You Still Need Your Friends

A few weeks ago someone told me that when a person becomes involved in a dating relationship they lose two of their closest friends. Before this year I would think that was absolutely ridiculous, until I experienced it first hand. Now don't get me wrong, I know when you first start dating someone it's new and exciting and you want to be able to get to know them more blah blah blah. However, I personally don't think it's healthy if you spend every free moment you can with them. It's important to invest time with your friends for a few reasons:

1. They were there first:
Remember that you partook in this friendship way before your dating relationship. Your friends were there when you first met your love, and you probably asked advice about if you should take the next step (become boyfriend/girlfriend) or just remain friends with them. You probably trusted them enough to meet said person, and if they approved then you felt comfortable to go ahead in the relationship.

2. God made us different:
As much as I love being married, I think I would pull my hair out if I wasn't able to see/hang out with another female. Don't get me wrong, I love Keven with all that's in me, but it's nice to chat with my girlfriends and talk about girl stuff. Any guy will tell you how much they enjoy a night with the guys, whether its playing basketball or video games, just being able to hang out together is so enjoyable. Same thing goes for girls.

3. When things get rough:
What happens if your and your new love have a disagreement, or get into a huge argument? Most of the time, you think you're right while the other thinks they are right. Most people don't know how to work through such a matter, and they like to take the easy route and call it quits. It's good to be able to vent about this frustration to your friends. This way you get an unbiased third party involved, and they can help you to take a rational approach about it.

4. Real ones tell the truth:
Your friends want you to be happy, and don't want to see you end up with a lame-o. Therefore, they will be able to surface your "loves" flaws and bring them to your attention. This is great because you may still have the love puppy goggles on, clogging up your vision. Now you can see if this flaw is something that you can work past, or if it's something that could be a deal breaker.

So, how can you go about making sure you don't lose two of your closest friendships when you become involved in a new relationship? Look at your calendar and set specific days/nights to hang out with your friends. If you go more than a week without talking with your friend, or more than two weeks without hanging out, then some red flags should be drawn. Your friends can only do so much with texting, calling, sending Facebook messages, etc. to get your attention, it's up to you to return the favor and set something up. If you don't, right now it may not seem like a big deal, but when you look back at your past all your memories will be filled with just going in and out of relationships, and not having steady friends by your side.

May Madenss

Forget about NCAA march madness, the month of May is packed full of events to keep Keven and myself busy!! Out of the 5 weekends in May, we are booked for 4 of them! We are so grateful to have understanding employers that are flexible with us needing practically every weekend off.

Here's the breakdown of our month:

May 3-5: Graduation weekend, time with all three families
May 10-12: Home to Winston-Salem for a much anticipated wedding of Jonathan and Emilie!!!!
May 17-19: Home to Greenville. Keven's home church is throwing a graduation celebration for all the high school and college grads -- it's so nice to have a small, loving church family!
May 24-26: NOTHING!! Here's to hoping for a beautiful weekend we can spend at the beach ;)
May 30-June 2: Traveling home to Winston late Thursday evening, then heading to Ohio Friday with my Dad for my cousins wedding!

Let me just take a moment to talk about our trip this upcoming weekend. I am beyond excited that Keven and I get to participate in Staff & Em's joyous day! Jonathan and Keven were roommates at CSU Freshmen and Sophomores year, and we had the pleasure of meeting Emilie when she would come visit Jonathan once or twice a school year. Luckily for Staff, his roommate had a girlfriend (me) that attended CSU, which allowed Emilie to spend weekends on campus with no hassle of an expensive hotel room! First meeting Emilie I realized how outgoing and inquisitive she is. The first night she stayed in my room I think she asked me 20 or so questions trying to get to know me, which was nice because it was a good ice breaker! They are both so sweet, every time Emilie would stay with me in the dorms, or now at our apartment, they would tell us "thank you" several times. We love being able to help them out, and help make their weekend visits smoother! (We know how dating long distance is a pain, so we completely understand what they have gone through the past four years). 

I'm very grateful God has blessed Jonathan and Emilie in our lives. They both have a deep passion for serving Our Lord, both athletic, both smart, and when they are around each other it's impossible to not feel the love they share. Dating long distance is no joke, and these two, through the help of God, have made it work over the past 4 years!! And in 2 short days they will never have to worry about planning weekend visits, spending parts of breaks with each other, skyping, or saying the dreadful goodbye. Marriage is such a wonderful thing created by God, and I'm excited that they get to share this experience with each other soon!

