Weekend Adventures: Livy Comes to Visit!

Last week on Thursday was the first time I saw my best friend since back in February for her 21st birthday, and now it was her turn to pay me a visit. This was the first time Livy had ever come to visit me, let alone be her first visit to the Midwest.

Of course, it was cold and rainy during her visit, even though we had beautiful weather a few days prior to her arrival. Nonetheless, we still had a great time and a weekend full of adventures!

All ready for the Run or Dye 5K!!!

Like I said, Livy flew in Thursday morning and yes, we squealed in excitement like a couple of high school girls seeing puppies for the first time when we were reunited. After we were done hugging and jumping around, we drove to the Sports Authority in Roseville, Minnesota to register for the Run or Dye 5K which we were running in that Saturday. After picking up our runner numbers and Run or Dye swag, I brought Livy back to campus for a quick tour, and then she got to tag along with me to my last class of the day. Unfortunately for Livy, I had to finish a huge paper that day, so after dinner we hung out in my room and tried (so very very hard) to be productive. 

Livy was SUPER excited to see the huge mall!

But first...let me take a selfie! ...Sorry, I had to...

Friday held more excitement for the both of us. Livy tagged along with me to my marketing and my business writing class - both extremely exciting, as you can imagine...*slight sarcasm here*). After which we had to leave campus for a family occasion of mine, but thankfully we were able to make a stop at the Mall of America for a little bit - Livy's first time! We didn't do too much shopping, but I needed to pick a few things up for a banquet I was attending Sunday night.

Dinner at Crave at the Mall of America was amazing, as usual!
(pictured above: Happy Hour's Vegetarian Sushi)

One of the stores definitely worth mentioning is Lush! Now, I had been to Lush a few times before, and knew that they sold soaps and bath bombs, but I thought that was it. I had never really thought to get a better idea of what Lush's life story was, and what the company was all about. So, while walking by the store entrance, and smelling the amazing scents from inside, I grabbed Livy's hand and we ran in to Lush! We were immediately greeted by one of the sales associates (whose name I will not mention for privacy purposes, but let's call her *Amber), and she was literally amazing. Another sales associate helped out Livy, while *Amber helped me out. *Amber asked me what brought me into the store, and I explained that while I had been to Lush before, that I didn't really know that much about the company and wanted to know more about it. I also informed her that I was looking for a face mask. *Amber escorted me to the face mask section of the store and told me all about Lush's values and morals as a company, and what they wished to achieve, in addition to telling me all about the various masks they sold and what each of the masks did.

Ingrid. Why can't I be as amazing and glorious as you??

Livy and I ended up walking out of Lush with a whole new perspective of the company, and purchases that we couldn't wait to try out when we got home for a spa night!

Also while we were at the mall, Ingrid Michaelson made a special appearance, and gave a small concert in the rotunda. This was super cool to me, since she is one of my favorite artists, and I never expected to see her that day, let alone hear her sing live! Not surprisingly, she was amazing live, and it was so cool to see her interact with the audience and engage with them.

Saturday was the day of color. It started pretty early (compared to my typical Saturday) at 6 a.m., as Livy and I needed to be at Harriet Island by 8:30 a.m. for the Run or Dye! We were both extremely excited, and were ready to run (okay let's be serious, jog/walk) a 5K while getting vibrantly colored dye thrown at us. In order to display our excitement (and craziness), we got ourselves decked out in knee high socks, fishnet rave gloves (which we won while dancing in the line waiting for the 5K to start from the two SUPER cute guys hosting the 

event), our Run or Dye shirts, and of course

our DIY tutu skirts (click for tutorial)!

Before...

...After!!

Heading into the blue mist!!

The adventure couldn't be complete
without a few colorful handstands :)

Trying to get most of the dye out
before driving home!

The run was crazy fun, and we've already started looking for other 5K's to run in! The nice thing about fun runs like the Run or Dye, or the Color Run, is that they don't require any training - you can go at your own pace! Which was super nice because of course I didn't train for the run... Haha!




