"Is it time to panic yet?"

June 24th 9:30 am

About to board our flight a toddler calmly turned to his mother and asked, "Is it time to panic yet?" I couldn't have asked it better myself. Luckily, I think the answer is not quite yet. My excitement is nicely balancing out my anxiety. Plus, I was in the minority at my 8:30 am breakfast for not having a drink which made me realize I was doing better than some. I'm on my way to Queenstown, New Zealand, the first of my many stops. I wish I could say I was going because there's some sort of amazing policy going on there, but in reality the flight there was quite a bit cheaper and I've always wanted to go. I'll be there a bit over a week before heading over to Australia. I'll hopefully be mostly over my jetlag when I meet my two host parents & my two host dogs. I'm looking forward to jumping in once there.

I've never written a blog (though I went through countless journals with only one entry.) The advantage of starting now is that my life is probably more exciting than it ever has been, the disadvantage is that I'm still quite new to this. I fear my writing has aways been much more "pleasant to grade" than "pleasant to read." So please forgive me if I switch formats/give too much bland detail/ ect. I can only promise that this blog should be acceptable by storybook standards-- there will be pretty pictures and a loveable sidekick. Though my fellowship does require that I travel alone, Leonardo, a small stuffed lion will also be making the journey. Since life at home doesn't stop while I'm away (who knew, right?) I'm going to be missing the birth of my nephew in October. Though I highly doubt he'll notice, just as I doubt my parents will notice my absence once he arrives, I wanted to do something special. Leo (well technically his identical, very clean replica) will be the baby's birth gift from me. Once I come back he'll have an accompanying storybook of his adventures that my nephew might like once he's older. Or hey, maybe he'll at least like the pretty pictures.