College Life

Hey! Ok so my goal was to try and post at least every month...but hehehehe you can see how well that worked. In my defence, I've had a lot of school. And I mean, yes, I know that everyone has a lot of homework, high school or college. But uh yeah. The average course load for a full time student is 3-4 courses or 12 credits. I have 9 courses equalling 19.5 credits. NINE. Life of a music student y'all 😑😄

But! School has been pretty amazing and I've been learning a ton. Literally ;) 

My courses this semester have been as follows:

Two Applied Music Lessons ~ these were vocal lessons and because of the certificate I was in, I had to take two. So yeah. Also, it was sooo encouraging to learn that I was the only in that program and no one else was because it was the harder one. Greeeeeeaaaattt :P 

Large Ensemble I and II ~ so much singing! and so much music to learn! We ended up having so much going on in choir, my music professor decided it was enough content for two semesters instead of one. It's been a pretty fun experience though. In October, the choir went to New York to sing at Carnegie Hall (more on this later ^_^) and then in early December, we had four concerts over the span of two days. (also more on this later ;))

Contemporary Music and Performance Practice ~ well...not really much to say about this. Except that it was very long and was mainly learning about genres of music. It was also a night class and yeah. I'll leave it at that. However, I DO have to do a presentation on Monday and I'm looking forward to that because it's gonna be on country music and I love country :D)

Introduction to the Old Testament ~ had to read the whole Old Testament in 12 weeks. TWELVE WEEKS. And yes. Everything. Leviticus, 1+2 Chronicles, Isaiah, Jeremiah, the whole shebang. And that's not including the really really thick textbook that gave me about a 100 pages of joy every week. (Ok actually though, the textbook was really interesting) And I did learn a lot and was probably one of my favourite classes because the professor was just amazing and made all his lessons so intriguing. 

Hermeneutics ~ basically just learning how to interpret the Bible. And make lots of observations. Like...lots.  

Christian Formation ~ A mini-course on living life to the fullest as a Christian. Actually had already done a lot of the stuff that was taught here...budgeting, scheduling, managing time, avoiding procrastination, etc. But we got to do some community work which was really fun (including carolling!!!) and I'm looking forward to doing more next semester! 

Music Fundamentals III ~ HAHAHAHAHAHA. OK. This course was...INTERESTING. I mean, I learned a lot, that's for sure. But my first class I just sat there with basically 3/4 of the content going over my head. And then I found out that it was a second-year course. And that there was a Music Fundamentals I and II that came before III. Makes sense I guess. Except that I hadn't taken those courses because apparently my theory scores were high enough for me to skip I and go into III. And yet somehow I could barely keep up with what was going on. And II was for ear training and sight singing. Hehe. Also hadn't taken that. Imagine my shock when my teacher gave me a sheet of music and said "Ok sing this out loud using solfege!" Soooo yeahhhh...this course was definitely a learning experience. But! I have survived it and completed it so YAY!

Anywayyyy...here's a look at the past four months through some pictures ^_^ 

// Studying 😄

// New York!

Super amazing experience although yeah, I'm not meant to live in the city. Too much stuff going on. And so many people. It's crazy. But we got to go to Central Park, walk through some rather expensive stores (Tiffany's is craaaazy), go to a street food market thingy at night and go to Times Square at night. And then the highlight of the trip...Carnegie Hall! It was so much fun and the architect of the building was breathtaking. 

Our College Choir!

Following 2 photos are not mine and were taken by a professional photographer :D

After the performance at Carnegie, the choir and orchestra were taken on a dinner cruise and it was so. much. fun. We passed the Statue of Liberty and the Brooklyn Bridge and eeks walking on the top deck with the wind blowing in our faces was amaaaazing.

//Babysitting

Cause I mean...I can't go without kids y'all. I sometimes scare my roommate by coming into our room and randomly saying out loud "I want a baby" :P But yeah anyway, I ended up babysitting for one of the seminary students who attend the same college I do and my first time was so much fun. I carved pumpkins for the first time, although I was a little taken aback by all the teeth I had to cut out for one of them :P I love the kids to bits and the parents are absolutely amazing, godly people who are honestly just a huge blessing in my life.

// Reading Week + Midterms 

Having fun with filters xD

Lookit all those notes :O 

I had been warned by some second-year students that the Hermeneutics midterm exam was one of the hardest exams ever so I tried to be as prepared as I could. I ended up memorizing all eight lectures word for word. My brain was absolutely fried at the end of it, but during the exam, I honestly just flew through it :P 

// Community Work

Part of one of my courses is to do community work, so the class is basically split into groups and then assigned certain areas of the village nearby to care for and witness to. We did a food drive in early November and it was quite the experience. Some of it was very encouraging, other times, not so much but all in all it was really fun and a great way to bond with the rest of my group as well. 

