish I want (the big cheek kind) and carefully choosing a name (Darnell).

  I patiently waited while my teacher found a tank, fixed a crack in it, let it "cure" (which I'm pretty sure was just some kind of test, because I swear that thing cured for weeks), and did the many, many other things that have to happen in order to turn a glass box into a home for fishes.   Many, many, many things.  You don't even know.

So, after weeks of waiting, the tank was finally ready and I had a free evening to head to Petsmart and pick up my new big-cheeked fish, AKA Darnell AKA my new best friend.  I had plans to meet a friend there for a regular fish buying partay, because such a momentous occasion shouldn't be experienced alone.  I was headed out the door, keys in hand, when I received a text. 

 "Ok . . . I have bad news, none of the fish have big cheeks." 

Usually, "None of the fish have big cheeks," wouldn't be incredibly devastating . . . except it was.  I had my heart set on big cheeked Darnell AND HE WASN'T THERE.  So I sat down in the doorway and bawled my eyes out in self-pity and refused to go to Petsmart.  Okay, actually we were eating dinner so we agreed to try again the next day and I stayed home and drowned my misery in garlicky chicken noodle vegetable stuff, which worked pretty well.  

Fast forward 24 hours to the second attempt.  We both made it to Petsmart without any break downs, (okay, that was only really an accomplishment for me) and I got right down to the business of picking out Darnell.  There weren't any huge cheek fish, but I was kind of expecting that so it didn't set me back too far.  I'm assuming that you don't really want to hear about the whole fish-picking process, so I'll just tell you that it's harder than you think because apparently some fish are jerks and like to eat their tank mates, so you can't buy them no matter how pretty they are.  I mean, you don't want all of the other fish owners to hate you.  The bottom line is that I settled on a super cool clear fish and started calling it Darnell and bonding with it.  That was my mistake. 

I had my fish all picked out and couldn't be happier, so we went and found the fish lady and asked her to please scoop Darnell out of his fish prison and send him on his way to a much happier life.  That's when the real trouble started.  The fish lady apparently wasn't parting with Darnell without a fight, because she proceeded to interrogate us.

"How big is the tank?"

"Does it have water in it?"

"Are there any other fish in there?"

"Are you ready to become a fish parent?"

"Have you ever been to jail?"

And I mean I haven't ever even been to jail, but that woman would. not. let. me. buy. THE FISH.  I was all "Can I have that super cool clear one named Darnell down at the end there?" and she was all, "NO because I don't trust you and 10 gallons of water is obviously not big enough for more than one fish are you crazy?"  At which point my memory started to become more clear and I recalled that the tank miiiiight be 20 gallons instead of 10 . . . or were there actually two tanks instead of one?  No matter what I told her, fish lady held her ground.  I mean, Darnell must have been her favorite fish out of the 500+ that she was responsible for, because she was not letting me have him.  And so we bought this buggy eyed black goldfish and I didn't get Darnell and we left.  You guys, it was so disappointing, and now all I can do about it is sit here fishless and pour my heart out.  And also warn you all to never, ever, EVER try to buy a fish from Petsmart.

Love,
Allie

How to Take Painless, Beautiful Homecoming Photos // Photo Journal

Hello?  Anyone there?  Like, oh, I don't know, the blogger who is supposed to be responsible for posting words here five days a week?   I don't know what you might have heard, but I am not dead, sick and about to become dead, or even without internet access.  You were worried, I know.  Let's just blame my little hiatus on homecoming week and not get to exasperated with me for it, okay?   Life got a little full of hallway decorating and football game attending, and then Saturday I obviously had to spend the entire day getting ready for homecoming: nails, hair, make up, Pinterest, chocolate . . . it's all part of the process!

