The quest for excellence

Off topic a bit.

Some of you know that I'm planning on applying to graduate school. For the others, I found this pretty awesome program at a nearby university in the counseling department that focuses on college and higher education. This has me really psyched because I think counseling is a good fit for me and I know I can relate (on some levels anyway) to college age youth. It covers a wide spectrum of possible placement within a college or university which seems like a beacon of hope for possible employment. And with the hubby's plan to teach in a university, I think it would make me versatile enough that I could work where he does. Hooray for figuring out what I (might) want to be when I grow up!

But with this realization comes certain insecurities.

I'm scheduled to take the GRE on September 24, and though I don't fear the testing at all and have been working to study and cram in my head what I don't know Verbal and Quantitative-wise, I'm scared of the outcome. I don't know what the program expects of me. For the hubby, going into English, it was pretty certain that a high verbal score and high writing scores were ideal. What does counseling want of me? I figure that if I work hard on just getting the best possible score, that's best.

Also, although this program is available elsewhere, I'm rooted for now. So I'm breaking a cardinal rule of applying to grad schools... I'm only applying to one. So I'm returning to my poker-playing days and taking a big gamble... all-in. Of course at this point I'm not in at all, still in the free-writing and drafting stage of my statement of purpose.

Which also scares me. I have 2 to 3 pages to tell someone I don't know all about me and why, out of all the other applicants, I deserve to get into this program. I have to explain why it's been 8 years since leaving school and why I decided to come back - to pursue a degree having nothing to do with my undergraduate B.S. and that I have no experience in. I'm a real catch, let me tell you!

So if anyone out there has some sage advice and encouraging words, that would be awesome.

Long gone... new news.

So I've been absent from the blogosphere for a while. Honestly, I wasn't sure whether I'd return, but my writing teacher (aka, my husband) says that this is good practice. Just writing, and it doesn't matter what. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I stopped writing for a while because I got some news. I'm having a baby. I knew the last thing I wanted this blog to turn into was a "mommy blog." There's nothing wrong with that kind of blog, per say, but that's not what the aim of this blog was about. And I hear the protest scream of "what could be more domestic goddess-y than raising a child?" Agreed, but honestly, that's not what I had in mind and I've read far better mommy blogs than I could write. But just as an FYI... in the picture to the left, the doctor told me two bars means it's a baby! :)

So since I found out I've been getting the nursery together. My hubby keeps saying that I should update this, since I made the curtains (that are on the right) and we painted the room, but I was wanting to keep this my secret from the web until a given time. Then the given time came and went. I told my family, I told my friends, I did not tell the web. But now that I'm nearly 5 months along and nesting is bound to happen as a perfectly ready number of events that will beg to be blogged, I am compelled to write again. So back I come to write about my journey into wife-ness/motherhood/all-around-woman-ness.

So here I am again. In upcoming blogs you can expect to hear about the planning and preparing for the English grad Halloween party, my continued practice writing, taking of the GRE and all that follows. Stay tuned!