On The Road to Redemption: Bouncing Back from a Not So Stellar Semester

Nothing like a new year to revitalize the motivation and drive for all A's this semester. Grades were less than awesome for me last semester, and now I am on a mission to redeem myself. I mean it's one thing to say "I'm shooting for all A's" at the start of each semester only to get halfway through and shape my thinking to "heck, if I pass I'll be okay!". I have let senioritis get the better of me, but not anymore! This semester I'm not just shooting, I am AIMING and having aim is much more accurate than idly shooting.

Let's flashback in time to me as a freshman: fresh-faced, overly ambitious, and on the Dean's List most importantly. What helped me stay so focused? I received the extra push with the help of some advice books.  I picked up again HOW TO WIN AT COLLEGE: Surprising Secrets for Success from the Country's Top Students by Cal Newport over the course of  winter break. It's an easy read with less than 200 pages containing 75 tips from top performing students all over the country! As I read the book again, like the back cover states, there were some surprising tips like: don't do all your reading and drop classes every term. Now don't let these two pointers keep you from checking this book out; like with any advice book, everything does not have to be taken wholeheartedly and is circumstantial. Over the course of the spring semester I will be putting some of these tips to the test  on my journey to A+ success (I think this is the makings of a mini series: Journey to A+ Success).
Disclaimer: Don't let my trial and error approach to tips I have deemed beneficial substitute checking the book out for yourself! There are tips that I will overlook that you find valuable that I overlook. On the other hand I also hope that my testing encourages others to change their old patterns by  practicing a new tip or two I am trying.

Won't you come along on this journey with me this semester to prove to myself that I can aim and hit the target of A+ success in school?

And if anyone has any awesome tips, advice, or stories feel free to comment below. I am always open to new ideas for studying!



May he give you the desire of your heart and make all your plans succeed. We will shout for joy when you are victorious and will lift up our banners in the name of our God. May the LORD grant all your requests.
                                                                                                                  Psalm 20: 4-5

Punk: Chaos to Couture

I promise to do an extended holiday post, but today was such a special day I had to share! Over a year later, but I finally made it back inside the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the largest art museum in the United States to be exact) today. Jessica and I ventured out to the Upper East Side this afternoon towards 81st and 5th Ave. It was her first time visiting but none of the other exhibitions seemed as important as a special one, Punk: Chaos to Couture, that "examines punk’s impact on high fashion from the movement’s birth in the 1970s through its continuing influence today" (excerpt taken from MET website). We were excited to see this fashion exhibit! I have not been to tons of fashion exhibitons but this has to be one of my favorites. Although the top prize for best fashion exhibits hands down goes to The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk from 2012 shown at The Dallas Museum of Art (DMA) & The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA). Anyways, I loved how it blended both punk style of the US (circa 1975) and London (circa 1976). There were over 100 pieces including many from the infamous duo of London's SEX 430 King's Road boutique, Vivienne Westwood and Malcolm Mclaren. Other designers featured included Alexander McQueen,  Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren (Viktor & Rolf),  House of Dior, Yves Saint Laurent, Hussein Chalayan, and Burberry to name a few. 

Basically the exhibit is about the punk rock movement being more than leather and torn cloths; it was the self expression through clothing to make a social statement using unconventional methods like D-I-Y, recycled and reused materials, and of course, studs and spikes. In my opinion, the outfits mirrors some of the styles that have been recurring the past few seasons such as the studs and spikes and leather moto jackets. This year has seen a huge resurgence of the choice punk footwear, the Doc Marten boot.

Unfortunately I was not allowed to take photos inside this part of the museum, but I got a few photos online to give a glimpse of the awesome punk fashion. ALSO for those wanting a guided tour with narration by Andrew Bolton, curator of The Costume Institute  the video is at the bottom. It is quite interesting even after I walked through. I do not own any of these photos. 

Intern Recap Week 3

So I just finished my third week of my internship. Time is really passing by fast! It is a little sad. I want to do so much during my time in the city. One of the drawbacks I face here is coming home after work and being exhausted. It is not a physical exhaustion, instead I am mentally exhausted. In between, meeting new people each day, going to vendor appointments all around the city, and the tons of new information I am learning about reports, trends, and vendor personalities I feel like I am going 1000 miles an hour. I will say I appreciate NEVER having a dull moment on the job. There are interns working for other companies that count the minutes until the end of the day and are bored, but for me I do not face that dilemma at all. Instead I am trying to figure out how to get everything accomplished before the end of the day. Time seems to fly by so fast that I blink and it is lunchtime. I blink again and it is already 4pm and I am in crunch mode to finish running and formatting reports that I have not finished in the morning before getting away from my desk.

