Lots has happened since I last blogged. Perhaps the most exciting was that we walked in our graduation ceremonies! Such a surreal moment for me--I never expected to actually do that. It is a goal that has felt impossible for so much of the time. But we did it, and it was awesome. The Parkes Clan came up (and down) to celebrate with us and clap and cheer for us. We hosted a lunch back at our apartment where we ate sub sandwiches and some cupcakes that we made. We LOVED spending that time with all of them, they are so cool and fun!
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| Obligatory Graduation Selfie |
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| Enter to Learn, Go Forth to Serve |
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| By the library |
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| At Mason's convocation!!! |
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| I'm in here somewhere.... (my convocation) |
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| Michelle and Lane |
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| Axe throwing that night with the fam! I had SO MUCH FUN with Maddie during this. |
On a more somber note, Grandma Mingledorff passed away in March. I almost didn't go to the funeral (in GA), but after much coaxing from my siblings and a particularly emotional conversation with Mom, I decided to go. I am grateful that Mom didn't tell me I had to come, but that she offered her personal insights and allowed me to make my own decision. It was really, really hard being there, especially for the viewing, and I was a total basketcase pretty much the entire time, but now looking back on it, I am glad that I decided to go. Some of the highlights for me were: spending some time with Russell and having some good talks with him, seeing all of Dad's siblings together (they are SO FUNNY), seeing Grandma Johnson, the closing hymn that Grandma picked out for the funeral (may the good Lord bless and keep you), seeing the beauty of Georgia (including the Camellia tree outside Grandma's house), and of course, all the Dairy Queen I got to eat. Shell did a really great blog post about it all, and since she has so many great pictures I don't have, I'm just going to link her post here:
http://nateandmich.blogspot.com/2019/05/grandmas-funeral.html
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| I found these clovers in Grandma's yard. They have hearts on them! |
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| All of the girls (minus Jen) in the car on the way to visit Jenna! |
We made it through finals last semester, and now we are in spring term! Campus is beautiful, the weather is fantastic most of the time (although it's supposed to rain like every day for the next ten days, and be back in the fifties...).
We are both enjoying our classes. Mason is taking a neuroscience class from my favorite professor ever, Dr. Rebekka Matheson, and he is killing it and learning a ton and teaching me pieces of what he learns and I am loving it! He is also in a service through learning class, and has to do some community service for 20 hours this term. He's continuing to work as a TA, which he is so passionate about, and finds to be very fulfilling. Hopefully he can get his senior thesis done this term and then he will be free as a bird!
I am in 2 Psych classes (309 and 310) and they are really challenging but I think I'm enjoying them. Probably the most stressful thing about these is that I'm in a ton of group projects, and that always stresses me out. But my groups are good! I'm also in an English class (well, really I think it's actually a history class,) and that one is a TON of work with about a million assignments, but it's been pretty interesting so far. We have a class blog! To see the things I've posted, you can search for the label, "Posted by Brianna P." Here's the link to the blog:
https://rhetciv.blogspot.com/
Shauna and Doug and their kids came out here for a funeral, and we got the immense pleasure of watching Evan (their youngest) for most of a day. It was so fun, even though we don't have a ton of experience watching little kids. We played on the playground, fed ducks, swung in the hammock, and watched a bunch of Magic School Bus. Also, funny story: he had a little accident that was totally my fault, and after when me and him were both soaked he kept looking at our shower and saying something. I can only understand about 60% of what he says because he's so little, and so I thought he was saying he needed to take a shower. I asked him, "Does your mom make you shower after you have an accident?" To which he replied, "Yeeees," in his cute little Evan voice. So I turned it on, he told me to turn it off because it was too loud, to which I replied, "It's not as loud once you actually get it!" And then I popped him in for a minute, and he just kind of ran around in the tub. Then we dried him off, washed his clothes, and watched Magic School Bus.
I can't believe I haven't posted about this, but we decided we are going to Auburn University in the fall for Mason to get his PhD!!!! We are very excited, and very nervous, and pretty much every other emotion too. He has to be there by August 12. Time to look for an apartment!!!
Oh, also, I had a birthday in the past 2 months too. Mason is so fun on birthdays. He made me the cutest cake (yellow with chocolate frosting and a heart made of jumbo chocolate chips on top.) For presents, he got me a shower cap (which I've wanted FOREVER) and my very own harmonica! I haven't had a ton of time to practice, but I learned the Piano Man harmonica part, and happy birthday. I sent this video to Mom on our birthday:
