Christmas 2014

Hey Everyone!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas! I know I did!
I had planned on posting this this past Saturday, or even Friday, but we were out all day both days, so that's why I'm posting it today!

So today I thought I would share some of my Christmas pics, as well as tell you what we did throughout the day!

There's me!

My sisters and I. We took a pic exactly like this the day before (Christmas Eve). I think this will be our picture taking-formation from now on!

My sister wanted this picture to look "candid." Lol.

My Uncle and his family were in town for Christmas, so we went to have breakfast with them. The hotel was really nice (aka great for pictures). That's where my sisters and I took all the pictures shown!

When we got back home, we opened our presents and watched t.v for some time. Then, in the evening, we went to a family friends house for a Christmas party. They have one every year, and we've gone there every Christmas for the past 3 years, so that was fun! The kids/teens were in a separate room from the adults, so we played a game (I don't remember what it's called. It's like charades except you can only talk, not show.) while the parents debated about Africa (what?!?). But it was a lot of fun. I didn't take any pictures, but my sister took a bunch of videos, and put them on Snapchat, although they've probably "disappeared" by now.

By the time we got home it was around 10, so we just put on our pjs and hung out before going to sleep.

P.S. I took pics with my parents, but they were all at night, so one of us or the other was in our pjs. Hehe. We also took pics with my aunt, but I wasn't sure if she wanted me to put her picture on here. People like privacy, ya feel?

This Christmas was a lot of fun, probably one of the best Christmases I've had. I know Christmas is about the birth of Jesus Christ and hope for the world, and it's been clear to me how truly important it is. But, this Christmas also helped me realize how important family is. It was a real eye-opener, to be honest. I was with family (immediate family, extended family, friends) all day, and I just really felt like it was a special time!

So, that was my Christmas 2014. I really hope all of you had an awesome Christmas spent with family and friends, and didn't forget the true meaning of it all!

Thank You!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

CHRISTmas: The True Meaning

What is Christmas all about?

Some people think it's about giving and receiving presents. While that is nice, they're's more to Christmas then that. Others think Christmas is about helping others and being with family. While this is important, and I hope all of you are able to spend Christmas with your family, this also isn't the most important thing about the season.

You probably already know where I'm going with this, so I'll just get on with it!

Christmas is about Jesus. God sent His son into the world, so we could be saved from our sins.

At Church on Sunday, my Pastor preached a great sermon about the true meaning of Christmas, and I thought I would share some points from the sermon with you.

~Jesus is real hope for real people in a real world.
(This means that Jesus came into the world to bring hope to the world. He wants us to trust in Him!)

~Christmas is about trust.
(Mary had to trust God AND the angel who told her about Jesus. She had to trust that everything would be okay, and Joseph had to trust Mary the angel, and God. Christmas is about trusting God and knowing He'll make a way.)

And one that I kinda put in my own words:
~Jesus sent His son into the world, not only to save us from our sins, but also to give us peace, and to give us rest. I know that's hard especially during this time of year, but trust God, and He'll give you peace!

If you're interested in reading the CHRISTmas Story, it's Matthew 1:18-25 and Luke 2:1-7. And if you don't have a Bible, you can download the Bible App!

Thanks for reading!

And I hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

Christmas Movie Favorites

Heeeyyy!

Christmas is only 2 days away!!!!!!I'm so excited!

I uploaded a Christmas Playlist post on Saturday to get you all in the Christmas spirit, so today, I thought I would share some of my favorite Christmas movies to also get you in the Christmas spirit!

1. Home Alone: This is probably the Christmas movie that's watched the most at our house. It's my Dad's favorite Christmas movie. He usually watches it every year, so we like watching it with him. It's such a cute movie!

2. Christmas with The Kranks: I actually watched this movie a couple days ago with my Mom and my aunt. I think it's funny how the movie goes with their whole not-celebrating-Christmas thing (if you watch it you know what I mean)!

3. The Santa Clause movies: I really like these movies, but I usually don't watch all 3 of them in a row (unless it's an ABC Family marathon. lol). The thing I like the most about these movies is how they keep the same Charlie throughout all 3 movies, and you see him all grown up in the 3rd one (you know how they try to switch out characters, and think we don't notice)!

4. The Ultimate Christmas Present: Okay, I know the events in this movie most likely wouldn't happen, but I think it's so cute! 

5. A Christmas Story: I can count the number of times I've watched this movie, but like all of the other ones I mentioned it's just a cute movie! My favorite scene is the part when his tongue gets stuck to the pole! Lol.

