October means birthday month in our household. Mine is the 19th & David's is the 28th. And then Grandpa's is November 2nd, so he just celebrated with us when we were littler.
This year my mom and dad will spend the birthdays of their two oldest in parent-teacher conferences. I will spend mine in Oregon and David will spend it in classes at UNI.
When I was little I celebrated a my birthday at a wedding in Minnesota. It wasn't the same waking up in a hotel to birthday gifts as it was at home. But over the past four years I have gotten used to celebrating in odd places.
Through college my birthday always fell during Central's fall break. Which is the typical time frame the Central Volleyball team takes their big trip.
My freshman year I was not on varsity so I got to go home for my birthday. My sophomore year it was Los Angeles. It was right in the middle of our trip, so when I came out from breakfast to load the vans all the parents sang 'happy birthday' to me and then surprised us with cupcakes after our game. It was nice, but not the same as being able to talk and see my family.
Junior year was even more interesting. New York City. However, it was the day we flew home. I was up at 3 a.m. eastern time to head to the airport to fly back to Iowa. Teammates were there to tell me 'happy birthday' but we were exhausted, so I spent the flight sleeping and then slept most the day when we got home. Senior I celebrated at home again! We had taken our trip to Oregon during Labor Day weekend, so we had fall break off. I got to see Daniel's cross country meet and Leah's volleyball match and celebrate my birthday at home!
This year I will celebrate in Oregon, the fourth state in 5 years! Interesting track record to have. But in the rules of our house you get to choose how to celebrate it. Chantel chose camping....my front runner is roller skating at the rink in Hillsboro decked out in 80's attire. Keep following for pictures to come! :)
Also I will celebrate with care packages.... :D haha.
But really: I like books, so Barnes & Noble. Panera & Target are nice too! Or just fun treats!
Monday, October 4, 2010
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Book Review: Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas
Fiction again, sorry. Since the library failed me I haven't been back. My roommates and I were at Goodwill looking for a couch a while back and got sidetracked by the books the large book selection they had. For only $2 a piece we stocked up, why buy a book at full price when you can get them that cheap? And most didn't look like they were previously read!
Anyway, Suzanne's Diary for Nicholas is by James Patterson, a different author than I have been reading so I thought it was worth the purchase. I also have had people tell me it was pretty good. Thinking of James Patterson as an author makes me think more of murder mysteries, so I was a bit skeptical of this book.
After getting into it, I really started getting into the plot. It was suspenseful and I wasn't able to predict the end before it happened. It was also a very detail oriented and emotional book. I was almost to tears near the end! I don't want to say much about the plot because I think it would ruin the suspense for those of you who read it, but I definitely think it is worth a casual read!
After getting into it, I really started getting into the plot. It was suspenseful and I wasn't able to predict the end before it happened. It was also a very detail oriented and emotional book. I was almost to tears near the end! I don't want to say much about the plot because I think it would ruin the suspense for those of you who read it, but I definitely think it is worth a casual read!
Friday, October 1, 2010
Budget Survival 101
Coupons!
We live by them here. Every Tuesday the free advertiser is dropped off at our house. It is complete with ads to every grocery store in the area and a pack of manufacturer coupons. I knew there was no way we were just going to throw those away. So every week I cut them out and put them in what has become our coupon drawer.
As I learned in Chicago, many specials at the Safeway are only good if you are 'club member'. So right away the first week I got a club card. Which every week the club card combines with Safeway coupons to save bunches. This morning I saved nearly $15 dollars and ended up only paying $25 for my groceries. I felt pretty proud to have shopped smartly!
Also we discovered how expensive slipcovers were last week, it would have been more to cover one couch than it was to buy both! So I found some flat sheets on clearance at Target and made up some slip covers. Grandma will be so happy I finally got out my sewing machine, a graduation gift from her, to put them together.
