So believe it or not it is less than a month away now. WOW! I'm pretty much still in disbelief this is actually happening, someone pinch me please! lol We got my ticket to NY today and I fly out of Kansas City on the 28th at 5:40am! That is so early! ugh lol Also my PDO is Saturday so I should have a little more understanding of the program after that. Time is going to fly!
Speaking of flying I am flying Erica to NYC in July to meet me when we get back and see the city. We'll probably go to a play and stuff like that. I figured that is the best way I can make up for missing her Birthday, Graduation, Senior year of track, and various other things. Oh and I'm paying for it all so thats why my parents agreed to it.
On a final note (so this post doesn't last forever like the others) I will be having my going away party on the 24th of January. It'll be most likely at my church and a come and go as you please type thing. I just want a chance to see everyone before I leave. The exact details will be posted when i figure them out lol.
Thanks for all your prayers! They have worked miracles thus far and we are almost there!
Monday, December 29, 2008
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Tanti Auguri Di Buon Natale
Merry Christmas!
This Christmas season has come with many blessings. The first obvious one is getting my host family. Walter and Paola are just perfect. I email them everyday and I just have a really good feeling about them. Also they got my school and enrolled me in the 11th year over there. The school looked really nice by its website. Oh and believe it or not there are after school sports activities. They signed me up for a after school volleyball team and I'm so excited! Imagine that I get to play the sport I love in Italy!
Anyways off the subject, I can't wait for Christmas tomorrow! It is the one and only day that my entire family is together. I miss having my brothers around the house and it is the greatest feeling to sit in my living room and see all four of us kids together. This is something adults usually say but time has gone by way to fast. At candle light I stood there in between my parents and just wanted to cry because it was just us three and that is how its going to be next year. Seems like just yesterday we were all at home. Heck it seems like just yesterday I decided to go to Italy and here I am 34 days away from leaving. Geez! I'm probably going to be on the plane and be like WHat? How am I here already?
Oh and one more exciting thing. I'm leaving for NYC a day early so I won't have to worry about delays. So with that in mind my parents don't want me to be alone so I'm trying to convince them to let Erica come with me and spend a day in NYC with me for her 18th birthday. I feel terrible missing so many important things but she is so understanding. I want to do this as one more thing with just me and her.
Well I've wrote to much again so I'll stop. Merry Christmas everyone!
All my Love!
Tanya
This Christmas season has come with many blessings. The first obvious one is getting my host family. Walter and Paola are just perfect. I email them everyday and I just have a really good feeling about them. Also they got my school and enrolled me in the 11th year over there. The school looked really nice by its website. Oh and believe it or not there are after school sports activities. They signed me up for a after school volleyball team and I'm so excited! Imagine that I get to play the sport I love in Italy!
Anyways off the subject, I can't wait for Christmas tomorrow! It is the one and only day that my entire family is together. I miss having my brothers around the house and it is the greatest feeling to sit in my living room and see all four of us kids together. This is something adults usually say but time has gone by way to fast. At candle light I stood there in between my parents and just wanted to cry because it was just us three and that is how its going to be next year. Seems like just yesterday we were all at home. Heck it seems like just yesterday I decided to go to Italy and here I am 34 days away from leaving. Geez! I'm probably going to be on the plane and be like WHat? How am I here already?
Oh and one more exciting thing. I'm leaving for NYC a day early so I won't have to worry about delays. So with that in mind my parents don't want me to be alone so I'm trying to convince them to let Erica come with me and spend a day in NYC with me for her 18th birthday. I feel terrible missing so many important things but she is so understanding. I want to do this as one more thing with just me and her.
Well I've wrote to much again so I'll stop. Merry Christmas everyone!
All my Love!
Tanya
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
HOST FAMILY!!!
MY FAMILY!
All the months of waiting is finally over. When I was at school today (my last day of school) I got a text from my mom saying that I had an email from my Host family! And they are just prefect! I have a mom, dad and two host sisters! And Eleonora is my age. The live in Modena Italy which is in the middle of italy toward the north. Mr. Bishline and I googled it and it is pretty centrally located between Florence, Venice, and Milan. It also is where the Ferrari is from! It seems to be a pretty decent sized city, somewhat like Springfield. I'm just so excited! Thank you everyone who said an extra prayer for this!
Here is the Email I got from my host dad today.......
Dear Tanya,
we are your host family and we are waiting for you!I'm il papà (the dad) and i'm very sorry to speackonly a little of English. La mamma (the mum) has beenin USA (Prophet's town near Chicago) in 1973 with AFSand speaks english well. Le tue sorelle (your sisters) Eleonora(born in 1992) and Anna (born in 1994) speack also english.In summer 2008 Eleonora with AFS has been in New Zealandfor two months. (i send you a foto)
Now we need something about you: next days we will choseyour italian school. We have seen in your candidate applicationthat you are 10th year: is correct? Here in Italy all students bornin 1992 are now in year 11th. Can you tell us which are the subjects that you absolutely needto attend in your italian school?
