Random

I had a Hershey kiss.... And a pipe cleaner... Sooo... I made a ring!

-Nikly

Winter Wonderland

Today while I was eating lunch, I looked out the window, and the grass that was peeking through the snow was covered in frost! It was so pretty, so, I went upstairs, got dressed, and went outside to take some pictures of the beautiful snow.

I'm not quite sure what happened here....

Winter is beautiful...I love it. :)
~Nana

Blank Paper

Blank paper is one of the things that just drives me absolutely nuts, and yesterday, my dad got me a new sketch book, full of, you guessed it, blank paper.
It's almost as if the paper is just waiting to be discovered, to be something great, something new, something creative, maybe even something famous!
Having a blank piece of paper, it could be anything you want, it could be about anything, or simply, be about nothing at all.
I love to doodle, because it doesn't really mean anything, but putting hundreds of simple movements together can create something that looks so complex...
I finished drawing this doodle this morning...

Now, I'm not going to say this was easy, but I'm not going to say it was hard either.

This took time, I started this yesterday afternoon, and finished it this morning.

I always start with the corner, just a little corner of creativity can create something big, even just a few tiny circles...

Then, the creativity starts to grow...
And the magic begins...

~Nana

A beautiful week..

Blog

This past week I have been on vacation and in 2 days I shall be home (on Christmas Eve....) I was on a cruise and it was wonderful. I woke up the first morning to the view of overlooking the ocean... I saw my "roommates" were still asleep so I slipped on my shoes and stepped onto the balcony. I leaned on the railing finding myself caught in a little bit a Gods creation that absolutely took my breath away. As the beauty bubbled up through me I laughed. I held my hand out and let it cut the wind. The sun warmed what the wind was cooling of the skin on my hand, as I looked my skin glowed from sunlight. As the days blurred together and I had gotten to know our maids, waiters and others on the ship I realized how fast time was escaping me until I finally found myself saying goodbye to all those I knew on the ship. As we lined up on the gangway to get off the ship I stood at the line between land and sea, I took a step onto the gangway because I couldn't stand still any longer, the people behind me were anxious to get off and my mother prompted me to keep moving. As I walked a sob escaped me, no tears, no crying, just one single sob. I looked back at all the memories I made there. I kept walking and soon the USA embraced me back into its safe haven, I realized how much I missed America.

Color

Blue

Oh, the interesting things I do...

Today I realized I do some pretty interesting things...For instance, I went outside while it was snowing to take pictures of snowflakes, here are some of the photos...

One point is missing!! :O

This snowflake is near the inside of my coat sleeve.

Another thing, I purposely left my stocking cap on, even though I was inside...

And the last thing I did interesting today was...




I had hot cocoa, and I took the marshmallows out with a spoon, so they wouldn't melt in the microwave...
What can I say? I love me some marshmallows. ;)


~Nana

As God Speaks

God. He speaks. Maybe not as a voice in your head but he places things in the walk of your life and reminds you that he's still there. But how do we recognize his speaking? Good question. I sat doing my literature last night, reading poems wishing I wasn't reading them but writing them. Lets face it, I was crabby. I was reading a poem and suddenly I felt a cold rush about me. As I read this poem I stopped a moment, was God speaking to me? The poem spoke about how, when we sin, satan rushes to God demanding our much deserved death. At that second Jesus, at the right hand of God, stands up and says "I paid for that sin when I died on the cross, that sin is forgiven." Satan is forced to runaway knowing what Jesus says is true.
So why do we sin? Although God forgives us we must realize our sin is on Christ. Everything we do is reflected on Christs image. Do we want to do that to our Savior? Do we want to make him look bad? Or do we, as Christians, wish to glorify God and Christ by being an upright representation of them. By no means perfect, but definetly, undeniably, a child of God.

-Nilly

A different point of view...

I was recently talking to a friend of mine, we were talking about Christmas, I asked him if he gets any presents for Christmas, he said "No, my family only gives gifts to Jesus, it's His Birthday, not ours."
Think about it...If it's Jesus's birthday, why are we giving gifts to ourselves? We should be giving to Him.
Now, I'm not saying we shouldn't give, we were made to give, I'm asking "Who/What are we giving to?"
Giving isn't always good, we may give our parents disrespectful words, we may give words that hurt, and receiving them is unbearable
"What you have done to the least of these you have done unto Me."
Some people may look at it and say "Oh, if I donate to the least of these, Jesus will be happy!" This is true...But what if we are ignoring the least of these? What if we rebuke them? "What you have done to the least of these you have done unto Me." it's not just giving, it's everything you do, to the least of these.
It doesn't matter how much you give, it's about to whom you choose give.

