San Jose!

This last week my sister and I went to San Jose to visit my grandparents! We also got to see my Aunt Dorianne, Uncle Doug, and our cousins while we were there, peoples we only get to see maaaaybe once a year. Though it's already twice for me this year! This time, though, I got to go with my baby sister.

My grandparents live in this pretty sweet retirement community that has different levels of care and it's a pretty great little set up. The days were pretty tame there, but it was nice getting to hang out. We would eat breakfast, hang out for a bit, maybe play some cards and read, then go back to the dining room and grab lunch. I was told by several of the residents there that I reminded them of "that girl on Criminal Minds." I take this as one of the highest compliments, because I kind of idolize Penelope Garcia and hope to someday be the school counselor version of her.

After lunch on Tuesday we checked out the library that our grandparents run and took over some projects of theirs for the community art show. We also went through some old photo albums that they've put together over the years. This picture is of the grandparents with their oldest, my aunt Dorianne. And those glasses! When I was little, I would look through albums and wish I could have glasses like those. And now I do! Ha!!

That evening we met up with my aunt and uncle and my cousin Emily and her husband, David, for dinner at Round Table Pizza. Lots of talking and catching up. Good times.

Wednesday Jesi and I took off with Grandpa's car and went to Daiso and Target. Daiso is like a Japanese dollar store. Everything there is $1.50 unless otherwise marked. Jesi bought me some presents at Daiso including a cute little lunch box with little Russian dolls on it to complete the little set of containers I bought at the Daiso in Seattle (I had bought her a round stuffed fox thing at the airport on the way down to San Jose that we've dubbed Butter Ball Foxy or B.B. Foxy). I think I have enough cute lunch box things for every day of the week now! It's my goal this year to get into the habit of making a good healthy lunch for school. Cute lunch boxes really help.

Oh! And BEFORE lunch, Jesi gave Grandpa a haircut. She's been doing Dad's hair all summer (and trimming both hers and my bangs). Not sure if she actually knows what she's doing, but she's saved me at least $40 in bang trims so, if they aren't perfect, they'll do. She doesn't look to sure about what she's doing here in the picture...

Wednesday night Doug and Dory came over for the fancy French themed dinner at the retirement home. We were serenaded by an accordion while eating filet mignon, asparagus, potatoes, and chocolate mousse with macarons for dessert. Yum!

Thursday after lunch Jesi and I went out with Doug and Dory to the California Academy of Science. I LOVE museums and this was a particularly fun one. There was an aquarium, a rainforest with butterflies (and giant nasty spiders), an earthquake simulator, and a room full of awesome skulls. The skull room included the skull of one of the cutest animals EVER: the Dik-dik. It's a tiny antelope and it's so cute!!

And, of course, we had out own personal tour guide with a million awesome facts about how jelly fish and sea anemones are related, what you can tell by looking at an animal's skull, etc from my uncle who only recently retired from teaching science.

After the museum we drove around until Kathy, their daughter, got home and we all went out to dinner. We got to stop by a park and get a pretty great view of the Golden Gate Bridge and a bunch of other stuff (like Angel Island) that the aunt and uncle pointed out. There's a lot of nifty stuff in San Francisco.

Kathy just started teaching physics in a high school in San Francisco and was regaling us with stories about her students. And, of course, their was lots of advice from Doug, Dory, and Kathy for me for starting my internship this next week (so excited!). I love that we have so many educators in our family. :)

And then Friday I got up bright and early to come home. Jesi was there for another day before flying down to San Diego to visit my mom's side of the family before heading down to start another year of school. It was a fun visit and I got to hear lots of awesome stories about my padre (seriously, Dad... I never knew you were so irresponsible in college...) and some of the great trips my grandparents have taken around the world. What a fun week! Jesi got some good selfies with the grandparents after I left.

And now I'm doing a bunch of little things to get ready for my internship to start up next week. I still only have one internship currently and I'm still waiting to hear back about my second one. I heard unofficially about one perhaps pending, but I'm still waiting. I've been told several times that everything is fine and even if I start a little after the school year in the second internship, it's not a big deal, it's normal, etc. But I want to know NOW (she says with a pout and a stamp of her foot).

Oh well. I'll just try to not stress out as much as humanly possible in the mean time. And now that Criminal Minds is on Netflix I have found a mindless way to pass the time and get some outfit ideas, as well.

Summer!

Wow! Time really flies when you are having fun. Or, you know, busy and stressed.

