This Never Happened Before

Friday, April 24, 2009

General Conference

Alright... I never really got around to writing about this.. but I've been kicked out of my apartment so I figured I might as well :)

We left Provo at about 7:15 on Sunday morning and had to squeeze all 6 of us (me, DaNae, DaNae's older brother, Scott, and his wife, Becky, Andy, and Neil) into Scott's 5 seater car. It was quite the adventure. It pretty much consisted of the four of us singles squished into the backseat in awkward positions. A nice pre- and post-lude to General Conference lol.

We got to Salt Lake and parked a couple blocks away from the Conference Center and walked up. We passed a couple of protestors shouting at us telling us we're "stupid" for not comparing what we're being taught to whats in the scriptures. It made me laugh when I heard it. Some people... do they have nothing better to do?

We went in and got our seats, which were pretty nice. We got to wander the Conference Center for almost and hour before Music and the Spoken Word started. There was an art gallery upstairs that we wandered through the whole time. There was this awesome painting of Eve that I absolutely love. When Neil saw it, he told us about this article he'd read in his English class about how Eve is understood a lot, even in the LDS Church. It sounded really interesting, so I told him I wanted to read it. I read it a couple weeks later, and it was really good. There are also some pictures in the HFAC (Harris Fine Arts Center) at BYU that chronicle the live of Eve. I only got to see two of them (because the rest were taken down before I knew about it) but I loved them. Anyway, there we lots of great paintings in the Conference Center.

Also unrelated to Conference, but it seems to fit here, is the fact that I declared a major finally. I was inspired by the humanities class I took this last semester. I am offically and "Art History and Curatorial Studies" major! lol Random, I know. But I'm really excited about it. I think I will do an internship at the MOA (Museum of Art) at BYU, maybe starting in Winter. I love this major because it's a humanities one that actually leads to a job.

Ok... so back to Conference... We went in for Music and the Spoken Word, and it was great! I love MoTab, and especially seeing them live. My humanties teacher from this last semester (the class that inspired me to pick my major) is in the Choir. Neil and I both had the class, so we picked him out in the Choir. He has this really white hair, but he's pretty young. Funniest guy ever. So cool that he's in the Choir!

I seriously think we got tickets ot the best session of Conference, because all the talks were amazing! I don't have my notes in front of me, but I just remember that everyone was amazing. And what added to the awesomeness was the fact that the Choir sang "We Thank Thee, O God, for a Prophet" and they did that montage of pictures of President Monson. I was in tears- it was beautiful!

We got out of Salt Lake faster than I expected. Like, so fast that I was back in my apartment before 1pm (Conference got out at noon). Crazy!

Well, I think that's about it... I thought Conference was great, and I was really hit by the emphasis on temples and being worthy to attend the temple. Seeing my close friends who are going on missions getting their endowments really makes me excited for the opportunity I will have some day to take out my own. :) I'm really glad for the chance I had to live 5 minutes from the Provo temple so that I could go each week, and also for friends with cars who wanted to go with me at 6 in the morning.

Saturday, April 04, 2009

March 29 - April 4

Hellooooo everyone! I miss and love you all! Here's the update from my last, most recent week...

Sunday afternoon I was hanging with Ashley and Ali and we randomly decided to set each other up on dates for the fireside our ward had that night. We would play Apples to Apple afterward and have treats. It was perfect! Ashley and Ali were all nervous about it but I was just ready to have some fun. I set up Ashley with this RM Brian in our ward. He's way nice and amazing. Ashley set up Ali with John, another Canadian and the EQP of our ward. They wouldn't tell me who they hooked me up with... so I found out when I opened the door to find Neil standing there. I was confused because they said they weren't going to do Neil. So I asked him why he was here, and he said he didn't know but Ashley had told him to come over. Then Ashley was like "Surprise!" So, I was still slightly confused, and Neil had no idea what was going on. Ashley explained it to him and things were fine from then on.

The fireside was really great. There was a Native American who spoke about his conversion to the church. Afterward we had veggie platters and cookies... yum! We stole a platter and took it back the the girls' apartment to eat while we played Apples to Apples for the rest of our date. It was really fun. That game is a blast! When we realized it was time for all of us to go to our different building meetings, we were all disappointed and kept playing "just one more round." But finally it was over. I've decided Sunday Dates are the best!

So, remember Andy? LOL So he's been hanging out with this girl Kelsey in our ward a lot recently. They are really perfect for eachother. It's quite funny. Their dates consist of playing video games and watching movies. A wonderful match! Just thought that was interesting and wanted to throw it in.

Clarissa and I have kind of fallen apart the past few months because of some silly little conversations and things. We pretty much started ignorning and avoiding each other. It was pretty awkward. But Saturday she came in and we started talking and hugged. It was nice to be talking again. I really love her, and I'm glad we are back on speaking terms. :)

So, I keep looking for good places to take naps on campus. I was looking for an especially quiet one the other day. Christine told me that Parker (that hott Canadian DaNae went on the picnic date with last week) told her about this place called the Memorial Hall in the Wilk where it's completely silent and there are lots of couches. It's Parker's favorite place to nap. So I thought I would check it out. So I went, and ended up sleeping for a few hours. I love having couches on campus!

LOL So Monday I was taking a nap in there (it happened to be a really long one) and I sat up and looked over to find Parker just waking up on another couch. I was so embarassed. I didn't want him to see me because I looked horrible from just waking up. So I pretended not to see him so there wouldn't be any exchange. But dang did he look good! Haha. I've decided that guys look really, really cute when they have that just-woke-up-and-have-puffy-eyes look. Seriously, I noticed it on guys I don't even think that way about. I noticed it when I was over at Andy's and he'd been resting and when Ali and I woke up John (the EQP) to give him cookies. And then again with Parker. Ok, but he looks dang good anytime anyway. :)

So Monday night I went to this FHE thing I'd heard about for another ward. Kirby Heyborne was supposed to be the speaker. I didn't know if it was true, so I showed up, and there I am, standing 10 feet from KIRBY HEYBORNE! I kind of freaked out inside. LOL I texted DaNae and told her to come and bring a camera. She had to go to her FHE (I was skipping mine... don't tell!) so she stayed for a few mins and left her camera. I stayed and listened to his talk. It was a really good lesson. He talked about Joseph Smith and the fruits of Jospeh Smith (Book of Mormon, D&C, Pearl of Great Price, and JST) and then he shared his favorite scripture from each. Really insightful. Then he sang two songs. Uuuh-mazing. And then I got to hug him and get a picture with him and he even signed my shoe... that's the picture feature at the top of my blog. He's like the nicest guy I've ever met. He spent a while with each person, talking to them, taking pics, signing stuff, trying to get them to come to his concert-- he's great. What a fun opportunity.

So, I think my Music Humanities teacher is in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. He cancled Thursday's class because he said Conference weekend was busy for him. And there have been other hints. Like he gave us a sneak preview of MoTab's new CD that is coming out this month way back in January. And I remember Neil saying that his professor was in the choir (I'm taking the same prefessor he did). I'm gonna look for him when I watch Conference.

Did I mention that I get to go to the Conference Center to watch it on Sunday morning?! I'm so stoked! I'm going with DaNae and her brother and his wife, and Neil and Andy. It's going to be awesome!! I'll get to see them all live!! EEEk!

Tuesday night I went with Ashley to pick up Ali from the library at midnight. After that we drove up to the temple to look at it and daydream. It was pretty with these huge snowflakes falling. It was a wonderful midnight treat.

Wednesday I was writing a paper for anthropology and I was on a computer on campus. My iPod was dead, so I decided to use Pandora, the online radio. It's great! This was like the first time I really listened to it for a good amount of time. I made a "The Beatles" station and got a great mix of songs! Seriously I heard a lot of hreat new songs. Pandora is my new favorite thing.

Later, I went over to the guys' apartment with DaNae and Rebecca on Wednesday evening. John and Neil got into one of their "fights." They act like a married couple. John told Neil to make him dinner. Neil offered him rice and beans. John said he didn't like rice and beans. Neil said John complained about how Neil would never feed him, but when he offered him food he didn't want it. John said all Neil made was rice and beans. Neil said beggars can't be choosers. John said fine, he would put it on a chip. I guess Neil didn't hear that part, cuz he warmed up some food and gave it to Andy, being sure to rub it in John's face on the way. John was like "I said I wanted some!" Neil said "No you didn't." And then John grabbed a big jug of salsa out of the fridge and banged it on the counter while saying "I said I would put it on a CHIP!" *bang* Suddenly I felt splatters on my cheek, and my eye was stinging. The side of the salsa jug had split and sent salsa flying. I thought it was just me, but then I saw chunks in Rebecca's hair, and spots on DaNae's face. Then I looked on the wall behind DaNae and it was COVERED with salsa. Then I looked up and the ceiling was covered with salsa too. John had collapsed with laughter and then disappeared into his room laughing hysterically. He came back out and started wiping it off. We were all just laughing out heads off. Andy had been sitting on the couch playing a game on his computer and looked up just in time to see the kitchen covered in salsa. He was so lost. Neil grabbed his camera and started videoing us. It was great. I had salsa on my clothes, which reminded me that I needed to do my laundry, so I headed off to do that.

