Deep in the Heart of Texas

Hello hello! I am glad to report that my '99 Honda Civic with almost 160,000 miles has made it safely from Texas to Massachusetts.

After Tyler arrived in Texas my time at home quickly began to wind down. As a newcomer to Texas, Tyler still had a lot he wanted to see and do before we hit the road. He was at my house for about 5 days. We went to Fort Worth, Dallas, the Ballpark and my little brothers graduation. I could tell you about every bit of his visit but since a picture is worth a thousand words i'll leave you with a few.

Texas owns a heard of Longhorns, part of which live at the Fort Worth Stockyards...this is just their daily stroll down Main Street.

At the Rodeo! Go Rangers!

I'll post again soon to share some road trip stories and pictures!

And the Homestretch

When I first started writing this blog we had just entered the homestretch at Stonehill. I still had papers and finals to finish up and turn in before I could head home. At this point I am really headed towards home. I spent a week in Lexington with my boyfriend and his family after taking my last final and packing up my room last Friday. Today I am headed home to see my brother graduate from Texas A&M Corpus Christi. His graduation on Saturday really got me thinking about how fast the past three years have flown by and how fast my senior year is likely to be. I’m not quite ready to be a senior; I was just getting good at being a junior.

This will be me next year!

Because I live so far away I don’t go home that often. I was home last, over Christmas break but after my visit home these next few weeks I wont be home again till Christmas. This trip home is extra special not only because my brother is graduating college, but so is my younger brother from 8th grade. To top it all off my boyfriend is coming down to meet the family! The two of us are then gonna road trip it back in my 1999 Honda Civic…don’t worry it’s gonna make it!

Until then I hope everyone is enjoying the first few days of summer or the last few of school whichever it be for you!

Tyler and I depart for our road trip on the 27th so ill be sure to post updates as we travel across the eastern US, we will be stopping in Country Music City, Nashville, Louisville, Lexington, KY and HERSHEY PA! This should be fun!

Spring Weekend!

Now that it is Monday afternoon, and we have all gone back to being regular college kids with classes and meetings, it is safe to say we have all survived Spring Weekend. This also means I have a ton of work I should be doing as classes are coming to and end in just two short weeks. But since I promised new posts I have the perfect excuse to avoid them just a bit longer.

For those of you who don’t know or have not heard of Spring Weekend, it is by far the largest and most fun theme weekend here. Originally it was just a weekend, but this year the festivities kicked of a bit earlier with a comedians, duck hunt, and a diversity program to celebrate Asian Heritage month all before the weekend ever got here. Even still Spring Weekend is really all about the weekend and so Friday night kicked off with a concert featuring Raining Jane, Sarah Bareilles and Three 6 Mafia. Every year the student body gets to vote on what type of music we want for Spring Weekend. Then the concert coffee house committee makes a list of people they want to try to get. It is always a big secret of who is actually performing at Spring Weekend until the big revel at a coffeehouse night.
Saturday is my favorite day of Spring Weekend because not only is there a mixer Saturday night (we call dances mixers in college cause it sounds much cooler ;-) but there is a carnival Saturday afternoon. It is basically the equivelant of a big kid recess. There are rides like spinning tea cups and swings but this year we added a mechanical bull. There are also carnival games and food. The Caf is closed because everyone gets to eat at the cookout put on by our cafeteria catering service. If that doesn’t sound like enough fun you can also get airbrush tattoos, decorated frisbees, keychain pictures and even better its all FREE! Since the Carnival ends at three you have time to take a break and come out of your sugar coma induced by ice cream and fried dough. This year I spent the afternoon at the Stonehill softball fields. My roommate freshman Kristen, year plays outfield for the team and since I had not gotten to a game yet this season I headed out. Unfortunately they lost both games of the double header against Southern Connecticut State University, but they still played two really great games. Here are a few picts of Kristen in action. To cap the day off, we ordered some food, and hug out with friends until the Spring Fling mixer. It is always fun to dress up and act like you are at one of those good ol Jr. High dances. Even better was this year's raffle of a brand new Macbook Pro to anyone in the doors by 10:30. Unfortunately that means I didn’t win it, but I’m sure whoever did is pretty stoked! My friends and I danced the night away until they brought out pizza for us all to snack on. By the time my belly was full of pizza I decided it was time to call it a night and head for my bed.

Time Flies When You're Having Fun!!