Summer is almost over. I have two more weeks doing my practicum at the counseling clinic on campus. I have enjoyed working with my clients, but I am excited to get started in my internships at the end of August! I am going to be doing my main internship at McKinley Elementary. I have yet to receive my second assignment for my secondary internship, but my professor says not to worry about it, that I should get it soon. I guess getting the new graduates real jobs in schools takes precedence over my internship. Go figure.

I'm so excited to get started working in an actual school! A little nervous, too. I met the school counselor and the office ladies at McKinley already. It seems like a really great school and I can't wait to get to work!

I'm also excited that I get to be a peer supervisor at the new counseling clinic that will be opening up this October at Beaverton High School. It's a community clinic, but because of the location it will be where the future cohorts of school counselors will be doing their practicum. I'm excited to see this new program as it's starting up.

I HAVE managed to get out and have a little bit of fun in between work and school in the last couple of weeks. I went with my friend Michelle from school to see the musical Lizzie at Portland Center Stage. I mean, really? A rock opera about how Lizzie Bordon axed her step-mom and dad in 1892? Count me in!

I liked it so much that I convinced Gena and Zach to go with me a week later. It was doubly fun since I hadn't seen them in a few years. I last saw Gena when I went to New York to visit Mindy in 2010 and I hadn't seen Zach since they got married. It was great to see them.

Then a little over a week later, my dad and I went and saw the Book of Mormon Musical with Gena (yay!) and I nearly died. It is hilarious. Bawdy and totally irreverent, but great. I get why a lot of people don't like it (a lot of swearing, and, yeah, they poke fun at the Church), but I think that it gives a pretty fair representation of Mormon culture. And they had the iconography down pat!

(Warning: language has been bleeped out, but, yeah, you can tell what's said at that point)

Dad and I also went to an arena football game. I think dad hopes that now that I've shown an interest in hockey, that I might start liking other sports, too. Not so much, but I do like going to see games with my padre, particularly if they are inside with air-conditioning. And it doesn't hurt that there was a fight. That's always fun.

On the work front, I've been getting ready for my last day at Dream Dinners. We found a new manager who will be taking my place and so I've been getting her trained and at least semi-ready for when I won't be there. Well, I say "won't be there" when what I mean is that I won't be there as manager. I've worked it out with the owner, Dina, to see if I could continue to work a few night a week and a couple of Saturdays a month. I won't have the time (or energy) to do all the manager stuff I do now, but I will be able to continue working and bring in a bit of a paycheck. And we've already talked about me picking up more hours next summer before I (*hopefully!*) start at my new job in a school.

Tomorrow is my last day as manger. Today was my last prep day and, just like every other time I've made the apple crisps, I managed to cut my hand on one of the aluminum pans. I make tons of pan dishes - jambalaya, lasagna, ravioli, stuffing - but I only seem to have problems with apple crisps. Just a big paper cut, but it stings nonetheless. Happy day.

After I'm done with work tomorrow, I'm free for two weeks before going to visit my grandparents in San Jose (yay!). In the meantime, I plan on reviewing some school counselory stuff, looking into what I want to do for a possible action research in the schools, and watch copious amounts of Netflix.

Oh, yeah. And GISHWHES.

A friend at school invited me to do something called GISHWES with her. One of my favorite actors from the show Supernatural started it. GISHWHES stands for the "greatest international scavenger hunt the world has ever seen." Between August 2-9 my team (Jesi, Alycia, Alycia's husband, and another group of 11 people from Australia) along with thousands of other people around the world will be trying to "capture" as many items as we can on the list that will be posted this Saturday. We upload pictures and videos online which will then be awarded points and the team with the most points at the end of the hunt will be flown out to Croatia to spend a week with Misha Collins on a pirate ship. Sounds good to me! GISHWHES works in conjunction with Random Acts and items on the list range from sweet acts of kindness like "perform a sock puppet show at a children's hospital" to the insanely weird, "a fully dressed storm trooper cleaning a pool next to a sunbather."

So I'll probably be pretty busy this next week! Super excited to get started.

Wish me luck! :)

A long awaited update

Hello friends and family! It's been a while since I updated my blog. Apologies! It's been a bit busy around here (go figure). Last you heard, I was making macarons and heading off to California to visit my grandparents. I spent a fun weekend with my Grandma and Grandpa Olson and some time as well with some cousins, aunt, and uncle, and playing in San Francisco at the Disney Family Museum.

While I was there, I helped fix up the concrete ducks that sit outside my grandparents' front door. They got a lovely manicure and some eyelashes. They look very fancy now.

I was, of course, under strict instructions from my dad to cause some mayhem while I was there. I'm not very talented in that area, so I just turned some photos on their sides and stuck the Pillsbury dough boy in the freezer.

