No Day But Today...

Before I drift off to sleep, I thought I'd update here in the blogosphere so that people know I'm still alive, and hopefully well.

NEWSFLASH: I am now officially done year 4 of university, with the exception of my month of student teaching coming up. =D It's a beyond surreal feeling. In less than a year I will be a certified teacher.

This weekend was an absolute gong show and I'm still marveling at how I accomplished it all and remained sane...or am I?

I had 5 final projects/presentations due today, 3 1/2 of which I started and completed over the weekend. Along with working a full set of hours at work (8.5 hours on Saturday and 5.5 hours on Sunday). I somehow managed to stay up until 3:30 this morning to finish everything, at which point I was a on a buzz, so I stayed up til 4 to do a clean of my room which looked like it had lost a fight with a tornado.  Alarm dragged me out of bed at 6:30 and off I went to a 10 hour school day full of presentations.

I will expand more on all the cool and interesting stuff I did tomorrow...when I have more than 2 1/2 hours under my cute little eye sleep-mask (yes I have one...I don't have new blinds for my fancy new window yet and I have a streetlamp directly outside my window that shines in and I need to sleep in complete darkness).

As a quick final note: THANK YOU SO much to my new followers! When I started up this blog I hardly anticipated 1 person wanting to read my daily ramblings, never mind over 20! You guys/gals rock my socks =)

xo

Consider yourself warned ;)


*stands up* Hi, my name is Amanda, and I have naturally curly hair.  I've grown up my whole life with people complementing me on my hair, even when it was at it's witchiest, most awful, fuzz-ball stage.  As a kid, I absolutely hated my hair.  I learned how to braid my hair at the age of 3 because my mom was a nurse who worked night shifts, and my dad was a hopeless cause, and if my hair wasn't braided, by morning it was literally impossible to deal with.  As with most kids, parents don't give their kids hair products to use...no gels, mousses, or balms.  And so, my family and I (because let me tell you, it was a family affair) struggled with my hair for years...broken hair brushes thrown away, hair elastics snapped, screaming fits, fights, chases around the house (with brush in hand), no cutsey little hair clips for me, oh no, I had too much hair to actually ever fit into any of those.  Because along with being *blessed* with curly hair, I was also equally *blessed* with ridiculously thick hair.

Anyways, from the time I was in about grade 5 or so, I would need to get up in the mornings and shower so that my hair would be semi-manageable...thus I usually went to school with damp if not slightly wet hair.  I was always scolded by other outside my immediate family for doing so, and was told repeatedly to use a blow-dryer on my hair. This suggestion only became more persistent as I grew up and started using products in my hair to define my curls etc. and yet we knew from experience that it only turned my head into a fuzzball worthy only of being called "Cousin It".  Then, we were introduced to a really cool product called a diffuser.  For those who don't know, the thing on the right is a     diffuser. It attaches to your blow dryer, and it's main job is to spread out the airflow so as not to disrupt and separate the curls.  It's great, if you want to spend a good 40 minutes blow drying your hair, because with my hair, that's how long it takes.  So that too, got chucked.

In high school, I discovered the hair straightener. I had the hallelujah chorus coming at me from all which ways that day....I looked NORMAL!!!  Not to dwell on this, but the straightener really has changed my life. I'm not one of those people who straighten their hair every day, a) because it takes far too long, and b) because it just isn't healthy for your hair, but I do do it for a couple weeks every month. I'd say about 1/3 of the time my hair is straight.

So lets get to the pictures...
This past week, I decided I would pictorially document why for years I have told people that I cannot and will not use a blow dryer on my hair.  My hair stylist discovered it the first time I went to her and she straightened my hair for me (trade secret...always get her to straighten my hair when I get it cut or coloured...saves me a lot of work!)  She now calls me (and puts me down in her schedule book as) Diana Ross.


