Autumn and new beginnings...

So, I'm officially a terrible blogger! It's been almost a month now since I last posted, and I don't even have the excuse of having been on holiday...
Since I last posted, a few things have happened. I think it'll be easier to post under a few headings so I don't ramble (which I'm rather good at doing!):

Education

I got my AS Level results on August 19th and I got AAAA in my four subjects (biology, chemistry, psychology and english literature) and an A* in A2 general studies! I was so happy once it sank in, and it gave me a confidence boost - I know I'm capable of getting the grades I need, especially when I resit module one of chemistry to pull up my A to a higher one. On 17th August, I sat my UKCAT (UK Clinical Aptitude Test) which is like an IQ test for people who want to study medicine, dentistry or vet science. I was incredibly nervous but ended up coming out with an average of 692.5 which is actually very good, and much much better than I'd expected! Yay!


On Friday (24th September) I sent off my UCAS application - I've applied to do medicine at Nottingham, Brighton-Sussex, Leicester and East Anglia, with deferred entry so I'd start in September 2012. I'm nervous because I don't really know what to expect, but I'm praying about it and I know that God will make it happen if He wants me to do medicine. If not, then of course I'll be a bit upset but, ultimately, I know that God's plan for my life is better than anything I could imagine <3

Spiritual Life

Since my baptism and camp and everything, I've been so close to God - it's been a great season for me in my faith. A lovely lady from church is now my mentor, and it's amazing to have her guidance and I'm feeling so supported by amazing people at church. A new girly Bible study group has started at Maddy's house every other Tuesday evening, called 'Butterflies' which I'm going to, and really like so far. I've also been getting much more involved in the worship at church - as well as Impact! am doing some Sunday evening services, and Wayne (the worship leader at our church) is trying to push me out of my comfort zone more, so last night it was just me and him singing, and he stopped on the verses. It was scary but so amazing, and I'm beginning to grow in confidence. So many people said lovely things to me after the service too, like elderly women saying 'I love it when you sing, you've got such a beautiful voice' and it makes me feel so great about myself :). After the last Impact! someone apparently told Wayne they saw me as a future worship leader so I've been praying about it loads and just waiting to see what happens...wow, God is so good <3

Everyday Life

I'm settling back into college now (although ready for a holiday already!) and getting to know the people in my new classes. Biology practicals are so much fun so far this year :D


I've been enjoying gatherings with people I've not seen for a while

and just those weekend days where I chill, go shopping with Hayley, watch 'Scrubs' on the sofa at Maddy's then get inspired by 'Come Dine with Me' and decide we'll make a cheese souffle....because spontaneity is the way forward! And, despite the fact neither of us had ever made souffle before and they're famously hard to make right - it was perfect!


At the moment, I'm in a good place - close to God, doing okay at college, loving my amazing friends. It's a great season; incidentally Autumn has gotta be my favourite as well - I'm loving those golden leaves! I'm excited for the future, because of Jeremiah 29:11 <3

Lots of love,
Anna xxxxxxxxx

Summer 2010

I've not blogged for pretty much the whole Summer (have been very busy) so thought I'd do a little update post with summaries of what I've been up to over the last month or so...

Baptism

On the morning of 18th July, I got baptised at my lovely church (SHCF). Our family friends were here for the weekend so my Hannah got to come to see me being baptised, -she'd never been to anything like that before so was intriuged... I'd had a series of baptism classes where we worked through a booklet and also ran through the practicalities of the baptism (where I'd stand, how to bend my knees properly etc). On the morning of the 18th I woke up early and was really nervous (actually threw up because I was so scared about saying my testimony in front of everyone). I got lots of lovely cards and presents once I got to church, though, and everything went really smoothly. As soon as I'd said my testimony I felt *so* happy because now was the bit I'd been looking forward to. When I got baptised it was one of the best moments of my life - that feeling of coming up out of the water was incredible and it was amazing that so many of my friends came to support me. Maddy told me she'd never seen me look so happy as when I got out of the pool, and seeing my gorgeous Hayley get baptised as well was amazing. Thank you, Lord <3







MCYC

MCYC camp is always the highlight of my year and this camp (Seniors 2) was no disappointment. It was such an amazing week of spending time with friends, teachings, worship and fun! God really spoke to me during the week, particularly about surrender (but that's for another post!) and our team (go Nigel!) beat everyone else on the sports day tug of war with ease!







France

Literally the day after I got home from camp, I flew out to Limoges to join Hayley and her family on the second week of their holiday. It was a really great week (despite my having to do UKCAT practice) and I loved the company, the trips out and Hayley's dad's great barbequeing!





Re:act

Re:act was a series of family fun days all around my town, run by Urban Saints and YFC, and I helped out on a couple of the days. It was a great week and loads of people enjoyed the free food and activites like face painting and hair braiding. Lots of people became Christians too which was great.






