a very small update on my life.

I haven't blogged about anything interesting for awhile. Don't get your hopes up.. this might not be very interesting either ;)


I just thought I would update you all on my life (mostly because I want to blog and have nothing better to talk about). I can't even really tell you about the life of a farm girl because I haven't really been working on the weekends, which is very strange. I kind of miss working. My cousin has been working for my dad so me and Liz have been out of work for the past few weekend... Anyway..

I just got out of my business 401 class where I found out that our group is responsible for creating a business plan for a real company. If you remember way back to last semester, I also had to do a business plan for my own business, and I am so NOT looking forward to doing another one, although this time I will have the help of 10 other people. Which is awesome! Maybe I won't want to beat my head against the wall or tear my hair out this time. (I'm not even kidding when I say that.. I thought of it many times.) I'm also the only one who has ever done a business plan so hopefully they won't be coming to me for all the answers because I really don't have any. I did learn a few things that could be helpful, but again, I am just not looking forward to it. I guess I just have to keep telling myself that I am helping out a business that does a lot for their community and will help them become more successful.


I also learned today that my job as a note-taker has ended before it even really started. I got an e-mail saying that they made a mistake and hired someone else to take notes. Oh well. It was only $6.55 an hour for 2.7 hours a week lol.. but it would have been nice to be getting some money since I don't have a job anymore. I haven't missed it once. The only thing I have missed is the money because I seem to be running out of it very quickly.


I also received an e-mail from a "Mrs. Maria Foreman" telling me that she was going to give me $500 million dollars or maybe just $5 million from her husbands trust. Yeah right, I could never BE that lucky. I hope no one falls for that.


Anyway.. that's about all I wanted to vent/blog about.. but I thought I would end this with posting a pic from last weekend just as the snow started to fall. The first is the original picture, then I decided to edit them on Picnik (it's a stress relieving activity for me) ;) If you look closely at the last one you can see the snow falling.

well, hello snow.

I woke up this morning hoping that all classes would be cancelled. I didn't find that to be the case, but all classes until noon were cancelled, meaning I got to skip out on 2 of my classes. This meant that I could go back to bed, which I was super happy about.. only I couldn't go back to sleep (mostly because of the pure excitment of cancelled classes) Then I took a shower, ate some lunch and went to help my roomie-cousin Chelsie try to get her car out for work. When we got out there we knew she wasn't going anywhere. I mean NOWHERE. There were 2 paths in the whole parking lot and no tracks from anyone trying to get out. We did see one person almost get stuck trying to get out, but he was close to the plowed section so he at least had a chance. I had no chance, and neither did she. Not that I was going anywhere anyway.

Since I had class at 2, I couldn't partake in the fun snow day activity of taking pictures and roaming around campus freezing, so I am going to steal some of Chelsie's pics. (Oh, and I FORGOT my camera at home and I am really upset about it :( )

So here is the parking lot (I guess when she took the picture a few people were able to get out, although I wouldn't have wanted to try!)

And here are a few random shots that I thought were pretty cool.

I hope you all got to stay inside today and/or had a safe trip wherever you were going.. if you could get out lol..

"un-interesting"

I'm sorry I haven't been blogging very often it's not that I'm really all that busy, I just haven't been able to think of anything interesting to write about.

This semester has been fairly easy so far. I'm just waiting for things to start happening. I know it's going to be crazy in a few weeks, so I'm trying to enjoy my downtime.

I really haven't had much homework. The only thing I've really had to turn in was a resume/cover letter for my capstone course. My online class just got started last week. I have four quizzes to take before Feb. 8th and I haven't taken the first one, which isn't good because we are supposed to do one a week, so since I am being a slacker I'm going to have to do 2 this week. I am going to knuckle down tomorrow and just do it. I have one class, and it's supposed to be nasty out so I should have no excuses.

As far as working out/eating right goes I did really really well my first week and lost 2-3 pounds. However, last week and both weekends did not go well. I am going to try to get back into the right mindset because really that first week wasn't so bad. I drank nothing but water all week, and ate within my point range. And to tell you the truth, I could already see an improvement. My skin looked much better (because of all the water) and I just felt better.. kind of cleansed. I don't know why I stopped.. it's just really hard for me to do it at home, but yet I've been doing bad here again.. not near as bad as I was before break though..

I've also went to Zumba twice. (Tonight being my second night.) It was a lot more difficult tonight, but I think it went well. I'm just proud of myself for making it through it. I also joined the gym last week (on Thursday) and did the eliptical for 35 min. I am going to go tomorrow if I'm not completely sore from Zumba.