Here are the before and after pictures of our lovely floral furniture:
As I learned in Chicago, many specials at the Safeway are only good if you are 'club member'. So right away the first week I got a club card. Which every week the club card combines with Safeway coupons to save bunches. This morning I saved nearly $15 dollars and ended up only paying $25 for my groceries. I felt pretty proud to have shopped smartly!
Also we discovered how expensive slipcovers were last week, it would have been more to cover one couch than it was to buy both! So I found some flat sheets on clearance at Target and made up some slip covers. Grandma will be so happy I finally got out my sewing machine, a graduation gift from her, to put them together.
Here are the before and after pictures of our lovely floral furniture:
Sunday, September 26, 2010
My Mom Rocks!
Even from 2,000 miles away my mom can bail me out!
After our women's home game on Saturday I headed to an outlet mall with my roommates. I had my computer packed because I knew I'd be finding another wireless cafe to write my men's soccer story later.
We visited a couple stores and I called up a cafe to check if they had wireless and then headed there way. Upon ordering my drink I found a table near a plug-in only to discover I was missing my power cord. This wouldn't be a problem for most laptops, because they can run on battery. However, my battery has about a 5 minute lifespan and I refuse to buy a new one. But in this situation it was a gut-wrenching experience. Should I just wait until we are back home in 4 hours to write a story or should I find an alternative plan?
Well I hate when game stories are posted hours after a match, so I knew I needed to find an alternative. MY MOM. I called her up and she logged on to my e-mail and read me the box score, which was a challenge considering she has never seen a soccer box score before....not sure if she has seen a complete game either!
So after receiving limited box score info from her, I hand wrote a story. After completing it I text her the entire story! She then typed it and sent me an e-mail with the story and the headshot I needed to post it. I quickly logged on to my computer went straight for the website to post the story and my e-mail and posted it!
It was amazing that my battery died about a minute after posting, but it was up! I was so relieved to have an awesome mom who can help me from 2,000 miles away. Love you Mom!
After our women's home game on Saturday I headed to an outlet mall with my roommates. I had my computer packed because I knew I'd be finding another wireless cafe to write my men's soccer story later.
We visited a couple stores and I called up a cafe to check if they had wireless and then headed there way. Upon ordering my drink I found a table near a plug-in only to discover I was missing my power cord. This wouldn't be a problem for most laptops, because they can run on battery. However, my battery has about a 5 minute lifespan and I refuse to buy a new one. But in this situation it was a gut-wrenching experience. Should I just wait until we are back home in 4 hours to write a story or should I find an alternative plan?
Well I hate when game stories are posted hours after a match, so I knew I needed to find an alternative. MY MOM. I called her up and she logged on to my e-mail and read me the box score, which was a challenge considering she has never seen a soccer box score before....not sure if she has seen a complete game either!
So after receiving limited box score info from her, I hand wrote a story. After completing it I text her the entire story! She then typed it and sent me an e-mail with the story and the headshot I needed to post it. I quickly logged on to my computer went straight for the website to post the story and my e-mail and posted it!
It was amazing that my battery died about a minute after posting, but it was up! I was so relieved to have an awesome mom who can help me from 2,000 miles away. Love you Mom!
Landscape Marketer
I am starting to get my feet under me a bit now with marketing ideas for Landscape Concepts, Inc. here in Forest Grove. They wanted me to start a Facebook page and a Twitter account. I still am not the biggest fan of Twitter, but am starting to understand it can play a large role in viral marketing.
The first week I didn't do a whole lot, I created the ad for a sale on the front page of the website, posted it and updated the website. I also had to find the need software, Ebay became my best friend for a while and I eventually won the bid war!
This week I created the Twitter account and designed the background. Let me tell you that was not as easy I had hoped due to the different types of browsers used, I had to make as many pictures visible as possible and I think I got it after 6 attempts! I also got my first experience listing an excavator on Ebay. I decided to use Twitter to announce the selling of the excavator and my auction got over 40 more views during my 4 hours at work on Friday. I guess Twitter is a viral marketing strategy!!
The software came pretty quickly so I am now well prepared to create ads, brochures, newsletters and update the website.
