Follow Up Friday: Where has the time gone?

I can't believe the holidays are already over. After pushing myself through the last week of school before break last week (which by the way was the longest week EVER), I still wasn't ready for Christmas yet. It still felt like it was still so far away.

But really, it wasn't. It has come and gone like the blink of an eye, even though my family and I had 3 Christmas parties in a row: Christmas Eve (Grandma's house) , Christmas Day (my house), and my Grandparent's Anniversary Party/Christmas Party (Grandma's house). At least I still have Christmas Celebrations round 2 with my Dad's side of the family in Ohio next week as well as New Years to look forward to!

Anyway, onto the Follow Up Friday:

What's On My Nails This Week: A sparkly gold polish by Charlotte Russe (a no namer)...it matched my sequin and glittery gold sweater I wore for Christmas

Beverage of The Week: Hot Chocolate with marshmallows (as you can see above haha)

Movie I Watched This Week: Elf (My Christmas favorite)

Biggest Accomplishment of The Week: Revamped my other blog, Dream It Up Nails. I made it look more professional and simpler, so that the images would pop out more. Check it out and let me know what you think!

Biggest Thing That's Been Looming Over Me: Finals. I have the joy of having finals after break, so I have to study for finals all throughout my 'break.' How stupid is that?! I'd rather just get it over with...

Countdown to Graduation:  5 months + 10 days

Thanks for stopping by!

Follow Up Friday

Well, this is an exciting Follow Up Friday for me! I’ve got a lot to share about this past week:

-Best Thing That Happened: I heard back from two more schools that I applied to! Although one wasn’t so good and I got deferred, I got into my #1 school! WOO-HOO! What I find interesting is the fact that I got deferred from the one which has a 67.7% acceptance rate, while the one I got into has an acceptance rate of 50.5%. ummmm….What?? And both the schools are pretty comparable for the major I want to go into, so that’s kind of confusing…but whatever, I’m just happy that I got into my favorite school!

-Best Re-Realization­: God works in mysterious ways. Period. Everything happens according to His plan, but sometimes we tend to make plans for ourselves and forget that He has a plan for us that is way better than the plans we make could ever come up with. So when things don’t work out or go as we planned, we need to remember to place ourselves in His hands and let Him lead us to where we are supposed to be so that we can give Him the glory.

I re-realized this when I got my two college decisions today. The first one, the one I got deferred from, came out at 4pm. I was really bummed, but I realized that maybe it just wasn’t meant to be. Then three hours later at 7pm, I heard back from the second one, the one that I got into (aka my favorite). So as you can see, God always points us in the right direction when he’s ready to.

What’s On My Nails This Week: chipping Essie Sable Collar (same as from last week… I haven’t had time to remove it).

Community Service: This week my Orchestra went to perform at a nursing home and play Christmas songs. The residents seemed to really enjoy it! And it was the cutest thing: After we had finished performing and were about to leave, the residents of the nursing home prepared a Christmas song to sing to us. Adorable! It really put everyone into the Christmas spirit!

Blast From The Past: I watched Switching Goals, an old Mary-Kate and Ashley movie, with my little sister earlier this evening. Does anyone remember their movies??

Countdown to Winter Break: 1 more week!! (next week will be one loooooong week though….so many tests!!)

Countdown to Graduation: 5 months + 3 weeks….

Hope you all had a great day,

Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow

Recognize the lyrics in the title? Good old Chirstmas music. 

Tonight it's supposed to snow 3-4 inches here in the Chicago area, during the wee hours of the morning. So my friends and I are hoping and praying for a snow day tomorrow. Yeah, that's not that much snow, but if it snows just at the right time where the roads are treacherous for the buses and teachers, we just might get a snow day. And boy, do I really need one.

(Credits)

Even though I only have a week left of school after this one until winter break, I'm being hit with tests galore (I have a part one of a Calc test tomorrow...hence hoping for a snow day), Orchestra rehearsals (like the one I have to go to tonight), my Holiday Orchestra Concert (tomorrow night), and other exams the following week. I just really need a day to breathe. Not to mention finals for me are after winter break, so I should probably start studying. And the fact that I should hear back from the other three schools that I applied to is pretty stressful as well.

But enough of me ranting.

 I hope you all stay safe and warm if you're anywhere near extreme temperatures or snow!

 

Friendship: Being Thankful

We got our first real snow in Chicago last night, and the temperatures have dropped dramatically. So right now I’m curled up with a blanket drinking hot chocolate while writing this blog post, trying to ignore my Calc notes which I should be studying for tomorrow. But that’s okay. I’ll procrastinate a little bit. ;)

While browsing Pinterest the other day, I found a pin with a quote that I really liked (I also thought the penguins were pretty cute too).

(Credits)

Now that I’m a senior, I now know who my real friends are. They’re the ones who have stayed by me at my best and at my worst. They are not only my best friends from school, but also my family. My Mom especially has done more for me than anyone, the person who has always rooted for me no matter how many mistakes I make.

So often times, people take the most important people in their lives for granted. I’m now realizing how much I have taken those close to me for granted over the years. That’s where this upcoming Holiday season fits in. So when you gather around during the Holidays with your family and friends, remember how much of a gift they are to you. And that their friendship is the best gift of all.

So this Holiday season,

Be thankful. Be loving. Be true.

Follow Up Friday

T.G.I.F!! I don’t know about you, but for me this week went by so s l o w l y. I don’t know if it was just because I had to get back into the swing of things after having a week off for Thanksgiving break last week, or what. It just seemed unusually hard to wake up in the mornings.

