Thank you, Pinterest

As our engagement/graduation party quickly approaches, I am looking at Pinterest more and more for creative ideas. It is going to be an outdoor party with tents and umbrellas for people to hide from the heat under. The food is going to be staying indoors so we can do a variety of things (fruit, desserts, etc.). Thanks to Pinterest, the possibilities will be endless.

Our party is on August 11th. Everyone is invited! It is at my parent’s house in Shelbyville. I was so excited just to have a graduation party to see everyone and get to visit with everyone that I so often don’t get to see. Now I am even more excited to see everyone and share our amazing engagement story with and get ideas and suggestions for the wedding.

We hope to have our wedding party and the date finalized by then. Which makes it even more exciting. I am trying to take a step back and just enjoy being engaged, but I am so anxious to start planning that it is a little more difficult to do. I told Alex though, I feel like I am enjoying it even more than I am suppose to by jumping ahead and having my brain going at 100 mph! The party day will be a day though that we just enjoy it all; our friends, family, and most importantly, each other.

Day 3

Now that we are home, we are overwhelmed by all of the love our friends, family, and coworkers are showing us. Between balloons, card, pictures, sweet messages and comments, it is amazing. Next step- – our engagement party. I have combined my graduation party to be an engagement party as well. We hope to see as many friends and family members that can make it to share these precious moments with. Also, we hope to announce our big day at the party as well. Lets hope!

As we begin to share the pictures we have (thanks to Sarah & Ben!) with our family, I will continue to post them on here as well. If you do not enjoy hearing about weddings, parties, planning, etc., it’s probably safe to stop reading now.

14er on the 14th

On Saturday, 14,110 feet in the air, Alex asked me to marry him. I said yes!

We went to Colorado for a long weekend to visit our friends, Sarah and Ben. The four of us drove up to the top of Pike’s Peak with everyone knowing, besides me, that when we later drove down, Alex and I would engaged. Between the elevation, the proposal, and the hot chocolate I drank before, I would say I was beside myself. I cannot believe that he did something more perfect than I could have ever imagined. I told him that I honestly could have not planned it better myself. For us, it was the most perfect engagement and thanks to Sarah and Ben, we have pictures to show our family and friends.

I cannot wait to start planning for our big day, but better yet to be married to Alex. Stay posted.

To you, from us.

Customize your own digital ecard

Ideas?

I need audience participation.

Although this may not even work out, ideally I am wanting to do an independent study either this coming spring or summer. I have been trying to pick my mind about different things that I could do that I truly ENJOY. That is key. I want to enjoy what I do. So many classes consist of reading, homework, quizzes, tests, repeat. I want something different.

As I signed onto blog about this, I thought what if I did a blogging project…

I would need something specific to do though. And I would measure how many people viewed my posts/page and from where.

Does anyone have any suggestions? Please, please, please suggestion anything! I probably only have about 3-5 readers at the moment since I haven’t blogged for months, BUT I would appreciate suggestions from all of you.

I’ve missed you.

Well hello WordPress. I have missed you these past few weeks. The thing I hate most about not finding time to blog is, I truly enjoy blogging. It is something that I can do that involves writing and zero thinking. I just write about what comes to mind, and it is really that simple for me. As I am finishing up my semester, I can’t help but think of how crazy it has been. What was I thinking being a full time graduate student accepting a full time position? One word, brave.

I wouldn’t trade it for anything though. I find time for both school and work, family, friends and the boyfriend. I feel if I can make time for things I MUST do and things I WANT to do, then I am good to go. This past week was Thanksgiving week and along with Thanksgiving week comes Kylie and Alex’s birthdays. I have to brag a little, I was able to completely surprise them both! It was great. I got Kylie the Kindle Touch so her puppy would stop eating the corners of her books. And now that she is pregnant (ahhh, so exciting!) she can be lazy this winter and read all the books she wants. Alex got the complete opposite present, a GoPro camera. This means that he will want to be more active than ever. But I bet he will have some great videos! So far we have recorded Beau to see what he does when we are not around, he is one bad cat.

I have two weeks and one day until my semester is over. And this will be my last full time semester. After this, I will take four more classes, two each semester. Then I am DONE. It seems like I just started. I feel like there is no way I am approaching the one year mark after graduation, but it’s true. Time flies. I am perfectly content and happy with where I am now though. Through all the craziness, I feel like I am finally adapting to what it is like to have a career, classes, family and friends that you have to juggle on top of trying to remain sane.

Week 2.

I think with each week, I will enjoy my crazy combination of work and school a little bit more. It is all about adjusting and managing my time. I have now dedicated my Sunday nights to my online class, my Monday and Tuesday nights to my classes on campus, and find time to do other homework in between my crazy work schedule.