 I attended a shoe vendor show in New Jersey Monday morning, and as GLAMOROUS as it may sound, it was exhausting. Yes do not get me wrong looking at shoes is never a bad thing, but I have been going to see shoes for three weeks and the styles get old. There are only so many ways to style a mens loafer or a girls combat boot. I have caught on to the lingo of the shoe business "there is nothing fresh". Anyways that day was long, and I couldn't wait to get back to the city and back to my apartment. The following day came a change to my routine, which was very much needed. I went to market with another buyer. I got to experience the world of clothes buying while accompanying the little girls clothing buyer. We went to three appointments, one for leggings, dresses, and denim shorts. What I took away from that day was that clothing vendors are totally different than shoe vendors. Whether of not the vendors we met were a good representation of clothing vendors, it is too soon to tell, but I found they were refreshing to the shoe vendors I usually encounter. Every side of the business is so different, and I learned that. Maybe I have found my calling, kids clothing!

Finally after three weeks, I am starting to get the hang of how to be of help to the buyer. With the assistant buyer on vacation the latter half of the week, I was forced to step up to the plate and perform tasks she normally does. My buyer expressed to me how impressed she was with my fast learning, and it made me finally feel like I was apart of the team. I ended Friday being proud of myself for a job well done.

I will be sure to blog about my weekend affairs soon, including pics!

When Disney friends reunite!

The bipolar rainy and freezing weather of this weekend couldn't bring me down because I had another treat this weekend, my friend from the Disney College Program, Jonathan was coming to visit! We hadn't seen each other since May 2012, nearly 10 months! What he didn't know was that although he was coming to visit me, there was a special surprise coming to Texas to come visit him. I'll explain a little later.

FRIDAY:
I felt most of our day was spent driving from one end of the Metroplex to the other! He found out that day just how BIG Dallas/Ft. Worth is! From Dallas to Arlington to Denton and a few places in between! We did stop for lunch at my favorite Asian Fusion restaurant, Bamboo Pho & Springroll. If you are ever in the Arlington area and craving pho and boba tea (which I am always craving), stop by this place! It's cozy and plays great music! There's also a HUGE TV on the main wall in the dining area that you CANNOT miss seeing! I always go for their lunch special $6.95 eggroll+pho+soft drink. There's also a bar area with drink specials.
The location is 330 Matlock Rd. #102 Arlington, TX 76015 
http://www.bamboopho.com/ 

The evening was spent in Dillards prepping for the fashion show (my previous blog post) and then Studio Movie Grill with my beautiful friends Bria and Sonia! I am so glad they invited us out to the movies with them because we had a great time. You know that feeling you get when you bring two groups of friends together and they mesh, I felt it Friday night and it was good. If you have never heard of Studio Movie Grill, the name does it justice; it's a dine-in theater. It can be a bit pricey but there are ways around it:
1) Groupon offers movie ticket+soft drink for $5 (unfortunately sold out that Friday night)
2) Student Discounts-use your ID and a ticket is $7.50 for peak evening which saves $2 off your ticket

Olympus has Fallen is what we saw. Of course with us being college students and all we questioned the accuracy of some of the events in the movie such as how much time passed between CERTAIN events (I won't go into detail so that I don't give anything away). Overall I liked the movie because I'm all about a movie with a few gun (or in the case a bunch) of gun fights. I'd pick a action/thriller or a romance movie any day of the week. If at least one person isn't shot in the movie, I'm bored! Point is, go see Olympus has Fallen.

Jonathan, me, Sonia, Bria
Studio Movie Grill

SATURDAY:

I spent the day with fashion show business and Jonathan spent the day with Fraternity business.

SUNDAY ie THE BIG DAY:

I told Jonathan that we were going to meet Matt and Diana, friends from high school, and there visiting friend from school, Steven at Six Flags. Which was true, but what he DIDN'T know was that there was also another group meeting us there, to surprise him which included our favorites Ashley and Taylor and their friends Kayla, Caleb, and Won Ton.

Ashley and I had been planning this surprise for weeks! And it was hard to not tell Jonathan that our friends from Oklahoma were driving down that morning to meet us!

