Author: Brooke

Where to Buy “Professional” or Business Casual Clothes – For Teens!

BrookeLeave a comment

Hello everyone!

Even as a teen not yet in the workforce, there are still quite a few instances where you’ll need “professional” clothing. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you would know that I am a member of the YMCA’s Youth and Government program. For our training conferences, we could wear casual clothing as long as it was reasonably modest, but for our culminating conference in Sacramento (coming up in about a week!) where we have to wear business casual clothing that fits the “Sac attire” dress code each day of the conference. I had a few outfits that I had been able to pass off as professional enough for one-off events in the past, but for this conference I actually needed to invest in some business attire. If you’re in a similar situation, keep on reading to find out where to go!

One of my biggest concerns when finding business casual clothes was the cost. Stores that sell this type of clothing are often on the pricier end, and I couldn’t justify spending that much since I won’t be wearing these clothes often- only for Youth and Government and other special occasions.

  • Banana Republic outlet – I found a ton of good pieces here, and they were actually pretty stylish/things I was excited to wear. Everything was around 40-60% off, so I got a really good deal on everything I got. They have petite sizing and a wide range of sizing in general, which is good if you’re younger/smaller.
  • Outlets of other similar stores (J. Crew, etc.) – Same thing as the Banana Republic outlet situation, but I wanted to include that as a separate place since their deals really stood out to me and I had such a good experience. I recommend just going to the nearest outlet mall and peeking into any stores that look like they have businesswear. I found that Banana had the best deals, but you never know.
  • Nordstrom Rack – Their selection differs a lot from time to time, but the last time I went I found a ton of stuff. They usually have a lot of dresses and shirts, but it might be harder to find pants and skirts. Everything I got here was around $20-30, so it’s very reasonably priced- it depends on the brand though, since they have such a variety of labels.
  • Target – You might not expect it, but Target has a bit of everything. Again, it depends on their current stock, but I would pop in just to see. If not clothes, they have a really good selection of flats and heels you could get for reasonable prices.
  • Goodwill / Thrift stores – This is probably the most affordable and hit-or-miss option. If your local Goodwill or thrift stores have decent section of business wear and carry your size, it might be your best bet. That being said, I know thrift shopping often doesn’t work out and it may not have the best selection of these things, so I wouldn’t count on getting all your stuff here.
  • Your family! – If you’re similarly sized to your mom/dad/whoever in your family, ask to borrow their stuff! They’ll probably have at least one thing that’s neutral and you can wear- I borrowed my mom’s cardigan last time I had a Youth and Government event where I needed to dress formally.
  • “Typical” stores – Sometimes stores like Abercrombie or American Eagle will have business-casual blouses or slacks. I recommend checking in these stores just to see- they’ll also often be on sale since their target demographic doesn’t end up buying them as often.

I hope this helps you on your business casual clothing search! Clothes shopping in general can be challenging, so I know it’s a bit of a nuisance. That being said, you’ll feel like a super-important businesswoman (or man) when you find the right outfits for you. Let me know if any of these places have worked for you in the past, or if there’s somewhere else people should look!

Brooke

Irish Coffee – Poem by Me

BrookeLeave a comment

Hello everyone!

I’ve been wanting to post more writing-related content on here, and today I had the idea to look up some poetry prompts and try writing poems based off of them. I Googled “poetry prompts” and went through images, and found a daily prompt challenge for January (I wrote this post on January 25th). I know it’s not January anymore so the challenge won’t be much of use anymore, but I want to give credit where credit is due so I’m including it.

The prompt of the day I wrote this was “Irish Coffee” as you can tell by the title of this post, so without further ado, here’s my attempt at following a poetry prompt.

if you were a drink, you’d be irish coffee and no, not because you’re irish, but it is quite fitting if you ask me. you’d be irish coffee because you like normal coffee, but you drink whiskey even more often. you don’t mind if the sugar and cream clog your arteries further because you only live once and you want to live life your way, right? you’d be irish coffee because i don’t drink irish coffee- i drink normal coffee and i don’t live life the way you want me to.

I hope you enjoyed reading my work. As always, please, please, please let me know what you think! I would also LOVE to ready your work if you’re willing to share, just leave a comment or send me a message 🙂

Brooke

TV Review – Good Trouble

BrookeLeave a comment

Hello everyone!

