So life in the apartment is more than a month underway, and although I spend many an evening alone, i'm really enjoying it. I'm starting to realize a couple things.

1.) Living with someone is easy if it's your best friend.
2.) Oprah is extremely addicting.
3.) Doing the dishes is a task that partners frequently try to pin on each other.
4.) I've become domestic.

The fourth is, without a doubt, the most astounding and perplexing realization yet. I'm the type of girl that high-fives the feminists, votes for exclusively for the democratic party, and scoffs at the notion of stay-at-home moms. I find myself not only doing the daily tasks required of every responsible adult, but going above and beyond the call of duty. I thoroughly enjoy cooking (something I've never really done before), and preparing the house to have company over, and am glued to the door when I know Joey is about to come home. I know what you're thinking: how utterly romantic.

Here are a couple of photos to prove the madness is true.









A yummy BBQ chicken home-made pizza (crust and all, people!) I made for dinner last night.




Don't be fooled, though this pie looks picture-perfect (in my personal opinion...), it was dry and tasteless due to my mistake of storing my freshly sliced apples in the fridge over night. (i didn't have the ingredients to make the crust...)

And just for fun, a picture of my new nose-ring I just got!!! Never thought I would get it pierced, but it just goes to show you that life and people are constantly evolving :)





Well...little Ms. Homemaker is over and out!

P.S. It is utterly romantic...*swoon* :)

Time flies. Period. I can't believe the time has come for me to move out and start my own life. I'm so scared to leave my family and leave my home but I'm also incredibly excited to start my life with Joey. I know he will take great care of me. He's my best friend and we have fun doing absolutely everything together. I can't wait to wake up with him everyday and cook, clean, play, grow, laugh and just LIVE together. I can't express how lucky I feel to have him to walk through life with. I feel safe and protected and loved more than I deserve. Thank you, Joey. For everything.

As I find myself flying over Wisconsin, I can’t help but have the most mixed emotions of my life. I’m so very excited to start out my unbelievable journey, and also completely heartbroken from leaving Joey. Today at the airport was pure torture. It is ridiculous how tightly your heart and soul will cling to another individual. As I looked at him for the last time, through tear stained cheeks and puffy eyes, all I saw was a mirror of myself in his own face. Watching him cry lurched everything inside of me, and I bawled all the way to my window seat in coach. A woman even had to ask me if I was ok. I felt everything but ok. I felt as if a part of me, the most beloved and cherished part, was left standing in the Seattle airport. I can’t even begin to explain how much I miss him already, and how simply flying over the state where he grew up can create in me such a longing for him.
The sun is setting on beautiful clouds and I wish I could be sharing every moment and new experience with the love of my life. I constantly look down at the ring on my finger and realize just how much Joey has given to me, and how much he promises to keep giving. I know that this step in my life is not the end. It is, in many ways, a beginning to everything. I have to remember that in 11 short months I will have gained an insurmountable collection of knowledge, and will be able to return home for good. If you’re reading this Joey, know that you have my heart, and that saying goodbye to you was unbearable for me. I love you.

i leave for germany in exactly one week, and i can't even express all of the emotions i feel right now. i have no clue why i'm doing so, but i find myself pushing the people away who i love the most. it's as if i'm subconciously preparing myself to part from these people. i feel a constant sense of aching, though, and wish so badly to spend my last days soaking up their words of comfort. i know a year is just that, a year, but in my young 18 year old mind, it seems like an eternity. and there are unknowns around every corner. i constantly ask myself, will i make friends? will i get along with my host family? will i lose joey next year? will i even want him when i come back? can i even SURVIVE without my family when i've never spent more than 4 days without them? am i ready to live on my own? Every possible motion is welling up inside of me and it's causing me great agony. I feel excitement and fear, longing, anxiety, anticipation, confusion...everything. is it bad if the thing i'm most looking forward to is the plane ride home? IS IT NORMAL FOR THIS TO HAPPEN?! i'll keep you all posted. please keep me in your thoughts.

I'm off for the weekend to watch my sister and my tennis team kick ASS in regionals...and watch my sis go to STATE! I LOOVE tennis and i'm soo proud of all of them :) We already KILLED at districts so let's do it again!

It's really funny how things work. You can be completely miserable with someone who seems to be perfect for you, and you can find a wonderful relationship in someone you would never even expect. Joey and I have known each other all 4 years of high school. We've had so many classes together it's ridiculous (German EVERY year, 2 yrs of English, science, CW, health). Despite all these classes, I never really liked Joey. He wasn't someone I would really have even considered as a boyfriend (probably because I was preoccupied with other people). But last year, everything changed. I became COMPLETELY infatuated with him, and i KNEW i wanted him. Fortunately for me, I was able to snag him. And now, one year and one day later, I've experienced the most beautiful, wonderful, fulfilling relationship. It just completely reminds me of the lyrics, "This is the first day of my life, I'm glad I didn't die before I met you, now I don't care I could go anywhere with you, and I'd probably be happy". He not only allows me, but ENCOURAGES me to be whoever the hell i want on any given day. If i feel insecure, I'm allowed to tell him. If I feel jealous, I don't have to keep it in, I'm allowed to come to him. I'm allowed to tell him ANY emotion, good, bad, embarrassing, annoying, and he'll embrace me. That is SO liberating. And, he's enough of an asshole that if I'm taking all my crap out on him, he'll tell me to knock it off. Get this: I'm not allowd to be a brat! HA! I found a guy that won't let me beat him up!
I just love Joey with my WHOLE heart, and I will miss him so terribly next year. But i also know that he is a good guy, and he'll be waiting for me when i walk off that plane in June. Here's to my one year with Joey, the best year of my life, in hopes of making it two :D

