Emotional

Sooo today has been one of those days and I think my roller coaster of emotions has begun. Today was my last day of college classes and all I have left in my college career is a couple finals and graduation.

My finals include 2 papers and 2 tests. Once those are over it is time to kick the job search in to high gear.

As for emotions, I have a lot running through my head right now and I just don't know how to feel about anything. I have a lot on my plate and things are just so overwhelming for me. There are really 3 things that are hard for me right now. First off, I have finals coming up and graduation which is crazy to think of. Secondly, I also have my last day at work coming up which is really hard for me to think about. I have worked there for 6 years and I can't believe it is time for me to move on. Finally, I have an uncle who just got moved to hospice and does not have long to live. This is really hard for me because I am not super close with this side of my family and so it is hard to know that he is not doing well.

So it has been a long and interesting week and I am looking forward to this weekend so that I can work on some of my papers and just relax and clear my head.

2 Weeks!

So things have been uber crazy lately for me. I am final done with my senior capstone project and gave my last college presentation of my undergraduate career on Friday! It is such a relief to be done with the project but I feel like I have a ton of free time on my hands now. All 5 groups that presented on friday did a phenomenol job and I was so proud of everyone!

This is my last week of college classes and then next week is finals. I don't have a ton of finals but the week will still be busy. Graduation is May 16th and then after that I am going to have a chance to slow down and take it easy. Wow, I haven't been able to do that in a long time.

My last day of work at the daycare is May 15th. I have been trying not to think about it because I have been there for over 6 years. I have seen so many families evolve and built some strong relationships with them as well. I know that my last day will be highly emotional.

As for other news, my family is getting a puppy in the beginning of June. It was born on April 17th and it is a Wirehaired Pointing Griffon and we named it Riesling and we will call it Ries for short! I am not an animal person but now that the puppy has been born, I am SUPER excited!

Where has the time gone?

I have been at the cabin this weekend and it has been so nice to relax and not worry as much about school and graduation. My life has been pretty much consumed by those things for the last two months and I am ready for it all to be over. I have just under one month until graduation and frankly that scares the CRAP out of me. I am so ready to be done with classes but graduating means finding a "big girl" job and joining the so-called "real-world" EEK!

This weekend has been so nice to get away and I have done some pretty interesting things. Here is what I have learned/done this weekend.

1. Cooked corn beef has for the first time
2. Swept and mopped concrete because of water damage
3. Cleaned the shower (woof)
4. Baked brownies
5. Siphoned gasoline out of our snowmobiles (SOOO FUN)
6. Cleaned gutters (not the coolest thing)
7. Chopped wood
8. Grilled chicken

So this weekend was filled with a variety of different things and I loved having the opportunity to learn how to do stuff.

New Spaces and Faces

So this weekend I went shopping at Merle Hay Mall. I tend to avoid that mall because it is run-down and there tends to have a sketchy crowd.

However, I was pleasantly shocked on Saturday when I stopped by their at how much it had improved. The front of the mall had been completely torn down and replaced with nice windows and some light sculptures out front as well. I think that this will really help the mall to attract more business and keep their sales up. They are also adding new stores such as Ulta and Staples.

I think that the thing that will really help the mall look perfect is to re-vamp the Sears department store on the end. It looks very old and run down and I think that a face lift will make the mall look great!

Birthday Week!!

Last week was a long busy week and I can't believe this week is ready to start. Last week was my 23rd birthday so I spent a lot of time celebrating. Wednesday night I hung out with my PR agency and we just hung out and talked. I ended up staying at Drake until 2:30 in the a.m.

Thursday was my actual birthday and my day started off with breakfast with Mallory, then for lunch my co-workers at Variety baked me a cake and we had lunch from simply italian. Finally for dinner my parents took me to Bonefish Grill and then we went to Cheesecake Factory for dessert. It was amazing!!! I got a new iPOD nano, iTunes gift card, money, and the collectors edition Sex and the City with all the seasons!!

Friday night I went out to Tonic with all my friends. It was a great time and I am so luck to have so many amazing friends.

The rest of the weekend I spent playing catch-up on my homework and stuff around the house.

Wow

Wow, it has been a really long time since I have blogged and I have no idea where the time has gone. I have been extremely busy the last few weeks with projects and tests. I have also been having some computer issues too. So I will give you a quick re-cap of my last few weeks!

I spent spring break with my brother and his friend in Minnesota at our family cabin. We planned on snowmobiling for the whole week but the weather took a turn and warmed up to 50 degress. This warm weather caused all the snow to melt and so we were unable to ride. Instead of hanging around the lake we headed to Duluth, Minnesota to hang out and do some fun stuff. We started off by going to the Great Lakes Aquarium and then went to the University of Minnesota at Duluth for a college tour. We spent the night and went shopping the next day and also checked out some of the shoreline of Lake Superior.

