Hello Again

Merry Christmas!
I hope everyone's holiday was fantastic! I had a great day. I woke up at about 8:30, finished knitting my sister's scarf, wrapped it and went downstairs.
After waking up my father, my sister and I went downstairs to open our stockings and presents. I was pleasantly surprised at the amount of gifts I received, due to the fact that I told my parents I truly did not want anything (I've been saving up for a Mac Book.)
In all, we finished opening our presents and drove down to my grandparent's house. We hung out, ate snacks, read an article on my great-grandfather's grocery store, and ate a delicious dinner. I know it sounds cliche, but I really love this time of year solely because I get to see my family. We have Christmas parties at my mother's dad and stepmother's house and her mother and stepfather's house. Christmas day, we open presents, eat a delicious egg dish, and then visit my dad's parents. It is wonderful.
After the joy of Christmas, I can only count down the hours until New Year's (my favorite holiday) because all of my cousin's from my dad's side come up to my grandparent's house. We all shop, lunch, dine, catch up on all that we've missed from each other (since we only see each other during this time and maybe once over the summer.) It is a wonderful, happy time and I never ever want it to end

x

A few weeks ago, I learned, from an article in the New York Times, of a website designed for young writers. I immediately typed www.figment.com into my browser and signed up.
Posting in the forums and reading the stories has given me back my inspiration and motivation to write. It was two years ago this vacation that I started my first novel, and have since finished the story line, but have yet to edit and improve it. I still haven't even looked at it since this vacation started, but have started two other stories since starting my membership.
I have published on my page a short story I wrote, and a few poems that I had originally posted on here a year or so ago, but other than the short story, I have not published anything of much significance. I hope that by the end of this vacation I will have let myself publish on the internet something that I have let no other eyes read before. Because, after all, this is the year of taking chances. I have gone out of my comfort zone many times already since starting school, and I can't keep myself back now!

If you would like to read any of my writings, follow me here

I will end this post with a few songs that I have found inspiration in and have found myself putting on repeat:


I love how it starts off slow, and then does the same song again, but more faster. Plus, the lyrics are amazing.


I think I'm just really into the slower songs right now...


Tragic but adorable.


Shun me for listening to Disney music, but I'm actually in love with this song...


I could honestly listen to this song over and over again. It's like an acid trip for your ears.


I will always love The Kooks.


I usually don't listen to rap, but...
1. I love the slow tempo of this.
2. As much as I dislike Kanye, his rap makes me smile everytime I hear this song
3. Cudi is so precious in this video.


This song semi inspired my story line. Plus, every favorites playlist I have has atleast one song by The Kooks.


I hope your holidays are festive fantastic!
-H

Renaissance

So, last night I was reading some of my old posts, looking back on my year. I smiled as I remembered the good times and sighed at the not so good times. All in all, I noticed how much I've neglected my blog. With over a year of posting and over 100 posts, I have changed a lot. And so have my posts. Though, I noticed that as this year progressed, my posts became shorter and more boring. I began to take away the actual substance of my posts and simply post pictures with random little thoughts, or no thoughts at all. I realized that I had forgotten why I started my blog in the first place- to have a place to express my feeling to anyone who would listen, and to hopefully inspire people like other blogs have inspired me.
In addition, I have recently noticed that my entire Bloglovin' feed consists of pictures. My thoughts were further proven when I decided to download Picasa and realized that I have over 13,000 pictures saved onto my laptop. Not only is that awful for my harddrive, but my obsession with pictures and neglect of words caused my blog to become a screen, rather than a person. With my increase in reading blogs with simply pictures, my own blog morphed into the thousands of others that just reblog every new outfit trend and editorial. I forgot about my personality.
The way I've been treating my blog can also be paralleled to my current state of living. As I've gotten older, I've had a lot more responsibilities. Since getting my first job in April, my childhood has been quickly swirling down the drain. With my entrance into my junior year of high school, I have seemed to lose sense of who I actually am. Granted, many amazing things that I will hold with me for the rest of my life will stay with me, but I have seemed to lose those good things in all the stress of my life. All the pressure.
I started this blog to vent about my life and to share my thoughts. As my responsibilities grew, my creativity shrank. As the school work was piled on, my stories became pushed to the side. I always feel like I have to do things to please other people: my teachers, my coach, my parents, my friends, and I lose myself.
As I looked through my posts from the year, I noticed the loss of myself. The posts became shorter with less words, and my personality dwindled. There was no substance, nothing to separate me from the rest. I was just there, barely hanging on, with nothing to hold me back from falling over the edge.
That is why I believe I need to have a blog Renaissance. I will not create a new blog to start over, because I don't want to start over. I want to grow. I want to remember how I used to be, how the words rolled out of my brain into my fingers and onto a keyboard or a sheet of paper. I want to change, but I don't want to forget. I can not forget because if I forget how I feel, I will forget how to save myself from slipping off the edge.

