Blog Changes.

A few days ago, I mentioned in my New Years' Resolutions post that one of my three main goals for 2015 was to commit to blogging more. I have so much fun with Keep Not Settling, and I want to keep my love for this blog strong. So, today, I'm coming at you with some changes you'll be seeing in the coming weeks and months here on the blog. Get excited!

• Improved visual content. I’m really working on stepping up my game when it comes to providing visually pleasing posts. You might be able to tell from my last few posts that the graphics side of Keep Not Settling is changing (and that’s so very exciting). My goal is to create content that you not only enjoy reading, but also enjoy looking at! Keeping in line with this change, I’m also working on improving my personal photography and that, I think, will open up a whole new world. 

• Newer topics. I’ll admit that I’m not the greatest at coming up with ideas to write about, but when I was thinking of what I wanted to change here to make it more interesting, I got really excited. Starting soon, you’ll see that content will be split into several categories, and I’ll be posting about each regularly. 

• Easier access to content. Following the last bullet, I’ll also be making my current and future content more accessible to anyone who  might want to re-read/find a specific post. While I do have an archive feature on the sidebar, I’ll be making specific links to each new category and bam, you’ll have accessed just one kind of post, rather than having to sort through all of them. 

And more smaller improvements you'll see pop up every once in a while... 

Here's to better blogging next year! 

Keep not settling,

Book Review: Eleanor & Park.

Reading has always been one of my favorite activities: I can remember just sitting by the bookshelves when I was little, pulling stories down and flipping through them all day. My desire to read has never faded, but the actual time I have to sit and just dive into novels has shrunk severely since the beginning of high school.

Towards the end of fall semester, I made the decision to give myself time to read something other than textbooks. I used this time as a way to chill out on the weekends when I didn't have much to study. To be honest, I started this immediately after watching If I Stay. Reading the sequel was a must, and it couldn't wait until winter break. Working reading for fun back into my regular habits has been so rewarding. I actually forgot how attached I can get to fictional characters....

One of my favorite posts I've written so far was my book review for Rick Yancey's The 5th Wave. So I figured, now that I'm finished my latest read, why not share my thoughts/opinions?

My most recent completion is Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell.

I'll be completely honest, I wasn't enjoying it much in the beginning. I had some issues with Rowell's writing style and most definitely with body image commentary. Something told me to stick with it, however, in hopes that it would lighten up eventually.

And I'm so glad I did.

Eleanor & Park (after the first 30 pages or so) is one of the cutest stories I've probably ever read. Without giving too much away, a out-of-place redhead girl and a quirky asian boy bond over mutual interests in comics and music on the bus to and from school. Eleanor and Park's journeys to acceptance of each other and themselves was endearing and special in a way I couldn't even describe. While reading, I related parts of both characters to myself. I understood their problems and fought  for happiness right along with them. 

Rowell's writing itself is quirky and definitely engaging. The overload on ugly descriptives in the beginning faded into a perfect balance of imagery and conversation. In a way, she's able to contribute an innocence to Eleanor and Park's relationship through her writing; she makes it obvious that there's a connection between them while simultaneously reminding her reader that both kids are jagged and lost; that it's going to take time for them to find what they need to enjoy each others' company. When it came to piecing together Eleanor and Park's future, I was along for the wild ride. 

By the time I was past the first 30 pages, I was flipping through the chapters quicker than I usually do. There’s just a spark to Eleanor& Park that I absolutely love.

Keep not settling, 

Resolutions.

I've always been the type of person that made countless New Years' resolutions and failed. Miserably. However, the thought of self-improvement is always excited to me. So this year, I'm going to try something a bit different; rather than setting a plethora of unattainable goals, I'll be sticking to three. 

• Have more fun. I learned a huge lesson during this first Fall semester at school - having a good time is just as important as academics. My biggest goal for 2015 is to enjoy myself more; realize that it's ok to take a few breaks. I was the worst at this. Because I'm a control freak when it comes to how I spend my time, my way to reach this goal is to make sure I leave a few blank spaces in my weekly agenda. 

• Blog consistently. Since starting KNS, blogging has become one of my favorite pastimes. I really let it slide to the back burner, especially towards the end of the year. 2015 is going to bring commitment to this little space. I hope you're just as excited as I am for the things I have planned. Trust me when I say that I already have a game plan. 

• Be present. This kind of goes along with "have more fun." I naturally spend a lot of time in my own head, especially when thinking about the future. Calculating every move I make is just something I've always done. This year, I'm going to work on being in the moment more - whether that's enjoying time with friends or letting just letting myself relax without stressing about what I "should" be doing instead. 

