New Apartment!!

Welcome to my apartment!!  A lot of people have been curious as to what my apartment looks like so I thought that I would make a blog about it to show my apartment off to everyone that won't be able to visit me for a while!  I actually had my first visitor today!!  Kyle Johnson came over and helped me hang up my curtains!  :)  so now my decorating is complete, and I am ready to make this post!

So without further ado I'll start off with my...

Bedroom:

 This is what you would see when you walk straight into my room.  You can see my new curtains, and my computer.  With the Sims on the screen of course!!  Because I am majoring in business, and minoring in the Sims haha.  I swear I've played it just about everyday!  :)  You can also see the desk that Becky donated to my "college furniture" fund.  Thanks Bec!! 

Here is a view of my two closets.  The first little closet has built in shelves that I can put stuff on. The other larger one is a walk in closet.  I have a better view down below.

 Here is my little closet opened.  You can see where I've already stacked some stuff up inside of it!! 

Here is half of my closet opened.  The other side actually doesn't have too much on it!!  Shocking I know!  I have my clothes arraigned by business casual, casual, and then long sleeves.  On top I have all of my t-shirts and hoddies.  This took me a while to do!!  I hate hanging stuff up... especially when I'm not sure if I have enough hangers!!  I actually forgot to pack my hangers on the initial move in so I had to bring them in my next trip.  This meant that my clothes were all on the ground for about a week!!  When I was gathering hangers up in my room I didn't think that I could possibly need them all....  NOPE!  WRONG!!!  I absolutely did need them all!  I actually just about ran out!!  I had to double up on a couple!!   And here I didn't think that I had that much clothes!!  Haha!

 Here is a quick view of my bed.  It takes up a decent amount of my room, but I actually have more room in this room than I do at my room in home!  I actually have room to walk around in this room!  Yaaay!  I'm soooo glad that my bed is alright!  On move in day it was supposed to rain, so I was stressing to cover up my new couch (below) and my bed up.  Well Cody just bought a new bed so he had a lot of plastic leftover that I used to wrap around my bed.  We ALMOST made it to BG without disaster... however once we got to BG it started to DOWN POUR... for about 5 minutes!  Just enough time to get everything soaked!  My bed was the only true potential causality.  Due to the plastic Cody gave me only the very bottom got wet.  Shawn let me borrow his box fan for the night, and my bed ended up drying and being fine!!  But I was nervous!!  I had to sleep on my couch that night!!  Luckily my couch was wrapped up in the plastic I bought it in or it would have been soaked too, and then I'd have been sleeping on my floor that first night!!

 Since I had taken a shot of everything else... I figured that I would show off my night stand and my LIFE SAVER fan!!!  When I moved in I originally thought that I was going to be bringing an air conditioner... so I almost didn't even pack the two little fans that I have.  Well... once Cody and Shawn carried my big heavy air conditioner up the stairs we realized that it wouldn't fit into the window (sorry guys) so they had to take it back... and I was left with the two little fans!  :(  It actually hasn't been too bad.  It's been pretty cool out, but there were a few scorchers nights that were just about unbearable!!

Bathroom

  Here is a view of my bathroom!!  I looove the look that I have in my bathroom.  If that shower curtain looks familiar I'm not entirely surprised.  I stole it from my dad's bathroom!!  Haha!!  I left him the cartoon fish shower curtain that my mom bought for me!  Haha!! Thanks for taking one for the team dad!!  I think this shower curtain looks a lot better in my bathroom than yours anyway.  Originally when I asked him for it I was just joking, but then he went on to say... "I don't care... I don't even know what the shower curtain in there looks like anyway."  So I was like... well then in THAT case I'll snatch it up!!

 Here is my most distinct and favorite part of my bathroom!  My Aunt Sherry hooked me up with most of the stuff you see.  I really love the shelf.  I think it's really pretty, and I love the fish and the sea shell pails!  I have q-tips, cotton balls, and hair clips in each respective bin.  Above on the top shelf I put all of my nail polish in the bottom piece that goes along with the set.  Once I was done I was in love with the top two shelves, but the bottom one looked distinctly plain so I grabbed some candles that I found in my attic and put them there.  I'm pretty pleased and proud with the way this turned out.  I'm not going to lie it makes me happy every time that I walk into my bathroom and look at it.  :)

 Here is another one of my walls.  You can see another piece that I got from my Aunt Sherry.  Also you can see one of my towel racks.