Actually, I didn't really care that much about what I looked like at the dance as much as I did pictures.  Those pictures are going to be around forever and ever, and darn it if I wasn't going to do my part to make them perfect!  I called on a few Youtube tutorials for a makeover, had a friend over to do my hair, and spent the morning painting, removing, and retouching nail polish.  I tried on my dress fourteen times.  Pictures were bound to be, well, picture perfect, right? I kind of think so.  Since I'm kind of a pro at pictures now, without further ado (drumroll, please) my guide to on how to take painless, beautiful homecoming pictures.

Start things off right by arriving to pictures with gum in your mouth.  That way, you can have lots of pictures with an I'm-sticking-my-gum-to-the-roof-of-my-mouth face.

                                                     

The key to a gorgeous pictures is a natural, relaxed smile.  You can accomplish this look by either by actually falling asleep for maximum relaxation (left) or casually laughing with a friend while having absolutely no idea that your picture is being taken (right).

A few candid shots always make a nice addition, and pictures taken while you're speaking flatter just about everyone.

Posture is everything.  Options range from the skinny arm pose (left) to the squatting / preparing to throw leaves pose.  

 Make sure you like your date.  If you don't, it will definitely show up in the pictures.  Fortunately, my date was pretty fantastic.

(I didn't really go with my little sister.  We're not allowed to bring anyone who isn't at least in high school.)

Be an original!  Everyone else is looking to the center as requested? Look to the outside.  It's that easy.

Bring props.  Prep a serious face for some seriously good photo ops. 

On the other hand, if you're not a serious-picture person, admit defeat and embrace it.

At the very least, try to take some cool jumping pictures.  I, for one, love a good jumping photo, and they're really fun to take!

When you succeed, make sure to be as immodest as humanly possible.  In front of all of your friends' parents who show up to take photos.  And their grandparents, it they chose to bring those.  And their brothers' girlfriends.  And all of the people who happened to be walking through the park.

Just know that jumping photos are risky.

If you're someone who has a short attention span, bring along a friend who also has a short attention span as well as a form of entertainment.

Okay, I promise that not all of my pictures involved me with gum on the roof of my mouth or avoiding taking pictures with my actual date my little sister.  They actually turned out really, really well (don't act so surprised; I'm obviously a professional with a bright future in the modeling arts) and homecoming was a blast!  It was definitely the perfect last homecoming of my high school career.  Um, now please excuse me while I go cry about that for the seventeenth time.

Allie

I Cry Over Spilled Water // First Day of High School Horrors

So, as you can see here and here and here, I'm obsessed with blogging about school starting lately.  I'm trying to face my fears head on, and I really see no reason to stop because I'm all about fueling my obsessions and ignoring all attempts at "balance."

I started my senior year of high school yesterday, and thinking about that reminded me of my horrible first day of freshman year.  Okay, horrible first few hours.  It was rough.  So, because blogging is cheaper than therapy or whatever, I should probably handle it and just blog it all out.  Thanks, you all, for being my therapists.

The day started off innocently enough with pictures in front of this lovely tree in our front yard that has faithfully backgrounded our first-day-of-school pictures for the last 12+ years of my life.

(I was planning on putting my first day of school picture from freshman year right here, but it's trapped inside my mom's old, dead computer so I'm really sorry about that.  You can just look at this one from last year if you want.  It's the same tree and the same people, so it seems like basically the same thing to me!)

I had my backpack all ready to go with all my brand new binders and pencils and scrapbooked pictures to hang in my brand new locker, which, by the way, I learned how to open like a pro.  Being the super prepared student that I am, I even had my brand spanking new, customized (with a Sharpie, whatever) JV volleyball water bottle, filled to the brim with ice water, stashed in my backpack to hydrate.  I mean, I was kind of adorable.  Unfortunately, the lid-bottle connection part of that water bottle had a mind of its own and was a prankster and thought it would be fun to randomly detach itself.  AND IT DID IT.

