A Michigan Fall

I am terrible at posting on a regular basis! It was shortly before summer break when I wrote last. We were spending two weeks at a Science Center Day camp, helping out as teacher's assistants. Move ahead to October, and I'm starting my third week as a camp counselor at a YMCA camp in Michigan. We've been in Michigan for a month and a half, and spent the first month doing maintenance work at another YMCA camp a few hours away.From the moment that I saw Lake Huron I was captivated by the beauty of it! Michigan is beautiful!!!

A picture of Lake Huron Currently I'm working as a camp counselor for the Sherman Lake YMCA Outdoor Center. They offer integrated education programs for local school groups. The children (typically 6th grade), come for three days or a week, and enjoy fun activities such as climbing, canoeing, low ropes, and team building. Everything they learn can be used in life beyond camp. I was a camp counselor for several years prior to this, so having the opportunity to be a counselor again was a dream come true. I'm even thinking of applying to work here next summer if I don't choose to do NCCC again. The staff here is incredible, and I am becoming friends with so many of them. For the first three weeks (including a week of training), education majors from a local college were here. It's strange not seeing them every day. Yesterday I went on a walk in preparation for an underground railroad simulation that the students will be doing on Tuesday, and I was amazed at how pretty the leaves looked and how gorgeous the views were.

it's getting cold here!

I hope to be more consistent about posting, but until then, I wish you a wonderful week and a happy October!

Appreciate the small things

I have to apologize for not writing any earlier than this, but I'm sure you know how busy life can get sometimes. I'm currently finishing up a two and a half week project in Cedar Rapids Iowa. It was definitely nice being back on campus after six weeks with my team. Summer break is rapidly approaching, and an experience tonight showed me just how wonderful my small town home away from home really is. Today I volunteered at, and enjoyed the festivities at Party in the Park, an event that started Thursday and concluded this evening. I spent the morning handing out water to runners at the 5k, and, along with the other two people with me, were thanked constantly for coming out and helping. One lady even stopped briefly to talk about AmeriCorps with us. In the afternoon I came back to assist with several games of Bingo at the local park, which ended up being a lot of fun. As soon as I was finished I changed and settled into the grass after trying out the climbing wall. I sat in the sun, reading and enjoying walking tacos (my first time having one!). As people began to arrive for the big events of the evening, I saw a community coming together to enjoy the entertainment and the people. They were there to have fun and recognize the local heroes in Vinton, an appropriate theme considering the huge windstorm that hit Vinton last year. All around me people munched on funnel cake and burgers, and sipped sodas and tea. During the opening group, children threw streamers in the air and chased after over sized beach balls while sleepy babies slept in the arms of their parents. People were spread out on blankets or chairs, cheering and enjoying the company of others. We were reminded to "Take it Easy" and gave tribute to the men and women who have helped keep out country safe. It was such a peaceful and memorable evening. Ever since I arrived I was struck by how nice everyone is here, especially to the AmeriCorps NCCC crowd. I have found a wonderful church community and have had the chance to share my experiences with different people. I get to enjoy delicious ice cream and three dollar movies (yes, be jealous). I have ridden my bike to the local pool and spent the afternoon relaxing in the sun with a book in hand. While we don't spend very much time in Vinton, especially when we are on project rounds, this experience has been very special. Even though being in this program isn't always smooth sailing, I am starting to appreciate more and more the various experiences that I have been having. This is a town where you can walk into a restaurant a week after being there the first time and having the waitress recognize you. This is a town where people come together to enjoy music, fireworks, and entertainment. This, at least until November, is my home, and I'm going to try my best to make the very most of it.

Goodbye Technology, Hello Dodgeville, Wisconsin!