 Here is a view of other wall and sink.  The picture there says "Powder Room" and I like it quite a bit.  The one aspect that I'm not 100% pleased with in my bathroom is that my door hides this picture a lot.  The reason why Cody and I decided to put it there was because the only other wall that I had was very close to the shower, and I didn't want it to get water damaged.

Kitchen

 Here is a view of my hallway leading to my bedroom which is straight ahead, and then the bathroom is off to the right.  On the other side is where my furnace is located.

 Here is a quick view of my kitchen.  It's not all that big.  I used to have a decent amount of counter space but then I put my microwave, toaster, and dishrack on all of my open surfaces!!  So now it's kind of a tight squeeze when I'm preparing dinner.

 Here is the door way view.  It's a good view of my dining table.  The weekend that I was moving to BG I went to Jamie's Flee Market with Cody and his mom, and we found this table and chair set for a reasonable price!  I was pretty pumped about it! So we snatched it up. I later found the material to throw overtop of it.  If you look really closely you can see my fragance warmer in the center of the table.  The fragance warmer is very similar to the Scentsy except a little bit better.  You buy jel and put a bit onto the plate, and you turn it on.  A light bulb turns on and releases the fragrance into the air.  It is sooo much safer than a candle and it's really easy to clean too!  All you have to do is pick up the plate and wash it!  I'm a fan!!  Kyle came over today and told me that my apartment definetely smelled girly.  I took that as an extreme compliment!!  :)

Living Room

 Here is my brand new couch!!  I looove this couch!!  I was originally planning on taking my grandma's couch and use it here at college, but then dad offered to buy me a new couch from Big Lots.  Cody and I went to Big Lots and we picked this couch out!  My dad and uncle Johnny were planning on going to Big Lots to pick up the couch for me. Well... they drove out to Big Lots and due to a communication error/phone error I did not receive the call that they were at Big Lots, and they actually purchased the wrong couch!!  I was going to just settle for the other couch, but dad said that he didn't mind if we exchanged it. So we went back to Big Lots and got the right one!!  I'm SUPER happy that we did, because I really, really, really LOVE this couch!!  It's so pretty and comfy!!

 Here is a quick view of my TV.  I don't have cable... so I don't really watch tv all that often.  But it's still cool!  You should have seen all the stress I went through to get the tv up on that little base!!!  GAH!  At least it's holding up on my stand well!  :)

 If you look in the opposite direction you can see my wall with my pretty pictures on it.  This is right behind my couch by my table.

 Here is a side view, and you can see it all together!  Yaaay!!  Can you see my new curtains??  I was excited!!  It was slightly difficult to get them up.  I'm glad that Kyle helped, because I'd have never done it the way he did!!  Also you can see my coffee table and end table here.  My Aunt Dar actually gave me another set of coffee/end tables that I could have used in my apartment.  I didn't use it because I was worried about knocking the glass tables off!!  I'm a clutz and I'm not sure if you can tell or not, but if you look there isn't a whole lot of room between my hallway and my coffee table.  I knock into that end table everyday so I'm sure that I would have destroyed the other set, plus I loved the drawers that Becky's end tables had!  You should see all the stuff I've put in them!!  :)

 I took this picture to try to highlight my favorite picture!  If you look it's right by my door!  I absolutely LOVE this picture!  It's my favorite!  I'm sooo glad that I got it from my Aunt Sherry.  I love looking at it when I walk out of my apartment or when I'm walking to the kitchen or living room!!  :)

 Here is a different view of my curtains.  Here I have them pulled back.  I'm not sure if I'm going to do that and then let the shears hang down to cover my window. As you'll see I pulled back both sets right now.  I'm really glad that I got the shears on, because I really really liked them.  You can't really see well but they have pretty flower decorations on them.  The actual curtains have a flowery/leaf design on them too.  I know that it's hard to see!  I'm not sure how I am going arraign my curtains.  I only JUST got them up so I haven't got to play with them yet!  I was too excited to make this post first!  :)

 Now to my door!  Here is the rug that Cody's mom bought me at Jamie's Flee Market!  It's really comfy!  I really like it!!  I notice now that it's not quite straight in this picture like it usually is... grrr...  I could go and take a new picture of it for my blogs sake, and then upload it and put in on here, but that would require just TOO MUCH EFFORT!!  It's already 10:25pm...  so please forgive me for the sloppy picture.

 I just wanted to highlight a couple things on my door.  Here is my regular lock, my dead lock, and my "Redneck Contraption Strap Thingy"...

