Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day to all the love birds out there! We take our time to show our love and appreciation to our loved ones on this special day, but we should be doing that all 365 days of the year! Right?! It's just a very nice day to spend with your sweetheart and I hope everyone enjoys it!

I figured for my post today, I would share some ideas on how to make Valentine's Day enjoyable for the whole family! Whether you are a current student or an alumni with a family, you always want to find some special way to bring everyone together!

What about a simple art & craft project, or making your favorite cookies in the shape of a heart? Whatever it is, it's all about being together and having fun! I remember when I was in elementary school, we would always do something fun for Valentine's Day. I'm sure many of you remember the mailboxes we use to make and our classmates would walk around & put cards/candy in your mailbox. It was something fun and cute for the whole class to enjoy! It definitely makes you miss those days, especially when girls thought boys were gross, and girls had cooties, accordingly to the population of boys at school!

Whether you are spending your Valentine's Day alone or with your family, take a look at this website I attached for some fun ideas: http://familyfun.go.com/valentines-day/

They have craft ideas, recipes, games, cards, and so much more to enjoy! Plus, it's only 1:30PM, so you still have plenty of time to whip something up if you haven't had the chance to get something for your honey! They say that homemade gifts go a long way, so get cutting, baking, or whatever it is you are going to do to make your Valentine's Day special!

Aside from Valentine's Day, life has been busy but a good busy. I am still in the process of looking for a job, which I just recently had an interview, so we will see what happens. It's all about being patient and waiting for that perfect opportunity to come along. You usually get a feeling when something good is coming your way, so I am just hoping I get that feeling soon!

It's hard to believe that graduation is quickly approaching. It feels funny because I did already graduate & have my diploma, I just didn't get to walk yet! Everyone keeps asking if I am going to go, and of course I am! It will be nice to see everyone I haven't seen, and it will feel like an even bigger accomplishment walking up on stage in my cap & gown! Woo hoo!

I hope everyone has an enjoyable day & a great week!!

Happy Groundhog Day!

It certainly seems really silly that we rely on a groundhog to determine how much longer winter will last or how soon Spring will arrive, but we do it anyways! Regardless of that, HAPPY GROUNDHOG DAY!



So according to Groundhog Phil, there are 6 more weeks of winter, which if that's the case, I don't see that as a huge threat considering we haven't had much of a winter at all. It was 60 degrees yesterday, explain that one to me! Then, I hear that Groundhog Chuck, predicts we will have an early Spring! Whose Groundhog do we trust? I guess we will see what happens with the weather and go from there! I am definitely crossing my fingers that Spring comes sooner! How about you??

Can you believe that it's already February? I feel like we were just celebrating Christmas and the New Year! I also can't believe how fast time has gone since graduating from Berkeley! I am getting pretty excited though that I will be walking at graduation in 2 months...It will be so rewarding to see all my friends that I haven't seen in a while, as we all walk down the aisle to get our well deserved diplomas! Although, I already have mine, it will still be rewarding!

And only 3 more days until the big game! Who will you be rooting for this year? The NY Giants or the New England Patriots? I personally don't follow football, so I don't have a preference, but I will watch the game with some friends & family. We will also be celebrating a birthday, so there will be different events going on! Whoever you are rooting for, I wish your team the best!



So to catch you up a little on my alumni life, I am still working part-time where I was interning and also still part-time at my job over at State Farm. I was recently given a new project to work on, which involves creating and designing a newsletter for our clients. I've been spending a few hours getting our first issue together, and slicing and dicing it to get the most effective newsletter released. I am having a great time doing it, and I hope all of our clients will enjoy it! Life has been busy, but busy in a good and exciting way!

I am still going on interviews for full-time positions, so it's a matter of waiting for that right opportunity to pop up! Certainly hoping it happens soon, but with time, good things will come!

I hope you enjoy the rest of your week and have a great weekend! Get ready to celebrate the winning of your team!

Is it really Friday....Already?

