The theme for this week was studying. Most of my time was devoted to school work. Classes take up a lot of time in my day, especially when some of them have quizzes every week. Hopefully, as I continue to understand the expectations of my professors for assignments and the amount of time certain classes require, the work load will not seem so heavy.
Besides spending my week studying, I have started to become involved in a church and Campus Crusades for Christ. The church that I am attending now has some people from the university going there. One of the astronomy professors from church invited us over for lunch on Sunday, and I had another professor from my Core class invite his students over for dinner that day. I thought this was nice of them to do for the students. It really shows that they want to get to know their students and are here for them if they need anything. I also enjoyed going to Campus Crusades. We played games, worshiped, and had a speaker. This was a great opportunity to interact and meet with other Christians on campus.
On Friday night, I took advantage of the opportunity to take a break from my studying. Some friends (Tiffany, Peter, Jana, and Jeffrey) and I went over to LaPorte to one of my favorite pizza places. It was nice to take a break from homework and spend time with people. I posted a picture of them at the restaurant.

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I did not realize until this week that my blog from last week got deleted by accident. So, here is my blog from the other week.
This week has been very interesting already. Not only have I had my first week of classes, but I have already learned and experienced so much. On Tuesday, I went to my first class, which was Core. All incoming freshman are required to take it. Even though I am a transfer student, I have to take Core, because my credits were unable to fulfill that requirement. Core seems like it will entail hard work and dedication. I have already had to write a three to five page informal paper for this week. On Wednesday, I had the rest of my classes. These were Anatomy and Physiology, History, and Financial Accounting. I am really excited about some of these classes. In my anatomy and physiology class, I have about 131 people in it, due to the growth of the nursing school. Yes, my major is nursing, which I cannot wait to get hands on experience with and fulfill my dream of working in the medical field. My history and financial accounting class had about twenty people there. I love having small class sizes, because you are not seen as a number. In my senior class in high school, there were only seventeen people. As a result, I feel uncomfortable with big classes. The small teacher to student ratio at Valpo helps me feel like the professors really care about their students.
There was a fair on campus the other day. All of the clubs from the university and some outreach programs from Valpo were present there. It was a great opportunity to become introduced to the clubs that Valpo offers. I received tons of information, and I was also able to give contact information to some of them. I believe that I am going to become involved with Campus Crusade for Christ and possibly something else. This event was wonderful, because it helps get people involved in clubs and college life.
On Wednesday, I experience something that I have never before. Despite the fact that I have been through three hurricanes in the past two years, the idea of a tornado scares me. So, I had the opportunity to hear the tornado alarms go off in Valpo. My roommate and I along with the whole dorm where sent to the basement. After sitting there in anticipation for an hour, the storm finally passed. I heard there was only damage in the surrounding Valparaiso area. Even though, this is not necessarily what I call fun, I did get to meet about five new people.
That was the brief summary of my exciting and adventurous week here at Valpo. I am looking forward to more exciting weeks ahead.

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The majority of my week was focused on studying and doing homework, but I did have some fun. I have been attending Campus Crusades for the past two weeks, which has become something that I really enjoy. I actually met two people there. They were quite friendly and welcoming. It was a wonderful night, despite the fact that I had to go back to my dorm and study for my anatomy and physiology lab. On Thursday, I went to a Bible study that was associated with Campus Crusades. Campus Crusades is truly a great ministry with many outlets to meet new people and become involved in college life.
Also, I went to a movie called Gattaca for my Core class. Since we are studying creation and creators, the movie went perfect with the theme in class. The movie was extremely interesting. It was about a man, Vincent, who wanted to travel through space, but his DNA was keeping him from reaching his goal. Only genetic engineered people were able to go into space. As a result, Vincent had to figure out a way to make his dream become possible. The rest of the movie focused on his efforts to become a space navigator.
I also went to the Popcorn festival on Saturday. There were so many people there that it was hard to actually enjoy the craft booths and other activities. I bought a piece of steamed sweet corn, which was delicious. The festival was a big event that the people in Valparaiso look forward to every year. Posted below is a picture of the popcorn festival from far away.

It has only been a couple of weeks since school started, but home sickness has already occurred. This week was full of wonderful surprises, emails from friends, and visits from familiar faces. On Monday, my friend, Amanda and her mom came up to Valpo to visit me. It was great to see some familiar faces from home. We went out to dinner and afterwards went to Barnes and Noble for coffee and hot chocolate. It was a terrific time to relax and spend time with friends. Unfortunately, I was busy again with homework that I was unable to attend Campus Crusades or the Bible study. For my activity of the week, I went to a meeting for house council. I am on the council to decide what we want to do with the money for our hall in order to make it the best on campus. This was a great opportunity to meet new people from my dorm. Hopefully through house council, we will be able to build community. I think that it is important to get involved with the different organizations on campus. Not only do you get to know people, but you become integrated into campus life.
On Thursday, my parents came in from Florida to visit. It was so nice to see my parents and also spend time with them over the weekend. I am already counting down the days to fall break.

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Last week was extremely stressful. As a result, everything seems like it is just a blur. I had to prepare myself for three tests and a quiz for the following Monday and Tuesday. All of my wakening hours were spent in my room studying. I spent a majority of my time studying for my anatomy and physiology lab test. Thankfully, the lab room was open for everyone to come and study any time they wanted to. On Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday night, I would go to the lab and study bones and slides. I spent at least an hour there every night reviewing. On Wednesday night, one of the lab aids had a study session for all of the students to attend. It was so nice of her to volunteer her time to help us. If we had any questions, she would try to answer them to the best of her ability. She even went over all of the bones we had to know. This took quite a long time. The rest of my time was spent doing homework and studying for my two other tests. I did go to House Council and Bible study last week. They were a great diversion from all of my stress. Fortunately, my tests are over, and the stress has somewhat subsided.