Fall in Florida ☀️

The past few weeks has flown by since my last post! I've been hanging out with my coworkers a lot lately! We've gone bowling, a few of us went out to a piano bar at one of the resorts, we've gone to the Food and Wine Festival again (I had a sip of a really delicious grapefruit beer) and watched the Illuminations fireworks show at Epcot, painted miniature pumpkins, and tonight some of us got together and watched Halloween movies! Everyone brought candy, snacks and drinks. SO many snacks! It's weird because it's so warm here and the leaves don't change colors so it doesn't really seem like fall, but it has been fun to do some fall activities with my coworkers!

Bowling at Splitsville!

Sco ducks!!!!

Last weekend on one of my days off, a friend and I went for a hike and swim at a local state park called Wekiwa Springs! The hiking trail was interesting because most of the trail was sand. The trail went around to a few different lakes and there were a bunch of different trails, some of which went to campgrounds. Also the main attraction there was a natural springs swimming area! It was so pretty and it was the perfect day for a swim. It was so nice to be out of the Disney bubble for a day and explore Florida a bit!

Wekiwa Springs

Let's hike!

The water was so pretty

Peace out, thanks for the great day

STOKED

I sure miss having my car! It's the little things like getting a ride home from work that make my days better. One night one my coworker Enrico gave me a ride home after a long day at work. I had just found out that he is studying opera and getting his master's degree at LSU, so I wanted him to show me some of the songs he listens to and sings! Picture this: two Disney employees stoked to be off work, windows rolled down, driving on the freeway, with French opera blaring out the speakers and Enrico singing at the top of his lungs. It was quite the memorable car ride home. He is such an amazing singer! I told him that one day when he is famous I'm going to come see one of his shows and hold up a sign that says "I worked with him at Disney!!!" :) (Thanks for letting me post this clip, Rico)

Back in August I found out about a mentoring program through American Speech-Language-Hearing Association called the STEP Mentoring program. I applied, and got paired with a speech-language pathologist mentor! The program started in the beginning of October and continues through the spring. It has been helpful to connect with an SLP and get advice and help applying to schools and figuring out what path I want to take with my career! In the program you set goals and your mentor helps to make sure you are on track in achieving those goals. I'm really glad I found out about the program. I also let my friend Nathan know about it, and he is currently a senior at UO in the program that I graduated from. He got a mentor as well! My mentor is from Michigan and went to school there, and she currently lives in Texas and does home visits and works with families, and also supervises SLPA's. I've been able to ask her about working as an SLPA - which is something I want to do when I get back home after my college program here - and she has provided me with a lot of info!

One thing I like to do to make the bus rides go faster is read on my kindle. I've finished 4 books since I've been here. The two I liked best are Wild:From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed and Ghost Boy by Martin Pistorius. Wild is about a woman's thousand plus mile hike on the Pacific Crest Trail, and it was made into a major motion picture film starring Reese Witherspoon. I saw the movie last spring and then found out it was a book. I definitely recommend it! Ghost Boy is about a boy who became sick at age 12 and was diagnosed with a degenerative disease which left him wheelchair-bound and unable to communicate. It details his struggles in different care homes, his journey back to consciousness, and his amazing progress with augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). Told by Martin himself, this amazing real life story is so inspirational!!

Other misc. pics/video:

A few cool pictures that a friend took of Epcot from a plane



Bird's eye view

Some live music at a bar in Orlando!