So, here's to you Staff & Em!

Amanda Castle Photography

I'm a College Graduate Babayyy

This past Saturday was one of the biggest days of my life (one being the day I got married to this stud I met at summer camp, and the other is when I gave my life to my Savior...those are both stories for another day). That's right folks, three days ago (May 4th, 2013) I graduated COLLEGE!!! This is a huge deal because I am the first person in my family to graduate college. My parents worked for the air force, and my older brother followed in their foot steps. Two of my cousins have their associates degrees, and I have two aunts who attended college, i'm unsure if they received their bachelors, associates, or if they completed. That being said, it feels great to be the first to accomplish something this big!! [Now, if the Lord provides me with the chance to go to grad school, then i'll be the first to achieve their doctorate degree as well!!]

This weekend was sort of pretty chaotic. The rough part about having divorced parents is trying to coordinate with an additional family, that's right Keven and myself had to do our best coordinating with three families! [insert stressful image of pulling out my hair here.] However, it all seemed to work out. My dad surprised us and came in late Thursday night, giving us more time to spend with him and his significant other. They treated us to Ihop for breakfast, and then Longhorn steakhouse for dinner! Due to the cruddy weather Charleston gave us, we spent most of our time indoors this past weekend. Later that night my mom, step dad, and siblings came in along with Keven's parents. My family was only staying friday night, so after dinner we said bye to my dad and headed over to my moms hotel to hang out with them for a few hours. My little brother wanted to spend the night with us, so he enjoyed playing Mario Kart on the N64 with Keven, until we realized Keven didn't have his black dress slacks here, resulting in a trip to walmart at 11:45 pm -_-

So, then we reach Saturday. It basically went like this: rush around to get ready, sit in traffice, rush to find where the heck our classmates were being stashed, take random pics with the iphone, walk out to a cheering crowd making you feel like you were famous, sit down, listen to boring speeches, and wait for 500 names to be called so you could walk across stage, focus on not  tripping, and sit down like a giddy little girl who just recieved a note from their crush. I'm sure I annoyed everyone around me, because my mom sat on the left side of the colesium, while my dad and Keven's parents sat on the right side. So while sitting and listening spacing out to the speeches, I kept constantly looking over and smiling (before and after diploma was in hand). Although it could've been worst, I could have been some of the people who played on their phones the entire time (what's the point of even attending then?).

Anyways, everyone knows the drill afterwards. Call your families and try to meet up somewhere to take a million pictures. The only thing that sucked about Saturday was the fact that we did have to coordinate between 3 families, I wish I would have been able to take pics with my friends that I didn't get to see while being stashed in a hallway, oh well, it's done and over with. After several pictures, and my poor mother in law trying not to catch hypothermia, we went out for a good meal at cracker barrel! Then, after my dad messed around and gave the waitress a hard time, we said our goodbyes to my Dad and Lori, and changed to go meet Keven's brother's family at the beach. [yes, I know that with every cloud possibly in the sky, and rain sprinkling it's not the most ideal weather, but hey, this family was deteremined to go to the beach, and Kristofer surprised us by getting his shift switched so he could attend!] So, after being splashed by the high tide and getting a good 3 inches of my jeans soaked, we said our goodbyes to them, and met Keven's parents to see Iron Man 3 (highly recommend)! Afterwards they treated us to taco bell, and then to Ihop the next morning before church!

Sooooo, yeah. That was pretty much graduation weekend! It's cool to know that my side of the family is proud of me, and that I can inspire my little brother and sister to work hard and to graduate college as well. I know Keven's family is proud of me as well, but they raised 4 brilliant kids who all graduated college with some sort of Cum Laude! Taking a moment to brag: I really pray that the Lord blesses our kids with Keven's smarts. This guy graduated Valedvictorian of his highschool with a 5 point something GPA, and graduated college with Summa Cum Laude (3.9-4.0 GPA) and through the honors program (only 3 of the 567 that graduated that day graduated with honors). So yeah, I'm pretty proud of him and wish I could have done just as well, but my GPA is still good enough to apply for Physical Therapy School so I'm happy!!

Here are a few pics from this weekend: (I will work on making these bigger later, the blog or my computer won't let me resize them at the moment!)

Lately this weather...

