I told you so you’d see how this whole world was made for you, how it warms when you smile and aches when you hurt. I told you so you could stop being afraid.

I graduated from the University of Iowa with a Journalism & Mass Communication major, English minor, and Fundraising & Philanthropy Communication certificate last month! Commencement was on December 16, 2017, which means I've officially been unemployed for one month today. Yay!

In all honesty, this is such a confusing time in my life. I've never experienced such boredom and relaxation, fear and anxiety, or just overall uncertainty. From one day to the next, I experience such a range of feelings and emotions. One day I'm totally relaxed and enjoying this period of rest and time off, and the next I feel like such a failure for not having found a job yet. Plus a variety of other feelings in between. Through it all, I'm just trying to stay optimistic!

Over the holidays, it was nice to kind of kick back and not worry about not having a job because I was enjoying time at home with my family. But now that I'm back in Iowa City, Ik now I need to stay focused and productive. I spend my Mondays and Wednesdays at my internship for the Iowa City UNESCO City of Literature and the other three weekdays browsing jobs online and following up with previous applications I've submitted. I try to give myself a break on the weekends, but I still find my mind wandering and uneasy, my fingers itching for my laptop to look for more jobs to apply. No matter how much I search or how long I look, I still feel like I'm not being productive enough, and nothing will be enough until I actually find a job.

I'm making space for the unknown future to fill up my life with yet-to-come surprises.

Wow, it feels good to be back! As you probably noticed, I haven't written for the blog in quite a while. In fact, it's been about two months since my last post. To be honest, I didn't feel the most inspired and creative this summer. I was working full time and usually wanted to do absolutely nothing when I got home at the end of the day. I know I'm going to have to get over that soon, as I'll be (hopefully) working full time after graduation in a few months, but for now I'm glad to headed back to school soon!

I wrapped up my summer internship at the Greater Des Moines Partnership on Tuesday, August 8 and had a lot of mixed feelings about being done. The experience wasn't necessarily what I thought or hoped it would be, but I still learned a lot and met amazing people and worked on incredible projects while I was there. I'm very grateful for the opportunity I had to work there this summer.

I think one of the main reasons I was a little bummed during the first few weeks of my internship is that I missed nannying! I missed my kiddos and hanging out with them every day and doing fun kid things and just having a fun summer with them. Ok, that bummed me out the whole summer and still does. I just really loved nannying and would honestly do it my whole life! But as Mary Poppins knows so well, kids grow up and don't need their nannies forever. I absolutely loved the three summers I spent with the Niggs and would not trade them for anything at all. I'm incredibly excited that I get to see my good ol' nanny kids before I head to school, so we'll get to catch up on everything just like old times.

I want adventure in the great wide somewhere. I want it more than I can tell. And for once it might be grand to have someone understand, I want so much more than they've got planned

I absolutely loved Beauty and the Beast growing up. I still do. Belle is my absolute favorite Disney princess, and I hold this story in such a special place in my heart. When I heard that they were remaking Beauty and the Beast as a live-action movie, I was excited but a little weary. But then they cast Emma Watson as Belle, and I was ecstatic. Add in the rest of the amazingly perfect cast, and I was simply thrilled, though disappointed that I had to wait two years for the movie to be released.

Well, two years have passed, and I finally saw the new Beauty and the Beast last night. I've tried to think of the perfect word or phrase to describe just how amazing the movie was, but nothing really seems to suffice. So I'll say simply what I said when I "checked in" at the movie on Facebook after the credits finished rolling: Wow.

This movie was everything I wanted it to be and more.

Look after my heart—I've left it with you.

Happy Valentine's Day! Ah, the day of love. I love love, don't you? Love in any form just makes me so happy. Today is such a beautiful day: the sun is shining, I'm done with classes by noon, and it's a day to celebrate love! While it's important to celebrate love every day, many people take the opportunity to do it even more today, so why not join them? I want to celebrate my valentines—yes, all of them because a girl can't have just one valentine! There are so many things in my life that I love, and I want to recognize those things today.

{Now Playing: Spotify's Valentine's Day Love playlist—When did they add Ariana Grande and John Legend's version of "Beauty and the Beast" to Spotify?!}

Childhood and adulthood were not factors of age but states of mind.

This week I celebrated my 21st birthday. Holy cow. Can you believe it? I certainly can't!

Every year I seem to get emotional on my birthday. It's not that I'm sad about growing up, though that may certainly be part of it. I think the emotions are more of a combination of excitement and fear and anxiety and happiness and sadness. That makes total sense, right? You may say that I have no right to feel some of those emotions about turning just 21, but I do! I feel them every single year. There's just something about growing up and leaving another year behind and entering a new year in my life that just gives me butterflies and a pit in my stomach all at the same time. I know, I'm overly-emotional; it's just who I am!

