Wow! It’s hard to believe that I am already writing the final blog for this semester. While these past 16 weeks of school have been amazing, I am really looking forward to this summer. I guess you could say pretty much everyone is, but I personally have never been this excited. I’m pretty sure this is going to be the best summer of my life thus far. Allow me to explain. First of all, I will be studying abroad in London for five weeks. I have never been out of the country before or traveled alone. This will be an entirely new experience for me that will help me grow tremendously. I have been making a long list of the things I want to do while I am in Europe.

Secondly, as soon as I get back from London, I am driving to Kansas City to go to the One Direction concert! I bought these tickets 13 months in advance, so this event has obviously been a long time coming. I love these guys beyond belief and couldn’t be happier that I get to see them live. Besides these two major events, I will also be attending a team bonding/leadership development retreat in Lake of the Ozarks with my fellow Fontbonne Activities Board officers. Any other time that I have will be spent working at Gordmans, babysitting, visiting with friends, and seeing Muny shows. My family gets season tickets to the Muny every summer. I will be missing most of them this year due to my numerous other plans. I am okay with this though considering I will be in one of the major fashion capitals of the world. I am convinced that summer 2013 will be one to go down in my personal record book. I will be sure to return next semester with many fabulous stories.

I’m very excited for this Friday, because it is the annual Springfest at Fontbonne. This is a day full of performances and activities, which changes a little year to year. This is one of the biggest, most talked about events of the year, which I have been looking forward to for a long time. It is always a great way to celebrate the end of the school year and end it with a bang. This year, Springfest starts out with a performance by indie folk artist Owen Pye. He was on campus earlier this semester during the coffee house night, where he played guitar and sang his own songs. I am glad to have him back.

After that, there is going to be a fashion show, which is produced by the Fashion Promotions class in my beloved Fashion Merchandising department. I am thrilled to say that I am a model in the show. During my first two years at Fontbonne, I have helped dress models and worked behind the scenes for a couple shows, which was a lot of fun. But, I thought I’d try something different and participate as a model. I was a little nervous at first, but I am proud to say that the rehearsals have been going well.

Next, there will be a live-band karaoke in the late afternoon. I am a huge fan of karaoke, so you can count on me to be there the whole time hogging the microphone. How awesome will it be to perform with a live band?! Following this, dinner will be served while the next performers set up for their show. These musicians include Tyler Hilton from the show One Tree Hill and Ryan Cabrera from the show The Hills. These guys were big when I was in middle school, so it will be fun to take a little trip down memory lane. After the show, I am hoping to get pictures with them and have my CD’s signed. Being a huge fan of pop culture, all the events at Springfest this year are right up my alley. The performances will take place outside Medaille Hall in the meadow, so let’s pray for good weather! Regardless, Springfest 2013 is sure to be a hit. I know I’m ready for it!

This past week was full of events, because it was spirit week. Every semester, Fontbonne has a spirit week the week of the dance (which is on Saturdays). So, every day last week was leading up to the big, main event. It was very busy, but also a lot of fun and definitely worth losing a little sleep over.

The week started pretty relaxed on Monday with a casual dance party in the DSAC. Songs that have well-known dances were played (i.e. YMCA and hokey pokey). Tuesday night, Fontbonne had a section reserved at the Cardinals baseball game. The weather was beautiful that night and we won! Wednesday night, a dueling piano performance was in the DSAC. I had never been to anything like this before. I had a fabulous time. Two musicians played piano and sang songs by student requests. They were extremely talented and played off one another very well.

Thursday night, the movie The Perks of Being a Wallflower was shown in the DSAC. It was supposed to be projected outside in the meadow, but it was too wet. It’s still always nice though to watch a movie and snack on popcorn. Friday was Fontbonne Day, which is a day where classes are canceled. Because of this, students are encouraged to do volunteer work around the community. Numerous and a wide variety of sites were available to choose from. I helped out at a homeless shelter. Friday night was the talent competition in which Mr. Fontbonne was crowned. Finally, Saturday night was the spring dance. The name for this one was “Welcome to the Hamptons.” This was a preppy themed formal.

Spirit week is always full of exciting events, and I look forward to more in the future!

This past weekend I took a trip down to Springfield, Missouri and visited my brother. One downside of being in college is that you don’t get to see your family as often. However, this has made me treasure the moments that I do spend with my family more. It was really nice and to see him since the last time we were together was on Christmas. He was equally excited to see me.

My brother is a part of the fraternity Delta Chi at Missouri State University, and their awards banquet and coronation dinner was this past weekend. When we go a few months without seeing each other, we have A LOT to catch up on. We shared stories about our school involvements and spring break trips in between a fancy dinner that was served. I also got to meet some of his fraternity brothers and I visited his apartment for the first time. This was a huge wake-up call on how much we are growing up. It’s funny for me to see him have his own place.

Before college, I spent much of my life cooking for him, cleaning his room, and helping him with homework. Now he has to do it all on his own (that is, if it gets done). While it’s exciting to grow up, it’s also hard to let go of that inner-child. We spent every day of our childhood together, and now we only see each other every few months. Luckily, that’s more than some people can say. At least we live 4 hours and within the same state. It can always be worse.

I don’t mean to brag, but I just got back from the best spring break ever. I could go on for days describing details about my wonderful trip to New York City. But instead, I’ll highlight just my favorite parts (although it’s very hard to pick). My favorite morning was when my roommate, Conner, and I walked across the Brooklyn Bridge. The weather was perfect and the views of the city were breathtaking.