And a movie favorite that I can't believe I forgot to include:

6. Merry Christmas Drake and Josh: Drake and Josh was one of my favorite shows, so naturally, the movie was a favorite of mine. I really liked the whole theme of the movie!

So, those are some of my favorite Christmas movies!

I hope you enjoyed it!

And if you haven't watched any one of these movies, I definitely recommend them all!

Thank You!

Stay True. Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

Christmastime Playlist

Christmas time is almost here! It's less than a week away, you guys!!!!!!

One thing I love to do during this time of year is listen to some festive music to match all the festivities!

So without further ado, I present to you, My Christmastime Playlist!

1. The Complete Justin Bieber Christmas Album: Okay, so I'm not the biggest JB fan at the moment, this is, by far, the best Christmas album I've ever listened to. It came out when I was a pretty big fan; my whole family was, really (except my Dad who insisted he had never heard of Justin Bieber. Yeah, right.). But anyway, I really like this album because every song is enjoyable, even the slow ones. It's not like other albums where one song is your "jam," and then you have no idea what the song after that is because you always skip over it. (You know what I'm talking about.)  

2. Kirk Franklin Christmas Album: My Mom used to play this CD when we were younger, and I really liked all of the songs too! But we haven't listened to it in years, so I might ask my Mom to bring it back out this Christmas!

3. Aly & AJ - Greatest Time of Year: Throwback to the first year my family ever had cable (meaning Disney Channel. Lol.). Around Christmastime, this song would play all the time. It used to be one of my favorite Christmas songs!

4. Toby Mac - Christmas This Year: I heard this song on the radio a couple of years ago, and I've really liked it ever since! Ir has such a fun beat to it! It's catchy!

5. Joy to the World: This is a Christmas classic! I like this one that Cimorelli sang!

Well, those are some of my favorite Christmas songs!

Thank You!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

Pinspiration: Christmas Edition!

Hey Peeps!

Before I get into today's post I just wanted to mention some things that I had in the posts I deleted. So everything in the fancy parentheses right here is from a blog post from last week Friday, in case you didn't catch it while it was up!

{Welp, I can gladly say I made it through my first semester of college! I'm not sure what all of my grades are yet, but on Wednesday, my U.S. History posted the grades for that class, and I got an A! My last final was yesterday, so I got to come home last night! I'm so happy to be back home with non-dining hall food, great wifi, and no one jumping up and down above my dorm room ceiling. I'm, by no means, complaining about college. I actually really like it, but it's just nice to be home for 3 weeks!

P.S. Let me know if you wanna see a First Semester of College Recap!}

So, for today's post I had planned on doing a few Christmas DIYs to show to you guys, but honestly, I had no idea what to do! I know Pinterest has tons of DIYs, but I kinda wanted mine to be original. I even bought some DIY-type things from Target a few weeks ago, but I don't know what to do with them!
So, I decided to scroll through Pinterest and pick some of my favorite Christmas-y pins!

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And, of course we can't forget what Christmas is all about...

via

So, those are my some of my favorite pins from my Pinterest board The Most Wonderful Time of the Year!

I hope you enjoyed it!

Thank You!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

Christmas Gift Guide 2014 :)

Hey Peeps!

So, you may or may not have noticed that about 3 of my blog posts magically disappeared. Well, they didn't magically disappear. I took them off, because if you aw them, you know they were Christmas gift guides for Mom, Dad, and Sisters. I had planned on posting Christmas gift guides for Brothers, Pets, Besties, and Boyfriends, but I just felt a check inside of me (if that makes any sense), and I didn't feel right dedicating 7 whole posts to gift guides (8 if you're counting the stocking stuffers post). 

So, I deleted the 3 Christmas gift guides that I already had up, and I had already made most of the remaining ones on Polyvore, but I deleted those too, and decided to make just 1 post giving you 3 ideas for each person. (The associate pastor at my Church said that he and his wife get their daughters 3 gifts because wise men brought Jesus 3 gifts! Makes sense, doesn't it?!?)

I put the gifts for each person in sections, so the one with the cute scarf is for moms, the other one on the top is for dads, the one below that is for sisters, and yes, that is a tea set (it's for the little ones, okay!), the one next to that with the awesome macaroon socks are for besties, the one next to that is for brothers, the one below that is for pets, specifically dogs (sorry if you have something other than a dog...), and the one next to that is for boyfriends (for both guy friends, and lovely dovey boyfriends). Of course you can switch around what you get for each person, but, like, don't get your dog  Marc Jacobs lip color or a watch, cause that would be weird...

