Thursday, November 18, 2010

BUSY is my new middle name...

Well, I've been asked for more blog updates, but I have to say that I have just not had any spare time to write them!  Plus, I don't have the internet at my house, so I'm limited to when I'm on campus. 

Anyways, here we go.  As the title says, my new middle name is indeed, busy.  I have written six or seven papers so far this semester, and I still have six or seven more to go!  Yikes!  

On another school note, it is shocking how many deaths, family problems, and illnesses there are when students have an exam near a holiday!  My students took an exam today or will take it next Tuesday, but at least I'm giving them candy, so hopefully that makes it a little bit better!

I am trying, however, to take time to relax!  First was Homecoming!!!  Below is a picture of the 75,000+ people at the Walkaround, a picture of one of my favorite house decs, and a video of my other favorite house dec!!!


A couple weekends ago my family went to the Oklahoma State game versus K-State in Manhattan.  What a great time!  I have to admit that since it was the morning after Halloween that I was extremely tired, but who cares!  Halloween also deserves a mention because one of my classmates and his wife hosted their 9th annual party, and it was a blast!  Here's Darby as a Jester and me as a bat on Halloween night ready to hand out candy to our many many trick or treaters!  It was so much fun to see the children all dress up!  And of course, I personally enjoyed my orange Halloween lights! 


 
This Saturday, I am headed to Lawrence to watch the Pokes at KU and to visit one my best friends and the absolutely cutest smartest little boy in whole world!! 

I'm ready for my family to get here for Thanksgiving!  Black Friday here we come! 

Tuesday, September 28, 2010

StRaNgE DaY

It's been a strange day for me today.  Overwhelmed with so many different feelings.  This morning, I was taking role for a lecture section, and Koch people were there to talk about Koch and the internship program.  I felt so strange to be there, but not as a Koch employee.  I had to resist the urge to jump in and add facts or answer questions!  For a few minutes, I desperately missed Koch, the people there, my job, recruiting, my boss, my interns...even my cubicle.  Because I did not come back to school because I hated my job; I loved my job.  I came back to school because I was and am certain that I did not want to work in a corporate job forever.  But I sure do miss it sometimes.

Later I went to lunch with some of the other grad students in the department, my colleagues if you will.  I love the people here too.  And during lunch I was overwhelmed with feelings of belonging and humility, I guess.  Let me explain.  I was describing a project that is due for one of my classes on Thursday.  (In fact, I should be working on it instead of writing this post, but alas, I'm not.)  The criteria for the project are ambiguous at best.  My professor mentioned on Friday that he would like me to write about interviewing and had I heard from a different professor in Wyoming with interviewing information.  No, I have not!  I emailed her to ask about it and to see if perhaps my professor had talked with her already.  But it seems unlikely that I will get a response back from her in time to complete the paper.  So, I can instead work on a project about commercials aimed at adults vs. children.  I'm sure that I can complete a 5 page paper by Thursday with this topic, but I'm concerned that my professor will be expecting the other topic.  So I was telling my colleagues about this...complaining is probably more like it, and what do you know, one of them chimes in that he has a couple of books about/that have chapters about interviewing!  I'm so blessed to have such amazing people as colleagues here!

Wowsers.  Confusing day.  And now it is time to go give my students their 1st exam.  Good luck to them!

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Just a quick post!

As requested, I will try to update more...but that also means that I need to see more posts from others.  :-)

Taking a quick break between teaching classes!  My students are doing case study presentations and papers, so my grading is piling up quickly, but teaching is good so far and I enjoy most of my students!

As for classes, last week was utter and complete chaos!  Two papers and two tests within one week!  I turned in papers on Monday and Thursday, but I was afraid that I would not be able to complete the Thursday paper on time.  It was an article review (peer review is part of the process for an article to be published in a journal) and since I've never done one before, it was a challenge!  Done though!  The exams were Friday and yesterday...Human Memory and Psychometric Methods, respectively.  The first one was relatively easy; it's an undergrad class that requires a term paper for graduate credit.  The second, however, was my first PhD level test...yikes!  After two full days of studying, I took it and was pleasantly surprised at how well I felt like it went.  I've gotten grades back on the first three things, but not on this exam, so we'll see!

Well time to get back to teaching!  Then class and hopefully sleep!

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Awesome old house on my walk with Darby this evening!

