The Results are In!

I just wanted to make this post to say a sincere thank you to both Uncle Dirk and Aunt Lori and Aunts Chris and Lee for donating to my blog! Thanks so much!

On another note, I got an email from AFS on Tuesday that said my application has been sent to AFS-USA for further reviewing... I've made it passed the first level! Hooray!

Thanks to everyone for being so supportive in every way about this! Can't wait for more news.

-Carly

Last Christmas in the States?

Tomorrow may quite possibly be my last Christmas in the U.S.A for a two years! :O *Gasp* That's exciting to think about.... Nudge nudge... to any relatives who don't know what to get me, a donation of any amount would be an awesome present (Sorry about the shameless plugging)! Anyhow, I have been informed that I will find out about my acceptance very very shortly! I will keep you posted!
I wish you all a very merry Christmas!
Sincerely,
Carly

Hooray for the Widget O' Wonder

Well, today was a good day before I checked my email... but, it just got better! Back in October, I was having some problems with email with AFS. It was quite confusing. But now, everything is happy again because I got an email today with the instructions on how to get the "Chip In" widget o' wonder onto my blog. Basically, as you can see to the right of this post, there is a little gadget that has a button with Chip In written on it. If you decide you would like to help fund my trip to France, which would be greatly appreciated, then you can click that button, enter the amount you would like to donate, and securely use paypal to help me reach my goal. I chose five thousand as a goal because that would help immensely with the application price. However, don't feel obligated to pay an insane amount of money. Any amount would help me out and I sincerely thank anybody that decides to donate any sum of money!
In fact, here are some examples of how many people it will take to reach five thousand dollars if each gives:

$1.00-5000 people
$2.50-2000 people
$5.00-1000 people
$10.00-500 People
$15.00-333(.3?) people
$20.00-250 people
$30.00-166 people

And so on. So you see, any amount makes it easier for me to reach my goal. Thank you all so much for helping!

Sincerely,
Carly

Ironically...

I feel like what happened in my French class on Wednesday is noteworthy news. Well, first of all, the question of the day just happened to be "Can you imagine studying abroad? Do you like that idea?" (In French, of course....) I thought it was an awesome coincidence, that my French teacher was just curious if anybody else in my class had put any thought into it. However, she didn't put that in just for fun, because later she said that the visitor we had been expecting was waiting to be sent up to the classroom. I was kind of in a daze on Monday, so I didn't exactly hear who the visitor was, and I was excited. But nothing could surpass the awesomeness of seeing an AFS volunteer walk in the door. It was amazing! He first explained what AFS was, introduced himself as Grant Ziolkowski and told us of his year in Spain when he was a senior. I had some troubles forcing down the extreme joy. At the end I went up to him with my French teacher and we talked and I thanked him. It ended up being one of those unexpected happy things that just make your day brighter. However, it wasn't just an awesome way to start the day. If I get that excited when a single AFS volunteer is in the room, I know that I am ready to make this gigantic step in my life. I can't wait!
Sincerely,
Carly

Application (Almost) Complete

Whoopee! This weekend I completed all except the passport part of my application. I am uber-pumped. Soon I will be turning it in, and after that i will be finding out whether I got in or not, and after that, I might be finding out when my flight is, and then it might be the END of the school year, and then it might be August (birthday), and then it might be time to pack, and then it might be time to leave. So as you can see, not too long until France becomes a reality. And judging on how fast a third of the school year has already gone by, I wouldn't be surprised if the AFS process happens just as fast as it does when I wrote that sentence above. I just sincerely hope that I get into AFS France and they aren't just like, "Sorry, France and French Belgium finished up months ago and you will have to wait another year!" :( They probably won't, though. And, you know, if I have to, I would choose somewhere else, like Italy. Get back to my Italian roots. That would be fun. But as of now, France is my number one choice. AH! I am so excited! I have random paroxysms of happiness I am so ecstatic! Knowing that next year might be the most life changing year of my life just makes this school year so much more tolerable... Almost...fun! Haha...maybe not, but you know what I mean. See you soon!

P.S. In a few weeks there will probably be a little gadget on the side of my blog to help with fund raising! yay! :):)