In previous years here at CSU spring starts in late February. Often students are wearing shorts and tanks to class by early-mid March due to the mid 70 degree weather that we are blessed with. Every year it is a struggle to not want to skip classes and spend the day at the beach, or skip being a "good" student and spend all weekend at the beach. Sure, there are days where it may rain crushing all these hopes. However, since being at CSU I haven't experienced this kind of spring that we are facing now.

This one semester I have finally taken a lighter load of credit hours, and there have been many weekends where I look forward to relaxing by either studying while laying out at the beach, going to the pool on campus, or playing some sand volleyball with my friends. But, mother nature has had a different idea for spring in Charleston. Sure there have been beautiful, sunny days with a high of 80 degrees, but it seems like those days a l w a y s fall on a day where I must study for a test, or when I'm working. Yet, there have been more yucky, rainy, cloudy days that have taken over our spring season, consisting of jeans and longsleeve apparel due to the lower temperature.

Now that I am done with classes, finals, and well college (Praise The Lord) I was hoping to use this week before graduation not only as time to look for a grown up job, but also to wind down and relax. Want to know the forecast for Charleston this week?? It falls under the yucky, rainy, cloudy days as I mentioned before. Here it is:

 

So, how in the world am I supposed to enjoy all the beauty of this town when I get weather like this? I planned on spending ALL day at the beach, walking around downtown and using our new camera to take beautiful pictures, and play countless hours of volleyball to jump in the pool in order to cool off. Perhaps I've just been spoiled the past 3 years. I just have a strong feeling that once we move out of Charleston, or if I get another 2nd job that the clouds and rain drops will go away and seldomly make their appearance. Oh well, I know the Lord has the weather like this for a reason (maybe to motivate me to actually use my time wisely). So, thank you Charleston for all of your beautiful sunny days, and for all the rainy days that we've been blessed with.

Oh, and one last thing, to whoever is reading this can you say a prayer for the weather Saturday? (GRADUATION DAY) It would be really nice if it was sunny, low humidity, and the clouds, or potential rain, held off until later that evening. Thanks! :]

Newest Addition

Back in August Keven & I heard some really exciting news about his oldest sister Kara!! Her and her husband (Alex) told us that they were expecting their second bundle of joy. We were beyond excited for this new blessing in their life (if you knew the back story to it all, and all the complications that occurred last time, you would understand all of our excitement). This past Monday (04/22) we woke up to a missed phone call at 7:31 AM, and when we called Keven's mom back we received news that Kara had her baby boy (6 days early!!). So after our last final on Friday, we packed up and headed up to Greenville, SC.

We made a quick pit stop and picked up a new toy as a graduation gift for ourselves. We are very excited and love our new investment! Seeing as how I lost my digital camera charger and have been unable to find a replacement, and we can't find Keven's, we decided to invest in a Nikon 3100. It was very challenging trying to make a decision, especially after I do my own research and ask for peoples advice making a decision for myself, then going into the store and the sales associate trying to talk us up to a higher camera (I'm assuming they didn't realize we were poor college students looking for a good deal). Nonetheless, we are stoked about our new toy and had a great time taking newborn pics for Alex & Kara.

taken via iphone

Ok, ok, enough small talk. The main point about this post is to introduce our sweet nephew, who as of right now is 6 days fresh from the oven. I'm no photographer, but these pics I'm about to show you are straight off our new camera without any editing! 

Introducing, Baby Ryan Dakota Shrum. <3 

That face!!

Seriously, melting my heart!

Frustration with Finals

Before my first-last final. 

I am very excited to announce that yesterday, Friday, April 26, 2013, I took my last college final ever!! I am beyond excited to be done with this stressful semester and look forward to getting so rest. However, I would just like to take a minute to give my thoughts on why finals frustrate me.

Final Exams frustrate me more and more each year. Maybe it was senioritis kicking in, or the stress, either way this year felt worst with this frustration.

Frustration numero uno:    Lack of preparation.
 All semester you learn all sorts of material that you are tested on throughout the semester. Then, some professors like to teach new material after your "last" test and A) either include that material on a final, making it feel like a usual exam, or B) they incorporate that material along with all the other material you've forgotten learned over the past few months.This wouldn't be as bad if professors gave you more inclination as to what was going to be on it. But, is it just me, or does anyone else get really frustrated when you spend countless hours studying something and maybe 1/10 of it is on the test...I mean let's be real, they could've been nice and informed us of half the stuff they didn't plan on putting on the final.  This would have ensured a lower stress level experienced by the student(s).