So, I went to to my laundry and, since I've run out of detergent, I used a sample of Gain I got from Christina Vanfleet. Oh my gosh... it smelled AMAZING! I am sooo buying Gain detergent from now on! <3 style="font-style: italic;"> The Elm Tree. I definitely recommend you check it out! I love his style.

We hung out in the lobby afterward to see if the line to see him would go down, but it was getting late, so we just left. We went back to Ali and Ashley's apartment and watched The Three Amigos. We ate hot pockets and rice and brownies and ice cream, too. We also watched parts of Singing in the Rain. I still haven't seen the whole thing, but I really want to! The parts I've seen are really good. I love musicals. I really like how they film entire dance sequences in almost one cut. That's talent!

Saturday I was totally going to wake up for the first session of Conference, but my phone was on vibrate, so I laid in bed all morning waiting for my alarm to go off, but too lazy to actually grab my phone and see the time. I need a clock on the wall. So I slept in until noon, just barely missing the first session (Utah time-- don't forget). So I got up and ate and facebooked until it was time for the second session. I went to watch it at Andy's with him and DaNae. It was really good. I love Conference!

After that I hung out at DaNae's and we made and ate food. We even had chocolate covered strawberries. We ate them while we envied the boys who got to go to the Priesthood session of Conference. :) I'll read it when the May Ensign comes out, no worries. Then DaNae and I tried to track down a bike she could borrow so that we could go on a bike ride together. We eventually got Steff to lend her one. By then it was getting dark and starting to rain, but we went anyway. We decided to go up by the temple. DaNae was having bad luck with bikes, yet again. This time the wheel was wobbly and kept rubbing against the brakes, so she couldn't really ride it. So we walked up the hill to the temple and took some beautiful pictures. We were wet and cold but it was great. Then we coasted pretty much all the way home down the hill. It was great.

After that we decidedly to randomly make Sprite Lemonade. You just make lemonade like regular, except your use Sprite instead of water. It's REALLY good. Mmm. We are watching High School Musical 3 for the second time in a row right now. And we really need to go to to bed so that we can wake up for Conference...! Let you know how that goes..

Oh and I will post pictures for the past 3 weeks' posts sometime soon... I hope. :)

March 22-28

Sorry this is like a week late again...

Sunday I got to attend a broadcast of the Draper, UT Temple in the Marriott Center at BYU. If you don't know what the Marriott is, it's the big basketball arena. They do devotionals and stuff there too. Well, about 3/4 of the place was filled, and we watched the broadcast on the screens. IT was great! How cool. The best part was that I had gotten to walk though it. I went to two Open Houses! Ahh! The Celestial room was amazing. That chandelier is amazingly huge. It's sooo gorgeous. Anyway, it was so cool to see the whole Marriott center full of waving white handkerchiefs during the hosanna shout. Bliss.

For FHE Monday night we played the Skittle game. It's really fun, but you get light headed if you are too intense. Everyone goes around rolling the dice and if you get doubles or a five, you grab the bowl of Skittle and start transfering them to your cup by sicking them with a straw. It's really funny to watch. You have to be fast too. I did well at the beginning, but then I stunk the rest of the game. It's really competitive and crazy.

Tuesday we went to the temple in the morning. My, John, Neil, DaNae, Ashley, and Ali. Neil is endowed now, so he did confirmations, witnessing, and baptizing. It was so cool to see him being all priesthoody :) He was trying to baptize us all, but our group got separated, so he only got to do John.

I spent like the whole day writing a paper for my anthropology class. I was in the Wilk at first, but the fire alarm went off so I moved to the JKB and sat on the floor there for hours. I got it done though, and then John called to play basketball so I got a ride home too!

We've been playing basketball (knockout, really) with just a group of friends a few days a week. It was fun. I really like it because it gives me endorphins and I get to spend time with my friends being comeptitive.

