This Never Happened Before

Brian Regan Live in Concert!

2012-01-21T23:06:00.003-07:00

My favorite (clean!) comedian, Brian Regan, has a series of shows in Salt Lake this month. My roommate got tickets from her parents for Christmas, and I was the lucky one who got to go with her!

We had such a good time. We laughed for almost 2 hours straight, which was GREAT stress relief, although very exhausting as well!

Me and Taylor before the show!

Sweet sculpture in Abravanel Hall in Salt Lake

Looking Back

2011-12-31T14:37:00.000-07:00

Highlights of 2011

What a year! Just reminiscing on some of my favorite happenings..

I always love the beach :)

Thirteen consecutive weeks of going on one date every week, asking the boy out for all but 3 of those dates.

Making kites with Matt

Made some of my best friends, Team 113:

Danie, Yandhi, Rachel and Taylor

Met and ate dinner with Matt the Meese

Turned 21-- and still no alcohol ;)

Birthday Dinner

Ran most mornings for a few months straight.

Before my first 5K

Sara graduated!

First time holding hands. First kiss. First boyfriend. First break-up.
(About time for all of those, I think!)

Eating at Porter's Place

Watched many of my good friends leave on full-time missions:

Clay, Ashley, Erika, Conrad, Christine, Matt, Nate, and Mikey.

My sister came to BYU, too, and my parents came to visit us in Utah.

Saw Taylor Swift in concert!

Got on academic warning with a 1.8 GPA.
Got off academic warning with a 3.8 GPA.

Dominated my dreaded Econ 110 class with an A.

Lost a total of 40 lbs!

The Power of Scripture

2011-12-05T09:44:00.001-07:00

In October General Conference, Elder Scott gave a message called, "The Power of Scripture." It wasn't one of the talks that immediately impressed me at the time. I've never really liked memorizing scriptures, probably because I didn't think I was good at it. But over the last few months I found myself increasingly turning to the scriptures for comfort and strength. Then I recently went back and re-read Elder Scott's talk. I realized that I had discovered the truth of his words for myself. When we memorize scriptures, they truly become friends that we can call upon at any time.

As Elder Scott says, "They can become stalwart friends that are not limited by geography or calendar. They are always available when needed."

"Learning, pondering, searching, and memorizing scriptures is like filling a filing cabinet with friends, values, and truths that can be called upon anytime, anywhere in the world."

"To memorize a scripture is to forge a new friendship. It is like discovering a new individual who can help in time of need, give inspiration and comfort, and be a source of motivation for needed change."

"Pondering a passage of scripture can be a key to unlock revelation and the guidance and inspiration of the Holy Ghost."

"Scriptures... have the power to heal emotional challenges when there is faith in the Savior."

There are so many verses that I've gone back to over and over again to find peace and direction. Sometimes it was a very familiar scripture that took on new power or meaning. There were also completely new scriptures that I discovered. I've written them down and I keep them where I can see them often (like the desktop of my computer).

I know God will speak directly to us through the scriptures if we listen to the Spirit. It's been an amazing and wonderful to experience it for myself. I love this gospel!

My Road Through Hell

2011-11-16T10:40:00.001-07:00

I take my inspiration today from a favorite blog of mine, Single Dad Laughing. This week he re-posted one of his previous posts. It's called The Thousand Roads Through Hell. It's good stuff if you're interested in reading it.

If not, I'll share here some of the things he said which were most meaningful to me, though it really is better if you read his whole post. :)

"Hell is different for everyone, and everyone must walk through it from time to time. Thank God for that...

"And, how many times have I been overwhelmed with gratitude for the desperation that resulted from it all? Thousands. Maybe tens of thousands….

"You see, every single noteworthy or remarkable thing I have achieved or done as an adult has been directly related to the moments when I was finally able to let go of that dark past and heal myself. Without all of it, I would be a weak excuse for a man...

"I really do believe I was lucky. Fate was smiling on this lump of a man as it dragged me bloody behind its speeding carriage...

"At the end of every road you will reach the edge of hell. When you take that last step from the darkness, the most beautiful things you could possibly imagine will be there...

"What we can choose is to keep walking. We can choose to look at the flames in front of us and maneuver our way through them. We can move forward with blind faith that there is always something good at the end of our road...

"Choose one road, any road, and start running. Run full speed and do not stop. Do not look back. Do not worry that you have made a wrong choice.

"The future will seem uncertain. It will seem unsafe. But you have to keep running. You must run until turning back is impossible. Only then will you see the beauty that sits on the horizon."

------------------

After my break up, I found myself in my own personal hell, faced with the choice of what I was going to do about it. At first, I tried as hard as I could to avoid the pain. I thought I was the exception, that I could be different. I kept starting down one road, finding that it was hard, and turning back. Trying to find the easiest way. But I only kept hurting and hurting over and over. I didn't realize then that the only way out of hell is through it.

One day, after another painful, failed attempt to take the easy way out, I finally accepted the fact that I would have to get through it the hard way, like everyone else. So I got on my path and started running as hard as I could. I'll admit that I still turned back and couple of times, and every time I was singed by the waiting flames. But each time that happened it gave me the motivation to keep moving forward.

But the strangest thing I've discovered through it all is that I have never felt closer to heaven than when I was going through hell. Something bigger than me got me out of bed every day; gave me the strength to go to school and work; helped me focus on my studies; sent me the right people exactly when I needed them; and, most importantly, gave me the courage to forgive so that I could let go.

"My people must be tried in all things, that they may be prepared to receive the glory that I have for them, even the glory of Zion; and he that will not bear chastisement is not worthy of my kingdom."
(Doctrine and Covenants 136:31)

God doesn't give us anything that we can't handle-- with his help. And he is there to help. Waiting, with open arms for us to accept his help.

"During your times of trial and suffering when you see only one set of footprints,
it was then that I carried you."

(Carolyn Carty, Footprints)

That is what I am most grateful for this Thanksgiving. A loving Heavenly Father and the reality of the Atonement of Jesus Christ.

Two Sleepless Nights

2011-10-19T13:48:00.001-06:00

[Unfortunately, I was editing this post and accidentally deleted the original content. I've re-posted it with what I can remember from before.]

I have debated and debated and debated again with myself whether or not to make this post. I was afraid it would make me too vulnerable. I was afraid people wouldn't appreciate it as much as I did. I usually don't like the idea of posting something that's so emotionally significant to me. But I want to share it and sometimes it feels like I need to share it.

I have recently been through my first break up. Just a week and a half prior to breaking up with me, he kissed me for the first time. As a result of these two events, I experienced in rather quick succession two very different sleepless nights. The idea intrigued me, and that idea of "two sleepless nights" kept coming back to me. I finally sat down and put my thoughts and feelings down in a poem.

And somehow, it helped. It helped me sort my feelings out and put them into a lyrical form that expressed them almost exactly how I felt them, and gave me a way to confront them more directly.

"The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul. No matter our talents, education, backgrounds, or abilities, we each have an inherent wish to create something that did not exist before... Creation brings deep satisfaction and fulfillment... One of the ways we find [eternal happiness] is by creating things."

~President Uchtdorf

And so, this is the result of that creation.

Two Sleepless Nights

The first one, I must admit, occured

When cetain wonderful feelings were stirred

By a kiss on the lips, my first one received!

I was thrilled with the prospect I'd finally achieved.

The long-'waited moment had suddenly come,

And there I stood shaking; I'd finally won!

Did it mean what I hoped? He seemed so sincere.

I trusted him fully, left no room for fear.

That first sleepless night I spent in a daze.

Mind spinning and buzzing, it passed in a haze.

I arose the next day, wondered if it was real,

And much to my pleasure, things continued ideal.

The second of two happened several days later.

We went for a walk, I suspected no traitor.

I talked for an hour, he gave me no sign,

That we were approaching the finishing line.

At the words that he spoke, "Our timing is off.

I just want to be friends," I wanted to scoff!

To him, all I'd given still wasn't enough...

But at least I could finally see through his bluff.

That last sleepless night I spent in a daze.

Mind spinning and buzzing, it passed in a haze.

I arose the next day, wished it wouldn't be real,

But I knew in my heart, I knew, I would heal.

Luau, Taylor leaves, and Bridal Veil Falls

2011-09-13T11:45:00.000-06:00

I can't believe it's been that long since I last blogged, but it has! Lots has happened since then, so I'll do a (somewhat) quick update.

I went to a Luau with my roommate, Lynn on Aug 5. It was really awesome. We envied the way all the girls could move their hips, drooled over the males dancers, and were wowed by the fire knife dancer.

Fire!

Roomies

Guys in skirts... surprisingly attractive

See above :)

The night after that I watched the final installment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, Return of the King. I think that I need to re-watch all of them now and pay better attention. Extended versions maybe?? :)

The next afternoon I went to dinner at the Vanfleets (our family friends in town; my "BYU Family"), and Evan came as well. They wanted to get to know him better, and it went well. They always serve a delicious dinner, and I love their family! They're so much fun!

The following week my friend, Erika, got her mission call to Poland. It was an interesting week for her, as she got hit by a truck on her bike the previous weekend. She was miraculously protected from any major injury, and was able to walk away minimal injuries. I guess that she is really needed on her mission in Poland!

After the mission call opening, some friends and I went to the duck pond, then to Wendy's, and tehn watched The Count of Monte Cristo. I'd never seen the movie before, but I loved the book when I read it in high school. Reminded me of how excellent a story it is.

The next night was a sad one for me and a lot of my good friends. Taylor, one of those good friends, was leaving us to go home for a few weeks before she moved to Idaho to attend BYU-I there. We spent the night at a Relief Society closing social, and then Evan worked on Taylor's car for a while to make sure it was ok to drive to Salt Lake.

Eating tons of otter pops the night before she left...

Later that night, when she was safely on her way, he and I drove up to the Provo temple and climbed up the hill behind it and sat talking for a while. I love having a temple so close!

Friday night was date night up at Evan's parents' house. Evan's car needed to be washed, so we did that as our activity, and then had dinner with his parents. We came back to his apartment and watched an episode of Psych, then watched Toy Story 3 which Evan had never seen. I love that movie! I had a great night with Evan, too. :)

On the following Monday, Evan had the day off so when I got off my morning shift he and I went for a hike up Bridal Veil Falls. It was lots of fun, and the first time I've done it. We got pretty darn soaked, especially my shoes, but had a lot of fun doing it!

Stinker.

Hard to see, but he's can be cute when he wants to

After climbing up to the falls

Standing in the mist

From the bottom after our hike

We went home and changed clothes, then went out to eat at Red Robin. It was my first time eating there, and I really enjoyed it! We got fancy lemonades and limeades to drink, and delicious burgers, and best of all, SWEET POTATO FRIES!! Yum! That night we watched Mall Cop for FHE. It's one of Evan's favorites. Reminded me of the stupid humor of Napoleon Dynamite and Nacho Libre that I so love. :)

The rest of the week was full of work, and there wasn't time for much else.

Cemeteries, Dutch Ovens, Dinos, and Bonfires

2011-08-05T17:04:00.026-06:00

I've been on quite a few fun dates and activities lately, and thought I'd share a little of what's been going on.

Last Thursday was our ward closing social. We met at our bishop's house and had dinner made by the first counselor in our bishopric-- he's a Dutch oven competition cook, always wins, and his stuff is delicious! We jumped on the trampoline and swung on the swings and played a few games. When it got dark, they showed Tangled on a projector in the backyard. It was so much fun to spend time with everyone and have one last hurrah before the semester ends in a couple weeks.

Me and Taylor eating dinner

Me and Evan in the background...

except you can't see his face because he put his foot up

And our good friend Erika making the silly face :)

Last Friday night, Evan took me to the Provo Cemetery to just walk around and talk. I love cemeteries for some unexplainable reason (I discovered this love for cemeteries when I went to Arlington National Cemetery a few summers ago), so he took me because he thought I'd enjoy it, and I did! We looked at all the cool gravestones, looking for the oldest one we could find. I think the oldest one we found was one from the 1850s (Provo was founded in 1849). Crazy! They have little plaques on all the original pioneers' graves, which were also cool to see. I think I like cemeteries because they are so peaceful and give you opportunity to think about life. I had a few moments where I got close to tears when we were walking through the area they have dedicated to infant graves. I just felt the overwhelming grief of the parents at losing their babies, mostly because of the sweet messages left on their gravestones. We also got barked at by the cemetery caretaker's dogs. It was really an unusual date, but a great one nonetheless. :)

Monday night, Evan invited me to go with him to a family get-together. They own some land up in the mountains in Eagle Mountain (they call it West Canyon) and every once in a while they go up there and have dinner together. I got to meet his parents, grandparents, and all of his siblings and their spouses and kids. I really had a great time and enjoyed their company. The food was great: Dutch oven chicken, ribs, and cobbler made by his mom, broccoli salad, potato salad, and homemade rolls. Evan took me for a ride on their four-wheeler and teased me by almost driving straight through a mud puddle. Then they got a fire going and we all sat around it and they played guitars and sang campfire songs. It was awesome! Evan and I got a little bit of teasing for cuddling next to the fire, but they're not half as bad at the teasing as our friends are.

Tuesday night, we doubled with my friend Taylor who is dating Evan's roommate Jordan. We went to American Fork for dinner at Chick-fil-a and then went to the dinosaur museum up at Thanksgiving Point in Lehi. We only had about 40 minutes in the museum, but it was lots of fun anyway, and we got some fun pictures. After they kicked us out, we ended up going to a nearby park to swing on the swings and talk, then laid in the soft grass looking at the stars. It was a nice, low-pressure, fun date, and I had a really good time!

