Butler University

Mark your territory

ChristinaL — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:05:01 GMT

Chalking for Homecoming Queen and King candidates: it gets intense in the high traffic areas like Star Fountain!

Betsy is Shirley my Queen!

ChristinaL — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:03:18 GMT

So my best friend Betsy is an RA in Ross Hall, and as the reigning female senior of the building, she has the honor of being their Homecoming Queen candidate. Here is the most popular means of advertising your candidacy at Butler: chalking!

Butler Request Live

ChristinaL — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 02:00:39 GMT

In honor of the retro music theme, we had a special Homecoming event this year called "MTV Butler" with a whole bunch of different MTV-like games and contests. One of the activities was making a thirty second music video. My Little Sis from my sorority is in this one, rocking the shades - she was embarassed but the video turned out to be really funny!

Homecoming fanny packs

ChristinaL — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 01:57:24 GMT

So, our Homecoming theme this year is retro music and one of the free giveaways were these oh-so-lovely fanny packs. Stylin!

BU101 tour - Hinkle

ChristinaL — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 01:49:19 GMT

Obviously one of the most important stops on the BU101 tour is Hinkle Fieldhouse, the home of our beloved basketball team. It is a pretty comprehensive tour... sports, recreation, academic buildings, residence life, student union... I think you get it all!

BU101 Tour - Pharmacy

ChristinaL — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 01:39:08 GMT

One of the stops on the BU101 tour I gave was the Pharmacy Building... lots of Pharm majors here!

WISH TV at No Doubt

ChristinaL — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 22:00:04 GMT

My housemate Meg is an intern at WISH TV, and at the concert we ran into Scott, who hosts a music show for the station. He remembered Meg from when they worked together at the 500 Festival! That was our closest celebrity encounter for the night.

MOOSE!

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:58:01 GMT

Here's the whole mighty Moose family - we've really grown in recent years! Below me, you can seemy branch of the family - my little sister Jackie, and my little-little Stephanie! I won't name all the rest because there are just so many Mooses but I love them alll. Aren't our antlers cool? : ) That's one of our traditions. We always wrap up Big/Little Reveal with family bonding over moose cookies and milk and some moose tracks ice cream.

Family night at Pi Phi

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:56:00 GMT

One fun part of the new member process is finding out who your Big Sis is! This is an older member of the chapter who serves as a mentor for one of our new Pi Phis. We "reveal" the sister pairings at a fun night full of songs, games, and sugar! An old Pi Phi tradition is the cookieshine where we pass around a huge cookie, and everyone takes a piece and makes a wish while the rest of us sing Pi Phi songs. It's very cute and a fun way to welcome the new members to the families. All the beautiful ladies in blue are from my family - the Mooses!

The Spice Girls, live at Hinkle Fieldhouse

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:52:29 GMT

One of my initiatives for Panhel, the group which oversees all the sororities, is for us to be a united force of women supporting women. So, I organized a fun evening for all the sorority women at a BU women's basketball game which was on ESPN. The theme was "Spice Up the Night! Girl power for women's basketball" and we had a Spice Girls costume contest and Spice Girl themed games (the sing-a-long was very popular).

Here I am with a full set of all 5 Spice Girls from Pi Phi. I had to be Scary because of my curly hair... my roomie Kim even went all out and dyed her hair red to be Ginger!

The event was SO much fun and it was the largest turnout at a women's basketball game in YEARS... success!

FREE breakfast at Denny's

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:47:49 GMT

Back in February, Denny's offered free Grand Slam breakfasts to anyone who came in after 6 am. We got there at 6:15 and the line was already out the door... and the place was packed with BU students! Here we are devouring every college student's favorite: free food!

My Greek family at Initiation!

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:45:26 GMT

My little sis Jackie and her little sis (my grand little!) Stephanie at initiation for Pi Phi. Part of this special day is letters and Pi Phi presents for our new members.

Bringing home the bling

ChristinaL — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 20:42:01 GMT

For the Student Foundation, exec members and a few other leaders in the group get to go to our regional conference where we meet students from other schools who also work with alumni and promote campus spirit. We swap ideas, learn new strategies... and compete for awards! BUSF cleaned up at least year's conference at Michigan State, and this year in Cincinnati we also took home several awards including Outstanding internal programming, Outstanding Advisor and Outstanding Student (all of which we won last year, too!). It's pretty cool that Butler student orgs hold our own against schools like Ohio State and Wisconsin.

Crazy new members on Bid Day

ChristinaL — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 03:35:50 GMT

So, the new members of Butler's sororities find out what house they are in; then they go to a ceremony in the student union where the Recruitment Counselors reveal what houses they are part of and then... they all come RUNNING out of Atherton Union to join their new sisters on Rowdy Row. It is insanity, but so much fun.