That night Ali (one of the girls I went to Idaho with) came over to spend time with me. We stretched together (for health class) and watched TV, and practiced the Canadian national anthem (she's teaching me), and then she edited my paper for me. It was really good, but she stayed until 1:30 in the morning, so we were getting pretty loopy.... lol!

Wednesday night Ali came over the boys' apartment with me and we did their dishes together then made homemade oreo cookies. Ali played Andy's trumpet for a little bit too. We got her to play "O Canada" into the wall, where the Canadian boys live next door. Then we delivered the cookies to a couple guys' apartments in the ward. We ended waking up the Elder's Quorum president because we didn't realize he was in bed. But, hey, we brought him cookies!

Thursday I took a nap on a nursing couch in the bathroom in the Clyde Engineering building. It is seriously the best nap spot I've found. It's in it's own little nook in the bathroom and its such a big comfortable couch. I slept 6 hours there once.. Yeah that was a wasted day. But I only did like 4 hours this time :) I love it.

Thursday night I went with DaNae to a job recruiting meeting for APX Alarm. It was for a Data Entry position. I really like the job description, and the meeting and group interview went really well. Unfortunately though, I didn't get the job. I got a letter in the mail about a week later telling me so. Oh well.

Ashley got this gorgeous Canadian in our ward to go on a date with DaNae. Her and I had been planning a picnic date for Saturday morning. Neil was going with me, and DaNae's date couldn't make it. So Ashley hooked her up with Parker, who happens to be her hometeacher. He's possibly the most gorgeous thing I've ever seen, and he's possibly the sweetest thing I've ever met too. Ahhh.

So Friday I spent getting ready for the date. I went to Shopko and found a bunch of shirts on sale that were super cute. I was gonna wear one on the date. Then I went to Buy Low and bought groceries for the date. Delicious food. Seriously. I had way too much fun there. Then I spend the rest of the day making chocolate covered strawberries, making cresent rolls, chicken salad and the like. Delish!

That night I played volleyball in the dark with Ashley, Ali, and Neil. It was fun. But it was dark so it was also a little dangerous. Eek. After that we went to Ashley's apartment and watched "My Fair Lady" until it was 1:30 and we had to kick out Neil. I went home too. It was sooo late. We finished watching it Saturday night. I love that movie! It's been so long since I've seen it.

So Saturday morning I got to go to the baptism of this guy in our ward from Nepal. His name is Pradip. It was soo cool to see a baptism, especially since I don't think they are that common in BYU wards. There was another guy from Nepal baptized on my birthday. I missed that one though.

So, after the baptism Parker and Neil came over (and DaNae) and we got packed for the picnic. We got our bikes and pumped up the tires then headed off. He took the Provo River trail to Utah lake. It was about a 45 minute bike ride. DaNae kept having bike problems. First she couldn't get the brakes to work (she was borrowing Ashley's bike) so she wrecked on the side of the road. Then Neil let her ride his bike, but then the seat was too high, and then she wrecked again. So they switched back and she figured out the breaks and we were pretty much smooth sailing from there. Parker was really sweet and helped her up and stuff and rode slow with her. Neil jets off and I'm left trying to keep up with him. Lol.

We got to Utah Lake and realized you had to pay to get in the park, so we just headed back and picked a spot along the bank of the river to have our picnic. Oh man, we had so much food. It was great! I remembered my cell phone played music, so we listened to that. Everyone loved my improvised chicken salad. I was even surprised with how much I liked it! Anyway, we ate a glorious lunch and talked and it was wonderful. Then we started the trek back. It seemed to go faster than the ride there. After we got back DaNae had to head off to do homework and Parker too. Neil hung around a bit, and I told him I'd proof-read his English paper. He came back a couple hours later to bring it to me, and took a nap on the couch while I read through it.

So that was my week..... sorry if I bored you, but I tried to pick the most exciting parts of my week. Love you all and miss you.

Saturday, March 28, 2009

March 15-21

Sorry, it's a little long... read on if you so desire :)

I've decided to try and do weekly updates for all you guys back home.... hopefully I'll keep up with it.

Ok so, first things first. If you haven't already heard, I'm planning on staying in Provo for the spring and summer to work and save money. My job prospect is at APX Alarm and I will find out sometime next week hopefully if I got it. If I don't have a job, I will come home. If I do have a job, I'll be staying here. The other job I would really love is as a conference worker at BYU for the summer or as an RA. Both of them get paid by the hour as well as having room and board paid for. It's a sweet deal!