Tomorrow I get into a fifteen passenger van and travel three hours or so to my new home in Dodgeville Wisconsin, population-4,698 as of the 2010 census. I will be spending six weeks in the great outdoors, removing invasive species, trail building, tiling, painting, and constructing benches at a nature retreat. I'm so excited to be in a camp environment! Since I won't be at camp this summer, it's going to be nice staying in cabins and being in touch with nature once more. The boys have grudgingly given us the cabin with heat and electricity, for which I am very grateful. We are bringing tents along as well so that people who are interested can sleep outside every now and then. Our days are going to be busy, and I'm sure that we will simply want to relax at the end of the day, and without internet and cell phone reception, I will be forced to spend time with my fellow corps members. Yep, no cell phone and internet at the camp. It's going to make getting work done for my representative roles a little more difficult, but it is a challenge that I am ready to embrace. That being said however, this will probably be my last post for a while. We will be spending our free times in town I imagine, so I will have access then, but my priority will have to be making calls and sending e-mails. When you have the two most time consuming roles that require constant communication with the outside world, priorities have to be made. The staff goal for one of my roles is to have a community day as well as a formal presentation, and for my other roles we have vowed to try to exceed the recruiting goal since we were unable to meet our requirements the last time around. So, what has happened since I last wrote you might ask? I arrived back in Vinton on Friday, after six weeks in Illinois doing energy conservation work. I spent the weekend relaxing, and got the opportunity to see a friend from home on Saturday. Sunday we were back to work as we put together our portfolio and did our prep work for our debrief (which was successful). For those of you who aren't quite familiar with this program, we have many meetings throughout the day. We have to debrief from our previous project and briefed for the second one, have to sign up for meetings for our different representative roles, and have additional training for those roles as necessary. I know this post is probably longer than some of the other ones, but since I won't have many opportunities to get in touch with people and my viewers, I figured this was the best way to let you know what I have been up to and where I am headed next. Until next time.

What I've been up to

As you have probably figured out by now, my original plan to write every day hasn't exactly worked out. I was shocked when I came to write a new entry and saw that I haven't posted since February. When I left off I had just moved to Vinton, IA, my home base for the next ten months, as a member of AmeriCorps NCCC (National Civilian Community Corps). I spent a month in training-tools, first aid/CPR/AED, shelter operations,cooking( learned how to make pizza!), getting to know new people, and learning more about what my new life would entail. We did a three day project at a local elementary school, where I got to assist a teacher in a third grade classroom, grading papers, copying, and assisting students with their spelling and writing. I found a church to attend (not CS but it was still nice to have a place to pray every week), and discovered a very nice opportunity.

After that month my group moved to Urbana, IL, where we have been doing canvassing work-going door to door distributing information about some weatherization programs that the county opens. During this project I have increased my public speaking skills and definitely stepped outside of my comfort zone. When we weren't working, we spent time volunteering at local organizations such as the University YMCA, a Habitat for Humanity ReStore, track meets, and SHARE-the Society for hooved animal rescue and emergency. I contacted various organizations about being potential project sponsors, attempted to improve my limited cooking ability, found a CS church to attend, and explored the community. For the past few days we have been pulling garlic mustard, an invasive species, at different forest preserves in the area.

Tonight we found out our second round project and I can't wait! We will be doing two projects, which is an added bonus, spending six weeks doing invasive species removal and other outdoor projects in Wisconsin, and then spending two weeks working at a science center in Iowa, which means that we will get to stay at our central location. I am very excited to travel to a new state. I will not have daily access to cell phone reception or internet, so my entries and communications with the outside world will be limited, but in a way I am glad. It will allow me to get to know my team mates better, spend more time reading instead of being on the computer all of the time, and get in touch with nature. I will write once more (or at least promise to try) before I head out, but hopefully this sums up some of what I have been doing.

