TJ's

Trader Joe's is like it's own little bubble of happiness... as hippie as that sounds, stick with me here, though I may be high on chai seeds and fermented kombucha  (I promise neither of those actually contain mind-altering substances).

This morning was full of adult things. I mean sure, I guess I'm an adult, but I don't always like acting like one. Who wants to go spend a considerable amount of time at the bank? Who wants to drop two weeks of pay on a speeding ticket? Who even wants to get out of bed before noon on such a snowy Saturday?
See, even adults don't actually want to do those things.

So as I stepped up to those automatic doors, I was in need of a little relief. Thankfully, it came in the form of dark-chocolate almond-bark.

If you've never been to a Trader Joe's, you're really missing out. It's almost like a Kroger meets health food store, but yet you feel like you're on vacation while inside.
I'm really not that high-maintenance in any aspect of my life, including food. Honestly, I eat an apple with almost every meal and drink twice as much coffee as a normal person. Nothing crazy.
But when I go to Trader Joe's, my high-end, food-snob, health-conscious self materializes out of nowhere. It's all I can do to not run through the aisles gleefully pulling into my arms all things colorful, organic, and weird. My wonderful strange-food-loving friend and I carefully perused each section, cringing a little at the prices, but being more distracted by the incredible variety and interestingly odd foods. Oh, and the coffee selection... don't even get me started! After walking up and down, back and forth, through the dried fruits and past the dairy (or everything dairy-free) cooler, we finalized our choices and headed to the counter, where we were serviced by a very friendly, greasy-long-haired, and gauged hippie. Truly wonderful.

 In the end, we walked out $60 dollars and 45 minutes poorer. But it was so incredibly worth it.

(and of course, we drove the long way home with hippie music blasting. Check out Young Blood by Lynx- so good!)

Ps. for anyone out there on the world wide web who cares, this was my purchase list:
- Blue corn tortilla chips
- Guacamole hummus
- Thai vegetable Panang curry
- Multigran and Flaxseed water crackers
- Tintern cheese with chives and shallots
- sweetened and dried mango slices
- Fair-trade Honduran coffee
- Dark chocolate almond bark thins
- Sweet sesame seaweed
- Soynog (from nearby Olympia health foods)

Pretty successful day, I'd say.

Cheers

This year was definitely an interesting one. 

Not quite as exciting as 2011 - it's a little hard to top traveling to 7 different countries, graduating high school, and moving off to college all in the same year. (Though in 2012 I did manage to cross five things off my bucket list, which carries its own share of excitement!)

 But all the same, this was a year of learning (sometimes even when I didn't want to), growth, traveling the country, wonderful people, and God's blessings. 

If I had to sum it up in three instagram pictures (not an easy task), it'd look like this:

Two more semesters at CU, a summer in Spain, a family move to Indiana, the last year of teenage-dom, and much, much more now awaits me in 2013 - I can't wait!

Monday Musings

- Midterms have a funny way of making you lose all motivation to do anything, even brush your teeth
- M&Ms may be more addicting than some drugs
- Correlating two people's schedules for a skype date is apparently an impossible task
- I wish the trees would stay this way forever
- Buying a new pair of Nike tights is the best motivation to go out on runs
- If you haven't listened to the Killers' new album Battle Born, do yourself a favor and check it out RIGHT NOW

“She said she usually cried at least once each day not because she was sad, but because the world was so beautiful & life was so short.”

― Brian Andreas

Running

Running. 
Funny how a word that used to make me scrunch up my face in a less-than-attractive way now defines almost every day of my week. And I just recently noticed how full of contradictions my running is.

I have almost always been a hater of running. It makes my muscles scream, it makes my lungs ache for air, and it completely tears me down every time my feet hit the pavement. But that's also why I am a lover of running. Call me crazy (most people do), but I think that's referred to as a "runner's high". I always thought that was some giant myth all the insane people of the world (read: long distance runners) came up with in some sort of secret society meeting to trick us normal folk. That is, until I actually experienced "the high" for myself. It's that feeling when you know in your head you physically can't go another mile, but your feet just don't stop ; you just can't get enough. It's really a beautiful thing.

I run to forget. There's something soothing about the repetitiveness of my steps, the distance from where I started increasing, and the fast-paced music blaring into my ears that help everything else fade away. When I run, I forget about that giant test I have next week. I forget that I barely ever get to see my family. I forget that I had a horrible day. But even while I'm running away from all these thing, I remember. Running reminds me to be thankful for each breath I'm given and to never take my physically healthy body for granted. Running reminds me that I've been so blessed with so much.

I run because I can. I have the physical capability, the time (mostly), the shoes, the trails, and the motivation (sometimes). But I keep running because I can't. I can't run a half marathon... yet. I can't run that fast mile time I've been shooting for... yet. I can't match pace with that one person... yet. I have never claimed to be a great runner, or even a good one. Heck, I'm barely even a decent runner. But the more I run, the more I can.

Looks like my running actually fits quite well into my life - it makes no sense.

Summertime

School at our back, sun on our face.
Nothing to worry about but sunburnt skin and sore legs.
Running, laughing, sweating, sleeping, stargazing, reading, soaking, dreaming.
Three months stretching endlessly ahead with unending possibilities.

I've been waiting for this