Hi life, its me, can you slow down please?

I feel like I've been in a total fog for the last few weeks. My class has an insane amount of homework and I've been doing a lot for my internship as well. I have read three good sized plays/poems/books in the last three weeks, written two papers, gone on a mini-vacation, done interviews for my internship and I feel like the other parts of life are falling apart around me. We are going out of town again this weekend for a picnic my Pennsylvania family is having and we'll be back on Sunday. Its also our nieces first birthday this week so there will probably be a party for her this weekend. I just keep praying that after this week things will calm down a little (and I'm glad I get Monday the 5th off from school, I need to catch up!)

My house is a disaster area - I cleaned my office space yesterday and the kitchen today but I still feel like its a lost cause.

I feel like I can't to anything with my friends and I haven't seen most of them since Memorial Day weekend.

I'm having sleep issues - I either can't fall asleep (like last night when it stormed) or I can't wake up in the morning.

I still haven't been to the water park or the zoo like I've been wanting to, but I have managed to make time to work out which is good.

I've found myself snapping and people and being crabby because my head is swimming.

I decided today that I'm not going to try and cram so much into everyday now. I'm going to take at least one day a week, even if its just an hour to do something for myself. Does anyone have suggestions?

Sunburns, boating, camp stoves and rain storms

The title of this blog about sums up my very first (and certainly not my last) camping trip! We arrived on Wednesday to find that we could check in about 5 hours early since the people who had our spot left early! We popped up the tent, unhooked the boat and headed down to the beach for some swimming. The campground had its own beach and boat launch as well as docks! The water was the perfect temperature and was surprisingly calm as we would come to find out over the course of our stay. After our swim we had two really bad rain storms so we drove around the park to check things out, we saw the Lodge and Cabins, the two marinas and studied the map to see what we wanted to do the next day. By the early evening the rain was gone and we took the boat out for some fishing and sunset watching!

That night we headed back and cooked some Jiffy Pop on the camp stove and a few hot dogs and went to bed. We decided that we really need a bigger tent.....and that maybe we didn't inflate the air mattress all the way!

Thursday we decided to check out some of the sites around the park and headed out in search of the Kennedy Stone House and Hosak's Cave.

This is the Kennedy Stone house which was at the other side of the park from where we camped. It was built in 1890 I believe and over the years was in bad disrepair so the park started a fund to fix the place up and I have to say they did an amazing job. We didn't get to go inside because it was only open for 3 hours in the afternoon and we didn't feel like going back.

Next we went to Hosak's Cave.....see those two "orbs" in the picture? We found out that two people had fallen and died at the top where that little waterfall is; one girl was 14 and the other 20. Someone told me that those orbs are ghosts and I didn't see them in any other picture from the trip. We couldn't go much further into the cave because they wanted people to keep out since its so dangerous but it was neat to see.

We took the boat out that afternoon, I got burnt and we didn't catch any fish but saw some interesting things like this island of pine trees, most of them were living in the water with their roots exposed, it was much prettier in person.

This morning there was a thick fog on the lake, it reminded me of that Stephen King movie, "The Mist" - we didn't catch any fish but the water was so calm and pretty and it was a great way to end our mini-vacation.

Busy Busy

Please excuse my absence this week as the following things are going on:

Tuesday: Internship event at 10am; taking the dog to Andrews parents house as well as digging up some flowers, then grocery shopping for our camping trip!!

Wednesday: Leaving for Salt Fork around 9am, fishing, getting to our campsite around 3pm at check in and staying until Friday at 1pm. This lake is HUGE and there is tons to do! Fishing, hiking and bike trails, one of the largest "beaches" in Ohio, miniature golf, a lodge with a restaurant and its close to some neat historical areas as well. I'm sure there will be a nice long blog about my first camping trip!

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Saturday: Internship stuff at 1pm then who knows what!

I hope that everyone has a great rest of the week!!!!