So, this Christmas, maybe consider filling a shoe box, or simply donating a little money.

Have a very Merry Christmas!

~Nana

Christmas is making it's way out of the closet...

Christmas music, snow, pretty lights....What's not to love?
This year it seemed as if Christmas slowly started walking into the world...And after Thanksgiving got out of the way it darted into the world! Or, at least my neighborhood. I live up North, so up here people put up their Christmas lights early, while it's "warm", so they don't have to do it when it's blistering cold out!
The lights make the neighborhood magical...And the snow covers the not-so-green grass...It's so beautiful at Christmas time...It's almost as if you can see the joy...Except in the malls, especially when there are sales. ;)

~Nana

A Wonderful Adventure...

A few days ago I went to a friends house....
The first thing we did was go outside and cruise around...
Hair flying in the breeze,
Sun glasses on,
Cruising around...

We weren't actually "driving"...Let me paint another picture,

Teeth chattering,
Hair blowing like a tornado,
Sunglasses falling off,
Holding on to rails so tight that your hands hurt because if you let go you might fall off,
Making doughnuts, (the ones you make in the ground, not the pastries)
Mud and leaves flying into our mouths,
and screaming "SLOW DOWN!!" because we didn't want to drive into a creek.

The answer.
Go-carts.

~Nana

Good morning!

As I woke up early and savored my morning alone... With myself.. My thoughts.. And my acoustic music, with a long list if stuff to get done, I peeked up through my window after around 2 hours of work just quickly enough to see the sunrise. In that moment I feel like life, and everything attached to it, it's all gonna be okay.

-Nilly

A Random Stranger Made My Day...

At Church this morning, the pastor told us to go around and shake hands with people as usual...
Most people just lightly shake your hand and say "Good morning.", well, one man stood out...
He was a very interesting man, I like him already! He has a white Santa Clause beard.
He firmly took my hand, while he was aggressively shaking my hand he said "God Bless you!!",

he did this to everyone he shook hands with, I found it amusing when he shook my brother's hand he said "It's good to be blessed by God! God bless you!". He was saying "God bless you" to everyone that surrounded him.

This man made my day, and brought a smile to my face.

It reminds me of a phrase I heard in a movie, "HUGO", a very good movie, but one phrase got to me...

"No one had ever seen anything like it before.", I had never seen a man with a white Santa beard firmly shake someone by the hand and say "God bless you!" with such a joyful tone.

Someday, I want to do something "No one had ever seen before"...

Trying to go beyond curiosity,
Nana

Feeling Christmas-y.

A few days ago it started snowing, and when there's snow on the ground, Christmas comes to mind, so, I got my Christmas tree out of the closet and put it up! I love the way the ornaments shimmer against the lights...

Merry Christmas!
~Nana

The Adventure Of Moving

Last year in June, I moved from one state, one I've lived in for my whole life, to another state....Fourteen hours away.
I'm starting this story on a Friday, a dark and cold night, I just got out of my youth group, which ended at 10:30, this will be my last time, I put down all my souvenirs and gifts from my friends in the grass, as soon as they hit the ground I was being bombarded by hugs, I didn't know if I'd ever see these people again, after all, we were moving, the next day, soon, after all the hugs and good-byes, by mom came to pick me up, and take me home, for the last time, I'm trying to stop the tears from coming down my cheeks, there's a big lump in my throat...But wait, my mom's phone rings, it's my friend's mom, she invited us to go to Stake'N'Shake with them, we had a grand time, we got some shakes, ate spicy peppers, and yelled "LIGHTING!!!" when ever lighting would strike. It was 12:30am when we got home, I went downstairs to go to the computer, my friend had wrote her email on my hand, and I wanted to email her, but the computers, were gone, packed up. I brush my teeth and go to bed exhausted from all the fun and bittersweet moments that happened that day.

All of a sudden, I am waken up by the sound of boxes being stacked and tape being ripped, "What's going on? It's only 8:30...Why am I up?"
I hear a strange whisper, "Is anyone in here?" a worker asked my brother, he said "yes, my sister is sleeping." well...At least I think he said it...I could've been dreaming...
I got up, got dressed in the bathroom, and started packing. Soon we were putting stickers on furniture, packing boxes with shoes, getting ready for the long drive ahead of us.

