Dream On!

It's not everyday that I am inspired to blog. It takes something striking that I experience or see to make me want to blog. It also takes something that I think is worth sharing with the masses (okay, maybe not the masses...). Today I would like to discuss dreams... No, not the ones Freud analyzed... I'm talking the fourth definition of the noun dream in Webster's Dictionary: a strongly desired goal or purpose dream of becoming president> b: something that fully satisfies a wish dream>.


My thoughts about dreams have been more frequent over the past year or so. Maybe it has to do with the fact that the "real world" is at a closer reach than ever before with graduation just months away. Whatever the reason, I have been thinking a lot about my own dreams lately. What made me take the step over the edge into blogging about dreams was watching "Working Girl", a 80's movie about a young secretary who has a dream of becoming something greater and finds her way up to the top in the business world complete with teased hair and shoulder pads and then watching "The Pursuit of Happiness" tonight. Some time last year when all this "dreamy thinking" began I started a 43 Things online. 43 Things is this great website where you can create an account and list 43 Things that you want to accomplish. You can check off what you have done and write about it, share stories with other people who share you goals, and cheer others goals and have your goals cheered. I highly recommend making a 43 Things to all those in need of tangibly seeing their goals and being able to keep track of them. I know that I am a visual person, so having my goals/dreams in a place where I can read them keeps me motivated to pursue them.

I think that it's so awesome that God gives us the ability to dream and gives us many of the dreams we have. As human beings, we're so unique in this world because of our dreams. They help to make us who we are and make us so unique. Because of this I think that the best way to work out our dreams is to acknowledge that we are created to dream and discuss our dreams with the one who created us. With dreaming in mind, here are a few dreams I have for my final semester of college...some of them are serious...most of them, not so much:

1.) Today I found one of my mom's old dresses in the attic. It's black with rhinestone straps. I really like it and I want to wear it somewhere before the end of next semester.
2.) I am trying to learn guitar. I have mastered one song so far, "Smelly Cat" from Friends. I would like to learn a song that is a little more challenging and perform it in a public place before I graduate.
3.) Knit ten caps for ten people. Today my friend Sarah W. sent me a website about how to knit caps. I started my first one tonight and if it goes well I would like to knit nine more (or more) before the end of the semester. I might even try my hand at selling a few!
4.) For my final project in cartooning class this semester (yes, I really took a class in cartooning...) I decided to make a line of greeting cards. Over the summer I met a woman who owns a gift shop in my town and talked with her about selling greeting cards at her shop. She said she'd love to see my work. At the time I didn't really have any, but now I do and I would love to sell what I have created at her shop and someday start up my own greeting card line...but for now, I'll stick with selling the greeting cards that I have made so far at her shop before the end of the school year.
5.) Read my Bible every day. I just don't read it as much as I'd like, so I want to challenge myself to do so every day. I know that when I do I feel a lot better and understand what exactly I'm doing here so much more.
6.) Go dancing because I now know how (somewhat) thanks to my ballroom dancing class!
7.) Make a music video. I've always wanted to, so why not now?
8.) I want to find a job...because I have to. I want to find a job that I'm passionate about and that gets me excited to go to every day. I'd love for it to have something to do with my major, because that's probably a good idea seeing as I've spent the last four years learning about graphic design related things, but I'd also like for it to be fun and for it to challenge me creatively.
9.) Since I have become more interested in music during my time in college, especially during my senior year, I would like to create a CD with my favorite songs from the year. I think this will be something that I'll play when I'm 40 and think, "Wow... wow." or something along those lines.
10.) Take a picture every day in 2008, put it on a blog, and write about why, where, and when I took it.

Well, I hope this blog post got you dreaming... or at least thinking about dreams. As Hall & Oates says..."I'm down on the daydream"... I hope that after reading this, you are a little bit more down on the daydream too.

Crazy Kids.

Today: A day that will live in infamy....
...at least for me.

