the desiderata

We talked a lot about literacy today in one of my classes, and it wasn't until I was sitting here, about to finish this post that I realized just how important reading is to my life. In class we talked about how we love to read books or magazines or blogs or Twitter, and how being literate enables us to be functional in society by reading signs, directions, etc.. But there's another aspect of literacy that is a huge part of my life that I never considered, and that is finding your identity through other people's writing. For me this usually takes shape in the form of quotes and song lyrics, and I've also found it in prayers or poetry as well. For as long as I can remember, I've been looking for quotes or lyrics that express what I'm thinking or feeling in a much different way than I could portray it. I think everyone does this to a certain extent - it sort of validates what we believe in, and is encouraging to see other people expressing the same thoughts in a different way.

All of that just to say what I originally intended to post today - the Desiderata by Max Ehrmann. I'm not sure if you would call this a prayer or a poem or what, but I love it. It's one of my mom's favorite pieces of writing, and I know I've "read" it many times aroud my house before I sat down and actually read it. I've read it at different stages or important moments of my life, and gotten something new out of it each time. I reread again this weekend and remembered just how relevant it is. So I thought I'd share it with you :)

Let me know what your favorite part is!

Go placidly amid the noise and haste,

and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible without surrender

be on good terms with all persons.

Speak your truth quietly and clearly, and listen to others,

even the dull and the ignorant;

they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons,

they are vexations to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,

you may become vain and bitter;

for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.

Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans. 



Keep interested in your own career, however humble;

it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs;

for the world is full of trickery.

But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;

many persons strive for high ideals;

and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself.

Especially, do not feign affection.

Neither be cynical about love;

for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment

it is as perennial as the grass. 



Take kindly the counsel of the years,

gracefully surrendering the things of youth.

Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.

But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.

Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,

be gentle with yourself. 



You are a child of the universe,

no less than the trees and the stars;

you have a right to be here.

And whether or not it is clear to you,

no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. 


Therefore be at peace with God,

whatever you conceive Him to be,

and whatever your labors and aspirations,

in the noisy confusion of life keep peace with your soul. 



With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,

it is still a beautiful world.

Be cheerful.

Strive to be happy.

never forgotten, forever grateful

When it rains, it pours...

...or at least that's been the case here in Maryland this week! The sun is finally shining today, which is a good thing because I think that everything and everyone are thoroughly soaked after these crazy days of rain we've been having!

Sometimes I don't mind when it's raining. Usually those times involve me being cuddled up in my bed watching a movie on the t.v. and the rain out the window.

There are other times that I do mind when it's raining. One of those times is when I'm on an overnight camping field trip with 65 fifth graders in the middle-of-nowhere Maryland. I'll spare you all of the details because a) I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to blog with too much detail about school related things (don't teachers get fired for that stuff?) and b) I don't want to bore you with my rain-soaked, mud-filled, outdoorsy adventure. But here are just a few highlights!

Microwaved s'mores (since we had to nix the campfire)

Getting on the confidence course before the kids took over! (complete with a zipline)

Getting the inside teacher scoop on the inner workings of BHES.

This cute little frog.

I got to try a pancake-on-a-stick for breakfast! It was delish.

Thank God Ashley came with me. I'm not sure I could have handled this alone.

(please excuse this gross picture...)

Now that I'm home, showered, and well-rested, I have a better perspective on the whole thing and can definitely say that we had a good time despite the rain. And more importantly, the kids had a blast! It was like a giant sleepover for them, and two days full of activities that they would never get to do otherwise. Some of them had never even had a s'more before! I couldn't believe it. Judging from the smiles on their faces, the trip was completely worth it, rain and all.

And for the record, camping is not my thing.

I'm Back ...and Loving Wednesday

Hellooo blogworld! I just couldn't stay away :) Even though my project 365 is over, I decided that I love the idea of having this blog as an outlet to share whatever happens to be on my mind. I'm not sure what it will turn into or where it will take me, but I'm ready to just play that by ear!

The dictionary definition of serendipity is:

noun. an aptitude for making desirable discoveries by accident.

I'm not exactly sure that I have an aptitude for this, so I like to think of it more as fate or karma - that if you put good stuff out there into the universe, you're going to get good stuff back.

(How's that for a deep, meaningful life theory?!)

I try to live my life believing that, in the hopes that I'll make a desirable discovery or two along the way. My hope is that this blog will chronicle these discoveries, and at the very least I'll have something tangible to remember this exciting time in my life by.

So to kick off this new blog I'm going to link up to something I've been reading on Ashley and Maggie's blogs for weeks and weeks - it's called "What I'm Loving Wednesdays." Not much explanation needed...just a quick list of what I'm loving on this rainy day!

I'm loving how excited my fifth graders were to see me this morning after I'd been gone since last Thursday. I guess we didn't give them enough warning that we'll only be student teaching on Wednesdays and Thursdays this semester. I missed them too!

I'm loving the note I found on my desk from one of the girls in my class. Seriously...how sweet?!

I'm loving my first day back at the preschool I work at on campus. I was only there for an hour this afternoon, but it was so great to see all of the familiar little faces, and meet some of the new kiddies. I was greeted with such cute smiles and lots of hugs! It's going to take some serious getting used to - going from being with 33 eleven year olds until 3:15 to being with 18 three and four year olds from 4-5:30. I'm up for the challenge :)

I'm loving Ashley for helping me get this new blog set up and answering all of my silly questions. She's way more advanced at this blogging business than I am!

I'm loving this adorable clothing boutique called "Vestique." Not only am I in love with their clothes (seriously. each thing is cuter than the last, and it's all so affordable!), but they featured the engagement pictures I took of my cousin on their blog! Here's their website and here's their blog.