I really do like the Zumba class. I'm sure I look like a complete idiot trying to "dance". I have never been good at it.. I don't really care though. I enjoy trying to follow different dance moves though. The only songs that I knew that we danced to were "Save a horse ride a cowboy" and "Hips Don't Lie". If you ever have the chance to do Zumba, you should try it. It's fun and you don't even realize that you're exercising. The class I go to is free for students, and it's an hour long. It doesn't feel like an hour at all, even though it's a lot of hard work. I'm going to try to go every week.. it should get easier for me as long as I keep working out.

Now that I've rambled on about random stuff.. I think I'll go to bed so I can get up to work out or at least start on some homework. My room is also a disaster, so that will have to be added to the list.

<3

grades, boredom, and afghan disasters

I haven't blogged in awhile, so I thought I would update you all on what's going on. I got done with my 7th semester of school on Thursday. My presentation and finals all went pretty well. I just go my grades today, and I'm happy to say that this has probably been my best semester grade wise. I always seem to get a C in at least one class. To be completely honest I have no idea how I did this well. I got an A in my insurance, human resources, and small business/entrepreneurship class, a B+ in my marketing class and a B in my organizational structure class which is where I had to do the business plan. It ended up that all of my last minute, hard work got me an A on the plan. I couldn't believe it actually. I was so ashamed of it when I turned it in, but it must have been alright. Anyway, enough about school, except for the fact that I only have ONE semester of college left. I'm scared but excited at the same time!

Enough about school, it's winter break! and so far it hasn't been too exciting. I got home last Thursday afternoon. My sister and I helped dad feed the animals and apparently we cut his feeding time from 35-40 minutes down to 15! Feeding is an every night thing, so it's good that we don't have to stay out in the cold forever. He's been feeding 13 buckets of corn a day. We have three different lots of cattle and they all need different amounts, so that's fun.

I can't even remember what we did over the weekend, nothing really. I guess Friday we loaded the semi (400 squares) It really wasn't that bad. I was freezing throughout the whole thing which is a huge difference from wanting to die from heat exhaustion.. anyway.. we haven't done much this week so far because its been so cold, which I like, but it gets boring sitting around the house all day. I really don't feel like cleaning my room either. I might after I get done with this..

I also made a pie today, for no reason. Not like we need a pie, I was in a bad mood and my sister and I got into a fight and after I cooled off from that I just started making a pie, it must be a stress reliever for me or something. Now I'm making some coffee and getting ready to watch Maury and work on my afghan (maybe I'll clean my room later ha)

Oh! About my afghan. I was trying to crochet, and I'm not very good at it anyway, but I thought it was looking really good. I had been working on it for a month or so. It wasn't even 1/4 of the way done, but it took me a really long time to get what I had done. Then I noticed that I had been adding a stich after every row, creating a huge triangle on each side. It looked so ugly and when I noticed it, it almost made me physically sick .. lol.. so I took it all out and started over, and now I'm doing a very simple one.. oh well.. Mom helped me take it out and wrap the yarn back up and the ball of yarn is the size of a basketball. I kid you not..

roomies

We (meaning my roomies, my sister and 7 other girls) went to Olive Garden last night. It was really fun. I thought I would post a pic of me and my lovely, awesome roomies! They are so much fun!

From left to right: Tonchka (Toni) , Chelsie, Me, Sarah



I also didn't know if I mentioned that one of my roomies is my (2nd?) cousin. On my mom's side. Her grandpa is my grandma's brother. So here is a pic of the cousins. I'm so glad I got to meet and spend time with her this year!

my roomies love me so much that they wanted me to stay in my room forever! ;) Don't worry I will get them back!

the bookstore, why I hate it, and other random facts

Let's start off on a good note. I went to my final at 10am which I was dreading because I hadn't studied very much only to find out that I had an A in the class and didn't have to take the final! SUPER excited!

And then I went to turn in my books, and that's where my day got a little worse.

I paid $80 for my insurance book they were going to give me $25. Nope, sorry. I'm selling it on Amazon.

I paid $130 for my marketing book, they were going to give me $5!!!, Amazon.

I paid $100 for my human resource book and got $83 back in cash because I'm smart and learned something about taking books back. Always, always, always take the used sticker off, that way they will think you bought it new and give you half back for the cost of the new book instead of half back for a used book. Score on that one!

Then I paid $30 for my small business book and they wanted to give me $3. No, amazon.

One of my other books was customized for my class, and they aren't even taking it back. I'm sure he will use the same one next semester. Oh well, I don't even remember what I paid for that one, I think it was around $70.

So I just put three books on amazon and hope that I can get a little more out of them that way. Another trick on that (since I know everyone who is reading this really cares ;) ) is to go a few dollars lower than other books in the same condition as yours because people will pick them everytime because they are a few dollars cheaper. Worked for me last semester, hopefully it does for this one.

