Congrats, you must be the only female on this site!
The Hakko FX-888 is great, but if you're worries about it being shipped in time, i would recommend trying to search out an electronics store near your area. I'm not very experienced with lots of different soldering stations, but the two main ones seem to be Hakko's and Weller's. Two key things to look out for; make sure it has an adjustable temperature knob, and make sure that it has a seperate base station that the iron attaches to... don't buy one of these irons that has teh temperate control built right into the iron itself; they're crap!
Good luck.