Hey guys! I hope you've all had a good week.

Lately my organ class has been planning a birthday party for our professor, Dr. Lewis. I really can't wait: we're planning games and a surprise (for him) trip; it'll be so much fun. I'll post more about that after it happens so no secrets get out! Who knows who's reading this?
(Hi, Dr. Lewis!)

In case any of you were interested (and because I just love it), here is a picture of our studio organ.
I think it's just lovely.

My Greek class has been going much better since I've started going back through the book and reviewing old chapters in my free time. Latin is fabulously easy, as always. Classes are good this semester!

Speaking of which, I hadn't looked at my grades from last semester at all yet until this past week because I was completely afraid of what I got on my final paper in my history class. I was completely sure I did terribly on it. But yesterday, I was looking at my transcript online and I happened to see that grade by accident - I got an A! Pretty sweet! I was proud of that :D

My old roommate Jamie and I are continuing to make lots of plans for when I visit her in France over spring break. I so can't wait to go - she's getting to do so many cool things over there throughout the year.
France countdown: 53 days!

Tomorrow an Auschwitz survivor, Tova Friedman, is coming to talk at Hope, so a lot of my friends and I are planning on going. I think it should be fascinating to hear what she has to say... I'll let you know how that goes!

Now I have to get to sleep - I have a quiz in Greek tomorrow, lovely. Wish me luck!

Hello, friends!

Let me tell you, I cannot WAIT for spring break.  My old roommate, Jamie, is studying abroad in Rennes, France for the ENTIRE year, not even coming back for breaks, so I am going to go and visit her over spring break!! I've never been out of the country, so I can't wait to go to France (of all places!) and see her again and visit Paris and do all sorts of things that people who actually travel do. This past week, Jamie and I have been planning a lot of things we want to do while I'm there, so I'm especially excited right now. 61 days until I leave!!

My classes are going splendidly so far. I love Latin, just like last semester. Greek has been a bit of a rough transition for me, especially switching from the Attic Greek I learned in high school to the Koine Greek they teach here, but they're not too terribly different so I'm making it through. My professor is really helpful, too; I usually have more than a few questions for him after every class but he's really quite patient with me! I wish I had that sort of patience for teaching! I start my night class, Intro to Global Politics, tonight.

Does anyone else out there watch Glee? You should! This past weekend, my friends and I were watching the Glee season one DVDs when we thought we ought to have a party in April for when the new episodes come on again. Then we figured that April really is quite a long ways away, so why don't we just have it this weekend and watch more of the DVDs and celebrate the fantastic happiness that is Glee? So that's what we did.


Everyone else at the supper table: Emily, Brittany, Jennifer, Sarah, Meghan. We had pizza and Slushies - if you've seen the show, you'll know why there are Slushies!

In keeping with the Glee theme, of course there were several song and dance numbers performed throughout the evening. We enjoyed them quite thoroughly.


I've said it before and I'll say it again: I love my housemates! We have so much fun.

I suppose that's about all for now. I'm going to go and get ready for that night class... Wish me luck!

I hope everyone had a fantastic break!  I sure did; I got a bunch of wonderful Christmas presents and managed to visit with a ton of high school friends and family members.  It was tons of fun, but I have to say I'm glad to be back at Hope.

Today was the first day of classes, but I only had one: choir!  Women's Chamber Choir usually has less people in the spring semester, so those of us who have been in it before were anxious to see how many we'd have this year.  We ended up getting about 18 girls, which isn't completely too few.

I went to the Hope bookstore today to get all my books and I found this:
Isn't that adorable?  I really wanted to get one for my friend at home who has a baby brother!

I'm starting two more of my classes tomorrow: Latin and Greek.  I'm quite excited for both of them, really, but I have to say I'm slightly dreading Greek because I haven't had a Greek class since high school but I'm jumping into Greek II this semester.  I would have done Greek I for review last semester but I couldn't fit it into my schedule, so I talked to the professor and he said that, since I'd had three years of it before, I could jump ahead.  I just hope I remember enough!

I don't start my last class until this coming Monday; it's a once-a-week night class: Intro to Global Politics.  Sounds fun, right?  Then I also have voice and organ again but they won't start until next week either.

