So, my roommate bought us a tree and we even took a break from our homework for about 15 minutes to decorate it yesterday night. So, isn't it cute? Basically, you aren't allowed to disagree because I finally have a draft finished for my retailing management class that it's worthy of being called a "rough draft" and I'm taking a break to post this lovely picture of our weird little silver tree. However, if you hate on it, I'll hunt you down and ... well, I don't really know what I'll do, but I'll figure it out eventually after I analyze my options and pick the best one.

All Decorated

After almost two and a half months of tracking down professors, honors program staff and CBA advisors, I am finally looking at a degree audit that says my degree completion is "In Progress." Yes, that means I'm officially graduating in May!!! All of my classes are applied correctly to my degree and when I have my senior check next semester, it will actually say that I'm going to graduate. It's really great that the JDE students' classes aren't reported correctly on the degree audit. No one really knows what to do with us when we show up at the various advising offices and ask for paperwork. But, I finally managed to get all of my classes put in the right modules on my degree. Who ever thought I'd ever actually graduate?

My parents took Meagan and me to dinner tonight. We went to spaghetti works. On the way back, we walked by Kinko's. There's a small tree outside Kinko's and apparently it's become a bagel tree. Who seriously sticks bagels on a tree in downtown Lincoln? Oh well. Good thing I had my phone with me.

Bagel Tree

to give you their flower friend and make you take it home with you because they can tell you're stressed. Because then you go from looking like this:

You think that you're going to be able to relax and take a break from everything. Instead, things break. Take, for instance, sleeping...going home after months of being away, the bed is foreign and sleep doesn't come. Or relationships. Holidays cause stress and extra tension and fights. Family gatherings happen where you have to put on a happy face and pretend you want to be there even if you'd rather stay in bed all day. Stress about money because it only seems to flow out during the holidays. Break doesn't mean a break from stress. Break means that things break and as much as you try not to, you'll probably cause some of it. Everyone is busy with family gatherings and obligations, so you can't even see friends you don't see often during the school year. I guess I'm just looking forward to the "break" being over.

Below is part of my Christmas present from John. He and his sister jokingly named him "Fatty McPenguin" and jokingly referred to him as fatty all week before Christmas. Apparently I'm supposed to rename it. But how do I rename the penguin when it really is fat and it bounces like it does in the video.

Fatty McPenguin

After so long I finally got the pictures of my cousin's daughter off my camera. I took the pictures on the memory of my camera and I got a new cable for Christmas. I waited so long to be able to transfer the pictures so I could print and post. I went to see her the day she came home. She looked so happy and so proud. Tenley was a beautiful newborn.

Proud Mom

Tenley