A long journey to this

Its taken me a long time to get to the place in my life that I am right now. After 7 years of struggling with school and all of the bad decisions that I have made I finally feel like everything has finally fallen into place. I don't want feel miserable in my job and struggling to make ends meet anymore - I know what I am good at and I want to be happy doing those things.

I think that my relationship with Andrew has had a big impact on the decisions that I have made recently. No, I don't mean that he has forced me into making these decisions, he is honestly the most supportive boyfriend I have ever had. He has sacrificed a lot for me in order for me to not work and go to school. We have an adorable home, he's given me a great and reliable car to drive and he wants what is best for me above all else. His family is great and we all get along. My family loves him and they could not be happier that we are together. I hate that there are some people who cannot see past the mistakes and problems that we had early on, I don't think there is a single person out there who can say there relationship is perfect.

I'm happy because.....

I actually love the class I am taking at the moment
I totally love my internship and everyone involved
My stress level has decreased dramatically
Everyone around me is proud of me and supporting me

I'm glad to have all of these fantastic bloggers to share my stories with!

"Like oh my god" - annoying popular girls

I was the person in high school, and junior high oh and probably middle school (my very dorky years) who liked to make fun of the popular girls. I think part of the reason I did this was because deep down I kinda wanted to be like them, but at the same time I LOVED the group of people that I hung out with all those years and would not have changed my social circle for the world.

In the 7th grade, I met my making-fun-of-the-popular-girls-soul-mate Caitlyn. She had just moved to my school and we had science together. She was the quiet girl that I always liked to befriend because I was the person who never shut up; I loved to break people out of their shell. We spent a good deal of the next six years of school making fun of the popular girls. We had several "targets" that were in a majority of our classes, Peroxide Boy/Mark (yeah I know not a girl, but he was popular) and Gina a girl who "always wanted to touch his big muscles." Since Caitlyn was a very talented artist she would draw pictures of them, which I still have after all these years. There were even times that some of our teachers made fun of these kids, which to us was the ultimate! They all stayed in our school till we graduated and our little jokes about them went on that whole time.

I wouldn't say that I was totally unpopular during school - I had lots of friends and was super outgoing (I still am today, ya know just in case you wanted to know that). I had friends that were in band, friends that were goth, jocks and theater people. The town I grew up in was pretty upper-middle class and in order to even be popular you needed to meet the following requirements:

1. Buy all of your clothes at Abercrombie
2. Have peroxide dyed blonde hair
3. Play some kind of sport, be a cheerleader or date someone who plays a sport (although I dated a wrestler, it did not help my popularity)
4. Get your parents to buy you a Mustang or other "cool car" for your 16th birthday
5. Go to parties with college kids and drink
6. Go tanning
7. Attend all school sporting events
8. Be on the Student Council (also tried this, and it didn't help my popularity but it was fun)
9. Sit at the cool table during lunch
10. Skip school and not get in trouble

I guess for me, popularity was not that important although deep down I think all of us pine to be that popular girl for at least one day of our lives.

What did you choose to write about for this weeks writers workshop?
Click the button below for more info and prompts!

Rainy weekend

It was another rainy weekend in Ohio (its been like this for a few weeks) so my motivation totally went out the window. Friday night Andrew got home from work and we went to get a new air mattress for our upcoming camping trip. As much as I hate to admit this, it will also be my first camping trip. Yes, you read that right, I've never gone camping. Beyond Camporee for Girl Scouts which was spent in cabins with bathrooms and not really roughing it I've never camped. We're going to a nearby lake for a few days while Andrew is on vacation at the end of the month. If it rains I'd assume that we won't go, but we'll be taking the boat and our tent and hopefully having some fun.

Saturday I was busy with my internship all morning, first a board meeting and then more survivor interviews later in the day. I didn't get home until 3 and that's when I realized that the van/ puke mobile really was in our driveway and it wasn't a nightmare. We had to drive it everywhere including out to dinner that night and then when we got home, Andrew sat out in the garage talking to it or doing who knows what till 10pm while I watched the Toy Story Marathon on Disney Channel.

