Taking on the week!

So this week is the 2nd full week of school this year, i am plenty ready for our first break, let me tell you! :) I have been noticing myself, in conversations with others, complaining a lot. About my busy busy busy schedule, my jobs, homework, my weight, and other things close to the heart. Im constantly stressing about having to do this, having to do that, having to go here and fill out this paperwork go there and do that, dont eat this, dont eat that, money for this money for that. UGHH!! My goal for this week, is to RELAX. sometimes i get SO overwhelmed, like my life is just to much and then the anxietty comes and the stress comes which leads to the headaches and sleepless nights. well, this week im going to make an honest attempt to take my days one by one, task one by one, and just calm the eff down & breathe. I know i am capable of handling whats on my plate right now, I just need to get there. Its always easier said than done! but i will get there. I need to just find my balance between work, school, social life, hobby time, fun time, ME time. all of it, and i know it will come as weeks pass and i get adjusted.

anyway, sometimes typing the things out and having them to read and look back on throughout the week help remember to breathe and keep focused.

so Thats all :)

Thought of the Moment

Courage is the power to let go of the familiar.
- Raymond Lindquist

This quote i came across today, really grabbed my attention. I feel like so many people, or i may just be talking about myself, hold on to things that are comfortable, familiar and safe to them. Their security blankets. Some healthy, some not, some they know maybe isn't right but its all just so familiar. you don't have to find something new, do something different, change anything, you don't have to let go.
I think if you can realize and admit that you are doing this, that's great, but like the quote says it takes courage to step out of your comfort zone, put yourself out there, drop bad habits and let go. But by doing so, you could also gain many things, that could even be greater than your initial blanket.
This is something i struggle with on a daily basis, but that I am working towards. And i feel like once i achieve this, whether it is the very small things in life, or the large, I'll be one step closer to where, and who I want to be! :)

"The Perfect World"

So i was going through old photo albums stuffed with notes and papers from back in grade school I found this assignment i had to do for class, and I thought it was interesting! It was an assignment called "The Perfect World" and i assume we had to write what we think would happen in a perfect world, so here is what i wrote. This assignment was when i was 15 yrs old.

"Well in a perfect world everyone would be happy and nobody would judge anyone. And all guys would be nice and like you for who you are..and you wouldnt have to worry about being yourself. And that me and all my girlfriends would have perfect boyfriends and we could spend half a year in hawii. that poor people would not be poor, and that i could go shopping whenever. That my dad would move back to minnesota and i could see him whenever. That they would lower the drinking age so i wouldnt have to wait 6 more years. And that everybody would et along and be free but not break the laws too bad. THat i was friends with famous people. I wish i could sing coz that would make my days so much better coz i love to sing whenever and i could play guitar. i wish no1 was in war. i wish that everyone would live to the fullest. I wish there was a cure for all diseases. I wish Reece was still here with us and me and him could start over, that would be my #1, and i wish the doctors could have saved him. I wish that people wouldnt drink and drive. I wish i had my license
Bye

ps. and that it was summer all year long, fo sho!
that would be the perfect world, but its not so lets live w/what we got so i gotta deal with that. So people need to put up or shut up"



Well, thats what i had to say at 15 years old. some of it is pretty funny, and some pretty ridiculous. Moving to hawawii with perfect boyfriends woulda been nice, well, that never happend. and WHY was i wanting them to lower the drinking age when i was 15?? ohh boy. Though, sometimes i do still wish i was friends with famous people :) i do wish i could sing, because i feel that would be the ultimate stress reliever. And yes, i had a HUGE crush on Reece and had been wanting him back after we broke up for a whole summer, i remember telling ashley gilberston all the time how much i liked him. I remember cutting a picture of him out into a heart haha. Also, my ending? people need to "put up or shut up? haha that amused me.

Well, Just thought itd share that because it made me smile and i thought it was kind of funny. :)
So i was digging for that pic of reece and I, and i found it :) have a look! we we're so young!


School started on Wednesday, I am going to be one busy busy girl this year. 2 jobs in menom, one that i work once a month in woodury, and taking 15 credits. and joining 2 clubs, whew--i will deffinitly have to be on top of my game this semester.