Anyway, I'm still really excited about not having my final. My roommates, and my sister and I are all going to Olive Garden tonight, so that should be fun. Then I have to work from 10pm-2am, then tomorrow is my LAST day of work :( Kind of sad, but super excited.

Then I only have my presentation on Thursday and then I am going HOME for Christmas Break! I have never been more ready. I can't believe I've almost made it through 7 semesters, and I only have one more week of finals, ever! Yay!

I hope everyone has a fantastic day! I'm going to relax until lunch then probably take a nap before girls night! :D

the end.

Well... I can't believe the end of the semester is finally here. I have one class tomorrow (a presentation), and a group meeting on Thursday in place of class. My other two were cancelled. After that, it's the weekend and I'm going Christmas shopping! :)

THEN! Wonderful finals begin. Monday I have two, one in the morning in Human Resource Management, but it will be a piece of cake (upside down) then one for my night class. This one might be a little more difficult 50 multiple choice. I am HORRIBLE at multiple choice. Tuesday I have one in Insurance, which is cumulative, but I've done well on past exams so I should be okay.. besides he's probably just going to take questions from the other three exams. No finals Wednesday, then a presentation Thursday morning. This will be one of the easier finals weeks that I've had since I've been here.

I don't know if I'm more sad, scared, or excited about only having one semester left. I think I will just combine those emotions.

Next week will also be my last week of work. I am actually kind of sad about leaving. I like the people there, but I know that I will be less stressed and I want to have fun during my last semester. I've also decided that I'm going to use my "free" time to work out and better myself. I think I just need to use the time to reflect on everything and make sure I am making the right decisions. After all, I have the rest of my life to work, I might as well have a little fun my last semester of college right?

I feel like I have learned so much over the past three (and almost a half) years. It's crazy. I have learned some through my classes, but most of all, I've learned how to be more independent and realize what I need to do with my life. If I just went out on my own right after high school, I don't think I would have been as "prepared". I am glad that I've had the experience and the chance to go to college, because I know a lot of people aren't able to. I'm also VERY thankful that I will make it out of here without student loans. It's unbelievable really, I don't know how we did it, but we did, and it's a great feeling. I have so much to be thankful for. I'm sorry I complain about my life because really, I am a lucky girl.

souveniers

This is probably my last blog until after Thanksgiving, because I have 3 projects to work on this weekend. Two that are due on Monday and Tuesday, and one that is due as soon as I get back from break.

So you are thinking, why am I writing a blog if I have so much to do? Well I think I had something interesting to say for once, and I didn't want to forget it.

Last night was the library holiday party. It was ok, not really exciting, and actually kind of boring, but it was nice to visit with everyone. It was also sad because I can tell how much the people there actually like me and I am feeling kind of guilty about not working next semester, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

Anyway, there is a girl from Korea that works there, she is a grad student, and I believe that this is the first time she's ever been here. She brought a friend with her to the party that she met her (I'm assuming anyway) because I think she was from Taiwan. Anyway.. we had sloppy joes, and they asked me if it was beef, so I am pretty sure that they had never had them before. Wouldn't that be wierd? Sloppy joes seem so normal to me, but if you didn't know what they were they might not look very good, but they seemed to really like them. They kept going on about how good they were, lol..

Then they were asking me about Black Friday, what it was and why it was called Black Friday. Then she asked me a really hard question: "If you were going to get a souvenier from here what would you get?" They wanted to bring something home with them from here that showed what America is all about.

That really stumped me. I didn't know. So my question to you is... What would you tell her to buy? I just think it's wierd because how would I know what is cool and what isn't. I assume that if I went to a foreign country I would just get something that seems different or unique, but I just couldn't think of something..

Anyway.. I have to get to work on all of this. I'm really excited about being almost done with my SEVENTH! semester of college. Whew! Graduation is going to be the best day of my life.

punkins and the worst hours of my college career

Well, how do I start this? punkins or worst day? We'll go with the bad news first? I guess, so the good news can make you happy at the end :)

Well you see, I had a business plan assignment, that I have written about and I thought it would be easy and it turns out that it wasn't, not at all.

It was due today, so of course I worked on it here and there thinking oh, it won't be a big deal. I came back Sunday evening around 4:00 and started working on it then I took a little nappy poo then went to work at 11p-2:15a. Then I went to bed about 2:45 and got up around 8 to see if someone ever wrote me back because I wanted to see if I could get someone to switch me shifts so that I could work on my project from 10-1 instead of all night.. well.. that didn't happen so I went to work from 10-1, and I was going to skip my 2:00 class (mind you I have only ever purposefully skipped class twice in my entire college career! Once was PE where we were going to have to go up 12 flights of stairs, not happening!, and the second time was my night class because it was my friends 21st birthday and I wanted to go!) Well anyway.. I WAS going to skip my class.. but I looked at the slides and we had something due during class, for points, which we NEVER have.. so I went to class... I got back around 3:30 and started working on my project again at 4.

