Just Like Rebekah

The year in review 2010

January-This month marked one full year of becoming a pre-pro at Atlanta Ballet. I was newly enrolled in Thomas Edison State College. I also joined the Twitter world.

February-I was in Atlanta Ballet's Cinderella, started my first two courses through TESC, and continued to finish up my testing.

 

March-I joined the world of adults and turned 18. It snowed on my birthday. I started two more classes through TESC.

April-My most stressful month of the year. I started two more classes through TESC and had 6 total going on at once on top of ballet. Thankfully, two ended at the end of the month.

May-Two classes ended leaving only two left.

June-I finished my last class, submitted my PLA, and finished my BA in Communications. The next week, I started Atlanta Ballet's Professional Intensive

July-Pro Camp ended and I officially had nothing at all to do.

August-We had my official graduation ceremony. I started the Conservatory program at Atlanta Ballet.

September-I became more independent; but I'm not saying how for safety reasons.

October-This was a pretty uneventful month. Just ballet stuff. I did go on a late night hay ride through little five points though. Oh, and we went on our annual cider trip.

November-Nutcracker rehearsals were in full swing.

December-Nutcracker, Nutcracker, Nutcracker...

Overall, 2010 was a great year. It was a year of growth, new experiences, and the beginning of a new chapter of life. I'm exited to see what 2011 will bring.

 
Happy New Year!

Christmas 2010

Because I have been so terrible at blogging lately, here are some photos from our Christmas.

Starting with the annual PJ party at Gran's

 

 
  

On Christmas day, we woke up as normal. Then it started snowing...and sticking...and accumulating...and we had the state of Georgia's first white Christmas since the 1890's

 
Merry (late) Christmas from the Diaddigos!!

Photo by: Mary Caroline Mann
 

Fall fun

 

 

  
 

 

The Mystery

The more I lose, the more I gain
The more I empty myself, the more I am filled
The more I let go, the freer I feel

Shouldn't it be harder?
Shouldn't I feel like I'm missing out on something?
Don't these realities go against the chatter of the world?

I'm not saying it's easy
Sometimes it's painful
But worth it in the end

Each day...
Less of me...more of Him

Long time, no blog

I guess it appeared that I fell off the face of the internet. I didn't mean to go so long without blogging but, you know how life goes. This summer has been full of transition and change. Lots of tears, lots of decisions, lots of firsts, lots of new experiences. But God is faithful, He knows what He is doing, and this was just another opportunity to learn to trust Him. He walks beside us every step of the way and will give us just the right amount of challenges for the growth we need. Now that things have settled down a bit, I hope to blog more frequently; that was one of my goals for this year and I don't plan on leaving it unreached. :-)

 

Graduation celebration

 

This week has been absolutely crazy (another post for another day). So even though this post is a week late, here are the promised pictures from my graduation.

 

 
 
  

 Daddy giving the commencement address

After the ceremony, we had a reception with great food, friends and family. The boys made a slideshow that we showed in the basement and we got to catch up with people we hadn't seen in a while. Overall, it was a nice day.

 

 

 Invitation by Whitelake Studio

Whitelake Studio Wednesday

This is an art piece that Bryan put together for us. For more info click here.

 

 

Random thoughts

Well, I officially have nothing to do now. My summer program is over, school is over (and not starting back) for the next two weeks, I have no obligations. As summer is winding down, I look back and realize how much I have learned. It seems like the theme of this summer is growth; it has been a summer of transition. More on that later.

I just wanted to let you know about a very inspiring person I met this summer named Sibahle Tshibika. We attended the documentary not knowing what to expect. I can say that Sibahle has a great story and God definitely has plans for her.

For the next few weeks, I'm winding down and preparing for next school year. A lot of changes are going to be taking place but I'm excited. Next weekend is my formal graduation (I'll be sure to post pics) and friends are coming to visit. Hopefully, with a new my new schedule, I'll get to blogging more often. What's happening in your part of the world?

