Famous Last Words: Last Time

Although I just wrote a post a few days ago, I felt I could write another due to everything coming to an end. I am so thankful for all of the extra credit in this course as it allowed me to take full weeks off when I needed to truly put forth all of my energy in one class. 

I am using this last week to rack up a few more points in order to get the grade I have been aiming for. I still can't believe how fast this semester went by. Each time I would go to put my label on a post, I would be shocked at how many weeks in we were! 

After I complete this course, I plan to devote most of my energy to my chemistry 2 final. For some reason, chemistry just takes longer to click for me. I have that final first on Monday and I know it is going to be my hardest final. I am just praying for motivation to continue to grow rather than decrease as test day comes around. I hope to manage my time and energy in order to ensure I can do my best.

I am a little upset at how my project ended up this semester, but I hit a wall when I wrote one story that wasn't so great. I find it very hard to go back and edit when I really just want to delete it and post a different story. I am thankful I tried a new method though! Last semester, I did a storybook and I feel like a portfolio was better for me in this course specifically. 

I am so thankful I was able to have 2 classes with Laura Gibbs as my instructor as she truly makes the course so interesting. She even goes beyond and provides us with extra credit that I will carry with me forever. I am thankful for all of the opportunities I have been given to learn and grow in this course and hope that others along the way appreciate it as well!

(Photo from WikiMedia).

Famous Last Words: Graduation

This week has been FULL of bitter-sweet times. As I finally allow all that I have procrastinated on catch up to me, I keep getting down as I remember I am spending my final days at OU doing homework. It's a little upsetting, but at least I can visit a few times in the summer before starting graduate school.

With these moments also comes exciting moments like graduation pictures. I felt like it was not really happening. I can't even believe how fast these last 4 years have flown by, but I am so thankful I got to spend them at the best university ever!

(A photo taken by Beverley Howze of my boyfriend, Hunter Justus, and I.)

I am hoping to get into finals mode tomorrow and try to crank out the rest of my work for this course so I can spend the remainder of my time preparing for my final on the Monday of finals week. Once I get that final out of the way, I will be able to spend a bit more time with my friends and that is all my mind wants right now.

Famous Last Words: OU Men's Gymnastics

On Tuesday of last week, I left for Chicago to cheer on the OU Men's Gymnastics team at their National Championship. It was AMAZING! They won their fourth national championship title in a row and made history. It was my boyfriend's last gymnastics meet ever and he officially went all four years of his OU gymnastics career undefeated. The weekend was full of so many huge accomplishments and I am so proud of them!

Photo by me.

The picture above is one that I took at the meet of Yul. He also made history on his own at the meet. He made All-American on 4 of the 6 events and won the individual all-around. It was amazing getting to watch all of his hard work pay off!

With all of the excitement, I still managed to get my assignments done during the week. Unfortunately, I fell behind on my weekend assignments and that makes me a little stressed. I am thankful we are given dead week to do some work because I will definitely need to take advantage of that in order to get the points for the grade I would like in the course.

I am hoping to finish up my assignments earlier this week so I an get all of my extra credit done as well. This will make me feel a little bit better since I know things are going to get extremely busy as the end of the semester creeps up on me.

This week is, hopefully, going to be a little on the slow side. I don't have any exams and just have to take my graduation pictures. I just have to keep myself on task and make my to-do lists each day to ensure I give myself enough time. I think making lists will give me more motivation to complete my tasks so I don't end up cramming everything on one day. I am trying my best to avoid that as senioritis is at an all time high and I know that cramming everything in one day in not likely.

Famous Last Words: Work Hard, Play Hard

This week has been fairly stressful. I had an exam on Thursday and have been studying for a chemistry exam this upcoming Thursday. In addition to my exams, several other things popped up unexpectedly.

Even though I had lots to do, I made sure to make time for relaxation. I feel as though I usually with just study for about 6 hours straight and burn myself out to where I don't have the energy to go hang out with my friends. Taking smaller study sessions and meeting up with friends for lunch or something in between has been more beneficial than I thought. Even though we are always told it, I really never have noticed a difference between when I study for a long time and when I study for a short period of time. This weekend, I feel like I retained so much more information while having fun and not being to stressed throughout the whole time.