Me, Evan, Taylor and Jordan

Me and Evan.

(The dinosaur in the back makes me think of Night at the Museum lol)

Me standing under a huge dinosaur

Can you imagine being around one of these things when it was alive??

Thursday night, we got a bunch of friends together for a bonfire before Taylor leaves for BYU-Idaho. We got a great group of friends together and went to Evan's grandparents' house in Lehi where they have a bonfire pit in their backyard. Evan got a great fire going almost immediately and we roasted hot dogs, marshmallows and Starburst (yes, Starburst... so good!), and made s'mores. We stayed there for a couple hours, laughing and talking and having a great time with good friends. I'm going to miss these guys when they all leave in the fall!

Evan's fire-building skills

Lincoln longs anyone?

Tay and Jordan not looking

Making faces

Jason trying to keep the mosquitoes away by standing in the smoke

Friends

2011-07-26T20:19:00.003-06:00

I have so many great friends!! Here are a couple things that have happened recently.

I've been saying goodbye to a lot of good friends who've left on missions the last few weeks.

First, my very best friend Ashley left several weeks ago, and I miss her like crazy. But she will be a great missionary, will kick butt at learning Romanian, and I am already loving reading her emails and letters!

Becca, me, Ashley, and Ali the night Ashley got her call

My friend, Conrad, also left the same week. I keep missing him randomly every few days when something reminds me of him. But it's great to get his letters, too, and I know he is just loving the MTC and learning Russian.

Conrad and me a couple months ago at a party

Then, my brother-from-another-mother, Clay, left on his mission a couple weeks ago. I have only gotten one letter from him, but it was nice to hear from him. Hopefully he'll keep up the communication so I don't totally lose track of him for two years. I think he's doing well (haven't heard otherwise).

Saying goodbye at Danielle's wedding

An old friend, DaNae, is leaving on her mission tomorrow. I got to hang out with her for lunch one day recently when she was in town, which was nice to take time to catch up and say goodbye. She's going to Morristown, New Jersey, Spanish speaking. I hope she has a great time!

After eating at our favorite haunt... J Dawg's!

A couple Sundays ago I went up to Salt Lake to have dinner with a bunch of friends. I love these guys! We had a great time and it was so fun.

Top: Ruben, Rachel, Danie, Taylor, Yandhi, Jake

Bottom: Evan (yes, that Evan), me, Sara

On our way home, we stopped by Temple Square so that Sara and Ruben could have a look. I went with them and we got some great pictures:

Also, I've become pretty good friends with my roommate Lynn (which has been very nice, considering the past frustrations I've had with roommates). We've started having "roommate dates" every Saturday where we go get Panda Express and eat it at the duck pond.

And don't forget that one day it was raining and me and my friends danced in the rain and splashed in the puddles and then jumped in the pool in our clothes...

Ruben, Taylor, me, and Lynn

Danie, Taylor, me and Lynn

Life is great!!

All That Dating Finally Paid Off...

2011-07-20T15:59:00.009-06:00

Well, I've been trying to keep this on the down-low up until now (at least on my blog), but I think it's finally reached a point where I can share it safely.

It's official: I have my first boyfriend!

Some of you know about him from me already, but the long story short for the rest of you is this:

-His name is Evan, he's 22 and from Lehi, UT.
-He was my home teacher last fall and winter semesters.
-Our first date was the last weekend of January (as part of my 13 week dating streak). We made tie-dye shirts for each other, which we both still wear.
-He's been my running buddy since the beginning of March. We've been slacking lately, but for a while we ran just about every day.
-I kissed him (my first kiss EVER) the night before I flew home to Florida. He was very surprised, to say the least.
-When I got back from Florida, we started going on more dates and spending more time together to see how it went.
-He held my hand for the first time while we watched The Fellowship of the Ring. Mind you, we weren't even sitting on the same couch. That takes skills.
-My favorite place to go with him is Squaw Peak. (But not for the reason most people go there.) I love the view of the valley up there at night. I don't know that I'll ever get used to the view from the mountains.
-He has yet to kiss me, but that's totally fine with me.
-We've started reading Believing Christ together some nights.
-We also like to watch episodes of Psych with his roommates.
-And we always stay up way too late together. Both of us have been sleep deprived for weeks. :)

That's a pretty good description of our relationship, I think.

Also, I just realized that I don't really have any pictures with him, so I will try to rectify that soon!

In the meantime, here's a silly picture of him:

(He's making that face because I was forcing/convincing him to try a maple doughnut with bacon strips on top. It's really delicious, he just doesn't think so.)

Back in Utah

2011-07-02T16:02:00.000-06:00

On the plane from Phoenix to Salt Lake

A lot of stuff has happened since I've been back in Utah, and it's only been 2 weeks!

I got a new calling... the first Sunday I got back. I was called as the new Relief Society president for my singles' ward. It's definitely been an overwhelming experience so far, but I think once I get used to my new responsibilities that things will seem much more manageable. It's also nice that the ward is small right now because it's summer term, so I get to practice in a smaller setting before the deluge of new students in the fall. It's going to be a great experience!

Sara started classes... just 2 days after we got in town. Luckily, she has her friend Christina out here with her, too, so they've been spending a lot of time together navigating campus and figuring things out for classes and such. I know it's a lot for her to be experiencing at once, but I think she's really enjoying it so far. Most everyone she's met in our ward likes her a lot, so she already has a lot of friends, whether she realizes it or not. It's cool to watch how much she's grown just the last 2 weeks. She's learning a lot more about life and being independent, which is really good for her. I think she's going to love BYU!

Work, work, and more work... I'm not taking classes this term (thank goodness!!), so I've been working upwards of 30 hours a week which is really great for the money, but doesn't leave me with as much time to spend with Sara or my other friends as I would like. But, I can't complain. I have a great job and work with great people. What's not to like?

Lehi Rodeo... The weekend after I got back, we had a tri-ward activity to go to the Lehi Rodeo. The wards did a BBQ before it started and then we walked over to the rodeo grounds. It was pretty cool to watch the rodeo. I've only been to one rodeo before, but I don't remember much from it, so it was fun to actually pay attention to what was going on. My favorite part was when they had the motor cross bikes come out into the arena and do flips and tricks off a ramp. It was quite thrilling. After the rodeo, there was a YSA dance at a chapel parking lot down the road. We went to check it out and I ended up staying with some of my friends until 1am. It was a pretty lame dance music-wise, but still fun to spend time with friends.

Missionaries... Also, this last Wednesday I said goodbye to two of my good friends who entered the MTC. One of them, Ashley, is one of my best friends who I met in my freshman ward and we've been really close since then. She is going to Romania and I am so excited for her! I'm very, VERY sad to see her go, but it will be fun to write her and hear about all her adventures. The other one is a guy from my ward last year named Conrad. He's my friend Taylor's older brother, and he and I got to know each other pretty well in winter semester. He's such a great guy, and I'm so glad he's serving a mission! He's going to Russia (brrrr!) and it will be really fun to hear from him, too! I LOVE missionaries!!

My mom is in town... and it's been really fun having her here! She hasn't been out for 5 or 6 years, so she's having a great time visiting places she used to live and seeing old friends. She's getting to meet my friends, too, which I think is a lot of fun. I've had to work a lot most of the days since she's been here, but we hang out whenever I'm not at work. Speaking of, tonight we're going to watch STADIUM OF FIRE together and we are so excited! Stay tuned for pictures from that!

What can you do with a month in Florida?

2011-07-02T15:23:00.000-06:00

Midway through May, I went home to Florida to visit for a month. It was really nice to be home, see old friends, and spend time with family. The visit was also a milestone of sorts, because when I came back to Utah, I brought Sara out with me, which makes my parents officially empty-nesters now.

Florida
I love the Florida heat and humidity. It's the familiarity and how it makes me feel at home. I love walking outside into that tangible wall of heat every time. :) Call me crazy! One thing that I realized I don't miss much about Florida is how many bugs there are. I guess I never realized it before, but I've grown accustomed to hardly ever seeing bugs in Utah and never getting bitten by anything. I got home and every day I had new spots on my skin from the fresh round of bugs that I happened to encounter that day. Yup, I definitely don't miss that about Florida.

Dances
Sara and I attended a few LDS dances the first weekend I was home. There was a tri-stake YSA dance on Friday night that we went to. It was Sara's first YSA dance, and one of the few I've ever attended. It was pretty typical, and fairly boring, too. To top it off, my parents were coming home from the temple that night and they stopped by to spy on us. Too bad there were no interesting boys for us to have been caught flirting with. :)

Cocoa Beach
On Memorial Day, my mom and Sara and I went to Cocoa Beach. Unfortunately, there was a "dangerous marine life" warning because of all the jellyfish in the water. They were strewn across the beach as well, which made even walking along the shore slightly treacherous. Because we couldn't get in the water, we walked along it anyway, taking pictures of the jellies and even getting brave enough to pick some of them up (by the tops of course).

Lots of jellyfish!

Sara and me

Dentist
I had a couple dentist appointments while I was home. I hadn't been to our family dentist for 3 years, so I guess it wasn't too surprising that I had some cavities to fill. Turns out, I had cavities in 3 different teeth, and each tooth had more than one cavity for a total of 7 or 8. I returned a week after my initial check-up to get them filled. They numbed me up and drilled away at my teeth for an hour or so. Now I have some shiny new teeth! I had a hilariously crooked smile afterward because no matter how hard I tried, my lips would not move the way they should! Anyway, I was glad to get that over with so I don't have to worry about it at school.

Sara's Graduation
Sara graduated from high school on June 6!! It was cool for me to attend graduation and experience it all from the viewpoint of a spectator instead of a participant. I really could have done without all the speeches, though. Why does our culture think it's necessary to always have speakers at events like that? Why not just get on with the fun stuff that everyone actually came for, huh? Anyway, I'm really proud of Sara for getting through high school (I know how tough it is), and proud of her getting AP Honors through it all, as well as participating in marching band! Now it's time for college and all the new adventures there!

Family before graduation

Sara's Wisdom Teeth
In preparation for college, Sara had to get her wisdom teeth out. I think that two of them were impacted, which might have made for some complications in the surgery, but luckily, all went well. Better than well, actually. She had a miraculously fast and easy recovery (she ate pizza the night after the surgery), which was a blessing because it allowed her to better enjoy the last week of her summer in Florida. I got to play nurse for her the first couple days, waking her up every hour to change gauze, get new ice packs, drink some fluids, and sometimes take meds. It was definitely an interesting experience because I realized that I'm more business-like than lovey-dovey in my patient care, so it's probably a good thing I didn't go into nursing... :)

Sara's Grad Party
Two nights after getting her wisdom teeth out, we threw a graduation party for Sara at our house. There was lots of food, good friends, and swimming, too! It was good to get to see and spend time with everyone who came. We even got to watch a video my mom made with pictures and old home videos of Sara growing up. So cute! (From the vids, we realized that I use to be a major brat, show-off, and attention-hog sometimes. Yikes!)

Sara, Amanda, and me at the grad party

My little buddy Camden at the grad party

Siesta Key
To celebrate (or mourn, in our parents' case) Sara's last week at home before college, we took a family vacation to our favorite beach spot on Crescent Beach in Siesta Key. It is SO beautiful. We stayed for 4 nights (new record for length of stay at one place for our family) and it was wonderful. We tried out some new restaurants, including a shady-looking place called Munchies 420 that had 'POTatoes' on their menu (figure that one out? It took us until after we'd left), and also an Amish restaurant with fried chicken the size of moobs (man-boobs) and scores of homemade pies. But most of our time was spent on the beach, soaking up as much sun as possible before we had to live in Utah for the next 6 months. Overall, it was a very successful, albeit low-key vacation. Not to mention, Siesta Key was rated the #1 beach in the nation this year. I highly recommend it!!

Moob-sized fried chicken

Mommy and me at the beach (and very burned)!

Kim's Birthday
My BFF from high school, Kim Johnson, had her birthday the last week I was home. Though I missed the actual day of the celebration, I was able to take her out to lunch at the end of the week and spend sometime catching up. We've been apart too long and we miss each other too much now! But the funny thing is, we pick up conversation like we've never been apart. We spent forever just chatting away at Pei Wei, probably annoying the heck out of the employees who wished we would just leave already. :) Happy birthday Kim!!

Danielle's Wedding
We got to attend Danielle Machado's wedding reception the night before we flew out to Utah. She was, of course, stunning and her dress was gorgeous. She was just glowing, though I'm sure exhausted. The cultural hall at the stake center was decorated all cute, Dad was DJing the music, and there were lots of old friends to visit with. Chris Raskey had just gotten home from his mission 2 days earlier, so I got to see him for the first time there and it was so fun! He's exactly the same old Chris I knew in high school. (For some reason, I expect them to come back from their missions completely different. Nope!) It was fun to dance and talk with him. It was perfect that most of our ward was at the reception, because then Sara and I got to say goodbye to everyone one last time before we left. Of course, that also means that it turned into a cry-fest, what between Sara and her friends and Mom and Lorraine tearing up over losing us. Anyway, the reception was a lot of fun with all the usual festivities, ending with sneaking out to decorate the couple's car and then sending them off amid a crowd of sparkler-bearing guests. It's so weird to think that she and I are so close in age, and yet we are in such different stages of life now. I'm so happy for her! I love weddings-- even if they do make me wish I were get married myself!

