Dingle, St. Patrick's and more...oh my!

Yes, yes, once again I've procrastinated updating my blog so it's been awhile. Quite a bit has happened since mid term crits and me asking you all to send me things =] First, we had a trip to Dingle, then there was a birthday party for people who had birthdays in March (there were three), St. Patrick's Day and there were a couple Irish Studies trips thrown in there somewhere.
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I guess I'll start with the Dingle trip. The 5th and 6th of March we stayed in Dingle. Dingle is such a quaint little town, it was so amazing. Our first stop before actually getting in Dingle was going to be for lunch and we were going to have a picnic on a beach. The drive over to the beach was intense. The road was a the size of a single lane, yet it was a two way road. This is not okay. Thankfully, our bus driver Brian, is a master magician with the huge bus and I think other drivers sensed his presence on the road and we didn't have to deal with another car coming. It was also a little scary because it was super foggy, not on the road or anything, but out in the ocean. We could see the edge of the cliff, the water right by the cliff and then it was just white abyss. We finally made it to the beach and that was so gorgeous! We got to eat our lunch on a cliff at this amazing beach. It is probably the most memorable place I've ever had lunch.

foggy fogginess

Jesus statue on a cliff

tiny road

lunch on a cliff

After we ate lunch we went to this information center/place with information all about the Blasket Islands, which was pretty cool. They had a little miniature of the island, some old timey photos (which I loved), a movie about it and a few other things.

miniature of Blasket Island

After that, we finally went to our hostel and the rest of the time there (Saturday night and Sunday morning) was ours to do what we wanted. It was spent walking around town, going into shops, eating and pub hopping. The hostel was awesome. It felt like an actual house, kinda run down, but adorable and the guy who ran it was from America and super welcoming. 

our hostel

Fungie the Dolphin!

hanging out on a pier

leaving Dingle 

(I don't think this is Dingle, it's a town close by)

 The March birthday party was fun. We always have the parties at Orchard House (the house I live in) because it's the biggest, which is good and bad cause I don't have to walk home super late when I'm tired, but if I want to go to bed (and i'm usually the first one who wants to) it tends to be pretty loud until everyone leaves. But I still prefer it to be at Orchard so it works out.

Ashley, Kate and me

Caitlin, me and Maggie

I actually didn't do that much or go crazy for St. Patty's Day. I stayed home for the day and cleaned and got some photo editing done, then that night I just went to the pub with some people and got some drinks. There was a trip to Kinvara for a parade thing, but I didn't go cause I knew if I went I would spend money on food and little trinkets, which I didn't want to do since I needed to buy art supplies and groceries so I stayed. It was a good St. Patty's Day though just cause I was in Ireland =] My friend, Casey, straightened my hair for the first time ever the day before St. Patty's. Part of me always hates straightening my hair because everyone always loves it straight and tells me how great it looks and always wants me to straighten it all the time and I DON'T WANT TO!! i'm just as pretty with my hair curly!! "and gosh darnit people like me!"

straight hairrr

So my Irish Studies trips will not be in chronological order, but oh well. Our first one was to a couple forts and a graveyard (the usual). Gordon D'Arcy (the Irish Studies teacher) told us that back in the day women were allowed to divorce their husbands one day out of the year which was February 1st, which i found humorous. Then we went to the remains of this cliff fort which was gorgeous. Literally at the edge of a cliff--pretty awesome. After that we went to the Corcomroe Abbey where I found my first Kennedy tombstone!! yay!

hey cow

doggy that followed us

cliff fort

cliff fort again

Kennedy tomb!

