Feelin' Great!

Yay! Lots to talk about, well I think anyway.

Last weekend I got to go home for the first time since I started college for Daddy's birthday! It was so great. Only Mom and Uncle Wayne knew. The looks on my Dad, Ate Jean, and Grandmama's face were priceless. I've never seen my parents smile as much as they did since graduation. It was so great to come home.

The drive was only 4.5 hours, thanks to Ryan. We were just so excited to go home. We arrived in Nashville around 9:30? I can't remember, I was still on ETSU time. Spending time with my family was great! It was also amazing to get a hot shower that actually had decent water pressure.

Sabbath's service was awesome. Pastor Angel is amazing! I love him. Anyone reading this who didn't hear his sermon should go listen to it on the Madison Campus website. He is our new youth pastor and he was great! After church we ate at Olive Garden. Mmmm, really good food! I was so happy. Christie and I took a little expedition to opry Mills that afternoon. I really missed hanging out with her. It was great to see her. (Oh, btw, Christie, if you're reading this, please make a CD of all the the songs that you think I would like that I don't have please! Thank ya sis! ;)). Oh! Daddy's party. I saw a lot of people, well family. It was great. Zack came over. It was great to see him too! (I know I'm using the word great a lot, but it was great!) And just for you Zack...GO GATORS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I even got to talk to Billy Saturday night because our team won! :)

I was sad that I had to leave on Sunday, but it's a little more bearable here now because I know that I get to see my family a lot during October. Even in November I get a little piece of home when Elizabeth comes to see me. I think I will be ok the rest of the semester. No more homesickness posts, knock on wood!

I've heard this question so many times: How was yoga? Well, I didn't go last week because something came up, but I went yesterday! It was amazing. I felt my body getting a workout, but afterwards, I felt completely relaxed. I slept really well last night too! I would go again tomorrow but I have a AMSA meeting that I need to go to. Next week though, I will go both times! I'm so excited.

Well, I've spent a lot of time writing this blog when I should be writing a draft for a paper for English, so I will wrap it up!

This weekend has been the best ever!

Love you guys!
Jillian

Work out Time!

Ok, so yesterday I went with Ryan to the gym for the first time. I was pretty amazed with my stamina on the bike. I guess all of that walking around campus is paying off! It was great! I love the gym. Tomorrow I'm going to try the Yoga class. Hopefully I can find someone to go with me, because Ryan thinks it's too girly for him (;) jk). Im really excited. I think we are going to try the Argentine Tango class too (but we will probably not be as amazing as Christie and Sydney).

There's not a whole lot more to say really. For everyone wondering how I'm feeling in terms of health, I'm doing much better. I'm still really cold, but then again it's only 65 degrees here. It's really different. I bet it's in the mid-80s at home. Anyway, not more achiness or sneezing or coughing. Just cold and a little stuffy nose. ;) I'm doing good though. I drink lots of juice and vitamins, which now that I think of it, I need to take some...

Right now, I'm taking a break from studying for my Calculus. Later on today I'm going to work on my picture assignment (I have some of it done Mommy!) Mellie, if you're reading this, how do you put pictures on your blog? Every now and then I have some random ones that I could post with my blog, but I haven't figured it out yet. Thanks!

Well, I got to get back to studying. I will post later.

Love you guys!
Jillian

P.S. I cooked kielbasa all by myself just a few minutes ago and I didn't burn the dorm down! Yay! It was yummy!;)

Homesickness

See, last week I thought I hit the main wave of homesickness, boy was I wrong. I never believe Allie when she said that homesickness normally sets in around the second week that people are here at ETSU. Well, now I believe her. Yesterday I got a big package from my family. I absolutely loved it! I had brought a chicken sandwich and some fries from the atrium for lunch, but I spent so much time looking at each and everything in the package so closely that I forgot it and I ended up having to reheat it. ;)

I was so happy to see that Grandmama put in some of her homemade bread in it because I had ran out of milk and it's my roommate's turn to get it this week. Now I have something to eat for breakfast and for snacks, along with the M&Ms. (Someone tell Grandmama that I did get butter yesterday and the Ryan has already eaten half of his loaf. ;)) I got two Sudoku books, the white and green belt books. I had seen these at Barnes & Noble, but I didn't get them because I figured I could play online and just wait til Christmas. Now I have something to do when I feel like procrastinating or just to get my brain going in the mornings. I got several pieces of mail, mostly which were junk mail, but hey I had fun looking at it. I finally got my camera case. Now I have two MS converters (that's not the right word, but I just woke up). And thank you so much Christie for sending me labels! (Yes I'm OCD and anal about organization).

