This past weekend was Easter! It was an awesome four day break! I had Thursday night, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday off. I spent Thursday night out with some friends and saw "Clash of the Titans" at Newport- awesome! movie by the way! :) But that was a late night and I had a blast!

Friday I spent with my boyfriend. He read all the "Twilight" books and wanted to watch "Twilight" and "New Moon" so that he could figure out what was different from the books and the movies. We got through the first one before we were bugged by my friends Rachel and AJ to go to the casino. So we left and went to Hollywood Casino where we had fun for a few hours! Even had a great dinner there too! I love free places 'cuz you can go and just hang out and not do anything if you don't want to. I play the slots but I had more fun just people watching and watching my friends gamble instead. It's quite an interesting place. This is my third time going. The first time was for my 21st birthday, then my friend Nicole's birthday, and then that day too just 'cuz we could. It's a fun time! Gotta love Indiana... :)

Then I went home and on Saturday I spent the day fixing up the house. My parents have decided that it's time to move since my brother and I are getting older, and so are they, so now it's time to find a condo where they don't have too many steps into the house, a two car garage (we have only a one car now and they hate it), an end unit, a club house with a pool, and a first floor bedroom. They want a place that they can work in the yard if they want to but are not required to because the Home Owners Association (HOA) does it for you, that's why you pay them each month like rent almost. So now we're looking and my parents signed the papers with the realtor on Saturday so it's going on the market in a week or so. We have a lot to do before then. It's kinda scary but very exciting! I'm ready for a new place. We've been in this house since 7th grade and I really like it but I can do with a change I guess. I don't know... I guess I don't have a real choice in it do I? But it's good I'm in the dorms so I don't have too much to move from our house now to the new place. I'll let you know what happens with our place. Keep your fingers crossed it sells quickly! :)

Then Sunday was Easter! I spent the morning and brunch with my family but the afternoon and evening was with my boyfriend's family. It was a great time! It's only the second time I've met his extended family (I went to his cousin's wedding a couple of weeks ago and met everyone then). He has two adorable little cousins, Shelly who is 4 and Bonnie who is 2, and they were so much fun! They kept wanting me to push them on the swings, find the Easter eggs with them, eat dinner with them- and I proceeded to get stuck physically at the kiddie picnic bench. It was pretty fun. My boyfriend got stuck too. It was hilarious! Then we went back to his house and played games with his parents for a while.

Then Monday I spent the day with my mom buying things to make our house pretty. TV shows say that you need to make the home a place that could be open to any possiblities so it has to be impersonal, clean, and open. So like my room. It has my queen sized bed, two nightstands, two shelves of ceramics pieces, a round Chinese lamp hanging from the ceiling, a desk, my printer, a chair, three words on the wall (metal words Love-Live-Laugh), a guitar picture, and a carpet. It used to have pictures of my friends all over the place, stuffed animals on one nightstand, a "Twilight" poster on the wall, and other knick knacks. Now they're gone. :( It doesn't feel like my room any more. But it has to be photographed and available for any showings that might be requested. It'll be an interesting process. I was 13 the last time we moved and I don't remember it very well. It'll be interesting this time... :)

Today was also Opening Day for the Reds and the MLB so that was fun to watch a bit of at lunch with my mom and brother. But after buying fun things all day, we watched the thunderstorms roll through, then I came back to school. And I just watched Duke beat Butler in the NCAA Championship. I think I totally lost the whole bracket for my pool but I really don't care. It's $10 so I'm not worried about it. :) Now it's back to the grind of school. I have musical practice every night this week, Spring Formal is this coming weekend, and the show is next weekend along with my one roommate's 21st birthday. It should be an awesome next two weeks! And not to mention I have little Easter Eggs everywhere to find, not only the candy kind, but the little things that make me smile. Like seeing friends and having fun. This is a great time in life and I am enjoying every minute of it! <3

            Last Thursday was our first practicum experience in AED210.  All of the teams went to Our Lady of Lourdes to teach our first lessons.  I don’t know about anyone else, but I was EXTREMELY nervous!  I knew we had prepared for it, I knew our lesson plan was strong and that our unit was exciting, but I was still extremely jittery.  I really couldn’t explain why though… I work with children on a regular basis and I am completely comfortable with them.  When I walk into “my” classroom at St. Joe’s I’m at home and I’m excited to get started with the tasks for the day.  It’s not to say I wasn’t excited about being at Lourdes, because I was, but part of me was dreading stepping foot in that classroom and having to take charge.  It was really the strangest feeling!