About to smash cake in face...

Danielle and me!

The last time a lot of us will be together... :(

Saying goodbye to Clay who leaves on his mission soon...

Car decorations

Getting to see Chris again after about 3 years!

Me and mommy! <3

Same old Chris... :)

Last time we'll all be together for 2 years

Kind of a bittersweet vacation to tell you the truth. So many goodbyes, but lots of happy reunions, too.

Life is good. Real good. :)

Weight Loss

2011-05-16T09:50:00.000-06:00

My initial three months Weight Watchers has ended, and since I haven't been tracking myself officially on there for a while, I canceled my subscription. That is not the end though. I still have about 30 pounds to go to goal! :) I will make it this time!

It's funny, the more weight I lose the bigger I feel. It's a strange phenomenon that I wouldn't have believed until I experienced it. It's probably because I expect to be a whole lot smaller after losing 25 pounds, but it's really not that much of a difference after all.

I'm going to be back home in Florida for the next month starting on Tuesday. I am so excited! I plan on keeping up my running routine while I'm back, which I hope will include running with my dog and on the beach! I'm definitely looking forward to it!

Thanksgiving Point Tulip Festival

2011-05-13T17:55:00.000-06:00

Last Saturday my friends and I went on a little trip to Thanksgiving Point in Lehi, UT to go to the tulip festival. They have these huge gardens there with tons and tons of tulips, and it's really pretty! I took TONS of pictures of course, but I'll just share a "few" here, which will still be a lot. :)

The colors of the tulips were so vibrant!

Danie, one of my best friends

I handed my camera to Reid and told him to take a picture of me, Rachel, and Danie.

Instead he held the camera facing him and took this. :)

Me laying by the flowers.

I realized afterwards that they look kind of dead in this spot. Oops.

One of the Thanksgiving Point waterfalls

Reid pushing Danie in her wheelchair, with a foot pop. Cute.

Danie and Rachel, some of my besties.

Jake, Reid, Rachel, and Danie looking at the fish in the pond.

Danie, me, Rachel, and Brandon by the kid's pond.

The Italian Garden, with lots and lots of bathtubs. :)

Me!

My favorite flowers of the day. So bright!

Jake atop the hill

Rachel and me in the tulips

Reid posing for photos

One of my favorite shots of the day

Stopping to smell the flowers

Rachel, Danie and me

Reid chilling in Danie's wheelchair :)

Yellow tulips!

Reid pretending to take a nap under a tree

Rachel resting among the flowers

My favorite color arrangement of tulips in the garden:

Jake the self-proclaimed photographer

Second favorite color arrangement

Mustafa, our Muslim friend.

He "died" here.

Reid holding up a pillar

We were lucky that it was such a beautiful day outside! One of the first truly warm days we've had this spring. I even got a nice, painful sunburn to show for it. :)

Summer Reading: "Ender's Shadow"

2011-05-13T15:34:00.000-06:00

My first summer reading of the year was Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card. It's a companion novel to Ender's Game, meaning that it's the same story, just told from the point of view of another character, in this case Bean instead of Ender. I really love the story in Ender's Game, so this was right up my alley. It was really interesting to see another side of things at Battle School. Bean's background was also really, really interesting to find out about, too, and see how it influenced his experience. There were also things at Battle School that we missed from Ender's perspective. And Bean was so intelligent that he figured out a lot of things that Ender missed or had to be told. I think it would be neat to read the same story as seen by some of the other characters, too, but, alas, there are none such books to be found. There are some sequels to Ender's Shadow that follow Bean back on earth after the Bugger war, which I will take a whack at later perhaps. If you liked Ender's Game, I'd recommend this one. If you haven't read either, why not??

WW Weeks 12 and 13

2011-05-02T17:28:00.002-06:00

Well, my friend who lived down the hall from me whose scale I used to weight myself every week moved out and I haven't found another way to weigh myself until today, so I'm a little behind. Let me catch you up...
------
Loss since last weighed: -3.9 lbs.
Total loss: -27.6 lbs!!
------
Gosh, I'm just so excited to still be losing weight! I've noticed a definite change in my appetite (for the better) and I am really enjoying running everyday. It's great to feel these changes in my body and feel myself getting stronger. :)

Here's a graph of my weight loss (it doesn't go all the way back to the beginning, though)

Get your own graph at skinnyr

Shutterfly

2011-04-30T10:53:00.000-06:00

The post below features the Mother's Day card I made for my mom this year using Shutterfly.com. Can I just tell you that they're possibly one of my favorite websites and companies? It's true! Just this week I ordered 2 photo books from them. I've been doing them to commemorate each school year and each summer of the last couple years. It's very simple, easy, and the results are fabulous!

I don't rave about many things, but Shutterfly is one of those companies that I can and WANT to rave about! I absolutely love their products. Everything I've ordered from them is awesome quality and a good price for it too! Seriously, you should check them out. And take a look at the Mother's Day card I made in the previous post. Maybe there's something you'll find that you'd like to do for your mom. :)

Mother's Day Card

2011-04-26T21:07:00.001-06:00

M Is For Mother's Day 5x7 folded card

Personalized Mother's day cards by Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

Well, guess our dating game is over...

2011-04-24T21:16:00.003-06:00

Due to finals, graduation, cleaning checks, move outs and the like, Rachel and I didn't have dates this weekend.

But still, 13 weeks is a long time! That's more dates than I've been on the rest of my life combined!

We might start again next week, or we might just decide that we want the boys to do the work from now on. We'll see.

We did it

for the story :)

Summer Reading

2011-04-23T19:35:00.001-06:00

It's the time of year again! Classes are over, so now that I have some free time it's time to start catching up on my "fun" reading. I got a lot of recommendations on Facebook and I've had a few on my mind, so I put a few orders in at the library and picked up my first batch of books today. I start work again on Monday, so that'll give me lots of reading time while I'm there.

My first round of books are:
The Help by Kathryn Stockett,
The Lord of the Rings Trilogy by J.R.R. Tolkien, and
Ender's Shadow by Orson Scott Card.

I'm excited to get started!

Dating: Week 13 - Cookies and Phase 10

2011-04-17T01:38:00.001-06:00

This week was another last minute thrown-together date, but it was one of the more fun ones I've done. I set both Rachel and myself up with boys in our ward. They are both super cool. Rachel went with Josh, one of my home teachers, and I went with Jake, a good friend of ours.

For the date we got together early Friday afternoon and made chocolate chip cookies and then played Phase 10. I'd never played before, but once I figured out how to play it was a lot of fun! And the cookies turned out really good, too.

The guys were great company, and it was totally chill and relaxed. We laughed a lot and had a really good time together. I really love that there are so many great guys right here in my own ward!

Well, it's been 13 weeks. The semester ends next Thursday, so we made it through and entire semester (minus the first 3 weeks) dating every weekend! We hope to keep it up until Rachel's 22 birthday, which will be 22 weeks of dating.

So, I have a favor to ask of all you Florida readers. I'm gonna need some dates when I come home from mid-May to mid-June, and I don't know any guys my age!! Would you be so kind to keep your eyes open for eligible young men to set me up with? Let me know if you know anyone who'd be interested... :) Thanks!

WW Week 11

2011-04-17T01:27:00.001-06:00

Week's loss: +0.4 lbs.
Total loss: -23.3 lbs.

No too bad of a gain. I have to say I'm pleased I didn't gain more back. I have been slacking off and life's been crazy. Not to mention all the birthday parties I attended this week. But hopefully I can get on a better routine once finals are over.

On a good note, my appetite seems to be controlling itself more lately, which is something I've never really experienced before. Maybe my metabolism is getting better? Dunno, but I like it!

Let's see if I can't break 25 lbs. by next week! :)

Dating: Week 12 - Divine Comedy

2011-04-12T02:31:00.001-06:00

This week I had to kind of throw my date together at the last minute. I was afraid I was going to have to give up this week. I had asked out two guys during the week, but one of them was out of town and I didn't hear back from the other. Then Rachel attempted to set me up with another guy who didn't follow through with the idea. So, I was feeling pretty rejected and about ready to give up.

But then I remember that I was going to a Divine Comedy show on Saturday night with some friends and that almost everyone had a date, except me and another guy in the group (Conrad-- my friend's brother who I'd been on a date with the first week we started this). So, in desperation, I called him up and presented my solution to our mutual dateless-ness. He thought it was a good idea, so we went together.

Divine Comedy was awesome as usual, and it was fun to be with Conrad because he's such a great guy and fun to be with. It's just too bad he's pre-mission... :)

Ok, so this coming weekend is the last weekend of the semester and it is our temporary goal to keep this going at least until then. The long-term goal is to make it to Rachel's 22 birthday, which will be our 22 week of consecutive dating (June 17th). Or until we have boyfriends, whichever happens first, haha!

WW Week 10

2011-04-11T17:12:00.001-06:00

Week's loss: -4.6 lbs.
Total loss: -23.7 lbs.

Need to start tracking my food again and get on a better sleep schedule.

P.S. Semester's almost over!! Little less than 2 weeks left!

Dating: Week 11 - Picnic and Frisbee

2011-04-03T14:00:00.002-06:00

This week Rachel and I planned a picnic for our date. Luckily, the weather was VERY nice that day. We did it in the early afternoon on Friday, and the weather was so warm. I was sweating just sitting there. I'd forgotten how that felt. Haha. :)

I asked a boy in my ward, Danny, who I'd had a crush on since the beginning of Fall semester. He's very sweet and funny. We had a good time. My home teacher set Rachel up with one of his friends. He was really cool and we had a great time all together.

We made a sub sandwich to split between all of us and had chips, soda, oranges, and Red Vines. It was delicious! After we ate, we tossed around a frisbee for a while and played the game 500 with it, too. I got some pretty sweet grass stains on my knees. Win!

Well, we've been going at this for 11 weeks now, and we're trying to keep it up until at least the end of the semester. We'll see how it goes!

WW Week 9

2011-04-03T13:52:00.001-06:00

Week's loss: -1.1 lbs.
Total loss: -19.1 lbs.

I'm almost to 20 pounds! Woo hoo!

My clothes are starting to feel obnoxiously baggy on me, too, which is slightly annoying because I don't want to spend time/money getting "intermediate" clothes. But, otherwise, I am loving this!

Dating: Week 10 - Kite Making

2011-03-29T16:29:00.000-06:00

This week I got asked out by a boy who I'd taken out a few weeks ago, Matt Gong. He had a really creative plan: We were going to make kites and then go fly them. Cute, huh?

We doubled with his roommate (another guy I've been on a date with.. lol), Conrad, and his date (and my friend) Riley. We spent a couple hours making the kites. It's harder than it may look! All of us, except Matt, went for the "traditional" kite shape-- and we had a hard enough time with that! They all turned out looking really cool.

Matt constructing his (much more ambitious) kite frame

Conrad and Riley in the building stage

Riley's finished product

Me and my kite

Matt and his kite (Optimus Prime face)

and Conrad's (it's in Russian)

We attempted to fly them and didn't have very much success. We don't blame it completely on our kite-building skills (or lack thereof), because the real kite we had wouldn't fly very well either. We'll blame it on the wind (or lack thereof), shall we?

I had a good time with good friends and think that's possibly one of the most original and creative dates I've been on!

WW Week 8

2011-03-26T23:07:00.002-06:00

Week's loss: -1.3 lbs.
Total loss: -18 lbs.

Ups:
Running every morning. It really helps to have someone to run with so there's some accountability. :)
My smaller clothes are fitting better and my bigger clothes are getting loose!

Downs:
I'm still eating out too much.
Need more fruits and veggies and water.

Dating: Week 9 - Divine Comedy

2011-03-22T09:04:00.003-06:00

This week I asked out a good friend I've known in the ward for a little over a year now. His name is Bryan and he is arguably one of those guys that every girl has a crush on at some point. :) He also looks like he's perfectly carved out of wax. Haha..

We went with a ton of people in my ward (who were also all mostly on dates) to see Divine Comedy on BYU campus. They are my current favorite comedy group on campus. They do all sorts of fun stuff. You could search them on YouTube and find all sorts of videos, like this one:

The do a series of skits poking fun at BYU and Mormon culture (they are a little harsh on UVU, though). It's great to laugh at our idiosyncrasies like that every once in a while.

Bryan was a great date! He insisted on opening my car door when getting both in AND out of the car, which was something I'd never experienced before, so that was nice. :) He also, very seriously (and literally), made a list of my qualities as I talked about myself. LOL, funny guy. He also had a freak-out moment when he discovered that I'd never seen any of the Lord of the Rings movies, and stood up to tell everyone else in our group about it. Silly, silly, silly. We had a lot of fun.

Well, it's been 9 weeks and counting... stay tuned for the continuing dating saga!

WW Week 7

2011-03-19T13:54:00.002-06:00

Week's loss: -4 lbs.
Total loss: -16.7 lbs.

Ups
Running every morning (this is probably the source of my loss this week)

Downs
Birthday dinner, brownies, cake, etc etc etc...
Eating out a lot

Ward Tubing Activity

2011-03-13T01:38:00.001-07:00

Our ward does an annual tubing activity up at Soldier's Hollow in Midway. They rent out the entire park for a couple hours and we go have fun with the slopes to ourselves.