// Christmas Banquet

This is an annual event the college holds every November and goodness was it fun! I wore heels for the first time and can you believe it...didn't break an ankle!! xD

My Parakaleo Group

All my roomies 💜

// Christmas Concert(s)

The college choir had been practising for this event since the middle of October and the closer to the date of the concerts, the more intense practice became. It was a really big event at my music professor's church and normally all four concerts were always sold out, which meant there were a couple thousand or more people coming every year. The last week before the concert, we had rehearsals on Sunday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and then two concerts on Saturday and two concerts on Sunday. It was craaazy. There was sooo much singing I thought I was going to lose my voice. Weirdly enough, it ended up strengthening my voice instead and on Monday during my vocal lesson, my teacher and I were both surprised to find that I could still sing :P

Love this girl 💛

// MY FIRST PAID GIG

Ok so I was soooo excited to find a PM asking if I was able to play at a Christmas banquet with one of the college graduates at a church nearby. It was very last minute and I only had one night to learn six Christmas songs (which happen to have chords at every single beat, but I found a way around it xD) but it was so much fun! I know I made a ton of mistakes, especially when I was nervous, but it was a great experience and people were very forgiving. And Julia, the one singing, was amaaaazing. Honestly, she has an incredible voice and it was so exciting getting to perform with her. Definitely made a lot of memories that night! 

// Finals

My dear, dear sister gave me this box to help me through finals. Isn't she the sweetest? 😉💕

I caved and bought ice cream and consoled myself with it during studying because well - it was just necessary xD 

Aaaannd yesterday, I had my LAST exam and it was the hardest but I finished it and I'm still alive and AHHHHH I'M DONE THE SEMESTER. So so so so SO so so so happy!!!! And then we made spaghetti and got people over to share it with and it actually tasted good and *happy sigh* it was a nice way to end the semester.

Honestly, this semester has been amazing even though at times it was so crazy busy I didn't think I could do it anymore. Work was relentless and never ended...until now. And boy oh boy. The feeling of no homework is AWESOME. I'm so thankful to God that I was given the opportunity to come here and I'm hoping I can continue it the next few years, but even if I don't, I'll still be glad for the memories I made here. I'm not the most extroverted person and tend to stay in my room a lot - partly because I'm an introvert and also because honestly, I had SO much homework :P I've learned so much and the people here are amazing. The relationships I've formed here are precious and they've taught me so much about life, God, and myself. I've found clarity where before all I could see was a tangled mess of pain and depression. I've found love and understanding and endless encouragement and support. They're amazing and I don't ever want to leave them 💕

But for now, we're all gonna take a nice Christmas break with NO SCHOOL and it's going to be absolutely positively amazing. 

Now for home and the holidays!🎄⛄

12 Days of Christmas // Day 8 // Christmas Collaboration

How is it only 4 more days 'til Christmas?? Time is just flying, I tell ya! 

Anywayyy...welcome to the 8th day of the 12 Days of Christmas blog party! 

For today's post, I actually did a collab with my bestie, Olivia Nickerson from 9 Kids plus 2. A couple of weeks ago, we all were given the opportunity to play at a Christmas recital and it was AMAZING. There were some ups and downs in getting everything ready, but as you can see in the video below, we were able to pull if off p.r.e.t.t.y well if I do say so myself!

To hear the background story on rehearsals and practices and such (as well as a possible amount of ranting ;)) you can go to Livs' blog HERE and read our collab post. 

Have a lovely Thursday everyone and don't forget! 

4 More Days to Go!!! 

12 Days of Christmas // Day 3 // Cinnamon Roll Cookies

Ack! Welcome to the third day of the blog party! Go HERE to visit Faith's blog and see the list of bloggers posting today with their awesome Chritmas posts!!

So for this post...you all get to see me attempt to try a new recipe! I had actually seen my friend already try to make it, and since they looked so good I decided to try them myself. And yep...as is typical when I'm in the kitchen, I encountered problems. BIG ones. But anyway. You'll get to that later. So! Onto some Cinnamon Roll Cookies!

So to start you will need: 

2 1/4 cup Flour 

3/4 cup White Sugar

3/4 cup Butter

1 Egg

1/2 tsp of Baking Powder

aaaand

2 teaspoons Vanilla

Take the butter and sugar and mix it together. And then beat it. Very well.