Last week was my first week of travel. Overall, it went well. Some days were more hectic and others and days that I was on the road from 7am-10pm were of course a little crazy, but I really enjoyed it. It breaks up my weeks so it makes work seem to fly by. I would say if anything, it just puts more of a burden on me to get my homework done, but because I know my travel schedule ahead of time, I will be able to plan.

This week, I am in the office most of the time but traveling some tomorrow and then Thursday night. I find this an even better balance because I know my work week will seem to fly by.

This weekend was also busy. I worked most of Friday night calling my students to tell them congratulations on getting admitted into the University. Then Saturday I spent the day with Alex. On Sunday we celebrated Landon’s 3rd birthday party. It was a joint party with my cousin’s boy as well, Kashton. We did it right and got a bouncy house. The kids loved it. Kylie, Alex and I also slaved away at cake pops for the children. I think overall, they turned out really well! Especially for our first attempt at making them. Check them out-

    

Week 1.

I survived week 1. Now that I have a full-time job and go to school full-time. I am literally going to have to find time every week to blog. That will be my goal though.

I had a great first week of work. I am being thrown into traveling to high schools starting tomorrow. Scaring, but exciting at the same time. I have my rental car all packed and ready to drive to Clay City Jr Senior High School bright and early tomorrow. Unfortunately, I already got called for jury duty and will be doing that Tuesday. Work was great though and really helped me get everything figured out since I already had multiple visits scheduled that day.

This week was also my birthday week. My parents and Papa helped me celebrate on my big day. Cortney as well if you count her keeping me company at the pet hospital. For those of you that haven’t seen my Facebook profile picture, Beau had a pretty rough day on my birthday. He has a puncture wound and got very sick. After a lot of hell, he is on his way to recovery! He is up moving some and starting to eat more and more everyday.

I also got to celebrate my birthday with my office when they threw me and another coworker a birthday party. It consisted of chocolate cookie ice cream sandwiches 🙂 Amazing. My last celebration was last night with most of my family and Baugher. We hadn’t celebrated our birthdays together in a long time so it was nice being able to do that again.

I also had to devote my one day off of work to working some (I better get use to that) and doing homework. I just keep telling myself 11 months til graduation and only 3 more months of going full-time (hopefully). I like to be optimistic but it sure is hard. I will try to be back to tell everyone about my week 2 sooner than later.

Day 2.

I have survived the first two days. I am exhausted? Yes. But I feel like I have made a lot of progress for it only being my second day. Especially having classes Monday and Tuesday, I feel like tomorrow will be a breeze (plus my birthday!).

So far I have shadowed more campus visits, started to learn Recruitment+, learn the filing systems, met with the majority of people in the office to understand what they do, practically meet every employee at UIndy, and much, much more.

I have already been calling schools and trying to schedule my remaining visits for the year. I actually start my travel on my own Monday. Tomorrow will be my first experience with day traveling. Although I have to get up even earlier, I am excited that I have a job that involves more than sitting at a desk. Actually, I have had barely any time at my desk. Yesterday I had about thirty mins total if that. And today probably more like two hours. But when you are trying to figure everything out and get to known unfamiliar things, two hours fly by.

It is the unfamiliarness (new word?) that makes someone uneasy or nervous. I feel like only time can solve this though. One thing I know for sure is how I very much enjoy everyone I work with and the atmosphere in which we work. I am lucky to have found such a great group!

Strategic Communication.

I am the newest member of the Strategic Communication team for the Office of Admissions at the University of Indianapolis! After being a Comet, Bulldog, Golden Bear, Boilermaker and Jaguar, I am now a Greyhound as well. As lame as it is, I am excited to get a UIndy sweatshirt to celebrate. Adding to my other two university ids, I got another today. Along with a parking pass that is FREE at UIndy (unlike IUPUI).

More about my position, I am an Admissions Counselor and will have a territory in Indiana to travel and visit high schools. I do not know my territory yet but do know Greensburg High School will be in it. Go Pirates! Lets all hope I get Shelbyville too, because that would be awesome. But my job entails a lot more than just visiting high schools occasionally. I will be working one on one with students and their families. I will help them figure out if UIndy is a good fit for them. I feel my education backgrounds will be great examples of what you could get at a larger university or an urban university, vs a small private school. I am on the Strategic Communication team and help with publications. I will be writing for pamphlets, magazines and any other type of promotion ads we can create. I am very, very excited to be the newest team member. I recently attended the Office of Admissions retreat and I would have to say, I think I will make a great fit as the 19th member. Everyone seemed so kind, laid back and helpful. I feel like I couldn’t ask for better coworkers.

Wish me luck at my first high school visit tomorrow night and then campus tours Friday!