After our early morning adventure, we had to clean up because I had a few summer job interviews that evening in Rochester, Minnesota. After we finished in Rochester, we went back to my parents' house and hung out, made a bunch of food, and tried out our face masks! It was definitely nice to relax after a couple of incredibly stressful weeks!







Sunday was supposed to be another day of fun, but unfortunately the rainy weather canceled all of our outdoor plans. We were going to pay a visit to the Minnesota Zoo (one of my most favorite places in the whole world!), but since it was so icky outside, we decided to hang out around the house and bake incredibly vibrant, pink macaroons! Check out my blog post on how we made the macaroons here! :)

Love these ladies!

My two favorite coworkers!

Livy and I had to be back to campus that afternoon, since I had to get ready for a banquet hosted by my university's Department of Residence Life. The banquet was to honor and thank us student and professional staff members for our dedication and hard work to the department, university, and impact on the student body. I am a Resident Assistant on my campus for those who don't know, and I advise a wing of freshman female students.









It's been an awesome year, filled with fun memories and proud moments, and I'm honestly going to miss them all next year! I will be returning as a second year Resident Assistant, but this time I will have twice as many residents - something that intimidates me, but I look forward to the challenge!

You could say that we're a sassy bunch... ;)

  I had a lot of fun at the banquet, and it was really fun to get dressed up and see the rest of my awesome coworkers all decked out and having fun!


After the banquet I went back to my room to see how Livy was doing (since she wasn't able to attend the banquet), and we ended up being invited out to dinner at Applebee's by a few of my friends.

It was a fun way to end the weekend, and I was extremely sad to see Livy leave. I can't wait to see her again soon, and hopefully next time she comes to visit our friend Megan can join her!!

Until next time guys,

Thanks for reading!!

xoxo AnnaMarie

Flashback to Belize

All this recent warm weather got me thinking of my recent study abroad trip to Belize. Belize was absolutely amazing, and I miss everything about it - the warm weather, the beautiful scenery, the warm friendly people, all the history the adventure... The list goes on and on!

I decided to post a few photos that I took while on the trip, while they are nothing like the real deal in person, they are amazing reminders of how awesome the trip was! I will never forget the two weeks we spent in Belize, and all the amazing people I got to meet and get to know while we were down there!

 

Five Easy Ways to Enjoy Your Campus When The Weather Gets Warm

Winter seems to drag on for eternity here in the Midwest. Now that Mother Nature has finally decided to grace us with warmer weather, students have finally been able to spend out of the dorms and instead in the outdoors! Thankfully, there are a lot of different ways to enjoy the warm weather on almost any campus. Here are just a few ways you can enjoy your campus outdoors!

1.  Go on an adventure!

Grab a friend and go explore! Thankfully, my campus has walking trails, woods, a river with waterfalls nearby, an amphitheater, and horse (and cow) farms on or near campus that students can walk to and enjoy! The Falls (which our town was named after) are absolutely beautiful, and are an iconic part of River Falls. Find out where you haven’t been on campus, even if it’s the science building, a random corner of campus, or even another residence hall, go find a new place!

2.  Eat outside!

Whether it’s a snack or a meal, eat it outside! Grab a blanket, good book, some water and something yummy and go eat outside! On the east side of my campus there’s a long stretch of grass where a lot of students hang out and eat lunch outside for a change of cafeteria scenery. We also have a bunch of picnic tables that students will eat lunch at.

3.  Go for a run!

Get out and get some exercise! Now that the weather has finally warmed up, long gone should be the days of running in the gym! In the past few days I’ve been going on walks/runs with friends and enjoying the beautiful scenery and company. It’s been amazing to get out of my room and spend time back outside! I recently went on a nice long walk/jog with a friend to the horse lab farm on campus. I’ve been missing my horses in the past few weeks, so it was really nice to go visit the horses on campus!

4.  Take your studies to the outdoors!

The nice thing about living on the East side of my campus, is that the big stretch of grass is the go-to outdoor study spot. I love grabbing a blanket or two, maybe a pillow, some snacks, a water bottle, and my books, and hanging out outside for a few hours! To minimize distractions, seek out a quiet spot by some trees, or find a spot along a walking path on the backside of campus!

