My God, He's Making me Draw!

My art appreciation professor assigned the class it's first hands on project for the semester. It's a 100 point project and it's due one month from today.

We have to take an advertisement, full face shot, and reproduce it in pencil in the naturalist style. Then we have to do a series of panels, where we take our reproduction and add abstract elements, then after completing 8 of these panels, we are to redo the original naturalism drawing in the abstract.

I draw stick people remarkably well.  That is the extent of my talent.

Happily, Dave said that we can use a grid to do the work, as long as the grid lines don't appear on the finished product.

Today I hie to Hobby Lobby to buy artist pencils, since the work can only be in black and white. The skillful use of eraser and smudging can provide proper shading, etc. It looks to be an interesting project.

Yesterday, it rained cats and dogs. I, as a consequence to having to walk about campus, spent the day in wet shoes. I hate having my feet stuck in wet shoes. My feet were all pruney when I took them off at home. I digress, while I killed time in-between classes, I got to meet a few of my fellow students, all younger than me of course, and we spent a couple of hours just hanging out and talking about anything. Surprisingly, three of the young men were musicians, and even though they are about 19 to 20 years old, they all appreciate Rush! They are also surprisingly conservative in some areas, financial in particular.

The main reason they are doing their core work at the community college is because of the cost of higher education. Marcus, one of the guys I was talking with, made a good point when he said that it made no sense to pay triple or quadruple the tuition for math, when he could save the money. He will transfer his credits to the 4 year he wants to attend, once his core is done. He will still have to borrow, but this way he is borrowing less.

Very sensible of him.

I am really enjoying talking to the kids I meet on campus. Thus far, they have been polite and engaging. They all think it rocks that someone my age is starting a second career. Last semester, after I made friends of a sort with a few girls, I even got asked advise about boys. Yesterday I was asked about how to get ahead at the work place...then we talked about music, art and professors who suck.

The real treat is when one of the music students breaks out his instrument and plays. Last semester I got treated to many an impromptu guitar performance, yesterday was the violin. On Monday, for the Chinese New Year, there were dragons and drums.

I am really enjoying school and sometimes I regret not going when I was much younger. Sometimes. I don' t think that I really would have appreciated the experience back then.

I do now.

Second Semester, Day 2

As was the case last semester, I am the oldest student in my class. Thus far, however, my professors are older than me or my age.

Microbiology looks to be interesting. My professor is actually an M.D. who worked in trauma and E.R. medicine before deciding to teach. My math professor is from India and he seems to be pretty cool. I ca also understand him, as he doesn't have a thick accent.

Thus far, today, I have taken my first Art Appreciation lesson...well it was a review of the syllabus...the professor for this class did his undergrad work at LSU and wants us to call him Dave. It was no surprise to me that he is a flaming liberal, but I am not in school to try to fire up my professors with anything but stellar grades. This is one of those required core curriculum classes that I have to suffer through, although I'd much prefer to have a heavier science load.

This young grasshopper must be patient.

Day one in each class and I have already sussed out the classmates who will be disruptions or have an attitude problem. I suppose that as I progress into higher levels of classes, these students will become fewer and far between. At least I hope so. It seems to me, that as classes get more and more specialized, then the students in them will be there because they are committed to their major. Right now, all of my classes are core for the spectrum of an Associate of Science degree, as opposed to something more specialized like nursing.  I am also hoping that I am wrong about my fellow classmates in Micro...most of them are declared nursing or lab tech majors. I'm hoping that this will also be the case in my A&P I class, which begins in 2 hours.

Two of my 4 classes this semester are at a different, and bigger campus than my usual one. I like this new campus, it's far bigger and has everything within walking distance. It also has a separate science center, which is where I am composing this post. The set up looks nice..as do the labs.

All in all, not a bad beginning to my second semester in college. Here's to making Deans List again!

New Years Resolutions....

This year has flown by for me! I can't believe it's almost over.

A lot has happened to me this year, the biggie being I went back to school to study nursing. Made the dean's honors list, too!

So as the end of 2011 approaches, I have been contemplating changes that I need to make in my life and around the house. Most of these will make it easier to be a mom to 2 teenagers, a supportive fiancee to Mike and still make honors in school.

Did I mention that the wedding is in August?

So, here is a list of things that I am doing in 2012...

1. January 2, 2012; inventory all of the pantry and the two freezers. I will also inventory the stockpile in the garage and organize everything.

I need to know what I have so that I can shop for groceries more effectively. With the stock pile I have built now, I haven't had to grocery shop for anything except fresh produce, bread, milk and eggs for about a month now. I did buy a HUGE ham this week. It was .99 a pound, and I couldn't pass it up. It was baked yesterday, we had some for dinner last night and I am cutting it up to freeze for meals tonight.

2. Make the bouquets for me and my bridesmaids.  Hobby Lobby often puts stems of calla lilies on sale for half off. These faux flowers look and feel real...they are $5.00 a stem. I will buy them at half off when they go on sale and make my own arrangements.

3. I will try Once A Week Cooking. From every thing I've read, this might make my life a bit easier in as much as all I will have to do is pull dinner out of the fridge or freezer and voila! All that I will need to do is take care of the sides.

4. I will Christmas shop throughout the year. We have good intentions when it comes to a budget, but we always go over. NO MORE.  I am a savvy grocery shopper, and if I apply this savviness to Christmas, Birthdays etc, we should do well.  Since Mike and I have a wedding to pay for, this will be really helpful.

5. I will do the favors for the wedding. I've decided that personalized M&M's are the way to go. When the favor tins go on sale for half off, I can stock up.

6. I will NOT add anymore people to the wedding guest list!!!!!!  200 people is quite enough, thank you very much!

7. I will expand my vegetable and fruit garden this spring. So far, so good with what I have planted so far, so why not expand it. Fresh produce is better for us anyway.

8. I am refining my housekeeping schedule. It's pretty good now, but it can be improved upon. My biggest pet peeve is the DAMN PET HAIR and the DAMN DUST!!!! Oh, and the CLUTTER that keeps accumulating on this one counter in the kitchen.  GAH! It drives me nuts!

9. This falls in with the pantry inventory, I am re-organizing the pantry too. The above mentioned counter and cabinets in the kitchen will be used for lesser used items. The cabinets are in between the pantry and the fridge. I don't do prep work on this counter. Theoretically, it's supposed to function as my command-ops center where I keep the calendar, laptop etc. Maybe if I get all mean mom about it, the clutter will stop gathering there. WHO AM I KIDDING?

10. I am NOT going to lose weight...I am rather going to shape up what I have. I am, shockingly happy with what I weigh, I'm just not happy with the flabby parts. Gravity after 40 is a bitch.

11. I am going to have an AWESOME wedding. People will speak of it in the decades to come, it will be that awesome, and I am going to do it for LESS THAN $12K.

12. I am going to finish redecorating the master bedroom. I only have some touch ups to do, and I have to stain the furniture. I have everything I need, except the stain. I just have to do it!  It shall be done BY THE END OF MARCH!!!

13. I will complete all of my prerequisites for nursing school this year. I will make dean's honors every semester.

14. I will blog more. The adventures of a 40 something in college with a ton of 20 somethings. It should be interesting  if this first semester was any indication.


That's it for now. I'm sure that I will come up with more, though. I've always been an over achiever.