1st Post from Lincon

This is my first official post since moving!  Needless to say, I've been a busy girl!  My house is nearly organized, though I have a few boxes that have not been opened.  Office and decorative stuff mostly.  It turns out that I don't really mind that I have no decorations in my house.  Haha.  I'm sure one of these days I'll pull everything out and find a place for everything!

Monday was my first day of class.  Wow, how odd to be a student again.  It seems like so long ago that I sat in a classroom and yet it seems like yesterday.  UNL is nice, but I have to admit that I miss Stillwater!  So far though, I have a couple of great professors and I'm actually enjoying most of my classes!  Statistics, psychology, and 2 marketing classes round out my schedule. 

Then there's teaching.  Yesterday was my first day of teaching.  Yikes!  I had 2 sections yesterday and will have 2 more tomorrow...about 160 students total.  I can already tell that one of my classes is going to be full of troublemakers.  Little do they know that I may be making a seating chart for them!  I was incredibly nervous before teaching, but it was definitely not as difficult as I was trying to make it in my head! 

I've also been something of a social butterfly, much to my dislike, actually!  Friday was department orientation, happy hour, and Indian food.  (The Indian food was a new experience, but I really like it, especially the appetizers!)  Saturday was the department back-to-school party, bowling with my fellow grad students, and Rock Band with Koch friends!  Getting home at 3AM is not something I plan to repeat, but it was a fabulous evening!  And finally, Sunday was free food at the Big Red Welcome (just like Lights on Stillwater) and swing dancing at a ballroom's country night!  I was exhausted after the weekend was over, and since the week just started, that's not a good thing! 

No photos to share this time; I need to remember to take some to share with you!

Monday, August 2, 2010

Home in Progress

My parents and I went to Lincoln this past weekend to move the rest of my belongings into my new house.  Finally out of the storage unit!  After about 2 and a half days, we made a lot of progress!  My dad was Mr. Handyman; he hung curtains, fixed some leaks in the shower, painted the inside of the medicine/linen cabinet, caulked the bathtub, etc.  My mom and I spent a very long time recovering the kitchen and bathroom shelves with contact paper because some previous tenants wrapped contact paper around about 2 inches on the bottom of the shelves, which looked tacky and was pretty icky.  They look amazing and fresh now! 

Then we worked on getting the kitchen organized.  I have quite a bit of kitchen "stuff" and there is not much cabinet space, so it was a challenge to figure out where to put everything.  Thankfully, the laundry room has an extra cabinet that I am going to use as a pantry.  One of our challenges was where to put the silverware tray.  The only drawer big enough for the tray is in the rolling island cart, but it still isn't big enough to expand the tray to fit all of my silverware.  So, I finally decided to set the tray on top of the microwave.  That's my best solution at the moment, but maybe I'll be able to figure something more effective out!  I have a lot of unpacking clothes and decorations when I go back in a few weeks, but I'm we made SO much progress that it's not looking as daunting as when we first arrived on Friday!  

Now, here are a few pictures of my home in progress!


And Darby!!!!


Thursday, July 29, 2010

Moving Tomorrow!

Two weekends ago, we painted.

This weekend, we will move everything else in!  My dad, sister, and I loaded the moving truck today after driving to Plainville to pick it up.  I just don't understand why U-Haul won't move trucks to the location that the reservation was made...what's the point of making a reservation?  Compared to when I moved from Wichita to my storage unit here, we packed the truck much more efficiently.  We expected to need to borrow my grandparents' van, but everything is in and ready to go! 

We should arrive in Lincoln tomorrow around noon!

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Paint...check!

Last weekend, my parents and I painted my duplex!  It looks like a completely different place!  When I looked at the duplex before renting it, the people that lived there then were in the process of packing to move, so there was a lot of stuff all over, so it was difficult to gauge the size of the rooms.  The living room was the biggest surprise - it was a lot larger than I remembered.  We painted everything except for the laundry room, which stayed purple, and the garage.  As usual with a rental, we found that several things were not in great repair.  The vents were ridiculously dirty with dog hair...ick!  We tried cleaning them with the vacuum and soap and water.  Neither worked very well, but we eventually got them reasonable clean and spray painted them a tan that better blends in with the carpet and tile.  The contact paper that is on the kitchen and bathroom shelves is gross, so we plan to take that out in a few weeks when we move the rest of my furniture and boxes.  I bought new pretty green and white for the kitchen and blue and brown polka dots for the bathroom from Target!  Possibly the worst part is the garage floor, which is filthy with oil and dirt that gets tracked into the house; hopefully I will get permission from my landlord to paint it with that sealing paint stuff.  The positives though are that there is quite a bit more storage than I remembered, and the carpet is a lot nicer than I remembered!  The paint looks awesome and I'm so glad that my landlords okayed it!  We cleaned and painted for 5 hours on Friday and 10 hours on Saturday; we were definitely exhausted after that!  Now I'm looking for a used trundle bed for my spare room because the bedrooms are a lot smaller than my last place!  Here are a few before and after photos!