            Jamie and I rode together from the Mount and we talked about how we were going to introduce ourselves since I was the main teacher for the day but it was also our first day and the kids needed to get to know Jamie and Rachael as well.  On the way there we realized we hadn’t packed any paper in our supplies bag, immediately following that realization there was an emergency text sent out to Rachael whom we were hoping and praying would still be at home… phew!  She was still home and she had grabbed a stack of computer paper.  Jamie and I were the first to arrive at Lourdes and we were 15min early, but we were warmly welcomed by the secretary and we signed in and wrote out our name badges.  We sat outside the office, Jamie trying to talk to me and me trying not to talk at all… within 5min Rachael arrived.  We ran through things one more time and in the process realized I had left the book I was going to be reading from in Jamie’s van… save number two of the day for Rachael!  At this point I was SO glad we were in teams, otherwise I would have been a COMPLETE basket case.

            After everyone else showed up and the kids switched classes it was time for us to start… somewhere between walking into the classroom and the first words coming out of my mouth I found my comfort zone… from then on out it was smooth sailing!  I loved this experience; it was great for me to work with kids that are very different from the inner city children I have daily exposure to.  The difference between Lourdes and St. Joe’s (as two private Catholic schools) was just astounding to me… but I loved the kids and I felt comfortable with them and I am really very excited about continuing our unit with them next Thursday!  This will help me in my future career as a teacher because I think it will be easier for me to get through the “first day jitters” now… the nervousness of not knowing the kids that will walk through my door and having a whole new set of brains to engage won’t be nearly as frightening for me since I have done this practicum.  The experience as a whole will, in conjunction with everything else I am being exposed to here at the Mount, supplement my own personal desire to teach and drive to be better in more ways than I can possibly imagine now as a sophomore.

I had an interesting night last night. The Campus Ministry Leadership Team (CMLT) put on a good event last night: Sundae Sunday! It was a time for students to gather in the 6 East Lobby, make ice cream sundaes, color some Easter pictures, decorate and make the tallest cupcake, and socialize. It was quite a good event!

For the coloring table, there was a coloring contest and three winners judged by Sam Gaier and Laura Leisring. They chose the winners and each winner won a prize bag that had things in it like gift cards, crayons, markers, coloring books, trivia questions, and other fun little things that I'm sure really add up! :) It was exciting!

Then the cupcake building contest was judged by Stephanie Schoenfeld and Courtney Cole. I don't really remember who won but it was exciting 'cuz I'm pretty sure the tallest one was about 6 inches high or so with icing, twizzlers, and other candies. It was quite disgusting looking I can assure you. ^-^ But they were excited that it got that tall! :) Of course, then it got interesting when I smeared a bit of icing on my friend Megan's cheek 'cuz then she went ahead and smeared me too! So we stuck them together and took a pic! It was quite a fun time!

But it was fun to socialize with all the people who came. There had to be at least 50 people that filtered through. Most people got ice cream, and/or a cupcake, then left. But quite a few stayed to talk, gossip, color, and build! I was excited for CMLT 'cuz they never have this many people show up for one of their events and this turned out really well! I was excited for them! Most events like this are put on by CAB so it was nice to see a different group have success too. :) That is one of the nice things about the Mount: we have such diversity and such fun little things that are put on that you really can't be bored with any of it!

I know that there is Pancake and Ponder on Tuesday morning, "New Moon" is being shown on Tuesday night, a game night on Wednesday night, "Bucket List" on Thursday night, and a comedian on another night-- all this week! Who thought the Mount would have so many fun things in just one week!!! :D This will be an exciting time for the Mount students!! :)

I guess I never realized how much of a break I needed until I had the time to just do nothing... Yes. I mean Spring Break. We were off the end of the day, Friday, March 5th through Sunday, March 14th. I spent the time doing nothing, hanging with friends, and just relaxing. I spent Friday night just really doing nothing and relaxing. Saturday I hung out with my friend Kathleen at Servatii's for, like, 3 hours. It's just awesome to sit and talk and forget the time passing. So much fun... :) I also saw "Cop Out" with my boyfriend- so hilarious! I had too much fun with that day.