I recently watched both available seasons of the show Good Trouble on Hulu and I absolutely loved it, so I thought I would talk a little bit about it. I normally don’t find that many things I want to watch on Hulu, but I watched The Fosters while it was popular a couple years ago and my friend told me that the sequel type show was on Hulu. I checked it out and finished it within one weekend (in my defense, I was sick and pretty much bedridden). It was a little cheesy, as all shows of this sort are, but definitely better than I expected for a sequel.

I highly recommend watching The Fosters before you watch Good Trouble, but it’s not completely necessary since there’s a lot of new characters in the show that weren’t in The Fosters. However, it does pick up almost exactly where The Fosters left off, so I would still suggest it. It follows sisters (adopted sisters) Mariana and Callie as they move to Los Angeles for their jobs at a tech startup and clerking for a federal judge, respectively. They move into an apartment in a building called The Coterie and realize it’s a communal living space- they have a bedroom to themselves, but communal bathrooms and kitchen/living space. Craziness ensues as they meet the other residents, and there’s lots of drama.

The show moves quickly and there’s tons of relationships and little storylines here and there woven throughout the main conflicts. The thing I was most pleased about was the continuity from The Fosters- pretty much all of the family members and original characters ended up coming into the show at one point to visit Callie and Mariana and there were actual plots surrounding these events. They weren’t just meaningless cameos to somehow tie the show back to its roots; they actually continued old storylines. I thought that was a really nice touch since sequels often don’t bring back the characters and plotlines- I know I was disappointed with The Originals after The Vampire Diaries, so much so that I never even finished it.

I don’t want to say too much else about the actual plot because I don’t want to spoil anything, but I will say that Callie’s character probably annoyed me the most throughout the episodes that I watched. She kind of annoyed me in The Fosters too so that’s not the biggest surprise- I have a lot of respect for her because of her passion for law, but she still makes self-destructive decisions and in some case just can’t make decisions.

Another element of the show I didn’t expect to enjoy so much was the portrayal of Callie and Mariana’s respective workplaces. I’m not sure how accurate a depiction of those jobs they are, but they definitely opened my eyes and I liked the little focus on the workplace- especially in Callie’s case, since I’m interested in law. Mariana’s storyline with her job really opened my eyes to more of the mistreatment of women in STEM (something I mentioned in another recent post of mine- you should go check it out!!). I felt that was a super important thing to include.

Overall, I really enjoyed the parts of the show that I watched. The show is currently still airing its second season, which I didn’t realize at the time of watching; I forgot that Hulu gets episodes pretty quickly as they air on actual TV. That being said, I guess this review only covers my impression of one and a half season then? Either way, I will definitely be watching the rest when I get a chance, but I’ll probably wait for the rest of the season to be done so I can binge-watch it all at once.

I hope you guys enjoyed this. I’m not the best at reviewing things, so please feel free to give me pointers or suggestions of things to review so I can get more practice in. Let me know what you think if you end up watching Good Trouble 🙂

Brooke

My 1st Time Performing in A School Rally

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Hello everyone!

It’s been a while since I posted some good ol’ ~high school lifestyle~ content besides the academic/educational stuff, so I figured I would talk about something exciting that happened recently: my first (and most likely last) performance in a school rally! Normally, only the varsity cheer team performs at rallies and I’m on JV, but for this last rally of the cheer season, all cheerleaders got to be in it. I will not be including pictures from the rally just for privacy and identification purposes of my school, but I’ll be walking through my whole experience.

I was only in the dance section of the routine, not the stunts, so it honestly wasn’t as stressful as I worried it would be. I personally don’t like performing in front of our school- usually at games we don’t have that big of a crowd, but pretty much everyone attends rallies, so it’s kind of intense. I was nervous, but I knew my part and it was short enough that I wasn’t too stressed about forgetting the dance. We’d had about 12 hours of practice put into forming the rally routine, so I think everyone was ready to perform it and have the buildup to performing be over with.

The past couple weeks had honestly been really dramatic with practice. We had cheer everyday after school between the rally practices and basketball games. Lots of people got taken out of the rally routine for missing a practice, and lots of others (including me) only got to be put in one or two sections of the routine. It was a bittersweet feeling knowing I only got to be in one part, but also happy that I got put in at all.

The rally was on Monday, so there was a runthrough Sunday afternoon in the gym. I wasn’t the happiest about having to drive to school on a Sunday, but it didn’t take too long and it felt good to have a dress rehearsal-type situation. Actually rally days are a lot more hectic- I had to miss my entire fourth period (the class period before the rally) to come to the gym early and practice again, and we got to wear our cheer uniforms all day (rally tradition). Normally, the only thing the JV and freshman cheer teams do at rallies is sit together in the front and lead our class in a chant with a cheer and some stunts. There was definitely a lot riding on this routine since our coaches were super proud of the choreography and expecting us to hit it.

