New Haircut...

I would describe myself as a fairly conservative hair person. I generally just find something that I like and then stick with if for a looooooonnnnngg time... making minor modifications here and there. However, in honor of my new haircut. I have decided to document a few of the stages that I have gone through in my life. Most of you know me as having brown hair, but that is a fairly recent development! I was blond for the first 18 (almost 19) years of my life. I have only had brown hair for about three years. If I have to write down what color my hair is, my first instinct is still to write "Blond."

This is my beginning stage. (I am sorry that the picture is so blurry! I am working with the resources I have right now, which consist of... well.... facebook.) See how cute I am with my long blond locks? I really loved my hair. This is when I am still at that cute stage. Thankfully my awkward stage is locked away at my parents house. I won't subject you to the torture of my "glasses and headbands are really cool" stage. Because my glasses were not glasses like this:

They were glasses like this:

And it wasn't a cute headband like this: 

 

It was a headband like this: 

Yeah, just try to imagine it. Not pretty. 

So you saw that I started out as a blond. But as I grew up, my hair started to darken. This was about the time that I started putting highlights in my hair and started flipping it out. This was my standard haircut for about 5 years (I started it in like seventh grade, these pictures were taken my senior year of high school. I look the same in all of my school pictures.) 

  

Can you find which one is me? 

After I graduated, I decided to become more "sophisticated." So what did I do? I started curling my hair UNDER!

(Pictured here with one of my darling "almost" sisters, Heather.)

Then I decided to get really brave and dye my hair brown. Haha. This was how brave I ended up being. (Sorry these are fuzzy, they were taken with my phone and then uploaded onto facebook back in the day when it was a big deal to have a camera on your phone and actually be able to get them on the computer.)

 

You can see that it wasn't as drastic of a change as I thought at the time. 

Because then came:

WHOAH! HUGE LIFE CHANGE! 

I was no longer blond, and I no longer had "long" hair. 

This lead to a new stage in my hair. This was also right before the semester that David and I met. He has only ever known "Brown haired- Shantel". 

I ended up trying out some extremes after that. 

Here is my "I have brown hair!" phase.

  

(Please forgive my gross appearance, I had been stranded on the side of the New Jersey Turnpike for over 13 hours at this point. This was the only picture that I could find where you could see the dark hair really well.)

Here is my "Red-Hair Phase."  (Complements of Melissa Hulse.)

And then my  "Gothic Phase".

Okay, okay. This was actually from my freshman year of college when I dressed up as a gothic for a documentary on discrimination. I couldn't resist putting it in. 

This is where I have been for the last little while:

It looks really gold here, but it is actually a nice shade of brown (I haven't dyed it for over a year.)

And here is where I am today! 

  

Literally. You can see the class of students hard at work behind me. These photos were taken with PhotoBooth on the consultant computer I am sitting on while I am at work. (Just one more reason why Macs are better than PCs.)

Anyway... I really like it. I am really happy with the way that it turned out. I just needed a change. I used to have this really weird quirk that whenever I would break up with a boy I would have to change my hair. Even if it was a simple trim, or a slight color weave. I needed it to feel like I was prepared to move on and face the world with a new perspective. I know that probably doesn't make sense, but it was true! I did it almost unconsciously. I never had the thought, "Well... now that [insert boys name here] and I are broken up, I better go get my haircut!" But I always seemed to end up with a new hairstyle within just a couple of weeks. Some of my friends teased me about it when David and I were getting married. They were worried that I would be stuck with the same hairstyle for the rest of my life! 

However, I have found that getting my haircut provides the same motivation to pick myself up and move on in other areas of my life. Not just dating. I have been struggling with my student teaching a bit, and even though I love the kids... I have been getting really frustrated. However, I have a new haircut... which means that I am a new person. All of my frustrations were left with the split-end clippings on the beauty shop floor. I have the power and motivation to succeed. 