My parents have decided that we are moving this year from our Cape Cop to a Condo. They have decided this is the last move they will ever make and they want to find the most perfect condo they can find. This will be the home they will retire in, raise grandkids in (*knock on wood*), and forever live in. :) So we have been spending a lot of Sundays condo shopping around Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. I have found two floor plans in two neighborhoods that I like the best so far and my mom agrees with me. I hope we can find something in those two places. That worst part of home shopping is that you start picturing yourself in places and I've already started to do that. It makes it hard to not want one place so much and then be disappointed when it doesn't work. But it's really wherever my parents really feel the most comfortable. But my mom says that our house will go on the market right about Easter so we have only about two weeks to really make over our house. Oh the joy. Not. :)

Monday and Wednesday I got to work at Oakdale Elementary in my practicum placement for my special ed. course and it's going good so far. I'm getting quite a few hours done and I'm about half way there I think. So it was nice to pick up a few more hours and not have to worry about classes as well. Then I came home from working in the classroom and I worked on the house. My mom gave me a huge list of things to do in the house and most of it was painting so I got a few major painting projects out of the way. I never realized how dingy some of the doors and door frames were until I painted them a crisp white again. :D It was kinda fun donning paint clothes, turning up the radio, and painting away. Immediate gratification really helps too. :)

On Tuesday I got to have lunch with my boyfriend at a Chinese restaurant and then we went to Hobby Lobby and ended up doing an art project together. My mom is always looking for new art projects for her classroom so we were testing out a new idea I had for her class. They're paper birds that are rolled into circled and nestled into each other. I attached a picture at the bottom. It ended up working really well in the classroom too. :) I was so excited and they are so cute and easy to make! I even got to help in my mom's classroom on Thursday so that I could help make them with the kids in her class. I had so much fun watching them come to life too. :) I also got to see the midnight showing of "Green Zone" on Thursday night and I thought that it was a good movie. :)

Friday I got to go to UD to visit my friend Kathleen and we spent a lot of time together so that was a great time. :) I came home on Saturday and I was able to hang out with another friend Nicole on Saturday night. We hung out most of Sunday morning together and then she went home but I had to move my stuff back to the dorms too.

On Sunday afternoon, I got to go to the Ringley Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus!!! I went with my boyfriend and we saw tigers, elephants, dogs, zebras, horses, clowns, magicians, high flyers, tight rope walkers, and so many funny antics and schemes and shenanigans! It was awesome! I haven't been in so long that I was like a little kid when I was there! I even got cotton candy... :D Then we went to dinner with my parents and my brother at Quaker Steak and Lube in Milford. Great food there. They even gave us twizzlers after we were finished eating. I thought that was a really unique way to do things. :) But unfortunately I don't like twizzlers so I gave it to my brother. :) And then I had to return to sad reality back at school. So sad... :(

But all the time that I got off was much more needed than I thought. We also lost that one hour when our clocks sprung forward on Sunday morning. It's strange, but I seem to feel as if losing that one hour is kicking my butt. I never once had jet lag when I traveled those 8 weeks last summer but this one hour jump just has me all mixed up. I hate it. :( Hopefully this week will be fine and I'll get back on my feet but I don't know just yet. I can't believe it's only Tuesday. Ahh! I want it to be Friday already!

            I work at St. Joseph School, downtown Cincinnati, through the work study program here at the College of Mount St. Joseph.  I chose to go to St. Joe’s for this AED 210 (Art Experiences for Children) class assignment because I love our art teacher Elaine Hoblik and I wanted to see how she handled her classroom.  When I arrived at school at 7:00 this morning Mrs. Hoblik was downstairs in the cafeteria greeting and monitoring the students as they arrived off the bus or with parents.  As they waited for their teachers to come and pick them up the students chatted happily with one another and visited with friends.  A small group of kindergarten students came up to Mrs. Hoblik and I and excitedly asked their teacher if they were going to be continuing work on their abstract pieces from the previous day.  It was great to see how excited they were about their work and their excitement really piqued my interest in just what it was that they were working on.

            After morning duty the students are picked up by their teachers and Mrs. Hoblik and I could go upstairs to her classroom and talk briefly about what the classes were working on, what they had already done with the lesson and where they would be going with their final pieces.  Mrs. Hoblik told me that they were doing a unit on abstract art and on thinking outside the box.  She is doing the same assignment with grades K-3 and her daily schedule works out nicely to where she has all grade levels consecutively throughout the day on Tuesday’s and Thursday’s.  I got to see the Kindergarten, First and Second Grade classes.  The children had all gotten their paper the previous day and had drawn their lines.  The lines all had to be moving lines, in other words none of them were allowed to be straight.  Some lines would be crossing each other and some would even run off the page.  When you had your lines down then you were supposed to color in the sections made by the lines.  Whenever two lines crossed each other they were instructed to change the color of the crayon they were using so that there were never two of the same colors together.