I am in no way, shape, or form complaining that it's Friday, because who in their right mind would actually complain of that? TGIF! I hope everyone is doing well. I know it's been 2 weeks since my last post, but it's been a hectic two weeks, but I am alive & well! To think we were preparing for a snow storm last Friday night, the snow is just about completely gone! Woo hoo! It was nice to have some snow because we've made it through a good portion of winter without any major storm issues & quite frankly, it didn't feel much like winter! We just need to get through the rest of February and I think we will be good!

On Facebook I've been seeing some of my Berkeley friends posting about how there are only 8 more weeks left to the Winter Quarter and it makes me think about how I use to do the same exact thing. It's funny looking from the outside this time around! Well, there may only be 8 more weeks left, but for those of you who will be continuing students, you will need to revisit the lovely FAFSA and make sure you get the financial aid you need for the upcoming quarters in 2012! My biggest piece of advice I could offer those of you who will have to go through the FAFSA fun, is to DO IT EARLY! If you wait until the deadline, you are really pushing it because it is a very involved process and you will need to spend the time going through it!




Here are some "Quick Tips for Filing Your FAFSA," which I want to share from this following website: http://www.fastweb.com/financial-aid/articles/1147-quick-tips-for-filing-your-fafsa

"Identify Yourself

* Use your legal name as it appears on your Social Security card. Nicknames or aliases will cause a processing delay.
* Read the questions carefully. The words “you” and “your” on the FAFSA always refer to the student, not the parents.
* To be considered a veteran, you must have served on active duty and been discharged under other than dishonorable conditions. If your service was only for training purposes (e.g. National Guard or Reserves, or ROTC), you are not considered a veteran for your federal financial aid application.
* Remember to count yourself, the student, as one of the people in your household who will be a college student during the award year.


Your Parents and the FAFSA

* If your parents are divorced or separated, the parent with whom you lived the most during the past 12 months is the parent responsible for filling out the FAFSA. This is not necessarily the parent who has legal custody.
* If the parent responsible for completing the FAFSA has remarried, the new spouse must report their income and assets on the FAFSA. Prenuptial agreements have no bearing on this requirement.


Your Dependents

* A legal dependent is a person for whom you provide and will continue to provide more than half of their support. Support includes money, gifts, loans, housing, food, clothing, automobile, medical and dental care, and payment of college costs. If you have a child who is supported by your parents or someone else, you should answer “no” to the question that asks about legal dependents other than a spouse.
* If you have an unborn child who will be born before or during the award year (July 1 through June 30) and will be your legal dependent, that child should be counted as a member of the household.


Given the Option

* In the question that asks about your interest in different types of aid (e.g. work-study and student loans), answer “yes” to each question. Answering “yes” does not obligate you to accept a loan or work-study position, nor does it guarantee you’ll be offered either. Answering “no” to these questions will not get you more grant aid.
* Even if you qualify for the simplified needs test, you should still complete the asset information section of the FAFSA. Some states and schools use this information for computing their own financial aid awards.
* By submitting the FAFSA, you give permission to release your information to the state aid agency. You cannot apply for financial aid without releasing this information.


What Counts as Income?

* The Earned Income Credit is considered “untaxed income” on the FAFSA. Other types of untaxed income include retirement plan contributions made during the year and military food and housing allowances.
* Taxable earnings from work-study jobs as well as any grant or scholarship monies that were reported on your income tax return are counted.
* Prepaid tuition plans should be reported as assets on the FAFSA.


Before You Submit Your FAFSA

* Whether filing online or off, sign the form (you’ll use your PIN online) and get all the other required signatures. If you don’t sign the form, you will receive an SAR, but you will not receive aid.
* Do not include anything with the form when you mail it; any enclosures will be destroyed. Likewise, do not write comments or notes in the margins of the form. If there are unusual family financial circumstances, you should contact the school’s financial aid administrator to ask for a professional judgment review.
* Make a copy of the form before mailing it. You can print out your online FAFSA before you submit the application.
* Submit the form on time.

If you don’t understand a question or are having trouble filling out the form, call the Federal Student Aid Information Center."