5.  Sports anyone?

Get some friends together (or make new ones!) and play some sports! Our campus has volleyball nets, basketball hoops, intramural fields, soccer fields, softball/baseball diamonds, and the list goes on! In the residence halls on our campus, students can rent sports equipment and games to play outside. Basketball, football and frisbee golf (frolfing) are the most popular, but you can play just about anything you like!

Take a study break and enjoy the warm weather! We’ve been denied sunshine for just about seven months now, enjoy it while it lasts! Some professors (with a little encouragement) will even have class outside if you ask them.

Even if it’s just taking a different route to class

than your normal one, find something different

to do to enjoy the outdoors!

Put down the television remote, get off your phone and enjoy nature, you won’t regret it!

The 5 Types of Guys You Meet on Tinder

So I recently downloaded the Tinder app on my phone as a joke, and my friend and I were creeping it up big time. Here is what we learned from our experience on the new dating/matchup app:

Desperate Dave

This guy seems normal at first, maybe even pretty generic and cute. But as the convo goes on, he gets especially clingy. When you don’t message back within 5 seconds, he sends follow-up messages of “hey”, “where’d ya go?”, “??”, “DON’T LEAVE ME”.

NEXT PLEASE.

Comical Corey

Corey is pretty funny, or so he thinks. He overuses LOL to the max, has at least two smiley faces for every 5 messages, and his opening line consists of something along the lines of “I won’t tell our kids how we met if you won’t…”. These guys think they are hysterical, when in reality they are usually just not attractive enough to attract anyone’s attention otherwise.

No thanks.

Already-Know-You-Adam

Adam is the guy that you have 20-some odd friends in common with, and of course you accidentally “like” him. He will then proceed to tell you how he knows pretty much everything about you, or you both will just awkwardly ignore each other. Or you find your friend’s boyfriend, and then it gets awkward.

Hard-To-Get-Harry

Harry. Harry Harry Harry.

This dude is the most elusive of the bunch. You guys are a match, you message him, and he takes two to three days to reply back. Pretty much nine times out of ten he has a girlfriend who is unaware of his existence in the Tinder universe, and is looking for an ego boost by seeing how many girls will match him based on his party pictures.

Grammatically Incorrect Greg

This is one of my personal pet peeves - people who don’t understand how to use spellcheck or don't know their grammar. Their, there, they’re are all used interchangeably, too and to - wait, there’s a difference? Please go back to middle school and figure your stuff out, because I can’t deal with you right now. I actually once had a guy who was messaging me an actual lovely conversation about our weekend, who said “2Mar” instead of saying “tomorrow”.

Please. Just... Don’t.

I give up.

What are some types of guys you've met on Tinder? Share your embarrassing moments below in the comments!

"She's a Vegetarian Because She's Afraid of Meat"

As I write this blog post, I am watching one of my most favorite documentaries: Vegucated.

                                                                        Here’s the synopsis of the film:     

“Vegucated is a guerrilla-style documentary that follows three meat- and cheese-loving New Yorkers who agree to adopt a vegan diet for six weeks and learn what it's all about. They have no idea that so much more than steak is at stake and that the planet's fate may fall on their plates. Lured by tales of weight lost and health regained, they begin to uncover hidden sides of animal agriculture that make them wonder whether solutions offered in films like Food, Inc. go far enough. Before long, they find themselves risking everything to expose an industry they supported just weeks before. But can their convictions carry them through when times get tough? What about on family vacations fraught with skeptical step-dads, carnivorous cousins, and breakfast buffets? Part sociological experiment and part adventure comedy, Vegucated showcases the rapid and at times  comedic  evolution  of  three  people     who are trying their darnedest to change in a culture that seems dead set against it.”

So why am I writing about vegetarianism/veganism? A couple of reasons I suppose; I think that choosing to become a vegetarian was one of the best choices I have ever made. I love being a vegetarian! I have never felt so healthy, light, happy, and energetic before! Within just a few weeks of becoming a vegetarian (mostly vegan at first) my skin cleared up and was a lot brighter, and I had more energy. I even lost a little bit of weight as well - just by changing my diet!

