This is my "Got It" expression. Because I'm awesome.

My goal was to have 10 posts at the end of January.

Hmmm. What to do? What to do?

GOT IT!

I'll blog about random happy-ness and adventures until I feel I have a sufficiently long post.

ITEM 2:

Me.

Yesterday was a normal day.

In the middle of my normal day, I drove to school to pick up my Best Friend and we went to the mall. (He had to buy stuff.)

We were walking out of the mall and saw some people taking pictures.

"Cute." I thought. "Just precious." Yeah. Whatever.

We tried to go out a door, but it was locked, so picture-taking-people walked out the other door in front of us.

As we walked behind them, one of the girls in the group looked back at us.

I froze.

I made Best Friend freeze.

"IT'S MICHELLE!!!" I whispered.

"No way." He replied. (Good thing he knew EXACTLY who I was talking about.)

This woman:


Is Michelle from the Bachelor. The season that is running RIGHT NOW.

HOLY COW!

She is from Salt Lake, and she is CRAZY on the show. No joke.

Best Friend's roommates are kind of *cough* obsessed *cough* with the show, so I've seen all the episodes. Michelle is definitely not my favorite.

But I saw her at University Mall! She is a real person! She really lives in Utah!

My world just got a lot smaller.

Or at least, it used to be rare.

Now I'm here a lot more often than I would like to be. I come when I'm bored and have nothing to do. I come because I have homework to do and don't have my laptop with me. I come...frequently.

Well. It's different this time.

I'm sitting in the Media Center.
I happen to be facing the service desk.

There is a really really Really REALLY cute boy over there.

I look at him. He looks at me. Sometimes we catch the other's eye.

Hmm. It's really fun, actually. Tee hee.

Maybe I will come to the Media Center more often.

Well. Tonight didn't exactly turn out as planned.

I wanted to spend the evening with my Best Friend. Unfortunately, I forgot that he is busy with a Men's Chorus retreat.

Yup. He's spending the night with a bunch of stinky, but talented, boys.

I was spending so much time being productive and forgetting he was busy that I got ALL of my homework done. So now I don't have any homework that I need to do tonight. Unless I want to get ahead on my homework for next week...but who does that? Well, I'm sure someone does, but it sure isn't me!

What am I going to do?

I'll tell you. It involves brownie batter and Hulu, followed by brownies, ice cream, popcorn, a blanket, my stuffed bear, and a movie.

Sounds fun, right? Actually, it sounds very unhealthy. But hey! I'm excited.

Take that, Best Friend. ;P

Signing out.
Me.

I can finally add another state to my (very short) list of states I have been to. Yay Hooray! And yes. It is Idaho. *phew* Finally, right? It only borders Utah, so I only should have been before, but I've never had a reason. Well. Last weekend, I did. And it was a good reason, too.

My Best Friend and I traversed the wilderness from Provo to Idaho Falls late at night to visit his sister and her family. It was quite the adventure. We left after classes and drove all night. Well, until 9:30 pm, anyway. The only problem we ran into was the unfortunate situation of driving through fog. However, nothing is impossible for the awesome team we are, and we both kept our eyes wide open as we drove through. Moderately scary, but we survived. No sweat. Well, maybe just a little.

After arriving late, there wasn't much to do except meet the family. Which turned out to be lots of fun. Sister and Brother-in-law have a daughter and they were all fantastic. It was a great time spent with them, lots of game playing (Boggle and Sequence and Stratego), movie watching (Episodes V & VI of Star Wars), and just chatting it up. Oh! And eating great food. We didn't spend any money on food this trip (except the gummy worms we bought before hand for the drive) and the food we had was de-lish! I definitely felt a teeny bit pampered. *sigh* Great way to start a vacation.

