Sweet Carolina

I am visiting home for awhile, making my way through South Carolina, visiting family and friends. Since I've come to the age where I and many of my friends have moved away from our home town it has become more and more difficult to see people and try to be in town at the same time. So I made a goal to try and visit as many old friends as I could as I trek through my home state. It's been good so far, spending time with my dad in Greenville and seeing old friends. Tomorrow I'm going to be driving to Winthrop to visit one of my best friends from high school and then heading to Aiken to visit my mom. I'm also planning on stopping in a few cities to meet up with other friends as I drive. So my trip home has been lovely so far and I'm glad to have so many great people in my life. I'll head back to Nashville at the week's end and then start my summer class (Book Arts) next week. Hope all is well with whoever happens to read this. Enjoy your memorial day!

Summer is off to a good start

Hello, hello. It is almost two weeks into May and I have been wonderfully busy and enjoying my summer so far. It has been wonderful being able to stay on as an intern at redpepper, and I continue to be grateful for my time there. Spending time with friends has been nice, and also a little time with my brother who is a student at MTSU. It was certainly nice to have him move to TN at the same time as me, and it was certainly a small world that we both ended up so close to one another. He just left to go back to South Carolina for the summer and I will soon travel there too for a brief visit with family and friends. I'll be starting my summer class in June and I'm looking forward to that too.
I've also been brainstorming about some personal projects I'd like to complete this summer. I always have ideas but with my free time, I'd really like to follow through with them. I've been thinking a lot about personal growth lately, and it's actually a focus at redpepper right now for everyone at the company. I've been thinking about my strengths and weaknesses and setting goals for myself. I'm trying to be totally honest with myself and truly working on parts of myself that could use improvement and achieving things that I've often talked about but haven't brought to fruition yet. This is the time to do those things. I'll plan on posting my personal work as it progresses.

DONE! DONE! DONE!

I am officially done with the semester! I am so freaking glad. Now I am looking forward to some relaxation and new things. Some exciting things to share is that I completed my website for Eric Night Films (6 talented film students at Watkins who work together) and I'm pleased with it. You can check it out here. You should watch some of their videos and see how awesome they are. Speaking of them and the entire film school, the film screenings are tomorrow at Green Hills Theater which I am super excited about. It's a long day, but filled with awesome short films by my wonderful friends. Plus, it will be a new experience for them to be screening at Green Hills as the screenings are normally held at the Belcourt in Hillsboro village.
Life is wonderful!

moving along

Thankfully, things are moving along this week and I officially have only one week left until freedom. I had my breakdown last week, I moved forward and I'm finally feeling like I've gotten things done. Earlier this week it felt like I worked, and worked and worked and worked. and then I ate something if I remembered to, and worked more after that. No time for sleep. And even on the nights I want to sleep, my mind is so active it won't let me. Last night was one of the worst bouts of insomnia I've had in awhile. I did so much work on so many different things yesterday alone, yet when I left the school at midnight with my work mounted for a morning critique, I felt like I'd barely made a dent in the massive load that has been weighing heavily upon my shoulders. But today, I kept on steady and got more done. Tomorrow will hopefully be similar.
On a truly positive note, I had my internship review with my creative director at redpepper last week and I am going to be able to stay on as an intern through the summer! He gave me a lot of positive feedback in terms of what he has seen in me and also a good number of things I should work on. I'm so grateful to keep this opportunity going, and I'm also looking forward to working there without so many classes. More time to learn about the working world, more chances to experience real life design and business problems and solutions. I'll have my one summer class and my internship, and hopefully a community ed class. I need a creative outlet that isn't connected to grades and they're offering some I'm really interested in taking. It'll be nice to get off the computer and just make things by hand. And hopefully, it will better my design work too!
As for now, I'm going to attempt to catch up on the sleep I've been missing for about a week now.

the breakdown doth cometh

so last week it happened. I broke down. I broke down in my Typography class because I was freaking out about all the work I had to complete in the short amount of time left in the semester. And I'm just being honest here, that I don't like to lose my composure in front of people, but that it happens and that I have learned to kind of embrace it, some times better than others. I tried to hide at first in the ladies bathroom and regain my composure but as soon as I began walking back to class and saw a friend, I broke down again in the hallway. And he knew exactly why I was upset, and he gave me a hug and said, "I was there two days ago. I know how you feel." And then more classmates and friends began to pass by and every single one of them stopped to hug me when they saw I was upset. Friends encouraged me, reminding me that it wouldn't be the end of the world if I couldn't complete a project, or if I couldn't make it as good as my "vision" for it was. Sometimes you can't get things done in the time alotted. A year from now, I won't be thinking about how my website wasn't a good as I wanted it to be... They also calmed the doubts I had swirling in my head, that I wasn't a good designer, that I wouldn't make it.
Standing in the hallway in Watkins, surrounded by the kind people I've been blessed to know, I began to feel better. I am so, so grateful for the people at Watkins. It is a community unlike any I have ever been in. My classmates are so kind and genuine, especially when they saw me breaking into pieces. And knowing they are in the same place makes it better too. They really do get it. My professor even joked that we all feel the way I do but I'm the only one brave enough to show it in public.
And so I share this as an admission of my humanity, but also to share about how wonderful the people are that I am surrounded by. Breakdowns are okay, and friends are there to hug you in the hallway.

the end is nigh

What's that I see in sight? The end of the semester?
Yes. yes it is!
Things are really busy as the last few weeks of the semester come upon us. But things are going great for me and I'm really happy with the work I'm doing. My internship is going great, I'm enjoying it so much.
Classes are intense, but good and I just completed my first ever flash animation. You can check it out here.
It was overwhelming at first but I really enjoyed creating it. We could do whatever we wanted so I used unusual collage elements that I have collected and one of my favorite songs by Jose Gonzalez.
I have a lot to complete in the next few weeks including two websites, a informational cd package, revising package designs, an annual report, and prepare for portfolio review. But I'm excited about all of them and I'm really looking forward to getting a break in May!

a decision to wait.

It's getting close to the end of the semester and the projects are certainly piling up. Flash projects, websites, magazines, annual reports, packaging- all need to be worked on and completed by the end of April. I really should be working right now but I'm pretty tired. I helped on set this weekend and they go pretty late and I'm still feeling it. I need to get motivated, but all I would like to do is take a nap!
But things are going really well, I'm really getting comfortable at redpepper and feeling confident there. I went to lunch the other day with two of the girls who work there as designers and they told me about their experiences at school, and graduating and then working. It was so nice to talk to them and it made me feel a million times better about graduating. I actually made a big decision this week to wait until the Spring to graduate. I started to think about how I would really be pushing it to take 12 hours of studio classes in the Fall to get out by December. 1, the economy isn't great right now and 2, I probably won't be doing my best work if I take on so many things in those months. I want to have the best portfolio I can, so it makes since to just take my portfolio class in the Spring so I can focus on that and I won't have any other classes to put time and energy towards.
I talked to my professors and my parents and I feel good about the decision. It lifted a big weight off of me. And I enjoy being at Watkins, so another semester is something to look forward to.
Well, I should go and do my work.