After spring break things began to get a little crazy. I have been busy working at the daycare and at my internship at Variety. When I am not working I find myself at school or in group meetings getting things prepared for final projects. I don't know where all the time has gone and I can't believe that April is basically here. My graduation is fast approaching. EEK!

I promise I will be better about blogging on a regular basis and keep my posts up to date!

Weekend!

So I can't believe how fast this past weekend went.  I guess part of the reason why it flew by was because I was so busy.  

Friday night I went out to dinner with my friend Adam and a few other friends.  We went to The Des Moines Club which is at the top of the Ruan building in downtown Des Moines.  For dinner I had Lobster Bisque, A Filet and amazing Cheesecake for dessert!  The night was great and I had a lot of fun!

On Saturday I spent the day babysitting my 3 favorite little girls.  The girls are 8, 4, and 3.  I have known them and been babysitting for them since the oldest girl was 2.  It has been so great watching them grow up and being a part of their lives.  Saturday night, I went to Panora, Iowa with my Public Relations capstone agency.  We went to Panora to just get away and enjoy some time off campus.  We ate a lot of amazing food and did a little work on our campaign as well.  It was really nice to hang out and get away.

On Sunday we came back from Panora and I ended up working on a lot of homework during the afternoon.  On Sunday night I went to dinner with some of my besties.  Amanda, Mallory and I went out to dinner at On The Border and had tacos and margaritas!  We had a ton of fun! Unfortunately the 4th member of our group could not make it because she was sick.  But we missed her a lot!

Here are some pictures from this weekend!

This is a picture of Adam and I at dinner on Friday night downtown.

Here is a picture of the girls that I babysit for!!

This is a picture from Saturday night in Panora with Teri!

Ultimate Peach Martini

So my step-mom just made me a Peach Martini and it is amazing.  I just thought I would share it with everyone!!

Here is the recipe for 2 Martinis:

2 Jiggers of Peach Schnapps

2 Jiggers of Vanilla Vodka

4 Jiggers of Peach Nectar

*Obviously just cut the recipe in half for one martini!  Hope everyone else enjoys these as much as I do!!!

Top 5

I was thinking about my all-time favorite movies and here are the 5 that I could watch over and over again without getting tired of them........

1. Tommy Boy

2. Con Air

3. American President

4. Steal Magnolias

5. Christmas Vacation

Working for the weekend...

My week is almost over thank god!  I had a quiz on Monday, a test on Tuesday, and a paper due Thursday.   Luckily I got everything done and I am almost ready to relax.  I have a group meeting tonight at 9:30 and after that I have to pack.

I am headed up to the lake tomorrow around 5 with my dad and one of his friends.  On Friday we are going ice fishing and snowmobiling and then that night my brother and step-mom will join us. We are celebrating my dad's birthday at the lake this weekend.  I am really excited to be up there and spend some quality time with my family.  

Technology

I have been without my laptop this week because of a virus.  I finally got it back yesterday afternoon and I can't believe how much I missed it! (Lame, I know) But seriously, I realized just how much of my life is on this little computer and how much I actually use it.  Needless to say, I am really glad to have it back.

On the other hand, now that I have it back, I feel like there are even more problems with it and that it runs even slower now.  I am not sure what to do, I feel like I am on an old-school computer with dial-up internet sometimes and it is driving me CRAZY!!!!  I just want it to work like it did about two months ago.  Fast and Efficient.  

When my computer was being fixed, I came to the realization of just how dependent we are on technology and what a huge part it plays in our everyday lives.  Now, I often think about when I was a little kid and there were hardly any computers and the thought of the "internet" seemed like a joke.  Wow, how these things have changed our lives.  

I wonder if we have changed for the better or not?

Exhausted!

This morning I did not want to get up. This weekend wore me out and I did not get enough sleep at all.

Friday- We had a HUGE snowstorm and it was absolutely amazing. The snowfall was so pretty and it snowed really hard for quite awhile. Unfortunately Friday night, I had to go to a speaker at school for my Sociology class and the roads were absolutely horrible. I took me about 45 minutes to get to Drake and the speaker was not very interesting. After the speaker was over, I picked up chinese food at Tsing Tsao and went home to watch Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist and Catch & Release.

Saturday- I slept in for the first time in a long time and it felt really good. Once I woke up, I worked out and got ready for the day. I spent most of the day reading for my history class (BORING) and of course I went to Target! My Valentine's evening was spent with Mya, a little girl from my daycare. Her mom went to dinner and a movie with her boyfriend. Mya and I played house, old maid and pretty pretty princess! It was a lot of fun and she game me 2 roses and some daisy's for V-day!