Here is a better view.  When we first walked into my apartment, this was the FIRST thing that Cody and I noticed.  We were like ....  what... in... the...WORLD... is... that?!   As earlier typed, I affectionally call it my "Redneck Contraption Strap Thingy"...  The "thingy" part to the name is the key.  I think that it sets off the name rather nicely, don't you?? Maybe?  But to be serious when I first saw this I was a little bit concerned.  I was wondering what made it neccesary for the "thingy" to be added in the first place??  I guess I can sleep assured... if my lock and dead bolt give out I'll be safe...  my faithful strap thingy will protect me!

But I won't lie... As much as I question the neccesity of it I still use it every night!!  I can't fall asleep unless I know my Redneck Contraption Strap Thingy is in place!  It's like when you go to a hotel, and they have an automated lock system, and then one tiny little hook that you can use.  I always use the extra hook, and secure myself in regardless if it's neccesary or not. I mean it's there right??  Maybe we have shady handy men here??  The apartment building has keys to all of the rooms so perhaps it's the same philosophy that hotels have?  They give you the extra lock so that you can sleep assured that their people won't come in during the night, or something??  I'm not sure, but they look like they were hastly added.  I'll have to look into the reason...

WELL...I hope that you enjoyed the tour of my apartment!  I know that it sure has taken me a while to make this blog post!!  I want to thank everyone that helped me move in, and everyone that gave me stuff for my apartment. 

A big thanks to Mark for letting us use his truck and trailer to get everything here, and a really big thanks to Cody and Shawn for helping move me in!  I wouldn't have been able to get everything in without them!!  And also another special thanks to Cody for staying after everyone left to help me set all of my pictures up!  If he had left right away with everyone else there is no way that my apartment would look half as nice, or if everything was on my walls it would have been after a massive struggle on this short girls part!! 

I want to thank Aunt Becky, Aunt Sherry, and Aunt Dar for all of their help and everything that they gave me to use in my apartment. 

And I also really want to thank my mom and dad for buying me a lot of the essential items that I needed in my apartment, and for always supporting me over the years.  I know that packing up and moving somewhere new is never fun, but they've both been the two constant people that have always made sure that I had everything that I needed and that I got to school safely!  I feel like they've both always gone above and beyond what is expected of a parent and I really do not take it for granted!

Overall I really apperciate everyone's help and I feel very lucky and loved for all of the help you have all given me!  I can't thank everyone enough for all the love and kindness you've all shown me!!  It's tough moving into a new place and trying to get everything needed for an apartment.  My family helped me sooo much, and I'm really pleased with how my apartment looks and how functional it is to live in!!  One hard part of living in Scotland was how little I had, and how my room was just plain white and cold, and I didn't have hardly any cooking utensils or anything.  My apartment is sooo completely different then that...  I feel like I have nice things, and my apartment is really comfortable.  I really feel like I'm starting out in my life.  So I just want to say one more time thanks to everyone that helped!!

Bendix CVS

I know that this post has been a long time coming.  I think that everyone knows now that I worked at Bendix in Elyria for 8 months during last spring and this summer.  I think that Bendix was a great experience for me!!

I learned sooo much from working at my coop.  I swear, before I thought that I was pretty good at Excel, but after like the first week of my coop I learned that there was sooo much more to learn!!  I feel like now I am a little bit more competent at excel.  I also got to experience some other programs; such as SAP, microsoft outlook, and other systems.  I think this knowledge going forward will help a lot.  Especially, because my group of co-ops made indepth training documents on a lot of daily tasks.  I think going forward to my new job... wherever that may be... I will be able to take these documents and figure a lot of stuff out on my own.  Very helpful!  I'm very excited that we have these training documents.

I really wish that I would have posted my about my doings at Bendix while I was there, but alas... I was a blog slacker.  A lot was going on for me during this time period.  I had ... 3 love interests during this time?  Which seems pretty crazy to me!  Here I hadn't really dated in a long time, and during my coop I ended going out with three different guys.  When I first started working at Bendix I was talking to Alex a lot, then I ended up dating Mark, and finally I started dating my current boyfriend Cody.   =)

  Not to make up excuses but that took up a lot of my time.  Let alone being at work 9 hours a day!  I think that Bendix was the longest that I ever had a consistent job.  The waking up and working everyday was a big adjustment.  I love having my spare time now, and I'm truly going to enjoy my last year at college!!