Most recently, I was worried that my trip to Belize was going to be a struggle as far as finding enough vegetarian options for me to eat. Thankfully, it definitely wasn’t a struggle by any stretch of the imagination. There were so many healthy, plant-based meal choices almost everywhere we went! The title of this blog post was something funny a friend kept saying about me on our Belize trip, all in fun of course! It also plays off of the time my older brother jokingly threatened to slap me with a piece of ham when we were having lunch one time. It was pretty hilarious, I don't even remember what the circumstances were.

Now, I’m not blogging about this in efforts to shame meat eaters, or to tell anyone they are wrong for what they choose to eat or not eat. But I think it is very important for us all to take a look at the value we place on food, because food is such a staple of the American lifestyle. Especially meat.

Americans are one of the very few populations that eats a meat protein at almost every meal. Being a vegetarian in Belize was so much easier than being a vegetarian back home in the midwest. I think that most people get hung up about where vegetarians get their protein from, as if it were only derived from meat. There are many countries whose populations don’t eat as much meat, if any at all.

The China Study, one of the most respected studies done, surveyed thousands of families all over China, taking a look at what the family eats and takes note of any health issues. It has been proven through the China Study, other studies, and studies of studies that plant-based diets are healthiest. Families in the China study that ate a plant-based diet had little to no health issues, but when meat was introduced to the diet health issues appeared. The more meat in a diet, the more health issues appeared.

This was one of the main reasons behind

my choice of becoming a vegetarian.

Having good health is one of the most important values to me, which is kind of nerdy as a 21 year old college student! I love eating and cooking healthy food! And just to amp up the vegetarian nerd level here, I'll throw in the fact that Trader Joe's and Whole Foods (also known as Whole Paycheck in my family) are two of my most favorite grocery stores (followed by The Fresh Market in Towson, Md, and Mom's Organic Market in Timmonium, Md). Nerd level: pro status.

While I know that it would be impractical to ask every single person to change the way they eat and live their lives, I challenge you to try eating healthier. That doesn’t have to mean becoming a vegan straight out of the chute; try to cut down on the fast food, the pop, processed foods, etc. Make a change for the better! Try a vegetarian diet for a week and see how you feel. A goal that I have set for myself is to cut back on my intake of dairy products.

There are plenty of delicious alternatives to eating meat

and other animal-derived products, why not try it out?

What have you got to lose?

Anna

Oops, I'm in Belize!

Hey everyone!

I am writing to you all from Belize! I was lucky enough to come here on a study abroad trip through my university, and holy cow is it beautiful here!

We are coming to the end of our third day of the trip, we have experienced so much more than I could ever have hoped or imagined for! Here is a quick run down: 

Day 1/Sunday (AKA Selfie-Sunday):

     Hiked around the temples of Xunantunich (Shu-nan-too-neek) with our awesome guide Eric! After our tour we had lunch at a park, and proceeded to a second location where we went tubing down a river through caves! All if it was do much fun, and I love that we are exercising every day!

     We also got to do a little bit of shopping at some stands on our way back from Xunantunich where I bought a jersey hammock, and I can't wait to try it out! 

Day 2/Monday (AKA Frumpday):

     Monday was a very, VERY early day. We started breakfast at 5:45 a.m. so that we could get on the road as early as possible. We went through customs in Guatemala and headed towards Tikahl, for another long day of hiking (5 hours if you're curious), followed by lunch and then and hour and a half of amazing zip-lining fun!
     On our way back to the boarder we stopped at this little gift shop that had these amazingly adorable boots. So, of course, I bought a pair as did Piper, so now we have matching shoes and hammocks! 

Day 3/Tuesday (I...have no creative name for today...sorry guys):

     Today we got to to sleep in the most so far on the trip - breakfast was at 7:30! Not very many of us were impressed though, with all this hiking we have all been super exausted and have been craving more sleep. While the rides in the vans are usually pretty long, the roads here are so bumpy and filled with potholes, it's impossible to sleep during the drives.

