hello old friend

i bet you thought i had forgotten all about you. 

well perhaps i had but i'm back and that is all that matters right? 

so much as happened since the last time i wrote anything on here but lets focus on the more recent happenings, shall we? more specifically just how crazy this last month has been. 

since coming back from the netherlands i have been able to dive head first into the accounting major which has been fun but scary. starting this senior year i signed up to take the three hardest accounting classes all at the same time. educational suicide may have been the phrase that was tossed out at one point. my reply? bring it on. 

but in the back of my mind i was worried. what if i didn't like accounting as much as i thought i would? then i would be stuck taking a lot of classes i didn't enjoy and might not be doing well in. i had been down that road before with chemistry but this time i would have to finish. 

turns out my fears never materialized and i am loving my classes though they may be difficult. 

but classes have been the least of my worries (hopefully grades don't reflect that) this last month. i wasn't aware of this and i'm sure you weren't either but fall is when many if not all of the firms in the area do their recruiting process for new hires. so the first week of october i was meeting with people from the career center on campus and staying up much later than the rest of my house making sure my resume looked good, i hadn't put the wrong name in my cover letter, and that my applications were complete. i applied to a total of 5 firms ranging from quite small to one of the big 4 accounting firms. as i told the people in the career center, "i just hope i get one interview" 

i got 5. 

after the joy of finding out that i had gotten an interview with every firm i had applied to came a bit of practice and picking out more interview outfits that i ever thought i would need all in preparation for the week straight of interviews i had lined up. it was rather funny coming into work everyday all dressed up and everyone in the office was starting to ask questions on how things were going and who i was meeting with each day. it was great because each firm came to campus to conduct a 30 minute interview just to get to know who we were. 

after the first round came the waiting to see if i had gotten a second round interview with the firm. again i told the people in the career center that all i wanted was one second interview and it would be worth it. 

i got 4. 

each email that came in letting me know that they wanted to see me again and have me visit the actual firm was a welcome surprise. it is not common that people have so many call backs for interviews and i was somehow managing to get nearly all of mine. 

the first second round was a full day with Moss Adams at their office in downtown Seattle. we met many of the people working there and ended the day with a social on the top floor of the Columbia Tower in downtown Seattle. i'm talking 75th floor - can see across the entire state - beautiful clear day amazing. the following day was a full day with Peterson Sullivan and going to delicious lunch and again lots of interviews. i also had a few hours with Bader Martin and Sweeney Conrad later that week.

after round after round of interview and telling countless people my story and learning so much about each firm was the wait to see if any of it had panned out. would the firm and i fit? did i make a good impression? will they want to hire me?

end result? 2 job offers. 

say what.

both Moss Adams and Peterson Sullivan - my top two going into this process - extended me an offer of employment with their firms. after a long weekend of pros and cons lists and many questions to those close to me, i finally made a decision.....

you are looking at a future

Audit Assoicate
at
Peterson Sullivan, LLP!!!!

i am certainly one of the luckiest students, i already have a career lined up for after graduation before the end of fall quarter. wow. it's fantastic and i feel like i have learned so much. who really gets the chance to have so many interviews and so much practice. i actually had a lot of fun and i'm incredibly excited to see how this opportunity goes and it is also amazing to look back and see how things like changing from chemistry, study abroad, and speech & debate have all helped shape me through college and drop me off at accounting of all major options!

now let the senior-itis begin! 

building websites...

for one of my classes i had to build a website for an assignment...

so if you are interested i thought i would share it with you! 

check it out at 

myhome.spu.edu/vandalenl

have a great weekend! 

moving on to new topics

well since we seem to hit the point of no return on ever seeing another Netherlands post i might as well simply move on and update more recent happenings in my life! 

besides school - which does anyone really want to hear about? no i don't think i feel like talking about it either. it's not as thrilling as one may expect. back to what i was saying - besides schoolwork i joined the SPU speech and debate team this year. 

a month ago (yup that far behind) i went with the team to my first tournament at Western Washington University. I had an informative speech prepared and knew that i would be giving it friday evening (which my family got to watch!) and then saturday morning. i figured thats a good soft introduction since i've never done this before. 

however that was not the case. saturday morning one of my teammates asked me if i would be willing to take her place in debate because she was not able to do it. 

ummmm i've never done this......

i've never even practiced......

or attended a team meeting.....

sure? 

so 3 hours later i'm about to receive my first topic. for my first ever debate. without practice. or a coach. or help whatsoever. this should be fun! 

let me just recap what happens for the normal population that doesn't get into arguments for recreational purposes. They announce the pairings and both people go up to receive a list of 5 topics. taking turns they each choose one they don't want to debate until there is only left. then each person goes their separate ways and have 20 to 30 minutes (depending on the hosting college) to prepare arguments and get information using the internet, teammates, coaches, or whatever is available. then the round begins. The set up of speaking times is simply like so:

Affermative - 5 minutes

Cross examination from Negative - 2 minutes

Neg - 6 minutes

Cross examination from Aff - 2 minutes

Aff - 3 minutes

Neg - 5 minutes

Aff - 3 minutes

the first day I had 4 debates and felt down about all of them. the following day were 2 more and then the elimination rounds. for each round there were 4 of us that would prep together but our coach was in a different building so it was just us or sometime we were all on our own. in order to advance to elimination rounds you must win more than you have lost. 

shockingly out of the 4 of us that were debating i was the only one who made it to the next round! 

the entire team was there to help my prepare but i was shaking as i thought i had lost all 6 of the normal rounds. as it turns out i won 4 of 6 specifically the first 3 rounds!! that was certainly a huge confidence boost and gave me no way to tell my coach that i still didn't want to do it. 

i lost my last round by a 2 - 1 decision so at least i won one of the judges over! 

needless to say i was surprised and excited to see that i did so well for never practicing or even knowing what to do. maybe it just comes from having 3 siblings.... whatever it is i'm excited to see if i can get better!