Birthday Time!

Dear Reader,

Today I turned 23. And by today, I mean the 27th. I haven't gone to bed yet, so even though it's 2 in the morning, it still counts.

Also the reason I haven't gone to bed yet is because I drove to DC tonight to visit friend Natalie for the weekend as a birthday present to myself.

I'm sure you will hear about this vacation soon.

(This is the balloon I found tied to my desk at work today, thanks to one of the Highlights editors. They are so nice!)

The Report

Dear Reader,

So I have worked at Highlights for four days now, and I love it! Everyone is so nice and it's such a cute town to live in!

And I have an apartment! Yay! I'm not fully moved in yet, but it's there and it's waiting to be lived in by me. I'm still staying at the Highlights Foundation cabins up in the hills in the middle of nowhere. To help you live vicariously through me, here are a few images of my drive on the dirt roads up into the hills of Pennsylvania:

This is my favorite little area on the drive. There was pretty much a constant stream of water falling from the sky for the first fews days being here in PA (some may call it rain, but it was so much more than that) and one time this whole field was flooded and it looked really cool.

This is a river that is by the cabins I'm staying at.

And this is my cabin! (Complete with running water, electricity, and wifi! What a wonderful age we live in.)

There will be more pictures of this super cute world I've stepped into soon.

Driving Pennsylvania

Dear Reader,

After driving 8 hours yesterday to my aunt's house in Corning, New York, and 3 hours today (and some added time for getting lost trying to find a gas station in the one town in the entire country that apparently doesn't have a gas station), I am finally in Pennsylvania!

I'm staying in one of Highlights' cabins that are about a half hour from Honesdale where I'll be working (and hopefully living once I find an apartment). Well, a half hour if I know where I'm going. Because I have yet to make it to and from Honesdale without getting lost . . . and one time ending up in New York. (Oops.)

Tomorrow, bright and early, is the first day! I am so excited. Can you tell?

A Mom Moment

Dear Reader,

So today is Mother's Day.

I basically spent a good chunk of yesterday buying all the presents my mom was getting today from all my family members, driving my brother to and from a church activity, grocery shopping for today's dinner and the cake I made, baking the cake (and partially burning it....), wrapping the presents I spent the day buying (which distracted me and is the reason the cake got burned--but don't worry it actually still tasted good), and then waking up early today to help make breakfast for my mom, go to church and come home quickly to make dinner for my mom, then decorate the cake (it was elaborate), and then having to clean up from all the dishes of each meal.

(The cake.)

After all the festivities, I was talking with my parents and I was saying how I had done all that work and had been basically running around all of yesterday and today and I was exhausted and my siblings didn't really seem to fully appreciate all the work I had done.

And then, I had an epiphany: All of the things I did over the past two days is what my mom does everyday and she rarely gets thanked for it.

Zing! Yup, karma gets me again.

So, thank you, Mom, for everything you do. Especially the little things that I don't remember to thank you for. You are wonderful.