Anyways, back to my coop.  I honestly believe that I was on one of the best teams at Bendix.  I was able to do so much with my group.  At first I was a little bit intimidated by the fact that the group I was working on was so diverse.  My original thought was that it seemed like everyone had very different distinct personalities in our group... which proved true.  I ended up really liking this though.  I think that is it great going forward, because I feel like I've worked for someone with just about every personality type that you are going to find in the work place.  Also, it was great because my group was very supportive.  I got to a lot of supplier visits, and I got to go to our plant in Huntington.  I got to take a GD&T training course, which is basically about how to read and label engineering drawings.  It was a long class, and pretty boring at times but I really think that it was beneficial.  I'm glad that I was included in being able to take the class.  I also got to experience a wide variety of training classes while I was there.  On my daily tasks I was given a good amount of responsibility and I was kept busy which I liked.  I also got to manage a summer help student which was a unique situation for me.  I have been managed before, but I've never really done the managing.  So that was an interesting switch for me.  It's a lot more difficult than you would expect!!

I feel like I learned a lot about purchasing overall at Bendix which is a large part of Supply Chain Management.  I liked purchasing, but I really wish that I could have a coop in planning just to see if I like that part of supply chain management too.  However, being the practical person that I am... I realize that there are a lot of opportunities in purchasing, and I feel that is at least where I will start out as in my career.

Overall I would have to say that my experience at Bendix was very positive and very beneficial.  I really liked it there, and I'm glad that I choose to work at Bendix.  When I was at the job fair I interviewed with quite a few other companies, and I received a few other offers.  Bendix had been my first choice all along for various reasons, but I'm really glad that they gave me an offer.  I was treated very well, paid excellently, and I feel like I learned a lot.  If anyone is looking for a coop I would highly suggest Bendix.  Bendix is a fantastic company with a lot of great individuals working there.

In my upcoming posts I am planning on showing off my apartment and new car!!  :)  Stay tuned!  I actually have some free time to blog every now and then now!  :)

Wizarding World of Harry Potter

I can't believe that it has already been a year since I visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  I have to say that this amusement park experience was probably the coolest thing that I had ever seen!!  I absolutely loved it, and I thought that it was very well put together.  Universal did a great job.  I was constantly amazed as I looked around the Wizarding World... I truely felt like I was going to run into Harry Potter at any moment.  It was fantastic.

I was very lucky!!  I booked my trip to Orlando back in December.  And it turns out that I just so happened to book for openning week!!  I got a super cheap hotel room deal too compared to what I would have paid had I waited until the openning day was announced.  It was extremely crowded when I was there!  People were waiting between 5-8 hours JUST to get into the park during the intial openning day.  Luckily, I didn't have to wait that long.  I only had to wait a couple hours to get in each day, and of course I was there right as the park openned!  In order to get into the wizarding world section you had to get a ticket to show that you had waited in line.  There is my golden ticket into the Wizarding World of Harry Potter!

Isn't the castle breath taking?  I was completely in love with it.  It looks just like the castle from the movies.  And the inside of the castle is the coolest thing I've ever seen.  I swear the wait in line was almost as good as the ride itself!  But we'll get to that later!

I know that it is hard to tell but this is the inside of Olivander's Wand Shop.  When I was there the lines to get into Olivander's were outrageous!  We were lucky because I met up with some people from my Harry Potter website and they let us cut in line with them.  Life saver!  Or I might not have ever got to go into Olivanders.  There is a quick show inside.  The man that plays Olivander picks a person from the crowd to have a wand choose them, and things happen inside Olivanders as you try to test out your wand, and find the right one for you.  It's pretty cool!!

Here is one of the stores that you can shop in to find all kinds of cool things from key chains to robes, and all kinds of other harry potter related merchandise!  Very cool!  But make sure that you don't wait in line to get into this shop and into Olivanders, because when you exit Olivanders you come into this shop.  The only complaint that I had about the park was how small these shops were! They were not accommodating to large crowds of people at all, but I guess they wanted the feel to be right.

Here is the Three Broom Sticks.  We waited a good hour or so to go into it.  But it was neat to get to eat inside of it :)  The food inside is actually reasonably priced for theme park food.  I also got my first taste of butterbeer while standing in line.. and let me tell you it was DELICIOUS!  I loved it!  I had soooo many mugs of it!!  I bought a mug originally that was $10 that I got to keep, and then the refills for it wasn't too bad. However, if you didn't know where to buy the butterbeer you could stand in line for it for a looong time, because everyone wanted to try it!

My recommendation is to buy it in the Hogs Head, because there is less of a line in there.  I think that people don't realize you can buy the butterbeer in there.