 

While I was in California, we got a new house guest! Meet Anja from Norway! She was having some trouble at her last host family's house and so we offered to let her stay with us until she heads home in June. Her friend Ice from Thailand may be staying with us for the next couple of weeks, as well. 

Soon after she joined us, Anja went to Hawaii and we got a snow storm. I got stuck in the blue car at the bottom of the hill and had to wait over an hour until Dad made it over to pick me up. We got the blue car up the hill later the next week. We had to stop a few times to fix the chains, but we made it eventually!

Grandpa started on chemo treatment while I was visiting and lost the last of his hair with it. Dad shaved his head to support his padre and they made a fine looking pair.

Jesi got home at the end of April and we have had some fun times with her back. She just started working at the theater in town, though they have only had her work a few days a week late at night, so it's not too fun, but a job is a job and she says it's not too bad. Plus, when she works as usher cleaning the theaters between shows, she gets to keep any unopened candy she finds (or old popcorn, I've been told). Kind of an odd perk, but you take what you can get!

We, of course, had a wonderful Mother's Day. I got Mom breakfast in bed, we found her a lovely, new tote for her cruises this summer, made a tasty salmon dinner, and made some pretty hand-drawn cards from her favorite daughters. This one's from me.

Now, life is just school, work, school, work. The usual. This April I started my practicum which has been very exciting. I work in the counseling clinic Mondays on campus. I have slots for three clients, though right now I only have two of the slots filled. It's tough, and not exactly the kind of work I'll be doing as a school counselor, but it is a really great experience working with clients. Both my peer and faculty supervisors are fabulous and I have, so far, been doing a pretty good job. 

I am in the process of applying for my internships for next year. We are supposed to have two internships: one 400 hour and one 200 hour. One of them is supposed to be at the secondary level (middle or high school) and the other in elementary, depending on our preference and what is available. We got notice of a paid internship (those usually aren't available) out at Estacada Charter School. It's an online based school that also works with local community colleges so students can get high school and college credit at the same time. From what they've said, it sounds like a lot of the students are 5th, 6th, and 7th year seniors who have had a tough time of things in the general education system. I have an online interview with them this Tuesday and I am really excited to work with them if I get the chance. Crossing fingers the interview goes well on Tuesday!

Well, I suppose I should stop procrastinating and get to writing my intergenerational trauma paper. Or maybe play on Facebook. That sounds like more fun, honestly.

Macaron Baking Adventure!!!

French macarons are so pretty. I hadn't ever had one until I went to Honey Toast with my mom for my birthday last year and our dessert came with a pretty macaron on it. There's just something about them. I don't know. So fancy, tiny, and pretty. And they come in so many colors!

Last week I was searching the internets for something pretty to paint for my watercolor class (did I mention I'm taking watercolor and yoga? It's fun to have self care classes), and I decided to look up watercolor desserts and a bunch of pretty macarons popped up. Suddenly the idea came that I REALLY wanted to learn how to make these myself.

My first thoughts as I began my endeavor on my Monday off, were something along the lines of, "WHAT THE CRAP ARE YOU DOING??!?! HAVE YOU FORGOTTEN...

...THE RAINBOW CAKE...

... THE CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES!?!?! AND YOU THINK YOU CAN MAKE MACARONS!!!?!??!"

But I'm not a quitter! I make goals and keep them. So, with the entire internet at my disposal, I searched for an easy macaron recipe, and bought me some ingredients.

The only "special" ingredient for the whole thing was the almond meal. I kept looking for it in the baking section and turns out they keep it with the nuts. That's dumb. But, whatever.

 While the over heated up, I drew some lovely circles for when it came time to pipe the cookies onto the sheet.

Sifted me some powdered sugar and almond meal. I really love doing that. I don't know why. It's just really fun.

It called for egg whites. Luckily, my grandma taught me how to separate egg whites way back in the day, so I felt pretty good about this step.

Only one casualty.

Then it came time to whip up the meringue for the cookie. I learned several things at this point:

• Meringues take a long time to whip up
• No, seriously. Like, over 10 minutes standing holding up the dang mixer. A standing mixer thing might be better. But I don't know where ours is. Oh well.
• Meringue is MAGIC. All it is is egg whites and sugar and if you beat it long enough, it turns into light, fluffy magic. Super fancy stuff, right there.

Following a teaspoon of vanilla, powdered sugar and almond meal was added and "gently folded" into the meringue. Then I had to "punch" it, which isn't as violent as it sounds, but it turns your fluffy meringue into something more liquidy to be piped onto your pans.

They had to set for about 20 minutes until they were ready for the oven. I left them white since I didn't want to have to worry about food coloring on my first try.