I am a little bummed that I didn't get around to my readings or story this week, but I am trying to finish up the remaining assignments now so I can get a head start for next week. Next week I have my chemistry exam that I am struggling with, so I know that is definitely going to take priority up until Thursday. I am hoping I will continue to improve as I study so I feel more comfortable with the material and can spend some time on this class so I don't fall behind on my goals.

On the bright side, I had so much fun this weekend with my friends. On Friday, we all went to HeyDay and bowled as well as play arcade games. I haven't gone out to do something fun and silly like that in forever and we had a blast! Little bits of fun like that will keep me going over this next week!

(Image from PxHere.)

Famous Last Words: SLEEP

This week was one full of craziness! I had several obligations cancelled, run late, and added into my week that I was not expecting. This in addition to an assignment that usually takes me around 2 hours taking 10, made for lots of sleep lost.

I am the type of person that needs sleep to function. By, "needs sleep," I mean a full 8 hours...sometimes more!

On the bright side, some exciting things were also the cause of my lack of sleep. I was able to volunteer with the United Tissue Network in their new high school outreach program called, "Heart for Minds." In this program, we took both preserved and unpreserved hearts to a high school in Oklahoma City. Students interested in the sciences were able to come by and see human organs for their first time and do a little bit of dissecting. We also had health lungs to compare to smokers lungs, a trachea, a heart from a woman with a unique congenital heart disease, a cancerous liver, and more! The students had a blast and the volunteers had an even better time! It was so refreshing being surrounded by others that are as dedicated to helping others reach their goals and get where they want to as I do. I'm hoping they keep this program going!

A personal photo taken of me while teaching high school students about the human heart.

With this lack of sleep, I simply had to catch up. My mind felt foggy and I could not function without it. I ended up falling asleep around midnight on Friday after finishing my assignment and I did not wake up until 11am on Saturday. After waking up, I ate breakfast and fell right back to sleep until 6pm. Yep, you guessed it. At 6pm, I ate and went right back to sleep until noon on Sunday. It was AMAZING! I slept more than I was awake this weekend and I am so very thankful. I am now refreshed and ready to take on the week!

Famous Last Words: Spring Break

This Spring Break was very nice. I got to go home to Houston for a few days and then fly to Colorado with some friends for a few days. I definitely planned to get a lot done over the break and absolutely none of that happened. I actually was okay with it since I told my friend I would drive with her from Colorado since she lives there and drove it home. I was all set and excited to get things done to make the 10 hour car ride a little productive...until I opened my laptop. My laptop was on 7%. I asked every gas station if the sold little outlets that I can plug a laptop charger into and all of them said no. I even sat in a gas station for 20 minutes on a stop to see how much I could get my laptop to charge -- nothing! It ended up being an awful ride because I was so anxious the whole time. I got home around 7:30pm and then had a meeting from 9pm-10:30pm, and here I am now.

This whole senioritis thing is SO REAL. Other than 10 hours of hardcore stressing, spring break was amazing!

(Photo from Trover).

Famous Last Words: Prepare for the Week

This upcoming week is going to be a very busy one. I have long lab on Monday, a chemistry 2 exam on Thursday, and my family comes into town on Friday. This in addition to a big portion of my capstone paper due on the following Tuesday, I am a bit stressed. In an effort to prepare for the week, I tried my best to be productive over the weekend besides Friday night. On Friday night, I relaxed with friends and just let out all of my stress since I know I won't have much time to hang out over this next week and half or so. 

I am a little nervous that I won't finish all of my assignments for this class with the mixture of big and small tasks I have to do all week long. For that reason, I tried to write out a mock schedule for the week. I am hoping I can stick with it because there is not more wiggle room to rearrange things.

Since I am worried about finishing my assignments for the week, I am trying to get done as much extra credit right now in order to even out any things that I do miss. I was about to call it quits for the night, but seeing my schedule definitely motivated me.

My goal for the upcoming week it to drink a lot of water and still try to work out 3 times. I feel like I put those things on the back burner when I need them the most. I made some checkboxes in my planner for both of those goals so I can stay on track.

I am hoping that this new way of approaching a busy week helps decrease some stress and keep me on track. There is nothing more stressful to me than having to turn in work that isn't my best because I didn't have enough time left for the assignment. 

(Photo from Flickr.)

Famous Last Words: PROcrastinator

WELP. After a week of productivity and trying to get ahead, those snow days put me on vacation mode. I definitely was not as focused over those free days and am suffering those consequences now. I am going to do some extra credit tonight as I feel it is too late for me to do my weekend assignments to the best of my ability. Hopefully, I will wake up early and get to work so I can finish up those assignments before the grace period ends. I have already done half of the project assignment and made some edits, but I need to do an edit challenge. I also need to do my project feedback and blog comments. Whether I complete all of them or not, I am hoping this extra credit will ensure I don't fall behind in the course. I would like to be at least a week ahead, but I am definitely behind on that goal at the moment.

On the bright side, I have learned a lot by taking my time on my revisions for my project. I did not realize how often I use passive language where simply rearranging my sentence and changing my passive verbs to active make such an impact on the overall story. I hope to be more aware of this as I write future stories in order to make them stronger. I know it takes practice and this is the perfect place for that!

(Photo taken by me at the OU Men's Gymnastics meet on Saturday, February 24th).

Besides that, I did have a great week. I made Oreo balls for the first time since sophomore year which was a blast. I used to bake all the time and I forgot how much fun it can be. I also went to the women's gymnastics meet on Friday and the men's gymnastics meet on Saturday which is always a good time. Our gymnastics teams are both so talented and deserve SO much more recognition than they get.

Famous Last Words: Rest

The week before last was a crazy one! In order to get all of my assignments for other classes, I put this course on the back burner. I am happy to say, I jumped right back up and completed all of my assignments this weeks and completed plenty of extra credit as well!

I spent most of my weekend relaxing and getting ahead in some of my other classes to ensure I have enough time to tackle this course. I have a feeling it's going to be a great week!

My goal for this week is to get just as much, or more, done as I did last week. I am also hoping to finish some of my other class assignments a tad bit earlier so I am able to go get help in office hours if needed. Nothing is worse than spending hours struggling on an assignment that you know would be so easy if you just had a few minutes of help.

Other than that, I don't have too many exciting plans. I may go see an OU theater show this week since my friend is in it and they are always amazing. All of my plans will just depend on how much I end up getting done throughout the course of the week.

Another goal of mine is to get back to working out this week. I have been doing very well this semester, but I took most of last week off in order to get all of my school assignments done without causing myself too much extra stress. I know this will be a struggle becasue I have been so sleepy lately, but I am making it a priority. I feel as though I have more energy and motivation when I have my workout routine in place.

Other than that, life is great and I am excited to see how this week goes!

(Photo from PixaBay.)

Famous Last Words: Senioritis and GymU

This past week was one of those, "I have a lot to do but don't want to do any of it," weeks. I think I finally understand that whole "senioritis" thing people talk about. I am going to try and make smaller goals in order to make completing tasks a little more exciting in this time of no motivation.

Although I am BEYOND thankful that I got accepted into my graduate program so early, it is making it hard to finish out my last semester strong. Unlike other students, I was a wild child in high school and never put forth any effort into school. I was excited when I got into OU and was provided a "graduation coach" that I had to meet with every 2 weeks to check and make sure I was using my planner and all of that fun stuff and I was enrolled in Gateway along with being advised to not take anymore than 12 hours. I think that coming in with people doubting my success motivated me to prove them wrong. As of now, I have only received 1 "B" my second semester, which I now know should've been fought. The one "B" I received was due to the fact that I was a cheerleader for OU and had to miss class for a national competition and was given a 0 for that class assignment as my professor would not accept my university letter of absence. If you can't tell, I am still very salty about that situation. But, apparently, the grade is set in stone after 3 semesters, so I realized this was an unfair situation a little too late. All of that being said, I have never received a graduation award before and my goal is to do so this year. I am trying to keep that goal in mind to motivate me to get my assignments done.

On a more exciting note, my boyfriend is on the OU Men's Gymnastics team and they had their first home meet this weekend. They had a rough first meet and were very nervous as this was their biggest meet (other than conference and NCAA's), but they CRUSHED it! They notched the top score in the country and continue their 85 meet winning streak as well as not losing at home in 11 years. I wish that more people would come and support those guys because there are several future olympians on the team and it is such an impressive sport to watch.

(All photos taken by me on 1/3/18).