Have a great week, everyone!

Exam week has actually been pretty good for me this year! I had two exams on Monday (Latin and Public Presentations), two juries on Tuesday (voice and organ), and two papers both due Thursday.

Leah had put up a bunch of balloons outside the organ studio on Tuesday with each of our names on one. Then after each of us finished her jury, she would pop her balloon. It was lots of fun; kind of a done-with-juries LOUD celebration!

That's a picture from my cell phone; sorry for the terrible quality. You can see my yellow 'Julie Anne' balloon there! Leah took a bunch of pictures of us all popping them; maybe I'll get some of those from her later.

Now I have to stop procrastinating and actually finish those papers. Wish me luck!

Have a great break, everyone!
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On Monday, November 23, we had our Women's Chamber Choir concert! That's always a lot of fun. We had a lot of fun songs this year. My friend Leah was the TA for the class this semester, so she got to conduct one of our pieces for the concert. I tried to smile at her the whole time so she wouldn't be so nervous! She did fantastically, though, as did everyone!

Then the following weekend was Thanksgiving break! I hope everyone had a great time off from school! I stayed up here in my house for the break since I'll be flying back home for Christmas break again in three weeks anyway. It was good, though, I got a lot of homework done and practiced the organ a lot.

On Tuesday, December 1, my choir professor had all of us in choir this semester over to her house for lunch! I look forward to this every semester; she always makes some fantastic meal and we play with her pets (a dog and a snake) and have lots of fun. This year was no different: Professor Wolfe made us four different varieties of quiche, along with salad and an apple crumb dish for dessert. The quiche was my favorite, especially the bacon and custard kind!


There's the snake peeking up from behind that log.

This weekend was Vespers weekend! Vespers is always beautiful. My housemate Sarah was in the choir that sang in the service this year, plus my friends Leah and Kaitlyn were organists for the services too. I especially love the piece that Leah played for the postlude! Below is a recording of it played by Diane Bish. I wish I had a recording of Leah's to share with you - no offense to Diane Bish, but I think Leah did an even better job!


Yesterday my housemates Brittany, Meg and I went downtown to the Kerstmarkt in downtown Holland. It's like the regular farmers' market downtown, only very Dutch and very Christmassy!


We got lots of gifts and all sorts of fun things there. I found these adorable Dutch shoe slippers which I originally intended to be a present, but on second thought, I just might keep, I love them so much!


Last night, our whole house got together to build a gingerbread house!


I love my housemates! We have so much fun.

This coming week is our last week of classes before exams. I can't wait for Christmas break so I can finally go home again! Have a great week, everyone!
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My friend Heather came up to visit last weekend!


Heather is a friend of mine from home; she goes to Mary Washington.  She flew in Friday night and we went to supper, then we went to Paint-A-Pot with some other friends!


Heather made a mug and I made a bowl.


Then on Saturday morning, Heather, Brittany, Emily and I got up early and drove to Chicago! I've been to Chicago quite a few times since being at Hope, but since it was Heather's first time we did all the fun touristy things again.


We went to the bean, of course!  If you've never been to the bean, basically it's a big piece of modern art. It's a huge reflective bean-shaped sculpture meant for viewer interaction -- meaning you can (and are supposed to!) walk right up to it, walk under it and touch it.  It's a ton of fun.


Then later we walked down to Navy Pier, where we found an anchor, appropriately enough.


We drove back to Holland in time to see Nykerk, which was fabulous this year!  I'm so proud of the odd-year girls -- they won this year!

On Sunday, Heather and I went down to Tunnel Park to hang out at the beach some.  I took some pictures with my old-school film camera, but I haven't gotten them developed yet.  Later that afternoon, Heather went back home.

Class registration for next semester was on Monday for me.  I'm really excited for next semester now; my schedule looks great!  I hope you guys all have a great week!

There are actually two birthdays in my house in the first week of November: mine on the third and Sarah's on the fifth. We went to Applebee's on the fourth (a nice compromise) for half-price appetizers and free desserts for the birthday girls!


My friend Heather is flying up to visit me this weekend from Virginia!  I'm really excited to see her. We'll be doing lots of fun things this weekend, so I'll have lots more pictures to share soon!