The other Irish Studies trip, which was just this past Friday, was one of the coolest ones (I think anyway). We went to this church with gorgeous stained glass, Yeats' tower, and Coole Park. Yeats' tower was pretty magical looking. It was right next to a river, and there were all these woods around. I'm sure it was a very inspirational place for Yeats. Coole Park was, shall I say it? Yes I shall. Well it was cool. mwahahaha. But it really was, first of all there was wild garlic growing everywhere!! You could smell it and a few people took some home to cook with. Coole Park is full of woods so we just got to walk through these gorgeous trees all day and made our way down to this huge turlough, it was amazing. The only downfall was Gordon D'Arcy insisted on reading poetry to us, which I don't like. I mean, I like poetry, but not when it's read aloud to me. I would hate poetry readings, I would've rather read it to myself. I almost feel like it was to cliche too, or something. Like we go to these places that are absolutely gorgeous, places which poetry is written about and we read poetry there. Like it's supposed to be this magical moment where the clouds open up and light streams down from the heavens on the reader and we are all enlightened and the world makes sense and that's not what happens. Sorry, my pessimistic-ness and cynicism are coming out. On the brightside, it was gorgeous!!! =]

St. Brendan's Catherdral

the stained glass inside

Yeats' tower

a house thingy attached to the Yeats' tower

Gordon D'Arcy reading poetry- joy of joys

Coole Park

This house was supposed to be up on that stone platform

it's Lady Gregory's house. I forget why she's famous, but

she took Yeats under her wing when he came to Ireland.

The Autograph Tree in Coole Park

Pathway down to the turlough in Coole Park

(makes me think of the computer game Myst)

chillin in a tree

Other than that, school's been going great. Starting to feel like I'm actually getting work done. I'll post some photos of my work.

This photo series is supposed to be a tableau vivant which is just a really dramatic, cinematic type of photo, usually involving lots of props and planning. I ended up doing a scary demon, dead people, zombie series--don't ask me why (i think i was inspired by tim burton).

this is just a photo of all of us hanging out outside on a gorgeous day

Thank you all for your packages and letters! I feel so loved now =] I really do appreciate it, I know how expensive it is to send things and I'm very grateful. Thank you all so much!

This weekend is our trip to the Aran Islands so I'll let ya know how that goes!

It's been awhile...

Sorry it's taken me so long to update my blog, I've actually been fairly busy. That's a lie. I mean I have been busy, but I've had more than enough opportunities to update my blog and just haven't because I'm lazy. So anyway, here I am finally updating it. Last week was the Berlin trip, which I didn't go on because it was too expensive, but it was nice staying home.

The week was pretty relaxing and I got to get work done that I wouldn't have been able to if I went to Berlin. Then, this week was mid term critiques. Which was a bitter-sweet ordeal. It was wonderful seeing everybody's work and all the different mediums and styles, but it was three days of critiques. It was just a bit exhausting. My critique was okay--not good, not bad, just kinda ehh. I did get some good feedback so I shouldn't be complaining. I presented three series of photos which I have all on facebook, but I'll put a photo from each series on here.

series of self portraits

series of minimalistic night photography

infrared photography

I can't believe I'm already halfway through the semester. Only a few more weeks and then it'll all be done and I'll be going home. Craziness! I feel like I've only been here a couple weeks.

The weather this week has been so beautiful! The sun has been out and it's not too cold--just gorgeous! I've been keeping my window open a lot! =]

This weekend we have a trip to Dingle. I'm pretty excited, even the Irish say Dingle is beautiful so it must be. It's only for a night and I think we have a couple things planned and some free time in the evening so it should be a pretty awesome weekend. Hopefully the weather stays amazing for the trip.

It's so nice to see the all the mail that comes in and then excitedly rummage through it looking for my name and then realizing that no one has sent me anything. I see all my friends running off with their packages and letters and a little part of me dies inside. I guess I'll go watch them open their mail and pretend that it's me.

I guess I'll leave my address in hopes that someone will send me something...

Burren College of Art,
Newtown Castle,
Ballyvaughan,
Co. Clare,
Ireland.


Here are a few things you can send me (mostly food): ramen noodles, hot cheetos, peanut butter, macaroni and cheese, a couple rolls of toilet paper, goldfish/cheese itz, oreos, granola (it's so freakin' expensive here), dried fruit (that's sendable, right?), and apparently they don't believe in sour candy over here so if you could send me some sort of sour candy that'd be great, and of course a loving letter from any of you would be amazing. Thanks family and friends!