Although I'm not normally one to admit it, I am a legal, no holds barred adult. In a few weeks it will be a full year that I have been this way. While most of young America cannot wait for the big 2-1, my 21st was not much different than any other birthday...except that I spent most of it on a plane home from Spain, but that's a different story... Anyway, the reason why today is a day that I feel is noteworthy and worth blogging about for my own records is because today is the day that I realized that I'm no longer a kid.
I started thinking about this on my way to babysitting this afternoon. I had just come from a class that always makes me think, so still being in that state of mind, I was thinking a lot...about my car, about winter break, and then I saw a skateboarding kid in the middle of the road...a very busy road, might I add. This got me to thinking about how kids always seem to do what they want, even if it's dangerous or not very thought out. This thought started me thinking about the things like this that I used to do when I was (according to my age) a kid. I can remember being told not to do things by adults and in return thinking that adults were not very fun at times and overall pretty boring. Like jumping on pillows...who didn't/doesn't love doing that??? But adults always seemed to think that jumping on a pillow in the living room would break the china in the kitchen or something... THEN I realized that the fact that I was thinking about my childhood had to mean something... that something being that because I was reflecting on my childhood and what I used to do, I must no longer be a child. In that moment I stood at a crossroad... childhood down one way and adulthood down the other. Now, if I saw adults as being no fun and kind of boring as a kid, what was that saying about me as an adult? Am I no fun? Am I boring? In order to answer this question I started making mental notes about what it was that I saw adults doing as a kid that I really didn't like. Here are a few of them:

1.) Pretending to laugh. Who does this? I have...I try not too that much, but I have and I'm not proud of it! The only adults who I can really remember being able to pin as fake laughers were my mom and dad because I was around them the most as a kid and heard all their various forms of laughter over many holiday gatherings and time spent at the playground with them. I vow here and now to not be a fake laugher... because kids never are. If it's funny, they laugh... if it's not, they don't. Simple as pie. Forget what's polite... Forget whats socially acceptable... Kids are real.
2.) Worrying too much. My roommate Sarah pointed this out to me when I was talking to her tonight. It's so true though... I can remember hearing my mom tell me about the things that she was worried about and feeling so helpless because all I could do was tell her that it was going to be alright. This worrying was over big things, but also little things... like cleaning up for company. Who cares if the corner hutch is dusted?? We're about to eat meatballs and pasta... no one will be looking up there anyway... I'm not saying that I have something against dusting (although my room doesn't always reflect this), but I am saying that worrying doesn't help anything. Kids are so good at just accepting things the way that they are and finding a way to work with them... or crying about it and then accepting it. Kids are also so great at always seeing things positively. I can't ever remember telling a worried adult that things wouldn't work out... I just never knew that side of things... except when it came to possibly not getting that Baby Born I wanted for Christmas.
3.) Forgetting to have fun. Maybe it's due to changing so many diapers or migraines or hot flashes, but for whatever reason I can recall being somewhere, most likely twirling, skipping or dancing, and wanting an adult to join in only to have my offer turned down. In my opinion there are no wrong places to twirl, skip or dance. In fact, I think there isn't enough twirling, skipping and dancing in the world. In fact, I'm dancing now! Okay... okay... I'm not... I'm an adult, remember? (But that won't stopping from dancing in front of the mirror later)... I'm not saying that adults never have fun. My dad is one of the biggest kids I know and he's always making things fun whether it's putting a bed pan on his head when my mom was in the hospital or dancing around the kitchen... but, I'm just saying that there are a lot of adults that I can remember seeing and who I still see who refuse to play along with their kids or be silly. I don't want to be this way.
4.) Losing sight of the adventure. I'm a strong believer in adventure. Whether it's a trip to a place I have never been before or an adventurous journey to the frozen foods aisle in the grocery store, I'm all about the adventure. I love making things fun and memorable, even when they are stupid or seem bad... Although I prefer not to, I like getting lost and finding my way with friends. I can remember taking a trip to White Plains, NY with my friend Lou and getting totally lost. This had to be at least five years ago now and we still talk about it. The thing I used to really dislike about some adults was the way that little calamities, such as getting lost, were always blown up into these big catastrophes that were yelled about and angrily handled as if they had no solution. Something that makes me laugh is remembering a phrase the my mom uses so well. Whenever one of these adventures would come up she would always tastefully say "f***ing shit" in a voice that I have never heard duplicated until this day. She still uses this phrase and it always makes me smile even though I know she is sometimes really upset... She always finds a way to laugh at herself about the way she reacts to things like this later, which makes her an adult that I look up to for finding the adventure in things that may seem sort of terrible at the time. The adults who I am referring to who have lost sight of the adventure are the ones who get so worked up about little things that they themselves feel that the world itself will end and as a result make everyone around them uneasy. I would much rather act like a kid in these sorts of situations and take the situation seriously, but make the situation fun at the same time... and maybe even take a few pictures along the way...
5.) Having such little faith. Maybe it was the whole Santa Claus thing that did them in, but for whatever reason adults seem to lack the faith that children have. I'm not saying that there aren't any faithful adults out there, but for the most part from what I know and now being on the other side of things (I gave up on the Santa thing when I was 14... I had some attachment issues...) adults are pretty skeptical about things. Now, there is nothing wrong with asking questions... I think the right to ask questions is one of the greatest rights that we have as human beings... but what I'm talking about is the way that adults have such a hard time believing things even when the evidence is there right in front of them. There is always that second notion of whatever the something is that you are trying to believe in being a scam or something. I am guilty of being suspicious of things in my life. Maybe adults have just been burned one too many times... or maybe kids are just sheltered from all the hurt that comes from being burned... But still, I think that there is a lot of good in the world... as much as there is bad...or more, but so much focus gets put on the bad (news anyone?). I say, take a step out on a limb... Take that leap of faith and believe in something that you haven't dared to before. I have and I couldn't be happier.


