50%

Yesterday afternoon I logged onto my student account to check my final grades for the semester and happened upon...

A in Group Counseling
A in Multicultural Counseling
A- in Ethics

This means two things:

1. I maintained my 3.9 GPA but much more importantly...
2. I'M HALFWAY DONE GRAD SCHOOL Y'ALL!

I honestly had no idea how I was doing in my classes throughout the whole semester, which is never a reassuring thing for me, but knowing that I'm *officially* through half of my graduate school requirements makes me so over the moon happy. Only one year to go and I will have my Master's degree. Hell. Yes.

I had originally planned on getting right back into school with the first summer session, but due to an advising mix up, I no longer can take one of the classes I had originally planned to in the fall, so I decided to give myself a little break and move the class that was supposed to take starting May 15th to my fall schedule. (That may have sounded a little confusing in text, but essentially a bad thing turned into a good thing and now I'm out of school until July 28th. YAY!) I'm kind of digging this whole 2-months-off idea (from school, at least) and am already getting back into some of my personal life pleasures, like reading for fun (currently wrapped up with The Book Theif - it's wonderful) and working out regularly - both of which got seriously neglected the past few months.

I'm also hoping to blog and vlog more regularly this summer. (Vlogging will need to wait a little while, though. My camera is currently M.I.A. somewhere in my apartment... pretty sure I left it somewhere absentmindedly and it'll turn up somewhere.) I have a slew of blog and video ideas and I can't wait to share them with you!

Tomorrow I'm starting a new position at BSU (Student Orientation Programming Coordinator) that will last through most of the summer while I'm not *technically* a Grad Assistant (even though I'm *technically* a Grad Assistant through May 30th...). I'm excited to get back into Orientation land after a 4 year absence (I was an Orientation Leader back in the summer of 2010) and experience it from a different perspective. Orientation is what made me first fall in love with working with students and I am so happy I get to get back to it!

I hope you all are having a wonderful May so far. I'm looking forward to catching up with all of you via your blogs, and also looking forward to blogging much, much more! :)

(P.S. One of my students is trying her hand at blogging during her summer internship! Go give her a visit here!) 

Twenty-Four

Midnight birthday cake surprise!

And just like that another year of my life has come and gone. 

I turned 24 this weekend and celebrated with friends, games, drinks, and (as pictured above) delicious Oreo ice cream cake! I was also treated to breakfast at our favorite local diner, a barbecue dinner at Brett's family's house, and a movie date later in the evening. The day ended with the new episode of Game of Thrones (duh) and cuddles. Such a wonderful way to kick off this new chapter of my life!

I'm excited to see what 24 has in store for me. I'm sure there will be plenty of challenges, but also plenty of good times to make them a bit easier - and I'll be documenting it all along the way! :)

Personal Life Black Hole

Hey everyone! It's been a while since I've actually told you what's been going on in my personal life, but that's because my personal life and school/work life have essentially been the same thing over the past month or so. Basically, my personal life has become a black hole where all of the fun has turned into work. (#yikes) Not that I don't love my jobs (because I absolutely do!), it's just that personal time has just been non-existent the past month or so and it's be stressful. Yes, April/May is probably the most hectic time in college land, and being both a student and a staff member, it's been especially so for me this year (and probably will be again next year). I figured it was about time I gave y'all a life update, though, so I'm going to sift through my calendar and tell ya what I've been up to.

Nick, Louie, Mom, Dad, and I at the Dean Dash 5K - literally in my backyard!

1. Running more regularly. Post-marathon, I let grad school and work kind of take over my life and the stress and exhaustion they caused and the time they consumed it became excuses to not exercise. Somehow in the month of April I found the time to clock in 22.17 miles - which would be low for me at any other time in my life, but it incredible for me right now. This puts me at just under 40 miles to reach my 100-miles-for-the-year-by-the-end-of-May goal! Once the semester ends I will absolutely have more time to train as I am going to be signing up for the New Hampshire Marathon soon, as well as (hopefully) another half for the summer. Can't wait to get back at it!

The amazing crew that made Springfest possible!

2. Springfest! This was one loooooong week of events at BSU, sponsored by the lovely club that I advise! They put on a carnival, movie night (The Lego Movie is amazing, btw), a comedy show, and several novelties - all of which were a huge success! Even though I didn't get home until about 11:30pm every night during that week, seeing this event come to life and go off without a hitch made me so proud of my students. All of that lost sleep was worth it - they're truly amazing!

3. Taking up occasional yoga. Runner's World has a few different yoga videos specifically for runners and I've been trying a few of them out lately. It's really helped with all my sore muscles (go figure) and has really made some of the stress melt away - even if just for a moment. It's good to have a coach type person to put me through a stretching regimen, because I'm not disciplined enough to stretch myself!

My amazing CA's tearing up as they give me a gift at the ResLife banquet :') <3

4. Banquet & Awards Season. With the end of the year comes banquets and award ceremonies for every office that you may be involved in. In the past week, I've attended a banquet for the club I advise, an award ceremony for student leaders at BSU, the Dean ResLife banquet, and another banquet for highly involved member of the club I advise as well as alumni who were involved in the club! It's always great to recognize the amazing students that we work with every day, but it's also extremely bittersweet to say goodbye to everyone - especially if they're graduating or leaving for whatever other reason - so things can get pretty emotional (if you can't tell from the photo above)!

Presenting to Student Leaders at Lasell!

5. Presentations on presentations on presentations. Over the past few weeks, I've been speaking publicly for various reasons. I presented two awards at one of the many ceremonies I've attended over the past couple days, I went back to Lasell to give a presentation to some awesome student leaders, and I gave an in-class presentation for one of my courses. Public speaking, for whatever reason, makes me really nervous. I don't know what it is, because the idea of it isn't really all that terrifying to me, but once I get up there I can just feel my face getting red and my hands shaking. I don't know if it's the adrenaline or what, but it's really annoying and I wish I would just get over it! That's why taking opportunities like this makes it a bit easier like this every time. Maybe one day I'll be able to present without the nerves attached to it (I used to be able to!) but for now I just gotta push through each and every presentation and it will get easier over time.

6. Finishing up course work (of course [ha]). The past few weeks all of my assignments have been due. It's been pretty absurd. But I'm now at the point where I am one paragraph to edit and two classes away from being DONE with the semester. I can't. Freaking. Wait.

We close at Dean on Saturday which frees me up to celebrate by 24th birthday! (What?!) 

This weekend is SOOOOO needed and I can't wait for the next few days to be over with so I can enjoy the weekend with a bunch of awesome people! :)

What have you been up to?