Our town, Modena, (180,000 inhabitants) is medium city in Italy. Was found 2 thousand years ago (ancient romans) andhave a old little center of the city. (i send you how try our housewith Google)Modena in in a plane (named Pianura Padana) and usually a lotof people and students move by bicicle.Are you interested to use it to? When the weather in not rainingEleonora and Anna go to school by bycicle and i do the samegoing to work. Mum works in Sassuolo, twenty kilometers fromModena and she goes there by car.
un abbraccio
dad
All the months of waiting is finally over. When I was at school today (my last day of school) I got a text from my mom saying that I had an email from my Host family! And they are just prefect! I have a mom, dad and two host sisters! And Eleonora is my age. The live in Modena Italy which is in the middle of italy toward the north. Mr. Bishline and I googled it and it is pretty centrally located between Florence, Venice, and Milan. It also is where the Ferrari is from! It seems to be a pretty decent sized city, somewhat like Springfield. I'm just so excited! Thank you everyone who said an extra prayer for this!
Here is the Email I got from my host dad today.......
Dear Tanya,
we are your host family and we are waiting for you!I'm il papà (the dad) and i'm very sorry to speackonly a little of English. La mamma (the mum) has beenin USA (Prophet's town near Chicago) in 1973 with AFSand speaks english well. Le tue sorelle (your sisters) Eleonora(born in 1992) and Anna (born in 1994) speack also english.In summer 2008 Eleonora with AFS has been in New Zealandfor two months. (i send you a foto)
Now we need something about you: next days we will choseyour italian school. We have seen in your candidate applicationthat you are 10th year: is correct? Here in Italy all students bornin 1992 are now in year 11th. Can you tell us which are the subjects that you absolutely needto attend in your italian school?
Our town, Modena, (180,000 inhabitants) is medium city in Italy. Was found 2 thousand years ago (ancient romans) andhave a old little center of the city. (i send you how try our housewith Google)Modena in in a plane (named Pianura Padana) and usually a lotof people and students move by bicicle.Are you interested to use it to? When the weather in not rainingEleonora and Anna go to school by bycicle and i do the samegoing to work. Mum works in Sassuolo, twenty kilometers fromModena and she goes there by car.
un abbraccio
dad
Monday, December 15, 2008
Leaving on a jet plane
So I got another package in the mail from AFS today. Actually two. The first one was my CultureTrek book and the second was all my travel info. I have to be in New York by 4pm on the 28th of January for an orientationa and then that evening we are flying to Paris. From Paris we'll fly to Rome and arrive in the morning of the 29th. I also already know that i'll be back in New York by 5pm on July 5th. So yes I am missing the 4th of July but at least I know when I'm coming back now.
Also my Pre Departure Orientation is January 3rd so I'm really excited about that. All I have to do is make it through 2 more days of school and I get to 'drop' out and basically concentrate completely on Italy. And of course I'm still waiting on a family but I'm sure I'll get one soon, maybe it'll be a Christmas present! lol
Also my Pre Departure Orientation is January 3rd so I'm really excited about that. All I have to do is make it through 2 more days of school and I get to 'drop' out and basically concentrate completely on Italy. And of course I'm still waiting on a family but I'm sure I'll get one soon, maybe it'll be a Christmas present! lol
Friday, December 5, 2008
50 Days And No Stress......Ok Maybe A Little
My first blog!!! For those of you reading this that don't know this is my blog for my semester to Italy. Here is where you can find updates about my trip as often as I can get them on here. Also please forgive any grammar or spelling errors, I'm not trying to be perfect, I'm just trying to let you all know how I'm doing.
So the last 8 months has been pure crazy! I never realized that signing up to be an exchange student took so much work! (Maybe thats why not that many kids do it) To even begin to explain the last 8 months would take me days so I'll just put in the more important things. One thing that I have definately learned through all of this is that even though it is extremely hard, patience is the key. I turned in my application in April and then worked and waited till I got accepted. On September 29th I got the letter saying I was accepted to AFS USA. Then on October 20th I was sitting in Younglife when my advisor called saying I was finally accepted to AFS ITALY! I was so excited I didn't sleep at all that night. Now all I'm left to do is wait again for a family, visa info, travel info, and all the rest of the stuff AFS sends us.
But now on to the happier things. Even though to the majority of people money is where they get depressed, it is where I get so excited! To help you understand my extreme excitement here's a little story.....