I’m happy to say it went well, and I’m glad I got to be in a rally routine at least once. If you’re new to blog, I’ve talked multiple times about my love-hate relationship with high school cheer and how I’m pretty much positive this will be my last season doing it, so I’ll never get the full varsity experience and therefore won’t perform in anymore rallies. I mean, I’ll never say never since there’s lots of other things you could perform in a rally for, but as far as cheer, it was a good first and last performance. I’m not going to lie- I won’t miss freezing my butt off in the uniform all day at school.

I know this was a short post and I didn’t get to go super into detail about anything, but I wanted to throw it out there since I was proud of myself for having a cool experience. Let me know if you guys have any questions- what are rallies at your school like?

Brooke

Opinion: STEM Isn’t the Only Pathway to Success

BrookeLeave a comment

Welcome back everyone!

As a sophomore in high school, I’m at the stage of my life where I’m starting to plan for college, and adults are often asking me about what I want to do in life, where I want to go to school, and what I want to study there. Additionally, it’s the stage of my life where adults asking these questions always tell me I should be gearing towards going into a STEM field, since they want more women in the field, it’s a more secure job outlook, and the pay is usually higher. I am personally not a STEM kind of girl- I do well in my math and science classes at school and enjoy them when I have a good/fun teacher, but I don’t love the subjects themselves and couldn’t really see myself studying them further, especially at the high and intense level you would in college. If you’ve felt similarly, but are constantly being told STEM is the way to go in life, keep on reading to hear my thoughts.

I’m not going to be including statistics or “evidence” to support my points because I don’t really have a hard claim- I just want to offer my two cents. First of all, don’t feel pressured into doing what other people tell you is best. They may have your best interests at heart, but they probably don’t know you as well as you know yourself, and you’ll know whether a certain path is right for you or not. It’s more important to do something you’re passionate about- you’ll most likely perform better in your college classes, be more driven in the field, and therefore get a higher-level position and make more money. If this is in the STEM field, great! If not, it doesn’t mean you can’t make just as much or more money/be as successful or even more successful (note that I’m not saying money = success, I’m just using these as two separate examples).

Another thing I’ve noticed from articles I’ve read or portrayals of STEM workplaces in the media is that women are often treated very unfairly at these companies. It is still a relatively male-dominated field and men at these tech-startups tend to feel superior to their women co-workers when they should be treating each other as equals. A lot of big STEM companies that come with the big salaries people are attracted to are also super stressful environments where there’s often a lot of competition- this environment isn’t for everyone. Yes, STEM is a very broad generalization of fields/topics of study/etc. and there are many industries and workplaces besides tech startups or companies that are under the STEM umbrella, but I feel like tech is the one that’s buzzing the most since technology is constantly updating and is proving to be one of the biggest parts of our future.

There are still plenty of jobs outside of the STEM umbrella, and there will be something related to your interest. Definitely be cautious about job prospects (ex. being an artist may not be the most steady job), but don’t force yourself into a field for the salary or the prestige- it probably won’t get you very far. I still don’t really know what I want to do, but I know that it most likely won’t be in a STEM field. Another thing that one of my older friends told me which I think could be a good idea if you’re nervous about job prospects and kind of on the fence about STEM is major in whatever you’re actually passionate about (i.e. something not in STEM in this case) and minor in something quantitative like programming, statistics, etc. I know this wouldn’t work for everyone, but it’s something to think about if you’re choosing a major and debating.

Think of this: there’s always going to be people at the top of a field. No matter what field it is, there’s a way to work yourself up and eventually have a higher-level position and make more money. If you love your job, you’ll be better at it- you’ll move up those ranks higher and end up making just as much money, if not more, than you would’ve made at a “more prestigious” entry-level job. Also, money and prestige aren’t everything! If you’re happy with your job and you’re able to pay for everything you physically need to live, who’s to say you need to go chasing prestige? It all depends on what your priorities are and how you want to live your life.

Lastly, remember that it’s okay to not even know what pathway you want to be on. I’m only a sophomore in high school, so of course I don’t know what I want to be- I know, I’m a little unqualified to be giving advice. However, I know that I’ve had countless amounts of adults lecture me on this topic and my mom has always reassured me that it’s more important to do what I love, so I figured I would spread that positive outlook. Let me know what you think!