Sunday I wanted to go to the zoo but that didn't happen - instead we had to get carpet and a carpet cleaner for the van. But I did end up talking Andrew into going to the park later on in the afternoon. As for the rest of this day, I just want to relax and have a chill day tomorrow!
Classes start tomorrow and I'm not really that nervous. I've had the homework done for a while so I think the first class at least won't be that bad. I have lots of time to get things done for my class and the other one doesn't start until mid-July. My goal is not to get stressed out about school and to take my time with everything and do it right.

Hope everyone had a lovely weekend!

The Ultimate Honey-Do List

So I didn't do Writers Workshop last week because I was in a blog funk but when I saw the prompts for this week I knew I needed to participate. I'm not married yet but I could give Andrew a really good Honey-Do list if I had the chance so this one is my ultimate:

1. Finish the entire lower level of the house - drywall, installing the bathroom, painting, tile and carpet, moving the laundry room up from the basement. (We are working on this but its like the never ending project)
   
2. Clean the floors in the basement and repaint the walls.
3. If asking someone to not leave 15 dirty coffee cups in the garage for 2 weeks can be on a honey-do list then that is my number three!
4. Put up the motion lights that we bought last summer.
5. Finish painting the trim on the house.
6. Build me a dark room in the basement and supply all of the needed darkroom items.
7. Fence in part of the yard so that I can get another dog.
8. Reface the cabinets in the kitchen, install new countertops and finally get me a garbage disposal.
9. Fix the speakers in the Impala that only work randomly.
10. Sell that gross van that you just bought.

I know that a lot of my honey-do list probably only makes sense to me because it involves all of these crazy projects that need done/I want done around our house. And a lot of the things on my list like the darkroom and most likely getting another dog probably will never happen unless of course pigs fly, cause then you know anything is possible.

What would be on your ultimate honey-do list?
Link up to Mama Kats or find a prompt by clicking the button below!

Summer Breeze

My brother got me this awesome retractable clothesline for my birthday. My mom has one and I thought it was such a cool idea. For the first time today I got to try it out.

I put it from the house to the garage and its long enough for a good amount of clothes. I use my drying rack from college on the deck for stuff I'd rather not have the neighbors see blowing in the wind. I am hoping that not only will the clothes smell amazing but it will save us money on the power bill as well. I have only been putting socks and towels in the dryer right now because they feel to stiff to me otherwise.

I love summer so much - my tomatoes are blooming, I finally got my flowers planted and the crazy Ohio storms have started.

What is your favorite thing about summer?

My most hated mode of transportation

I think (or assume maybe) that most people who pay attention to cars like I do probably have a car that they cannot stand. Every guy seems to have a brand preference, Andrew likes Chevy's and most of my brothers friends are on the Ford bandwagon for the moment. I've always loved Mustangs, but I drove a Chevy for 7 years and now just drive a nicer version of the one that I had.

But there is one kind of vehicle I cannot stand (for my own reasons, so please don't be offended by this, its mostly for fun) - VANS!

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Now I know that if you have say 3 or more kids this is probably a good vehicle for you, but I don't have kids and even if I did I'd rather drive a nice mid 90's Volvo station wagon before I would be caught dead in a van like the one above or a mini van. A van like this one can seat 8 people, we have no kids, just a dog that doesn't take up much room and we rarely go on any trips.

Whenever I see those big vans I imagine that a kid is puking in the backseat and the mom is yelling as juice cups are being thrown and cheerios grinded into the carpet. I remember my aunt had a van when we were kids and it always smelled like fast food and cigarette smoke and had that gross velvet interior, a built in TV that never worked and mood lighting. We never had a van when I was a kid, we had a big blue Chevy Impala from the late 70's, then a Ford Bronco, Toyota 4 Runner and when I got older a Toyota Land Cruiser. They were all great cars - they could tow a trailer if need be or take a load of mulch home or drive our whole family to Maryland comfortably.