OH MY GOSH! I GOT IT! I'M SOOO EXCITED! WOOOHOOO A FREE YEAR IN GERMANY NEXT YEAR!!!

it has to hurt before it heals
it has to break before it mends
it has to endure the ugly before it realizes the beauty
it has to die before it lives
it has to smother before it breathes
it has to choke before it swallows
it has to be imperfect before it can appreciate perfection
it has to crumble before it's glued

nothing starts out or may endure as a utopia.

nothing is truly happy unless it has experienced sorrow.

nothing is black and white.

realize the ugly, and accept it. accept it, and treasure it. for without it, there is no heaven, merely pandamonium.

this, today, can be heaven, or it can be your hell. today is all you have guaranteed.

so hurt, break, endure, die, smother, choke, be imperfect, and crumble.

and then lift up your head, and experience life.

WOOOW...soo this past week I found out that I'm a finalist in the Germany scholarship I applied for!!!! Wow. They only take 50 kids from 11 states. I have an interview this next weekend to see if i get the scholarship or not! I am soo psyched. It would be really hard being away from home for so long, but it would be so rewarding. lol I was telling Joey about it and he said, "How long is the longest you've been away from home?" Me, "4 days..." >< ahhh lol ya, keep me in your thoughts! I really want this, and I also really want to be able to handle it!!!

So I was alone and confused at lunch yesterday, I was sick, and my lunch schedule had been changed for second semester. I went and got a spicy chicken basket, in hopes that i'd be able to taste it inspite of my stuffy nose, and chose a table to sit at. Sit at all by myself, mind you. I then spotted my sister, and went to go and sit by her. When i came back to get my backpack, it was gone. I looked all over, under, around, upon (basically every preposition) the table like a raving lunatic. I left no stone..er..lunchplate unturned. After having little than NO success, i spotted a girl sitting hunched over a light blue jansport backpack. I didn't want to jump to any conclusions, almost anyone could have that backpack, but it was IDENTICAL to mine. I told my sister what was wrong, and since family sticks close to family, she kept an eye on that girl for me. I then went to the science hall and had to pester Mrs. Parrish to go and unlock her room so i could make sure (even though i was 100% sure) that I hadn't left it there. When i came back to the cafeteria empty handed, my sister was wearing my backpack!!! I asked her where she found it, and the girl HAD HAD IT! She had watched me search the lunch table looking for the backpack, she saw me run, distraught, out of the cafeteria (and did absolutely nothing, except grip the backpack even tighter). It turns out, when lunch was over, she tried to put the backpack on, but said, "this is too heavy!". And left it at the lunchtable, and then my sister RAN over and checked it, RIGHT in front of the girl (how TRASHY), and discovered it was indeed my backpack. I'm very glad i never listened to any of my friends who have nagged my over the years to use my locker to save my back from scoliosis. I guess I made my point, scoliosis is a lot safer than an empty backpack...ha.

What a day

So, when is one able to correctly diagnose oneself as a Sex and the City addict? I've pondered this question, and come up with only one conclusion...when one is willing to rent every season of this said show, and goes through withdrawals, much the same as withdrawals tied to lack of drugs, when they can't have a hit. I, Natasha, have become a Sex and the City addict. I've stayed at home, nearly the whole weekend, with Charlotte, Miranda, Samantha and Carrie. Sadly enough, my weekend couldn't have been better. There's something soothing about laying in bed, accompanied by a warm cup of peppermint tea, and the girls. Even if those said girls are mere characters in an already-over melodrama made for HBO. I don't know why, but i can't get enough of it. Maybe it's my lack of real life girlfriends, or maybe more simply my lack of a life, but I'm strangely tied to the errotic sexual content, the crisp, witty humor, and the confusion regarding every member of the opposite sex. I like to lose myself in the rollercoaster-like lives of the four women who live in uptown New York and enjoy midnight escapades on a more than regular occasion. I also find the subject matter outrageous, and yet completely accurate. And while i can't say that i hope to be this provocative as an adult, I can say that I'd love a life filled with so much excitement. I suppose i should go attend the life I actually live.

ohhh finals...how i hate you.

but actually, not really. All my finals have been fantastic. I have four of them done, and that leaves me with my CWP final and AP English tomorrow. Since my lowest grade was a 95% this semester, i was able to chill out about finals. None of my grades are really going to drop from low grades on my finals (let's hope). I'm a little worried about AP English though, because it's the class i have a 95% in. I need to get a 66% on the final, but even that might be tough. Because it's a practice AP tests, and those are absolutely RIDICULOUS. Ahhh i just want to do well on that test and have finals be OVER with :D mmm half day 2morrow. I think i'll go out to lunch.