Landscape Concepts, Inc: http://landscapeconceptsinc.net/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/landscapeinc
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gales-Creek-OR/Landscape-Concepts-Inc/149730238386441
The first week I didn't do a whole lot, I created the ad for a sale on the front page of the website, posted it and updated the website. I also had to find the need software, Ebay became my best friend for a while and I eventually won the bid war!
This week I created the Twitter account and designed the background. Let me tell you that was not as easy I had hoped due to the different types of browsers used, I had to make as many pictures visible as possible and I think I got it after 6 attempts! I also got my first experience listing an excavator on Ebay. I decided to use Twitter to announce the selling of the excavator and my auction got over 40 more views during my 4 hours at work on Friday. I guess Twitter is a viral marketing strategy!!
The software came pretty quickly so I am now well prepared to create ads, brochures, newsletters and update the website.
Landscape Concepts, Inc: http://landscapeconceptsinc.net/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/landscapeinc
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Gales-Creek-OR/Landscape-Concepts-Inc/149730238386441
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
I Survived!
The first crazy weekend for me at Pacific is over and I survived! I am completely exhausted, but happy it all went relatively smoothly.
I spent nearly 24 hours in the press box of Lincoln Park Stadium over the 3 days. Friday was a men's and women's soccer double header. They took on Whitworth and for the guys this is the team who has won the conference 4 years in a row and are chosen to do the same again this year. So the nerves were high. The women went into overtime and pulled out their first win! They scored just 2:34 into the overtime period and in soccer that ends the period. The men pulled out a 2-1 and while that sounds awesome it was full of stress of my student worker crew. A time discrepancy between our scoreboard and the refs caused our coach to get a yellow card and Whitworth got a free kick that bounced off the top crossbar with 7 seconds left. The coach was still mad by the time I sent workers down with stats and they both go ripped! I felt bad for them, but in the end I decided it was nothing to stress about. We scored 2 goals, they scored 1, therefore we still had the win no matter how close the kick was at the end.
Saturday was the event that everyone in the office has been stressed about...the first Pacific home football game in 19 years! Pacific disbanded football after the 1991 season, but has brought it back this year. Our team is mainly freshmen, so it is a bit of rough going. Coming from Central's strong football tradition I was asked a bunch of questions I was unable to answer. I have worked 2 games while at Central and attended maybe 4! Volleyball season kind of overlaps football now doesn't it? :) However, I was asked to be there as support for the statcrew and my boss. My main responsibility during the game was to keep the Twitter feed going with the play-by-play and then post game get the players and coaches for interviews and tape an interview with the head coach for YouTube. Over 3,000 people attended the first game and the support was great for the young team. I just found it interesting to see so many tents set-up tailgating on campus grounds, because that is rare at Central! The Boxers didn't win, but I think the support they got was a moral victory.
Sunday I was back in the press box for another soccer double header. The women pulled out their second victory of the season against Whitman and the men followed with a 4-0 shutout of Whitman. The day went smoothly, but was just a long day after other full days of games!
While all these games were going on at the stadium, the men's and women's golf teams were also hosting their Pacific Invitational. The women golfed Saturday and Sunday and the men golfed Sunday and Monday. So while I didn't have to be at the meet, I had to be in the office to send results to the other SIDs and write stories when the meets finished. Over the weekend I wrote 8 stories! Coming up with wording to sound different each became harder as I got more tired! But overall I felt like I achieved a lot during the weekend!
Sunday I wish I could have been in Greene celebrating my mom's birthday, but clearly the distance does not allow that. I was able to talk to her before the soccer games and got a card sent to her, but if anyone wants to take her to DQ that'd be great, because I couldn't!!
