Senior Projects

I spent this week working on the dock at Lake Ozark. The dock at my Uncle’s house is very old, and it’s probably been there for 30 years, which is unusual for a dock. The wooden boards on the dock are cracked and are covered in algae, so it was time for some new boards. We started on the walkway down to the dock, which is the hardest part. When constructing a walkway, you have three layers: 1. the metal bars that support everything, 2. the vertical runners that run from the shore to the dock, and 3. the wooden boards that go horizontally across the runners. The walkway is right over the water, and without the boards there, you’re just walking on the metal support bars. I made this collage to show the progress we made over a couple of days.

Working over the water is the worst place for construction. Even by the dock, the water is extremely deep, and my uncle can’t swim! Every time he would slip it was a little scary, but luckily he didn’t fall in. The only thing that fell in was a very expensive ratchet, which we tried to recover, but sadly it’s now one with the fishes. It was so nice to be out on the lake though, and working with my uncle was fun. I became the master of using the drill to unscrew the boards. We aren’t quite finished as you can tell by the last picture, so we will have to work on it another week. Overall, I had a really fun time getting to help my uncle and learning about how docks are made!

My last week of Senior Project was supposed to be spent at Higher Focus Photography- just 15 minutes away from school- assisting Jill Gray with client portrait sessions, this includes: holding/positioning lights and reflectors, looking for hair or clothing distractions on the subjects, and giving posing suggestions. I would have also been: learning Jill’s editing style and editing photos alongside her, checking client orders for accuracy, auditing order revenue to be sure income and expenses are recorded properly, checking client photo uploads, creating Graduation Galleries online for all 2020 seniors, and assisting with creating future social media campaigns. However, instead of spending a whole week working with her and being taught the operations of a small business, I went over to her studio on Tuesday. 

When I arrived we went to her office and she showed me different aspects of my camera that I hadn’t discovered yet, knowing what your camera can do and how to make it do it is a time consuming task with lots of trial and error but in the end you get a very rewarding result. Later on in the day we set up her studio to take pictures of different flavored coffee beans for one of her clients. We had to make each picture cohesive but get creative by adding different props so the viewer would be able to distinguish the flavor just by looking at the image; some of the flavors included: Chocolate Raspberry, Caramel Cream, English Toffee, Blueberry, Bourbon Pecan, Buttered Spiced Rum, and many other… interesting… flavors like, “Mudslide”… what is that even supposed to be?After taking the photos she taught me how to edit on Adobe Lightroom.

It was such a great experience and I had a lot of fun being with her. She let me express my creative ideas whilst shooting and encouraged them all, even if they missed the mark. I wish we got more time so she could really show the inner-workings of her small business instead of just talking about it for an hour or so. Jill is very welcoming and even offered to let me assist with client portrait sessions when businesses open up next week! If you are or know someone who would be interested in getting photos taken by Jill for a variety of occasions- business headshots, family photos, senior photos, etc.- I have three $50.00 gift cards that I would love to give you!

This week I was supposed to be at Entercom Communications located in St. Louis. Entercom features radio shows, some being: 102.5 KEZK, 97.1 FM TALK, NEWS RADIO 1120 KMOX, NOW 96.3, and Y98. If you have ever turned on your radio driving through the St. Louis area you have most likely flipped through one of these. At first, I contacted Courtney Landrum from Y98’s “Courtney & Company Morning Show,” asking if there were any opportunities for me to shadow a marketing position at the radio station for a week or so. Ms. Landrum got back to me, saying that she would put me in contact with someone from the station’s marketing department. A week later, Bridget Harrison, HR/Business Administrator, emailed me asking for more specifics about Senior Projects and the timeline.

Sadly, this opportunity had to be cancelled. I would have been observing the various roles at the radio station during the week with them. This included sitting in on radio shows, learning from their Program Director- Cat Thomas- and observing the marketing team. In other news, I’ve been doing a variety of things this week from programming to sewing. My Dad brought home a pile of “some” invoices –which I know for a fact he hadn’t touched since I last sorted them in 2018– that needed to be organized and filed with their purchase orders.

I am very proud of completing my upcycling project with the American Eagle x Adidas jeans because I had to get creative with lining up the middle Adidas stripe and the side seam of the jeans- let me tell you, hot glue is a girl’s best friend. I am in the process of applying to St. Charles Community College so that I can take MAT 158 College Algebra that transfers to Arizona State University as MAT 117 College Algebra. If everything works out I will be able to start my first semester on track and take Brief Calculus with the rest of the students in Marketing!

This week I did lots of outdoor activities! My mom and I started playing tennis together, which has been very fun! She played tennis a couple years ago and now she’s starting to play again. It’s so awesome being able to hit with her because I haven’t been able to hit with anyone in a while. My mom, uncle and I started construction on a wall to go around a tree in the yard. We started by digging up all the brick around the tree and we put it in our backyard. Our plan is to use that for riprap up at the lake to break the water. Unfortunately, it was very rainy on Monday, but we kept working. We cleared all the brick and then we started to dig up some dirt around the tree. On Thursday my Uncle came back and we moved the new bricks out to the tree. The new bricks had been sitting on the pallet for a while, so when we pulled them up, there were a bunch of snails underneath. They were so cute. In a couple weeks we’re going to rent a water saw and start cutting the brick to the right length and then we can cement them down.

I’m back up at Lake Ozark and we’re starting dock construction tomorrow!

Hi everyone! I am posting early so I can have a rest day tomorrow. (Just kidding. I never take a break. Don’t be like me, please.)