Here are a few pictures of our adventures...

Waiting in line

Pretty Rachel

Brother and sisterly love...

Our friend Travis jumped in this picture :)

Friends and Donuts

2011-03-13T01:07:00.000-07:00

Impromptu donuts and friends...

(Maple bar with bacon, Butterfinger, and Cookies and Cream)

Gorgeous Ali

Action shot

The most surprisingly delicious thing ever...

bacon on a maple bar

We called it the Canadian donut (Canadian bacon and maple... lol)

Here we have a Canadian (Ali) and a Canadian donut:

I love these girls!!

Dating: Week 8- A Capella Jam

2011-03-13T00:35:00.000-07:00

This week I had a blind date with a guy from Rachel's work. His name is Austin. He's reeeeally tall, very nice, pretty classy, sings in Men's Chorus at BYU, and, ok, he's cute too. :)

Rachel and I were late (we met our dates there), so there wasn't much time to talk before the show. We were able to chat a bit at intermission and also afterward. The show was amazing. I am still in awe of the performers. There are so many amazing things people can do with their voices! One who was especially entertaining was Mister Tim. You should check him out on Facebook. Seriously. Do it.

About 5 or 6 groups performed during the show. It was really, really good! I had such a good time. After the show, we drove our dates home and said goodbye. They were really fun guys, and hope they had as much fun as we did!

All in all: Best. Blind. Date. Ever!

WW Week 6

2011-03-13T00:20:00.001-07:00

Week's loss: 0
Total loss: 12.7

Low points
Eating out too much, once again.
Not enough healthy options in my apartment.

High points
Finally went grocery shopping tonight! Hallelujah!
At least I didn't gain anything. :)

Dating: Week 7 - Laugh Out Loud

2011-03-08T08:10:00.001-07:00

For my date this week I asked a guy in my ward named Joe. (He is, consequently, roommates with two of the other guys I've been out with recently, Conrad and Matt.) He's such a nice guy, always smiling, and he likes to give hugs. Rachel doubled with me and went with a guy she knew from back in her freshman ward.

We went to a comedy club on campus that I've never been to before. It's called Laugh Out Loud and it's improv done in the style of 'Whose Line is it Anyway?'. I think it took the audience time to warm up to the style, so it was a little slow at first, but a few skits in everyone was enjoying it and having fun. I had a great time, got some good laughs, and definitely relieved some stress. :)

My date was great. He was good at keeping the conversation going and keeping it interesting. And we had fun laughing together. All in all, a great night. (Oh, and he won a BYU umbrella, one of the prizes they were giving out to the audience! haha)

WW Week 5

2011-03-08T07:57:00.000-07:00

Week's loss: +1.3
Total loss: 12.7

Where I went wrong:
I think my mistake this week was the fact that I haven't been grocery shopping recently and I've run out of fruits and veggies. So, I ate out a lot because of my lack of food at home.

This week's goals/adjustments:
Go grocery shopping. Stock up on good food!
Eat out less. Don't give in to the temptation when friends are going out to eat, or make healthier choices when eating out.
Exercise! (finally getting around to it)

Dating: Week 6 - Cookies and Games

2011-02-28T11:42:00.001-07:00

This week I asked out a boy in my ward named Matt. He's a funny guy who I don't know all that well, but I'm friends with his apartment. We planned it as a double date with my friend Rachel and the guy I set her up with, Josh. Turned out that 3 of Rachel's roommates and another friend wanted to join, so somehow they all got dates and we did a huge 6-couple group date.

Our original plan to make cookies was difficult to do with 12 people, so only some of us could actually help with that part. We did no bakes, and then set them out to dry while we played some games. We played The Game of Things, a new favorite we've discovered, and then we played Catch Phrase. Both were very funny. We had a great time together.

Matt was kind of quiet, I think he's a very contemplative kind of guy, but I had a good time getting to know him a little better, and he was good at initiating questions and returning mine.

Overall, a great night with friends and lots of fun. :)

WW Week 4

2011-02-26T07:29:00.002-07:00

Week's loss: 4.4 lbs.
Total loss: 14 lbs.

Low points:
I've been stressed and depressed this week, which led to me eating/munching almost constantly when I was home. But I still attempted to make good choices in what I ate and how much.
Haven't been eating as much fiber as my body wants.

High points:
Been drinking more water.
Was pretty good at tracking almost everything this week.
Made up for last week's gain. :)

Dating: Week 5 - Classic Skating

2011-02-20T16:45:00.003-07:00

This week for my weekly date I was actually asked by a guy in my ward. His name is Will and we've been in the same ward for about a year and a half. His roommate, Josh, asked my roommate Katie out and we did a double. We went Classic Skating up in Orem. I'd never been before and I had a lot of fun! I don't think I've been to a roller rink since like elementary school. It brought back so many memories!

We all got roller blades because we weren't brave enough to try the classic skates. I really miss when I used to roller blade a lot growing up. It felt good to be back on roller blades. :)

There were a lot of little fearless kids there that we were all so afraid of hitting or knocking over. But after 9 they kicked out everyone under the age of 16 for Disco Night, so that was a little nicer to be able to skate a little more freely. I LOVED the music for Disco Night and had a blast "dancing." I wish I knew how to dance better on roller blades. There were so many guys on skates who had all these cool moves and were break dancing in the middle of the rink and weaving in and out of all the other skaters with their smooth moves. We even saw a much older guy who was just skating around the rink. I love seeing older people having fun doing stuff they love like that!

After wearing ourselves out skating, we headed over to Cold Stone for ice cream. Delicious!

When I got home I didn't realize how tired I'd gotten, but I'd had a dang good time!

WW Week 3

2011-02-20T16:32:00.002-07:00

Week's loss: +1.1 lbs.
Total lost: 9.6 lbs.

Low moments:
I gave in and ate Valentine's Day chocolate and cookies.
On a night of depression I got Panda Express for dinner.

High points:
I've been eating mostly fruits during the day.
I did not buy myself any candy/treats for Valentine's Day.

Weight Watchers

2011-02-18T20:50:00.004-07:00

Yup, that's right. For the umpteenth time in my life I have once again joined Weight Watchers. Only difference this time is that I think I've finally realized how my weight is impacting me negatively, and I want to change that.

Weight Watchers had made a lot of changes to it's program, and I like them.
For instance:
Almost all fruits and veggies are zero points.
It emphasizes whole grains.
It's kind of a low-carb program now, because carb content is the main determining factor of the points value.

Anyway, I thought I'd use my blog to track my progress and hold myself responsible. I'll post at least weekly updates on how I've done for the week, my high and low moments, weight loss, etc.

So, to get you all caught up, here are my stats for the past weeks:

First week
Week's loss: 7 lbs.
Total loss: 7 lbs.

Second Week
Week's loss: 3.7 lbs.
Total loss: 10.7 lbs.

So after 2 weeks I'd reached my 5% goal! My 10% goal is coming up in just a few weeks hopefully!

Another goal of mine is to add more exercise to my week. At the current time, I haven't been sufficiently motivated, but hopefully soon I'll make time for it.

Dating Machines - Weeks 1-4

2011-02-18T01:45:00.003-07:00

Me and my friend Rachel have recently made a goal. We've gotten tired of sitting at home with all our girlfriends on the weekends because no guys will ask us out. So we're taking matters into our own hands. Even if it means we have to ask guys ourselves every stinking week. So far we've done 4 weeks straight, and this weekend will be our 5th. Think we can keep it up the rest of the semester?

So, first week we did a huge group dinner date with 7 couples. It was one of the funnest dates I've been on, ever. Such a perfect mix of people, a great date (his name is Conrad), and delicious food (enchiladas).

The second week we did another huge group date and did tie-dye. We all brought an item to dye, and then we switched with our dates and dyed them for each other. It was a lot of fun and they turned out really good! My home teacher, Evan, was my date. We went to DQ afterwards and got treats! Very fun. :)

The third week Rachel set me up with a friend she used to work with. Rachel, her roommate Yandhi, and I went on a triple date to get frozen yogurt. My date's name was Darren, and his parents are deaf and he served an ASL "speaking" mission in D.C. He's a mechanical engineering major, too, so between computer programing, calculus, and ASL, we had a lot in common!

The fourth week I asked an old friend, Brandon, to go to the BYU Museum of Art with me and see the big Carl Block exhibit that's there. It was really cool! I didn't realize how much of Carl Bloch's art is used in the LDS Church, but I recognized a lot of the paintings, and they are beautiful! Afterward we went to the Creamery on 9th and shared a brownie sundae with chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream!

One of my favorite paintings from the exhibit, The Doubting Thomas.

Stay tuned for updates about my upcoming dates!

Books I Want to Read

2011-01-15T21:05:00.003-07:00

...if I only had some spare time. :)

I did download the sample (first chapter) of these books on my Kindle app, so maybe I'll read those at least.

Matched, by Ally Condie

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto, by Michael Pollan

The Lost Gate, by Orson Scott Card

From Twilight to Breaking Dawn, by Sandra L. Gravett (this one's free on Google Books, here)

Fiber

2011-01-08T18:06:00.004-07:00

A couple months ago I went to see my doctor about some digestion problems I was having. He suggested I increase my fiber and water intake. Ok, sounds easy enough. Unfortunately, because of so much of my energy going to other places because of my bike accident, final exams, and going home for the Christmas break, I hadn't made an effort to eat more fiber.

Until now. It's a new year, right? So my most recent trip to the grocery store was successful in the sense that I didn't spend a fortune AND was able to find foods high in fiber that I would actually eat. Win!

Besides the digestive benefits, I just read this article today which talks about several of the other health benefits of a diet high in fiber, which include preventing breast cancer, lowering bad cholesterol, and controlling diabetes. These are all health problems which have been on my mind recently, because I've been afraid I would develop them if I didn't make changes to my diet. Looks like fiber may be the answer!

Another plus of increasing my fiber intake (with food) is that I will also be following the Word of Wisdom better, eating more fruits and veggies and whole grains. Yay!

MyFitnessPal.com
I found this sweet website (MyFitnessPal.com) where you can track your eating for the day and it calculates how many calories, fats, proteins, and carbs you should have everyday and keeps track for you. It has a HUGE database of foods and can usually find exactly the brand and amount of what I'm eating. Plus, you can get an app for your smartphone and track on the go! I love it!

MapMyRun.com
Here, you can use your smartphone to track where you walk, run, bike, or practically anything else and sync it to the website. They have a few challenges going on for the new year, including "Walk a Marathon in a Month," "Run 30 Miles in 30 Days," and "15 Workouts in 30 Days." Check out the website here.

Finals and Such (Blogging from 30000 feet)

2010-12-16T19:14:00.001-07:00

I am sitting in an airplane at cruising altitude on my way from Memphis to Orlando while writing this. Pretty cool, eh? I'm also on Facebook and my e-mail at the same time. In-flight (free) wifi is where it's at! (Another reason to love Google Chrome: they are offering free wifi on Delta flights for Christmas!)

Well, finals have been in full swing at BYU this week. It's a cool atmosphere, I think. Finals usually ends up being a pretty relaxed time for me (which may or may not be a good thing...). I finished all my finals yesterday which was such a relief. I managed to pull off decent grades, too. And now I get to go home for the break! Awesome!

Just a few pictures of what I've been up to the last few days. (And, I just really, REALLY wanted to write a blog post while flying in an airplane.)

The trees all decked-out on campus

The library packed with people = not normal. Must be finals week.

(you can kind of see if you click to make it larger)

Last night my friend, Alicia, and I made a Wendy's run just after midnight.

Since she couldn't park at my apt complex, we took a trip down memory lane to the Wyview laundromat. (She and I met while living at Wyview).

There was a party going on in the laundromat. A bunch of freshman playing ukeleles and singing.

Sometimes I miss being a freshman.

The tomato from my burger, and Alicia dying of laughter in the background.

That's it for me, for now. I will be landing in wonderful Orlando in approximately 45 minutes!!

Temple Squared

2010-12-12T19:41:00.002-07:00

Here are some pictures from my second trip to temple square this year. This time I went with Clay and my friend Alicia and her roommate Katie. It was very pretty and we had a fun time.

(I'd taken some pain meds for my leg and forgot that they would make me drowsy, so I was pretty loopy the whole night, haha.)

The Assembly Hall

We got to go in and listen to a high school a capella choir sing for a bit.

Love this side shot of the temple

Looking up into one of the trees

From the top floor of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building

Tree and chandelier in the lobby of the Joseph Smith Memorial Building

Statue of Joseph Smith in the Memorial Building

Nativity on the reflecting pond

Bagpiper outside Temple Square. He was super awesome.

Group picture in front of the tree

Group picture in front of the temple

A good night spent with great friends. :)

Must-See Christmas Movie List

2010-12-07T18:01:00.001-07:00

There are just some movies you have to see every year. These are some on my list.

Elf

"Is there sugar in syrup?"

Source

The Santa Clause

"Now, do you want this doll or not? Go back to sleep."

Source

It's a Wonderful Life

"My lip's bleeding, Bert! My lip's bleeding!"

Source

A Christmas Story

"I can't put my arms down!"

Source

A Charlie Brown Christmas

"That's what Christmas is all about Charlie Brown."

Source

Temple Square Lights!

2010-12-05T22:43:00.001-07:00

This last weekend I had the opportunity to go to Temple Square and see the Christmas lights with some of my ward! We also watched the Joseph Smith movie in the Legacy theater. I love that movie more and more each time I see it!