I had two very special things in my package. One of them was a card from my parents. I love cards. They are a real pick-me-up. I keep all of my cards next to my bed to read them when I'm down. Secondly, my yearbook. I must have spent and hour looking at my yearbook. I love pictures, if you guys couldn't telll already. I saw so many pictures of my friends and my sister and Ryan's sister. It was great. I loved it! I even had a signature from Sydney! I was so surprised. And then I reached the back cover, my sister's little note to me. I couldn't help the tears, and I'm trying desperately to hold them back now. It was so sweet. We have both been equally busy so we haven't been able to talk over the phone much. I miss her a lot....

I've figured out that talking to the people that I miss helps a lot. Yesterday, I received some pictures of my Grandmama with the surprise flowers that I sent her for Grandparents' Day. I had to cry. After like 5 minutes, I got a phone call from her. It was great to hear her voice. I was ok again, but I can't wait until October. Later that night was rough, until Daddy called. i talked with him for a long time. It was great, because I hadn't talked to him all week. (The package was good though, because I could imagine him carrying this huge box to the post office and mailing it.) Then I talked to Mommy. It helped a whole lot. After talking for about an hour with my parents, my homesickness began to slowly fade away. It's not as bad today, well right now anyway since it's only 10:00 here.

Well, I need to go take a hot shower and make a grocery run to buy everything that cures the common cold, klennexes, vitamins, gatorade, juice, etc... Well I will write again sometime this weekend.

I love and miss you all so much!!

Jillian

Labor Day weekend.

hello everyone,

(excuse me for all the lower cases, my shift key is being weird so i'm not even going to bother.) well, this weekend was a long weekend and guess what, nobody is here on campus. it was kinda funny, free parking spaces, plenty of places to sit in main meal, and extremely quiet. my roommate went home and ryan's roommate went home, but came back yesterday. i have yet to see my roommate, but i'm expecting her later on tonight. so friday, ryan and i watched a movie at my place. saturday, ryan and i went around johnson city. we went to the mall and to all the little shopping centers since we had nothing to do. we again watched a movie except at the movie theaters. we watched invincible. it's a good movie. anyone who likes football or underdog stories would like this movie. i recommend it to anyone like that. after the movie, we came back to campus and ate dinner at main meal, then watched larry the health inspector at my dorm.

yesterday was great! ryan came over to fix me french toast and kielbasa because i was feeling homesick. normally on sunday, mom fixes breakfast and i read the paper (well the advertisements) with daddy, but now i'm not home so ryan kept me company. we went to grace fellowship church. we both loved it. it's a lot like ryan's church except with instruments and well it's just different. it's smaller than both of our churched, but we like it. after church we went to walmart, the local hangout except for this weekend because everyone went home instead of stay here.

then we went to petsmart...

now before you you make assumptions...well go ahead. ryan and i now own a fish tank. and as of yesterday we own 4 fish and a frog. they're awesome! the frog is what amazes us the most. we saw him at petsmart. we were actually looking for an algae eater and we saw him and he was swimming like crazy. we decided we had to get him, so we did. now you're probably thinking that i have enough stuff to fill up my room, well true. the fish are in ryan's room. hannah might be bringing her fish up today, so our fish are in ryan's room. :) i'm so excited.

as of today, i plan on doing a lot of homework, maybe hit the gym if its open, and i don't know what else. maybe i'll go and buy ryan's birthday gift. (it's his birthday on the 10th. if you want to send him a card or something, leave me a comment and i will email you his po box.) well, this weekend wasn't too bad, it was actually kind of fun!

i will blog soon!

love ya,
jillian

Ah Friday!

Ah! I'm done with my day and it's only like 2 o'clock. This morning was nice. I woke up and headed off to my APS job. I figured it would be a lot like the Vanderbilt Children's Hospital summer volunteer program...but it's so much better! I actually got to work a lot more. I didn't have to clean and I didn't have a stupid checklist. It's so fast paced but I love it. I'm really going to enjoy working there at the Student Health Clinic.

Classes today were great. I love World history (as I mentioned in previous blogs). The professor is so laid back, but passionate about history in a different way. He's not like Ms. Royal, not that I don't love Ms. Royal. He's just relaxed and ready to teach. I loike him a lot. English has gotten better. I finally see more similarities to other people in my professor. He's really nice i think. Minnick, he's a lot like you and I think that's why i think that I will like his class. ;)

Well, i'm just sitting here in my dorm room. Thinking of something to do before Ryan gets back so we can go work out. I think I might do some laundry. I guess I have to. I'm running out of pants. ;)

Love ya,
Jillian

P.S. Homesickness is gradually slipping away, well, until everyone seemed to go home today for the holiday. ;(