     Today though, it was a little different. Of course, one of the vans had to break down half an hour before we got to our destination. None the less, Piper and I kept ourselves entertained by hiking further down the road where we found a horseback riding trail. Once the van was fixed we were off to Rio Frio Caves. We hiked for just over an hour and a half through the rainforest to this GIANT, awesome cave, with a pretty river flowing through it. Afterwards we drive a little bit to a beautiful waterfall where the group went cliff jumping and swimming. Oh. My. Gosh, was that fun!! I got so many awesome shots of everyone jumping, swimming and posing! I can't wait to upload them to my Mac and edit them!

That's all for tonight guys! Thanks for reading about my life, haha! 

:) Anna

Be Your Own Cheerleader.

Reading the Thought Catalog is one of my favorite things to do when I am bored, stressed, or simply avoiding homework. An article titled 3 Powerful Reminders For When You Feel Stuck In Life, and it got me thinking about the struggles I have had recently, but more so the thing that I typically struggle with most. What is that, you ask? Making a decision.

Every single day, throughout our lives we have to make decisions. The clothes we wear, what to eat, what to do... The last one is the one that gets to me the most. I can be incredibly indecisive, and if you know me, you know how frustrating it can be.

I like to think that I love being organized and planning things out, but when it comes time to make a decision, I sometimes freeze up. Also, don’t look at my room right now, it’s definitely not clean or organized...

When it came time to start applying to colleges, I froze up. I didn’t know where to begin, I didn’t know what I wanted to major in, let alone what profession I wanted to do after college.

I think there are a few different reasons as to why I freeze up and struggle with making a decision. The biggest reason being that I know that my decisions can greatly affect my life, and I don’t want to make the wrong choice.

Picking which college to go to was a big problem for me. I had lived a pretty small life so far - I lived in the country with hardly any neighbors, my graduating high school class was a mere 97, and I had always been incredibly close to my family. Don’t get me wrong - I knew I was going to college, I planned on it. But deciding which one just about gave me a straight up panic attack!

It’s crazy to think that one small choice can’t change your life,

and knowing how incredibly true that is is what scares me the most.

Case in point:

Had I not attended Rochester Community Technical College during high school for post secondary (PSEOP), I wouldn’t have taken an equine business practices class. Had I not taken that class, I would never have traveled to Texas in 2010 to compete in the American Miniature Horse Association’s World Show. There, I met a boy from the East coast whom I would fall in love with, and would then move over 1,000 miles from home to attend a university through an exchange program, and meet my best friend Livy. Four short years later the same boy would break my heart, making me become a strong, independent woman.

College worked out though. I ended up attending the one university that I applied to, and while I may not like the campus as much as I would like to, I have had plenty of amazing experiences:

I have a graphic design internship that I absolutely LOVE and I am a Resident Assistant, advising 28 freshman girls. I studied at a university on the East coast for a semester, loving every second of it. And this weekend I am leaving for a two week long study abroad experience in Belize!

The smallest details can change your life, and that can be terrifying. But it can also be exhilarating and exciting! I wouldn’t trade my experiences for anything in the world! Our troubles, fears, hurt, hopes, excitement and dreams - that’s what makes us who we are.

To be able to push on and live life, those are the people I admire most. To realize what you want out of life and be willing to do anything for it, that’s what I want. Although it would be incredibly convenient for the 30 year old me to come visit me and tell me what my hopes and dreams truly are, I know that:

A.) Time travel is not a thing yet.

B.) It wouldn’t help me.

We have to learn our lessons on our own, and as much as that sucks, how else are we going to discover our true selves?

Life can hurt, and it can really suck at times,

but we need to be able to pick ourselves up and carry on.

Now, reading the Thought Catalog is one of my favorite things to do when I am bored, stressed, or simply avoiding homework. This article caught my eye, if you are ever feeling down or just stuck in life, read it! It has some great points that I think we all need to be reminded of every now and then.

Be your own cheerleader. Uniforms are optional.