Seattle spring

 Flowers at Pike Place Market

 The Seattle aquarium in Puget Sound

 

 Colors at the Olympic Sculpture Park

 

 The Experience Music Project museum

 Views from a run to the top of the city

A secret garden in the hillside neighborhoods

I spent last week in Seattle as part of a national geography conference. The city was everything I imagined: amazing food, even more amazing coffee, cloudy skies, Pacific mist, and an amazingly casual urban vibe. Love the city, don't love the climate. I'll say I liked the weather though; it's very refreshing and much better than the dense overcast/pouring rain/ice/snowstorms of central Pennsylvania. It was a fun week and a great chance to catch up with friends and undergrad professors after the thesis maelstrom of the past couple months, and I can't wait to go back someday to explore a little more and make trips over to the rainforest and mountains. 

Now that I'm back at school, but with the purpose of my life (thesis) complete, I am at a strange limbo-esque stage and trying to juggle the new more relaxed schedule of my life back into a semblance of balance. I am not as excited and proud of myself for finishing my thesis as I probably should be. The stress and worry of finding a job is kind of overwhelming for now. 

However, (despite random lingering 40* days) spring is here, my birthday is next week, I am a diploma away from being a Master, and the future will work itself out.

winter at the farm

My grandma lives on a small farm in eastern Iowa, which has been surrounded over the years by neighborhoods and development but still provides an overgrown pine grove and fields and pastures where my sister and I spent our childhoods playing make-believe.  This Christmas while we were there we were blasted with a fluffy snowstorm, which turned the place into a magical wonderland.  The beauty of snow maybe makes up for horrendous winter driving.

wandern.

Yesterday Ellie and I went to Forest Park Nature Center to hike around and break in my new boots.

We grew up in a forest sort of like this but with older trees, and spent our childhood summers exploring the woods and creating all sorts of imaginary worlds and quests.

I love trees.

May flowers

Happy June!

Late May/Early June is my absolute favorite time of year.

Everything is lush and green before the heat of the summer zaps the life out of the world, and everything somehow seems so much better with the prospect of the whole summer spread out in front of you.

Even when late May decides to be 90 degrees and a million percent humidity, I am not complaining. After all, soon it will be 100 degrees and two million percent humidity. Good thing I am headed out west before then, muahaha.

All the late spring flowers are pretty much fading but last week I still managed to do a little flower portrait shoot in the backyard.

The perk of being part of a Dutch flower business family is that you get your own personal botanical garden.

The perk of being the oldest child is that once you grow up and move away you are pretty much exempt from all the yardwork.

death of a peony

girl on the go

{photos from my last sunny Baltimore weekend.}

Oh, my goodness. I have no idea where the past week went!! So much for the days when the end of the semester meant instant freedom and carefree summer.  In grad school, it just means that you are done with the distractions of classes and can actually focus on your own work.  I have been busy busy busy tying up loose ends and prepping for the summer.  Aaaah!

Today was a big day because I finally defended my thesis proposal (aka my baby of this semester), and it was approved! Which is a very good thing, because it means I can officially go out and do my field work, and am not screwed. yet.  I am so glad I have the defense over with; basically the first official loophole you have to jump through in the quest for a masters degree. I have no idea how those crazy PhD people do the even more intense version. 

So anyway...I have one more day in the lab before the craziness that is going to be my summer officially begins!

I have said goodbye to the boy for the summer (waaa) and am ready to launch off and do this thing.

Crazy itinerary:

-Tomorrow= last day in the lab, clean, pack (uck), pick up obligatory PA gift of Yuengling, burn CDs for 12 hour drive

-Thursday= hit the road and drive home to the beloved cornfields, humidity, and devastating summer storms of IL yay!

-While at home....stock up on camping gear and finish organizing 100+ pages of field data sheets :/

-Memorial weekend= drive to the Quad Cities to help college roomie/best friend Christine move, catch up on life, and stomp on ye olde revered collegiate grounds !

-June 8= the day the camping urge I've had for the past 2 years is quenched for probably quite some time.

Fly to the west shore of Tahoe and spend the rest of the summer camping, playing in the Sierra Nevada, and oh yes, doing field work 50 hrs/week.  Which basically entails lots of wandering around and tree measuring.

I am so excited to go home and relax. I haven't seen my family since Christmas and I kind of miss them despite our common dysfunctionalities ;). I also can't wait to reunite with the high school and college friends. I honestly think I have more friends from high school (that I keep up with) than I do from college; I come from a small town and had a very close group! 

I am also excited to see California for the first time, do mindless outdoor labor (my brain has not shut off for the past 5 straight months and it is beyond the burn out point) and of course get tan!

Most of all, I am excited to have fun+work hard but also get the summer over with so I can be back with Ben, hopefully in the same town for the first time in 2 years !!!

Life is kind of spinning right now, but in a good way.

the world needs more magnolia trees

My favorite thing about college campuses are the FLOWERING TREES!

Unfortunately they are already starting to drop their petals, and it's not even May! Freaky weather.

I had a great birthday on Monday, and am now stuck in paper purgatory.

aaaaaaaa

I am looking forward to being DONE and sunny relaxing fun weekends coming up so soon!

But for the next week I will be stressed and frantic and will probably drop off the face of the earth.

That's just the way it goes.