The 5 Best Things About March Madness

** Apparently this did post on Thursday like I thought it would! Hopefully this bug is just a one time thing. The Marquette loss is old news, but the sentiment of everything still applies :) 

As you may or may not know, I am currently a freshman at Marquette University, where we haven’t lost a football game in over fifty years. For those of you who don’t get the joke, Marquette University has not had a football team in over fifty years, so that pretty makes everyone die hard crazy for basketball.

To be honest, I was hesitant coming to Marquette because even though it seems like a little thing, I LOVED high school football. Once I had committed to Marquette for all the other very important reasons you should commit to a school, I prepared my self to never again feel the same pride and excitement I felt when I went to high school football. Boy, am I wrong! I have absolutely fallen in love with basketball at Marquette and I’ve enjoyed going to a bunch of home games with my friends this year.

My friends and I at a Marquette Game!

Anyway, unless you’ve been living under a rock, you’ve probably heard about this little thing called MARCH MADNESS. This is my first year really even caring about any form of basketball and I can fully say that I have fallen into the madness!

Without further ado, the 5 best things about March Madness! (not in any particular order)

11)   Classes are canceled! Even the professors take this time of year seriously, and when Marquette was playing Davidson my Political Science class was cancelled. If (fingers crossed) Marquette makes it to Atlanta then I am promised to have two of my classes cancelled to watch the game. Basketball takes first priority!

22)   Chatting with the fam. After Marquette won against Davidson I was busy for the next hour fielding phone calls and texts from my parents and my brothers (and my friend who goes to Davidson J ).  After we won against Butler I was again bombarded by various forms of communication to chat about the game and try to predict what will happen in the next game.

33)  Social media goes crazy!  Facebook, Twitter and Instagram have absolutely exploded from the time of the first tip off. Whether it’s breaking news on other games, taunting other teams or cheering on your own, everyone has something to say.

44)    Competing with friends.  After finally learning what a bracket is, my friends and I spent a lot of time yelling at each other while making our own. We all have very different ideas of who’s going to win. I do this not only with the friends that I live near, but my friends I live far away from will text or call to celebrate or complain about our brackets.

55)   Probably the most obvious: SCHOOL SPIRIT! Lights all over campus, streamers and flags hanging up on streetlights, there’s an undeniable energy all over campus thanks to our Golden Eagle pride!

Yay March Madness. Let me know how your brackets are doing!! And I hope everyone is cheering for Marquette playing against Miami in the Sweet Sixteen today!! J As we say in Milwaukee, WE ARE!! (Clap clap) MARQUETTE!!

MAD love,

E

I know I said on Monday that today would be about makeup, but because of the time sensitive nature of this issue, I’ve decided to push it back!

5 Things About My Sunday

If you look up any "tips and tricks" for blogging, one of the first things listed will be: blog regularly at all costs. They say that people will stop caring if you stop blogging, which makes sense. The moral of this story is that I suck. I made a promise to the Internet that I would blog every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and literally on my second week blogging I screwed up. There's really no excuse except business, which I said wouldn't ever be an excuse. Anyways, to makeup for it I have made up an extra long blog for Wednesday (That's funny because the blog for Wednesday is about makeup Haha).

On to today's topic: my Sunday. This post is going to be short and sweet, but it's of personal so I hope that this will be a nice mini look into more of my life.

5 Things That Happened to me on March 24, 2013

1) I ate really good Chinese food and felt satisfied and not gross.
2) I spent hours in my friends room and realized how lucky I am to know them.
3) I met a friend in Starbucks and had delicious coffee, a good cry and got even better advice.
4) I took a long walk in the cold that made me feel alive.
5) I read my Bible on my own for the first time in a very long time.

Today just made me feel really blessed and happy. How was your Sunday? Give me the top 5 highlights in comments.

I promise you'll hear from me Wednesday!

xoxo,

E

5 Things about PreLawPrep

Happy Happy Monday!

I want to take this blog post to make a major shout out to the person who made this blog possible. It all started with a text over our spring break. My gal pal Kelly was starting a blog and wanted an opinion about a font or a color. A few texts later, and we had a plan for a blog of my own. (More like Kelly gave me the idea for my blog!). So with out further ado, here are five things about the wonderful, beautiful, brilliant Kelly (the original PreLawPrep):

1) Her style is something to write home about (or write on a blog about :) ). She gets teased by our friends sometimes for being too preppy. But I think that she is always dressed perfectly, has fantastic taste and puts together great outfits. I seriously wish I could be as half as stylish as her.