So tall...

I love night pictures of the Salt Lake Temple, or any temple for that matter :)

My first time going in the Tabernacle.

The organ is so pretty!

Lights outside the Assembly Hall

Ooooo, pretty..

Me and my goofy friends

The classic shot

Friends again... (whoops my eyes are almost closed)

Yay Temple Square! I hope to be able to go again in the next couple weeks!

Thanksgiving

2010-12-01T23:23:00.003-07:00

My Thanksgiving break started off with a major blizzard warning in Utah. We were told it was supposed to be the worst blizzard in 40 years or something. Campus closed more than a day early and everyone worried about traveling for the break.

We got nothing.

Of course, I was out of town for the break, but I'm not even sure that it snowed much while I was gone. Everyone was pretty disappointed that the big blizzard turned out to be a big nothing. Well, I was glad at least that it didn't interfere with traveling. Besides, I don't really like snow that much. Or at all.

Well, I flew to Phoenix for the break to visit my grandparents who live there. It was much, much warmer there, and I loved it! It was good to see my grandparents who I haven't seen for about 3 years.

Grandma Sue and Grandpa Bill

They have 6 cats and a bunny. I'd never met any of the cats until now. They were really sweet! They seemed to like me too and it was cute when they would come up and want me to pet them. Five of them were all grey, so it was a little hard to tell them apart at first, but they each definitely have their own personality.

This is Buddy. He was my "buddy" while I was there

He's missing his front leg there.

Lucky the bunny :)

Lucy

(she likes to come up behind you when you're sitting and tap you on the back when she wants to be petted)

Another one of Buddy. Aww, he's so sweet!

It was a nice, relaxing break in Arizona. I got a lot of sleep, which was lovely.

On Wednesday we went to Arizona Mills and saw "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1." (If you haven't read my previous post already, it tells why I didn't get to see it at midnight.) The movie was so so so so good! I heard that a lot of people thought it was too slow and boring, but I liked watching interactions between the trio, who were the focus of most of the movie. I think this movie was a really good representation of the book as well. I absolutely loved Dobby, who kicked some serious trash. I also really enjoyed the scene in the Ministry of Magic where they were disguised as different people. I also liked Ron a lot more in this movie. He usually bothers me. The scene at the beginning where Hermione modifies her parents memories is so sad! And the part at Godric's Hollow with Bathilda Bagshot is soooo creepy.

After the movie we ate at Panda Express- yummy!

For Thanksgiving my grandma ordered most of the meal from Mimi's Cafe. Oh boy, was it delicious! Those mashed potatoes were the best one I've ever had! It was nice because that took a lot of the hassle out of preparing the food, so we could have a more relaxing time.

We all took a nice nap that afternoon after eating. Then we watched "Elf" (my favorite!). It just cracks me up every time! Good stuff.

My grandma and I went shopping at midnight at Arizona Mills to check out the Black Friday deals. We mostly just wanted to go for the experience, though we did get a good deal on fleece pullovers at The Gap. That was all we bought, and we left after a little bit. There were lines waiting to get into some of the more popular stores. I couldn't believe how many people were out and about at midnight! But I guess that's Black Friday for ya.

Slept in a bit on Friday, and then went to Old Navy to check out the sales there. I ended up getting some pretty good stuff for a good price! I've been needing some warmer clothes. :)

Later that night we went to Cici's Pizza for dinner (yum yum yum!) and then to the Mesa temple to see them turn on the Christmas lights. It was really cool! The lights seemed like they were even better than Temple Square in Salt Lake. I was playing with my grandma's digital camera which has some neat features, so I was able to get some great night shots of the temple and the lights, and some awesome panoramics as well. Check them out! (You might want to click on the panoramics to see them bigger--they really are neat!)

Mesa Temple

Love this shot

One of the panoramics

(click to view larger)

House of the Lord - Holiness to the Lord

Lights!

The palm trees were really cool!

Me and Grandpa Bill

Temple and the garden lights

(click to view larger)

View from the street

(click to view larger)

Nativity with an awesome big star

What a great Thanksgiving break! Thanks for having me, Grandma and Grandpa!

Maybe I can go again next year. :)

I got some cool shots out the plane window on my flight back to Provo:

Isn't the sky beautiful??

Flying in close to Salt Lake

Some sort of mine.. it was huge!

I wish I had thought to take pictures when I flew out of LA (I had a layover there).
It was so cool flying out over the ocean and then looping back around over LA.
I even got to see the Hollywood sign on the mountain as we flew over.
Pretty neat!

Accident

2010-12-01T23:08:00.001-07:00

Ever since this happened I've been struggling to know how to tell people about it. There's just no good way to put it. Well, here goes...

I got hit by a car a week before Thanksgiving while riding my bike home from campus.

Now, don't get all worried. I somehow managed to (literally) walk away from the accident, escaping with just three (albeit, pretty big and nasty) bruises. I was wearing my helmet, thankfully, though I don't even think I hit my head. My bike was pretty much totaled. I'm glad that I didn't have any more serious injuries.

(The guy who hit me was turning right and didn't look to see me riding into the crosswalk. He was just 4 weeks off his mission and probably hadn't driven in 2 years.)

Well, I took a trip to ER to get everything checked out (they actually had my information from like 20 years ago when I used to come to the same ER for nurse's elbow, which gave me a good laugh). I was just so overwhelmed with everything that was going on, and I was trying to figure out how to handle the situation on my own. Luckily, my mom was helping me out on the phone, which was a huge relief.

Also, my roommates, friends, and ward members were so willing to help me out, and I really appreciate everything they did for me: a priesthood blessing, a ride to the ER, food from Wendy's, company in the ER, sweet notes and treats, and rides to and from campus. It's been really cool to see the outpouring of love from everyone. So, I guess that's one positive thing about the whole situation.

A sweet balloon a girl in my ward gave me. :)

It sure gave me a lot to be thankful for this Thanksgiving!

The Band That Changed Everything...

2010-11-16T18:34:00.002-07:00

Now on iTunes.

Here comes the sun indeed!

Extra bonus: You can watch the ENTIRE video of their first concert in America on iTunes. It's only about 40 minutes long, and definitely worth the watch!

Ward Ballroom Dance Activity

2010-11-07T23:51:00.001-07:00

Nothing too exciting, but I had a lot of fun learning the cha cha with some people from my ward.

There I am in the florescent shirt.. you can't miss me. :)

Rachel is dancing behind me with Jason, who we call pumpkin face. (I just needed to include him)

Fun stuff!

Halloween

2010-11-07T23:35:00.002-07:00

This year, Halloween was great! I had a ton of fun stuff planned and everything turned out great.

Thursday night: Ward Speed Dating Costume Party
Everyone dressed up and we did a huge speed dating line. Pretty fun. The costumes were great!

Yandhi, Me and Rachel

(Thing 1, beat up athlete, and Thing 2)

The Lovely ladies of apartment 113! (I practically live there now)

Alicia, Yandhi, Rachel, and Taylor

Me and Elvis (Travis) and Taylor

Leopard!

(She painted this herself! She also gave me my black eye and bruise)

Adorable Thing 2

Me and "Facebook".. hehee

Me and Tay!

Friday night: Group Date to the Haunted Warehouse

We got a group together and went on a huge date to this haunted warehouse at The Center. It turned out to be pretty legit. We all had a good time. :)

The whole group, before the date.

(Clay & Talyor, Alicia & Dallas, Josh & Rachel, Alexa & Travis, Yandhi & Daniel, Austin & Danie)

There was a cool Alice in Wonderland walk-through adventure and a bunch of other little kid things.

Saturday night: Harry Potter Feast and Party
Some of my friends threw a Harry Potter party and it was so fun to dress up and play Harry Potter games. :)

Cho Chang (Caidy) and Bellatrix (Kim)

Owl!

Serving up baby owls for dinner

Hermione (Me!) and Cho Chang (Caidy)

Me with the Quidditch players

Me wearing the owl head!

Me and Bellatrix (Kim)

Caidy with the smoking cauldron

Well, that was my Halloween weekend! So much fun-- I love having great friends to share it with!

Boyfriend

2010-10-20T23:10:00.001-06:00

I have a boyfriend.

This is not him.

(Made ya look!)

This is my boyfriend.

His name is Mac.

Pretty good-lookin', eh?

We spend pretty much all our time together.

(I love my new Macbook!)

Class Assignments

2010-10-03T13:49:00.006-06:00

Over the last few weeks, I've had some pretty cool assignments in my classes, and I wanted to share a few links with you.

This is a website I wrote for my IT class from scratch:

www.et.byu.edu/~slaughta

This is a website for my Computer Science 100 class, where we put links to our assignments.

students.cs.byu.edu/~slaughta

For my IT class we do a lot of labs building cool things.

Like, a ethernet cable, for instance:

I made that. Neat, huh? (Actually, it's not as difficult as it may look.)

Also, we did circuit boards. We had to solder all the little bits onto the board.

It plays 4 different songs and the little LED light blinks. Check out the vid!

(Songs are the BYU Fight Song, Happy Birthday, The Star-Spangled Banner, and Come, Come Ye Saints.)

Sorry for the bad quality. My camera refused to focus, darn it all!

Also, I've been writing a lot of programs, at least one every week. They're tiny little things really, but they take me usually 10 hours or more.

Like, I had to write programs to do these things:

- Convert decimal numbers to Roman Numerals

- Translate sentences into Pig Latin

- Read in strings of DNA and determine if they might be a gene

- Read in a file with banking information and calculate the total value of the portfolio (including compounding interest on bonds and looking up stock values from a website)

- Sort a list of names alphabetically (and write the results out to a new file)

- Compute the steady state temperature distribution over a piece of metal (what the heck??), then export the results to Excel and create a graph from the data.

Pretty crazy stuff, eh? Haha, turns out that most of those are a lot easier than they sound, too. Well, at least once I know what I'm doing. :)

Let's hope I can keep up the rest of the semester!

This Semster

2010-09-27T11:50:00.001-06:00

First off, let me tell you that this semester has caught me by surprise.

Firstly, it literally snuck up on me, and it took me a good couple of weeks to get my head in the game and realize I was actually in school again.

Secondly, my classes are hard this semester. Real hard. I don't think I've ever had to work this hard in my life for anything. Talk about a wake-up call! It's stressing me out pretty good.

I'm having to learn:
-how to get enough sleep,
-how to get enough hours at work to make enough money to pay rent and buy food,
-how to manage stress and not just bottle it up,
-how to be social with my new ward,
-how to fulfill my church calling,
-how to exercise effectively,
-and how to make time for existing friends.

Somehow, there's hardly even enough time to get sleep, work, go to classes, and finish my homework, let alone all those other things.

I think it's just going to be one of those semesters.

But, I really don't have anything to complain about, since there are plenty of others with much tougher lives than me.

Besides, I have great roommates, supportive friends, an awesome ward. And I'm learning about stuff I really like. And I'm going to BYU for crying out loud!

Sometimes I think I'm spoiled. :)

Posters

2010-09-19T23:31:00.000-06:00

Sorry it's been a while since I posted. School is keeping me busy, busy, busy. I think I might go crazy by the end of the semester. This week, for example, I have to teach myself HTML and Javascript and incorporate both into a website (from scratch). I also have to write a program that translates words into Pig Latin. And I have to do a big photo editing project with Gimp. Great stuff. Really, it is interesting, but it takes a lot of time.

Also, I just got a calling as a Relief Society teacher. I taught my first lesson today! I planned way too much and our class time was cut short, but I thankfully wasn't nervous and a lot of people participated, so it went really well!

I got some awesome posters from the bookstore this week. I'm pretty much in love with them. I'd never seen either of them before, but I thought they were pretty awesome! :)

Well, that's it for me right now. Hopefully I'll have slightly more exciting things to post about in the coming weeks. Peace!

Apartment Tour

2010-09-06T01:05:00.000-06:00

For those of you who don't know, this year I stayed in the same apartment I've been in since January. I did switch rooms, so now I have more space and a bigger closet, which is super nice. My mom has still not seen it, but she did used to live in this complex 23 years ago when she met my dad. So, here's a video tour of the apartment, just for Mom (and Dad will probably appreciate it, too.) Enjoy!

BYU Football

2010-09-06T00:05:00.003-06:00

Football season! Ok, I know that I wasn't the greatest football fan last year (ok, maybe that's an understatement.)

But, I have repented of my evil, anti-football ways and am giving it a go again this year!

And, it doesn't hurt that I have someone to go to games with now.

It's so fun having Clay out at BYU!!

And, another plus: WE WON!!! GO COUGARS!! (I'm really working on my football spirit here)

Some pictures from the game:

Our seats, really high up

View of the mountains from top of the stadium

Marching band doing their Journey show :)

The stadium at sunset-- favorite picture of the night.

Go Cougars!

Mockingjay

2010-08-28T10:52:00.005-06:00

I just finished reading the last book of the Hunger Games series, Mockingjay, last night. I've reeeally been wanting to share what I thought about the book, so I thought I'd put it here for those of you who've read it to read. (Beneath where it says "SPOILER" below, you can highlight the text if you want to read it. Otherwise, it stays safely hidden.)