            Most of the students were still coloring and Mrs. Hoblik doesn’t tell the students where their projects are going to encourage more creativity so that’s when I asked her what the final outcome was going to be.  She told me that she would be blending this abstract unit with a weaving unit for Easter.  These abstract coloring pages would be cut up in the shape of Easter Eggs and those eggs would then be placed in baskets that the students were going to weave out of construction paper and assemble themselves.  I thought it was a very cute assignment that nicely put together two units of art and a lot of creativity on the student’s behalves as well.

            St. Joseph just continues to influence my views on my future career in more ways than I could have ever possibly imagined.  All of my experiences at the school have taught me something about how I will handle my future classrooms.  I hope to get the opportunity to either teach some art classes or integrate art into my general classes and what I saw today with the overall way Mrs. Hoblik handled her room will help me with those future situations.  While most of what I saw was definitely positive there were some things that I would have done differently had I been running the class.  Mrs. Hoblik would go to a particular student and take their hand in hers and draw the lines on their paper, she sometimes even colored or drew right on a student’s artwork and I didn’t like that.  I don’t think I would ever draw on a student’s artwork.  Another thing that I thought I would handle differently than Mrs. Hoblik was the way she handled the kids’ questions on why they weren’t allowed to have any straight lines, I feel like she didn’t answer their questions in an appropriate manner.  Overall, however, this experience was fun and it will definitely be beneficial to me in my future career.

I feel like a hippie just writing that title: Flowers, Hugs, and Kisses. Doesn't it sound like something that would happen in the 70s or something? lol :P

Random acts of kindness seem to be a continuous theme recently. Such as in the Olympics. Joannie Rochette won bronze for womens singles ice skating on Thursday night after she did her long program but she did her short program on Tuesday night. But her mother passed away suddenly from a heart attack on Monday. And yet Joannie skated anyway. She considered a tribute to her mother to skate regardless and it was what her mother would want her to do. And throughout this entire ordeal, she has been receiving all kinds of support, help, and sympathy for her loss. She was, in the end, even elected by the rest of her delegation to carry the flag for Canada in the closing ceremony of the Olympics.

Another moment has been the earthquake in Haiti and the enormous amount support the world has shown them in this tragedy. Water, food, and supplies have been pouring in from everywhere along with countless volunteers trying to help this devastated country. And now Chile has been hit been by a 8.8 earthquake- one of the worst in recorded history- and tsunami I'm sure they will receive even more support. These acts of kindness are amazing and so touching.

And even the tiniest things that only matter for one person is important. For example, my roommate Maria. She is a nursing student and has to be up at 5:30 AM so she can get to the hospital by 7 AM until 3 PM. And since Sam is still sleeping, and so am I, we set a chair in the hallway for her so she can sit while she eats her breakfast. It may not be much, but if you have to be up that early and really don't want to, sitting is much more appreciated than standing. It's always the little things that count. Speaking of that as well, my boyfriend brought me carnations (the flowers) and a bag of Hershey's Hugs (white chocolate) and Kisses (regular) just randomly. He said it was because the day ended in 'y.' How cute is that? And what a way to end the weekend!? :P

Random acts of kindness and ones that are the simplest and most helpful are the ones I appreciate the most. Life is full of them if you pay close enough attention... :)

So this week has been quite an eventful one the country hasn't it? I heard on the news that 49 out of the 50 United States received some amount of snow in one way or another this week. Hawaii was the only one who didn't. I read somewhere that DC had, what, 39 inches of snow? My uncle who lives in the middle of Penn. said they got 27 inches on one day! And one cousin who goes to school in Maryland near DC said they ended up getting a snow week instead of a snow day! They had Friday the 5th off for the first wave and then just proceeded to get one day after another the next week until his school just shut down for the rest of the week! A pre-spring break break. Geez.... :)

Let's see, we had school last Friday but classes on Saturday were cancelled which, unfortunately, didn't benefit me at all but it was nice for those students who do dread Saturday classes. Then Monday we all crossed our fingers for snow and get a snow day and fortunately enough we did! Then Wednesday we weren't sure what would happen but we did get a delay until Noon so I got to miss four classes over that period and one practicum opportunity. Once we did get out onto the roads, they really weren't that bad and I was happy that we got a small break nonetheless.

