Oh my Blogger!

I am blogging two days in a row. I think I need to calm it down a little. I just cant. I wanted to tell ya'll a little bit about my break. Since school got out (well kind of I secretly am not done with my semester yet) I have done a whole lot... of nothing. But here are the big things I can report.

I cleaned my room. But Cassandra that sounds so boring. Well, it was but it took a good 10 hours of my break so I have to brag about it with before and after pictures of course.













I bound a book, then told every form of social media I belong to about it. Because I am proud of that craziness. The thing about my book is that is is the perfect size and weight. I just love to carry it around. I am a nerd. So be it. I even made it with water color paper so I can paint in it. Silly art majors




I Skyped with this kid a lot, because lets face it, I suck at not being with him.

I went to a poetry slam. Seriously how pretty are these lights?
Lets do this in our dorm room. Screw lights only at Christmas rules. Why do those rules even exist!?

I also did some laundry.


















So there you go folks! Add a lot of Netflix, a trip to the dentist, the Sims 3, and a bunch of zzzzzzzzzzz's and you have my winter break.

Its been nice doing nothing but I'm ready to get back to school. I miss people, my roomies especially.

I also overhauled my blog. Just take a moment to admire it, because I had to fight with HTML, Indesign and Photoshop all day yesterday.

BYE!

Feeling Stronger

If you are one of those people how have endlessly been telling me that they haven't seen me in a while: I'm sorry if I reacted rudely. Truth was I hadn't seen myself in a while either, hence my blog not seeing me in a while.

I guess that is weird phrasing"I haven't seen myself in a while either". It was true on 2 levels:
 1) I hadn't looked in the mirror in a while so on that level it was true. This was due to busyness. I'm sure I walked around looking like a dead zombie for a while.
 2) I hadn't felt myself in a while. Something in early November knocked me down in the dumps, I'm still not sure what it was. It had a strange effect on me. I became so unbearably sad, and life got out of my hands. Homework got harder, getting out of bed got harder, hell everything got harder. During this time I kept to myself and a couple other people. It was like my mind went absent took a really long inconvenient vacation. But it's coming back, I'm feeling better. 

So if I responded rudely to you It was probably out of frustration. I still don't know why this came and went, I still don't know if it will return. I'm hoping and praying like crazy that it doesn't come back.



During this time I developed a mantra that I repeated to myself when I needed to fight my slump. It went like this:

Do not run, Pray pray pray, Be here now

This mantra addressed in order all the things I would need to make myself do when I came across something it felt like I couldn't handle. Because the first thing I would do was run, this came via skipping classes, walking away (physically) from my homework or someone that was stressing me out. Then I needed to focus myself on letting God help me, because I was staying (which was hella' hard), and God has got so much more strength than me. And finally I would need to convince myself not to check out mentally, (i.e. pay attention in class, do the homework I was making myself sit in front of) and only because of the previous step was this possible.


I'm sorry for not being around, but life just got really hard for a while and taking care of myself was something I needed to concentrate on. I anticipate next semester to be much different.

I love you, I hope you'll take me back.

Miss Cassandra

Do I look as different as I feel?

Lately a lot of people have taken to calling me Miss Cassandra. I noticed it first with my friend Adam. I sent him an e-mail explaining somethings pertaining to dating. An e-mail which said caused him to gain respect for me. Ever since I have been Miss Cassandra. It just happened again with my friend Hart. I was talking to Hart about his life and how I know that there wasn't much I could tell him to make things better but I would do what I could to be there for him. And I became her again, Ms. Cassandra.

The thing is I am becoming a Ms. Cassandra. I've heard lots of people talk about how they didn't even notice they were growing up, but I feel it, and frankly its kind of painful. At the same time, I feel amazing; I am becoming someone strong. I am speaking my mind and spending time with God. I am become the Miss Cassandra that I've always known I wanted to be, but was to lazy or rebellious to become. I can pin point the day this started and the events along the way.

I know I don't look as strong as I feel. I need to life some weights.

Here is a slice of what I have been thinking about growing up lately.

I realize it is trivial to assign steps to growing up, this is a common theme I've been observing:
Realizing where you have been. Realizing where you are. Realizing where you want to be. Doing something about it. I think to realize where you want to be you have to realize where you are. I think to realize where you are you have to realize where you have been.

For a long time I have been stuck in the realizing where you are stage. I've known for so long where I was. I was well aware of the fact that I was doing a lot of things that were not glorifying God. I definitely knew where I had been because that was causing me to act like I was. I thought I had some sort of excuse for hanging around in those juvenile times for a while. I didn't want to move on, I wanted to rebel, I wanted to kick and scream.

Maybe I had good reason, maybe I just wasn't ready to move on. But I started to want to want to move on, which is in fact different than wanting to move on. Then that want to want turned into pure wanting. So I examined what I wanted my future to look like. Not too closely, because lets face it I like to ride life like roller coaster. So I didn't picture my job or my husband or anything like that, I more pictured the character I wanted to have. Devout Christian, caring, strong, encouraging, someone who lives life the right way, I could go on but I'll spare my blog readers from a terribly long post.