I’ve decided that on Fridays I’m going to start what I call “Follow Up Friday” where I can reflect on the past week and maybe preview the upcoming week.

Since I really like to keep things organized in lists, here goes:

• What’s Been On My Nails This Week: Essie Sable Collar (I’ll swatch it at some point)
• What I’ve Been Reading This Week: The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers for my English class. I actually just finished it.
• Biggest Indulgence: My friend and I went out to lunch and instead of getting real food, we went out to Oberweis and ordered Peppermint Fudge Brownie Sundaes. As good as it was, I’m now going to have to run an hour tomorrow morning to feel a little bit better about myself…
• Biggest Annoyance: Having to wait weeks and weeks and weeks to hear back from the schools I applied to. Especially this one school, which sends decisions every Friday evening between 7-8 p.m. So after constantly refreshing my email inbox and admission portal earlier this evening, I disappointingly find that tonight is not the night.
• Biggest Accomplishment of the Week: Helping my Parents set up the Christmas tree and hanging up all of the decorations. It’s my family’s tradition to do this the Sunday after Thanksgiving, so we had our annual tree-trimming party complete with cookies and hot chocolate. It was sort of bittersweet for me this year since depending upon where I end up going for college next year, I might not be able to be home for this family tradition…
• Scariest Realization: Only 6 more months left until graduation…

Even though I’m so ready to be done with high school already, I don’t know if I am ready quite yet to go off to college, so that last bullet point scares me a little.

On the bright side, only 2 more weeks until winter break, which seems so close yet so far away because from now until then, I still have some much to do. From multiple tests coming up, to an orchestra concert, to a couple of violin gigs I’ll be playing in, to FOR SURE hearing back from a couple of schools, these are going to be a packed couple of weeks.

Stay tuned,

Swatch Time: Orly Angel Rain

Well, I’m glad tomorrow is Friday…I’m definitely in need of a weekend! And thankfully I was able to finish my book before my English test today…I’m trying to make a promise with myself that I will never procrastinate again (haha funny story…but I will try).

Anyway, since I was initially a nail blogger, I thought I would do my first “real” post on a swatch of one of my favorite nail polishes: Orly Angel Rain, from the Orly Surreal Collection that came out this past fall.

Angel Rain is a beautiful icy blue duochrome that flashes a pinky/purple shimmer. Although the formula was a little thin, I just love the color and mystical feel to this polish! I used 3 coats for the pictures below.

Even though this polish came out in the fall, I actually think looks great for the winter too because of the icy/snowy/glistening feel to it!

Have you tried out any of the polishes in Orly’s Surreal Collection? Or have any other favorite Orly’s?

I hope you have a great rest of the day and thanks for stopping by!

Love,

10 Facts About Me

 

Today I thought that I would do a little more of an introduction, so here are 10 things about me (in no particular order):

1. I am from the Chicago area. I don’t specifically live in Chicago, but I do live pretty close by. On a clear day, there’s this hill in my town where if you drive on it, you can see the Sears Tower (yes, I know, it’s called the Willis Tower now. I just prefer to keep calling it the Sears Tower).
2. I love nail polish and painting my nails. I have a blog Dream It Up Nails that I have been blogging on since June with nail art and swatches and what not, but I have decided to start this blog that will be about more than just nail polish. I don’t know, I just feel like it gets a little boring talking about only nail polish and would rather just talk about anything that comes to mind. That way, I will be able to look back on this blog in a few years and really be able to see a clearer snapshot of ‘Me.’
3. I am Christian. I take my faith seriously, and don’t know where I would be today if I didn’t have my faith and my love for God. I have some interesting stories that deal with my faith and how it has grown stronger, which I hope to share with you at some point on this blog.
4. I live with my Mom, Dad, and my little brother and sister. My Mom’s side of the family all live here in the Chicago area (well, minus my Uncle who lives in California) and my Dad’s side of the family are from a small town near Dayton, Ohio.
5. I have been in Orchestra for nine years now. I played the Viola in 4^th grade through first semester freshman year and then switched to playing the Violin from second semester freshman year and continue to play it now (senior year). In addition to playing in my school’s orchestra, I have been in the pit orchestra for my School’s productions of Les Miserables, Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, and The Sound of Music. I am also in Honors Orchestra where we competed in the North Shore Jazz Festival and won in our division two years in a row and we will be going down to IMEA All-State in January to perform and give a workshop about Jazz Improvisation to Illinois music educators.
6. I love, love, LOVE to shop! Some of my favorite stores include: Forever 21, A’Gaci, American Eagle, Francesca’s, Charming Charlie, Pac Sun, and Charlotte Russe. Let’s just say money burns a whole in my pocket when it comes to shopping….
7. I applied to 5 colleges in total, all of which are in the Midwest. I got into two of them already and am still waiting to hear back from the other three. I plan to double major in Accounting and Finance (I’ll talk more on why I chose this later, as well as pre-college rants).
8. I am absolutely TERRIFIED of spiders and basically everything that crawls. If they’re outside fine, but if they’re in my room, I’m not-so-fine.
9. I love to read. Some of my favorite authors include: Veronica Roth, Simone Elkeles, Dean Koontz, Nicholas Sparks, Pittacus Lore, Becca Fitzpatrick, Stephanie Meyer, John Green, etc, etc, etc…
10. I used to be a competitive swimmer (more on this to come). I was on the National Team at my club swim team and I was also on the Varsity swim team at my high school.

I hope to elaborate on these facts about me in the upcoming future and so much more!

I should probably get back to reading my book for English that I need to have finished before the test tomorrow…oh why oh why did I have to procrastinate?

So long for now,