We had a Black and White Jazz Night :) Beautiful music. This is a picture of my floor and I and then of me and my girl Mi-Mi, she is in the white dress (and some of her friends)

Shout-out Outfit: If you ignore the very messy room behind, this is a picture of my new favorite t-shirt which is from my favorite TV Chuck (given to me by Colton) and the super nice leather jacket from my mother! Thanks so much!

Here is a look my first sculpture project! It is made up of more than 50 4inch pyramids. Our assignment was to make something out of cardboard that was abstract and looked nothing like a box that it came from. We only had a week to complete this project so it is nothing fancy, but I really enjoy the finished project :) My inspiration for this piece was to combine geometric/industrial with organic. Thats why the triangles are metallic silver for that sharp shape feel, and the tiny people are left the color of cardboard, to hold their natural origin of cardboard.

The joy of walking through security and seeing Erazim, Cole, and my Parents waiting to see me is a most cherished memory. 

My Birthday weekend can only be described as a magical one. Everyone who I loved with my entire heart was there! It brought tears to my eyes just getting to go back and hug those dear to me. Reese can walk now, and is officially 1 years old! She is as strong as ever, turning into one independent girl. Erazim is even more talkative, and yet he still let me hold him as much as I want :) He also has developed the hilarious habit of a courtesy laugh. Its priceless. I missed him sososososososo much. The Fantastic Four aka the pieces of my heart aka Em, Ju, and Syd all showed up at my party. They endured the "DeNell family traditions" and made me feel so loved by taking time to come and see me. Our dining table was decorated head to toe with Avengers things. My mother knows how to decorate and make me feel special. I got to spend some quality time with my "Sugar" too ;) He wore his fancy shirt and told one-liners that made everyone laugh.

Only downside was my cat and him being a terrible sleeping partner and the size of a WHALE. He is so so so fat now. Oh my goodness. Talk about stress eating. He was his usual cuddly self the second night though.

My favorite parts by far happened during the birthday party time. Where my friends and family piled on the love with all their amazingly thoughtful gifts. I was beyond touched by all of them.  I received a TON of clothes - which is a dream come true and I hope to wear them throughout these next 2 weeks and post pictures of me wearing their gifts as "shout outs" to them.

It did my heart good to get to go home to place where all the parts of it were :) Thank you all from the bottom of my heart for that amazing, AMAZING weekend that I will never ever forget.

Me and Javaria's Roommate Joy. (Javaria is taking the picture)

I have been making friends and forcing myself out in social activities here at Trinity. I have learned a lot about myself through the "social" process. I have learned I am definitely a small  group type person. Big social events, I can go to all the while smiling and laughing, but I am usually counting the minutes till I can escape with a graceful exit. Everyone is different :) I did loved going out for pizza with Javaria and Joy (although I felt broke afterwards) It was delightful! We had a great time laughing, poorly tipping the awful waitress and eating super super delish pizza.

This is one of the BIG social events I went to with a couple girls on my floor.  It was a Chicago Fire Soccer Game. Fire won (woot) in a 3 to 1 landslide. There was also a Christian concert at this event and a potluck before hand.

On a completely unrelated note, something interesting had grabbed me with week. I realized the amount of people here that are like show characters is unbelievable! Those extreme personalities that are only entertaining in family sit-com shows. And nearly 1 out 5 people I meet are so dramatic in one way or another. It makes life here a treat :) Where else can you walk around and be able to have people with such strong personalities and reactions to life that you feel you are watching several different tv shows at the same time. If I made a cartoon, these individuals would flow seamlessly into 2D characters. Its every artists inspirational dream.

These Powerberries are a wonderful thing to send me :) I munch on a few when I am doing HW and struggling to finish strong

We had ANOTHER fire alarm go off in our dorm today. ANOTHER. And for the same reason - burnt popcorn.

Time to play "Find Rebecca"

This is a historic picture of the rare "belly button bagel". Only once every few million bagels is it ever found by the average bagel eater.

This post is to accomplish 2 things: Try to answer some of the typical college student asked questions and tell my family and friends (who I will be visiting in 2 weeks!!) what I want for my birthday. This is the most effective way to share that knowledge, if you have never given me a birthday gift or plan to, then the second half of this post you can simply skip.

How do I like Trinity/campus: It is a beautiful school, perfect size, the professors are very caring and want to know each of us individually. Everyone here is insanely nice, lots of activities, and decent food :) My favorite is either the pasta or sandwich bar.