Brooke

A Love Letter to My Elementary School & Teachers

BrookeLeave a comment

Welcome back everyone!

It was about time that I made my last “love letter to my ___ teachers” (for now). In case you’re new to my blog, I’ve also written posts similar to this one towards my middle school and current high school teachers, so I recommend checking those out if you haven’t already. My blog has a lot of content relating to my schooling experiences and my love for learning (I mean, the title is “My High School Adventures”), so it’s natural for me to pay tribute to the people who have gotten me this far. In elementary school, high schoolers seemed so old, yet here I am, still shocked how fast time has gone.

For a little background, I switched schools going into fifth grade; I had been commuting to a highly-ranked school about 30 minutes away, when I lived near a perfectly good school. I had a rough fourth-grade year with my teacher leaving halfway through the school year, and it was time for a change. It put me on a completely path, and I would not have gone to the wonderful middle school or high school that I’m at now if I hadn’t made that change.

If I could address all of my wonderful elementary school teachers in one letter, I would say this:

Thank you so much for introducing me to new things and pushing me to be better, even as a young child. A special thank you to those who allowed me to pursue the things I loved, by moving me up in reading level and letting me read “the big kid books.” Even though I was EXTREMELY shy and quiet, I definitely appreciated everything you did for me. I honestly wasn’t that good of a kid- I wasn’t a troublemaker because I was so intimidated by you guys, but I know I didn’t have the best habits. Thank you so much for reprimanding me and correcting my ways. It seemed harsh at the time, but it helped me so much in the long run and I understand why you did what you did.

Honestly, I don’t know how you do it. Dealing with twenty to forty needy, crazy little kids everyday and trying to teach them multiple things while doing it is more challenging than I can imagine. I look back on the version of myself you had to deal with and cringe. Thank you for taking on such an important role in molding kids during a formative time in their lives, and doing your best to make it fun. We may not have realized how fun it actually was until moving on to the harder parts of our schooling, but I appreciate it so much now.

Thank you for encouraging us to make new friends. I miss that feeling of actually getting to know each person in your class and having a little family by the end of the year- sure, it’s not always the happiest family, but that sense of community taught me a lot about what friends I wanted to seek in middle school and high school. Thank you for giving me the building blocks and life lessons that I’m still building off of today. I’ve only realized it recently, but a lot of the things I’ve learned I actually started learning from you. Thank you for being kind, encouraging, and overall welcoming spirits that made me more comfortable with getting close to my teachers as the years went on.

Thank you for being people that would check up on me and notice when I needed a motivation boost. Thank you for teaching me how to write!! As silly as it sounds, I actually do think the writing I did in elementary school set me up on the path to do well in writing in middle school, which put me on the path to do well in writing now. Thank you for being you, and well, thank you for teaching me. I know a lot of time has gone by already- you’ve had many, many more classes with new faces and mine has probably disappeared from your memory, but I will remember the years I spent in each of your classes.

Remember to thank your teachers and tell them how much you appreciate them. I hope you have been lucky enough to have at least some teachers you love or have enjoyed learning from- those are the ones that deserve a world of praise 🙂

Brooke

Mundane Symphony of the Healing – Poem by Me

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Welcome back everyone!

The first poem I’d posted on this blog (a week ago or two, I believe), “Jumble” actually seemed to be pretty successful. I would love for you to check it out if you haven’t already- it’s gotten the most views out of any of my blog posts. I love to write if you didn’t know already, so I figured it was worth it to put myself out there again and share another poem. I would love to hear your thoughts and read other aspiring writers’ work, so please leave a comment or message me if you’d be interested in sharing! Here’s “Mundane Symphony of the Healing”.

Music lingering in my brain Nothing clear yet it stays all the same Notes and words all a jumble A tune mixed with lyrics I begin to mumble Replaying on a constant loop Until my eyelids start to droop

My own personal choir between my ears However, it seems to target my fears Chanting through day and night The music never leaves my sight I would do anything to make it stop How can I get a new beat to drop?

A new harmony and a little of this Makes for a delightful song I can’t miss Facing the music brings it to an end A new instrument, a new friend Stronger than I previously thought Look what this victory has brought

Although I don’t hear the music today It may never fully go away Music can be a beautiful thing But it can also haunt and cling Create your own song today Trust me, it will be okay

I hope you enjoyed! Please, please, please let me know what you guys think 🙂

Brooke

Reusable Notebook Review – Rocketbook

BrookeLeave a comment

Hello everyone!