Where did the time go??? I really don’t know. As I sit down to write this I can’t believe we are already in the home stretch of the semester. Pretty soon May 8th will be here before we know it and I will be enjoying my last summer of college. I can’t even remember everything that has been going on over the past few weeks; they have all rushed by like a crazy whirlwind. But here are some of the more important things.

First off, Spring Break!! It is hard to believe that break was weeks ago by now. Since I spent first semester in Italy I am still broke as a joke, and so I did not make any extravagant travel plans. I spent the week sleeping, eating, and catching up on the work that had managed to pile up. I spent part of the week in Lexington with my boyfriend and his family and the rest of the week I spent in Rhode Island with my adoptive family. I am really not adopted, but my best friend moved to Rhode Island after fourth grade. Now that I live in New England most of the time they have become a second family to me. I even have my own room in their house! I love them so it’s a pretty sweet gig I got. In Rhode Island I caught up on some of my favorite Rhode Island past times like shopping, scrapbooking and the most famous and delicious South County Brickly’s homemade ice cream.

Secondly, I GOT A JOB! Finding a job every summer is something I just dread doing. I had so much fun working for the admissions office last year that I really wanted to do it again. Not only do I really enjoy the job it allows me to stay on campus for the summer, which is a pretty great perk! So when application time came around I reapplied and crossed my fingers. There was a lot more people who applied this year so I was a little nervous about getting rehired. But a week or so after Spring Break I got the word that I will be living on working on campus this summer…I could not be happier!

Next on the list is I am getting my CAR! Now this may not seem like a big deal to most of you but to me it is. I have never really needed my car on campus and getting it from Texas up to school seemed to be a ridiculous idea. It does not pack neatly into a suitcase like most things. In all honesty until now I have been quite content borrowing friends’ cars and stealing their gas anytime I need. But with senior year approaching I realized that I will be going on interviews and eventually looking at places to live. So it only seemed practical that I have my own car. Right now my mom drives it around so it does not just sit in the driveway, but when I go home for by brother’s graduation in May I will be making the cross country road trip back up to school! Hopefully my ’99 Honda Civic, comically named the Green Machine will make it back!


Last but not least is Easter Break! At Stonehill we are very spoiled with a second shorter break spring semester. We always have Holy Thursday through Easter Monday off. It is just one of the many perks of going to a Catholic school. So while all my friends were in classes Thursday and Friday, I slept in, relaxed and put off doing homework just a little bit longer. Friday my boyfriend Tyler and I headed to Rhode Island to spend Easter weekend with them. We had plans to go fishing Saturday but the weather man had other plans. The weather was rather gross so we stayed in side and watched movie and caught up with one another. We did manage to find a break in the rain to enjoy the hot tub for a while…it’s my favorite! Sunday we all went to church and had an amazing brunch after. Because not everyone was as lucky as I was to have Monday off we all headed in separate directions Sunday afternoon. Tyler and I to his house to have Easter diner with his parents, and my friend Kacie back up to school at UNH.

Even though the end of the semester is mere weeks away we still are all still looking forward to Spring Weekend before we have to hit the books for final exams! I promise an update before then!

Phil Say’s 6 More Weeks of Winter

What many people don’t know about me is that I have a special love for Groundhog Day. Growing up, the pastor at my church was originally from Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, home of Groundhog Day. Needless to say this often forgotten holiday was never forgotten in the halls of our elementary and junior high school. Even though I’m older I still look forward to Phil’s prediction every year.

For those of you who don’t know the story of Groundhog Day I’ll fill you in on some Punxsutawney Phil history. Groundhog Day has a history that dates back to the earliest settlers in the small town. The first trek to Gobbler’s Knob, was in 1887. Every year on February 2, Phil emerges and makes his prediction. If he sees his shadow there will be six more weeks of winter, if he doesn’t see his shadow we are in for an early spring.

So what was Phil’s prediction for this year??
6 more weeks of winter….stay warm!

Here We Go Again!

Hello, Hello, Hello

Sorry it has been so long since I last let you peek through the window and into my life. Lets just say I finally have a new computer and everything seems to be working again. That being said I didn’t mean to leave you hi and dry about the end of my semester. Instead of rehashing my last few days in Perugia let me assure you they were WONDERFUL! The three and a half months I spent there were truly a once in a lifetime opportunity and I hope everyone has the opportunity to have a similar experience at some time. So to wrap that part of my story up I’ll share with you my list of superlatives from the past semester…Enjoy!


Best City- Dublin, Ireland
Worst City- Barcelona, Spain

Best Travel experience- Overnight trains
Worst Travel experience- Tie: First weekend of trains to Cinque Terri, 12 hours on a buss back from Munich.