It was November 25th, and my bill of approx. $8,000 was to be paid by that coming Friday.(3 days away) But the worse part was not only did I not have the bill but I was still about $1,800 short. Everyone knows to come up with that kinda money in that amount of time is almost impossible. So as you can guess I was freaking out! So I called my advisor and she said don't worry you don't have to pay it till it comes. So I took a deep breathe and headed to work. When I got there everyone was gathered around the front counter waiting for me. When I came around the corner there was a lil cake and a card. Emily (my boss) said that they didn't want me to worry about not getting enough money so they took donations. She then poured out a bucket of money in front of me, $225.20 worth! Then she turned the bucket around and it said "Help Send Tanya Budler To Italy! The Cafe Will Match All Donations Made Today" So Emily pulled out her check book and wrote me a $225.20 check. Of course I just started crying because this means so much to me and they just so humble helped me out. But i'm not even close to finished. Then Emily put a paper in front of me with all of the donations people were mailing to here. So in total they made over $850 for me in one day! I love them so much, I mean who has a boss and co-workers like that? They will never know how thankful I am for them. Now just sit back cause God just continuely showed up and showed off in my life that day. So i get home and didn't even get a chance to tell my mom about it all and she hands me two envelopes. I opened them and the first was from my financial advisor for $105! Praise the Lord! Then the next was from my church and it had to checks in it. The first was out of the missions fund for $200 and the second one, oh the second one. I looked at the number a couple of times before it actually sunk in and I dropped everything in my hands and fell against the wall. I uncontrollably cried as I looked at the $1,660 check in my hand. Less than 12 hours ago I was worried about not having $1,800 and now I stood in my living room with over $9,000 to my name. But hold on, God has more! The next day my advisor called again and she informed me I got the full $700 in scholarships from AFS based on merit! So at this point I'm just like wow God, you are just so amazing! I'm never going to doubt you again! I can't even begin to describe the feeling of having tuition completely paid for when you've spent every waking moment working toward it. Praise the Lord, He has done more for me than I've ever deserved!
So as you can see, its not impossible, especially with God. Saturday we finally got the bill in the mail and it was only $7,450 so I just wrote one check and i'm done...Pretty much the greatest feeling ever! lol But that is just the begining of all the amazing things God is going to do through this trip. Now i just wait for my family and to leave! Only 7 more days of school and 50 more days and my dream will be more of a reality than ever!
So the last 8 months has been pure crazy! I never realized that signing up to be an exchange student took so much work! (Maybe thats why not that many kids do it) To even begin to explain the last 8 months would take me days so I'll just put in the more important things. One thing that I have definately learned through all of this is that even though it is extremely hard, patience is the key. I turned in my application in April and then worked and waited till I got accepted. On September 29th I got the letter saying I was accepted to AFS USA. Then on October 20th I was sitting in Younglife when my advisor called saying I was finally accepted to AFS ITALY! I was so excited I didn't sleep at all that night. Now all I'm left to do is wait again for a family, visa info, travel info, and all the rest of the stuff AFS sends us.
But now on to the happier things. Even though to the majority of people money is where they get depressed, it is where I get so excited! To help you understand my extreme excitement here's a little story.....
It was November 25th, and my bill of approx. $8,000 was to be paid by that coming Friday.(3 days away) But the worse part was not only did I not have the bill but I was still about $1,800 short. Everyone knows to come up with that kinda money in that amount of time is almost impossible. So as you can guess I was freaking out! So I called my advisor and she said don't worry you don't have to pay it till it comes. So I took a deep breathe and headed to work. When I got there everyone was gathered around the front counter waiting for me. When I came around the corner there was a lil cake and a card. Emily (my boss) said that they didn't want me to worry about not getting enough money so they took donations. She then poured out a bucket of money in front of me, $225.20 worth! Then she turned the bucket around and it said "Help Send Tanya Budler To Italy! The Cafe Will Match All Donations Made Today" So Emily pulled out her check book and wrote me a $225.20 check. Of course I just started crying because this means so much to me and they just so humble helped me out. But i'm not even close to finished. Then Emily put a paper in front of me with all of the donations people were mailing to here. So in total they made over $850 for me in one day! I love them so much, I mean who has a boss and co-workers like that? They will never know how thankful I am for them. Now just sit back cause God just continuely showed up and showed off in my life that day. So i get home and didn't even get a chance to tell my mom about it all and she hands me two envelopes. I opened them and the first was from my financial advisor for $105! Praise the Lord! Then the next was from my church and it had to checks in it. The first was out of the missions fund for $200 and the second one, oh the second one. I looked at the number a couple of times before it actually sunk in and I dropped everything in my hands and fell against the wall. I uncontrollably cried as I looked at the $1,660 check in my hand. Less than 12 hours ago I was worried about not having $1,800 and now I stood in my living room with over $9,000 to my name. But hold on, God has more! The next day my advisor called again and she informed me I got the full $700 in scholarships from AFS based on merit! So at this point I'm just like wow God, you are just so amazing! I'm never going to doubt you again! I can't even begin to describe the feeling of having tuition completely paid for when you've spent every waking moment working toward it. Praise the Lord, He has done more for me than I've ever deserved!
So as you can see, its not impossible, especially with God. Saturday we finally got the bill in the mail and it was only $7,450 so I just wrote one check and i'm done...Pretty much the greatest feeling ever! lol But that is just the begining of all the amazing things God is going to do through this trip. Now i just wait for my family and to leave! Only 7 more days of school and 50 more days and my dream will be more of a reality than ever!
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