Ireland

This was my family holiday this year - Mum, Dad and I went to the south-west coast of Ireland for a week (as well as stopping off for a couple of days in Dublin). It was nice to spend some time with my parents and the weather was amazing! I also got very attached to the cats at the holiday house (who I named Nugget, Bertie and Horatio!) and am sad to leave them...







(I'll update tomorrow about UKCAT and results day because this post is getting way too long!)

Lots of lovee :) xxx

A strange Summer approaches...

Yesterday, I officially finished college for Summer. For the Summer holidays! The ones that children and teenagers make thousands of plans for; the ones that you spend the rest of the year dreaming and romanticising about. The very words 'Summer holidays' bring memories of dangling out of trees giggling as a child, that delicious smell of suncream on holiday and lying in the sun with wet hair...
But somehow, I'm not really excited. I think it's partially that it hasn't really sunk in that there's no more college for months, because I keep forgetting, but a bigger part of it is my feeling apprehensive about my university application - things like the UKCAT (booked for 17th August) and the personal statement I've somehow got to cut down from 6270 characters to under 4000 while still proving myself to be more worthy than the 15+ other people fighting for exactly the same coveted place on the course.



Right now, this is my bedside table. Reading these books and doubting myself doesn't make for the best night's sleep, but it's the only way I've been able to fit it in my schedule lately - hopefully I'll have a bit more time now I'm not at college, and can avoid thinking about university stuff just before I go to sleep.

All this is a bit of a cloud hanging over the Summer I see stretching out before me, because I'll have to be doing UKCAT practice among other things so the guilt whenever I relax will remain. But that didn't stop me from having a nice end-of-year celebratory sleepover at my Maddy's last night :). We ate ice cream out of the tubs in front of a film and went to sleep relatively early, so it was nice and relaxing, and I feel quite refreshed this morning.

Tonight I have a baptism class and am meeting my lovely Hayley, Becky and Beth for a late-afternoon coffee, but I'll be doing some serious room tidying for the rest of the morning/early afternoon. So instead of daydreaming and blogging I'd better get stuck in!

Love, love, love
xxxx

Happy times!

I haven't blogged for a while, but I've been so busy! The date I'd been longing for came and went, and I officially have NO MORE EXAMS, not even general studies! Yay!

I feel very free...




...saying that, my ambitions to do medicine at university mean that I can't really relax for the next months - I have my UKCAT (UK clinical aptitude test - like an IQ test for unis to distinguish between medical candidates) booked for August so I'm busy practising the methods for answering the different questions, although it's impossible to revise for, as such.


But today is a good, good day for several other reasons:



1)Tomorrow is my 17th Birthday - how old do I feel?!
2) I'm in Bristol for the university open day, and it feels like I'm coming home almost - I lived around here until I was 8.
3)Being in Bristol means I get to meet up with my old best friend, who I love to bits!
4) Well, for the past couple of years, I've been seriously thinking about getting baptised - I wasn't christened as a baby (and my parents are athiests) so I really felt that it was the right time to make a commitment to God in front of other people. So the date was set for the 18th July, and today I decided to tell my mum about it, as I was a little hesitant about telling my parents.
So I plucked up the courage in the car today, and after a few abortive attempts (I was really nervous so the words didn't seem to want to come out) just said "Mum, I'm getting baptised on the 18th July". She was surprised, and then worried that I'd been pressured into it, but when I assured her that it was totally my decision, and explained that I was doing it because I really believe in God, consider myself a Christian and want to make a commitment she was fine with it and said she would go... Yes!

This is a picture I love, that I took in France of my beautiful Hayley and her charming brother on the swings <3



So I'm so happy at the moment, and loving life.
Hope you're well :) love love love xxx

Summer...

Did I mention that I love Summer? I love the scents, the sounds, the feeling of the sun on my skin (after, of course, slathering myself in factor 50!). It even makes revision better, which is good because at the moment I'm spending 75% of my waking time revising and the other 25% feeling guilty because I'm not revising!

^here is me getting distracted while revising by how gorgeous the sky was!


I love daisies, walking barefoot through fields with sunglasses on my head and that feeling when you've finished all your exams and for a few weeks you forget that soon you'll have to do more, getting increasingly important each time.

I'm going to stop daydreaming about that day (10th June this time, although I have general studies exams after then - but general studies doesn't matter!) because I need to focus on the immediate thing - the dreaded 'R' word!
One last picture - me this afternoon, with some of the things I really love about Summer, in that lovely time between church and revision!



take care <3 xxx

A Year at College

As of yesterday afternoon I'm officially on study leave for my exams, and when I go back in June I'll be starting my A2 work - so this was my last day at college doing ASs. I genuinely can't believe how quickly this year has gone - and it's quite a scary thought that this time next year I'll be getting ready to leave for university!
This is my bus stop, on a day in Autumn when the tree was particularly colourful.

Here I am being a packhorse with everyone's bags on wednesday free:


I'm not sure if the person who named this thought of the implications, but it certainly amused me! It's surprising how much chemistry nomenclature I can apply in everyday life - in newspapers when the name of a drug substance is mentioned, I can picture the structure in my head and it make me feel rather clever!






