30 before 30: Second to last update!

I know I'm a little late. But only by a few months, right? I'm going with that being okay. But I realize that now I have less than a year to complete my 30 before 30 goals! Oh my gosh! I'm not sure I will get all this done. Eep! I picture myself doing a lot of work this summer to catch up.

But here it is! My next to last update on my 30 before 30 goals!

1. Graduate from the Portland State School Counseling graduate program
I did it! After two years of working part time, going to classes in the evenings, writing papers, reading, reading, reading, six months of clinical practice and then 9 months of stressful internships, and I did it! I met some amazing people who are now doing amazing work at schools. Go team!

9. Get a "real" job
Around about the time I went to Korea last summer, I was starting to feel a little worried about what I would be doing in the fall. I had done SO. MANY. INTERVIEWS. So many. And I had gotten so many phone calls and emails saying no, no, no. I got a couple of phone calls that were like, "It was down to you and another person, and we went with the person with more experience."

Then, in August, when I was in Santa Clara for my grandmother's unexpected funeral (rest in peace, Graham Cracker), I got a phone call while at the wake at my Aunt's house from a job in Newberg. We played a little phone tag and I got the interview set up. Then I got ANOTHER phone call from another school in Newberg asking if I wanted to schedule an interview for a little bit after my interview at the other school since I was in town.

Back to back interviews and both went well. I got tours of the schools showing me where my office would be, etc. As I as going into my second interview I got called off from work which turned out to be a blessing because I got a phone call from the district asking me to come interview with the superintendant (and the principal of the school from my first interview of the day). At that interview I was offerred my pick of either position and while I felt like I knew which one right there, I told them I would sleep on it and call them in the morning.

Thus I became the school counselor at Mabel Rush Elementary in Newberg! Every day is an adventure. There have been many tears and lots of self-doubt, but I have been told by my principal I am doing well so I'm going to trust her judgement and continue working hard to create a better and more prevention focused program next year.

19. Practice my language skills (Spanish? Korean?)
Well, I am definitely practicing. I have a fair amount of Spanish speaking families and I try really hard to go out of my way to speak with them in Spanish when I see them (same with my Spanish speaking students). I have been told I have a wonderful accent (why, thank you), but I still have a lot to learn! I really really REALLY want to do some more active practice. I'm hoping to find an imersion program (preferably involving travel, of course) where I can attack this language.

20. Put fun color in my hair
I BECAME JEM!!! I had pink hair last summer. I was going to wait until I had a job but when July rolled around and I was frustrated with not getting hired, I decided to color my hair so it would be pink for the two weeks in Korea. It was amazing and I felt like a fairy princess.

I plan on dying my hair again in June. Still trying to decide if I will wait until school is over or if I want to have pink hair on the last day of school.

23. Learn to sing Korean karaoke
I decided to say yes to this one, though it is half-hearted. When I wrote this goal, I meant that I would be comfortable reading the Korean alphabet enough that I could sing Korean songs at a noraebang. Well, I'm not quite there yet.

BUT!

Mindy and I DID manage to sings a song in Korean when we went to the noraebang in Korea (mostly) AND we were able to figure out the  remote to work the basics of the karaoke machine at the noraebang.

In other news, I recently went with some friends to a Korean noraebang place in Beaverton that had the SAME GIANT REMOTES. And they had a sticker on the table with the translations! Look! It's so awesome!!

26. Go back to Korea (hopefully with a job there, but I'll settle for a vacation)
I went on a two week vacation to Korea last summer! It was AWESOME!!! I'm on the edge of deciding if I want to go back and work there (kind of feeling the vibe for western Europe), but that kind of depends on where I'm at in the next few years.

There are still quite a few of my goals that I have not reached yet (why did I put so much reading on there? and shoot a gun? what was I THINKING?!), but there's a year of adventure before me so we will see what comes!