 

Summer Adventure

Monday night was quite an adventure.

A friend of mine had a free ticket to go a previewing see the new Charlie St. Cloud movie and invited me to go. A group of us got together and went to the theatre. When we got to the theatre the guy said "That movie isn't playing here." It turns out we were at the wrong theatre. A man behind us noticed what happened and said "Do you want to see Inception instead?" After a little deliberation, we decided to go. It turns out that we got into a press viewing sponsored by a local radio station. A little over half way through the movie, the scree flipped upside-down and the dialogue became garbled. They were having technical dificulties and said the movie would be back in 10 minutes. Well, 10 minutes turned into and hour. I was keeeping an eye on the time because we have a curfew at the dorms of 9pm. We had planned on getting back in plenty of time because the movie started a 6. Well, we watched until 9:15 and then decided to go back. On the shuttle ride back, a drunk lady kept us amused (keep in mind that it was 9:30 on a Monday night :-/). We didn't get busted when we got back to the dorms but we did gain a new experience.

Now on to the movie review. Inception is a very complex story. Simply put, it is about a team of people who manipulate other people's dreams. In the beginning, I was thinking what in the world is going on? But as the movie progressed more and more things made sense. The producers did a great job of taking the viewer from a state of confusion to a state of understanding of a very complex storyline.

There are definitely some themes that can be drawn out for discussion such as choosing to deal with sin instead of feeding or avoiding it but, Daddy would do a much better job of explaining and discussing them.

Surprisingly, this movie was quite clean except for violence and action sequences. As far as I can remember there was no inappropriate humor and minimal swearing (for movies of this type). There were also no inappropriate romance scenes (there is a little romance, consisting of a kiss, between two characters. Also, sometimes the main character's wife is a little sensual but this is within the context of marriage).

Overall, Inception surprised me. It captured my attention, told a good story, and cut out unnecessary frippery. Unfortunately, I didn't get to see the end so I can't say if it was worth it (well, it was free so it was worth something) but I wouldn't mind watching it again (when it comes out on DVD).

And that is one adventure of my summer and how I got to see Inception before anyone else...Hope your summer is going well! Drop me a comment about your adventures.

I'm Done!

Well, I finally finished school. My graduation application has been sent in and now all I have to do is wait for my diploma to come in the mail. I am receiving a BA in Communications from Thomas Edison State College. My family is going to have a graduation ceremony in August after my intensive so pics from that will come then. It is really a God story how I managed to do high school and college at the same time. So, here it is...

Ever since I started school, I thought it was important to get a degree. As I progressed through high school, I realized that I wanted to pursue dancing through college. I thought I would get a degree in dance (and possibly double major in something else writitng related) then find a teaching job somewhere. So, I started looking into colleges that offered a dance major. None of them really clicked--I either didn't like the academics and the dance program was good or the academics were great and the dance program was just not where I wanted to be. The summer before my junior year of high school, I realized that God was leading me to pursue a career as a professional dancer. But I still wanted a degree and I knew that it would be hard to do both. One night, while Mommy was looking into debate classes for Joshua, she came across and ad for CollegePlus! It was an answered prayer. I enrolled in November of 2008 and took my first CLEP in February of 2009. I enrolled in TESC in December and took my classes February-June 2010. And now I'm done!

I am so glad that I have a degree under my belt. Now, I am wondering what I am going to do with myself. I have kind of hidden behind school for the last seven years of my life. It kept me busy (along with ballet of course) and gave me an excuse for not being social. Mommy called it my crutch. Well now, my crutch is gone and I have a new plan. I am going to expend most of my energy focusing on ballet. I also hope to get to work on some of my goals for 2010 (one of which is to blog more often) and meet new people but there isn't really a fully conrete plan yet (just a half dried one). I am excited about this new phase of life but also a little nervous. However, I know that God will put me exactly where I can be used best for His glory and though the future is uncertain, I have peace in that.