just breathe

I am so happy here that it scares me. Life is so easy here, so good and fun. I love all my people here, I have no difficulties with the Uni work, I love exploring this country and I love to learn that I really don't need that much alone time. Nothing feels better than walking to class with the sun shining in your face, a warm breeze in your hair, meeting lovely people you know everywhere on campus, the beautiful Austin skyline always in the background... the weekends are full of parties, good food and hanging out. And  still I can't stop thinking about the end of the semester- I also still don't have a clue what I will do in my free time in May. Annoying!

Last weekend we danced the night away at The Ranch on West 6th, went to a crazy cliche co-op party at UT (the other massive school here in Austin), enjoyed the almost 30 degree summer weather and celebrated Homecoming here at St. Edward's- with a casino night, basketball games and other activities.

New Orleans #2

Okay I just realised that my pictures should probably have come first, but whatever. Some pictures of the car journey, we also drove through Houston on our way to New Orleans, got stuck in traffic there. And then some pics of us in the first bar on that night.

Now some pictures of the next day, the French quarter and market, pretty architecture and so on... awwww I just love the city!

And lastly, the boys:

 

It was a great trip, except for when we wanted to leave and our car had a clamp on the tire. The idiots from the parking spot decided that we didn't pay (but we did) so they booted us. Omg we were SO ANGRY! We had to pay 100$ for them to take it off. Denise and I drove the whole way back without sleeping, we just couldn't. So instead we had 6 Red Bulls and talked all night until we finally made it back to campus at 6am. By that time we were so tired that we just started laughing at everything. I am actually still tired, even though I slept 10 hours last night. It 8.30pm now and I could just fall asleep. 

I might even do that now.

New Orleans #1

Here we go, a slightly photo heavy post about New Orleans.
The drive from Austin takes about 8 hours, but with pee stops and traffic it took us almost 10. We left Friday after class and got there around 11 at night. We drove with two cars and because the other car got left earlier, we met up with them in a bar on Bourbon Street. Let me tell you, it is terrifying. So many drunk people, nothing compared to 6th Street here in Austin. Don't know why but the city scared me that night (well I kind of do know- the others told us a story of how earlier in the day, someone just got shot on the street. oh okay then!) The next day we wandered around the streets, bought Mardi Gras accessories, met some other nice girls, had typical food (Jambalaya and Gumbo) and had a great time at the French market. The French Quarter in general is so beautiful, I love the houses, the little balconies, the trees... Like I always imagined it!
Then we waited for the parade to kick of Mardi Gras- SO exciting! After the parade we went to Frenchman Street, a fantastic street that is less scary than Bourbon and has an endless amount of bars. We danced to Jazz, walked from bar to bar, I extended my collection of beads (the bead necklaces are very typical for Mardi Gras,everyone wears them- I will show a picture in the next post) and we had a great time until we headed home. Unlike other cities, New Orleans' bars stay open very late and more importantly, you are sort of allowed to drink on the streets. Wohoo!
In general it seemed almost like a dream to me- New Orleans has always been this interesting city to me, with so much character and tragedy that I wanted to visit it so badly but never really made an effort. So when the others suggested it I was SO excited!
If you look at the pictures of what Hurricane Katrina did to the city, it is impressive how much they must have rebuild and renovated. It all looks great!

Now this is just the first load of pictures and I cannot take credit for them, all of them were taken by Alyzee, who took one of the Uni's camera with her and I am so happy we have so many great pictures.
Okay, enjoy!

lovelovelove

Gosh, today was/is such a good day!

My social media class was great today, we did a sort of scavenger hunt which is all about St. Ed's! Click on the hashtags to see the tweets or just see this post, I stole some of the prettiest.

#JRLWeb or #COMM3309

Also can I just mention how good I got at YOGAAAAAA??????? My favorite part of the day- walking back from Yoga across the most beautiful campus. 

SO MUCH LOVE AND SUNSHINE!

so see ya'll on Monday, I am off to New Orleans tomorrow!

Austin print love

I am such a big sucker for stationary, art prints and all of that. I already have an amazingly beautiful print of Edinburgh and having one (or 100) of Austin is my next goal. Etsy is such a great place to look and here are my favorite ones:

 x - x - x - x

Spring Break!

via x

Jesus, do you guys know how hard it is to organise a vacation with 10 people? OMG don't tell me about it. I still don't know exactly how we finally managed, but for 5 days in March, we are gonna rent a beautiful apartment in South Padre Island. It's in the very south of Texas, almost in Mexico. You can only reach it via a long bridge, it has beaches to either side, dolphins, and of course... spring break parties! The first plan was actually Cancun, but sadly that was too expensive. How cool would that have been though?! Anyway, this is great too.
Our view is of the Gulf of Mexico, we have a pool, are at the beach... what more do we want?
5 girls, 5 boys, spring break people!

Sunday review.

This week went by so fast! A little review and stream of consciousness of this past week.

• The weather has been horribly, mostly really cold and not sunny and windy. I might as well be in Scotland. On Friday we had a "snow day" again, so all classes were cancelled! 

• The night before we went out to have 2$ Frozen Margaritas at the Black Sheep Lodge, which is just around the corner. When we got the email saying that all classes were cancelled things went a little crazy and our total bill consisted of 30 drinks. Oops. 

•  Yesterday we took a little girls trip to the beauty salon and got our eyebrows done- finally! I took all the girls to the only Benefit Brow Bar here in Austin because that's where I go in Edinburgh- everyone was so happy with the result- no surprise, they are just amazing at what they do!

• One of the girls here has a car and I just love when we drive somewhere- the buses here are better than in most cities but still not really that helpful if you wanna go somewhere off the main route.

• I am knee deep in homework actually but writing this helps a big deal to procrastinate- I also already got my first paper back with a ridiculous good A- woohoo!

•  Yoga is hard, people! I go to the classes here at the gym and I envy all the girls who can stay perfectly still during those difficult poses. My goal for the semester is to be just like them. Haha we will see how that goes.

•  Last but NOT LEAST- I BOUGHT A TICKET TO SEE JAMES BLUNT IN MAY IN HOUSTON! SO SO SO SO HAPPY!!!

Randoms.

 

1# Super Bowl Sunday
To be honest, the only move I understand is a touchdown. Everything else is just weird to me- we watched it in the lounge with everyone, eating pizza and wings. Fun! And how cute is Bruno Mars?

2# Philip Seymour Hoffman
I am so so sad and shocked about this. He wasn't my favorite actor or anything, but it just makes me sad to see such talented people die for such stupid reasons.

3# New Orleans
On the weekend of Valentine's Day we are going to New Orleans. SO excited! Mardi Gras is in the beginning of March but apparently the parades are starting earlier than that. Woohoo!

4# Oscars
I am so so happy that I can watch the Oscars here, on Tv, at a reasonable time. So I got around a month to watch ALL of the nominated movies. HERE WE GO!