Saturday we drove to Rexburg to visit a convert from Best Friend's mission that is now attending BYU-I. She is a super sweet girl and I enjoyed walking around campus a little (even though I complained a tiny bit - I was ridiculously tired). Best Friend loved getting to see her, and so that made it more than worth it. After saying good-bye, we drove across the street to the Rexburg temple. GORGEOUS! And sort of just appeared right out of the fog. It was magical. Loved it. We headed back to Idaho Falls, but got lost. Hooray for us. We drove past the Idaho Falls temple, which was also gorgeous, and after I failed at my attempt to figure out where we were on the map, Best Friend pulled over and took control. He figured it out quickly and we were on our way. I was grateful he could read a map. I'm sure it will be handy again someday.

We made it back safely, and enjoyed a relaxing evening playing and talking w/ Sister, Brother-in-law, and Niece. Since it was a vacation, you'd have expected us to stay up late - no dice. We totally went to bed around 11 pm every night. It was a great & relaxing weekend, but oh man, we were beat. (That's good.)

Sunday we went to church and enjoyed a beautiful musical number. It was definitely my favorite part of the block, at least, I'm not sure about the others. It was so touching. The girl that sang was blind and sang about God's love for her. So touching. I wanted to cry. Almost did, actually. Cuz I'm awesome like that. After church, Best Friend and I baby-sat Niece while Sister and Brother-in-law went to their home teacher's. Actually, Niece was sleeping and so we did the dishes. Yup. We're awesome like that. Then we went to Best Friend's Grandmother's house. She is an awesome lady. Being there reminded me of being at my Grandma Stepan's house (my dad's grandma). Good memories were brought back and I was reminded how grateful I am that I know I'll see her again. It was incredible.

Another early bedtime, and the next morning we woke up ready to get going. Breakfast was delicious (all the meals were, truth be told, I loved it!), and while Best Friend's Sister went to the doctor for a baby check-up, we baby-sat Niece. She was so much fun to play with and super easy to watch. We make a great baby-sitting team. We took turns so the other could get ready and pack, and then put the baby down for a nap and did dishes. WA-BAM! Lots of fun.

We left Idaho Falls shortly after lunch. We made a special detour to go to Logan to visit my ex-roommate Winona (ex-roommate. Haha). It was a fun trip, we all went to dinner together and got to do some awesome chatting and fun-having. The food was amazing, too. The plates were ginormous!!! I loved it. So much food. It was beautiful and happy and exciting. We said good-bye to Winona and finished our drive back to Provo.

Idaho added to list of states? Check. Good time w/ family & friends? Check.

Yay for a great weekend.

Signing out.
Me.

You know those times when you refuse to admit you're wrong? Even though you are?

Or those times you really think you should be right? But you aren't?

I hate those times.

Or those times when you do or say something really stupid because your tongue seems to disconnect itself from your brain and keep blabbing and blabbing and blabbing while inside you're screaming at the stupid little man inside your brain that lost control of the tongue and thus let escape a huge variety of words that weren't ever supposed to?

Yup.

I had...an interesting day. It definitely wasn't a bad day. Nope. Not even close. I enjoyed my classes.

But I was exhausted.

And apparently that does funny things to the little men that run my brain and causes them to mess up.

Now I sound even sillier because I'm not accepting responsiblity for my actions.

Ugh.

I am accepting responsibility. I said some things I shouldn't have. I said them in a way I shouldn't have.

Then I got upset when someone reacted to what I had said in a fairly predictable and understandable way.

Then I got even more upset while driving.... and said more things I shouldn't have.... Oops.

I was behaving like a child and then got it handed right back to me. I deserve it.

I shouldn't behave like a child. That's stupid. And not the way to get what I want.

...

You know those internal battles that happen sometimes? They go something like:

"I'm grumpy!" "No. You're tired. Be happy. You can and should be." "...I'm grumpy!" "No. You're stupid. Now smile." "... ...I'm grumpy!"

It's so easy to be happy, but it's so easy to be grumpy too.

But...who wants to be grumpy? I mean really?

Not me. I like being happy.