 While my cookies baked in the oven, I made my first butter cream!

Cook that egg-milk-sugar mixture!

I tasted it after folding in the butter and I was really dissapointed. It tasted, well, like butter. Then I realized I had forgotten the vanilla. That made it MUCH better. I also added coconut and food coloring (PINK!!!).

The cookies came out of the oven looking fabulous. They even had the little frilly things they were supposed to have!!

I put my pink coconut butter cream on them with a little bit of raspberry jam.

They look like little peanut butter jelly sandwiches!! XD

Pretty, pretty, pretty.

Some got a little smooshed, though. so they didn't get to sit on the plate with the pretty ones.

I was a little nervous trying them, but they turned out fabulous!! Even my mom said they were delicious. When I came down the next morning to put one in my lunch, I found she had finished off the rest that we hadn't eaten the night before!

I'm going to visit my grandparents in California this weekend, so I decided to make some to bring with me!

Since I felt more comfortable making the cookies, I decided to add some food coloring to the mix and make the cookies pink and purple!

I didn't care too much for the butter cream, so I made two different fillings this time: a raspberry cream cheese, and a lemon-lime curd. The lemon-lime curd was DEFINITELY the better of the two. I'll be taking that with me to fill the cookies I set aside to take to the grandparents. :) 

Aren't they pretty! My piping needs a little bit of work, but I'm getting closer to a pretty little macaron! 

And this takes care of number 24 on my 30 before 30 list: Bake GOOD cookies (all by myself!!)

For my next baking adventure, I plan on trying to actually make chocolate chip cookies that taste good. My friend sent me a recipe for chocolate chip cookies and I'm going to try THAT one out. Maybe it's not me; just the recipe! 

Merry Christmas 2013!!

Merry Christmas everyone!!!

Everyone else is still asleep (come on... it's after 8am, already!!) and I'm the nicest person alive seeing as I'm not going in and waking them all up.

We spent Christmas Eve at the Smith's house with the Jones and Riggs families for a fun dinner of munchies and cheese fondue (thank you, Annette! It was delicious).

After hanging out, eating, and chatting, we headed home for a family tradition Jesi and I started a number of years ago when we went to Hawaii for Christmas and didn't get to participate in the annual Nativity reenactment with the Smith family. We made popsicle stick puppets and reenacted the Nativity story (though we might have gotten some bits mixed up... somehow Colonel Sanders ended up bringing Froot Loops as a gift for the Christ child...).

That was such a hit, that in 2011, Jesi and I made a sock puppet video for our parent's entertainment.

Since our sock puppet show went over so well, this year we decided to make another Christmas video for our parents. Knowing that it would be difficult to top the last one (and we didn't have as much time as we did in 2011; we only had about an afternoon to finish this one), we went a little simpler this year and made a music video to the Christmas classic, "Santa Bring Me a Dinosaur." 

I have such a wonderful sister. She doesn't really like making these things, but she lets me boss her around anyways. She's pretty much my favorite.

Merry Christmas, everyone!! Hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and a happy New Year! My kindness has run out and I'm going to go wake some people up, now. 

Thanksgiving 2013

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I hope everyone had an enjoyable weekend. It was a bit lackluster in the Olson household. We are putting off having the full Thanksgiving spread until after Christmas when Jesi is home; it felt silly to make all that food for three people. But we got all of our sides ready and waiting in the freezer from Dream Dinners. Instead, we made flank steak, deviled eggs, and broiled brussel sprouts, onions, and bacon. It was super delicious... and we ate it on Saturday! Haha!

We spent our Thanksgiving doing nothing! Well, I say nothing, but what I really mean is that Dad worked putting molding in the craft house, Mom went through all the Black Friday ads, and I wrote a paper/researched curriculum for reducing test-taking anxiety. Then we enjoyed the traditional Jack in the Box Thanksgiving dinner. I enjoyed not stressing out in the kitchen.

It's been really great having a long weekend with no work or class to really get some work done. I have only two weeks left in the term (yikes!!) and I have yet to make any of my finals study guides. I also have a big group project for my Foundations of School Counseling class. We'll be presenting the project on the last day of class to a fake school board that will consist of people from the community like principals, real board members, etc. You know... people who will hopefully want to hire us in the future. I'm really loving the project; but it is also really stressful. I've pretty much given up on maintaining healthy eating habits until the end of the holidays.

I've also been able to spend some time this weekend making Christmas cards, wrapping presents, and getting ready for the holidays. I hit a few of the Black Friday sales and managed to get a sparkly silver tinsel tree for my room as well as some white Christmas lights to hang around the ceiling. I've always wanted to have a room with lights around the ceiling and now I will!