It would have been less horrible if I'd have noticed it an hour before I left, but I obviously didn't. That evil drip didn't show itself until I was en route to the car.  I opened my backpack up, and there were like two inches of water in the bottom, making a mess and dripping all over everything and drowning all my new supplies and ruining the cute binder covers and scrapbooked pictures that I had worked so hard on.

 You had better believe that I got a little teary about that sitiation.  So teary, in fact, that my mom forced me to use    offered me one of her purses to carry my stuff in for the day.  It actually matched my carefully-chosen first day of high school skirt really well, come to think of it, but at the time I was just terrified that I was going to be pegged as The Girl Who Carries Her Books in a Purse forever and ever, amen.  And that, my friends, is the stuff of  X-rated horror movies and terrifying nightmares.

I kind of got over the purse thing (not really, because X-rated, remember? X.) and allowed myself to be taken to school.  I walked in with my heart beating with all the cardiac muscle power it could muster and began the task of trying to remember which of the four hallways in the entire school had my locker in it, which is harder than it sounds.  I mean, I had looked for that thing for a good ten minutes without finding it.  Understandably, I began to lose hope. The freshman hallway obviously did not exist.

  I couldn't even find another person I knew, much less another freshman.  I'd walked into school with my friend who was on crutches and in an immobilizer at the time, but she had somehow gotten away.  I kind of wandered aimlessly around, asking for a girl on crutches under the pretext of "wanting to help her."  Ha, ha.  I'm sure everyone could tell that I was the one in desperate need of help.

Fortunately, my wandering eventually landed me right in front of my locker, from which point I found a friend who had all the same classes as me and followed her around for the rest of the day.

  That worked out well.  I'd recommend that. I'm pretty sure the rest of the day worked out fine and I returned home, thoroughly exhausted and prematurely jaded toward high school.  And here we are.  Senior year, and, if nothing else, I no longer carry my water bottle inside my backpack.

Allie

P.S. I can't be the only one - any memorable first day of school stories?          

Free Stuff Isn't Free // Trying To Use Birthday Coupons

So, if you follow me on Twitter, this little life update may have shown up in your feed yesterday:

This was me trying to set myself up to live tweet about the 340845 places that I would get free food from because it was my birthday.  I Googled up a list of over one hundred places that would give me free stuff for officially being a year older and then chose five or six that are pretty close to my house, figuring that I'd be gone and back in about an hour with the car overflowing with free coffee, ice cream, subs, and stir-fry meals.

After convincing my little sister that, yes, she did want to ride around with my while I got free birthday food and ate it in front of her, I headed for my first destination:  Baskin Robbins.  BR promised me a free 2.5 ounce scoop of ice cream on my birthday and I had the coupon to prove it, so I was pretty confident as we waded through the parking lot as fast as we could to avoid the rain.  I walked in and smelled the smell of ice cream shop, which, for those of you who haven't had the pleasure of smelling it, is pretty delicious.  When I walked in, the ice cream lady was helping another customer, so I scouted out my options and laid my eyes on the most delicious, chocolatey ice cream I have ever seen.  And then the other customers left and it was time for me to get 2.5 ounces of it for free.  I was so excited, so full of hope, so completely sure that free ice cream was headed my way. . . (foreshadowing)

"Hi! Do you do the whole free ice cream on your birthday thing?"

"No."

Oh.  OH.  I don't thing I said any words; I just kind of walked out of there, secretly steaming at the ice cream lady.  How DARE her Basking Robbin's not participate in the free birthday ice cream promotion? Why was she so mean?  She was trying to ruin my birthday!

As disappointing as that was,  I'm not one to give up on free food that easily.  I had my dad's word that Biggby gives you free coffee on your birthday, even if you show up with no coupon and no legal ID.   We drove a little further away from home, country radio blasting and wind shield wipers in a frenzy.  We sloshed through another parking lot and I approached another cashier with slightly less confidence.

"Um, hi.  I heard that you get free ice cream here if it's your birthday?"

"You do if you're registered! Is it your birthday?"

"Yeah . . . I'm not registered.  That's disappointing.  It's okay."