The plan was to meet in Gotham City in front of the Batman ride, but we all arrived at different times and were in different parts of the line for this thriller ride. I feared our cover was almost blown when I happened to look up above at the exit bridge and see Ashley scurrying along! I was convinced Jonathan would look in the same direction I was looking and see her, luckily that didn't happen. The night before she and I thought the same fate when I had left my phone next to Jonathan faced up and Ashley sent me a text about where to meet up in the morning. He didn't pay the phone any mind, thank goodness!

There was a little miscommunication and Jonathan and I met up with Matt, Diana, and Steven, but headed to another ride that the Oklahoma group was going to ride. But they had came back to Batman! We are still unclear how we didn't pass each other but nonetheless, my friend Matt came through for me and we made a pitstop at the restrooms so that I could call Ashley in private to get everyone together!

Cutest reunion EVER because Jonathan was so surprised! Ashley ran up behind Jonathan and covered his eyes. He had NO idea who it could have been either! We had pulled it off, a successful surprise at Six Flags! And our group of 10 headed to ride Six Flag Over Texas' biggest roller coaster, the Titan! Actually we rode it twice! Our groups split up for a bit to do our own things and after 8 hours in the amusement park we ended up at Chilis for dinner.

Ashley needed wifi to finish a homework assignment due at midnight so we ended up at a nearby McDonalds before finally all heading home :(

Oh and we also ATTEMPTED to do homework lol

He was "helping me with homework" lol

MONDAY:

We definitely couldn't top Sunday. Monday was no where near as eventful since I had to be in class in the morning and Jonathan and I both had to study for tests the following day. It took us relocating to three different study locations, two libraries and the business building, but by 8pm we had enough of studying.
On the drive home we did a quick car tour of my city and took a few pictures of the lit up buildings. My mother cooked stir fry for dinner and my entire family rallied around the den for funny conversation. I think that was the best part of the evening just all laughing together.

TUESDAY:

Awake for the break of dawn, Jonathan and I headed to the airport for our last goodbyes. It wasn't goodbye though it was more like a see ya real soon (that's the Disney talking lol), December is the next reunion, at Disney World of course, and it will happen sooner than we know it!

In closing I just want to say how great of friends I have! They made Jonathan's weekend in Dallas truly memorable! Until next time, peace!

That is the Titan. Yeah, we rode it....T

I was caught off guard and didn't get any other pic of the reunion SORRY

Disney brought them together; distance can't keep them apart

Diana and I friends since High School!

Me, Kayla, and Ashley at All American Cafe
my hair had deflated at this point 

She's my absolute FAVORITE!!! <3 

TIRED, HUNGRY, & FREEZING last pic of the day
Jonathan, Won Ton (Daniel), Taylor, Ashley, Kayla, Caleb, me

Exploring Downtown

Merchandising Inc Fashion Show

I have been gone for a minute but I'm back again! This past weekend has been a flood of events! Lets start with the fashion show put on by an organization I'm a member of, Merchandising Inc. The spring show was this past Saturday and was a major success!!!

This season I wanted to be apart of the action so I joined the fashion show committee. Along with 5 other members and the 2 producers in charge, we put together the show,  from promotions and visuals for the show, to clothing catastrophes we rallied as a team, weekly to produce this baby! Props go out to Emily and Shala, the fashion show producers, who REALLY made the show a success through countless hours of hard work before the show and motivating everyone to have great faith in their cause!!

Speaking of clothing catastrophes, let me slightly elaborate on the matter: one store backed out completely of letting us borrow clothing, a second limited the number of items we could take (no pun intended, the store was The Limited), and a third completely put a damper on our plans the NIGHT before the show not allowing us to take all the clothes originally picked out! Yeah the producers had their work cut out for them. Luckily stylists, models, and members rallied together to bring in tons of clothes from their own closets for the show. When in a crisis the UNT army stands together!

The day of the show was a long one, about 8 hours, but totally worth it! Seeing the the visuals we made come together for our "Enchanted Forest" theme was like magic. As the models slowly got their hair and makeup done and practiced their walks during the rehearsal, there was adrenaline in my veins! The lineup for curtain call came and ten minutes after the hour I sneaked from backstage to tell the DJ to drop the beat, and it was that runway was on fire!

The theme of the show was A Twisted Tale, a 2013 twisted on classic tales such as The Frog Prince, Alice in Wonderland, and Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves. The money raised from the show goes to fund events/activities  held by the Merchandising Inc. Organization.

Enough with the talking I will just show you the pics! Not all are mine; model pics courtesy of Ryan Cheval.

The closing number: Villainess with a dagger through the heart!

 Me and one of the stylists T'iundra after the show