My favorite evening was the one spent attending a Broadway show (which made me feel very classy). Conner and I saw “Nice Work If You Can Get It” starring Matthew Broderick. I was thoroughly entertained and blown away by the beautiful lights that fill Times Square. My favorite dinner was at Benito I, a cute and quaint restaurant in Little Italy.

Last, but not least, the company that I favored the most was M&S Schmalberg,  which we toured as a class. This is a family owned business that creates custom fabric flowers for various companies and designers. I formed so many amazing memories in NYC that I will cherish forever. Hopefully I will be able to travel there again someday.

Luckily, I had a few days to spend at home as well during spring break. My favorite part of my time spent in St. Peters, Missouri was dying Easter eggs with my cousins. I look forward to this tradition every year. Let’s just say that spring break 2013 is going to be a hard one to beat in the future.

It’s almost here! The plane for my class trip to New York City leaves in only a couple days! Naturally, I am extremely excited for this upcoming adventure and very grateful for this opportunity that Fontbonne has provided. Twelve fashion merchandising students and four faculty members are attending, which is Wednesday through Tuesday. Three of those days will be spent as a group, visiting various companies for exclusive industry tours. The other days and each night students have to themselves. My roommate and I have done a lot of research and planning together and came up with a very busy agenda. We are scheduled to visit multiple museums, see a Broadway show, dine at amazing restaurants, walk the Brooklyn Bridge, stroll around Central Park, and do lots of shopping, of course! (Considering where we will be, “shopping” will require more looking than actual buying). It has been a bit exhausting preparing for the trip and making up my school work on time. However, I know that this fun and amazing experience will definitely be worth it.

I work at Gordman’s, and the company recently implemented a new dress code. This was announced about a month ago, so everyone else has already been following it. But today was the actual starting day for the new code to be implemented; therefore today I had to start following it with my fellow employees. The new dress code is as follows: solid black shirt, plain blue jeans, and solid black shoes. Boring! Being a fashion enthusiast, clothing is how I express myself. I love to wear crazy patterns and bold colors, which I was previously allowed to do at work. I rarely wear regular blue jeans because I don’t like to wear things that a majority of other people have. I am not fond of conforming. However, I understand why the company would want its associates to look similar and how it may be helpful to shoppers. Accordingly, I will keep my complaining to a minimum, especially since I love the people I work with and have a lot of fun merchandising at Gordman’s (and after all, my job is what is paying my way through college). To spice up this required basic look, I plan on accessorizing like crazy. This way, I am still being somewhat expressive and sticking to my personal style. I’ll just conform in my own unique way. Now you’ve heard my opinion, so how do you feel about dress codes?

Remember when you were in elementary school and how excited you would get when going on field trips? The whole class would count down the days in anticipation of getting out of the classroom for one day. Well, I experienced all these good childhood feelings again when I went on a class trip this morning. This field trip was not to the Magic House or zoo, but to a dancewear company called Weissman. This may not sound exciting to some, but to a fashion merchandising student like me, it was a big deal. My class met with numerous employees and we got a tour of the building, enabling us to see the design, product development, trend forecasting, marketing, and production departments in action.

In the classroom, we have learned about such careers, so it was eye-opening to witness the real thing. Luckily, Weissman in based right in St. Louis, so the field trip was very convenient. Also, it was a rare opportunity to have seen all the steps that go into the development, production, and selling of a product all in one place. So, just because I’m not a grade-schooler anymore, that doesn’t mean I don’t have any field trips to look forward to. Not only are they fun, but it is a great way to break up the monotony of the classroom and see the real world go to work.

As we all know, there were a couple snow days recently. I have never met a student or teacher that does not like snow days. For one, that means a day off. And secondly, snow is just so gorgeous to look at. (At least it is until it gets plowed to the sides of roads in massive, dirty piles.) When I was younger, in elementary and middle school, of course my snow days were spent outside. My brother and I would walk past only a few houses up the street to a church with a giant hill that we would sleigh-ride on (sadly, the hill has now been taken over by the church expansion). It was convenient because we could get there all by ourselves. Eventually, we would come back home and watch the movie Snow Day. You may not be familiar with it, but to me and my brother, it’s a classic (a very corny Nickelodeon movie, but classic).

However, my ways have changed since those days. Now, I prefer to use snow days as a catch-up day. I like to wrap myself in a cozy blanket and get ahead on some school work. This makes me feel so accomplished and ready to conquer the upcoming school days. Don’t worry, I do take breaks in between subjects and watch an episode of The Big Bang Theory, Project Runway, or American Idol (I’m not 100% a book worm). As you can see, my inner hermit characteristics come out during my most recent snow days.

To earn money that goes directly towards tuition, I have an internship with the Department of Leadership Education and Student Activities. I started this last semester and had a great time helping promote events, set up, and bonding with my fellow interns and the staff. So far, I am enjoying it even more this semester. One of my projects is to develop and run biweekly trivia nights on campus. Considering I am very into pop culture, this job is perfect for me. I come up with all the questions, themes, and host the actual event. The assistant director of student activities at Fontbonne, Joel, helps me create flyers and promote the events through Twitter (#GSOPC). Typically, the trivia nights start at 8:15 every other Tuesday in the DSAC Caf’. However, this week it will be on Wednesday since the last home basketball game is on Tuesday. This week’s theme is “Broken Hearted.” The questions revolve around celebrity breakups, breakup songs, and other famous relationship drama. Hopefully this tradition will continue to grow and I thank everyone who has been participating (and hope they’ve been having as much as I have been!). Other trivia themes are as follows (the first two have already successfully been completed).

House of Mouse

Revenge of the Nerds

Animation Domination

The Scoop on Hoops

I Love the 90′s!

British Invasion