May Flowers

 

Dead Flowers

Dead Flowers

These were the flowers that previously graced our porch.  The green of the plant behind it tricks you into thinking it’s still alive, but believe me these have been dead for many months.
Ever since moving into our new apartment last summer, I had fancies of planting flowers on our porch.  I love flowers, but much prefer them still on the plant than cut and placed in a vase.  One of my favorites, impatiens, was the perfect choice for our shady porch.  It’s so much more pleasant to water your own flowers than someone else’s, and these are the first that are truly my own.  My parents have wonderful green thumbs, but it was to my brother and I to water the impatiens, and it was certainly one of my least favorite summer chores (second to picking tomatoes…they make me itchy!).
New flowers

New flowers

These are the flowers that are now on our porch.  I have two identical planters, one on the left, and one on the right.

The Bigger Picture

The Bigger Picture

This is the bigger picture of what I see when I gaze off the porch.  As many jokes as have been made about me hating trees, I really do enjoy this view of the woods (disguising the other apartment complex a couple hundred feet on the other side).  And yes, the plant peed a little.  Can’t take it anywhere without it having an accident…

Close up

So pretty!

Final Papers and Mini-Floods

All the pressure from the past week? It’s practically gone. This week will still be busy, but I can see how I possibly can get everything I need to done. And starting Tuesday night?

It’ll be a week long party.

I just hope I’ll have enough energy by then!

This weekend was incredible. I can only thank God that I got everything done that I did, because I have never written papers in so little time before.
Friday I went grocery shopping, went clothes shopping (needed some essentials for graduation), went Christmas shopping, wrote my last 2 Sunday school lessons (it was my internship this semester for class) as well as a couple of pages for my smaller paper while I was babysitting.

Saturday I finished my smaller paper, went a baby shower, re-wired the dryer, did 3 loads of laundry, cleaned my room, wrote several pages on my long paper, cleaned up a mini-flood, and rooted for my national-championship-bound Sooners.

Sunday I attended church, finished memorizing Titus 2:1-3:11, wrote on my paper, cleaned up a minier-flood, went back to church, and came home and finished that paper. Yesterday afternoon I actually wrote 5 pages of one of my papers in an hour. I’ve never written a paper that fast. I’m more in the 1-page an hour with a break, 2-page an hour without a break type of gal.

You’ve been keeping count with me, that’s my last paper of the semester, of the year, of my masters, and of my entire career as a student. I almost teared up when I put the finishing touches, and then I thought better of it.

Hmm, seems like I had something else to say. You may have a question in your head if you’ve actually read the whole post semi-carefully: “cleaned up a mini-flood,” “cleaned up a minier-flood,” what is that all about?

Yes, I had to clean up a couple of small floods this weekend. We’ve been without a washer and dryer in our apartment since August when our old roommate came back from visiting her parents for the summer and needed her washer and dryer for her new place. We’ve made due by visiting friends with baskets of laundry in our hands and making a few costly trips to the laundromat (why in the world should it cost $4 to wash and dry a load of clothes?). But this week we finally have a washer and dryer to call our own. Okay, to call my roommate’s own. She paid for them.

For whatever reason, the washer is really shaky, so shaky that it knocked the water return hose loose while I was doing a load yesterday. Water flooded the entire laundry closet about half an inch deep. It made me vaguely reminiscent to when our entire apartment had at least that much water in it last year. After getting the water to stop pouring out, I was able to mop up most of the water with about 6 towels or so. The rest of it dryed up pretty quickly as it was warm in their and it’s winter, so our apartment is pretty dry. I put those back in place as far as it would go, and thought we’d be good.

Not so. The same exact thing happened yesterday afternoon, ironically while I washing the towels I used to mop up the first accident. There is a learning curve to such things, though, and I was much quicker to respond and clean up. It only took 3 towels this time around. From now on, it looks like we’re going to have to make sure to push down the hose with each load, or we’re going to have more floods.