I love biologyyy :) especially when Alex and I arrange our folders and pads in a sad symmetrical way!

The bus stop and tree more recently (the symbolism I could find in the way the tree's changed over the year!)

I think I've been avoiding revision a little too long - it's quite sunny so I'd go in the garden if the wind wouldn't blow my paper everywhere!



It'll have to be the left rather than the right today, sadly! :

24 hour fast!

In my local area, lots of the churches are passionate about stopping human trafficking, which is happening all around us - with the 14 being the average age of a girl being trafficked as a sex slave, the reality is very shocking! Churches have been doing lots of fundraising over the last few years for the charity 'Hope for Justice', which tackles these problems, and this weekend I took part in a 24 hour lock-in and fast in order to raise money through the sponsorship of friends and family. The slogan of the charity is written on the wall of the picture below: 'Because no-one is free, until everyone is free'


We arrived at 6:30pm on Friday (I was very full after eating all the food I possibly could after college on Friday), and signed in and gave in our sponsorship forms before being taken through into the boys' and girls' dorms (the main church hall was a boys only zone from 2am to 8am and the other big room was girls only at the same times) to put our bags/sleeping bags/pillows down. We all went in minibuses and cars to Unite, a great Christian event in the town centre, before coming back and watching 'Slumdog Millionaire'. The film was carefully chosen on the basis that it was relevant to the cause we were doing the fast for and, although our stomachs were beginning to rumble by the end (12am, having not eaten since half 6), it reminded us to focus on why we were doing it.

There was another film on, but I didn't really want to watch it so went to play table football and pool with a few other people :) I was good at the table football, but I think my pool skills need a bit more practice! We went to bed at 2am, and got to sleep not *too* long afterwards!

I managed to sleep for quite a long time, considering we were sleeping on the floor in a big room full of other people making noise! In the morning, I could feel my hunger much more and felt really sick until about lunchtime, when the nausea thankfully changed into normal hunger (much easier to cope with!) We had a session of worship which helped us to focus on God - I was pleased that we sang 'I can Only Imagine' because it's such an amazing song and we rarely do it at my church!
The afternoon went quite slowly, but the nicest hour of the fast was when we were allowed out onto the church field for an hour (from 1pm to 2pm). There was a water slide but I didn't feel like getting wet, so just sunbathed with some friends and messed around in the sun:







^ these people are all so lovely, and made the afternoon really nice despite the hunger growing ever hour :)

After we were made to go back inside (it was, after all, a lock in as well as a fast!) there was a special guest waiting to talk to us: Josh from the TV documentary series 'Blood, sweat and takeaways' that was aired on the BBC about a year ago. The programme had a section about the slave trade, and how many women had to sell their bodies in order to send money home to support their families and, after meeting these women while doing the series, Josh was really passionate about the cause. We got to talk to him and he spoke about his experiences - it was really good!


There was more free time after Josh left, and we all did our own thing (I tried and failed to do revision, so ended up just chatting to a group for a while), before another worship session. This one was really special, not only because of the great songs we did (Light of the World, The Stand etc) but also because the hunger we were all feeling had a bit of a spiritual effect during worship. The last song was 'Strength Will Rise', which was amazingly relevant because, by that time, I was feeling really lightheaded and weak and the song really helped me to focus on God and the cause. I think the worship was so special because drawing on God's strength was quite necessary by then - I was a bit wobbly so standing up was getting a bit hard!

And then, after the longest 7 minutes of my life, the pizza arrived! I can imagine the Domino's delivery men must have been a little alarmed by 40ish starving teenagers pressed up against the glass and staring at the pizzas they were carrying!
After the leaders had sorted out who ordered what (the tension by this point was horrific - we were all sitting around the tables staring longingly at the pizzas they were sorting out) they put them down in front of us, and was going to share a large Haiwaiian with Kiri. Then, when everyone had got theirs (waiting took a great deal of self control!) we stood up and did the 'superman grace' ('Thank you Looordd for giving us foooood' to the tune of superman!) and then tucked in...



and, wow, that pizza was absolutely AMAZING! We ate and ate - the tables were half as loud as usual as everyone delighted in the gift that was food - wow! I got very full afterwards, but it was worth it! DELICIOUS! :D

I think the fast, while obviously raising the money for 'Hope for Justice' (so far, the group of fasters has been pledged £1,453 for the 24 hours!), I gained personally from it as well - I think I learned how much I took food for granted. I'm now trying to make sure I only eat when I'm actually hungry rather than out of greed or boredom, which will hopefully be nice for my beach body (pfffft) as well as my self control and not being so greedy!

I have a biology test tomorrow on meiosis, mitosis, DNA and haemoglobin (arghh) as well as a chemistry quantitative assesment (although I got full marks on the first attempt of that, somehow, so not worried about my mark) so I'd better go to do some preparation...
xx