Friday, September 8, 2023

last day of work

Today was my last day of work for the season (hurray!) 
I am so glad to be done. Today was a triple crusie ship day (but one's been broken down in the harbor for a week, so all it's passengers are done exploring by now :) but it still was suprisingly slow. The season winds down so fast. 
Now that the summer season has officially come to a close, I'll hopefully be able to get into a better groove and habit for school, blogging, extracurriculars etcetera. 

it's fall...

 Of course, I knew fall was coming. I was maybe in a bit of denial for the last three weeks of chilly rain, fog, and woodstove fires. 

Don't get me wrong, I love fall. But, for the first time ever, I am not especially looking forward to it. 

Thursday marked the first appearance of snow on the mountains + 38 degrees. September weather has been treating us a lot better than August. Now we have beautiful (but cold) sunshine, with abrupt bouts of extremely strong rain. It's a blast. The red flies are out in full force too. 

Anyway, fall is here! 

the BEST healthy snack

 Introducing my newest obsession: 

    healthy snickers. 

These healthy snickers taste amazing. I cannot explain how delicious these are. Added bonus? They are so so simple to make. You can just spend ten minutes and store a huge batch in the freezer. 

All you need is pitted medjool dates, peanut butter or almond butter, and sugar free chocolate. Just barely slice into a date (almost like you're making a loaded potato), fill with peanut butter (warm up in the microrwaave to make it easier to work with), and then dunk in your SF melted chocolate chips (I melt with some coconut oil). If you want, add a tiny piece of graham cracker in the middle...it's the best. 

These things are seriously so good, perfect for a quick breakfast on the road, a midday snack, or a late night sugar craving. 

Friday, September 1, 2023

Life Lately

 Life Lately | August 

Wow! It's been a minute since I've done a Life Lately (or a post in general, sorry!!) Now that summer has been closed (for the most part), I'm excited to start doing these monthly posts. They're one of my favorites. 

Life has been crazy busy and I feel like I'm just getting my schedule figured out. We'll see how this next month goes. 

So, where were we?

August...you've got to love it. August is my second least favorite month, mainly because of the huge amount of tourists finishing off vacation. The first cruise ship docking was May 8 and the last is October 14...it lasts a long time. Mid-September is when things start quieting down a bit more. The bugs and this extremely persistent rain have also made August more difficult. We've gotten so, so much rain. 

Actually, today it's sunny, a welcome relief from the weather. I'm about to go to work and sitting in the library finishing up some homework. I was the first person in here and so I was able to claim my favorite spot. So far one person has been kicked out. 

This month has been busy with my work schedule (just three more days left!!!), hanging out with friends, and preparing for school. 

My friend group has done so well hanging out this summer (mostly because two of them were only up here working for the summer). We went camping, had poker nights, game nights, movie nights, after church Subway get-togethers...the goodbyes at the last football game were so sad. 

Oh yeah, I bought a car! It was a very last-minute decision. The guy selling it dropped the price because he was moving (literally the next morning). My mom, brother, and I drove up to Anchorage around 8 p.m., bought it around 10:30, visited my aunt around 11 p.m., and got home around 1 a.m. It was crazy. He's a white 2007 Rav4 with just a few issues haha. Hopefully, after a brief stay at the body shop, he'll be ready to go :) 

I did a room renovation I have been dreaming about for a decade. I bought wood laminate flooring and tore up my carpet. My bed frame also broke during that process. 

I got a desk! My desk was just way too small, and I knew that this school load was going to require me to have a good study area. So far, I am completely in love with it. 

We said goodbye to all of the puppies. Carson went to a family in Colorado, Daisy went to a family in Seward, Bates went to my aunt and her family, and Sybil (now Shiloh) is ours! We decided to keep her, and so far (besides the normal puppy nonsense), she's been amazing. She's more chill than the others and she loves to snuggle. 

That's all I can think of! Hope you have a great rest of your day, and thank you for reading!

School Supply Haul

 This year I am pursuing my associate degree in liberal arts through CCU Academy. I am taking five courses through them: College Writing, General Psychology, C.S Lewis in Film & Literature, New Testament, and Intro to Statistics, as well as a Graphic Design class through our co-op. 

Notebooks: 

 I wanted to try dotted notebooks because I love taking elaborate notes, these ones from Amanaple are fantastic. The pages are thick, the binding is durable and the colors are pretty nice. 

New Testament Notebook. The covers are fairly see-through. 

Psychology...

Writing.


Math (blue Mead Five Star is for Notes and the composition notebook is for formulas and vocabulary) 

C.S Lewis Film & Lit. 

A glimpse inside...the pages are so nice to write on and the dotted notebooks help provide guidance for notes, but also add the freedom for more creativity. 


OTHER  
Those Mr. Pen Highlighters (in the Earthy Colors pack) are my favorite! I like the muted colors and they're so smooth. 
Pilot G2 pens are my absolute favorite! 
BIC Gelocity pens are super good too and 0.7 pencils are a necessity! 
I love to use tabbies and page markers for easy access to important things in textbooks or notes. 
I love using sticky notes to write important dates or reminders. 

Planner 
I really like this planner. I think it's very aesthetic and well-organized. It has many cool features like a daily habit tracker, budget tracker, and goals page. If I could change one thing I would give more space for writing school assignments (there's only one line per subject). I ordered this from The Passionate Penny Pincher.  Click HERE for link

NOT SHOWN: MY BINDER :) it just has blank paper and all my syllabi.