Frustration numero dos:    Back to back.
Most universities have their finals in a one (school) week time frame. That being said, if you are like me and a lot of others who typically take 17 credit hours (equaling to 5 classes and 2 labs) then if you are lucky you have a final on EVERY day, or if you are luckier (sarcastic tone) then they get grouped together on the same days. [[yayy more stress!]]

Frustration numero tres:    The Pressure.
Most Professors are nice and use the Final as a way to boost your grade above that B+ mark, but seriously, when you are one week away from sweet, sweet freedom, who even wants to think about doing exceptional? I love when professors give you the option of dropping your lowest test grade, so if you are a good student and make it to every test then they allow you to let your final be the dropped grade. Then there are professors who make the final 25% or higher of your total grade, this is the difference between passing and failing!

Frustration numero cuatro:     No more reading day?
Most campuses allow the students to have a day before finals start, to gather all their thoughts and make a game plan as to how to attack these monstrous tests, but not CSU. Apparently, students were taking advantage of reading day and local beaches were filled with college students on the day the University allotted us to spend chained to the desks in the library. So now classes are either straight review the day before, or a cram session to get every last drop of info into the students notebooks. But I see it differently, we are all grown adults and if some of us want to study on the beach so be it. They shouldn't allow a few peoples actions ruin something for the rest of the University...but oh well, welcome to 'Murrrica.

Frustrations numero cinco:    See ya later sleep!
Everyone knows that when this week roles around students can all say goodbye to sleep and start getting "jacked up on mountain dew". However, one of the main things we're told is to get plenty of rest...I don't think I have ever slept more than 6 hours before a final. Maybe it's better for the students that don't have to work, I made the mistake of still working both my jobs during finals so that probably didn't help.

Anyways, congrats to those of you who are done with finals, or almost done. And a even bigger congrats to those of you who are about to GRADUATE (including kev & I). I hope after all your finals are done you can get plenty of rest, sleep in, enjoy your summer and family, and maybe even work to save up moolah for the next semester!

(Side note: Highlight to being done is I'll probably be posting a lot more on here. It may not mean a lot since there are only 5 or so people who check this, but thanks for checking it if you do!)

Before entering our fourth final...kind of over it by that point. 

Secure In the Unknown

photo credit: Michelle Priester 

 

   As my senior year of college is wrapping up I have so much left to do before graduation. After today there are only 7 more classes left until finals start! (insert excited yet not ready for finals tone here) If trying to stay motivated to finish strong and not give in to senioritis isn't hard enough, I also have to do my best to hang out with as many of my friends possible before we all go our separate ways. Oh and did I also mention that in between all of that I'll be working both of my jobs, and trying to figure out what the Lord has in store for Keven and myself?

Trusting in the Lord, easier said than done.  After I realized that we would not be attending grad school right after graduating, and that taking a year off is what the Lord had planned all along, I knew He had plans for us to live somewhere and would provide us with jobs. However, now that I literally have 22 days left until I walk across that stage, grab my diploma (being the first to accomplish this in my family), and enter the real world of adulthood, it's hard to not doubt what God has in store for us. Don't get me wrong, I know He will provide, He has shown that for us time and time again, but when you barely have time to even look at places to live, and you have already applied to ten or more jobs it's hard not to wonder what we are supposed to do.

So far we have a few options. Option number 1 is to stay here in Charleston, find somewhere to live, continue working at our jobs (adding hours of course), trying our best to find a second job, and volunteer at physical therapy places. [this option is favorable because it's convenient, and we would still be around our closest friend..however, God doesn't call us to be comfortable] Option number 2, move towards my family in NC, and find jobs and a place to live. Until that happens bumming off my dad and living in his spare bedroom. Option 3: moving towards Keven's family and pretty much doing the same thing. [These two options are great so we can spend more time with our families, and not just when we visit for a holiday]       O u r goals are to get a Physical Therapy Aide or Rehabilitation Tech job, and live in either an apartment or a really small house. However, those jobs are not easy to come by, especially in this job market, which is a bummer since it would look great on our grad school applications and possibly get our name out to some companies for when we actually do graduate grad school.
[[Side note, I saw an article the other day that said 2013 graduates will have the hardest time in history trying to find a job in this economy...well isn't that encouraging?]]

But, for now, we have to focus on all the last minute assignments and doing well on our finals. Thankfully we have until the end of June in our tiny apartment at CSU, so hopefully by then the Lord will open the next door in our life. If you're reading this and would like to say a quick prayer about where we should live and our job situation, I would greatly appreciate that!