Today I’m going to go more into-depth on my experience with a product that I received as a Christmas gift and had been wanting for a while: the Rocketbook reusable notebook. I found out about this product from a Buzzfeed video and I knew I wanted to try it because of it’s eco-friendliness and convenience. I’m a big planner and I like to write out basically my whole life on paper, so it would be a way to continue doing this without as much waste, but still getting the feeling of actually writing and not having to go fully digital. If you’re interested in getting this product or something similar, keep on reading!

In case you’re confused on what the Rocketbook is, it’s a notebook where the ink can be erased from the pages. In order to preserve whatever writing you have, there’s a QR code on each page that you scan using the Rocketbook app, and the contents of the page will be sent to your online destination of choice as a PDF or JPEG file. Once you’ve digitally saved the file, you wet the microfiber cloth that comes with the notebook and use it to erase the special pen ink from the pages- and repeat!

For specifics, I received the Letter size Rocketbook Smart Reusable Notebook in Deep Space Gray, purchased off of Amazon for $34.00 (I picked it out so I know the details ;)). When you receive the notebook, it also comes with a little instruction manual, an erasable Pilot Frixon pen in black, and a towel that erases the pen ink from the pages when dampened. The notebook is thirty pages. The instruction manual tells you to download the Rocketbook app from the App Store, and things get exciting from there.

The app comes with how-to videos in case you get confused on anything, but it will start with having you make an account and link it to an email and/or some sort of cloud. I linked mine to my main email account (a Gmail account) and the Google Drive that goes with it. There are 7 categories that you can connect to different destinations so you can organize where your files are going if you’re using one notebook for different subjects/purposes. Your scans will also be preserved in the app to look back on in case you lose track of them in whatever online file storage you sent them to.

I’ve really enjoyed using it so far- I don’t waste paper on simple to-do lists, and I can keep a lot of thoughts in one place. I don’t love the dot-grid since I tend to write crooked without structured lines, but it’s not a deal-breaker since I only use it for planning and creative writing. It would be bother me more if I used it for school and note-taking though. It definitely feels different than writing with a normal pen and normal paper, but it’s not different enough to be weird. I don’t think there’s much more to say about using it, but I’ll include some pictures to give you more of an idea!

Here’s the overview of a page- the inside cover has the seven categories’ images.
A close-up to give you an idea of how the pen writes!
The scan history screen in all its glory.

I hope you enjoyed this review. Let me know if you end up getting a Rocketbook or similar product and how your experience goes 🙂

Brooke

Laws I Believe Should Be Made

BrookeLeave a comment

Hello everyone!

This has been a post I’ve been wanting to write for a while, but I’d been debating on whether or not it was a good idea. Inspired by my recent Youth and Government conference, I figured I should just go for it and see if anyone’s interested. Today I’ll be sharing a few bill ideas/things I think would be good laws. Some of these I thought of, and some were debated in Youth and Government/brought up by other people. That being said, they are not exactly original and I’m sure you could easily find people advocating for most of these with a Google search- I’m mainly going off of my Youth and Government experience and personal beliefs.

  • Preschool should be free – Preschool is a crucial step in education that right now the lower classes often can’t afford. When I was going into preschool, my grandma had to help my parents pay for it since they had just bought a house and were dealing with the budget adjustment. Education should not be for sale, especially not at such a young and fundamental age for developing knowledge.
  • Cap the amount/percentage college tuition at public institutions can be increased – Even though state school tuition is much cheaper than private institutions on paper, there’s not always much financial aid given (a lot of private schools meet more demonstrated need for aid) and it’s still extremely pricey. Prices rise each year- college was soooo much cheaper when our parents went, but the quality of instruction is the same. There should be a limit on how much prices can increase, so that they can only rise to account for inflation.
  • Increased vacation time – We need to be on board with European countries and other developed countries with this. Americans work so much and often only get two to three weeks vacation a year, if that. There should be a month or more paid leave in most, if not all jobs.
  • Stoppage of funding for public institutions named after questionable/racist/etc. people – This was an interesting one brought up at Youth and Government. It’s pretty self-explanatory, but it would definitely be complicated and controversial to enforce. I assume most of these institutions would just rename themselves anyways, but I still think it would be an important message to send.
  • Require a certain ratio of school counselors and psychologists to students – There are not enough counselors or school psychologists for students, and this is something I’ve witnessed first-hand. I know schools are severely underfunded so it would be difficult to find room in the budget for this, but it’s worth it to promote mental wellness and provide a support system for students.