The best thing about Paris - chocolate!

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:19:32 GMT

If you asked me what my favorite thing I did in Paris was, I would definitely reply "Walking around and eating!"

With so many cute cafes and dessert shops, you can achieve both of these joys simultaneously. When I was wandering around the classy Ile de St Louis, I saw this little chocolate and caramel tart in a window and had to stop and by it. I'm not sure which was more cute - the dessert or the street I bought it on - but I DO know that it ranked in the Top 5 desserts of my entire life. Mmmmmmm!

Christmas at Notre Dame in Paris

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:16:20 GMT

They have lots of lights in Europe for Christmas, but this was the first legitimate decorated Christmas tree that I found, and how appropriate that it was in front of Paris' most famous and lovely cathedral? We got to see a free Christmas concert inside the church - what a cool experience.

Eiffel Tower at night

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:13:27 GMT

My last trip before I came back home to the States was a weekend in Paris with my girls! The city was really beautiful with all the Christmas lights - but of course nothing can outshine the Eiffel Tower at night! I went up inside the tower at night and got to see not only the panoramic view of Paris, but the interior of the tower as it sparkled with white lights on the top of the hour!

It's blue with yellow stars right now to look like the flag of the European Union - France holds the EU presidency for 6 months.

Sleeping with 11 other people (aka life in a hostel)

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:10:25 GMT

Sleeping in the same room as other people really doesn't bother me. I had my own room growing up, but at Pi Phi, I sleep in our cold dorm which has forty of our beds in one dark, quiet, wonderful room, and during the summer I sleep on gym floors with 150 other students from my drum and bugle corps.

So, when it comes to travelling, I am totally down with staying in youth hostels, which are super cheap and fun accomodations for the young and cheap study abroad/backpacker crowd. However, hostels usually have dorm-style bedrooms where you have a bunk bed and a locker and you share with random strangers from around the world. This is a unique experience that is part of almost everyone's study abroad adventures, but definitely something different for most people. I thought I would give you a peek at the bunks in my favorite hostel that I stayed in - Palmer's Lodge in London (SO nice! stay there!).

Amazing sunset in Bath, England

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 14:04:53 GMT

So, I didn't take too many pictures in England because, well, there really is very little sunlight and even though it is quite a fun place it looks a little dreary in photos.

However, when I was at the Roman baths in Bath (adorable town where Jane Austen used to live - the Hollywood of 19th century England) I saw this beautiful sky and had to take a photo. If you're ever in England, I highly recommend Bath - it's very cute and the people are so nice.

Picnic on top of a castle

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 13:28:14 GMT

In many ways, being a study abroad student living with a host family was like being in first grade again. We went on field trips almost every week, and for those days our mamas would pack us lunches with sandwiches and juice boxes, which we would of course compare to see who got the best ones.

When we went to the Alcazar in Segovia, which is supposedly one of the castles which inspired Disney, we climbed up to the top of the tower (the stairs were brutal!) and then sat down and had a picnic lunch on top of the castle. You know, just a regular day in Spain.

The sand castle cathedral

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 03:05:08 GMT

Have you ever made those drippy sand castles with wet sand before? That's kind of what la Sagrada Familia cathedral in Barcelona looks like! It was designed by the innovative modernismo architect Antionio Gaudi, who made it his life masterpiece and lived and worked there for years up until his death in 1926. These days it is STILL a work in progress - only about a third of it is done! However, when it is finished, you can bet that it will be one of the most unique and inspiring churches in the world.

Angels with swords

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 03:01:23 GMT

This is Valle de los Caidos, the church/"memorial" that Franco (the fascist dictator) supposedly built in honor of those who died in the Spanish civil war... actually it appears that he built it more as his own tomb. He and the other biggest leader of fascism, Jose Antonio, are buried in this creepy bulding which has now windows and is kind of like a giant masoleum. As you walk along the dark hallways to their tombs, angels with swords loom over you. CREEPY.

Soaking wet

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 02:57:32 GMT

We decided to have a picnic lunch out in the gardens of El Escorial palace... then it started pouring rain. Oops.

El Escorial

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 02:54:29 GMT

Yet another of the many royal palaces that we visited this semester. It made a nice day trip (about two hours from Alcala) and we met some cool students from Montana while scaling one of the walls! (please notice the foreboding clouds in the sky, though.)

Flamenco!

ChristinaL — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 02:15:41 GMT

In Cordoba, we went to a flamenco show! The dancers were AMAZING, the musicians were great and the costumes were very cool. Definitely one of my favorite nights out in Spain.