Well unfortunately for me Andrew comes from a family of van lovers and just today he made a "hot deal" on a van....one just like the picture above. I am totally mortified and I don't think I will ever drive it, maybe not even ride in it. The entire interior of the van is covered in stains and smells like puke, rotten food and cigarette smoke. Kids have put stickers all over the door panels inside, spilled every color of juice on it and probably grinded cheerios into the floor too. The windows don't roll up and down right, the doors don't open and close all that great and the smell alone was enough to make me think he wouldn't buy it but he did. Part of me thinks he did it just to spite me......but I can guarantee one thing - you won't be seeing me driving it down the road any time soon!

And although this was meant to be funny, I kinda do hate vans....I know that might make me sound like a snob, but there are plenty of van alternatives.

Is there a vehicle that you hate or wouldn't want to drive?

A series: Freshman year part 1

After doing my writers workshop post on writing the story of my life I've decided to do series about my college years. As a few of my commenters suggested I have a lot I could write about on these topics. So lets start with September of 2003 where it all began.

Back row left to right: Megan, Andrea, Mandy (roommate), Me
Bottom: Lauren and Ashlee

The summer before college flew by, I worked at Joanns and spent as much time with friends as I could and slowly they all trickled off to school. We would cry each time someone from our group would leave and wait for the next person. I was one of the last to move to my college since we were on quarters and started later in the summer. My mom and grandparents went to my move in day (my dad couldn't get the day off work). My roommate had already been there for two weeks training for the equestrian team. She had picked the bed by the window and all the better stuff in the room. She wasn't even there when I started moving in. Slowly other girls on my floor started showing up and we all seemed equally nervous. Soon my mom and family left - I stood outside and cried for a little while wondering if I could do this or not. My roommate came back around this time, met my family quickly and then her and I started chatting. The girls across the hall from us started moving in and I went to offer them some linen spray for their sheets - that is how I met my first good college friend Andrea and later her roommate Lauren.

That night our RA Charity had us all meet and say what our major was and tell something about ourselves that was interesting. My roommate as I recall said she liked to vacuum and I think I blabbed about loving Bon Jovi. All of the girls seemed nice and I figured we'd all get along (which we did). The next 3 days were our orientation, signing up for classes and getting to know the tiny campus. Our whole floor would go and eat dinner together mostly every night and we soon learned who had cars and who liked to go shopping since we were close to the two best malls in the area.

The first night of orientation my roommate went out and got drunk (just a small sign of how bad this year would be) and the second night there a friend of hers came to visit, her best GUY friend from high school. Of course she was no where to be found and out drinking again. I called and called her to no avail and had to entertain her friend till she came back. He was 6'5" wearing tight jeans, boots and a western shirt and was apparently in town for some kind of cowboy convention. We made small talk and watched TV and I'm sure I probably acted like I had homework to do or something. He mentioned being in town for a while and left soon after.

Classes started and I was trying to get used to this major life change as well as having a social life and making friends. My roommate wasn't around much as she was on the equestrian team and always at the barn but about a week later her guy friend was back and we all decided to go out dancing that night. I remember he drove a Mustang which I thought was super cool and he was again in a cowboy-ish outfit that night. I was oddly attracted to this guy but didn't know much about him. We danced the night away and headed back to the dorms around 2am - I wanted the night to continue, but we couldn't have boys stay the night so we sat out in his car and talked. He walked me to the door and kissed me goodnight and that's when it began.....from that day on we were an item. I wasn't expecting to get into a relationship so quickly into college, let alone a long distance relationship.

During this time as well I met my close knit group of college friends: Sarah, Megan, Andrea, Lauren, Ashlee, Val and Charity.

Stay tuned for part two coming soon!