I thought this was a great article to share and remember, NEVER BE AFRAID TO ASK FOR HELP! You just need to take your time, read everything that is being asked of you, and just make sure you are filling things out entirely, and not skipping over things here and there!

You can always reach out to Berkeley directly for any questions you may have!

Well, with 8 weeks left to go, that means mid-terms will be approaching shortly and you will need to prepare all those papers that may be due or get to studying for those big bad tests! Regardless, I want to wish you all the best!

The Monday Blues...

The most hated day of the week....Monday, Monday, Monday! As I logged on Facebook this morning, I could not believe the amount of status updates pertaining to: "Oh Mondays, I hate you!" It's no surprise that we have such hatred for Monday's because it only means the weekend is over and we are back to our work week. Since I was a little overwhelmed by these hating on Monday statuses, I decided to look up what other reasons there are for hating Monday so much!

I came across an article, "Mondays Are More Depressing Than We Thought," by The Huffington Post. Let me start off with this quote in the article: "According to researchers, Monday mornings are so depressing that, on average, we don't crack our first smile until 11:16 a.m., reports The Telegraph." (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/25/mondays-are-more-depressing_n_908491.html) That means by the time you finish reading my post this morning, you should have cracked that first smile or at least I hope you did! Everyone has their bad days and yes, Monday seems to be the biggest downfall to the week, you just have to pick yourself up and do something you love! It could be treating yourself to a nice lunch or buying yourself something you have wanted for some time now, just try to be optimistic and look forward to the weekend that lies ahead!

I feel that Monday is a great day to sit down and analyze your weeks schedule and to figure out what you are going to do and what you are going to accomplish. A new week means a fresh, new start. This could help take away the depressing factor that the weekend is over, and that you can find things to keep you busy to get through the rest of the week and then have the rewarding factor of enjoying the weekend once again!

For example, you're a continuing Berkeley student, who has a term paper due in 2 weeks from now. You typically wait until the last minute to start the paper because procrastination has taken over your mind and you just assume you can finish it the weekend before. Let me ask you this though...Do you really want to spend a weekend, (keeping in mind you worked all week, and went to school all week), working on a paper that may lack a lot of information because you haven't had the time to do ALL of the research? I didn't think so! Here is a simple solution...You are probably going home with either a reading assignment or some piece of homework to complete for your next class. After completing that assignment, take a half hour or even an hour if you can, to do some of the research and lay out an outline that will make sure you hit every point you need to hit within your paper. If you do a little bit each and every day, it will make writing your paper that much easier. At least the research will be done, and all you need to do is think out how you want to phrase the information you have and make it a very appealing, yet effective paper.

There is a method to my madness here, but you have to be willing to tackle this task and get things done! Instead of hating Monday even more after spending a weekend working on a last minute paper, you will find Monday to be rewarding because you would have finished the assignment and can again, set new goals for the week!

With all that said HAPPY MONDAY and think about what you want to do this week to make the weekend come even faster and be even more enjoyable!

New Year....New Changes!

Happy New Year to all and welcome back to all continuing students! It's time to kick off the Winter Quarter the right way and stick to that goal of getting your work done on time! Every year we come up with all these resolutions, but a week or two go by and we find ourselves drifting away from them. How about making 2012 the year you don't lose motivation to obtaining your resolution and just stick to it? Sounds pretty easy and harmless if you ask me!




I remember when I was in school, I set a goal for each quarter. Those goals included staying on top of my work and working towards the grade I deserve. Now that I am graduated, my goal is to find a job that I LOVE and using my creativity to create some new ideas that will be beneficial for the company all together. Once you graduate, you get into a mind set where you can't give up and you just have to take every new experience with pride. Whether it's an interview or speaking to someone within your career field, you learn from it all and you are able to apply it to whatever else comes your way.

We can all sit here and complain how big of a pain school can be and how we can't wait for it to be over, but there are times where we just need to step back and analyze how lucky we are to be given the opportunity to go to school and obtain a degree. All the knowledge and skill set we obtain in school, not only benefits us personally, but will benefit a future employer, who may not have employees with that skill or may be looking to expand. We are all in school for a reason and it all pays off. You can't ever give up on something or else you are just giving up on yourself and when you do that, what good does that do?