This week something really “exciting” happened. We suspected that there is a mole in our team. One night, when I was posting our daily schedule, we found out that someone changed our Instagram password. We stayed up until three in the morning tracking who they are and continued the next day. This emergency taught us the importance of security and that being cautious is sometimes just as important as trusting our teammates.

Since our founder is gone, I have taken over some tasks from the manager because she currently has a lot on her plate. I have been posting a daily schedule for every team and communicating with other directors more frequently. I made a table system to keep track of whose posts are published because someone accidentally deleted a post that has the same cover as another post.

We recorded a podcast episode about cancel culture (well, we recorded twice because we weren’t our best selves the first time). How is it effective? How is it harmful? What about free speech? Can we separate a person and their works? Watch our second episode on COVID-19 and racism here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NK2myWMsI2E.

We reached out to our instructors from Kenyon and they donated and advertised for us on social media. I couldn’t believe that I am still in touch with so many wonderful people from Kenyon. As I gained more experience in critical writing, I also rethought how to make a living as a writer and explored new career possibilities in the literary field.

I am in the process of getting a new I-20 (which an international student needs to stay in the U.S.). I have been emailing with the international advisor at Kenyon.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Ocean

Hi everyone! I finally got some pages done. I’ve got two pages fully completed. The first page took a while, but the second page I got done much quicker. I think I can do at least two or three pages per week based on how fast I got the second page done.

They’re actually pretty tiring to make. I was pretty tired after I finished the second page, but it’s also super satisfying once they’re finished. I did have to do a lot of work on deciding my process on the first page. I had to decide on the size of the brush (I found a larger brush worked better), a color scheme (I went with mostly cool colors) and just little stylistic things like how I would draw eyes and hands.

I’m having a lot of fun finally getting this story written! Here’s the first two pages!

Last week, I was able to watch 10 videos as I had been in the previous weeks. However, my schedule is becoming a bit more out of whack. I did end up working from Monday to Saturday, some days I did more than others. I was able to pretty much finish up the notebook, however there was a few more pages than I thought, and ended up being down 4 pages front to back. Some of the videos also didn’t give me as many notes as others of course which also contributed to me being a few pages short. 

I did manage to fill the note book yesterday though. I started working for this week yesterday, so to make up for it, I will at least work until Saturday this week (which I have done some other weeks anyway despite generally having a 5 day work week.) I didn’t work Monday due to having some problems going on that day.

Working on math (because I’m in 1818 and we have to work all 4 quarters for this particular credit) has also been getting in the way.

As for week 5, the 10 videos I were able to watch were all from Gross Cutting Room again. I’ll list them here:

• Cervical Cone Dissection
• Orchiectomy Specimen
• Cystic Ovary and Fallopian Tube Dissection
• Uterus Dissection
• Abdominal Panniculectomy Specimen
• Tonsillectomy Specimen
• Finger Amputation Specimen
• Toe Amputation Dissection
• Skin Excision Dissection
• Lung Lobectomy Dissection

All of the videos are dissections, however sometimes the video just says specimen and not dissection, however they all are dissections. 

I’m glad the notebook is full. This week and next short week, I will be using a small notebook that has a few notes from my time in the OR in it and nothing more. 

I have been blessed.
Unfortunately I did not pass my math placement test that I was working on. Thankfully I can take it again.
Today I had a very exciting day at Grace’s Place in Washington, MO. I organized diapers and other stuff with my new buddy, Summer. We took inventory as well. Thankfully I didn’t lose count of too many things! I think this experience has shown me the practical side running an organization.
I wore a bandana on my face and used gloves, which I think is pretty important at this time.
I have recently been learning to ripstick some.

Cheers!

I just remembered that I haven’t done one of these is about 2 weeks. I apologize. I have continued my worked at the pantry 9-12 on Mondays Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I have also been working Wednesdays Thursdays and Sundays from 1-8:30ish. I have stopped making masks because, after finishing off the first batch and starting a new one, I realized that it took way too long for me to make 24. It was too time consuming and I was barely getting any out to people. Now I am opting for a new research paper. I have started research on medical masks and I plan on going back as far as I can in history to see how everything has differed. As strange as it may sound, I may have found a connection between theater masks and medical masks, however I need to keep digging in order to confirm my theory.

For a couple of weeks, I have been banned from baking because I was just making too much, but that ban has been lifted thankfully. I have a classic chocolate chip cookie recipe that I have been struggling to make consistent. I can’t seem to figure out where exactly I have been going wrong, but it may be the way I have been mixing the butter and sugars together. So, if anyone wants some chocolate chip cookies in the next couple weeks, I will be more than happy to yeet them to your front door.

I did lots of baking and I tried out a couple of new recipes! I’m not very good at cooking, but I’m hoping to get better. I also decided to do a full cleanup of the kitchen. The kitchen in the house is very tiny, and my mom and I barely have any cabinet space for food. All of the cabinets are taken up by appliances, Tupperware, pots, and other kitchen items, so our food has to be put on the counter. With my mom’s help, we cleared some room in the cabinets, cleaned everything up inside, and now we have our counters free of food! I cleaned the floors, the stove, and the fridge as well.

This week I also started my intermittent fasting! There are many types, but fasting is a set time for eating and a time for fasting. I did a lot of research before I started to see which type of fasting was best for me. One type is a 5:2 method where you eat regularly for 5 days and then for 2 days, you eat 500 calories. I’m doing the 16/8 method. I have a specific time window when I can eat, so my time window is from 11 am-7 pm every day. I can’t eat anything before 11 and I can’t eat anything after 7. I’m doing this so I don’t overeat in quarantine and to hopefully lose a little weight before I go to college. So far it’s going well!