Ok, on to my week... I think I discovered that I'm lactose intolerant. How strange to figure it out this late in life, huh? Well, I've never really liked milk growing up, and I wonder if that's why and I just never realized it myself. The weird thing is that it only happens with chocolate milk (because that's the only kind I drink straight) and yogurt. I can have milk on my cereal fine, and eat ice cream and cheese with no problem. Werid.

So the Vanfleets (the family I know out here in Provo-- the mom was my mom's freshman roommate at Heritage and she used to teach me Piano in Orlando when we randomly met up with them) brought me cookie and groceries for my birthday. Seriously the best gift they could have given me, considering my pantry was practically empty. I think I had a box of spaghetti :)

Speaking of birthdays, mine was great! It was March 14th. I started the day of going to the temple with a coupel friends. After that I went on a run with Neil which was way fun. He made me lunch after that... it was "Fancy Ramen." Very delicious! Then my RA had her bridal shower (which I missed most of on accident because I was napping), and I hung out with a few girls in my ward. Then I roped some friends together and we went to see Bedtime Stories at the Dollar Theater. It was so funny. A little cheesey, but hilarious!

Anyway, this week it started getting WARM! I am so in love with it! It makes me feel almost exactly like I'm back home (even though, I'm sure it's still like 20 or 30 degrees colder here). There was this one beautiful day where EVERYONE was laying on the grass around campus studying and napping. I had to do it too, it was too tempting! It was soooo nice. I can't wait 'till it's like that everyday. Unfortunately it decided to snow that weekend. :( Boo!

I had a meeting with my Freshman Academy advisor, Brittany. She's just checking up on how things are going with me. Her and I set a goal together to replace negative thoughts with the song "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go." I've always wanted to do that, but I just never actually decided to, and so I finally did and it's awesome! I chose that song because I have recently started to like it while listening to MoTab's new CD "Called to Serve." I love that whole album, but that song is one that I've never really cared for before, but for some reason I really like that arrangement. Go figure.

Our ward had a FHE activity where we got to go bowling in the Wilk. It was fun, but I haven't bowled in like over a year, so I wasn't at the top of my game which made me sad :( But it was fun anyway.

I've started going out the basketball courts in the apartment complex with a bunch of friends and play knockout a few times a week. It's lots of fun and always makes me happy. I love endorphins!

Neil went home this weekend to get his endowments at the Manti temple. I'm so excited for him! John is going next weekend. P.S. I don't know if I mentioned where they got their mission calls to. Neil is going to Brazil Porto Alegre North, and John is going to Italy Milan. So cool!

I went running with this girl Ashley in my ward (she's the FHE "grandma" for the ward). I've been hanging out with her and her roommate Ali a lot recently. They are so fun and nice! Ashley and I ended up running for like an hour and a half! It was crazy. I didn't event realize how far we were going until we had already gone really far! LOL Anyway, she invited me to go to Idaho with her that weekend because she was going for a cousin's wedding. I decided to go so I could say I'd been to Idaho. It was all really last minute and random, but so fun.

In Idaho we got to go to the Boise Idaho Temple and it was so pretty. I took tons of pictures! <3 Also, we got to go to some hot springs up in the mountains. The three of us girls went with Ashley's older brother and a roommate of his. We were the 5 "A"s: Alexa, Ashley, Ali, Aaron, and Adam. lol We ended up going to a skinny dipping hot springs because it was closer and we had left too late to make it in time to the other one. We had to hike the mountain in the rain (wearing flip flops mind you) in the dark. There were a whole bunch of crazy hippies up there, but thankfully it was dark and we didn't see anything scary. But I really want to go to some hot springs again. It was so relaxing and nice.

A whole bunch of guys in my ward go their mission calls this week. We got one going to Washington D.C. (his least favorite place in the States-- he's from Canada), one to Tucson, AZ, and one to Tokyo, Japan (my home teacher). So fun! And they just keep coming every week!

Well, I think that's about it. Miss and love you all!

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

St. George- Whiterocks Trail

We went on a hike in Snow Canyon on the Whiterocks Trail. It was so beautiful. Sorry, there are a lot of pics, but I couldn't stop taking them of my silly friends and the stunning views.