Start of the year

I am alive...I promise! The past few weeks have been so busy with school just around the corner. I've been studying for my Italian proficiency exam (which I took last Wednesday). I am praying that all went well and that I passed and one less part of the doctoral process is behind me. I am now in full blown study/read mode. Comps are JUST around the corner and everyday I get a little sicker thinking about it. To top it all off, Hubby is gone this week to Beaver's Bend State Park as his firm is re-designing most of their camp grounds and such. Thus, Miss Mia and I are here to fend for ourselves as I get ever closer to October. I pray daily, sometimes hourly, that God will get me through all of this, and more importantly my family with my focus directed somewhere else.

So this is where I'm spending almost all of my time, in the OU Bizzell Library.
This library was one of the reasons I chose OU. As a historian, libraries are your home away from home. I needed a library or libraries with many of my primary sources and the ability to get whatever I needed. OU definitely offered that, espically given my area of focus.
This is the Great Reading Room of OU. My heart skipped a beat when I walked into this room. It had all the charm and character of the Great reading rooms Hubby and I saw on our trip to England and felt VERY out of place in Oklahoma. My nephew says it looks like it should be in Harry Potter & I must agree. I have my own little office in the library b/c I am a Ph.D student, but I still like to haul a few of my books down to the reading room and read. The best day in this room are the days when it rains. I can hear the rain drops slowly going down the windows. It is a small slice of heaven for a book nerd like me!