This week I spent Monday getting out the weekly notebooks, which I am finally getting better at! Tuesday morning I got the honor of writing about the 3rd and 4th men's soccer players to receive student-athlete of the week. Each week I have to nominate soccer players who had good playing weeks. Each week this season Pacific has won the men's offensive player and it has been a different guys each time. This week my defensive nomination was selected too! It's kind of cool being able to nominate someone and then have them selected and for 3 weeks in a row!! The other new press release I got to write was the fact that the men's soccer team jumped from not being rated to 14th in the national poll. They are currently 6-0-1 and have a good chance to finish right at the top of the conference. After the rating I was told if they make it to the national tournament there is a strong possibility I would get to travel with them to cover it all, so let's keep cheering on the Boxers!!
Wednesday I finally got a day off!! It is my first day off since labor day and trust me it's much needed. I got to sleep in and get a bike ride to Hagg Lake in, plus a nice little stop to pick some blackberries along the route. Then I headed to Hillsboro to get my oil changed. Let me tell you it was an experience! I have never gone to Jiffy Lube, in fact I always just schedule my car to be serviced when I am home on break. And in Greene, the mechanics just know what to do and will pick-up your car at home! Here I was asked a bunch of questions, had to pick out my oil and make decisions! AHHH! Then wait patiently while they finished. Oh well, add it to my list of new experiences. After the oil change experience I just bummed around Hillsboro and hit up Panera, because I have the MyPanera club card and had a freebie to use. Also I highly recommend the Pumpkin Spice Latte! It was great to just have the day to myself.
I spent nearly 24 hours in the press box of Lincoln Park Stadium over the 3 days. Friday was a men's and women's soccer double header. They took on Whitworth and for the guys this is the team who has won the conference 4 years in a row and are chosen to do the same again this year. So the nerves were high. The women went into overtime and pulled out their first win! They scored just 2:34 into the overtime period and in soccer that ends the period. The men pulled out a 2-1 and while that sounds awesome it was full of stress of my student worker crew. A time discrepancy between our scoreboard and the refs caused our coach to get a yellow card and Whitworth got a free kick that bounced off the top crossbar with 7 seconds left. The coach was still mad by the time I sent workers down with stats and they both go ripped! I felt bad for them, but in the end I decided it was nothing to stress about. We scored 2 goals, they scored 1, therefore we still had the win no matter how close the kick was at the end.
Saturday was the event that everyone in the office has been stressed about...the first Pacific home football game in 19 years! Pacific disbanded football after the 1991 season, but has brought it back this year. Our team is mainly freshmen, so it is a bit of rough going. Coming from Central's strong football tradition I was asked a bunch of questions I was unable to answer. I have worked 2 games while at Central and attended maybe 4! Volleyball season kind of overlaps football now doesn't it? :) However, I was asked to be there as support for the statcrew and my boss. My main responsibility during the game was to keep the Twitter feed going with the play-by-play and then post game get the players and coaches for interviews and tape an interview with the head coach for YouTube. Over 3,000 people attended the first game and the support was great for the young team. I just found it interesting to see so many tents set-up tailgating on campus grounds, because that is rare at Central! The Boxers didn't win, but I think the support they got was a moral victory.
Sunday I was back in the press box for another soccer double header. The women pulled out their second victory of the season against Whitman and the men followed with a 4-0 shutout of Whitman. The day went smoothly, but was just a long day after other full days of games!
While all these games were going on at the stadium, the men's and women's golf teams were also hosting their Pacific Invitational. The women golfed Saturday and Sunday and the men golfed Sunday and Monday. So while I didn't have to be at the meet, I had to be in the office to send results to the other SIDs and write stories when the meets finished. Over the weekend I wrote 8 stories! Coming up with wording to sound different each became harder as I got more tired! But overall I felt like I achieved a lot during the weekend!
Sunday I wish I could have been in Greene celebrating my mom's birthday, but clearly the distance does not allow that. I was able to talk to her before the soccer games and got a card sent to her, but if anyone wants to take her to DQ that'd be great, because I couldn't!!