The two Biggby cashiers proceeded to feel appropriately sorry for me as I hung my head and walked out the door.  It was so sad.  I thought I was going to cry, true story.   I guess once I get set on something, it's really hard to give it up.

Brooke and I sat down in the car to regroup.  I checked my email, desperately searching for birthday freebie offers, and WHAT DID I SEE but five free dollars from Menchie's!  Which is froyo.  Which I love.  Brooke transformed into my copilot and informed me that the nearest Menchie's was twenty minutes away, which was obviously a small distance to travel for five glorious dollars worth of free froyo.  So we drove, and it was still rainy.  And at one point we were stopped at a red light because that's the law and I was dancing to the song on the radio because I was so overjoyed about my free froyo.  And then I looked up and apparently the guy in the truck next to us thought that show was for him, because he was just staring away and laughing.  The nerve.  Of course, that light proceeded to be red for about the next five years, giving me a change to act really sophisticated and erase all memories of the dancing that had just been going on.

Anyway, when the light turned green we got to go to Menchie's.  I grabbed myself a cup and eyeballed five dollars worth of mint - iced coffee swirl, which I easily paid for with my five free birthday dollars.  Except my eyeballs were a little off, because I had only spent $2.50.  After demolishing my froyo, I decided that, it being my birthday and all, I'd shell out the other $2.50 for Brooke to get a cup of her own.  She was super happy and concocted herself a mix of lemon yogurt and gummi bears and lots of other fruity stuff and we went to pay.  By pay I mean, not pay.  But then there was a birthday surprise, which was that apparently you have to use all five of your birthday dollars in the same transaction.  I mean, obviously.  So I had to give the lady some actual money and then we left.

At that point, I was slightly discouraged.  We'd been out for quite a while with only some BOGO froyo to show for it, and that was unacceptable.  Naturally, I told Brooke that we were going home and that the only way we could get something else was if we saw one of the free birthday stuff stops on the way.

We saw it on the way. "It" being Firehouse Subs.  I didn't really want a sub, but by that point I was numb to the pain of rejection, so it was worth a shot.  WE DIDN'T EVEN GET REJECTED!  The really nice cashier glanced at my drivers license to make sure I wasn't making the whole birthday thing up, helped me choose a sub, and gave it to me for free without any trouble.  It was a really good sub, and I can not tell you how much that helped my mood.  Suddenly, I felt like we had had a super productive day and that it had all been worth it.  I probably should have told the manager of Firehouse Subs some of that.  My cashier might be able to get a promotion or something.

So, yeah.  Two + hours of driving for BOGO Menchie's and one Turkey Bacon Ranch Firehouse Sub. A word to the wise:  on your birthday, don't go to Basking Robbins expecting a free scoop OR try and step food in Biggby without registering first OR use your five Menchie's dollars in two transactions.  These people are ready and willing to play hardball with you, birthday or not.  You're better off signing up for the birthday coupons now and hitting up Firehouse Subs for a TBR on wheat.  Trust me.

Allie

But, seriously.  Where do you guys go for free birthday food?

Let Them Eat Cake // The Time I Tried to do a Giveaway

Hey guys!  I hope you had a great weekend!  I got to spend mine playing sand volleyball on the west side of the state, along Lake Michigan.  Ugh, so pretty.  Ugh because it was so pretty it hurt, and also because I'm currently sitting on my couch instead of at the beach, getting sand in my shorts and just generally being happy.  #withdrawals

Oh, and then later on Saturday I sat by a bonfire with some of my favorite people and ate a bunch of chocolate chip cookie dough dip, sometimes on graham crackers and sometimes on my fingers.  I came home mosquito bitten and smelling like campfire and happy.  So, yes, I guess you could say that the weekend treated me okay.

But then Monday came, and it couldn't just let Friday through Sunday be the coolest days of the week! Oh, no.  Today happens to be a really exciting day . . .