You'll know you've beat it enough when it becomes lighter and fluffier. Something like this.

Drop in that egg and mix it up. One key thing when making cookies is to make sure you stir it enough...but not too much. Otherwise it'll get all doughy and icky.

Once that egg's stirred in, stir in that oh so good smelling but awful tasting vanilla.

Dump in the flour (ok so don't actually dump in the flour. I was in a hurry and dumped it and...yep! Got flour aaaaaallll over me. That was fun xD) Anywayyyy...stir that in until just incorporated.

My dough was extremely dry (I'm blaming the extreme cold outside and inside cause really, our house is like a fridge...might I even say freezer? in winter) soooo I used my fingers to bring the dough together.

Once you've got the dough together into a ball, cut it in half and then leave it to rest while you get your filling. I mean, they are cinnamon roll cookies, so of course it needs a filling! For anyone who's made cinnamon rolls before, you probably already know what's in here.

Sooooo you will need:

2 tablespoons Butter (sofftened or melted, whatever's easier for you)
1/4 cup white Sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon

Gonna say now though...if you feel like you need more of any of those ingredients - go for it. I added more cinnamon to mine because *shrugs* You can never have too much cinnamon.

Excuse the peculiar rotation of my picture. Didn't quite upload properly xD)

Mix the cinnamon and sugar together and watch all those lovely swirls blend together.

Now for the fun part...aka the really messy part. Grab one of the balls of dough and place it on a mat or cutting board or parchment paper. Now, I tried it on a flexible cutting board we had - BIG mistake. My dough was waaaaay too crumbly and trying to roll it up was a HUGE mess because it kept cracking :/ SO...what I ended up doing was adding a liiiiitle water (very, very tiny bit) to my second ball of dough and letting it soften up a bit before rolling it out.

So yeah! Take a rolling pin and roll your dough out into a rectangle. Also...I reeeeaaaallly don't like it when recipes say by how many inches the length and width of said rectangle should be....because well...is it normal to have a ruler to measure your dough with or something? If it is...I shall admit then I am not normal. Cause yeahhhh....I've never rolled dough out exactly as the recipe says :P I just guesstimate. Since you're rolling UP the dough, you want to make sure it's not too thin otherwise you're gonna have a rather hard time.

Once the dough's rolled out to your desired thickness, length, and width, spread half of the butter (remember you have another ball you gotta roll out) all over the dough.

Then sprinkle on the cinnamon-sugar! Don't forget the edges...they don't want to be left out. 

Aaaannddd...as I mentioned earlier, after this you roll your dough up just like a cinnamon roll. Start at one end of the dough and begin to roll it up, moving along the dough until one roll is complete, and then going back over to do it. Rolling it tightly is KEY for the cookies to come out properly.

And taking a short break from ingredient pictures to show you my dear sister's face as she watched me dispair over my first roll since it cracked all the way up to the end xD

This here's the second ball of dough...softened and rolled out a liiiitle thicker than the second one. Also placed it on parchment paper which helps soooo much. It rolled waaaay better too.

After you've got your dough all rolled up, place it in the fridge and let it chill. For some recipes, you can skip the chilling, but for these ones, you MUST chill the dough. Otherwise you will completely lose the shape of your dough.

It also helps sooo much when you cut out your dough since it's all nice and firm. I think this was my favourite part of the recipe...cutting the dough into nice little swirly circles. So fun!

Lay your cookies on a baking tray and stick them in an oven preheated to 350 degrees F for 10-12 minutes. 

Once they're brown underneath, you'll know they're done. 

Once they're cool, it's time for the next step that is crucial for any cinnamon roll to be a cinnamon roll. Don't know about you, but cinnamon rolls just aren't complete until they have...

ICING. Your icing is pretty simple to make, just milk and icing sugar and a little vanilla if you want it. Watch the consistency of your icing though, too thick and it won't drizzle nicely, but too thin and it'll just become invisible on your cookie! It must be just right, as Baby Bear would say ;)

And there! You're done! They make a great cookie for parties or just a snack at home! I was able to bring them to our church youth Christmas party, which was sooo fun ^_^

Let me know if you try this recipe at home! I'd love to see pictures of them :D And let me know how the rolling goes ;)

Do you like frosting on cinnamon roll cookies? 

What's one of your favourite Christmas cookies? 

You ready for Christmas??

10 More Days to Go!!!