Christmas lights.

I have been done school now for almost a week, and I feel like I haven't really done anything productive that I was hoping to do. My to-do list is a page and a half long, and I think I've crossed off 2 things. My number one thing I want to do is catching up on my letters, and number 2 is working on my correspondence course. Should be fun trying to do that, in between work and family/friends/Christmas events =)

In other news, my boyfriend's family is the best. They're leaving tomorrow to go to Edmonton for a week, to visit Sister and Brother + Wife + baby Nephew! Since I'm not going with them, they had Christmas dinner with me yesterday! And then they showered me with gifts =) I feel so loved and special. Awesome.

Finally over

Well friends, I officially finished my assignments last Wednesday! I am done and it feels so good!! I have an exam tomorrow and the next day, so I have it pretty easy. The exam on Thursday is making me nervous. Its one is those exams that won't have anything to do with lecture notes, but rather writing about abstract ideas. So that should be fun. Not. But I'll still pass all of my courses so I'll be good.

So today, since all I need to do is study, I have accompanied Chris to the city to his exam. Yesterday he drove in an hour, wrote his exam in 20 minutes, and drove an hour home. Feels pretty useless. So today we're gonna at least make something out of the trip. Not sure what we're doing, but our options are going to the museum, or watching Voyage of the Dawn Treader. My vote is for the movie but we'll see if I win ;)

Fill in the blank Friday 1.8

1. I wish that I had $50,000. I'm not greedy, that's why I'm not asking for a million bucks haha. That would just get rid of all my debt and still have a considerable amount leftover for a shopping spree =)

2. Yesterday I worked in the evening, and couldn't fall asleep until 2 am.

3. Today I will go to my last day of class for the semester and dance the night away at my school's Christmas banquet!

4. Tomorrow I will sleep in and work all evening.

5. Maybe someday I will be able to fit into all of those clothes I put under my bed again.

6. Someday I will be able to wake up next to the man I love (cheesy and sappy? Yes) (also, I do not know when that day will be but someday)

7. I love my friends, Christopher, my family, Coldplay, hot chocolate, staying in bed til noon reading, shopping on Amazon, and my church.


Have a great weekend, my friends =)

And that's how I like it.

Research Methods - 1 paper (with partner)
Environmental Science - 1 presentation
Global Problems & Change - 1 paper
Biblical Poetry - 1 project
Intro to Theatre - 1 performance (with partner)
Literature for Children - 2 lessons

I have no more papers!!!!! YAY!!!! Today I'm performing my scene for Intro to Theatre, and tomorrow I'm presenting in Environmental Science, and then I am done like dinner until next Wednesday!! I'm so happy :)

(I feel for all friends who still have crazy assignments/stress left! You can do it!!)

Coldplay has my heart forever.

Fill in the Blank Friday 1.7

1.   Holiday spirit  sometimes feels fake to me, like it has too much with shopping and spending money, not enough about celebrating the important things like family and Jesus' birth.

2.  The holidays are incomplete without  family, watching Elf half a dozen times, and awesome Christmas services at church.

3.  My favorite things to do around the holidays is  catching up with family and friends, watching Christmas movies, and eating way too much chocolate.

4.  A holiday tradition my family and I have is   nothing. When I was growing up my dad was a long-distance trucker, so we couldn't really count on having the same traditions every year. So we just spend one day together as family, usually Christmas Eve. That's it.

5.  Holiday music is    best when people make it their own.

6.  This year, I'll be spending the holidays   working on a correspondence course while Chris is gone for a week, working, hanging out with friends, catching up on writing letters, and of course spending a lot of time with my family.

7.  Holiday wish list  anything from my Etsy wishlist, books, and clothes. I'm easy to please.

Sometimes I write smart things.

This is a paper that I wrote for my Global Problems & Change class, and part of the assignment was submitting it to a newspaper or something. I think that I could have done a better job, but it still got printed in my local newspaper. So that was cool. I thought that I would post it here for you lovely people to read.

Most people in North America believe that slavery ended when Abraham Lincoln abolished it as the president of the United States. But what these same people do not realize is that slavery still exists today, and experts believe that it is worse today than it ever has been in human history. They estimate that between 27 and 30 million people worldwide are modern-day slaves. And what’s more, slaves exist in every major city in North America. This is not a problem that exists “somewhere else.” It is here and it is now.

            The most common reasons that people are enslaved today involve economic reasons. Globalization has created more opportunities than ever before for people to move across the world, and there are evil people in this world who take advantage of that. Impoverished people across the world are so desperate to survive, they allow themselves to be lured in by false promises of a better life. Their captors then traffic them to another country before they know what is happening to them.

            When people hear about child soldiers, debt bondage, and forced marriage, they are actually hearing about slavery. Women are often abducted and sold into the sex trade. A common misconception in Canada is that women who are in the sex trade choose to be in it, but it has been said that “A lot of the girls in brothels never meant to be in brothels. They got there because someone threatened and forced them into it.” And this does not happen only in undeveloped nations. The 2008 movie Taken, starring Liam Neeson, highlights the situation of women being abducted in Western Europe and sold into the sex trade.

            In Canada, human traffickers peddle young girls to work as sex slaves for as little as $2,000. If this seems unlikely, simply Google “Montreal,” “escort service,” and “young girls.” Young girls have been taken from places like Cameroon and sent as slaves to the states of Virginia, Maryland and New Jersey. In addition, many people will remember the scandal involving Craigslist in 2009, where it was brought to light often that their “escort service” was little more than a façade for sex trafficking.

It is true that trafficking happens in Canada, but Canada is also a place of transit. People are brought to Canada from other nations, and then transported to their destination. There are people in Canada working to combat this disgrace to civilization. Conservative MP Joy Smith has been one of the leading activists against human trafficking in Canada, and has recently submitted a private bill requiring a minimum sentence for those caught involved in human trafficking. There are many organizations that are dedicated to ending human trafficking. Not for Sale, Exodus Cry, International Justice Mission, and others are solely devoted to freeing those in slavery in today’s world.

Condoleeza Rice once said, “Defeating human trafficking is a great moral calling of our time.” Human trafficking is an atrocity that must end as soon as possible. People were never meant to be owned by other people. As Christians, there is a clear calling to fight injustice, and to be Christ’s earthly aids in doing everything possible to free those who are in bondage.

The light is shining brightly!

Research Methods - 1 paper (with partner)
Environmental Science - 1 presentation
Global Problems & Change - 1 paper
Biblical Poetry - 1 project
Intro to Theatre - 1 performance (with partner)
Literature for Children - 2 lessons

YEAH BABY finito with 2 classes!! That last paper is 1/3 done, and I'm hoping to finish that and get my powerpoint ready for my Science presentation. I wrote my final exam for Science yesterday, so I'm pretty much done with that too! Oh I can see the end and it is glorious, my friends :)