So, it’s time for look at my list of goals!

(crossing out things I’ve finished, and italicize things that are in progress)

19 Things to do When I’m 19

1. learn how to embroider
2. knit 2 blankets for charity (1 in progress)
3. do a new diy/pattern each month (I kinda missed July…and April….)
4. read 20 books that have substance (13/20)
5. do something with my Italy & Switzerland pics/tickets (still a work in progress!)
6. work out over spring/summer break
7. start my Etsy store by Sept 2011 (this is sooooo not gonna happen, darn! but I don’t really have time this year   )
8. visit a state I have never been to
9. visit a new country
10. learn Python (a computer language)
11. go geocaching
12. fix Dad’s porthole clock (funny story about this below!)
13. do something with all of my shells
14. grow out & cut my hair for Beautiful Lengths
15. eat healthier (will definitely need to work on this at school…)
16. de-clutter my room and closet
17. cook a meal once a week at home (I missed 2 weeks… :/)
18. complain less and listen more
19. be a good friend, sister, daughter, and cousin

Alright! 6 out of 19! (With 2 that can’t be measured, 6 in progress and 1 that’s not going to happen)

Okay, so ready for the funny story about the porthole clock? So I was going to buy a replacement clock part at JoAnn’s but they didn’t have them in the store. Then my dad was looking at the clock and realized that there was a “Start/Stop” switch that was on “Stop”. So naturally, when it was on “Start”, with a battery in it, it worked! hahaha well, that was easy

Interactive Map from 1 Month 2 Win It

OH MY GOSH. LOVE. I’ve been wanting something to track all the states I’ve been to, and this is perfect!! (If only I had some cork and could use a hand saw…)

Cork Display Board from Birds of a Feather

I saw this idea over a year ago and my sister made one and it looks so cool! I have a bunch of corks saved up – so all I need now is a board/something to glue them to!

Song Lyric Wall Art by A Beautiful Mess

I finally got my haircut today!

Here’s proof:

Now I just need to send it off to the Pantene place!

Oh, and here’s a before picture:

hahah yeah….I don’t have any good serious pictures of me before getting it cut…(this was taken the night before)…so ya…you get the picture. lol it was ready to GO!

Yay for Beautiful Lengths!!

Anyways. My sister and I have been vegging since we got home (walking ~500 mi makes you not want to do anything) so we watched a bunch of movies and have been reading manga. haha it’s so cute and really easy to read! I love my mindless books. But of course, my goal is to read 20 books with substance. Hence the books I brought with me on my trip:

Okay, so maybe some people wouldn’t say this had a lot of substance, but I think Philippa Gregory did a lot of research, and I really enjoyed this book! I read this on the plane – the only book I owned that had something about Spain! I ended up leaving this at our first hostel – didn’t need to add any extra weight to my bag!

This is the book I brought for reading on the walk – I figured it was pretty small/light but has a lot of text on the pages (at least my version that looks like this is…) – and would take me the whole trip and a later bus-ride to read. Which it did! Great! (a plane ride too…) Anyways. About the book. I ended up really liking it! I tried to read it in 8th grade, but got like 3 pages in, lol. After getting through the first 3 chapters or so, when I finally figured out (the set up of the book is different) what was going on, I really enjoyed the story. It was different from some other books I’ve read.

This is the book my parents brought for me for the way home. I’ve never read anything by her, but I know she’s supposed to be good and I like the book so far – I’m about halfway I plan on finishing it before heading off to college in like 2 weeks! (ack, so soon!)

Have you read anything good lately?

My trip overseas was AWESOME. I did the Camino de Santiago, and it was such a cool experience! You can read about it here, if you want: 4Caminantes - just a short blog we updated occasionally on the walk! (no pics yet…maybe sometime soon…????)

I’ve been back for a week, just relaxing and stuff.

It’s time for a GOALS UPDATE!

(crossing out things I’ve finished, and italicize things that are in progress)

19 Things to do When I’m 19

1. learn how to embroider (got a sweet book from my friend last night! I think this’ll be a Christmas break project…)
2. knit 2 blankets for charity (started a new blanket last night! )
3. do a new diy/pattern each month
4. read 20 books that have substance (13/20)
5. do something with my Italy & Switzerland pics/tickets (I’ve got all the pictures on the pages, I just need to write out the words and make it pretty-ful!   )
6. work out over spring/summer break (I worked out over spring break!)
7. start my Etsy store by Sept 2011 (this is sooooo not gonna happen, darn! but I don’t really have time this year )
8. visit a state I have never been to (I went to OHIO w/Running Club   )
9. visit a new country (I got 3 – France, Spain and Portugal!!)
10. learn Python (a computer language)
11. go geocaching
12. fix Dad’s porthole clock
13. do something with all of my shells
14. grow out & cut my hair for Beautiful Lengths (min of 8ins) (cutting it off in August!…still hasn’t happened yet )
15. eat healthier (fam still on a health kick – ate pretty good on vacation…lots of dessert though :/ haha I can’t resist my sweet tooth)
16. de-clutter my room and closet (finished this yesterday! I might do a bit more…but more just from cleaning up my scrapbooking stuff)
17. cook a meal once a week at home (I missed 2 weeks… :/)
18. complain less and listen more
19. be a good friend, sister, daughter, and cousin

Halfway through the year and I’ve only finished 3 things! ACK!