So, I don't really have anything to say about these items except that I picked them because they're really nice and affordable, and they're gifts I would definitely get for my family!

If you wanna get the full deets about all of these items, you can head on over to my Polyvore page!

Oh, yeah. I'm really sorry I didn't upload yesterday. I was basically out of the house all day, so I had time to make the Polyvore set, but I didn't have time to upload it on my blog, so sorry about that!

Thank You!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

Christmas Tag!

Hey Everyone!

Today, I had planned on doing a finals related post, but then Allie tagged me to do the Christmas tag, so I thought, why not? Who wants to hear about finals anyway, am I right?

So, yeah, today I'm gonna be doing the Christmas tag!

1. What's your favorite Christmas movie?

~This is actually kinda hard. I really like the Santa Claus movies, but I  also really like Home Alone, so yeah, I guess it's between those two!

2. Do you open presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas day?

~I feel like we've opened them on Christmas Eve at least once, because I remember it being dark outside - signaling the night time... 

and there was wrapping paper literally everywhere. So, I guess we have done it before, or maybe it was at like 12am on Christmas Day. But now we open them on Christmas morning.

3. Do you have a favorite Christmas memory?

~It was probably that same Christmas I mentioned in the question before. I got something that up till this day, is still one of my favorite gifts (keep on reading, friends.)

4. What's your favorite festive food?

~Can it be a drink? Because mine is eggnog! I tasted it for the first time about 2 years ago, and I was like, "Where have you been all my life?!?"

5. Favorite gift?

~Yay! You kept on reading! So, my favorite gift is definitely my Powerpuff Girl (Why was there a red line under Powerpuff? Why is that word not in the dictionary???) diary that I got when I was like 7! It was awesome! It had a lock and a key and everything! But, I don't use it anymore... it was cute, so I'm gonna start using it!

6. Favorite Christmas scent?
~Gingerbread, maybe, or cinnamon, but I like the pine-y smell too! Oooo, and the minty candy cane smell!

One of my diys from last year :)

7. Do you have any Christmas Eve traditions?
~We usually go to Church in the evening for the candlelight service, and we'll usually watch a movie or something until 12, but at least one of us has fallen asleep by then!

8. What tops your tree?
~We have a star and an angel, but we use the star most of the time.

9. As a kid, what was the one crazy, extravagant gift that you always asked for, but never received?
~My story's kinda similar to Allie's, but in 7th grade, I really wanted the iPod touch, but I didn't get it that year, so I just moved on. I don't think I even asked for it again. Lol

10. What's the best part of Christmas for you?
~Being able to spend time with my family and reading the story of Jesus' birth with my family, and eating, and I'm not gonna lie, opening presents is pretty exciting too (but that's not what Christmas is about, remember that!)...

So, I guess I should tag people now.

I tag Cathleen, Alana, Kierra, and Meredith!
If I didn't tag you in this one, you're still welcome to do the Christmas tag, or you can tell me the answers to your favorite questions in the comments, or you can do both!

Thank You!
Stay True, Be You,
Itunu

♥♥♥

Christmas Gift Guide 2014: Stocking Stuffers (Gals and Guys)

Hi pretty people!

Well, can ya believe it's December? That's crazy! The year went by so quickly, and now we're in December aka Christmas season, the most wonderful time of the year - in my opinion.

Since we're finally in December, I thought I would begin my Christmas series today (I'm currently working on a title...)!

I'm not sure exactly how I'm gonna set this up - whether I'll do a full gift guide all at once, or whether I'll split them up into separate categories (Mom, Dad, sisters, brothers, pets, etc.). I'm thinking about splitting them into separate posts based on their categories, but posting them all on the same day so you can pick and choose which posts you want to read. And it will most likely be up later next week aka after finals, so look out for that!

Today, I thought I would start off with the basics: stocking stuffers!

P.S. I only have the gals' stocking stuffers because my computer was angry at me, so it was taking its time, and I really need to go to bed. Hopefully, I'll be able to upload the guys' stocking stuffers tomorrow, latest Thursday!

I chose all of these lovely things because: 

1. they're each $10 and under (yes, even the makeup set and eye-shadow palette)

2. they really helpful/essential

3. they're cute!