Best Food-tie: eggplant parmesan and gelato!
Worst Food-

Best Weekend- Long weekend in Munich, minus the rain
Worst Weekend- Archaeology field trip…I have never been so wet and cold in my life.

Best Shower- Ben Albert’s Geneva Switzerland
Worst Shower- the one in my apartment…gross!

Friendliest People-Dublin
Least Friendly People- Paris

Best Museum- Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel
Worst Museum- Archaeology Museum

Walking in a Winter Wonderland

As I sit down to write this I can’t believe it is already December. I just got off the phone with my dad and he told me he would see me next week. I think in that single moment it hit me…my time here in Italy is coming to a close. Wednesday was the last day of reviews. Finals begin Thursday and carry on until Tuesday. That same evening we will be packing up and heading home. It’s a strange feeling, knowing that we are actually going home after living her for the past three and a half months.

This weekend I went on my last trip of the semester. It is hard to remember what my first weekend traveling was like, and it also makes me grateful for how much better I have gotten at using the trains and using charades to communicate when I have trouble speaking the language. Visiting Munich lets me mark off the last place I really wanted to visit before heading home. Now I can say I am officially ready to hit the road back home.

Munich was absolutely amazing, just like everyone said it would be. It might actually even be my favorite place of the semester. My journey to Munich was a littler different than most of my other travels. My friend Lindsay and I signed up with a travel company called Euroadventures. They organize different tours for study abroad students throughout the semester. You pay one flat free and you get transportation, a place to stay, breakfast, and a guided tour of the city. It worked out great, we even ran into fellow Stonehill-er Kait Mendell. So after boarding the buss Friday evening we drove for almost 10 hours before reaching Munich. Every year Munich decorates for the holidays and celebrates with famous Christmas markets. You can buy all sorts of holiday presents as well as food. If you can believe it, I held off my shopping/ eating bug just long enough to take a walking tour of the city and see some of the highlights…did you know there were surfers in Munich?? Here are just a few picts from around the city.

The old town gate

Town hall and the famous clock

Old town hall

Lions are the symbol of Munich, you can rub their noses for good luck.

Later on Saturday afternoon the three girls and our new friend Jose headed about 20mins outside of Munich to Visit Dachau. As a history major, WWII is one of my favorite time periods to study, and so I was really grateful to get to visit this piece of history. Even though it was mid afternoon, the weather that day made it dark and dreary. Being on the grounds of Dachau, which was the first concentration camp established, was very sad and eerie. We had just enough time to see the memorial museum, view the video explaining the background of the camp and view a few of the remaining structures. It is nearly impossible to imagine the atrocities committed there.

Later that night we headed out to experience what Munich and Germany is known for….beer! Lots and Lots of it. Anywhere you walk in Germany you can see beer gardens and beer halls. Our Euroadventures group headed to Hofbrauhaus house, one of the oldest, biggest and arguably the most famous in all of Germany. I have never seen a three storied restaurant so packed at 7:30. We had some traditional German food, sausages, mashed potatoes, and sauerkraut, and a big stein full of beer to wash it all down. The entire hall is packed so you just join people already sitting at the long wooden tables. By the end of the night everyone is friends, eating, drinking, and singing together to the house band dressed in full lederhosen. Sunday morning we slept in before heading out to fight the crowds at the Christmas Markets. The entire main square is turned into a Winter Wonderland. Sunday became a day of eating local treats and shopping. We also took a shopping break to watch the Glockenspiel clock go off. For as famous of a clock as it was I was slightly disappointed by the show. But my huge pretzels, 4th or 5th bratwurst of the weekend seemed to make up for it. Before calling it a day Kait, Lindsay and I had a glass of Gleuwine which is a warm spiced wine. I have to say, that it is not my favorite German holiday food.

We finished our weekend with a trip out to see two of Mad King Ludwig’s castles about two and a half hours south of Munich. Apparently, the mad king got his name by spending tons of money on building castles all over the German country side. We got to see the castle he was born in and one of the ones he built himself. I am sure most of you know what the Disney’s Cinderella’s castle looks like. Well you can thank good ol’ Mad King Ludwig for providing Disney with inspiration. The castle itself I absolutely beautiful by itself, but the foot or so of fresh snow made the trip feel like a winter wonderland. The whole day we drove home was like driving though a picture.

I can’t believe that in less than a week I will be back home in Texas where a white Christmas is only a dream. Good luck to everyone with finals!