Um, yep!  Today's the big one-seven, and it's going to involve omelets for breakfast and free Starbucks and canoeing and a triple layer red velvet cake and a sweet sign decorating my spot at the kitchen table, compliments of my mom.  Maybe a present or two, and an eighty percent chance of rain.  I'm down.  In blogging terms,  the fact that it's my birthday today means that we're going to have ourselves a little birthday link party (and possibly a winnable party favor)! A Monday party . . . is that okay? 

| One of the coolest things about celebrating your DOB? All the free stuff.  We're talking enough free food to last me until next year at the very least.

| Why human birthdays are better than animal birthdays.

| And how did they even celebrate birthdays before Pinterest?

| It's okay if you forgot / didn't know it's my birthday today . . . it's not too late to send one of these!

| As long as we're celebrating, let's throw it back with a taste of the playlist from my thirteenth birthday party.  (There was also ping pong and a chocolate fountain involved. . . I know. )

|  The reason we light our cakes of fire and blow them out while making a wish for, oh, I don't know, Zac Efron forever.   

|  If you're ever in need of gift wrap, coughcough I like Disney movies and clothes coughcough,  you can customize some here and here!  

| What the coolest nine - year - old ever does with her birthday presents. 

| The adorable little boy in this video is so funny, and he probably has a birthday, so I can include him in this post.  

Party game time!  It's called. . . Try to Win My Cake. Sharing cake with people I like is one of my favorite parts of my birthday (let's be honest, that's partly because of the fact that I get to have some, too!)  and so I'm hosting my first ever giveaway today!  The prize at stake?

One ready - to - make red velvet cake with cream cheese frosting, which just so happens to be what I'm eating today.  

Okay, so it's not made with rainbows and smiles, but I can almost guarantee that eating it will make you happy! :)

Well, don't just sit there reading words . . . you have a cake to win!

Allie

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Awkward Years // Thinks That I Don't Understand

To be honest, I'm pretty much in the bumpiest seat of the struggle bus right now as far as an intro to this post is concerned.  You know, that seat right over the back wheel where there's not enough leg room and you can feel every pothole and the giant, hot bus seems to be constantly swerving?  Yep, that one.  It's kind of hard to write an introduction to a blog post from that position.  So I'm not going to try.  Wait, what's this? Words that come before the main body of my post?  An introduction, perhaps? Cool.

So, the struggle bus I'm on right now is feeling awfully similar to one I rode about five years ago during my awkward stage, when I was young and had no idea what I was doing with anything.  (At least, I think that was my awkward stage.  Hopefully I don't look back at this time five years from now and thing, "Wow, I was awkward.")   Let's talk about that other struggle bus, and all the stuff that happened on it that just doesn't make sense.   It's feeling like a struggle bus kind of day.

The vocabulary.  Which included heavy doses of "lyke" and "mi" and "coolio", because I was a hipster.  Maybe that's one of those trying to find your identity things.  It's sad that I thought I had to be grammatically divergent to be my own person, but it's okay.  I figured it out.

My affinity for all things zebra print, neon, or slightly edgy. I was all over it. I have since realized that I'm not a zebra, neon usually looks better on signs, and I'm not edgy in the least, nor do I want to be.

My obsession with Taylor Swift.  However, upon further review, I've decided that I'm totally okay with that.  Old Taylor was a thirteen-year-old girl's best friend.  Heck, I can still belt You Belong With Me with the best of them.

The fact that I never once realized how easy school was at the time.  I had no idea that the years were fast approaching when I'd have to do homework ever day, and that it would be hard, and that my grades would have a direct effect on the rest of my life.  Ignorance definitely is bliss.

The way that my make up had to match my outfit every single day.  My mom started letting me wear make up in seventh grade, and I used that to my full advantage.  Granted, I don't think anyone else could tell what I was doing, but it was a big deal to me.