Anyway, I’m entirely sorry that this post is rather rambly. Maybe those papers took all my writing skills. Regardless, I’m going to refrain from posting until I am completely done with my school work tomorrow night. The last thing I have is a final at 6:30 tomorrow night, so by 8:00, I’ll be a free woman! Don’t expect a post right then, though, because I might just have to out and celebrate. =)

As Random as the Day is Long

This will be quick, because I have a busy day in front of me. Normally I like to keep one post on one topic, but this will be random. Sorry.

Kerry mentioned the other day that maybe it’s time to update on the smelliness of our apartment. And she’s right. I mentioned way back that our new apartment smelled like a couple of smokers lived there. The smoke was drifting over from the apartment next door. After many efforts to rid the smell ourselves, we didn’t get very far. With the help of friends and heavy-duty air purifiers, it had gotten better. Then slowly the lingering smell faded away. I still ask people that come to visit if it smells like smoke, and the answer is always “no.” There’s an occasional time if I’m standing in the just right place of my bathroom or dining room that I smell it, but other than that it’s gone. I think our property manager told our neighbor about how it was affecting us and he has started smoking more outside or at least inside with the window open. He should be moving out by the end of the month, so that’ll be even better.

I have a friend visiting this weekend which is a lot of fun. I’ll also be starting back with Sunday school and Awana. The beginning of the year can be overwhelming at times.

Since everything is starting back, I think about what was going on a year ago. Things looked a lot different, that’s for sure! Thursday night before we started Sunday school was when the fire took place. It definitely threw me off a little bit, but I learned more than I ever thought I could through that experience.

Work is uncharacteristically busy today for a Friday. Goes along with the theme of the week!

A lot of my friends are going through changes of various types at this time. They’ve all been on my mind a lot, which inhibits blogging some. After all, I can’t really talk about what I’m thinking about if what I’m thinking about is someone else’s business. It also doesn’t help that I haven’t been reading; I’m sure that has stifled my own creativity. I’m definitely not winning any blogger of the year awards for this week’s material: some disorganized posts, a couple random posts, and a meme. Hope to back in better form come Monday!

Hope you all enjoy your last pre-Labor Day weekend!

Day in the Life of a Ronnica

Today hasn’t been a typical Sunday. I have been running nonstop, and–get this–have totally avoided the painful task of school work! I can’t think of a single day in the past two months (except when I was various shades of green) that I’ve actually been study-free. It certainly won’t become a habit of mine, but it was a great, though exhausting breaks (funny how that works). Without further ado (and before the last 30 minutes of today run out), here’s my day in list form:

  • Woke this morning at my usual 6, a little irritable. It seems that allowing myself to sleep in until 7 on Saturdays makes it harder to get up on Sundays.
  • I helped entertain/teach the K-5 class…we only had 4 students. Last week we had our top attendance of 13. We’re the smallest children’s class, but 4 is by far our lowest point!
  • After church I went out for Mexican with a good friend. It was great to hang out with her (and get some good Mexican!).
  • After lunch, I headed back to the church to watch one of my Awana girls receive her black belt. I knew that this was something that meant a lot to her so I was glad that I was able to attend.
  • After going to a local gas station for a pick-me-up (a Diet Dr. Pepper and a Cookies and Creme candy bar), I went to look at some apartments with my roommate. We’re deciding between two: one with better amenities: pool (with lap swimming!), tennis courts, fireplace, etc. and the other with more spacious floor plans. The rent is about the same and are both probably have about the same drive time to work (though one is longer to school and church).
  • Next was Awana. It was crazy hair night. Mine looked like it was fit for a bird. I didn’t realize how much hair I have hanging from my head. Maybe I should chop it off?
  • After Awana, I headed home to watch Becoming Jane with my roommate. I liked it, though her books (and the movies based on them) are better. My roommate hadn’t realized that she didn’t get married, and was disappointed. I knew but didn’t tell her. Oops.
  • Now I’m sitting here taking care of super secret birthday business for my other roommate and advising you to my goings-on (with 5 minutes to spare). I hope it wasn’t too rambly!