I’m baaaaackk!

Thank you all for the well-wishes on my trip; it was absolutely amazing! I really have no idea where to begin with it; so much happened in the twelve days and they were all jam-packed with things to do. It really was a great trip, and it was so cool to see all the things that I did see, yet it was very exhausting.

We landed back in St. Louis about 8:45 p.m. on Sunday (June 19th) night after about 26 hours of traveling. We woke up that morning at 3:00 a.m. to be able to get to the airport in Rome by 4:30, which we were exactly on time. We were to take a flight from Rome to Frankfurt, Germany, then to Philadelphia to St. Louis. This is what we saw when we got to the airport:

I was so upset. I was exhausted, I was missing home, and I just wanted to get there. All flights to Frankfurt were cancelled for the day because of some bad weather, so we didn’t even know if we would be able to get home that night or not. We waited for hours before they were finally able to book us for a flight directly to Philadelphia, and then another couple hours after that because they accidentally double-booked us and couldn’t transfer our information. Or something. It was an absolute nightmare. Dx

Overall, we were at the airport for about 8 hours and still barely made our flight. By that time though, I was just so thankful that I was heading home. Everything went smoothly after that. I was so happy to be able to use my phone again when we got back to the States, and my mom, dad, and Andrew all showed up at the airport to pick me up. Andrew was supposed to be a surprise, but he told me he was coming.

I’ve got some serious jet lag right now, though, which is why I am up at 6:00 a.m. writing this post (which I would never be up this early on normal circumstances in summer!). I didn’t even sleep in yesterday! Craziness!

So, this is just a short little post to let you all know that I wasn’t taken (I’ve got funny stories though) and that I had a great time. I’m thinking about doing a little blog mini-series where I write a post about each individual day since we did so much. I kept a journal so I wouldn’t forget anything. Would you guys be interested in something like that? I’ve also got tons of pictures (835 of them) to do something with. So far they’ve just been uploaded to Facebook.

p.s. It makes me feel better knowing I’m not the only one that hates packing.

Andrew left Friday evening for Orlando, Florida. Him and his family are going on a Disney theme park kind of vacation; they’re going to almost all of the Disney parks and I think they’re going to be gone for a week and a couple days. It was really hard for me to say goodbye to him because when I’m in France and Italy I won’t be able to talk to him hardly at all (no phone or laptop). But, c’est la vie!

I’m leaving for my trip Wednesday morning, and I guess I haven’t realized how close it is! It’s just been creeping up on me and I am not prepared at all. I haven’t even looked at the suitcases in the basement or planned out what I’m gonna wear. Ahhh!

I think I have a valid reason for my unpreparedness, though. This weekend we finally redid my room (!!!!). On Wednesday, my mom and sister switched the furniture in our rooms while I was at school and painted my sister’s room. I came home to my room in disaster and my sister’s all nice and neat.

We were waiting on a comforter that I ordered from Target before we went and got the paint for my room and could actually start on it. It finally came Thursday afternoon, and I was really pleased with it, so we took the sham that it came with to Home Depot and had them match the paint. It’s kinda cool how the computer/machine makes the paint the same exact shade. Or maybe I’m just a dork.

My mom woke up bright and early Saturday morning to get start on my room. I’m not a morning person, so I was not exactly chirping with happiness, but I eventually got up and we moved all my furniture out and started painting. It took us what seemed like forever, but we finished it and I lovelovelove the color. :love: We moved my furniture back in at night once the room had time to air out and dry. Today I finished putting up all my shelves (except two, which I spray painted a different color so they’re drying) and getting everything organized. So all I have left is to put my curtains and shelves up!

I am really really happy with how it all turned out. My old room was alright, but it was more for 13 or 14 year old me, not 17 year old me. I’ve put up some before and after pictures:

Before:

After:



(The purple is a little bit darker than in the pictures, my camera wasn’t taking very good pictures that represented the actual color.)

What do you guys think?