Altogether, I feel like these three goals are attainable and definitely manageable. I'm looking forward to 2015 to be a positive, comfort zone-stretching, exciting year. 

Let me know what your New Years' resolutions are, if you have any!

Keep not settling, 

Merry Christmas!

We're doing things a little bit different in the Jansen household this Christmas, and I have to say that I'm pretty dang excited about it.

Rather than doing a whole lot of gift giving and cleaning up endless bits of wrapping paper, we've decided to have an all-day board game marathon. Some old favorites and a few newer additions give us quite the stack of fun to choose from. Take a look:

Hopefully, this is a Christmas tradition that will stick.
Being home is a "present" enough for me!

Keep not settling, 

My Life in Instagram Photos #3

The last time I did a My Life in Instagram Photos post, I'd just moved into my dorm room at Salem. So I figured it was about time to update.

Top Left: My bed at Salem has quickly grown to be my favorite part of the room. It's not lofted super high anymore, which makes everything about it - especially making it - even better. There's something about the almost obnoxiously bright pattern that always reminds me to be happy.

Top Right: A few of my friends and I experienced our first college football games at Wake Forest's final game. Though it wasn't the best (neither Wake or Virginia Tech scored the entire game), Wake ended up winning in double overtime. Maybe next year I'll actually know enough about football to understand what's going on?

Bottom Left: During finals week, a bunch of us headed down to Krankies, an amazing local coffee shop, to study and just get off campus for a while. Of course, I couldn't resist snapping a picture of my delicious hot chocolate (the one time I skipped out on coffee... you know it's caffeine overload when..). T'was good.

Bottom Right: I ordered a vest from my favorite store back in July and it finally arrived at the beginning-ish of November. So, it's pretty much safe to say that I've been wearing it non-stop. Plus, I really love this llama sweater.

Keep not settling,

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1 of 8.

The last post here went up on November 2nd. I can’t believe how fast the last 6ish weeks have gone. There is so much to catch up on, yet not a lot at all. Sitting down to write this post has been on my agenda since....well, for a while. Oops. 

I’m proud to say that I’ve successfully made it through fall semester ALIVE. One down, seven to go.

November was a complete blur for me, preparing the final pieces of projects and working through the longest math chapter of my life. I was fortunate enough to spend Thanksgiving with one of my favorite Salem friends (a huge thank you to M’s family) since I wasn’t able to get back to California for the long weekend.

After Thanksgiving I jumped immediately into finals prep mode. Wow. I didn’t think I could drink so much coffee. I can’t recall how many hours I actually slept -- that’s probably why I’m still working on catching up now that I’m at home. Still, I can’t manage to actually sleep in.... 

Speaking of being home,  I’ve been back on the West Coast for nearly a week now, and it’s been fantastic. My two lifelong best friends met me at the airport (along with my dad, of course), and spent a few days in the good old Central Valley with me before Christmas. 

Thankfully, my family made sure that we didn’t have much planned for the time that I’m home. Until January 4th, it’s safe to say that I’ll be living in pajama pants most days. Absolutely no regrets there, whatsoever. There’s also going to be a lot of Gilmore Girls, State of Affairs (new favorite!), CSI, NCIS... you name it.  

Let me tell you, I never thought I’d actually miss getting to slump in front of the couch. I have a whole semester’s worth of television shows to start watching/catch up on. So exciting. 

Keep not settling, 

The Important Things.

Some days are better than others. 

Yesterday was one of those days where nothing seems to go right at all. I woke up with a nasty cold that resulted in me leaving a conference to take a nap that never actually happened. That, plus some unwanted drama left me no choice but to call my mom and bawl for an hour and a half. I'm sure she has no idea how much I appreciate her..

I was not a pretty picture by the time dinner hit, let alone midnight. 

You should've seen me.

Through all of the ups and downs yesterday, I learned who some of my real friends are: the people who refuse not to give you hugs just because you're contagious; the ones that come sit on your bed with you when the drama won't stop; the ones who go on a frantic manhunt with you when you think you've lost your roommate (no worries there, she's ok!); the RA who sits on the floor with you during a meltdown; the ones who leave you texts making sure you're ok...They're all important. All of them. 

Without all of these people, I don't know what I would've done to make it through yesterday. I think it was my first truly awful day since being at Salem, and their encouragement was beyond helpful. 

Today is a new day, and I've come to the decision that it will not be a bad day. I won't let it be.