The ride was long, but it wasn't too bad, most of the ride I slept, and read, we stopped occasionally to let my dog out and go to the bathroom, and to fill up on gas, but eventually, and midnight, we arrived, at our new house? No, not yet, we're spending the night at our friend's house.
The next day we got up, my mom, one of my brothers and I, went back in the cramped van full of a bunch of...Stuff...My dad, and my other two brothers drove separately.
Soon we stop at a coffee shop, there's internet there, my mom is in there for about two hours...
And at last, we're in the city I'll be living in, and we arrive at our house, my dad and my brothers are already there, I look around, go into my room, not as big as I suspected it to be, but, it'll work. :)
We only have one rocking chair, a couch, and an air mattress for furniture, I slept on the couch cushion, it was a very tiring day...

Life with few entertainment systems and very few furniture is pretty fun! We would sit on the floor and watch movies on my brother's Xbox.

Overall, it was a bittersweet, fun adventure.

~Nana

Friendship bracelets

Recently learning how to make friendship bracelets I am now hooked. I've ranged from making bright happy colored bracelets to a little bit more sophisticated. (As shown) Happy Saturday! -Nilly

Art journal

This is my art journal (not extremely artistic) artistic isn't what I am going for, I'm trying to capture the texture if life (hence fuzzy pipe cleaners, tissue papers, water colors, bleeding ink, glitter and stitching... I literally ripped pages and sewed them back together.) I left raw edges, my journal is beyond imperfect its terrible but it captures the most important thing it can. It captures myself among its pages...
-Nilly

Beautiful things

It's amazing how easy it is to find beautiful things.. You just have to find the beauty! There's beauty in an old embellishment button because it holds a story... There's beauty is sunset.. Lets face it there's beauty in all!
-Nilly

Song Title/Lyric Art

Today I made this

Just normal "Made To Love"?
Look closely.

Inside the letters are the lyrics of the song.
I missed some of the lyrics cause I haven't heard it in a while.
And you can see how I made the letters, I wrote the letters in pencil, wrote the lyrics in pen and then erased the pencil. (Apparently I didn't erase it enough)
This would be really cool with "Forever Reign" or "Lead Me To The Cross".

You can hear Made To Love here.

~Nana

Halloween Adventures!

Halloween, between Labor Day and Thanksgiving, a day where kids go dressed up as characters and go house to house asking people for candy...What's not to love?
This year I handed out candy at a friends house, and usually when people hand out candy they say "Take two" or "Happy Halloween!!" Or some (rarely) say "trick." And close the door.
But not me, when I handed out candy to the kids I said "Merry Christmas!!" The first time I said it was out of habit, every time I give someone something I say "Merry Christmas!" I didn't realize I said it, til after I said it...The kid got a kick out of it though, and so did my friend! Soon my friend and her mom were telling me what to tell the kids, Happy Birthday, Happy Valentines Day, Happy Veterans Day (true story).
And as if it wasn't weird enough...I had a heart painted on my head...

Kids: "Trick or treat!!"
Me: "Happy Birthday!!" *Gives candy*
Kid: "Thanks!-Wait, what?!"
Me: "It's your birthday!! Congratulations!!"

The looks on their faces were priceless.

Those kids will probably remember me forever...Well, maybe not, but they probably told their parents about it! ;)


Merry Christmas!! (Happy Halloween!)

~Nana

Bubble art.

So I got bored, and made my own bubbles (3/8part corn syrup, 3/8 part dish soap, and 1/4 water) and put food coloring in the bubble mix and blew on the page! These are the results of my venture :)

A little slice of a smile

I'd like to dedicate this post to that random stranger I "danced" with today, (and by danced I mean that awkward moment when you are trying to get around someone and you both go left, both dart right until someone stands still and the other passes) you made my day. Simply by making a joke of the awkward "dart left then right" motions we were doing, your comment, "thank you for this dance" was utterly hilarious and was a very funny comment. Just thought I'd share :) oh the funny things people say..

-Nilly

Today was magical..

Last night I wrote a bit about snow.. It's magical.. Anyway today I was with my friend (Nana!) and we made bracelets (pictured) which was awesome!!!!!! (She made the pink, blue, green and yellow one and I made the rest) so I came home and saw my precious snow was melting so I quick took some photos before it slipped away... Come again soon snow...

-Nilly

A randomly genius idea..

Today I was panicking (okay not panicking... But hey..) I'm going on a vacation in December and metal knitting needles aren't allowed on the plane. :( my friend recommended bamboo knitting needles but if you know me you know I'm cheap and lazy so the idea of going out and buying needles wasn't the happiest thought I had. Then my genius siblings told me to stick chopsticks in a pencil sharpener and sand em down and use em as homemade knitting needles! Hence, here they are! (: -Nilly