Living Room (before)
  


 

Living Room (after)
 

Bathroom (before & after)

Kitchen (after)

Bedroom (after)

Living room with my new furniture!

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Painting has begun...

Today was our first day of painting at my new house!  We were on the road from KS by 8:30 AM and finally arrived to unload and get started.  After eating a yummy lunch at Scholtsky's, we got paint at Walmart for the living room - Trenchcoat Khaki, living room accent wall - Tibetan Orange, and bathroom - Afternoon Shade.  Painting began around three in the afternoon and we finished up a little after eight.  We completed the living room and bathroom (which started out maroon) and edged the kitchen.  The kitchen is going to be a sort of tuscan yellow that my parents used in their kitchen too! 

It's getting to really feel like a real house, and I'm getting excited to get everything moved it and arranged.  Just a few weeks until the big move in!

Well, it's late and we have an early day tomorrow!  We are planning to get started around eight in the morning and there is a Safelight person coming to fix a chip in my windshield that happened on the way!

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

Teaching...oh my!


Just about a month until I will be in Lincoln full time, so I decided to crack open my books today!  No, not my books for the classes I'm taking, but the books for the class that I'm teaching discussion sections for.  The teaching manual is much less exciting than the student's textbook...no pictures, charts, or anything.  I took this class at OSU my freshman years, I guess it's time to start studying! 

Furniture comes tomorrow, so I will at last be able to finalize paint colors!  This morning I had to search through my storage unit for my living room curtains because I'm thinking about an accent wall in the living room and I want to make sure the paint doesn't clash with the drapes.  The only other thing to consider is the carpet color, but I will hopefully narrow the choices down before we get there to see the carpet.  I'm still leaning towards "Trenchcoat Khaki", which I used my senior year in Stillwater.  It's not a current color, but I confirmed with Walmart today that they can still make it!

Almost time to start dinner!  I'm using a recipe from my friend Sarah's blog for enchiladas!  I can't wait to see how they turn out!

Monday, July 12, 2010

Friendly Flowers

I have three pots of flowers for my new home, and I can't wait until they start growing and blooming!  They are going to look beautiful on my front porch! 


I also just ordered new living room furniture!  I found a super comfortable set in Claflin that are discontinued, so I got an incredible deal on a matching mocha chaise and loveseat. 

Things are coming along quite nicely for my little duplex.  Now on to picking paint colors...I've gone to Ace, but today I'm going to Walmart, Heartland, and Home Depot!  Suggestions are welcome!

New Chapter of Life

I'm officially starting a new chapter of my life.  For the past two years, I've lived and worked in Wichita at an amazing company - Koch Industries.  Now, I've resigned and will begin graduate school at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in August.  I will first be studying to earn my Masters in Marketing and then my PhD in Marketing!  Yes, I know I'm going into the family business.  :-)  Throughout the next 4-5 years, I will be in school and teaching basically year round.  But I will get more than 2 days off for Christmas! 

The break between working and going to school has been relaxing, and I've loved spending time with family.  I've been sleeping in, reading, golfing, vacationing, and just hanging out. 

A couple of weeks ago, my dad and I went apartment hunting in Lincoln.  I ended up with a 2 bedroom duplex that includes the washer/dryer and a garage!  I'm definitely looking forward to that garage when the snow comes this winter.  The bus stop is less than a block away, so I plan on taking advantage of public transportation too.

Here are some pictures of the neighborhood...my duplex is one of only two rentals in the entire neighborhood!


There are a lot of limestone houses in Lincoln...they are so cute!



I have a few inside photos of the duplex, but they are from the Craigs list ad and are on a different computer right now.  I will try to add them soon, but here are a couple of my new place!



And finally one picture of the business building where I will be spending much of my time soon!