SPOILER (highlight below to read)

Last night as I was reading the last several chapters, I became increasingly frustrated. It got to the point where I wanted to throw the book. I left my job before I finished reading, and I was inexplicably annoyed with everyone who got in my way on the bike ride home. When I got home, I settled down to finish reading, prepping myself for disappointment, because I couldn't see the book wrapping up in any sort of emotionally satisfying way. But, I was wrong, and I ended up in tears(bittersweet ones) by the end of the book. So, by the end, I liked where things had gone, I just didn't enjoy the path the story took to get there.

So, now some specifics.

Peeta being hijacked threw me for a huge loop. I was not expecting anything like that, and it was a HUGE source of frustration for me.

I've always been "Team Peeta." This book freaked me out, because I thought the author was going to force something between Katniss and Gale. Or Peeta was going to die. Or something would happen that made Katniss fall for Gale instead of Peeta. I guess that since we actually got to see Katniss and Gale together more, I felt like he was going to be more important to the story. Well, he was, but luckily not in the way I anticipated. I really didn't want anything to happen between them because I realized he didn't understand the post-arena Katniss.

I couldn't stand Katniss most of the time. I didn't like how she went into those phases where she avoided everyone, disregarded everything, and just wandered around alone. Especially at the end, after she killed Coin and she didn't care about anything else that was going on. If I were her, I would be begging people to know what the heck was happening outside.

In the end, when Peeta sort of returned to normal, I was surprised, but happy, at how easy it was for Katniss to let Gale go. I knew all along that she had to end up with Peeta, but I thought Gale was going to have to die in battle for that to happen.

It took a few pages for me to realize that Prim had died. I thought that should have been made more clear, but whatever. I wasn't really too sad that she died, because she hadn't ever really been too big a part of the story.

I was however, very upset when Finnick died at the hands of the mutts. Especially since he'd just barely married Annie. And mostly because I was upset that he died saving Katniss. I felt like she didn't deserve to live at that point.

Beetee was one of my favorite characters. I loved how intelligent he was, and that he was so on Katniss's side and understood her and wanted to help her.

Ok, my only huge problem with the ending was Katniss's decision to vote yes for the last Hunger Games to be played with the children from the Capitol. I was totally on Peeta's side there. I think it was irrational of Katniss to want "revenge" for them killing Prim, when that mentality was no better than the Capitol's when they first instituted the Hunger Games. And hadn't Katniss had gotten into this whole mess in the first place because she was trying to save Prim from going into the arena? She says something later on in the book that makes me think she finally saw reason, when she says something along the lines that killing eachothers' children wouldn't undo things of the past.

I really wish Cinna hadn't died (he's my favorite character), but I'm glad that he had the foresight to plan her outfit/armor beforehand. I loved seeing his influence cropping up over and over throughout the book. I really thought he would suddenly appear sometime during the book, but, alas, all we got was Effie. ("May the odds be ever in your favor.")

And, finally, I think the cutest line of all time is when Peeta says, "You love me. Real or not real?"

Siesta Key (Times Two!)

2010-08-08T15:25:00.008-06:00

This summer, while I was home in Florida, we took 2 trips to Siesta Key! It'sour favorite beach, and is regularly rated #2 in the nation! Seriously, you have not lived until you have been to this beach.

It's such a beautiful place, my pictures don't nearly do it justice. But here are a few just to give you an idea of what this paradise is like...

Visit my Picasa web albums to see pictures from each of the trips:

Siesta Key with Diana and Christina

Siesta Key Vacation

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter

2010-08-08T13:18:00.002-06:00

A few days after I flew home to Florida, my Great-Aunt and her daughter came down from Maryland to visit us and go to Islands Of Adventure and Harry Potter World with us!

It was so awesome! I'm so glad I had the chance to go, even though the park was insanely crowded and everyone was hot and all the tourists looked miserable. It really was the coolest experience to actually be there. All these places and things I've read about for the past 10 years, and finally I'm getting to see it come to life! Walking through the meticulously decorated Hogwarts castle for the first time was one of the THE coolest things I've ever experienced.

This place is a "must see" for any Harry Potter fan-- but you may want to wait a couple of years for the lines to die down... :)

Check out my web album for pictures:

Harry Potter World

There's No Place Like Home

2010-07-25T22:31:00.234-06:00

This is a really long, journally post about my month home in Florida. I've tried to make it easier with large key words so that you can easily skip around for whatever sounds interesting, or just look at the pictures.

My flight home was a good one. I had a layover in Las Vegas, and per tradition I ate at Burger King there. My next flight had a stop in Nashville, so that was cool since I've never been there before. Well, I still haven't actually been there since I never got off the plane, but I thought it was neat.

Here's my view out the window and my first (and, so far, only) glimpse of Nashville :)

On the flight from Nashville to Orlando I sat next to a nice lady from the Phoenix area. I told her I was going to BYU and she guessed I was LDS. We had a good conversation, and I got to talk to her a little about the Church, and school, and what I wanted to do with my life. She wondered if I were going to go on a mission, and things like that. She had a lot of interesting things to say (she worked for Southwest). It's probably the first time that I've had a real conversation with someone on a plane, since I usually keep to myself. It was nice. I like meeting new people and hearing what's in their head. Maybe I should talk to strangers more. :)

I landed in Orlando later that evening. We stopped at the McDonald's drive thru on the way home. Krista Johnson was working there and liked the fact that she was the first person besides my mom to see me. Sara was at EFY for the week, so I didn't get to see her until Saturday. Dad came home from work a little after I got home, and it was good to see him and Mom after so long.

The next morning there was a beach group at Cocoa beach with a bunch of families from church. Of course, I slept in so we were a little late, but it was so good to go to the beach again! I've missed that so much. I'm trying to figure out what it is that makes me love it so much. The sand? The sun? The water? The friends? The sea breeze? Maybe it's all of that, and a little bit of something intangible. Regardless, I love it.

Mom and me

Some friends

Every time I come home I'm amazed at how quickly I get used to it. Obviously, there are a lot of changes that happen while I'm gone, and those things weird me out a little bit because I realize how fast life is going. (I'm going to be a junior in college this year... weird, huh?!) And I'm surprised how quickly I adapt back to the humidity, too. Granted, whenever I spend a lot of time outside doing something active, I start dripping sweat like there's no tomorrow, but I don't feel like I'm drowning in the humidity anymore.

Saturday was a lazy day around the house. I had really forgotten what it was like to have free time, since I'd been working nonstop all day, all summer, up until I got home. I don't really know what to do with myself. You mean I have to come up with things to do on my own? Saturday night Dad was fixing the screen enclosure for our back porch, and I was out there holding a light for him after it got dark. I was out there for about 20-30 minutes wearing shorts and had forgotten about the mosquitoes... we'll they didn't forget about me. My legs looked like this the next day, and for weeks after:

It really looked like the chicken pox.

Thankfully, none of those mosquitoes were carrying the West Nile virus...

Sunday was great. I love our ward so much. I'm so glad that all the people I love stay in the ward so that I get to see them when I come home. Whenever I come back, I always realize how many people there were that I'd missed. I hope to come back and live in this ward after college so that I can stay friends with all the great people and families who live here.

Monday I babysat Will and Caroline, and Ella from the ward. They are all such cute kids, and I can't believe how fast they are growing up!

That night my mom's aunt, Diana, and 16 year-old cousin, Christina, flew into town from Maryland. That night, Christina, Sara, and I went to see Eclipse at the movie theater. I had been planning on waiting to go until after I'd finished re-reading the book, but I hadn't finished yet. It was so good! The movies just keep getting better. I thought Edward was a lot more good-looking, everyone's acting was better, and Jacob, of course, was just as Jacob-y as ever. Love!

Over last week my mom and I have gone back and watched Twilight and New Moon, too. I like them a lot better than I remember. Oh, and if you haven't listened to the commentary on Twilight, it's pretty much the funniest thing ever. Robert Pattinson spends the whole time making fun of himself, and it's hilarious! Besides, it's fun to listen to his English accent.

The next day we had a purse party for a company called 31. They have some really cute purses! Sadly, very few people came, so it wasn't as fun as it could have been, but there was a lot of great food to eat! That's one of my favorite parts of parties. :)

Wednesday we went to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Islands of Adventure with our aunt and cousin. It was so cool! We got Lela Machado, who works there, to buy us discounted tickets, so that was great! We did a bit of the other stuff in the park at first, because we were hoping that the crowds in Hogsmeade would die down. Finally, we just gave in and went. The Hogwarts castle had been teasing us all day, drawing us in.

Check out the web album for pictures from Islands of Adventure and Harry Potter World:

Harry Potter World

The next day we went with our aunt and cousin to Siesta Key, our favorite beach spot. It's such a pretty place!! We stayed there overnight in this really cute hotel room that was like a 5 minute walk to the beach. So fun! Check out my web album for pictures!

Siesta Key with Diana and Christina

My aunt and cousin flew home on Saturday morning. My dad informed me that I would be giving a talk in church the next day. Great, Dad, thanks for the warning... (he'd kind of hinted at it a week before, but never told me for sure.) So, I wrote my talk Saturday night about building our testimonies. It turned out well. I thought I'd planned out plenty to talk on, but on Sunday when I got up to speak, I was part way through giving it and realized that I was running out of material, so I just ended it naturally and it was a good length. I mentioned how I've never given a talk in any of my BYU wards, but it seems every time I come home I give one. Brother Lopez was conducting and said he didn't know of anyone else who went on vacation and gave a talk. It is really kinda funny when you think about it.

Over the next couple of days I got into a really bad sleeping schedule, where I stay up until 2 or 3 in the morning (doing nothing, I might add) and then I don't wake up until 1 or 2 in the afternoon, sometimes later. Yikes! I guess it has something to do with the free time problem. I just don't have motivation to get up, because there's nothing to do.

I did try to to roller blading one day, but I mistakenly went in the middle of the day when the sun was it's hottest, so I practically died in the heat. It was nice to roller blade again, though, I haven't done that in a while. But, I don't think I'll be doing it again anytime soon, unless it's in the dark.

Sara was at band camp for most of the week, but she was done at 4pm, just as I was getting ready to start my day. ;) I didn't really do much that week. We did do some fun stuff though: we did a bit of shopping and Mom made a skirt for me that's awesome. We used the pool a lot this week. We got in almost every night, so that was nice. We should use our pool more often.

Mom and I also cleaned the garage (without telling Dad) and took a lot of junk to Goodwill. That was a good feeling. The garage is so clean and organized now. Now, if only it would stay that way.

Friday morning, Mom and I hit up Cocoa beach with Lorraine, Keriann, and Camden. (Sara and Clay both stayed home sleeping-- such bums!) It was a nice day. It was really windy, though, and the waves were a little scary. We didn't go out too far for fear of them. They looked like great surfing waves, but not great swimming waves. We took a bag of really great shells from Siesta Key and threw them all over the beach to surprise people walking along. It was fun to watch them get all excited when they would find one.

That night I had a pool party for a bunch of my friends, mostly youth from the ward. I was hoping that a lot of people would come because I think that's what really makes a party fun. Happily, tons of kids showed up and it was great to get to see and spend time with all of them!

A funny thought occurred to me at the party. Some of the younger youth are kids that I used to babysit just a few years ago, and now they are all grown up and coming to my pool parties like regular friends! I reminded one of them of this and he started talking about the fun things we used to do when I would come babysit. I'm glad he's not that embarrassed about it!

Sadly, I didn't take any pictures that night. Lame, huh?

Saturday I spent the afternoon finishing up re-reading Eclipse. It was better than I remember, and I'd forgotten a lot of it. And I didn't realize how different it was from the movie. Not too drastically, but there were a lot of details left out of the movie, understandably, and they tweaked a lot of the scenes in some little and big ways, but none of it really bothers me. Now I want to re-read Breaking Dawn, too.

That afternoon, I went to dinner with my friend Amanda who was in town with her boyfriend. It's always nice to see her, since I'm away for most of the year. Luckily, she comes to visit Orlando often, so I usually get to see her when I come home.

Saturday night was a youth dance for our stake, so I decided to tag along and hang out with my younger friends in the ward. After all, my dad is the DJ, so I'm allowed to visit, right? :) It was so much fun. BYU doesn't do very many dances, and they just aren't as fun anyway. Our stake's dances are the best!

Sara and Clay dancing

Sarah's super-long hair!

Savannah's nerd glasses

Keriann and Sara

Sunday at church was nice, yet again. I keep running into people that I haven't gotten to talk to yet, and it's great to see them all. I'm definitely going to miss them a lot when I go back to Utah. Later that day we found out there is a water boil alert in effect for a couple days. It's really annoying because boiled water doesn't cool down very fast, even in the fridge, so we don't have cold water to drink yet. Luckily, we had some water bottles in the fridge already, so we rationed those and survived. The next day we found out that the water boil didn't apply to our neighborhood. Darn it all.

Monday was a pretty boring day. I'm sure I slept in and spent the day lounging around the house.

Tuesday, I went to IKEA with Mom and had so much fun! What a cool place! There was so much I wanted to get, and I kept telling my mom I needed to get married so I could buy a bunch of the stuff for a new house. I got a few things for my apartment, but I couldn't get much because I wouldn't have been able to get it all home in my suitcases! I loved the 2 hotdogs, chips, and soda for $2!

That night I watched my favorite movie ever: Nacho Libre! "Do you not realize I have had diarrhea since Easters?"