How do I like my Professors: 

1) My history professor (Prof. Fry) is my favorite to look at, he has very interesting body/facial proportions as well as a unique way of speaking. He looks like what a rat would look like if they were turned into human form. But I mean that as an observation only, He is my favorite Professor so far! He has been very kind though, easy to talk to, and he had my name learned by the second week. 

2) English (Prof Dielemen) is a woman from Canada so she has a beautiful accent that is a gentle blend of French and British. She is as thin as a pencil and has worn a different, very colorful dress to class everyday - even though the room is freezing. I feel like my writing skills have already advanced after just a few classes which is an amazing feeling, but she is a very rigid woman. I don't get the impression any sort of excuse of any kind will fly with her. 

3) Pastor Bill is my theology teach and he has a white kinky beard all the way down to his collar bone. It is a very impressive growth of hair. He loves talking about his family, in love with his wife, and just simply gives a sermon the entire class. So they go slow - but I still think he is a peach. 

4) Prof Thompson is my final professor. He looks like he has barely squeaked to the age of 20 and is brand new to Trinity. He obviously is older than that, I am assume around 27ish, from what he has told us, but still - baby face. He talks in a consistent monotone and dresses every day in a fashionable button up, colored pants, and styled leather shoes and rocks a typical boy-band haircut. I hope to get the most out of his classes, he teaches both of my art classes, so fingers crossed I can make art that is 'A' worthy as well as learning new things.

How do I like my classes: My Gen. Ed. classes are easy enough, a very manageable amount of HW everyday. English is the most interactive class. And Art is just a long day. Its 5 hours of sitting in concrete rooms. Hopefully once projects pick up - so will time.

Everyone there nice?: Yes. Extremely. Its harder to be excluded by people than anything else.

Do you like your roommates: Its an unusual mix of girls, but we all have gotten along really well. Dana shares the room with me and even though she certainly made an entrance her first few days here, we really have started to get along :) We eat  lunch together sometimes, talk about boys, and share food. And she is my favorite :) Holly and Kaitlynn are in the room next door so I don't see them as much. Holly is the mystery roommate who I never see and talk to, and Kaitlynn and I text, and I listen to her talk about either an injury she has received recently or how much she misses her family.

I hope this covers at least your initial questions for my college experience!

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Birthday list for family and friends (Who want to know this information, please ignore if you have no interest in giving me things of this world)

• Season 2 and 3 of Chuck (all the seasons would be a dream come true, but those 2 are a need)
• CLOTHES!!!! I am a medium in usually everything!!! Shirts -plain, colorful, patterned - anything beautiful! Hippie/Long skirts too :) (Ask Martha, she knows my taste pretty well)
• Jewelry :) You can never go wrong here - the more extreme the better
• Makeup - Think out of the ordinary here. Colorful eyeliner, Lipsticks that aren't typical colors, sparkly eye shadow 
• Movies: Id really love to own 300, Thor, Captain America and the AVENGERS (it comes out the 25th of Sept!!!!!!)
• Tv Series: The Batman (the THE is very important) Teen Titans, Justice League, 
• The classic gift card to Target is never a bad thing either :)

Txt me if you need more ideas or specifications on items.

This is my most loyal skype partner ;) 

This building I'm sure will soon become my new home. It is fondly known as the "ARCC". I was waiting to post about it, hoping I could share information or cooler pictures of art projects, but so far it has been a lot of "how to" work which doesn't lead to many photography opportunities or even interesting stories to tell. For example today we learned how to use a hot glue gun and operate a mac computer (Both skills I am pretty fluent in already)  They are long days, but I know once we get more studio time and more projects to bury myself in,  time will fly by.

The gym as also finally opened to us mere "non athletes" so I can now start developing my daily routine. This definitely will help me with stress and feeling like I can become more organized with my time management :)

It is my goal to somehow, either by sneaking or awkwardly asking, to post pictures of all my Professors with their names to give you all a picture of my authority figures. They all seem very nice, my history and theology Professor I get along with the best currently. Each class comes with its concerns and learning how each Prof teaches.

Finally I want to give a special shout-out to all the wonderful people who have given me their time in letting me Skype them, or been impossibly generous and send me a card or care package. It touches my heart and I always love getting to check my mail and know that somewhere someone is thinking of me. Thank you so much for all the support you are pouring into this adventure of mine, it makes it impossible not to make the most of this opportunity.



Much Love,



Rebecca DeNell