Happy Halloween!

One thing about me that has not changed since I was 5, and probably wont change until I'm 95, is I LOVE to decorate. I'm not sure what started it, but I think many of my childhood memories included our house being decorated for the holiday season. (So, let's go ahead and give my mom credit for my decorating obsession! Haha)

Once I moved down school, my mom would send us a bunch of cute decorations for the holidays: Halloween, Thanksgiving, Easter, Mardi Gras, Chinese New Year... it was something I looked forward to each month! Once Christmas rolled around, she probably thought there was no point in sending us stuff because we were only in the halls for a week or so, but I took care of that one... I snagged a bunch myself and took it back with me. ;-)

Nonetheless, something that I love about October is the beginning of the holiday season. Oh, and I just LOVE Halloween. When I was in high school, my parent's house would be totally DECKED out in orange and silly decorations. With my own apartment right now, I tried to make it tacky to remind me of home. :)

I decided I wanted everything to be in my living room, so every picture takes place there. I'm not sure these pictures are very good, but rest assured, I have LOVED every minute of my tacky Halloween decorated apartment!

Above my kitchen table, I have pictures of areas I want to travel to... and some cute little Halloween signs

Above those signs, I have a light up strand of pumpkin lights. :) I love them!!!

In my kitchen, I just loaded up my fridge with some goofy little stuff! Hehe

Here's a close up of one of the ghosts I have flying around. You'll probably notice them in the pictures :)

Against the wall splitting the kitchen and living room, I added some more tacky decorations. Haha, I'm a fan of the witch!

Here's the cat head in the dark! I love my light up decorations!

On the wall with the windows (again, with the light ups!)

My light-up skull heads and holiday piggie!

A fake gourd with hilarious body parts. This is probably one of my most favorite decorations!

I have a bunch more pictures, but they didn't come out so great with the dark/light up factor. So Mom- don't worry, I'll have more pictures to show you at Thanksgiving! :)

I hope your Halloween has been spooky and fun, too!!!

My Mom's 30th Birthday!

Psych!!!

It was actually her 31st birthday.

Bahaha. Anyway.

On the 8th, I traveled back north to spend the weekend with my mom for her birthday. I hadn't been back up there since Labor Day, and it was safe to say I was missing everyone a lot. I was SO excited, I stayed up til 1am cleaning my apartment, packing, and preparing for the drive home. I just couldn't wait!

Of course Friday dragged onnnnn and onnnn but finally 4pm hit and Megan and I hit the road. Once I finally got up to my parent's house, they had a nice home cooked meal waiting for me! How exciting and spoiled I felt. :)

Saturday started off verryyy early, which at first I was worried about, but then I realized it was totally worth it. We met up with Aunt Kathy and Stephanie for a mommy-daughter stamp class. It was... interesting!

This is us at the class during a brief break!

It was a little nuts! The teacher for the class was a little intense and rushed. At first we were all a little irritated and annoyed by it, but it didn't take long to just be amused by it. It was hilarious as Stephanie and I started to laugh and repeat some of the snippy comments the instructor had. Ok, I admit, it wasn't incredibly mature, but hey! We had to do something to make it a little more enjoyable! In the end, we walked away with a bunch of cute Christmas tags and a fun story!

We then went to lunch and had some delicious Noodles and Co. and then went over to Aunt Kathy's brother's house to check out some trees he had some questions about. It was a little funny, they asked me to check it out and said they'd understand if I didn't want to. Hehe, when do I not want to look at trees? :P

This is what we found in their tree!! Some nasty mushroom fungus! Sadly the diagnosis is to remove the tree before it removes itself from high winds or severe weather. :(

After that little side trip, we were all a little tired and ready to head home. During the drive, my dad and I were scheming via text message....

Well, as we arrived back at my house, we all went inside and surprised my mom with a few gifts from Aunt Kathy and her family. They had gotten her some fun things to help organize her craft room... after I cleaned it over the summer, we are hoping she can use it more for some stress relief! But that wasn't all! As we went upstairs to look at her craft room, there was another surprise for Mom.... Uncle Ed and my dad had installed lifts for the washer and dryer!!!

Ok, I know when you read that, it seems sort of random... and it also sounds like we are encouraging mom to do laundry! But really, we had been talking about them for a LONG time... so for a few weeks, my dad, Aunt Kathy, Uncle Ed, and I were emailing, calling, and texting each other to find a way to surprise my mom with it. It was fun to see her reaction and I hope they help!!!

After our dear friends left, the three of us hung out and my mom called her mom. I accidently fell asleep on the couch watching TV, because let's face it... I'm not a morning person and we were up early and were busy! I was woken up in time for dinner.

We met my dad's parents at an AMAZINGLY yummy restaurant, Ted's, and had a great dinner. To top it off, EVERYONE enjoyed it... even my some times picky Grandpa enjoyed it!

I HIGHLY recommend this place! Very yummy!

Once we got home, Dad and I pulled out a few last gifts for my mom. She isn't a fan of pictures, so I just took a picture of the pile! haha.

This was probably one of the best weekends I've had for awhile!! It was something I exactly needed and I hope my mom had a happy birthday!!! :)

Welcome to My Blog

My goodness. Finding time (and interesting things to blog about) has been nuts lately!! This post is a little overdue, since I promised pictures like a month ago!

Things at work sure have been going... really fast. The students just went through midterms. Which means.... the semester is half over! WHAT? I barely feel like I am in a routine with everything, but I guess I am! My office sure has evolved since my first few weeks here....

July


October

Whew! Check out that change. I look at this picture and laugh because of how busy and disorganized it is.... but this is how I work the best! My room is like that in my apartment. And really, it is quite organized!!!

Here are a few other views of my busy body office:

This is the area next to my desk. Right now its a holding place for supplies and materials to be delivered to my service areas

Next to that holding area for supplies is my "point board." And no, it's not done yet (I KNOW, it's October), but it will eventually have who has how many points. BTW, points are bad.

Across from my desk is my jam packed file cabinet and extra crap that I took out of the front desks/fitness center. I'm holding onto it just incase I find a need for it later.

Shot from the file cabinet to my desk! :)

My door with a bunch of door decs from RAs. :)

Even though sometimes being in my office is overwhelming, it is definitely my place. Just a little bit into my life here at ISU! :)