Oh the weather outside is frightful...

Time for a new bundled up wardrobe

p.s. I have lost the credits for these photos so if any one of them are yours, or you know who it belongs to, tell me and I'll give credit where credits due:)

Hair Color

I want cool colored hair!

shorts and tights

all from google

I look at you blindly. Ignorantly blind, for I do not understand I am seeing you as the person I wish to see. I do not see you for who you really are. I do not see through your slightly wrinkled clothes, your short hair, or your freckled skin. I see the green of your eyes but not the sunshine of your soul. I see the curl of your hair, but not the capacity of your mind. I think I know you. I know every scar on your skin and the chip of your tooth, but I do not know the scars and chips of within. I am blind to every bruise on your heart and scar on your soul. I can not see. And the worst part is is that I do not understand. Little do I know that to you, I am blind.

What is your purpose in life?

I am only sixteen years old. I have no idea what I'm supposed to do in life; I barely know what I want to do. Through my experiences, I've learned things that inspire me, things that have helped me, things that have hurt me, and others.
One three-day-long experience that I think of everyday is a leadership seminar called HOBY. In my life as my "pre-HOBY" self, I knew right from wrong, I had done some community service, valued my family and friends, and knew exactly what I wanted to do in life to make sure that I was happy. During HOBY, though, I learned to open my eyes, mind, and heart. I was taught not only to do community service, but how to. I was given so many opportunities to make other people smile, whether it was delivering gifts to the elderly at a nursing home, or cheering extra loud to show your appreciation for someone. My groups that I spent the whole three days with became my family. After the last meeting, my dad walked with me back to my dorm as tears rolled down my face because of the realization that I would not see my HOBY family the next morning and that the best weekend of my life was ending.
I cried all the way home and again when I got home, knowing that it was over. These intense emotions, though, inspired me. I stopped stressing out about school and remembered how great I felt by making other people smile. I signed the HOBY commitment to doing 100 hours of community service by the next seminar, not because I had to, but because I wanted to.
I think my "pre-HOBY" self would answer the proposed question with something along the lines of "write for a fashion magazine," or "become a mom," but now I look at the question and actually think about it. What is the thing I want to accomplish most? My answer: I want everyone to feel at some point in their lives the way I felt that weekend. I want to be someone's cheerleader (another thing I learned at HOBY: you can't be sad when cheering as loud as possible!). I want to help someone remember love and happiness who has lost those feelings along the way.
So what is my purpose in life? I don't know exactly, but what I do know is that every time I see a glow stick, meet someone named Bob, eat a burrito, or hear "Don't Stop Believing," I will be reminded of my commitment and desire to make other people feel true happiness.

A New York Moment

I visited New York City with one of my best friends in July to see the Fashion exhibit at the Met. We made it a day trip and took the train down and back, and had a ton of fun.
I don't know why I waited to long to put up these pictures, but now I'm looking at them and missing the summer and this day! (even though it rained the entire time...)

Camp

she grew up in a nice neighborhood, but it didn't do her no good

note to self:
layers, denim+zippers, stripes, oversized shirts, button downs, clean sweaters, plain white t's, tucked in

The End [1]

x

This was the end. Not the beginning or even the beginning of the end, but the end. This was the end of the end. This was the end of a life, the end of a body, of a mind, a heart. This was the end, and Jenna knew it. She knew it well. Too well, even. Jenna knew too much. She knew too much sadness, too much heartache, too much anger. She was so informed about these that it became dangerous. It became unhealthy. It was unhealthy for her to be so sad, to be so familiar with heartache, to be able to hold so much anger. But it was all going to end now. Right now.
It was very early Monday morning. Her house was so quiet that every move she made, with every squeak of her bed, she feared waking her parents, her brother, or even her dog. Her house was so dark that she could barely see her hands resting lightly in her lap, or even the small plastic baggie she was moving between her fingers and thumb. She closed her eyes, completely blinding herself. All she could think about, all that she could see on the back of her eyelids was the end. Not the beginning of the end, but the end of the end. She was finally ready to end this.

Hello summer, so glad to have you back.