Makes you grimace a little, huh?  Don't get me wrong, though.  As much as I make fun of Awkward Allie, I really like her.  She was kind of fun, she definitely didn't care what people thought, and she makes me feel like I've made progress in the last few years.  If you think that was rough, though, you should see my Facebook from the same time period.

Linking up with Juliette, Faith, and Allie to share my awkward self with the blogging world.

Love, 

Allie

Cool Runnings // Why You Should Never Exercise Ever

Today's mission: 

July 9th: Most Embarrassing Story - Some of us have a ton to pick from. Share with us something really embarrassing you've done in your life.

Oh yes.  The sweet spot. 

Foreword
A word, please before this whole "embarassing story" business gets started.  Personally, I really like it when embarrassing things happen to me.  Not to say that I'm not completely mortified in the moment - trust me, I've bargained with God to avoid the unfortunate situation I've gotten myself into more than a few times.  However, I like to think I'm good at seeing the big picture; while I'm being royally humiliated, there's this little voice in the back of my mind that's all like, "This is going to be super hilarious later," and it's thanks to this voice that I've been able to survive a number of awkward conversations and klutzy public disgraces.   It's probably also due largely to that voice that I keep allowing stuff like this to happen to me. 

Part 1
Once upon a time, volleyball season was over and cross country season was not.  I play volleyball, but I also like to run sometimes and was looking for something to do.  So, brilliantly, I asked my totally insane cross country running friend, Maria, if she thought the coach would mind if I ran with them one day.  She said, no, she didn't think the coach would mind, and other people did that all the time.  

The appointed day of the run arrived: October 31, 2012 (AKA Halloween of my sophomore year of high school).  I had plans to go trick-or-treating with my non-running friend, Elise, after I ran, and so I forced  encouraged her to come run with me so she wouldn't have to wait around school alone.  She grudgingly borrowed some too-long sweatpants and too-big running shoes and we followed the cross country team into the wet, muddy woods.  Which Elise really appreciated given her attire. 

We made it through the warm up to a spot on the other side of the woods from school where the team stretched.  We began to stretch, and apparently that's the first time the coach noticed us, because she quickly informed us that it was a closed practice and we weren't welcome, effective immediately.  Which she announced in front of the whole team.  She proceeded to give us quick directions back to school, and I pretended to understand them, knowing that my keen sense of orientation would get us back, no problem.  

Yeah, it didn't.  We couldn't figure out what the heck the coach had been trying to tell us, and Elise's pants - and her morale - got soggier by the second.  We decided to head back along main roads, which took us about a mile out of the way but was sure to at least get us back.  We walked along,  (Elise was way over the running thing by now) and things seemed to be looking up when what did we see on the horizon but THE CROSS COUNTRY TEAM!  If we'd have known where we were going, we should have been back at school 30 minutes ago.  The humiliation of being lost, along with the humiliation of being kicked out of a practice that half of us didn't even want to go to, was way too much to handle.  So we did what any logical twosome of wet, humiliated, tired girls would do- we ran off the path and hid behind a group of trees.  And waited.  And promised we'd never tell anyone about this, ever.

Eventually, the cross country team disappeared somewhere, a Halloween miracle. After a mile or so of walking which felt like 234873 years, we made it back to school - after the cross country team.  And that was a little embarrassing. 

Part 2
It gets better.  I don't have much to say about the rest of the night, except that these were our Halloween costumes. 

And one of us may have been falsely accused of dressing up as a Muslim for Halloween (can't imagine why) and given several disapproving looks. 

Sharing my sworn secrets with you all because of Blog Everyday in July with Juliette, Faith, and Allie. 

Love, 

Allie

P.S. Marie and Elise are not my friend's real names, because they would murder me if they knew I had told the whole Internet about their parts in this story, and I like them too much to get them locked up for the rest of their lives.

P.P.S. Elise and I have nicknamed October 31, 2012 "the coolest day of our lives," and that's all we tell anyone about it.