I hope you enjoyed learning a bit more about my political beliefs and types of theoretical legislation I would support. Don’t take this too seriously, it’s just some topics I found interesting from Youth and Government. If you’re into politics and/or debating, I would love to hear your personal opinions on these issues as well.

Brooke

Sophomore Year – 1st Semester Reflection

BrookeLeave a comment

Welcome back everyone!

First semester of this school year is officially over, meaning I am halfway done with my sophomore year. I think it’s always nice to have some self-reflection, especially documented in some way so you can look back on it again in the future. I decided I would post it on here because it may help some of you guys out or inspire you to do some self-reflection of your own. It sure has been a crazy past few months, and summer feels like it was eons ago.

I came into sophomore year trying to not have expectations, but I definitely had a few. I didn’t think it would be that much harder than freshman year (wrong-ish), I thought it would be a lot better than freshman year (true-ish), and I thought I would feel soooo much older since I wasn’t a freshman anymore (COMPLETELY wrong). Don’t worry, I’ll explain the reality of all these expectations. It hasn’t exactly been harder than freshman year, but it’s been a lot more work. I have a lot more homework, tests are more frequent, and there’s just more information being covered so it tends to move faster. Once I adapted my schedule and work habits, I was doing fine again- that being said, I’m always stressed and always have been.

I thought this year would be so much better than the last- that I would find my place within the school, spend more time with friends, get more involved and start up all these new activities, etc. In a way all these things happened and I definitely made a lot more progress with my goals than I did in freshman year due to being a bit more comfortable with myself, but I still left a lot to be desired. I’ve definitely been (and still am) overscheduled because of my ridiculous cheer schedule, so cheer prevented me from having free time to get everything done as well as doing other activities during a lot of this semester. Once cheer season is over (mid-February), I’ll have a lot more free time and I can re-evaluate my commitments from there.

Lastly, I definitely don’t feel older than I did last year. I think part of it is because I’m young for my grade so a lot of my friends are currently getting their licenses while I’m just starting driver’s ed right now to get my permit, so I have a lot less freedom than most people in my grade. The freshmen this year seem just as old (or older than) as me- probably because a lot of them are. I can’t believe I’m going to be driving soon, but I also can since a lot of my friends already have their licenses and cars and jobs that they drive themselves too; it’s weird how different their lifestyle at the moment is from mine.

Going back to my academic performance, I’m very proud of how I did this semester. I was able to end with straight As in my classes again, and I definitely put in the work to get them. I didn’t accomplish as much in the extracurricular department this semester, but I have been spreading myself a little thin mainly because of cheer, and I’ve gotten off to a good start of trying new things with Youth and Government. I hope to branch out and get involved in more things this semester, but it will probably end up happening next year since most things can’t really be joined mid-year (depends on the opportunity).

I improved my writing a lot this semester, which is another thing I’m really proud of. I think it’s just because of getting in more practice and constantly brainstorming- I’ve found my creative juices have really been flowing lately. That’s why it’s been frustrating to barely have any free time; I have so many ideas and I want to execute them as soon as possible. I’ve written a lot of poetry and read a lot more poetry. I hadn’t read that much poetry before, and I’m so happy I decided to try and read some of the classics/well-known poets’ work.

This blog has grown a lot this semester. I know it’s still relatively small, but I found that I’ve gotten a lot more likes and views from new viewers lately, so my posts are slowly trickling out to more people. I appreciate all of you so much for sticking with me through my adventures and my inability to pick one topic to blog about. As always, I’m open to suggestions since I love to cover different points of discussion, so please let me know if there’s something you would like to see me post about on here.

Lastly, I wanted to talk about my personal growth and relationships with people. I’ve made an effort to be friendlier and kinder to people who I cross paths with, and I think it’s paid off a lot. I’ve made lots of new friends in classes and Youth and Government among other things in my life. As far as myself, I struggled with my self-esteem since I didn’t have as much self-care time for myself and I was constantly over-scheduled and overwhelmed, but I think towards the end of the semester I was balancing things a lot better. I’ve learned a lot about myself and I’m working on balancing school with my social life more evenly now.

I hope you enjoyed hearing about how the past few months have been going for me in all the main aspects of life. I would love to hear about how your semester has been- we’re all in this together. Here’s to a new semester and a fresh start!

Brooke