Well, that's all I have for now. I don't know who actually reads this blog, but if there are people out there who do, I would love to hear your feedback and see what you think about all this... and please no that regardless of what my age may say, I will always be a kid at heart and I hope that you will too :-D

Things We Lost in the Dryer

So, it's been a long time since my last post...and as long times usually go...a lot has happened since then! In an effort to keep this post short, yet insightful, I have decided to highlight the top five happenings since last I posted on Pass the Mustard Seed.

Here goes nothing...

5.) I have learned that if you're going to get a flat tire, you should get one while in the presence of my friend Christine. Not only is Christine encouraging in any situation, she is also a Physical Therapy student. My tire went flat on Mt. Carmel Avenue, a scenic road which always seems to bug just narrow enough to keep me driving under 45 mph (probably a good thing) and just wide enough that on early mornings I can pretend that I'm driving in the countryside (this in on days that I see geese and/or the horse that resides in the back of one of the houses on the street). Anyway...my tire went flat and I could have called AAA, but Christine and I like an adventure so we wanted to do it ourselves...AND Christine was so encouraging the whole time! She didn't complain once, even though it was raining and windy...and she reminded me to keep my back straight.

4.) I have become a Venti-sized Office fan. The show is just so good!

3.) I cut my hair...at a barber shop...and now have bangs.

2.) I learned to pearl and am now making a ribbed scarf!

1.) I have developed an eclectic taste in music! I know, I know...don't people normally do that before their senior year of college? Well, yes...yes they do, but up until this year I never really had as burning an interest in music as I do now. My cousin told me about a website called The Hype Machine where I find out about a lot of new music...I highly recommend it. Some of my latest favorites are: Ingrid Michaelson, Regina Spektor, Sondre Lerche, MIKA, Nellie McKay, Iron & Wine, Travis, and Feist...to name a few. Heard of them? Let's talk! Haven't heard of them, check them out! They're goooood!

This happened.

So, it is a somewhat widely unknown fact that during high school I went through a few phases. There was the toe sock phase, which entailed my wearing toe socks (which were usually rainbow colored) with capri pants and sandals. Then there was the driving around aimlessly phase from Stamford, CT to Portchester, NY (a total drive of fifteen minutes) and then back...and then back again. I mustn't forget the prank phase complete with Marilyn Monroe wig, tiny hand-shaped back scratcher and made up languages. There were many more...too many and too inconsequential to to name here, but I will mention one more: the walking home from school phase.

I know that you're all on the edge of your seats about this one, so I won't keep you waiting any longer. This phase included, oddly enough, me walking home from school. I know, you wouldn't have guessed that in a thousand years... The reason why I'm mentioning all this is because of a certain occurrence that happened today which reminded me of those good old days of walking home from school.

You see, during a handful of those walks home, for no apparent reason, I found an assortment of playing cards. Now, I may be a little out of the loop on the latest beats that the kids are listening too and who's dating who in Hollywood, but I'm pretty sure that there was never a major outflow of sidewalk card players. Even so, there seemed to always be a card to pick up whenever I chose to walk home, which seeing as it was my "walking home from school phase", was quite often.

