Broke College Student.

That may or may not be one of the dumbest titles ever, but not far from the truth at all. Anyway. I'm currently trying to finish writing my support letters for the fall. IT IS SO DIFFICULT. Why? How do I completely express who I am, what has happened in the past 3 years, why I'm so drained, why I feel like I should be at Focus, etc., in such a SHORT amount of time. I feel like I need a three page letter for this thing. Seriously. I wrote a rough draft and got it to fit on the stationary I want to use (I'm a huge fan of pretty paper. hello I'm an art major.) and now my mom is sitting on the patio revising it. At first she had a red pen out but I was quickly like, ummmmmm please don't remind me of high school with a grading pen look-a-like. So she grabbed a blue one.

Anyway. I always use so many words to express myself, so trying to say a lot with a little is pretty much super difficult and frustrating but kind of exciting at the same time. Thank goodness one of my best friends has an English degree. She will be getting a phone call shortly. :) The adventure to Colorado in the fall has officially begun. It's going to happen.

John 3:30

Wishes

I just went through some old notebooks, and found a list of things I want to do in life. Some I've already accomplished, some are in the near future, some will be just pure amazing if I'm able to check off the list.

• Graduate with a Bachelor Degree
• Go back to the Czech Republic on a second mission trip
• Visit Greece & Italy
• Get a photograph published in a "coffee table" book
• Get a photograph published in a magazine
• Live in a state I haven't lived in yet (I've lived in Texas, Oklahoma, Indiana and Illinois)
• Go legit camping
• Go skiing in Colorado [December 2008]
• Take a cruise in the South America region
• Work at summer camp in Colorado
• Pet a giraffe
• Obtain a wedding planner certificate
• Photograph engagement shots for friends
• Photograph a friend's wedding
• Design a wedding invitation
• Take a train somewhere other than to downtown Chicago
• Pay off my student loans
• Visit Ireland
• Visit Australia
• Go scuba diving
• Go on a mission trip to a 3rd world country
• Work at summer camp [Kanakuk K-2 Summer 2008]
• Go to the Sears Tower [Summer 2009]
• Try snowboarding
• Successfully ski down a black/blue diamond mogul run at Winter Park without stopping, sitting, or falling. It's gonna happen.
• Give a friend a hair cut
• Learn how to drive manual [August 2009]
• Buy my own car
• Kayak on a legit river
• Experience Times Square on New Years Eve
• Find giraffe print fleece and make footie-pajamas
• Work in a coffee shop
• Read the Bible cover to cover
• Travel Route 66
• Go to the Grand Canyon
• Get my associates degree [december 2009]
• Go on a road trip with my sister
• Go on a road trip with my best friend
• Have an upsidedown Christmas tree
• Visit the art museums in Chicago

I have another list somewhere else. But for now, get a glimpse of what I want to do. :)

21

Hello Twenty One Years of Life. :)

I have to say that I really had a fantastic birthday. It didn't turn out how I expected, it turned out better. It started with Sweet Dream Cupcakes and an unexpected gift from my parents. (That I'm entirely too excited about.) Then a graduation party for a great family friend. Then my parents took me to Acquaviva (my second job for the summer) which was a very interesting experience. After that I headed to Wheaton to meet up with some of my fantastic friends from Taylor. Anyway, I'm thankful for everything that I've been blessed with over the past years.

Here are some pics from the day!

One of the "briana do something crazy shots" by Heidi

I love Maggie Burns. :)

Well...best picture we have with Rutzen.

21

"Misconception"

Concept:
Doppelganger is described as the ghostly double, evil twin, and harbinger of the future. Its use in this ongoing visual exploration of your relationship with the depiction of self [self portrait] is to create a metaphor of your alter ego or an exaggeration of an aspect of yourself with the presentation you typically adopt. The use of emotive hue through emphasizing temperature, value, mark and expressive color will offer the climate and impact required for your specific communication.

A. In you SKETCH BOOK write out 10 personal characteristics that describe how you perceive others see you.
1. What is you presentation of self?
2. Who are you attracted to, or repelled by and why?
3. What would be a total contradiction to who you are?

Result:




Basically this was my favorite piece to work on all semester. I love working in color and I'm finally okay with my style of drawing. I started to use directional lines on figure forms in life drawing about a year ago, and never really strayed away from it. I also for the first time was able to convey movement of fabric with the illusion of folds.

So what is my piece saying? I started thinking about how people see me, actually, how I thought people would see me when I started at NIU this semester. Being a Christian in the art department can be a struggle at times. Overhearing conversations at the beginning of the semester before I actually "revealed" my faith to people, opened my eyes to how "religious" people are perceived. The figure on the right is me as a nun. It is a super exaggerated view of who I am. I'm showing myself as extremely judgmental, righteous, religious, etc. Like I said, exaggerated view of Christianity based on overheard conversations and media portrayal. The figure on the left is me, as me. Me plugging my ears to block out all the comments and misconceptions about my faith.

This piece took forever and a day. :) But I love it. It is actually hanging up in the art building all summer along with some of my fellow classmate's pieces. So there ya go. Drawing 2 Final. :)

life lately

I wish I had time to just sit and write. I love writing. Sharing about what God has taught me, praying that maybe God will teach someone else through my experiences. It makes me think of the verses in 2 Corinthians: 3-11.

³Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, ⁴who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. ⁵For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. ⁶If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. ⁷And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort.

⁸We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about the hardships we suffered in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired even of life. ⁹Indeed, in our hearts we felt the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. ¹⁰He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us, ¹¹as you help us by your prayers. Then many will give thanks on our behalf for the gracious favor granted us in answer to the prayers of many.

I just think it is so cool. :) God is awesome.

Possible topics I'll tackle this summer: Purity, Discipleship, John Piper's sermon from Passion 2010, etc. Let's be honest...the purity one might be tackled in many different posts. Last summer one of the other leaders from the high school youth group, led a study on purity for the h.s. girls. I got to help out with it and just LOVED it. I have tons of notes and thoughts from that. :)

School is done in about 4 days.

My birthday is in a month.

Focus is in just over 4 months.

Back to working on finals.

Holga

Blame Justin for me wanting this. As well as pictures that Mark has taken. Drool.

Someone in my family said the pictures looked old and like they were developed wrong.

They are supposed to look awesome like that.

I admit I love really clear/sharp pictures with fantastic color via digital cameras.

But seriously.

Holga.

I mean, look at this beautiful picture.

(photo by Justin Rutzen)