Mom reminded me last night that my health is the most important part of this overall picture, and I'm taking that seriously now. Today is going to be a good day. A great day even. 

Here's to an awesome November. 

Keep not settling,

Favorite Quotes.

One of my favorite things to do while I'm procrastinating things on my to-do list (I promise this doesn't happen very often...) is to look at inspirational quotes on my Pinterest. They serve as a reminder to keep things in perspective which, I'm not going to lie, is often useful. 

Rather than keep these to myself, I figured I'd feature them here. 

Keep not settling,

Note: These images were collected from pinterest.com, all rights remain with their original owners.

Family.

So, first thing's first: Salem's wifi has all of a sudden decided that it doesn't want to work on my laptop. Or anyone else's, for that matter. While Salem's tech team is trying to figure out why it's happening, I'm stuck in the library on the ethernet-enabled computers.

But that's besides the point, I promise. 

This week, I've had the pleasure of my family being here. Tomorrow starts the beginning of Family Weekend here at Salem. Let me tell you, it's very different having my family here on campus rather than being home, but I'm enjoying it a lot. Dad and Shawn ("Baby Jansen" around here) haven't visited before, so they've been getting acquainted with the area. Hopefully by the time they leave to go home on Tuesday I'll have successfully communicated all of the reasons why I love Salem. Pictures just don't do some things justice. 

I have an entire list of places my family has to eat at before they leave. Not kidding.  We've knocked off three from the list already, and there's a good six or seven more. Plus, they had the opportunity to experience their first College Night Coffeehouse -- Salem's weekly live performance in the Student Center -- starring a band called Runaway Dorothy. Check them out. They were amazing.

As far as the rest of the week goes, I assume we're playing it by ear. On the agenda includes trips to the Wake Forest library and Costco. Exciting, I know. 

In the middle of midterm prep stress and all that wonderful goodness that comes with the end of October, I can't say that having my family here is a bad thing. I mean, it gives me every excuse I need to finish my homework. 

Hopefully by this weekend we'll have some decent wifi connections...If not, you might be hearing from "Library me" again in the near future. Stay tuned.

Oh and, 

keep not settling,

My Washington D.C. Trip - Part 2!

Here we are for the second part of the pictures from my Washington D.C. trip. 

If you haven't already, go check out part one! 

This second portion covers stops at the Smithsonian National Air & Space and Natural History museums. Unfortunately we only had so many hours in the day, and all of the museums close at 5:30 PM, so we didn't get the chance to explore nearly as much as we'd have liked. Nevertheless, these two museums were incredible. 

I have a ton of pictures, so I'm not going to talk anymore. Enjoy! 

There was so much to see in both of these museums... and we only covered about half of the exhibits in Natural Science and less than a quarter of Air & Space. Hopefully one day I'll get the chance to back and round them off. 

Keep not settling, 

My Washington D.C. Trip - Part 1!

I figured it would be easiest to split up pictures from my trip into two parts, since there are lots of them. This first part will include pictures from our first stop, the Capitol Building!

In general, the trip was incredible. Roommate J and I woke up at 3:45, easily the earliest I've been up in a loooong time. Salem women have incredible energy, though, even at four in the morning. Even just overhearing everyone's plans for the day had me forgetting the time. So, although we spent 10+ hours on a bus that was not conducive to sleeping, it was a great time. We stopped at a McDonalds along the way, and I've never seen better fast food customer service in my life. Props to all the staff on duty at 5AM who managed to get 50+ through the registers and fed within 45 minutes. 

But enough about the travel, let's talk about the really fun stuff.

Honestly, I don't think I've ever seen anything more beautiful in my life. We got the chance to tour the historic areas and rotunda within the building... it was all incredible, not to mention extremely motivating. There's something about actually seeing the building in my textbooks in person. As soon as I left I wanted to go back. As a political science major, this was definitely the highlight of the trip. Maybe one day I'll make it over to see the White House.

(Probably my favorite picture of the whole trip!)

The historical Supreme Courtroom.

Inside the "Crypt." Fun fact, there's an empty tomb for George Washington sitting underneath... turns out he didn't want to be buried there.

The top of the Rotunda. The donut tarp is due to the 3-year-long construction project to restore the dome.

The following pictures are all from the inside of the Rotunda:

Really, I don't think I've ever seen anything more beautiful in my life. From the moment you walk into the visitor's center, everything is breathtaking. Add an entertaining tour guide and you're set. I'd go back in a heartbeat.

Stay tuned for pictures from the rest of the trip!

Keep not settling,