There will never, ever be another Jan. 10, 2007, so perhaps it is important and profound to record the happenings of today. I woke up at 7:15, and thought someone was banging on my door, trying to wake me up. I later discovered this was merely my dog's tail wagging and hitting my door. I thought I'd overslept, and immediately jumped out of bed. I had made a committment to myself last night (as I do every night) to try and eat healthy (lol I usually fail at this by about lunch time...), so I made myself a bowl of special k. mm :) When I arrived at school I found out that I'd received a 90% on a pre calculus test, and was quite relieved, because I hadn't really understood the chapter. Up until this point, my morning had been very, very uneventful. And I'm surprised if you're still reading at this point. I then, though, attended Wenatchee's Apple Blossom speeches, and was thoroughly amused. I was surprised by how some of the girls LIED completely about their character and morals. I also laughed when it was announced that the competition isn't a "popularity contest" or a "beauty pageant". While we all HOPE this isn't the case, it will inevitably prove to be true. I was soo excited to find out that my good friend Kaylee Anderson made it!! After that, nothing was very eventful. I did receive an assignment in stupid AP English regarding Cold Mountain (awful book...). Now I'm just trying to kill time until Deal or No Deal comes on.

Unfortunately Joey's at home doing all of his homework, and I have no one to hang out with. I have made a promise to myself to do no homework at home this year, so i really have nothing to do. Surprisingly enough, i have a 4.0!! Haha Paul Simon, my soulmate, said it best "When I think back on all the crap I learned in High School, it's a wonder I can think at all.."

I'm also having very mixed feelings regarding next year. What if i receive the scholarship for germany? What would that mean to me? I've always been a homebody, and i don't know if i'm ready to pack up and go to germany for a year. Even though my friends would all be leaving, and Joey will be off at Gonzaga becoming an engineer, i still feel the need to be around home. A part of me wants to be completely adventurous and just GO for it...drop all my inhibitions. It would be SO cool to spend a year with a German family and become fluent in German (my passion). And it could potentially help me to decide which career i want to pursue. I would love love LOVE to become fluent and teach German in High School, but that is an unrealistic profession. It offers potentially no jobs, because everyone is going into Spanish for a second language. Don't get me wrong, that's well and good, but i took a year of Spanish in 8th grade and absolutely hated it. German, i LOVE! I'm torn between pursuing my passion, or taking a safe route. Taking the beaten path, or the road less traveled. Keep me in your thoughts :)

Hallo, hier ist Natasha, und du siehst mein neues Livejournal! Spassig, ja? Ich hab schon ein myspace, aber ich hab gehoert dass ein livejournal auch total cool ist. Vielleicht soll ich ueber laetzes Monat reden. Also, ich hab so viel gemacht. Ich hab ein scholarship fuer Deutschland ausgefuellt. Ich hoffe dass naechstes Jahr koennte ich die ganze Jahr in Deutschland bleiben. Die Scholarship bezahlt fuer ALLES! Ich muss nur ein Flugzeugticket fuer Washington D.C. kaufen! Es ist TOTAL wunderschoen, und hoffentlich werde ich es bekommen!! Ich hab auch so viel mit meinem Freund Joey gemacht. Wir haben "ice skated" bei Rotary Park (schoen schoen schooooeen!!!), und wir sind schigelaufen (Joey's erste mal, und mit meinen neuen K2 Schis!!! :D), und viele Kaechse gegessen (haha jetzt bin ich ein bisschen dick!). Dezember war sehr schoen und hat mir gefallen. Vielleicht soll ich ueber mich sprechen? haha. Ich bin 17 (fast 18 in April), ich bin ein Senior, ich wohne mit meiner Familie (meinem Vater, meiner Schwester, und meinem Hund). Wir haben immer so viel Spass! Ich liebe lachen, mein Freund, Joey, myspace, DEUTSCH (naturlich), und Tennis. Ich spiele fuer mein Varsity team, und laetzes Jahr haben wir in 4A GEWONNEN!!! So spannend, doch? Ich bin #3 singles. (ich weiss nicht wie mann "singles" auf Deutsch sagt, tut mir leid). Fuer vier Jahren war ich ein Christian. Aber, diese Sommerferien hab ich etwas anders gedacht. Ich kann nicht glauben, dass Leute ins "hell" gehen koennte. Gott sollst so viel Kraft haben. Es ist total falsch. Und als ich ein Christian war, war ich immer so so so depremiert. Ich war nie froh, weil ich immer so schlecht gefuehlt habe. Es hat nicht Recht. Jetzt glaube ich dass Gott jeder liebt. Es ist ihn egal ob du "schlecht" oder "gut" bist. Haha vielleicht brauchst du ein Dolmetcher. Du kannst mich "message" wenn du was nicht verstehen koennte. Fuer jetzt, ist es alles. Tsuess!



Joey und ich :)