At first, when I went back to look at this, I felt like these stocking stuffers were targeted more towards teenage girls and young adults, but then I realize that there are some things on her that mom's would like. Like, although my Mom most likely wouldn't wear sparkly nail polish, she would use the compact mirror and the lotion and the notebook and the lip set and the mani-pedi set, and maybe even the cute little owl lip balm, and I'm rambling... 

Some other things you could include your mom's stocking are mini candles, mini perfume, chocolates, a cute pair of gloves, a scarf, a minimerency kit, and a whole lot of other things!

Now, on to the guys' stocking stuffers!

These are just basic things, and of course, you can't forget the Christmas DVDs! I also included some cool cups or tumblers or whatever you wanna call them. I think the one with the red twirly thing would be great for a little dude; it looks so fun and kid-friendly!

I hope this gave you ideas on what to put in your stockings! If you wanna find out where to get these items and for how much (all of them are less than $10!), check out my Polyvore. Just click on the set you want to see, and it will give you all of the prices! 

Also, if you have any other suggestions for stocking stuffers, let me know in the comments!

Thank You!

Stay True, Be You,

Itunu

♥♥♥

5 Ways You Can Help Others this Christmas

Hello, Beauts!!!!!! 

(that's what I'm gonna start calling you guys! Beauts.)

Thanksgiving 2014 has passed, and up next is Christmas!!!!!!

Christmas is my favorite holiday, so I'm really excited.
Christmas trees, lights and decorations, hot chocolate, candy cane, eggnog, reading about the true meaning of Christmas with my family - Bah! I'm so excited!

Thinking about all of these things, the traditions of Christmas, makes me feel for those in need, those who don't have homes or don't have food to eat.
But, there are ways we can help them, especially during the holiday season. Here are some ideas, but first some verses and inspirational quotes to inspire you:

1. Help out at a local food shelter: The number of food shelters out there are many, so there should be at least 1 in your state. And it's actually a lot of fun. It's so nice to see the expression on these peoples faces, people who haven't eaten in days. It's really a great experience!

2. Donate clothing: If you have clothes that you don't wear anymore, and that you would like to give, donate them! If you feel comfortable going downtown, and actually handing coats out to people, then definitely go for it.

3. Visit a children's hospital: I know children in hospitals aren't necessarily less fortunate than us financially, but in other ways, they really are. They're in the hospital because they;re sick or hurt, and Christmas is a really hard time for them especially if they're not able to go home. Visiting them in the hospital, and maybe taking a gift (or perhaps whip out your guitar and sing for them!) to them is sure to bring a smile to their faces!
Note: You can do the same with a nursing home!

4. Make care packages for soldiers: You and your friends are always together, so stay together and make care packages for soldiers who won't be able to be with their families this Christmas. Include simple things like lip balm, sunscreen. Check out this post on veteransunited.com on What Deployed Troops Really Want In Their Care Packages. And of course, don't forget to write a thank you note, telling them how thankful you are for their service.

5. Plan your own food drive: Start a fundraiser, go out and by canned goods, and start your own food drive! Check out how a blogger did it!

I hope this gave you a few ideas on how you can help others this Christmas!
If you have any other ideas, let me know!
Thank You!
Stay True, Be You,
Itunu
♥♥♥

Holly Jolly Christmas Bloggy: Day 3

Hey Everyone!!!!!!!! You're probably wondering why I'm posting two Holly Jolly Christmas Bloggy posts in one day. Well, my Mom doesn't like it when we use our computers on Sundays because we're on them all week, so she likes us to take a break from the internet on Sundays. But not social media, no no!!!!!!!!

So that's why I'm posting this today, so don't read it until tomorrow!

For Day 3 of Holly Jolly Christmas Bloggy, I wanted to talk about the true meaning of Christmas.
A lot of people think that Christmas is all about what cool presents are gonna be under the Christmas tree on Christmas morning, or the yummy food you're gonna over consume that day. People also think that Christmas is all about family and friends, but while these things are important, there is one true meaning of Christmas. It's the event that started Christmas. It's the birth of Jesus Christ.
Before you exit out of this because you don't want to hear it, I just want realize that presents aren't what Christmas is all about. Spend time with your family, enjoy it, and remember to appreciate and be thankful for everything you have!
The first chapter of the Book of Matthew, along with a few other places in the Bible, talks about the birth of Jesus. Read it if you want, and remember the true meaning of Christmas!

Thank You!
Merry Christmas!!!!!!!
Stay True, Be You,
Itunu