Here's (to the left) what my hair normally looks like curly, when I've taken the time to make it look good:



Below, you will see why you never tell a naturally-curly haired girl to blow dry her hair. Personal disclaimer: I'm almost regretting putting this picture out to the public.  Note: I know I look horrid, I'm not wearing any makeup, and I look half-dead. No need to point out the obvious-es to me, K? K. Also...can you tell the curly one was taken in the summer and the blow-drying one in the winter? WOW am I ever pale here....






So THIS is why you never tell a curly-haired person to blow dry her hair with the expectation that that is all she needs to do with it. Sorry folks, but I'm NOT walking out of the house like this, no matter to who's amusement.  This is after product has been administered, a lovely anti-frizz brush has been used, AND half an hour spent getting overheated.

HOWEVER, should you have the decency to tell me I should straighten my hair more often, then this is what you might see (pardon the very myspace-ish picture):

Hello my friends :-) This has been a hectic week to say the least. First of all....I've changed some things in my blog (hopefully you've noticed!) Some of the styling has changed, and I've added a few things here and there, like an About Me page, and a page that will eventually hold a collection of my favourite Quotes.  If anyone has any favourite quotes that they really love, send them to me either in a comment or through my email button on the side and I'll include them on the page (I'll give credit where credit is due)!  A few little decorations and embellishments added along the way, and I'm finally starting to feel at home here on No Day But Today. I'm planning on writing a post as to why I chose my blog title and what it means to me soon...but not in the middle of my craziness. Someone please remind me somewhere down the road in the near future to write on this, okay? Okay!

Anyway, like I said, my week as been extremely hectic.  In the certification part of the education faculty, classes are condensed to 10 weeks instead of the normal 13 weeks, so I'm starting my final week of my 4th year...and then after that soon to be starting my 5th and final year in university (for my double degree anyway). I know I'll go back and get more degrees and stuff eventually, but for now, the end is coming and it's coming quickly.  Back to my point....next week is my final week of classes before I start my teaching block, so all final projects, essays, assignments and presentations are due.  The faculty is a HUGE fan of group projects and presentations and I just don't seem to be having much luck with them this semester...exhibit 1.  I have a group presentation on Wednesday that I haven't even started yet, and my partner is not as enthusiastic about getting it done as I could have hoped. Good ideas, just lacks motivation. So powerpoint and I make an awesome team along with a pot of coffee and plenty of chocolate yet again.  I have no issue saying I did all the work in our self-evaluations. Another suggestion I got from a classmate who cares about her work is just not to put her name on the presentation or any work handed in. Sneaky, but it gets the point across.  I won't lie and say I'm not considering it...

In other news...I had another realization of my age. Some of you might have heard of my fall-to-earth moment when my little brother was filling out registration forms for grade 11 (?!) next year.  The other day, sitting nonchalantly on his shelf in the shower was a razor and can of guys shaving gel.  MY BABY BROTHER IS SHAVING!!!!!!! Gah! I'm not gonna get all sappy and talk about how I used to rock him to sleep and read to him and feed him and play with him and think the sun rise and set on his cute, over-sized little head....no, I won't get like that. *sniffle*  Just because it seems like the universe is trying to tell me I'm getting old...he brought home his driver's ed form the other day. (Thankfully) he wasn't at school early enough and the course was filled up by the time he got there (apparently kids were lining up at 7:30 and the poor teacher in-charge had to fight her way through to get to her office...) so I still have a while before I have to worry about that. Scary bananas though, I tell ya.

In even more news that I just realized...this is my 50th blog post!!  I honestly can't believe I've made it this far. A huge part of that is my followers...you guys keep me honest, even without saying anything, because I know you're reading and that keeps me writing :-) So THANK YOU!!! <3

Now, although I would love to stick around with you lovely folks and chat more about my fabulous life (what planet am I on?!), I have a fabulous fruit and chocolate fondue waiting for me in my kitchen.  Sorry guys, but the chocolate fondue wins, hands down. Much love, and I'll update soon!

*edit* I forgot to add that I've also added a "Blog Roll" in which I list all the bloggers who I'm currently checking in on and reading! (I had added it, but forgot to activate it).
xo