2) We are pretty much kindred souls because we were both rejected by our #1 school and ended up at Marquette. Even though it came with a lot of disappointment, I think we both ended up where we belong.

3) She's okay with me being weird and we do weird things sometimes. So you can get a better picture of what I'm talking about, here's an example of something we both agree to be especially hilarious:

We call him Pervus

4) Kel is a hard worker, almost anyone could tell you that about her because it obvious when you look at how much success she's had. But it's more then just that. When Kelly works hard, it makes me want to work more, push a little farther or spend a little more time on something. Quality is the name of Kelly's game and she won't settle for anything less. 

5) Blog inspiration! Kel posts everyday on her blog and is dedicated (see #4) to make it the best it can be. She's so hip with social media (Twitter, Pinterest, Weebly, LinkedIn, Instagram, etc.) and has been/is going to be teaching me a lot!

This turned out probably being a creepy love note to Kelly, but I'm okay with that. Keep on being great Kel! And to get more Kelly in your life (because who doesn't want more Kelly?), follow her on twitter at @KellyMeyehofer and check out her blog, prelawprep.blogspot.com 

Kelly and I dressed as hipsters for a themed date party. (We were dates)

Mad love and respect,

Emily

5 Yummy Gluten Free Foods

For Lent this year I decided to go gluten free. If you would have to me that I was going gluten free a few months ago I would have said you were crazy. I'm all about super starchy foods like pasta and bread. I couldn't even imagine it would be possible to go gluten free. The truth is, that it's not as nearly hard as you think it will be. Below are my top five favorite foods that I've had while gluten free

1) Udi's Muffins, preferably the double chocolate variety, are to die for. You may think that when you decide to go gluten free, you must forsake everything delicious and chocolaty. This is definitely not the case. In fact, you need to beware that not all things that say “gluten free” on them are automatically good for you. These muffins can be a great treat, but they still have about 300 calories a pop.  The bottom line: they are so delicious and moist you won’t even think that they are gluten-less. Just make sure you don’t go overboard. 

Udi's Double Chocolate Muffins

2) French Toast (Bread): One thing I learned from going gluten-free is that you don’t have to completely toss out all the recipes you loved that have gluten in them, you just have to find ways to adapt them. That’s what I do with gluten free French toast. I just make French toast the way I would regularly, I just substitute regular bread for gluten free bread. I prefer Schar Gluten Free Classic White Bread. The biggest critiques gluten-free bread gets is being stale tasting and crumbly. Most people recommend using stale bread for French toast anyway, so it’s a win-win. By letting your gluten-free bread soak up the goodness of your batter, when you eat it, you don’t even think twice about the bread you’re eating. Click here for a basic French toast recipe.

3) Like I said above, it’s all about adapting things you already love with gluten free substitutes. I (like most people in this world) can’t resist a good chocolate chip cookie fresh from the oven. Using an almond flour recipe (Honeyville Farms Blanched Almond Flour works great!), you can still have chocolate chip cookies (or any type of cookie) while still being gluten free. HERE is a tried and true recipe for almond flour chocolate chip cookies.

Give almond flour a try!

4) When asked by anyone what my favorite food is, I will always reply “Asian Food” because it umbrellas all the food I like into one category. Thai, Chinese, Japanese, Indian, you name it! If it’s cuisine from an Asian country, I promise you I’ll love it. That being said, besides delicious flavors, rice is a staple to many Asian dishes. Luckily for us, rice can also be made into noodles! These Pad Thai Tiger Tiger noodles are gluten-free, delicious and SO easy to make. Pop them in the microwave for two minutes and you are ready to eat. I’m so stocking up on these for my dorm room! (Fun Fact: At Noodles and Company you can get any dish with rice noodles on request! Yay!)

Tiger Tiger Rice Noodle are SO EASY

5) Mac and Cheese is the ultimate comfort food. And it can be a sad thought to those going gluten free that they will have to be without this old friend. NOT TRUE! Annie’s (in addition to a bunch of other gluten-free products) has a fabulous boxed Mac and Cheese with, you guessed it, rice noodles! Think along the lines of Kraft Mac and Cheese, all you need to add is a little butter and milk and you’re good to go. I found mine needed a little salt, but at the end of the day, this is a yummy option for gluten free eating.