This week I spent Monday getting out the weekly notebooks, which I am finally getting better at! Tuesday morning I got the honor of writing about the 3rd and 4th men's soccer players to receive student-athlete of the week. Each week I have to nominate soccer players who had good playing weeks. Each week this season Pacific has won the men's offensive player and it has been a different guys each time. This week my defensive nomination was selected too! It's kind of cool being able to nominate someone and then have them selected and for 3 weeks in a row!! The other new press release I got to write was the fact that the men's soccer team jumped from not being rated to 14th in the national poll. They are currently 6-0-1 and have a good chance to finish right at the top of the conference. After the rating I was told if they make it to the national tournament there is a strong possibility I would get to travel with them to cover it all, so let's keep cheering on the Boxers!!
Wednesday I finally got a day off!! It is my first day off since labor day and trust me it's much needed. I got to sleep in and get a bike ride to Hagg Lake in, plus a nice little stop to pick some blackberries along the route. Then I headed to Hillsboro to get my oil changed. Let me tell you it was an experience! I have never gone to Jiffy Lube, in fact I always just schedule my car to be serviced when I am home on break. And in Greene, the mechanics just know what to do and will pick-up your car at home! Here I was asked a bunch of questions, had to pick out my oil and make decisions! AHHH! Then wait patiently while they finished. Oh well, add it to my list of new experiences. After the oil change experience I just bummed around Hillsboro and hit up Panera, because I have the MyPanera club card and had a freebie to use. Also I highly recommend the Pumpkin Spice Latte! It was great to just have the day to myself.
Friday, September 17, 2010
How Lucky Our Small Town Is!
Wow, I have come to realize how lucky Greene, Iowa is to have a library at the level it is. The other day I wanted to get a biography, because I am sick of reading fiction books. So I decided to use my Boxer Card (the Pacific ID) at the public library in Forest Grove.
I went in planning to get a biography on John Wooden. You'd think a very common one to find, considering he was one of the best coaches in the nation. Anywho, after I was directed to the biography section I roamed the bookcase, NOTHING, NADA! John Wooden didn't exist, in fact most of them on the shelf were rather old. Not saying old books stink...well actually they do...but I mean their text isn't bad, but there were now newer people. So I found the computer card catalog and searched for John Wooden. To my dismay they had nothing at all, not even already checked out books. I was very frustrated, but decided to settle for some fiction.
After finding a book, I went to check out and gave them my Boxer Card in order to set-up a library card. I was then asked for a my current address so I told her, she then needed proof. Really, I have lived here for 3 weeks, and my Driver's license still is from Iowa...I have a staff ID I clearly am not running away with the book. However, I was unable to check out a book. I guess I have to figure out proof of my address, suggestions?
What I discovered at this library was there was a big emphasis on the technology. Lots of computers in the main area. Honestly, what I love about our library at home is for a town of 1,000 people we have a great selection of new and old titles. The librarians takes suggestions from the public and the library teen board makes new book picks. It is a community oriented library. Greene residents should feel lucky to have the resource they have!
I went in planning to get a biography on John Wooden. You'd think a very common one to find, considering he was one of the best coaches in the nation. Anywho, after I was directed to the biography section I roamed the bookcase, NOTHING, NADA! John Wooden didn't exist, in fact most of them on the shelf were rather old. Not saying old books stink...well actually they do...but I mean their text isn't bad, but there were now newer people. So I found the computer card catalog and searched for John Wooden. To my dismay they had nothing at all, not even already checked out books. I was very frustrated, but decided to settle for some fiction.
After finding a book, I went to check out and gave them my Boxer Card in order to set-up a library card. I was then asked for a my current address so I told her, she then needed proof. Really, I have lived here for 3 weeks, and my Driver's license still is from Iowa...I have a staff ID I clearly am not running away with the book. However, I was unable to check out a book. I guess I have to figure out proof of my address, suggestions?
What I discovered at this library was there was a big emphasis on the technology. Lots of computers in the main area. Honestly, what I love about our library at home is for a town of 1,000 people we have a great selection of new and old titles. The librarians takes suggestions from the public and the library teen board makes new book picks. It is a community oriented library. Greene residents should feel lucky to have the resource they have!
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