Senior Design

Senior Design is upon me. Weird to think, that when I was a freshman I thought it would never come. I would watch my senior friends work on their projects and pray that I was ready when the time came for me to do mine. Well, the time's here, and I'm totally not ready. I feel like I have homework in the summer, too, which is unfortunate. We were supposed to have a group by June 1st, a project by July 1st, and a faculty advisor by August 1st. These are all tentative dates, and they're really flexible about it, but if you don't hit those milestones you are behind. We hit the first one okay...I have a group, we are all ready to work with each other. Except its so much harder to stay in contact with them when we're not constantly in the REDC. The second goal isn't coming quite as easily as the first. Right now we have a few prospects for a project, and hopefully Andy will talk to Dr. Wu about a project on Tuesday and get that finalized, but it's kind of stressful. This project deterimines whether or not I graduate. Picking a project topic is the hardest part...because we will have to live with it for the entire YEAR. It's REEALLYYY important that we all like it. And the fact that the economy is bad doesn't help at all, because industry people don't have as much work to do, and don't have anything extra to give to a bunch of clueless college students. It shall be interesting. Hopefully we'll be able to get something with the Barber Center, which would be awesome.

Oh, and my job is pretty sweet :-).

And I was just in the REDC printing something off, and I discovered that some of the engineering labs have dual screens, and some have widescreens! How sweet is that? Although that means that the dual screen lab is going to become similar to the one the business students have...a haven for people playing video games and doing homework at the same time. Oh well. The administration finally remembered they have engineers shoved in the little basement!

Relay for LIfe...Part 2

Just kidding. No website for Relay for Life donations. So if you want to fight cancer, let me know!!! The event is at Harborcreek High School on June 19-20. It would be awesome to have all donations by then. Or if you can't donate, come support the cause by coming and participating! It's an awesome time :-)

Relay for Life

Relay for life was the best part of my summer last year, and I missed intern orientation when they announced the forming of teams and such! I didn't think this was a big deal, until I talked to someone today and they said the relay was in 2 weeks! So that means I've already missed 1/3 of the available fundraising time. Awesome. I'm emailing the person who's in charge of assigning teams tomorrow so I can get on that.

If you want to donate, let me know!!! I'll have a link posted in a few days hopefully!!

Summer Shenanigans

I haven't blogged in a month. Whoops. I thought that summer would bring more free time, but apparently that isn't true.

A lot has happened in a month.

I have slept in 5 different beds since a month ago, in 3 different states. How awesome is that? Can you guess the states? Or, if you're really good, can you guess the locations??

I have started an old, new job. It's old because it's GE and I've worked there before. It's new because it's in a completely different department and a completely different job description. I work in the measurements and test lab. AWESOME. My second day, they showed me a locomotive, gave a description of a test that was going to be run, and I helped hook up thermocouples to a data acquisition system...all of this ON THE LOCOMOTIVE. So much fun. I did a lot of safety training my first week, and today watched a completely disturbing video about this guy who died via electrocution by way of touching an overhead electrical wire while standing on top of the loco. So I'm going to avoid doing that. Today, I ran the test with another girl who graduated from Fairview a year ahead of me. We caught up a little bit while pressing buttons, recording data, and turning on and off the loco's engine. I am really excited for the rest of the summer...and can't wait until I actually know what's going on.

I also realized that Fairview produces a lot of girl engineers. Weird.

I have the best GE buddy ever. He graduated from Behrend with the same degree I am currently pursuing, and got me reassigned to the test lab before I even started my job because he thought I'd like it there better. He was right. And he likes El Canelo.

I went to my first funeral yesterday. My Grandpa died on Sunday from complications of a surgery he had to remove some lung cancer...stuff. I have been lucky enough this far in life never to have lost a grandparent ... or anyone close to me for that matter. The whole family traveled to Ohio to pay homage to Grandpa...he had 8 children, all of them have families and live in different corners of the country. The funeral was beautiful, and the burial had a 21-gun salute (Grandpa was an ex-marine war veteran). The family was somber before the funeral, but afterwards was able to share funny stories about Grandpa. My grandma's sister brought her dog to the burial, and we laughed about the fact that he would have said something to the effect of, "why'd you bring that damn dog to my funeral?!?" That was Grandpa for you! Here's a picture of Grandpa and Grandma when my sister Abby was crowned homecoming queen a year and a halfish ago. We'll miss him, but he wants us to rejoice (per reading from Philippians 4 - read at his funeral). So that's what I'm gonna do :-). And my Grandma is the strongest lady I've ever met.

Another first this month: missing work. I've never called off of work or used a single sick day until this week. And I missed 3!

I went to Chapter Focus week. Oh my goodness, so amazing. I was feeling downtrodden from the past semester, but God totally took me and renewed my hope. Leadership team did a lot of planning big changes for next year - changes that are TOTALLY God's ideas and I am TOTALLY excited about them. Our campus will be renewed ;-). Also, the worship was excellent, as always. The exposition was about the book of Philippians (I know, right?), and the speaker was incredibly awesome at making the scripture come alive and apply directly to my life. Not just a generic college person's life, but my life. IV conferences always do that to me, though, I need to stop being surprised. Like, when she spoke about how Paul tells the Philippians not to be anxious...that was totally speaking to me. I alwaysssss am anxious. If you want proof, read my previous blog posts. Patience and trust in God's providence are the two things I struggle most with. I want things to happen now, and I get anxious when they don't happen as I expected. Or I freak out about homework and tests and the future of Behrend's IV chapter, when I really just need to chill, sit back, and ask God what's next. Anywhoo...that's something I always have struggled with, and probably always will. But He keeps reminding me, and little by little I'm learning to be less anxious :-).

I saw fireworks.

I sat around a fire like old times with some old friends. These times are getting more and more scarce, and that scares me. I love them with all my heart; I don't want to lose my friends. It's hard though, because there are so many other aspects of my life that don't include them, and they have lives that don't include me anymore, either. It's sad. I suppose it's just like that annoying song that mentions making new friends and keeping the old...

I took my first ever road trip with my new car to Conneaut Lake. Barely a roadtrip, but it involved an hour and 15 minutes or so of driving each way, so it counts ;-). My car did well. I also learned that it has an uncanny ability to shake when I hit 70mph and to slow down as soon as I take my foot off the gas pedal...but whatever. I don't need to coast, especially not at 70mph. Who does that?

I bought shower curtains for the first time. Twice.

I went to the first of many bridal showers this summer.

Thanks for reading. By the way, these are not listed in the order in which they occurred.






P.S. Leave me comments!
**Bonus question: What color do you think my shower curtains are?
***Recap of previously stated question: What states have I slept in the past month?
****Personal question: What has your summer been like so far?