Anyway after reveling in where I was, I started taking steps. I turned back to God, found him waiting with open arms. I am running from my vices. I am thinking critically about the relationships I enter (an encouraging others to do the same). Today I told my my mom what I thought. I stood up for myself in a way I never have before and I thought, "Where the hell is this coming from!?"

Now I remember.
That was Miss Cassandra speaking.
And damn do I like her.

'Work Hard' 'Give Birth' Day

I woke up at noon and an hour later I am still laying in bed blogging (and eating gobstoppers), ON A MONDAY. How is it possible? Labor Day that's how!

I have been back at school for just over a week (9 days) and have had two days of classes. Needless to say, for me it has been pretty chill around here.  So I will now ignore my homework by giving you a dorm room tour!

Tour Time!

Here is one angle of the room

The beds

The beds!
1. My bed
2. Kaity's bed
3. The rug that is so happy to walk on. (my mom and i walked on all the rugs in Target barefoot until we found the happiest one to walk on.)
4. My bookshelf (see detail below)
5. My dresser/ shelves/our bedside tables
6. The window (see detail below)
7. Kaity's desk

If you turn around!

1. Kaity's dresser and bookshelf
2. Our lamp (so our room doesn't look like a hospital)
3. The door (don't let it hit you on the way out!)
4. Kaity's desk
5. A trashcan!
6. Random stuff I put in front of the door due to rebellion
7. The AC unit that takes up too much of our room. And the mirror we hung on it so we would hate it less. We aren't allowed to put anything in front of it. 

On to my beautiful bookshelf

Bookshelf

 

 

 

 

1. All the cosmo you could ever read!
2. My fiction books
3. My school books
4. My Art books
5. My Devos/ Bibles/ Jorunals/ Stuff to make and mail letters
6. Fun non-fiction books I love reading.

The window!

Has an amazing view of shirtless boys playing volleyball. Not that we ever shamelessly watch them (with snacks).

Sitting Room

Due to lack of room in our room our
1. Fridge
2. My desk/ craft bin
and
3. Kaitys food and who else knows what

were moving to the front room. It all worked out pretty well.

Now you know exactly how my room looks.


On being back:

It is still a constant stuggle to convince Kaity that the devil is not in our room so all is normal there and I am absolutely adoring living with Brittany and Abby. The laughs are endless and there is always good company. I think that sophomore year is going to be a blasty blast!

More on my classes later. I think I'll actually do some homework now then go to IHOP!




Love you!

The Problem With Tee Shirts

I am not the Tee Shirt wearing type of girl. I always kind of wished I was because they always look so sporty and effortlessly cool, but when it comes down to me getting dressed in the morning the last thing I want to put on is a tee shirt.


I am writing this to you while I take a break from cleaning my room, you read that right I'm cleaning.

Trust me this is a big improvement.

Today while I've cleaned my room, I have stumbled upon many many tee shirts. Tee shirts frustrate me to no end because they all represent something I want to remember (i.e. South Hall, Young Life Camp, Kony 2012, college visits, The Starkenburg Quitich Team, the list goes on and on and on), so I end up keeping all of these shirts I never ever wear.

Haha remember Kony?

All of this cleaning and clothes sorting has been making me worry a bit. If you have ever helped clean my dorm room, or seem me with a bag of Laundry, you know I have A LOT of clothing. I have been trying to narrow it down but I seem to be attached to every piece of clothing I own, except the tee shirts which I have to keep on principle. I have no idea how I'm going to choose what to take to college I know one thing for sure though: I need to take less clothes than I did last year. We have smaller closets this year :(

Anyway if you have any suggestions for packing for college let me know. I love you!

Difficult Conversations

I have been having a lot of difficult conversations lately. Some over text, some in person but all equally difficult. I think it might be making me braver though. Possibly more confident but definitely they make me feel relieved.

Have you spoken whats on your mind lately?
I have.

Dear Rest of the summer,

Hurry your ass up. I want to go back to Chicago.

When I am back in Denver I realize just how cool living in Chicago should be. Why is it so hard for me to get into the city. I can't believe I live by all that culture and I never take a Saturday to saunter around a beautiful city.

So I'm making a list of next school year resolutions:
1. Hit the city at least once a month.
2. Get involved in the gallery scene downtown. I love art damn it.
3. Go on more late night adventures. (including but not limited to Omegas, the White Palace Grill in the city, and the Chi Cafe in Chinatown)
4. Meet people from the U of C. By this I mean creep on their college a bit, hang out in their coffee shops and things like that until I make some damn friends.
5. Read more. I've been reading a lot this summer and I miss it.
6. Don't act cliquish towards freshmen. I HATE Trinity's cliquish ways and I refuse to go into that cycle.
7. Get breakfast with cool people I care about. (i.e. Leah Laky, Alissa Vander Wilt, Courtney Roosevelt, all my Froomies)
8. Do my laundry more often. I think it will be easier in Alumni
9. Save my flex for the end of the semester.
10. Don't forget about my Denver self. When I am in Denver I find myself looking for adventure and being outgoing. That person faded into the distance when I went to Chicago the first time. I don't want to loose me.
11. Finally do better at keeping in touch with people from back home.

I know I am early on this list but trust me more items will be coming. I just really miss school. Who ever thought I would miss that tiny Trinity campus?