So what are some of your resolutions for this wonderful year of 2012? Let's all stick to it this year!!

Look for my updated postings throughout the year! I am going to start coming up with some exciting topics and maybe incorporating a new twist to my blog! We shall see...

Best of luck to everyone this quarter! May these next 12 weeks be the best they can be!

Happy Monday....It's Finals Week!

Happy Monday to all! It’s finals week, so you know what that means, studying all day, studying all night, just to pass that final at the end of the quarter reflecting back on all you have learned! It can’t be that bad! Believe me, I know the stress of finals week…been there and done that! Once you reach Alumni status like myself, you will kind of miss it in a weird way! I use to always say “I can’t wait until I am done! No finals, no homework, no late night studying….Life will be GREAT!” Well, while it is great to eliminate that stress from my life, I do miss it! Having a job can have its stressful points as well, especially when you have deadlines to meet! You can never fully eliminate the stress of work and school, but you do find better ways to deal with it!



Since it’s finals week and I know some of you tend to put off on the studying, I would like to share some tips that will hopefully benefit you in the long run! I always say, DON’T OVERTHINK what you are studying. Sometimes you test yourself and then you start questioning whether you answered the questions right, and you over think the situation drawing attention to topics that have absolutely nothing to do with the question at hand.

The no brainer here is STUDY. We all have our own tricks in our hats on how to study and how long to study each subject, so you should pay careful attention to all the different topics and areas you need to go over. You may need to spend more time on one topic than another, but it all comes down to carefully analyzing the situation as a whole. Don’t procrastinate though! You know you need to study, so just do it and get it over with. Even if it’s for 15 minutes every hour or every other hour, just do it! It will add up and when you sit down one final time to go over everything before the test, you will see how easily it all comes back to you!
Then, the most obvious is to eat and sleep! I know, this is your FAVORITE part of my blog post today! You are probably thinking…Wow, studying! Is this girl for real right now!? All joking aside though, it’s important to keep hydrated and have some food in your belly so you have energy and motivation. Just think about it…when you don’t eat or sleep, you drag your feet and you don’t feel like doing anything! So get your rest and eat up!



I wish you all the best of luck on your finals! If you have any tips that help you out during finals week, share them with us! And once finals are done, it’s time to enjoy the Holiday Season with all of your loved ones and you can say “See ya next year Berkeley!”

Tis' The Season....

Happy December everyone!

The holidays are quickly approaching and that means the frantic last minute shopping continues and all the party planning gets underway! I personally LOVE this time of the year, despite the craziness and stress it brings! In the end, it's completely worth it because you get to spend time with your loved ones who mean the most to you! We are also dwindling down on the year 2011, and getting ready to bring in 2012! I am still in shock over how fast this year went, but with every new year approaching, it means bigger and better things for each and every one of us! No matter how bad things seemed at times, there was always something that highlighted the year and made it seem like all the little things didn't matter! They are just bumps in the road that life throws at us to test our strength! Although I lost someone very dear to me this year, my Grandmother, I know that she would want to continue on and do well in all the things I continued to succeed at! (See, positivity is key!)

So as you wind down on the Fall Quarter, what things will you be looking forward to in the upcoming year? Better grades? Study more? Tell us! Being that I have been out of school since September, I am still always looking forward to continuing my success and working within my Marketing field because I absolutely love it! I was given the opportunity to go back to where I was interning so I am more than thankful for that! I interned there for 6 months, then left for 2 months to set out to find a full time job, and then went right back to that company because I was given a great opportunity to gain more experience. It all pays off and it's totally worth it!



I want to take some time in my post this morning to pay my respects to all the lives that were lost during the bombing of Pearl Harbor, that then escalated into World War II! We always remember their determination and strength for protecting us all...Please take some time today to pay your respects and to never forget all that has been done to protect us today!

It's mid-week so continue your studying, get your work done on time, and end the Fall Quarter with those excellent grades! Only few more weeks to go, and then it's time to enjoy the holidays! Till next time....see ya!