Wednesday afternoon we went to Lorraine's house for dinner. Lorraine has lots of questions to ask about college since Clay is coming to BYU in the fall. We spent most of the afternoon in the pool talking about misc college stuff. I mostly played with Camden-- boy, do I love that kid! Dinner was delicious, as is usual at Lorraine's. That night we watched "What Would You Do?" and "Wipeout" (Camden knew the episode's name: "Screw You, Banana"-- haha). I did a US Map puzzle with Camden that was slightly challenging. Camden is amazing at puzzles. He puts me to shame. :)

Thursday I spent most of the day re-reading Breaking Dawn. I'd completely forgotten most of the plot, so it's kind of like reading it for the first time again! It's very good, and well-thought out. I remember now why I loved the series so much!

Friday morning, we went to the beach with the Machado family, minus Danielle. It was a lovely day at the beach and a fun time with the Machados. It was great to get to talk to Lela, who will also be out at BYU this fall! Check out my web album for pictures!

Cocoa Beach with Machados

Saturday I went bargain shopping with Mom for most of the day. We went to garage sales in the morning and we found one really great one that had a bunch of cute clothes in my size, so I got a lot and they were only 25 cents each! Then we went to Old Navy and stumbled across their half-off clearance sale! I got a ton MORE clothes there. Happy, happy, happy! Then Mom and I went coupon shopping at Target and Publix. I love bargain shopping!

Sunday at church was good. It was Fast Sunday, and testimony meeting was pretty good, though a little more... quiet... than a student ward. :) We had the sister missionaries over for dinner, which was delicious. There was a HUGE thunderstorm during dinner and it was awesome! That night Mom finished sewing up some awesome skirts that she was making for me. They all turned out so cute! I love them! That night I was also practicing packing everything into my suitcases. It was definitely an ordeal, even for just practicing.

Monday, I spent the morning purchasing my all-sports pass with Clay. He was having difficulties with the website, but eventually got it all sorted out. I'm so excited! I was going to go see Eclipse with Kim, but she had a job interview so it didn't work out.

That afternoon we left for family vacation to Siesta Key around 6. We got there a couple hours later and settled into our hotel room, and went out to walk on the very dark beach. The next day we did food shopping in the morning and evne bough some new floats to use at the beach. Publix was awesome and inflated them for us for free! Then we finally went to the beach! We spent most of the rest of the day there, and I took a nap in the late afternoon. There was a lightning storm way out at sea around dusk, but we still went into the water. Then we went out to eat at McDonald's. The next morning we all slept in late, checked out of the hotel, and then went to the beach again. Luckily, I hardly even got burned during our whole stay, and the beach was so nice the whole time (except for the water being a little too warm). We stayed out as long as possible, then got dinner (Pizza Hut and Cold Stone-yum!) and headed home. We picked up Rosie who had been staying with the Martinez family, then went to our house.

Check out my web album for pictures!

Siesta Key Vacation

When we got home and walked into the house, it felt like a sauna. The thermostat said it was 112 degrees in the house! Dad had turned the air conditioning off, like usual, while we were gone, but he thinks the heater must have been malfunctioning and was on while we were gone. You wouldn't believe how long it took to cool the house down again. It was only down to 80 degrees by the next morning. I was trying to pack, but my room was so hot that I was sweating bullets, so I gave it up for a while and the whole family sat out on the back porch, waiting for it to cool down. (How many times has the inside of your house been hotter than outside... in the summer?) Finally, with the help of an open window and two fans was I able to finish packing. Oh, and Mom helped as well, since I was having a hard time figuring out how to pack everything, or what to pack. Happily, we got everything done in time for me to get some sleep... downstairs. :)

My flight was at noon, and I got to the airport around 10. I have to say that I just LOVE Sky Cap curbside check-in! It's sooo much easier and faster. And the line through security was unusually fast. Very happy! My flight was also shorter than I expected. I got to switch planes in Denver, so that's another airport I can add to my list! :) I got into Salt Lake around 4:20 and was able to get my baggage in good time to catch a 5 o'clock shuttle ride back to Provo. It was a long, quite drive with a quiet driver and another passenger who read the whole drive. Ah, well. I don't like talking much anyway.

First (and only) view of Denver.

It was pretty sad to get back to Utah. I remember thinking on the shuttle ride that I was suck here now. I would be here until Christmas. My apartment was lonely, messy, and smelled weird. I'd really liked to have stayed later in Florida, but I needed to get back to work so I could start making some money. I'll probably get over my homesickness fast, at least I hope so, since I do have a lot of friends here. I really miss everything at home, though, like the beach, my dog, and our house, and especially my family. But, the fall semester is coming on fast and I have lots to look forward to.

Fourth of July Weekend

2010-07-05T11:26:00.039-06:00

(Sorry, this is more like a journal entry than anything, so feel free to just browse the pictures.)

What a great 4th of July weekend it was! It's probably one of my favorite holidays, just because I love learning about and remembering the history of the American Revolution.

This year, I got to reunite with an old friend and spend the weekend together. Ashley Whitesides came down from Syracuse, UT to go to Stadium of Fire with me. I haven't seen her in about 5 years! It was great to get together. It's amazing how much we've both changed, but at the same time are very much the same as we were back then.

She came into town on Friday night, and we watched Shrek with another girl and guy in the ward. It's been so long since I've seen that movie! Very funny :)

Then we stayed up pretty late just talking and reminiscing about the past. Good times.

Ashley was sleeping in the extra bed in our apartment. We slept in pretty late. :) After breakfast and showers we went out to her car and found this waiting for us:

Darn the Provo parking authorities!

Waiting for the parking guy to come take off the boot

Oh well, I took care of the fine, picked up a parking pass for her, and then we were finally on our way.

Our first stop was the Freedom Festival downtown. There were lots of booths selling cool stuff and we walked around for a couple hours. We both got some hair flower clips that we love. Here's a picture of mine:

I love the yellow :)

Cotton candy!

The Boy Scouts' Native American villiage

Inside the teepee

Plus, we got a picture with THE coolest guy ever!

He had tons of bells on his ankles for dancing. It was sweet.

And of course we had to get our picture taken in front of the huge American flag hanging on the Mexican restaurant downtown.

We were now pretty hungry, so we headed to J Dawg's for some big hot dogs with special sauce.

Delish!

Sadly, we didn't take any pictures there.

After that, we visited the bookstore and walked around campus a bit, making a short stop in the art museum.

And then we hit up the Creamery on Ninth for some famous ice cream.

Ashley got the Cookies & Cream

I had a Raspberry Refresher

(raspberry sherbet, vanilla soft-serve, Sprite, and limeade-- oh baby!)

We took a drive up to the base of the Y Trail to get a look at the valley. Pretty sweet view.

After that we headed to the Provo Temple, and had to make due with pictures outside the gate since they were closed.

Squinty!

We even stopped at the MTC to take pictures by the sign out front. We didn't know where to park, so we started pulling in and got stopped by the "MTC police"!! hahaha

I pulled off an innocent voice and asked where we could park to take pictures.

Tons of elders were out playing on the fields for P-day.

Ashley was like, "I've never seen so many missionaries before!" hehe

We had to hurry and snap pictures fast because there was a district waiting to take theirs, too. Awkward...

Greatest. picture. ever.

Too bad my eyes were closed. Sad day.

Thumbs up!

Then we went to go pick up dinner to eat at my apt. By this time we were fighting the Stadium of Fire traffic. We ended up driving in circles around Provo (trying to find a restaurant that was open) until we finally decided on Cafe Rio.

hehehe.. we got brave and asked someone to take our picture while we were standing in line.

I think just about every person in Provo was eating there. The line was out the door.

Look at the kid in the lower right hand corner-- hahaha!

By the way, I haven't been a fan of Cafe Rio until now. I got the pork burrito and it was delicious! The funny thing was that I ate half of it, set it down, looked at it for a while, and then realized that I think I'd gotten someone else's order. Whoops! Hahaha.

We ate out by the pool at Glenwood. This guy named Arturo ("you gotta roll the R!") came and talked to us for a bit. He found out I was from Orlando and immediately got excited and started asking me about universities in Florida that he could attend. He wants to do tourism studies. Nice guy, and funny that we happened to meet.

After eating, we got ready for Stadium of Fire, then walked over to the stadium. So many people were out an about. It was crazy!

Our seats were in the very top row of the end zone. Not so great seats to see the performances, but great seats for the fireworks!

Carrie Underwood came out for just a minute at the beginnign to sing the National Anthem.

They had dancers do an awesome opening performance. One of Ashley's cousins was a dancer, so that was pretty cool! They were awesome!

Jenny Oaks Baker (Elder Oaks' daughter and a famous violinist) played a very fun song with a small group of other violinists. I was blown away by how fast she played! She was totally rocking out!

There was a tribute to the Boy Scouts, celebrating the 100th anniversary of Scouting this year, complete with the world's oldest Eagle Scout at 96 years old (!) who opened the ceremony. They created the world's largest Eagles' Nest to honor 200 new Eagle Scouts. They had every person in the stadium who was an Eagle stand up, then the new Eagles got their badges. Pretty sweet.

The Osmonds 2nd Generation (totally boy-band sounding, but they still good) sang right after that. They are all Eagle Scouts, and they sang "Fly Like and Eagle" and "I Believe I Can Fly." Cheesey, but fun. :)

After some other presentations, the 5 Browns did a performance. They played a medley of Star Wars songs. I was in hea-ven! It was so cool. They are really awesome.

Finally, Carrie Underwood took the stage to perform.

Boy, was she great! I see now why she is Entertainer of the Year. I was surprised by how spiritual she was, too! She sang three of her sad songs (I cried, a lot), and at the end of one of them she added a few lines from "How Great Thou Art." It was breathtaking. She's just amazing. (Plus, she sang my favorite jam-out, girl-power song, "Before He Cheats." hehe)

After she was done, the fireworks started up. They did like 3 segments of fireworks with breaks in between for patriotic video presentations and stuff. The fireworks were great. I saw a few new kinds that I liked, like the "fireflies" (as I called them), and the huge orange globes. Sweet!

On our way home we stumbled upon a street dance party going on right outside the stadium and we stayed to dance for an hour or so. It was a lot of fun, and very spontaneous. :) We were pretty tired after that...lol.

Ashley spent the night again and went to church with me. We have church at 9, and I didn't wake up until like 8:41. That was a little stressful. Sarah, my roommate, didn't wake up until I knocked on her door 5 minutes after I got up. I totally freaked out and started rushing around looking for a ride to church (I had to conduct the music in sacrament meeting), until Ashley reminded me that she had a car. Dur. lol. So we made it on time, and I managed to look fairly put-together.

After church, Ashley stayed for a couple hours. We ate our Cafe Rio leftovers-- still delicious-- and cookie dough, and watched Pride &Prejudice (the Keira Knightly version). Ashley had to leave before the movie was over so she could make it home in time for a family celebration. It was so good getting to see her. I'm so glad we did this!

What a great 4th of July weekend! Happy Birthday America!

What I've Been Up To

2010-06-27T19:59:00.002-06:00

I've been up to a lot lately. It's mostly been work, but there have been a few fun times as well...

Toy Story 3
I saw Toy Story 3 on opening weekeng, and let me tell you (if you haven't given in and seen it yet), it's the BOMB.com! I'll be honest, I cried (HARD) several times. It made me really nostalgic for my childhood, and it also reminded of how bittersweet it was to leave for college. I highly recommend it. Pixar has done it again!

Aeropostale Sale

Later that day I went shopping at the mall and ran across a sale that Aeropostale was having. Just about their entire store was on sale. I got a lot of cute polos and graphic tees to replace my crumbling old t-shirts. Plus a super cute swim suit cover.

Fun, huh?

Census

Things have been wrapping up at the Census office for our big NRFU (Non-Response Follow Up) operation. We got an e-mail the other day that said Provo and Ogden were some of the last offices to finish it up, but that we had done a better quality job in several specific categories. It was nice to hear some praise after weeks of being told to "just get it done."

On Thursday, Davy Jones and I FINALLY finished up the last questionnaires from our big project! It was a good feeling, but after that we sat around wondering what to do next. Haha, guess we'll have to do some of the grunt work for a while.

Here are some of my buddies from the office:

Top: Soup Dave, me, Sammy, Dick

Bottom: Davy Jones, Nancy

And a comic on our bulletin board that is only too true...

Getting Ready for Eclipse

1. Read The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner.

(Entire book is FREE online until July 5th at www.breetanner.com).

It's really good! And it's a fast read, only 178 pages. Thanks, Mom, for sharing.

Check!

2. Re-read Eclipse, since I forgot the entire story. (Currently in progress)

3. Re-watch Twilight.

4. Re-watch New Moon.

5. See Eclipse!

Coming Up This Week: Provo's Freedom Festival and Stadium of Fire!

Father's Day

2010-06-20T19:25:00.001-06:00

My dad is pretty awesome. Not gonna lie.

See?

He was always there to support me through the years.

I especially remember him always helping me with my math homework. He spent just about every night of my 8th grade year up late helping me do my math homework.

Without his help, it would have been a lot harder to make it to this point:

And eventually this point:

(BYU!)

He came out to help me get settled when I came out to BYU. It really meant a lot to me. :)

And did you know he's my favorite DJ?

We have pretty similar taste in music.

(The blog background music has a few songs that he likes/remind me of him)

And did you know that he's been really involved in scouting, even though he only has daughters?

Here he is getting his Wood Badge- the highest training available to scout leaders.

Woo! Go Dad!