Of course that meant bright and early on Thursday morning I had to get back into the swing of things and actually make an effort to try to get back to normal. Hard to do when you sat around doing nothing for almost 48 hours straight. I can only imagine how my cousin feels on his snow week. I also heard that we are supposed to get another 2-4 inches on Sunday night into Monday morning so maybe another snow day...? :) Wouldn't that just screw everything up. Most places are closed on Monday already for Presidents' Day but the Mount will be open for classes and whatnot so if we do get a snow day that'll benefit us but no one else really. lol :)

I started my practicum last Monday, before all the snow, and I had a great first experience there but then they had no school on Wednesday and they have no school for the holiday on Monday so I'm missing another two opportunities to go so I'm not sure at this rate if I'll get in my 50 hours or not. I'm sure I can find other times and dates to go but Mondays and Wednesdays just work best. But we'll see... It's just hard to have a routine down, get something introduced, then have weather interrupt everything everywhere, and then trying to get back into it. I really don't like. If the federal government can get a snow day, shouldn't the whole country get off as well? Thank you Ellen for that comment. :) Love that show! lol

But we have our Mid Semester break on this coming Friday and that'll be nice to have a scheduled break, not that we really need it considering the break we just had in the middle of the week. We'll see how it goes though. :) I really want to go visit a friend at UD either that weekend or the next when she has her mid break but I'm not sure when it'll work out, if it does at all. But I hope so. :)

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day, or as Sam calls it "Singles Awareness Day." lol That's just when we need to put all the singles together and then they won't be single anymore! lol The guy I've been seeing has something planned that day for us but he won't tell me what it is so I'm in for a surprise. I'm not really into surprises so I'm not sure how I'll react. lol But to you all, Happy Valentine's Day in advance. :) Hope its a fun pink and white day! <3

So this weekend was an awesome one if I do say so myself. I had an amazing time doing different things with my friends and all for different reasons. One thing I did this weekend that I was very excited about and had a ton of fun at, was the Polar Bear Plunge.

The Polar Bear Plunge is a annual fund raising event for the Special Olympics in our area. Their goal was $80,000 this year but as far as I know, they raised $102,290.51 which is so much more than they were expecting. This event is similar to those that are walks, runs, jogging events in which you sponsor someone for a cause, but this one is a bit different. Instead of walking, they go swimming. A participant raises money, at least $50 or $75 depending on your age, and then after you achieve that minimum goal, you show up on the day, you wa feet tall- just an inflatable backyard pool), and one of the other jumpers jumped in to "save" him. They yanked him right out and took him in the nearest tent to see if he was okay. They eventually told us that Oscar was fine and that he would not be going to the ER. It was kinda scary though. I felt bad for him, and his wife who didn't even know that this was going on at all.

In the end, though, it was a ton of fun and a great event to raise money and awareness. Newport was packed with people the whole time and a lot of the jumpers seemed to have fun jumping. I enjoyed it and I would have not known this was going on if Farva had not said anything to me about it. Being a part of special education, this was a great opportunity to see people and what they do to support this extensive community. I enjoyed it all. :)

This past week was the anniversary of the landmark decision of Roe v. Wade in the Supreme Court. In this case, it was decided that abortion was legal and it has been, now, for 37 years, since Jan. 22nd, 1973. And on this date each year, the March for Life is held in Washington DC. It is there that protestors, believers, dissenters, and supporters walk the streets voicing their opinions about abortion. But being a Catholic and being a part of a Catholic school for over 14 years now, I do not believe in abortion. And therefore, our Lions for Life group, the resident pro-life group, organized a bus and went to DC on this past Friday to march on the capitol.

We left about 11:30 PM on Thursday night and arrived in DC about 9:30 AM. The rally for the march started at 12 but our group met up at 12:30 after spending our morning wherever we wanted to. We started really marching about 2 PM and finished about 4. We were near the end of the march which is why it was a very, very, very slow process of starting and stopping from about 1 to 2 PM. It was very long. But once we got moving, we were moving. We crawled around the Mall (the grassy area that separates the Capitol Building from the Washington Monument- the pencil- and is lined with musuems) and then up the hill to the Capitol building. There were so many people from so many places. I saw as far away as Wisconsin.

We marched for about 3 hours and then waited at Union Station for our charter bus to come back and pick us up. We left about 5:15 PM and stopped for dinner in Maryland before continuing home. We arrived back at the Mount about 5:30 AM on Saturday morning, the 23rd.

Of course I went with my two roommates, Maria and Sam, so we spent a lot of Saturday sleeping and recovering from the march. It was a good cause and most of it was fun except the parts where there was just a lot of standing and not moving. I made new friends, voiced my opinion, and experienced DC in a whole new light. It was something I won't forget...