So get this, today I got to thinking about those good old days of walking home from school and collecting playing cards and thought, while walking by the library today, that it would be great to find a playing card one of these days so that I could write in my new blog about it. The thought passed and I continued on with my day...Then tonight at precisely 11:25pm my roommate, Sarah B., text messaged me with, "Hey will u be up in 15 min? I found something on the street for u lol!" I know you all know what it was by now...a braughtworst...well you're right! Just joking... YES!! She found playing cards...and we're not just one standard Bicycle brand card...we're talking a nearly complete deck of smiley faced, candy corn shaped playing cards!! What are the odds...seriously. Today I think of walking home which makes me think of the cards I used to find and how I'd like to blog about finding a playing card while walking today and then POOF! Sarah B. shows up with a deck of cards in her hands that she found not on a table...not in the mouth of a dog...but ON THE STREET. I know, it's crazy...but the Lord works in mysterious smiley faced, candy corn shaped card-finding ways!

WHY?!

Today I stumbled across this sneaker while doing something that I do quite often-browsing google's image library. It got me thinking about my own shoes and their lack of music. I guess it would be a good way to get moving and I could see it taking the place of the 90's boom-box-on-the-shoulder craze (which, in my mind was the cause of a number of cases of scoliosis) but besides all that it seems a little extreme.

Cucumber

I just thought I'd document this large cucumber I got from the QU cafeteria.

Dude, Where's My Mac?

Today I had no finals, which should mean that I'm happy...well, I was...until right now. You see, the Macintosh computers at QU are a crucial part of the Interactive Digital Design curriculum... In order to do homework I pretty much need a Macintosh. Unfortunately, they seem to run scarce on our campus, especially during finals week. I was happily using one earlier today in our school's Mac lab until I was told to leave by a professor who had a final class coming in. This is understandable seeing as the final class needed to render their final projects (a term which here means sit and watch while the computer processes information for sometimes hours at a time). I was fine with that-it allowed me a break for dinner and some time for the swelling, that I'm sure was occurring in my head due to excessive exposure to the program Flash, to go down. What triggered my mood to go from <:-) to something more along the lines of >:-( was the fact that when I came back to the library to look for open computers there were none and when I went to the lab nearly an hour after leaving it originally, I found several open computers and a locked door with the class still inside! It wasn't the fact that the there were empty computers in the classroom that made me angry as it was that the door was locked so I couldn't even ask the professor when he would be done!

Okay, enough of that rant...One thing I really like about blogging is that it kind of puts things in perspective. Here I am feeling annoyed and frustrated, but then I write down how I'm feeling this way and realize that things that seem to really matter don't as much when they're in writing next to an angry bean cartoon wearing a hat that was probably borrowed from Frank Sinatra.

Besides all these negative vibes (dudddee...) I would like to comment on how nice a day it was! There's so much to be thankful for-the beautiful weather, friends and family, chocolate milk, and of course laughter...I think I should write for Hallmark. I hope all of you out there in blog land are doing well. I'll catch ya later.

Blogger Happy

I've never had my very own, personal, 'this is what I did today...' blog, but I figured that since I am embarking into the summer where I'm hoping to have some noteworthy experiences and since it's the Monday of finals week at 11:something PM and I don't have any finals tomorrow, it's probably in my best interest to create a blog! I have kept diaries and journals (the grown-up diary) before, but frankly, it's still a little strange to write down today's happenings in virtual form...if I could have made 'virtual form' all squiggly I definitely would have!

Today was a nice day for a few reasons. The first reason is that I got to watch two movies with my roommate who is graduating this year! We've been roommates for three years now and it's going to be weird to not have her there in the morning to tell about the dream I had with the dancing waffles or to be able to walk to the cafeteria with her for lunch. Today was also enjoyable because of the beautiful weather and of course, a wonderful turkey sandwich I got for lunch (we just got new turkey at our school and I couldn't be happier about it) Well that's all for my first post. I'm sure that you were absolutely on the edge of your seat reading that one... Talk to you soon. Is that what I say?



P.S. The picture of those older folks represent how excited I am about having this new blog!