Looking Back...May 2017

May was a month to relax and smell the roses. Literally.

I honestly don’t know where May went. I really don’t. I understood where April went but May has been almost a blur. I really wanted to enjoy some time off. The semester ended right at the very beginning of the month, I finished all my school responsibilities on the 1^st (perfect timing!). I then took the rest of that week, Tuesday through Sunday, off from work and just did absolutely nothing. I slept in, I binge watched stuff on Netflix, and probably some other stuff but I really can’t remember because it was all just so relaxed lol.  

I managed to accomplish all three goals for May.

After taking some time for a break, I started to get to work planning and strategizing for the summer. I have a lot of work to do if I’m going to try to get at least a couple chapters drafted before school starts in August, and that’s with teaching summer school in July. Getting into a summer schedule has been difficult. PhD burn out is real. By the time you get to ABD you are so exhausted but you still have a significant amount of work to do. I’m still trying to get fully adjusted to this whole ABD life. I did a lot of reading in May, mostly for school but also a novel, so that was fun. I also spent some time shopping and hanging out at one of my favorite coffee shops. I also went to the library and picked up some more research, good thing since it’s now over 100 degrees and not an ideal time to walk across campus. 

Who says you can't combine work with pleasure? I can shop at Sephora, enjoy a delicious iced latte, and read an awesome book, that also happens to apply to my PhD research. Winning!

I also took some time to clean out my office on campus in preparation for our department move to a new building at the end of the summer. It was a bitter sweet experience. I’ll miss that office. It’s been home for 4 years. I’ve shared that office with some really awesome PhD students. Packing up the office felt like packing up memories. I found several little notes I’d kept from friends and former students. And then there was the weird and fascinating “Childbirds” poster. We still have no idea what that poster was for or who/what the Childbirds were lol! The new building/offices will be lovely I’m sure, but they won’t have the same charm that good old “LL” has had. I spent 2 years as an MA and now 4 years as a PhD student in that building, and I’m going to miss it.

Seriously...what are the Childbirds? This will torment me forever lol!

One big thing that I got done in May was book my trip to London for this October. I will be presenting a paper at the Association of Dress Historians’ conference and I couldn’t be more excited. Or scared lol. I haven’t done much presenting at conferences and certainly none in another country attended by a bunch of fashion scholars. I’m used to being one of only a few, if not the only, fashion scholars at the conferences I’ve been to so far. So this will be an adventure for sure. And I’m really just so excited to be back in London. I miss it so much!

Let the countdown begin! I seriously can't wait to be back in my favorite cities, London and Oxford!

Overall, May was a weird but good month. Quiet, relaxing, but still fairly productive and gone in a blur. Thank goodness for my Instagram feed and my weekly vlogs to remind me of what the month was like.

xo

Andrea