And most of all I'm loving you! Thanks for reading - leave me a comment and let me know whatcha think :)

xoxo,

Lauren

a trip around the sun

Can you believe that the year is over?

Because I can’t.

There were times when I thought it would never end, and times I thought to myself, “Am I really still doing this?” But now that the three hundred and sixty fifth day has arrived, I’m so proud of myself for sticking it out and completing the challenge!

Some days it was hard to pick just one picture to represent my day, and others, it was hard to come up with something to post about. Some days were bad, most days were good, some were amazing, and some were boring or stressful or busy. Some days marked special occasions, and some marked nothing special at all. But this collection of three hundred and sixty five pictures isn’t just about those individual days. To be honest, I can’t specifically remember a majority of those days. Most of them came and went and nothing special happened. But if it weren’t for this project, those days would have been gone from my conscious memory forever.

So to summarize, I’d say I’ve learned two important (and possibly contradictory) things from this project. The first is that you need to be able to appreciate the little things so that you can appreciate the big ones. To take the time and process every single day acknowledges that each day is a gift and deserves to be appreciated. We all remember the big moments in our lives, but it’s all of those seemingly insignificant days and moments that make up who we really are.

But - at the same time, you need to be able to look beyond all of these single, individual pictures so that you can see the big picture.

(Ha! Picture! See what I did there??)

I’m so lucky to live where I do, to have been blessed with an amazing family and friends, to be healthy and happy, to have so many great experiences behind me, and to have so many more to come. Those are all of the things that I see when I look back over each of these 365 days, and it makes things like a broken air conditioner or a long day at Chevys seem not so bad at all.

So let’s take a trip back in time and see just what happened over this past year…

First of all, according to the labels that I assigned to each from post, I blogged about "Chevys" 15 times, "class" 21 times, "family" 66 times, "food" 45 times, "friends" 49 times, "Honduras" 15 times, "Random" things 33 times, "SHH" 15 times, and "Summertime" and "the beautiful outdoors" 12 times each. I'd say that's a pretty accurate depiction of my priorities, with family, friends, and food being my top 3 :)

Here's what else happened...

I started out with one big post of my whole first week.

I went back to work at the CYC, and shared a few stories about the cute kids there.

I got a new job, too! A few too many of my 365 days were spent at Chevys, and many of my blog posts showcased the “specials boards” I had to make for them.

I spent an unusually hot fall doing things like going to concerts and some football games. I went to YogiBerry a few times in there too J

I got rear-ended on day 39, and spend a few more months with Ruby the Volvo until I handed her down to my sister and got Lucy the CR-V.

I spent a lot of time missing my summer in Spain and longing to go back. I also got to reunite with some of the amazing people I spent time with over there!

I didn’t post a picture on a couple of days. Once that was on purpose, and once it was an accident.

I graduated from College Park Scholars.

I celebrated Halloween in College Park, Thanksgiving and Christmas in both College Park and Berwyn, New Year’s in the Adirondacks, Valentine’s Day at Target, St. Patrick’s Day eating Shamrock Shakes and singing karaoke, Easter in Mexico, and the 4^th of July in a variety of backyards J

I turned 21!

I celebrated a lot of other people’s birthdays, too! Most of them were milestones (1, 21, 50, 60) and some were not (17, 20…)

I had a few visitors come! And more than a few fun nights with my best friends.

I made A LOT of friendship bread.

I got to go to Florida twice; once to see this guy and this guy, (and their parents!) and once to celebrate my nephew Brett’s Bar Mitzvah and see family I haven't seen in a long time!

It snowed a few times, and Maryland freaked out like it normally does.

I missed Mom-mom just about every day of the 365, but wrote a post about it on her one-year anniversary.

I did all kinds of things to prepare for my trip to Honduras…

…and then I went ahead and went there! I blogged a lot about that and the life changing experiences I had there.

When I got back from Honduras, I got really involved with SHH on campus. We raised money in all kinds of crazy ways, and I had so much fun doing it.

I watched Bobby change so much over this first year in his life. I’m in love with him!

I got to go on TWO spring break trips – one to Hilton Head with my friends, and one to Mexico with my family.

I read a book that changed the way I view teaching, and will definitely impact the teacher I become.

I met my brand new baby cousin Julian, and then scored the best job in the world babysitting him over the summer.

I got excited over lots of random, silly things like neti pots, bananas, planners, sharpies, and drying racks.

I also got excited over a not-so-silly thing – my brand new camera!

I made a few trips to the beach to get my tan on.

I went to my cousin Meredith’s wedding, and then headed back down to College Park to start my year-long student teaching internship!

There were two natural disasters during my first week of student teaching, proving to me that you really do need to be prepared for anything when you’re a teacher – even earthquakes and hurricanes!

And that brings me to today! So many other things happened in between all of these posts that I just mentioned, and so much else went down this year that never even made it onto my blog. It goes to show you that there are so many things that make up a year, and consequently make up a life. And it wasn’t just my life or my year, a lot of times it was yours too!

My life and my year and my days wouldn’t have been what they were if it weren’t for the family and friends, colleagues and kids, and sometimes even strangers that I interact with on a daily basis. So THANK YOU! Thanks for sharing this year with me and for reading my blog – you guys rock J

Stay tuned to laurenelizabeth11.blogspot.com...….”Picture This” may no longer be around, but who knows what might show up next!

Xoxo,

Lauren

day 365

To celebrate my final day and final post, I decided to end this thing where I started, on my favorite spot on campus :) Happy new year, people!

day 364

This is the chalkboard in our entry way :) It's a little bit exciting and a little bit terrifying to be entering into our senior year, but regardless of that, I'm LOVING that tonight ALL of my friends were back in College Park!