Most people were standing outside in line at the butterbeer stands.  These lines were quite long in the sun!  I can imagine that people were not happy to be standing in the line, but I would say it is worth it, because it tastes yummy!!!

Here is the Hogwarts Express!

After years of talking, and being friends on Hogwarts Online I finally got to meet Chauncey!!  I was really excited about meeting him, because we've talked so much over the years.  I think that the Wizarding World of Harry Potter was an appropriate place for us to meet for the first time.  He didn't get to go into the parks with us, but we did get to have lunch together which was really nice. We actually ate at the Hard Rock Cafe with a few other people from HO.  :)  That was definitely a highlight of the trip for me.

Here is the outside line to get in the ride.  Notice how it is a like a greenery? That is because you are supposed to be waiting in the Green House or Herbology department at Hogwarts.  If you looked up you could see all kinds of magical plants along with normal plants.  I was pretty cool!!  I didn't even notice it at first, but the girl I was with Rachel pointed it out to me!

Here is the entrance into the castle!!  I was sooooo excited about getting to go inside.  I had nooo idea how amazing and detailed the inside of the castle would be.  I almost feel that once you get to this point you are no longer just waiting in line.  You are going through part of the experience.  It was sooo amazing!!  There were so many chambers and rooms inside that just seemed absolutely magical!

Once you walk into the castle there are a number of objects around you.  I won't list every detail here, but I'll just show some highlights.  Here are the house points area.  Which I thought was really cool.  The only part that I didn't like was that Ravenclaw was losing!!  Boo on whoever made that decision!!  Haha.

There are a few more rooms in between the entryway and this room, but this is the first significant room.  Here there are numerous pictures on the wall.  And the 4 founders of Hogwarts are here, and they are talking among themselves.  I think everyone was a bit amazed to see this, and here were really excited about it.

Here is Dumbledore's Office!!  There is actually a hologram of him in this room, and he is talking to everyone.  It's pretty neat!!  I loved looking at all the different gadgets and what not that would be in his office!!  And it was the first hologram that you see.  Which leads us to the next room...

Here is a Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom which has skeleton's of creatures inside of it, and the trio appear to talk to you.  Originally they sneak into the classroom under the invisibility cloak.  Basically this is where you learn the story behind the ride.  The trio is surprised that muggles got into the castle, and originally you were supposed to come to attend a history of magic class.  They tell you that class is dreadfully boring, and that they are going to sneak you out to quidditch match!!  Very cool!  Now each room in the castle has two different version's of the story they tell.  In this case sometimes Ron will make the room snow or he will cause lightning to go off.  I think they change the story up a little bit so that it's a bit different everytime you come in.  You always hear different sinbits of the conversations.  It is rare that you will stay in one room to listen to them talk all the way... unless of course you stayed there and let people pass you in line.  Which is what I did when I figured this out!!  :)

 

After the DADA classroom you will past numerous other things.  Among that is the portrait of the Fat Lady.  She will talk to you a bit.  But then you get to the sorting hat which tells you to hurry up and get onto the ride!  Once you see the sorting hat you will QUICKLY get onto the ride.  I mean you will almost have to run to get up there!  I was shocked at how fast it moved.  This ride continuously moves and loads so that the most amount of people can get on it.  I think it is incredibly popular ride at Universal.  I wouldn't be surprised if it was the single most popular attraction.  While waiting in line for the ride was spectacular going on the ride was amaaaazing!!!!   It was the most unique ride I have ever been on.  I have to say that I was thoroughly impressed by it.  It was a ride, but it was sooo much more!  I really felt like I was in the world of Harry Potter.  It was sooo well done. I couldn't believe it.  Very creative, and very detailed.  The ride itself must have cost a fortune to make.  It had quidditch, giant spiders, dragons, dementors... everything in this ride!  It truly put you into the scenarios.  Half of it was flying into a screen, and the other half was 3D props.  It's very hard to describe it properly.  You will just have to ride it for yourself!!  I would HIGHLY recommend it.

Here are some more props around the park!  The Ford Angelina from the second book!

Here is a view of Hogsmeade.    The buildings are very detailed and quite impressive to see.  They were bit a little bit too small for the park, but still... they looked very authentic.

I thought that this was pretty neat!!  Above the ATM there was a sign for Gringotts Bank, or the bank in the Wizarding world.  I thought this was too funny!!  Very cool!  Right next to this sign is probably the only water fountain in the whole area!