Sunday- I got up early sunday and headed downtown to Variety(my internship) to work at the 35th annual telethon. The telethon takes place once a year and raises money for the children of Iowa. I spent about 6 hours downtown and I worked on logging pledges into our computer system. We had a great turnout this year and managed to raise over 3 million! For dinner my brother and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings!

Today, I have class and then Morgan and I are going to go out to eat at Bonefish Grill for her 23rd birthday!!

Days Go By...

So today some new friends and I were talking about how we have changed since Freshman year and began looking at photos from "way back in the day." Wow, I couldn't believe how much I had changed, and I definitely think for the better!

First off, I have been on a new diet (the work-out daily and don't drink alcohol/eat fried foods and make healthy choices one). Well so far, I have lost about 12 pounds which has been great, but I had not been able to really tell. But when we began looking at photos, I was amazed at the difference! Looking at these pictures encouraged me to continue on this diet plan and work hard at getting in shape!

The second thing I realized was that I can't believe I am almost ready to graduate from college. I feel like I just started and I didn't know where I was going to go or what my major was going to be. Now, I am 3 months away from graduation and I am beginning to look for a job. Eek. This is really intimidating and scary to me, but I know it is just the next chapter in my life.

I am really excited and nervous to face this next "chapter" of my life!

What A Weekend!

This weekend, I drove 8 hours to my family cabin. We left Friday at 2 and headed back to Des Moines on Sunday at noon. A lot of people think my family is crazy because we drive 1000 miles in a weekend to spend about 30 hours at our cabin.

Little do people know, it is totally worth it. To the right is a picture of our final destination on our saturday ride. This is Kettle Falls, which is a river that borders the United States and Canada. I am standing in the U.S. and to the right is Canada.

On Saturday my family rode 225 miles in just one day. I am not sure I have ever ridden that many miles in one day, but it was a lot of fun! I am doing something new this year and keeping track of how many miles I ride for the season. So far, this seasons total is 1473 miles!

The day ended when we made it back to Lake Vermilion and I saw one of the prettiest sunsets I had seen in a long time. It had the most bautiful colors and I had to stop and take it in for a few moments.

Time Flies When You are Having Fun

Wow, this week has flown by. I have been so busy with school and meetings that I am just getting around to my blog today.

I attended the first Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA) meeting of the semester. PRSSA is a great organization for PR students, it allows students to meet a lot of great professionals and learn about PR. I really enjoy the meetings and I even won a MARS cafe gift-card for attending!

As for the rest of the week, I spent a lot of time in classes and working on projects. Wednesday night, I went out with some of my favorite journalism school friends for 2-fer martinis at the Lift. Above is a photo of Deanne and I sipping on a Cosmo. This was the first night we have gone out this semester, but we decided we should make it a regular occurance so we are going to start going out every 2 to 3 weeks and having "Group Therapy" at the Lift! I love spending time with these girls and will miss them a lot when we all graduate and go our separate ways.

As for the weekend, I am heading to our cabin in Minnesota! I am really excited for a weekend full of riding and sightseeing!

And it just keeps getting worse...

So this weekend has been a lot of fun. Friday and Saturday were both spent with good friends and lots of laughs.

However, today has just been one of those days. Let me fill you in.....

1.) As I was working out, I was doing sprints in our basement and caught my arm on an un-used picture frame. I now have a huge cut and a bruise.

2.) Later on in my work-out as I was lifting weights, I set the weight down on my ring fingernail leaving a bruise there too.

3.) While in the shower I got shampoo in my eye.

And just when I thought things couldn't get worse, because bad things usually come in 3's...It did.

4.) I was at Dahl's just up the street from my house and I had a basket full of groceries and I was just about to check out and I realized that I had LEFT my wallet on my computer desk at home because I was purchasing ink online. Grrrr. So needless to say, I had to run back home and back to the store. I felt sooo dumb.

Well I sure hope my run of bad luck has ended and that this isn't a preview of the week to come. I am really busy this week with Class, Work Meetings, PRSSA Meetings and DR Appointments, oh yea and Homework to boot.

Whew....I am one busy girl!

The Start of Something New....

Well, this is my first official blog! I have decided it is time to join the craze and become a blogger myself! Plus, after having the importance of Social Media being pounded in to my head as I Public Relations major, I decided I would go ahead with it.

Today is a beautiful day here in Des Moines, the sun is shining and the breeze is blowing. This morning I went to Davids Bridal with Morgan to pick out her bridesmaid dresses! We decided on floor-length strapless dress in Tangerine. I am really excited for her wedding and can't wait to wear a fun new color! This evening I am babysitting for some of my favorite little kids from the daycare and then I am heading out to meet some friends for a few drinks!

Tomorrow is Super Bowl Sunday, but I am not sure if I will even watch the game. But, if I had to cheer for a team, I would say, GO CARDINALS!!!