He doesn't really like the beach. Or camping.

(Sometimes I can't believe we're related... lol)

But he does love Blizzard Beach. And so do we, even if he does wear those old, holey shoes--his "sandals"-- that embarrassed us as kids. :)

That's my dad!

(Oh, and he's also a goof-ball, hehe)

Love you Dad!

David Archuleta

2010-06-10T14:58:00.002-06:00

One of my favorite perks of living in Utah is opportunities to see/meet all sorts of LDS celebrities (and General Authorities, who are just as exciting as celebrities). Some others I've seen and met are John Bytheway and Kirby Heyborne. Fun times!

This week, I had the chance to see David Archuleta up close and in person at his book signing in Orem. (He wrote a book about his life/inspiration.) I went with this fun lady from work, and we got there at 6 am when the line started. I know, we're crazy.

She's a hardcore David fan, and so were the other ladies who showed up that early.

I was a little surprised HOW intense some of his fans are (like, several of them had flown to Utah just for his book signings). I felt a little out-of-place, since I hardly even know David's music. Yikes! But it was still fun, I got a lot of sun and got to eat at Five Guys-- yum!

The great thing about getting there early was the fact that we were right up front and center of the stage where he performed two numbers before going in for the book signing. I got videos of both songs, and they were really great!

Playing piano and singing "Crush":

A capella version of "Lean on Me" (this is also the song that he sang at the White House the next day when he met the president):

After the songs he went into the building and we all followed in line to get our books signed. I never realized how tiny he is. He really looks like he could be 12.

Here he's reading my name off the sticky note in my book as I walk up. :)

Sadly, when it was my turn to meet him at the signing table, a lady outside tripped off the curb and twisted her ankle, so he was concerned about her and distracted, so he just signed my book without looking to speaking to me. He did read my name off the sticky note when he wrote "To Alexa" in my book, so that was kind of cool. Plus the fact that I stood just 3 feet away from him! His performance really was the best part of it all, though. Enjoy the pics and vids!

Hiking the Y

2010-06-10T14:37:00.002-06:00

For those of you unfamiliar with BYU, there's a giant "Y" on the mountain east of campus.

There's a popular trail to hike that takes you up to it. After making it through my freshman year having never hiked it, I kind of had this mindset that I would never do it. Especially after hearing Ashley Lisonbee tell me how hard it was, and especially for us Florida girls who aren't used to the elevation.

Well, this activity was pretty much unavoidable. I'm an FHE group leader and we hiked the Y as a ward FHE activity, so I pretty much had to go.

Me at the bottom of the trail. Cool view, huh?

Everyone kept saying it wasn't hard.

Well, they were wrong.

I was dead by about the second switch-back, and there are twelve. I honestly thought I wouldn't make it to the halfway point, let alone the top. But I forced myself to get to the top since we were doing a little devotional at the Y. And after nearly passing out from lack of oxygen, I finally made it.

Conqueror!

Dead tired

It was definitely worth it, just for the awesome view of Utah Valley. Plus, we planned it so we got there just as the sun was going down over the west mountains, and so there was a beautiful sunset as well. Just lovely.

Me and my friend Brittany

Me and Claudio, my FHE "husband"

Oh, and did I mention that I love my ward?

We Are The World

2010-06-06T19:05:00.009-06:00

[My music player is at the bottom of the page if you want to pause it to watch the vids.]

Last week, I heard the Spanish remake of Michael Jackson's "We Are The World," called "Somos El Mundo." I loved it!

It'd been a while since I'd seen the other versions, so I went back and watched them all. I like all of them in different ways.

I really love the 1985 version, though. I think I even know more of the artists in it than in the 2010 version.

Then there's the 25th anniversary version they did to raise money for Haiti. It's great to see so many artists come together. I mean, you've got everyone from Justin Beiber and Miley Cyrus, to Celine Dion, Josh Groban, T-Pain and Kanye West. The stock footage of Michael Jackson is a nice touch as well, as is the duet between him and Janet.

Then the Spanish version. I love this one, mostly for the rap at the end, and also because of David Archuleta (his voice just stands out from the others, doesn't it?). I also love some of the particularly beautiful accents.

So in love!

Reading, Working, and Listening

2010-06-01T01:10:00.006-06:00

I've still been reading like a maniac. I read Ender's Game during the end of last week and finished it up Saturday night. It was good. I remembered parts because I'd tried unsuccessfully to read it years ago, after my 6th grade teacher had read it to us. This time I understood a lot more of it, too. It's a dang intense book. I stayed up until 3 something Saturday night/ Sunday morning to finish it. Bad idea. I the ending totally creeped me out for some reason. So there I was, mind buzzing with wars, buggers, alien worlds and all sorts of other creepy stuff, at 3 in the morning, trying to go to sleep. Never doing that again.
Image Source

So, today at work I started Specials. I just finished it tonight. What a disappointing ending. Still a fairly good book, but the story just... ended. And it confused me, too. That might have been partly because I read it so fast, but still, I didn't feel any emotional closure. There's so much more I want to know! *sigh* I'll get over it soon enough...

I borrowed a new book from a friend in my ward. It's Look Again, by Lisa Scottoline. My friend said it was really good, and it's a pretty quick read, too. That's good. I need that, because with my hectic schedule I hardly have time to get into any deep, slow books, however good they are.

Speaking of my hectic schedule, the work never ends. Even today, on Memorial Day, I was scheduled for work at Info for 4 hours, then I ended up going to the Census Office for 2 hours so that I can take Friday night off to go to a Tri-Ward dance. Then I raced home to prepare for an FHE that no one ended up coming to. Just me and 'Dad' waiting around to see if anyone would show up. One finally did about 45 minutes later, but we'd given up by then. *sigh* I guess we can forgive them, it is a holiday afterall...

Something very happy did happen today, though. I got a CD by one of my favorite independent artists, a guy I discovered at a Grand Pianos Live competition here at BYU. His name is Nik Day and he sings and plays the piano and the guitar. He makes me melt. He sounds a lot like Michael Buble. Love! You can listen to my favorite song of his, the one I fell in love with at the competition (the one I recored on my phone so I could listen to it if I never saw this guy again) on his MySpace page here. It's called "How Could Life Get Any Better." Seriously, it's melt-making.

That's life. Tomorrow's back to the grind. I cannot wait until I get to come home for a whole month! Beaches, theme parks, and parties here I come!

Life Updated

2010-05-24T22:45:00.001-06:00

Hey there.

Yeah, not much is going on in my life.

Working between 50 and 60 hours a week. That's pretty much all I do.

I got called as an FHE group leader for this summer. It's going to be really good, my group seems fun, and my 'husband' is from Chile. Last week we combined with another group to play soccer (which, I realized, I'm absolutely no good at) and tonight we had an awesome spiritual thought then introduced ourselves to everyone, telling about our most serious or recent injury. Good stuff.

I've been reading ravenously since I got hooked on Uglies last week, and so I'm itching to get my hands on more books. If only I didn't have to work so much, I could read to my heart's desire!

I bought my plane ticket home for this summer. I decided that since I'm working so hard Spring Term that I'm going to come home for a whole month! I can not wait to party and hang out with all my buddies and go to the BEACH (that is, if they aren't slicked in oil) and go to theme parks (omgosh-- HARRY POTTER!!) and be hot in the wonderful humidity.

It snowed today. It was an adventure riding my bike to campus in that. I was completely soaked and didn't dry out until about 5 hours later. Lame. Tree branches broke everywhere from the weight of the snow on the leaves, and at work we got a call about a power line that fell on a car. Yikes. Plus, everyone's gardens are now nicely frozen. Gotta love Utah (or not).

I got new shoes last week. My old ones had holes everywhere, side of the foot, toe, sole, it was pretty bad. I ordered some Vans online that I've wanted for a while. Best thing was they were 20% off and free shipping! Love!

Yay for new shoes!

Well, I think that's it for me. Hope you are doing as wonderful as I am (or wonderful-er)!

Summer Reading-- Switching Gears

2010-05-24T22:25:00.002-06:00

Ok, so I totally failed at my original summer reading list. I got a few of the books, but I never really got into any of them. Plus, I don't have a lot of spare time to read like I want to. But, last week I read Uglies by Scott Westerfeld, and I got completely sucked in! I'd originally started reading it a few months ago, but I didn't quite get into it back then. But over the months I found myself wondering what happened next, so I guess curiosity eventually got the best of me and I picked it up again last week. I inhaled it in a couple of days, only able to read between calls at work. At the end of last week I bought Pretties, the sequel, and gobbled that one up too, finishing it this afternoon.

I guess I've decided that I need a lighter selection for my summer reading. I think the subjects on my first list were a little too heavy (politics, bios, etc.) so I'm switching gears. My friend Kellie has been reading some really good books lately and so I think I'll start copying her (hehe). I want to finish off the Uglies series (though I hear it gets really weird with the next book, Specials) and then do the Fablehaven and Leven Thumps series. I'd love suggestions of other good juvenile fiction series you've read.

Wallpapers

2010-05-17T01:59:00.001-06:00

The other day, I decided I wanted inspiring wallpaper for my desktop. These are what I came up with. I like some of them better than others, but they're my first attempts.

Thoughts on Hypocrisy and Army Wives

2010-05-17T01:28:00.005-06:00

Image source

I've been thinking a lot about some things after a conversation I had with a coworker, Garett, at my new job. He's a really nice guy, funny, flirty, etc., and he's in the army. I remember the first few days I met him, he was talking about basic and deployment and such, and because of that I automatically ruled him out as a potential romantic interest.

Why? Because my cousin is in the army and was deployed all of last year. I saw his wife's daily struggles, how much she missed him and how hard it was to only get to see him for a couple weeks at a time very occasionally. I just thought to myself that that's exactly how I would feel. I imagine that I will want to see my husband everyday, have him around for comfort and security, and not worry about him all the time. And so I silently vowed to myself that I would never marry someone in the military. There were other things, too, like having to move around a lot and uprooting ourselves and our kids socially and academically. I was convinced that these were all great reasons.

Then I was talking to Garett the other night at work, and I asked him about why he joined the army. Later, he asked me if I thought a man in uniform was attractive. I avoided the question, trying to figure out what I to say. The conversation went something like this.

Garett: Does seeing a guy in uniform spark anything in you? A military uniform?

Me: My uncle gave me some of his old desert camo and I really like that. [Avoiding the question]

Garett: That's not what I meant.

Me: What do you mean? [Stalling]

Garett: Like, is it attractive?

Me: Mmm, maybe the navy. [This is true, I really like the navy uniform]

Garett: Ah, the sea daaaawgs. You know they're all gay right?

Me: Sadly, they're the best-looking.

Garett: Do you at least think something like, "He has a job, he's not lazy"?

Me: Yeah, I guess so.

A few minutes later:

Garett: So, what do you think about guys in the military?

Me: I don't know. [Yes, I do, I just don't want to say it.] I mean, I don't think it's a bad thing, I think it's good discipline for a guy, and I support our troops and all...

Garett: But you just don't know how close to home you want it?

[And THAT was the kicker that got me thinking.]

Me: Yeah... is that bad?

Garett: No, I don't think so.

----------

Well, now that I think about it, I DO think it's a bad thing for me to have that mentality. I've always thought it was wrong of people to be so selfish that they wanted to live in our free country but wouldn't be willing to have their family members sent off to war. Let some other family's son or husband die for you. I guess I just always thought that was what other people thought, and didn't realize I had pretty much the same mentality. I felt like a total hypocrite.

Since that conversation I've been thinking a lot about the possibility that I could have to see my husband and sons sent off to war. Conditions in this world most likely aren't going to get better from here. What if full-blown war broke out and they were drafted? That's something I couldn't control, even if they weren't enlisted in the military before that.

I've finally come to the conclusion that I need to have a less selfish attitude about the military. After all, I've always believed that "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" and that it is noble to sacrifice your life for your country. How can I believe those things and not be willing to live them?

Sometimes inspiration really does come from unlikely sources.

Happy Mother's Day, Mom!

2010-05-09T14:05:00.005-06:00

Here's a special post for my mommy.. I love her so much! She is my best friend.

I was thinking what I could post about and I thought of some of the songs that remind me of her. Some of them are on my blog's playlist so you can listen to them. I'll just mention some of them and why they remind me of her.

Escapade- This was the number one song on the day I was born, and I think of my mom doing her Janet Jackson impression with her shoulders.

Eye of the Tiger- I remember her talking about how her band used to play this song at football games in high school.

Flowers on the Wall- We loved this song for a while, I remember her trying to explain to me who Captain Kangaroo was.

Goodbye Earl- Back in the day when we were huge Dixie Chicks fans we used to sing along with this song really loud.

I am a Man of Constant Sorrow- From the movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" which I've never seen, but I remember her listening to the soundtrack a lot.

She Blinded Me with Science- I just remember her listening to it a lot when I was little, and we would sing really loud to it in the car. Just about any song from the 80s reminds me of her, actually.

So Long, Farewell- She would sing this to her 5th grade students as they were leaving for the day.

There is No Arizona- Another one of those songs that we obsessed over for a while. It reminds me especially of her because she's lived in Arizona.

Wedding Bell Blues- Agian, we used to sing real loud to this in the car. I always thought it was funny because the song is about Bill, and that's her dad's name.

I Get Knocked Down- I remember she and Lorraine loved this song years and years ago and we would always dance and sing to it in the car with their family. Good times.