And, since everyone has been doing it (and because I love making lists), I wanted to make a list of 20 things I am thankful for this Thanksgiving:

1. Family: I love my family (crazy as they are). They are my best friends and my biggest support.

2. Friends: Although my social life is crap (thanks, grad school and work!), I still have some wonderful friends out there that I really wish I could spend more time with.

3. Graduate school: I know, right? Why? What I mean to say is that I am grateful to have the opportunity to attend graduate school to go into a field I am passionate about with a cohort of fabulous people

4. Hulu: And all forms of online video streaming. Thank you for helping me watch Korean dramas, Xena: Warrior Princess, and other fabulous shows to help me keep my stress levels at yellow (sometimes even blue!).

5. My job: I am so happy to be employed and even happier to work with such fabulous coworkers and customers. Seriously; I have never had a retail job where I have so few complaints about customers.

6. My bosses: I know I was already thankful for my job, but I seriously have the best bosses: Dina (the store owner) and Annetta (the store manager). They are totally supportive and wonderful people. They are totally spoiling me for all future bosses.

7. Text book rentals: Now I don't have to store or sell all my textbooks at the end of the term! I just return them!! Except for the really good ones. Like the ASCA National Model... or Making DATA Work. Those ones are seriously fabulous.

8. Facebook: It has its problems (boy, does it have its problems!), but I love it anyway. I love being able to have quick peeks into all my old friends' lives and connect with people easily.

9. My Chromebook: I got a little Chromebook last year and it makes my life so much easier. It is super lightweight and I can take it to school, take notes, write papers, research in class, check email, etc. at school without having to find a computer lab. I love it so much.

10. My new room: I love it. Love love love. I can't wait to put up my curtains and lights. :)

11. Christmas music: You might recall my post about Christmas music from when I was in Korea. I am listening to it right now. It just makes me happy, okay? Even in July...

12. Cute things: Thank you, cute things, for making life a little more adorable and happy.

13. Trimet: I take the max train to school and while I sometimes dislike the max, I really am happy I don't have to drive to school.

14. Modern medicine: I love having easy access to Advil, Claritin, and all sorts of wonderful medicines that help keep me functioning. This includes local urgent care facilities that help sew my finger back up after I cut it instead of my avocados...

15. Portland: It's weird and I love it.

16. Portland State University: It really has some great people there and a nice campus.

17. Drawing: I miss you; I promise that I'll try to make more time for you.

18. My phone: I can easily get in touch with people, check the internet for things when I'm not at home, it's really awesome.

19. The Church: How fabulous is it that the Gospel is all around the world? I can go to the other side of the globe and have a support network right there.

20. My privileged existence: Seriously, people. I am ridiculously privileged in a million different ways. From loving parents (who feed me and let me live with them while I go to grad school) to teachers and friends who have supported me. Thank you, all!

30 before 30 Update

You might remember that last year I made a list of 30 things to do before I'm 30. Well, I haven't gotten very far on my list; in fact, looking at this list a year later, I realize that I need get cracking on this! So, here's a bit of an update on the items that I have done so far.

6. Decorate a room the way that I really want to
Currently in progress. I'm going about it one little bit at a time. But I'm really loving my new room! Well, I say new, though I've been in here since the summer. I promise I'll devote a post to it once I've gotten a few more things done.

13. Make and send holiday cards
Another "in progress" one. I'm currently in the process of making my Christmas cards to send out. Looking pretty cute, if I do say so myself.

And don't assume I know your address. If you want a card, don't be shy. Message me on Facebook. :)

15. Take sister photos
Thanks to a JC Penney Groupon, Jesi and I got some adorable sister pictures this summer.

Us holding the picture of when we first met. I'm the one with bangs in both pictures. ;)

28. Go to New York
I totally went to New York this summer!! It was SUCH A BLAST!! I saw five shows in one week, visited a million things, and generally drank my weight in water every day to keep up with how much we were sweating, it was so freaking hot. Check it out!

I'm in Times Square! In glasses because city air does not agree with my contacts.

30. Learn a new song on the piano
Actually, just this week. The piece was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be, but it's really pretty so I'm totally counting this one as done. Here's a video of it synchronized with dancing Christmas light. Just to be clear, I'm not actually the one playing it in this. 


P.S. Only 37 more days until Christmas. You ready?

And that's it so far. Five things *mostly* done. There are a few that are kind of time dependent (graduating PSU, getting a realy job (in my field... need to graduate, first), going to Korea... etc.), but there are others that I need to get started on if I'm going to finish them before I'm 30! Let's DO THIS!! *punches the air*