Training, Training, Training

I've been here for about a week and our days are packed full of early mornings and meeting after meeting! For the next few weeks we will be receiving all the training that we need to be successful when we head out on spikes, our six to eight week projects. Soon we will go on a short spike, probably somewhere in Iowa, to get a feel for what the longer ones will be like. There are ten people in my team, nine members and a team leader. We found out our permanent assignments last Sunday. I am serving in Oak 2. This week we have been getting to know each other, as we participated in a low ropes course and talked about how we can work as a team when stress gets in the way. My wonderful roommate is in my unit, so even though we aren't in the same team, we have a lot of training together. This past week I learned basic van maintenance, got certified in first aide and adult CPR, and participated in training sessions where we learned about the different representative roles. I am going to be the Project Outreach Liason (POL) with my friend James, as well as a member of CAP (Corp Ambassador). With one other person we are responsible for doing recruitment events to get people in the community more aware of the program and what we do. As a CAP, James and I will research different non profit organizations that our team can do our ISP's (Independent Service Projects). In addition to our regular hours of service, we also have to perform at least 8- hours of independent service, which happens in addition to the time spent on projects. Yesterday we spent the morning in the hospital getting medical testing taken care of, and then had two short meetings. Afterwards I went with my roommate Becky, my friend Stacie, and Becky's friend Zach to a nearby diner, and then Becky and I walked around the town, taking pictures and trying to find a nature trail (that was a fail). I went out with some friends later in the evening, but came back early and got some sleep. Tonight I am cooking dinner with Gabe, one of the other members in the group. We do our own cooking and shopping, and thanks to Gabe we went under budget which is really cool. This coming week I have a cooking class,extra training for my representative (REP) roles, a disaster services overview, and shelter ops and simulation, in case we have to set up a shelter. We also have weekly room inspections and kitchen/common area inspections. It's a lot of working, but I'm learning a lot!

New Beginings

On Tuesday I received a call from AmeriCorp, officially asking me if I was interested in serving. I of course said yes, but was in shock. I had to listen to the message twice before I finally understood what they were asking. When I had called the day before, they had asked me if I would still be interested in serving should a spot become available. I had three days to get ready! It was pretty crazy, since I had people to contact and last minute shopping to do to get ready for this next adventure. I flew to my new home in Vinton, IA on Friday, and the chaos began. This week is what is known as in processing-getting all the paperwork taken care of, meetings to go over policies and expectations, and fittings for our uniforms. We are placed into a temporary team. We eat our meals with them and go to meetings at the same time. Tomorrow we get our official group assignments, and these are the people that we will be with for the remainder of our stay. Monday starts CTI- Corp Training Institute, where we get certifications in CPR and first aide, participate three days a week in physical training, and get the skills necessary to go out into the field and start our term of service. This is going to be an amazing adventure. It will be challenging, and I have so much to learn (and of course I'm not just talking about learning how to navigate the complex tunnel system), but I know that I am going to come away from this ten month experience with new skills, new friends, and more confidence in myself and my abilities as a leader. I will post more as things start rolling, but hopefully this post provides the reader with some information as to what I have been up to since arriving in my new home.

Loans and Other Spendings

Towards the end of last week I made two more payments on my student loans from college. A few days later I made another large transaction on a ticket to see my boyfriend in Phoenix in a few months. As I was looking at my history of past transactions, I was amazed at how much I had spent over the past few weeks. Working at a grocery store is both a blessing and a curse. It's a blessing because it means I have a source of income, which can be used to pay for the things that I want or more importantly, need. It's a curse because I'm often sent to the store to pick things up for the family. Usually I have my parent's credit card with me, but from time to time they will text me at the end of my shift, asking me to pick things up. I'm usually reimbursed if it comes from my account, but when I'm buying for myself, it's smaller items-a dollar here, four dollars there. I want to move out as soon as I can, but without a driver's license and a full time job, I just don't see how that is possible at this time. Travel expenses to get to my new location, rent, utilities, basic living expenses (food, clothing...) and loan payments! It's so expensive. When I do eventually learn how to drive, I will have monthly car payments as well (though I want to avoid having a car if at all possible). This blog is more of a way for me to put my feelings out there more than anything else, but if someone happens to be reading this and has any advice as far as money goes, I would greatly appreciate it!