For the most part, though, I'm SO excited to be 21! It's a number that means something. In a way it says "I'm finally an adult," but also, "You're still young and have a lot to learn." And I'm perfectly okay with that combination of sentiments. I do feel myself getting more mature and growing up a little bit, though I've always felt pretty mature—maybe it's my old soul. But I also feel like I have the whole world in front of me. There are so many possibilities ahead! I could take this path or that one or one of these over here or one of those over there. Endless possibilities, each one as amazing and exciting as the next. And it's so comforting to know that no matter which I choose, my life will be full of excitement and experience and learning and love.

We all get the exact same 365 days. The only difference is what we do with them.

My first blog post here on sarahndipity was January 6, 2016, and it was all about my resolutions for 2016. It was a great way to start off my blog, and it's been so fun to write my way through the year. Now, however, it's a brand new year! New resolutions are in order.

Everyone has a different take on resolutions. Some swear by them and make them every year while others don't even like the idea. When I was younger, I always made resolutions, simply because I thought that's what you were supposed to do for the New Year. However, I never really took the time to understand what resolutions really were or why people were making them.

I've decided that I love the idea of resolutions. Some people say they don't like resolutions because we should work on bettering ourselves throughout the year. I totally agree! However, I think there's something so magical about the New Year, a time when we feel fresh and new and as though we have a chance at a fresh start. Resolutions are things we can work on throughout the year. If you think of a new resolution in June, there's no reason to start working on that right then in June! We don't have to wait until December 31 and January 1 to think of resolutions and begin them, but this is the prime time to make these changes!

Reflect upon your present blessings—of which every man has many—not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.

2016 was...interesting, to say the least. Many people hated 2016; granted, a lot of negative things did happen this year. A large number of influencers and artists passed away, an election divided our country, and violence and hate continued to tear our world apart. I'm not going to try to sugarcoat it: it was a tough year for a lot of people. But I've never been one to focus on the negative. I always try to see the positive, especially in difficult situations, so I'm looking back at the positive highlights of my own 2016.

—To start 2016, I started this blog! It's been so much fun to do, and I have some great projects in the works for the new year.

—My nephew and godson turned one, and I got to spend another incredible year watching him grow and learn. He also said my name for the first time this year (both as "Rah-Rah" and as "Sarah")!

—I got to go on two amazing trips to New York City. The first was in April with Ed on Campus during which we visited a number of magazines and got to visit with editors. The second was in July for Her Conference, which featured great speakers and workshops. During this trip I also bonded with three Her Campus Iowa girls, and they are now some of my best friends.

What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas...perhaps...means a little bit more!

Christmastime is probably my favorite time of the year. I love everything about the holiday season: time with family, giving gifts, the music, the mood, the food. People are so joyful and kind during the holidays, and while I wish everyone could be this way year-round, it makes me so happy to see others so happy and excited during this time. I also think there's something just so magical about this time of year. As children, we believe in the magic of Santa and winter break and just the whole season. It can be difficult to hold onto that magic as we grow older, but there are ways to recognize that magic and spread it around as we grow up.

While it's fun and exciting to receive presents during the holidays, there's something almost more magical about giving. Taking the time to pick out a gift for someone special that you just know they will love creates so much love and happiness in our hearts. Volunteering to give others a better holiday than they might have had spreads the joy of the season. Spending time with family reminds us of the love we've always known. Traditions show us where we come from and remind us what's important to us during this most wonderful time of the year.

I've put together a list of some of my favorite parts of the holiday season. These are things that help me rediscover the magic I felt as a child during Christmas year after year, even though I'm grown up now. We don't have to lose that magic that we felt as children. Sometimes we just have to be reminded how to find it again.

She was blindly following whatever impulse moved her, as if she had placed herself in alien hands for direction, and freed her soul of responsibility.

It is a time to refresh! There are many reasons to let go and relax a little bit right now, which always helps me to feel refreshed. While I'm not the biggest fan of change, as you know, endings and beginnings can be good and exciting. I've got three exciting and refreshing changes happening right now, so I wanted to share a little bit about them with you.

The semester is over

Another semester at the University of Iowa has come to an end. It's hard to believe that I've finished five semesters at Iowa and only have two left. Having only two semesters left technically makes me a senior, and I've got many mixed emotions about that.

This semester went by so fast, and it may have been my busiest semester yet. While I took fewer semester hours, I also had an internship this semester. Logging on and working during those set hours during the week meant there was less time during the day to do homework, which meant I was doing more of it at night. Overall, my internship was an amazing experience, and I'm so happy that I did it. It's hard to find internships to do during school, so being able to do it remotely worked out perfectly. I didn't post much of my work throughout the semester, so if you want to check out everything I wrote for Her Campus (nationals) during the semester, you can check out my author page.

Maybe it's wiser to surrender before the miraculous scope of human generosity and to just keep saying thank you, forever and sincerely, for as long as we have voices.

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays of the year. Of course it's because of the food. Who can resist a Thanksgiving feast?! But as I've grown older, I've come to appreciate the bigger meaning behind Thanksgiving: giving thanks.