Off to go do something on this list!

Here they are: (I’m going to cross out things I’ve finished, and italicize things that are in progress)

19 Things to do When I’m 19

1. learn how to embroider
2. knit 2 blankets for charity
3. do a new diy/pattern each month
4. read 20 books that have substance (11/20 as of June 14th)
5. do something with my Italy & Switzerland pics/tickets (I’ve got all the pictures on the pages, I just need to write out the words and make it pretty-ful! )
6. work out over spring/summer break (I worked out over spring break!)
7. start my Etsy store by Sept 2011
8. visit a state I have never been to (I went to OHIO w/Running Club   )
9. visit a new country (I’m heading to Europe as we speak!)
10. learn Python (a computer language)
11. go geocaching
12. fix Dad’s porthole clock
13. do something with all of my shells
14. grow out & cut my hair for Beautiful Lengths (min of 8ins) (cutting it off in August!)
15. eat healthier (my family has always eaten homemade food and good food has been on even more of a health kick recently…)
16. de-clutter my room and closet
17. cook a meal once a week at home
18. complain less and listen more
19. be a good friend, sister, daughter, and cousin

The last 2 are kind of hard to judge…they’re mainly there just for a reminder

I finished Brian Falkner’s Brain Jack – the ending was not really what I expected, but I really liked it.

I also read two more books by Sarah Addison Allen:

I loved the magical-realism of the book, but of the 3 books that I have read by her, this is my least favorite. But I LOVED her books, so really that doesn’t mean too much, lol.

I think this is technically a companion to Garden Spells, but really they aren’t that similar – there’s still some magical realism, but not as much as the other books I read by her. I LOVE this book though! I started it at night (bad idea) and then I was getting ready for bed, at like 1 am and I said to my self, “I’ll just read 1 or 2 chapters, then go to bed”. Well….1 or 2 chapters turned into “just one more” and you know how it goes….then it’s 4 am and I’m finished with the book and really going to bed this time.

Yesterday I finished The Sunflower by Richard Paul Evans – this book is so good!!! It had a really great story and made me want to go to the Amazon and help orphans! lol (this is his goal – using writing to talk about issues in our world – so I’d say he’s pretty good at it!)

I can’t wait to read more of his books!!

Right now I’m reading Battle Dress by Amy Efaw and The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith. But I think I might have to go the library next week to get some more books by Richard Paul Evans and The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen.

P.S. that’s 4 more books for the 20 I want to get for the year – I’m now halfway!

My only mishap was that I had one of the pages turned….so it didn’t fit in right… :/ But I finally got around to just trimming one of the edges so that it fits the right way in the sleeve

We also sat in George Washington’s pew in Christ Church

(sorry it’s kinda hard to read….)

We also sat in the pews of Ben Franklin and Betsy Ross. Pretty cool stuff!

We also walked past city hall, which I’d never seen before!

That’s pretty much it, as far as pictures (well, good ones anyways) go…we also went to Reading Terminal Market, Elfred’s Alley, and the LOVE statue. I’m glad that I’ve seen more of Philly and have finally had a true cheese steak!

On Sunday we went back to the city to do a 5k for ovarian cancer research. It was a pretty good race – it was hot out, though! They had a lot of good food, though! lol I was also excited because I got to drive there and back, and I can pretty much count the number of times I’ve driven on the highway on one hand, and I’ve had my licence for over 2 years….gah, it was good highway driving practice, too, since we left pretty early….

That pretty much sums up my adventures in Philly! Though we did have a very interesting time leaving the city when I was with my friends…we accidently went over the Ben Franklin bridge….which goes to New Jersey…ya that was interesting lol! We were also driving during rush hour (*face palm*) so….we ended up being in the car for 2+ hours…. (at most that drive should have taken an hour…)

Anyways, I live near Philadelphia but never really visit the city, but my friend from college whose parents live near by was home for a week and my sister and her boyfriend came home for the weekend, so I ventured to the city a lot!

I’ve now been to Pat’s and Geno’s for cheese steaks! Yum!!! I LOVE cheese steaks!! (I always get them w/Provolone cheese and onions)

Pat’s is the more intense place to order a steak, though they are both pretty similar.

Here’s a sign that’s hanging by the order window:

And here’s my steak:

It’s funny because the first time I went to the city this week – and to get cheese steaks – I went with 2 friends and they said that they liked Pat’s better. Then on Saturday I went with my sisters and one of their bf’s and my sisters said that Geno’s was better!

So here’s what Geno’s looks like…

It is way more flashy than Pat’s, that’s for sure! haha unfortunately I have no pictures of it :/ Anyways, I decided that I should try Geno’s this time, so here’s that steak…

It was delicious, too! We were thinking that we liked the bread at Geno’s better than Pat’s but I must say I don’t really have a preference…haha that probably makes me a bad Philadelphian, whoops!

Also I kinda took lots of pictures, so there’s more to come!