Then I had dinner from 5-6 with my friend Lacy, then worked on it pretty steady until 11:30p. when I decided that I was entirely too stressed and sleepy from working the night before. So I went to bed, and told myself that I was going to get up at 5am, well for some reason I woke up at exactly 4am with no alarm going off, nothing, so I got up and started working on my project. It's a pretty good thing I did because I worked from 4am until 7, took a shower, started back up at 7:30 and worked nonstop until 10:45.

I got to the computer lab at 10:50, printed it out and realized that it was landscape instead of portrait. great. (which meant I also submitted it to my teacher in landscape.. hmm hope I dont' get counted off for that) So I put it to portrait really quick and hit print at 10:57am, and of course my table of contents was completely off, but I didn't have time to fix it so I just left it (Is he seriously going to check to see if they are right?) anywho.. I ran to class and was probably like a minute late.. but it was all good.. I got it done. I have NEVER in my life been rushing like that on an assignment. It was so difficult and I really underestimated the time that it would take to do it all. I'm sure I didn't even do it right at all and I know I spent 12+ hours on it. I'm pretty sure it's more than that.. but that was just over the past few days.. anyway.. then I had class from 11-12:15, and a test at 2:00.. yeah it was a pretty horrible day and now I'm super sleepy but still need to work on homework so I can catch up and never feel rushed ever again. It was a lesson that is for sure. Never ever wait to do something, I'm telling you take it from me. Just do it a little at a time.. it's so much easier.. I hope I remember this when I'm workinng on 900 other projects this semester.. and next :( I am SO sorry about all of the run-on sentences.. I have a major problem with that. I don't understand how I get A's on papers.. bleh..

Anyway.. I told you it was kind of depressing and I'm sure you all don't really care, but anyway now onto the Punkins!

I was determined to carve a pumpkin this weekend. I even printed out some awesome templates from here. And here are instructions on How to Carve a Fancy Pumpkin!

So here they are. Liz's is on the left (Cat in the Moon) and mine is on the right (Frankenstein) They are pretty cool looking if you ask me :) I think it would have been cooler if Liz would have shaved the moon a little deeper but it's still pretty awesome! You should try it!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

help!

First off, I was wrong about the number of people who read my blog.. apparently only one person wanted to vote on my poll.. :( Oh well! Anyway.. I hope more than one person reads this because I really do need your help and your opinion! Whoever did select something from my pole wanted to hear about school, and my problem just happens to be with school!

I already said something about this particular assignment, creating my own business plan. I have my business but I need a good name for it (that's where you come in!)

This is my business description (it needs A LOT of work) but you'll get what the business is about by reading it.

My business idea is a catering business that would provide country style food. The company would also provide a reception hall where weddings and other parties can be held. It would also offer in-home catering as well as the ability to cater to businesses in the area. A kitchen would also be included in the reception hall and would enable the company to have a place to store and prepare everything. This would be useful for the in-home and on location catering services. The reception hall will be fairly large with an outside area for outdoor parties when the weather is nice. This could also be a place to hold weddings if the couple wants to have an outdoor wedding.

Another aspect of the company is that they will allow smaller events such as birthday parties and other events. Most companies have a limit to the amount of people that need to attend. This would be another unique aspect of the business. Customers would be able to enjoy very good service and quality comfort food at a lower price than some gourmet catering services.

I know this doesn't sound very exciting, but to me, it is extremely exciting because I've been wanting to do something like this for a long time! The only way you can fully understand what this would look like is to crawl inside my brain, because it's flooded with ideas and exactly how everything would look. I wish I could explain every detail, but it's hard.. Anyway.. I need a catchy name, and Rachel's Country Catering and Reception Hall isn't going to cut it!

Also, would any of you use anything like this if it was available? I guess I am thinking of this being in a really pretty country setting where people can enjoy the scenery and just have a good time! Right now, I am trying to estimate the demand for my service, and it is not easy. It is hard to find out how many people you THINK will want to use your business. Right now I guess I'm just going to see how many people have gotten married in my county and maybe close cities nearby and try to find something about how many people need catering services. The only thing that I don't think will be good about all of this is that people in my county don't make a lot of money and probably don't have a lot of extra money to be spending on catering services. I know the reception area would be good because there are only a few I can think of in my area. It would give people more options anyway.. So.. what do you think? PLEASE comment! :) :)