The classes I am taking are:
Managerial & Corporate Accounting
Food Technology
Social/Pysch Aspects of Clothing
Sociology of Gender Roles
Retail Promotions

That would be it for this semester! Wish me Luck :) I've done well thus far, so i shall try and keep up the determination!

While reading the book " Women, Food and God" i came across an interesting thought or Idea. I'm not sure how hard it would be to grasp, if not reading the chapter. but this is what i found interesting, and true.

" Jill Bolte Taylor, a harvard-trained neuroanatomist, talks about the euphoria she experienced when, during a stroke, her left-brain functions of linear thinking and using the past to orient the present stopped functioning. When there was no longer a memory of the way thing were, there was no concept of the self, no longer a me and you. THere was no seperation between the molecules in a hand and the molecules in a sink or in a blade of grass. Without the grid of the past imposed on the moment-to-moment unfolding of the present, there was only peace, only radiance, only awareness and profound awe at living itself.

Spiritual teachers have been pointing to that same possibility minus the stroke for thousands of years: the bliss that occurs by arriving where you are. When we are not reconstructing the past in every nanosecond, what is here is so satisfying, so loving, so unbelievably simple that once tasted, it changes everything. Because then you know whats possible and you refuse to settle for anything less"

"By Constantly Laminating our past defenses onto our current reality, we create the illusion that what was there then is here now. We never arrive in the refulgent ever-new possibilities of the present"

This was really interesting to me, Because sitting thinking about it, if everyone eliminated all that has happened in the past, we would be so much more satisfied with whats here in the present. I think people should working on taking a look at all the have right now, in the moment, forgetting what may have happend in the past, or how youve felt in the past, and just let the present be, let go, and look at what you have NOW. I have a great apartment that i love all to myself, i have piece and quiet, I am going to school full time, pretty much year round, i have 3 jobs, and a family whom i love. Looking at that right there, is enough to put a smile on my face. I am so fortunate to have those things, that i know a lot of people out there cant say that they have them. From here on out i will start loving what i have, instead of dwelling over what i do not have, or wish that i had, or never wish that i lost. I am going to stop dwelling over things that i cannot control, and focus on ones that i can :) Right now, thats the only way to be if i want to keep moving forward!

The Great Minnesota Get Together

It has been since, 2006 that i had been to the state fair last, and finally i got to go, and i even went TWICE this year. I was happy :) a couple low key visits was all i needed! My first time back was with Steven, the First day the fair opened, that thursday! Twas a good time, we bought a coupon book hoping to save a couple bucks, it was $5 so why not, plus we passed it down to Aaron and Amanda after we were done with it. But our first stop, was the Big Fat Bacon booth, Steven really wanted one, but we didn't have a coupon so he said no no..but i ended up buying him one cause that was a must, when will he ever get to eat a Big huge piece of pure fat bacon, ON A STICK! Here is a picture of him enjoying :)

After that we walked around for a long while, im pretty sure we covered the whole fair, walked all the way down by the machinery area then took one of the sky rides back so we could wait in line to get my mom one of those kare11 backpacks they were giving out for free, she asked us if we go to just try and get one, so we were determined! We looked through our coupons and we decided to head to Heritage Square to get a pretzel, it was buy one get one free, so we got 2 jumbo pretzels and cheese for like $4.50 so that was a good deal, that and between the pops we bought pretty much covered the cost of the coupon book. We stayed around for a while then just headed up, took the buss from the oakdale location! Im glad we went though, we hadn't been able to do a lot this summer together, or in general so it was nice to get out for a couple hours, plus we both enjoy a good day of people watching :) Here are two others of our food, and of us from our day trip to the fair :)

My Next trip to the fair was with my mom September 5th :) She hadn't been in about the same amount of years as i have, so we decided to go and walk around for a bit as well. I also brought my SLR to mess around a little bit, so that was nice to, i got some practice in on the night photography with the ride, got a few good shots, but the tripod that i brought i couldnt figure it out, so i didnt get very clear pictures because im not very steady, and with the slow shutter speed it made it difficult to get clear pictures. But we also had fun, walked around, peaple watched, went into a few barns. We had one of my favorite foods, but on a stick, PIZZA. gotta love pizza :) we also had some cheese curds (a must) and a corn dog too, oh and ofrcourse, BEER! Here are some pictures from OUR trip to the Great Minnesota Get Together!