Gratitude is so important for so many reasons. Not only is it important to be grateful; it's also very important to give thanks to those around you who you're thankful for. Make your thanks known!

There are so many amazing things to be thankful for, and there are just as many ways to give thanks for those things and people and experiences you are thankful for. This year I am thankful for...

How wild it was, to let it be.

A couple of weeks ago, my mom and my sister and I went to see Cheryl Strayed speak. Cheryl Strayed is a writer and the author of Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, which is about her experience hiking the PCT. I loved Wild when I read it, but after I heard Cheryl speak, I discovered I relate to her even more than I had previously realized.

Cheryl decided to hike the PCT a couple of years after her mother died. In those years between when her mother passed and when she hiked the PCT, Cheryl's life kind of spiraled out of control. She cheated on her husband, used drugs, and just lived a life she wasn't happy with. As Cheryl put it in her talk, she had decided to continue her life after her mother died in a way that would best honor her. She had decided not to thrive because she couldn't bear the thought of living without her.

Cheryl's absolute love for her mother in as portrayed in Wild is something that I so deeply connected to when I read the book. Simply put: I absolutely love my mother and can't imagine how I would go on without her. Without her mother, Cheryl is simply broken, and I would be the same way if I were to lose my mother.

One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.

Today is a very special day. Today, my sister and her husband have been married for three years. Happy Anniversary, Holly and Seth!

My sister and I made a pact a long time ago that we would both be each other's maid of honor when we both got married. I imagined our wedding days a lot when I was little, but I never expected hers to come so soon.

I remember the day Seth told me that he wanted to propose to Holly. We were in Minnesota for my cousin's graduation party. Seth and Holly were going to Disney World with some of his family the next month, and he wanted to propose in front of Cinderella's castle.

When he told me, my stomach dropped, and my head started spinning. Of course I was so excited for her, so happy for her. But this was my big sister, and everything was about to change for her. If you know me, you know I'm not the biggest fan of change, so while this news was super exciting, it also made me uneasy, nervous.

This had nothing to do with Seth, though. Seth treated my sister so well, and I could tell that they both really loved each other. Again, I'm just not the biggest fan of change, and a wedding is about one of the biggest forms of change there is.

Because even if the whole world was throwing rocks at you, if you still had your mother or father at your back, you’d be okay. Some deep-rooted part of you would know you were loved. That you deserved to be loved.

This week my parents celebrated their 29th wedding anniversary.

{Fun Fact: Other things that happened 29 years ago
        -Dirty Dancing came out
        -The Simpsons premiered
        -Margaret Thatcher was elected as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom for
         the third time
        -The world's population reached five billion.}

Everyone says it, and everyone says it's true when they say it, but my parents are the best parents in the world. I don't care if everyone says it. It's probably as true to them as it is to me. My parents are the best.

Because it's their 29th anniversary and because they're the best parents in the world, I decided to make a list of the most important lessons they've taught me.

The past beats inside me like a second heart.

Grandma's front door.

This past weekend was filled with violence and loss and overwhelming sadness. I don't understand how people can be so cruel and hateful. It just doesn't make sense to me.

In a world where such tragedies happen far too often, I sometimes wonder if I would be better off hearing about them as a child. As children, we didn't truly understand what all of these things meant. We didn't understand hate or violence or cruelty or even death. We understood kindness and friends and acceptance. I wish I still lived in a world where I thought everyone believed in those things, practiced those things, lived those things.

Home wasn't a set house, or a single town on a map. It was wherever the people who loved you were, whenever you were together.

I've always loved being at home. I love hanging out with my family and just being together.

Coming to school last year was really hard. I remember the day I moved in, and honestly, it was probably one of the worst days of my life. To me moving away to school meant that I was leaving home for good, that I would never live at home again. To some this probably sounds amazing, but to me, it was devastating.

After a few days, especially once classes started, I got into a schedule and started to feel better. But I still longed to be at home and with my family.

I still get homesick sometimes. This week, even, I've been missing home a little more than usual.

After almost two years of school under my belt, I've come up with a few things that help me when I'm missing home a little extra.

Call home
Whenever I'm feeling homesick, I make a phonemail home. I usually talk to my mom a lot throughout the week, but when I'm missing home, I give her an extra call. And she always knows just what to say. After talking things through with Mom, I always seem to feel a little better.

Do something familiar
I find that when I'm missing home, doing something that reminds me of home helps. Whether it's watching one of my family's favorite shows on Netflix or reading one of my favorite books, doing something that brings back those homey feelings helps me work my way out of my funk.

Stay busy
Like I said before, once I got into a schedule with classes and student orgs, I didn't really have time to dwell on my feelings of homesickness. By getting involved, you also open yourself up to meet more people and make more friends. Plus, getting involved helps you to get excited about something, so that excitement helps take the focus off of sad feelings.