The End of an Era

So the day finally came, May 9th 2009. This was the day that my classmates and I graduated and were sent out into the real world. I can hardly believe that I am supposed to be a "real" person now! Yikes! At least my wonderful boyfriend Eric bought be a Garmin GPS system so I wont get lost anymore.

We were all fearing the worst for the weather on graduation day, our individual college ceremonies were even moved up an hour from 11:30 to 10:30 to try and avoid getting hit by thunderstorms. It was supposed to be a terrible day, but it ended up beautifully! 18 of my closest friends and I held a huge graduation party behind our row in Fox Hills, with a tent, tables, chairs, and plenty of food and alcohol. We were also worried about having enough food and alcohol, but we could not have planned it any better! The day was a complete success, and I would not change a thing! We all celebrated long into the night and really made the most of our last day as one big JMU family!

Above are some of the pictures from the big day!

The Next Big Adventure

Although my post-graduation depression will already be setting in, I still have one big adventure to look forward to! In June, my friend Leslie and I will be traveling to Livingstone, Zambia to participate in a lion rehabilitation and release program!! I am SO excited! Our trip will take us to London for 2 days, Zambia for 2 weeks for the program, and then Cape Town, South Africa for a relaxing 3 days on the beautiful beaches!

This is a video that shows a little bit of what we'll be doing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qblr_bySGKM

And here is an example of a typical day for me while at the program:

06h15: You will be collected by your project manager and driven out to the lion project base at Thorn Tree lodge located within the Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park. This is a 10 minute drive.

06h30 – 09h00: Meet your guide and their clients and join them for a lion walk, taking cubs from 4 months to 18 months out into the bush. Watch and take data capture recordings as the cubs practice their hunting skills on the many game species they encounter.

09h00 - 10h00: Breakfast.

10h00 - 12h00: One group might head off to a nearby school to begin the day’s Conservation Education classes - sometimes there are up to 60 kids in a class! Chaotic but fun! The other group will be cleaning or feeding the cubs, or driving into the National Park to conduct a game census.

12h30 - 14h00: Lunch back in Livingstone town at our volunteer base.

14h30 - 17h:00: Your afternoon duties could include a snare sweep before an afternoon lion walk.

18h45: Briefing by your project manager about the following days activities.

Evening: The volunteers socialize at dinner from 19h00 at our volunteer base. On some nights volunteers venture off into Livingstone town to experience the night life of this tourist mecca. For others you may be camping out at a water hole to watch the African Bush come alive at night - you may spot the rarely seen Aardvark, known as the “earth pig”.

If you want to read more on what we'll be doing, here's the link!

http://www.africanimpact.com/volunteers/livingstone-lion-volunteer/

I'm hoping that maybe I'll have my own Christian the Lion experience, to the tune of "I Will Always Love You" by Whitney Houston and all!

My Life

In no particular order, these are some of the most important people in my life!

Summer Nights

E.E's graduation with Mr. & Mrs. P

Night out with Todd and Sarah

My Mae

Brendan and Shelley

Mageroo and Jack Jack

Addie Tay and Bam Bam

A day out with the big boys

HAIL

My boys

Beach with my girls

Hometown bests

SML <3

My lala

Shannon's 21st celebration with some of the faves!

My amazing family whom I love more than anything!

All the "roomates" 1521+

JMU girls I can't believe I ever lived without

The love of my life, Eric

Getting Started

So I am extremely new at this, and am still trying to figure this whole blog thing out. My name is Jenna, and I will (in 5 days) be an a college alumn! I can't believe it! I wanted to start a blog to keep my friends and family updated on my life as I (reluctantly) move on to the next chapter of it.... so ladies and gentleman, I've officialy jumped on the bandwagon, and here it is! Enjoy.