I realize that none of you really care about this, so don't feel obligated to leave a comment... (even though I have been reduced to begging for comments to validate the existence of this blog.) This was more for me than it was for anyone else. I just need to keep telling myself to focus, laugh, and love this time of life.

Underprepared....

I know that I shouldn't be wasting my time writing this blog. But I am in desperate need of something to relieve my boredom. Unfortunately, no one has updated their Facebook in the last 10 minutes and I have already stalked all 100 blogs (personal, crafty, food, photo... you name the blog.. i've read it in the last 3 hours) that I have on my blog roll.

A waste of time? No! I have found inspiration, laughter, love, hope, and happiness.

I now have 5 dinner ideas I'm desperate to try out. I have three baby shower gift ideas that I think will turn out fabulously.

Have I written any lesson plans? Yes! (Three of them.) Did I write ALL of the lesson plans that I planned on writing/need to write tonight? No. Not even close.

I am really struggling with being prepared. I got stuck when I was starting the Dairy Unit with the Foods I class, and haven't been able to catch up. Class is going well... and I have been blessed enough to be able to pull everything off without feeling like an idiot. But I feel like I am constantly under prepared until right before class is starting, and then I can pull it all together.

However, like I said... my student teaching experience is going really well. I am learning a lot, and LOVE being up in front of the class.  At first it really weirded me out to have the students call me Mrs. Peaden. But now I LOVE it. "Mrs. Peaden? Are we cooking today?  Mrs. Peaden? Jason is touching me. Mrs. Peaden, Mrs. Peaden, Mrs. Peaden!" I LOVE it. It makes me so happy and I love telling all the little eighth grade girls about my dashing and wonderful husband. You would think that our love story was the cutest chick flick that they had ever seen. It's so fun!

I realize that I should be doing lesson plans instead of writing this blog right now, but I have declared myself finished for the night, and now have 15 minutes to get ready for bed before lights out.

Hidden Valley Ranch.

David and I love ranch. Hidden Valley Ranch to be specific. No other ranch will suffice. Simply put, Hidden Valley Ranch tastes the way ranch is supposed to taste. 

  

Many of you know this, most of you however, don't understand the extent of our devotion. We eat ranch with most everything: veggies, pizza, spaghetti, salad, chicken, macaroni noodles, you name it. Needless to say, we go through ranch at a fairly rapid rate. Before we even got married, we started buying all of our food together. After going through an entire bottle of ranch in a shockingly small amount of time, we decided to set a life goal together.  Someday we will have our own hidden valley ranch commercial. 

Sounds far fetched? Give me a break. You remember Jared right? And now Christine with her "drive-thru diet." 

 

Why shouldn't David and I someday become the spokespeople for Hidden Valley? 

So what did we do? We have started numbering each bottle of ranch that we buy at the store. I regret to inform you that we did not get any pictures with the first five bottles, but I can guarantee that they were numbered! Our eventual goal is to contact Hidden Valley with hundreds of pictures of us using their product throughout our lives together in hopes that they won't be able to say no to giving us our own commercial. Just picture it "Music playing in the background. Thousands around the nation buy Hidden Valley Ranch every day because they and their families can taste the difference, but one family would accept no substitute for the very best ranch around... and they documented their dedication to Hidden Valley through the last 50 years they have spent together. Flip to a shot of David and Shantel. David says, "Before we even got married we vowed to never buy a brand of ranch that wasn't hidden valley. It was part of my promise to give Shantel the absolute best that she deserves." (Or something really cheesy like that.)

Okay, Okay, I'll spare you the rest of what will someday be an award winning advertising campaign. Maybe we will even get a spot during the super bowl!  

Here are some pictures of us with our beloved ranch bottles.

And then of course from our "European Adventure" (we are trying to capture our Hidden Valley Ranch in context.)

Please try not to be disgusted at how much ranch we consume. Just be impressed with our foresight. This is our brilliant get-rich-quick scheme (minus the quick part). But if we are going to be eating the ranch anyway... we may as well document it and then try to get paid for it later! (At the very least, we may end up in the Guinness Book of World Records!)