I hope that the foods I highlighted today inspired to you to give gluten-free eating a try. If nothing else, try and substitute for gluten-free where you can. I’m not planning on being gluten-free forever, but after Lent I will for sure continue to eat some of these yummy gluten-free foods!

Happy Eating!

Emily

P.S. If you didn’t see on the alert bar above the “About Me” section, I’ve finalized my blogging schedule! Expect to hear from me every Monday, Wednesday, Friday J Have a great weekend everyone and I’ll see you on Monday!!

5 Things To Do Over Spring Break

The upcoming movie, Spring Breakers is centered around the insanely scandalous spring break of four college students. However, we all know that spring break can't always be as exciting.


Spring Breakers hits Theaters March 22nd

For those of you, who like me, are stuck at home for their spring break this year, it can feel like the best thing you have to look forward to is showering with out shower shoes! Have no fear, there is still a lot you can do from home to have a memorable spring break.

1) Consider donating some of your abundant free time by volunteering over spring break. It can be a big time commitment to volunteer when you are torn between millions of other commitments. Any organization would be happy to have a college student helping out during their spring break. It means a lot to people that you are willing to give of yourself when most people spend spring break treating themselves. If you volunteered during high school, pay a visit back. Or find a new place organization to help with. I volunteered at an ESL (English as a Second Language program) that I worked with in high school where I hung out with children of refugee families. I even got to bring a craft home!

Tiger hand puppet I made with the kids at ESL

For those of you in Minnesota, Illinois or Arizona check to see if there is  Feed My Starving Children food packing center around you. At FMSC you pack nutritious meals for hungry people around the world. For more information click here.  Here's a picture of me and some of my friends at FMSC:

Hanging and packing food at FMSC

2) Spring break is a great time to try a new look. This can mean anything from changing up your hair do, getting a piercing or add to your wardrobe. This spring break I ombréd my hair, meaning that my hair stylist bleached the bottom of my hair so my hair color fades from darker at the top to lighter at the ends. Spring is all about out with the old and in with the new, so get a head start on your break! Here's an awkward picture of my ombré! I think you'll get the idea though. I think it turned out pretty good!

Ombré Ombré Ombré

3) One thing I greatly miss when I'm at college is the lack of access to a kitchen. Sure, there is a communal kitchen in the basement but I miss settling into my kitchen and baking the day away. This spring break the best thing I made was lemon poppy seed muffins! Make something you've never tried before. Check out websites like Pintrest to investigate new recipes.

4) Other than my kitchen, I also miss people when I'm away at school. Spend time with people from home, whether it be other friend home from school or people you know living at home. You can even take this time to Skype all the people you said you would but were too busy to, or even better VISIT someone you said you would. Trust me, it's worth it to take the time to make a trip for people you love.

5) Start a new project! This could be a craft for your dorm room, chipping away at your reading list or if you dare... starting a blog :) Like I've emphasized before, time is on your side if you are home over break so take advantage of it!

Don't let a lack of exotic location get you down this spring break! There's tons that you can do to enjoy your time home. And if all else fails, Spring Breakers hits theaters March 22nd.

xoxo,

Emily

An Introduction

Hello Internet! My name is Emily and I am a freshman at Marquette University and a newcomer to the blogging world. I'm sure through out the course of my blogging career you'll end up knowing more about me then you ever wanted to, so let's just leave it at that. 

I guess this all started with a brilliant idea. I wish I could tell you that this idea was my own, but sadly this blog is the brain child of my friend Kelly. Kelly started her own blog (prelawprep.blogspot.com CHECK IT OUT) and I decided to hop on the bandwagon. Thanks for the inspiration Kel, I'll be sure to make you proud.

There's enough in life to overwhelm you, and if I can sort through everything in to groups of five, I think I can get a little closer to figuring everything out.  Five seems like a reasonable enough number to me. There are five fingers on your hand after all. And five toes on your feet. Five is reasonable. Five is understandable. I'm going to make any topic I talk about fit into five things. Challenging? Yes. Clarifying? Yes. So that's the goal. Hang in there with me!

Emily