So why was I being so stubborn? Because I was behaving like a child. Maybe preschool is bad for me.

JK.

I was stubborn, tired, and grumpy and the little men in my head lost control of my tongue and I made a mistake.

Now I have to fix it. But I don't want to. Why? I'm grumpy. And stubborn.

But it's only hurting me.

*sigh*

Someday I'll learn.

P.S. I am going to fix it. In approx. 15 minutes. Well, I'll try to fix it anyway.

How?

Not the slightest clue.

Moral of the story: Don't be grumpy if you aren't. It's stupid and childish. And only hurts you.

Yup. That's all. Cheerful, huh? Sorry. I'll write again when I fix this. Just had to get my thoughts out.

Not that they made any sense, but oh well!

Signing out.
Me.

Hello.

Classes started on Tuesday.

And I am exhausted. Seriously.

I mean, I started the week after a long break. That may have contributed.

I also started the week feeling rather ill and out-of-sorts. That may have contributed.

Actually. I think that problem is my schedule. It SUCKS this semester.

It's ridiculously hard. I'm taking 6 classes that are 16 credits. That means 4 of my classes are 3 credits.

Seriously. These classes are going to kick my butt. They are all hard-core developmental stuff. I'm super nervous. I'm either going to do awesome, or fail. Praying for the awesome, but we'll see.

On the bright side, they all seem to be relatively enjoyable. Meaning that the teacher seems pretty cool. Which will definitely be helpful. I have a hard time with uninteresting or excited teachers.

I also get to work in the preschool this semester. YAY! I so miss being around kids all the time.

Well. That's my sum-up for now.

Good luck with your...stuff...

Signing out.
Me.

This is a brief synopsis of my Christmas Adventures. (Promise. Brief.) I will detail specifics later.

Two weeks ago, I send goodbye to my best friend, had breakfast & lunch with a couple of old roommates, packed my car, and drove to Vernal. School was finally over!
This is a picture I took outside my back door. This is two days into the storm. We got another inch or two on top of this lovely supply that is now ice and will last until March. You can sort of see where my sister tried to walk down the stairs.

(For the record - she didn't succeed. She slipped and fell in the snow. It was hilarious.)
I stayed bundled nice and warm and refused to go outside more than absolutely necessary. While staying inside nice and warm, I had another spectacular adventure - I almost burned the house down. Well. It wasn't my fault. Really. It was just in my bedroom.


This is a picture of the outlet after burning. Scary, huh?

We went to Draper and Lehi and visited family. We saw my Pearson grandparents & my dad's sisters and their families. Then we saw my Brown grandparents & all of my mom's siblings and their families.

We spent Christmas Eve and Christmas at home with just us. It was perfect. Lovely. Special. Our last one. Really sad. But I loved it. I peeked at my presents (more out of tradition than any special desire to break the rules) and Christmas morning, my parents surprised us with a trip to Disneyland for our present! (Well, they surprised the youngest three. The oldest three found out before. We are sneaky.)

DAY ONE:  Sunday we all went to church together for the first time since... Like three years ago? Then we piled in the car and drove to St. George. Long drive. Icy roads. Good fun.

DAY TWO:  Monday we drove from St. George to Los Angeles. We spent FHE at the beach.

DAY THREE: Tuesday we started the day at Disneyland, had cold stone for lunch, McDonalds for dinner, spent a little part of the afternoon at California Adventure, and finished the night in Disneyland with beautiful fireworks and snow.

DAY FOUR:  It rained. All day long. Crowd control was nice, though. We were all super wet. We started the day at California Adventure, then finished at Disneyland. We didn't stay quite as long as the day before, but still had a great time and did everything we wanted.

DAY SIX:  Drove from St. George to Vernal. Long drive because of bad weather. Took us all day long. Gross Gross Gross. But still lots of fun.


New Years Eve I spent doing puzzles and watching movies with my mom. It was lots of fun. New Years Day I did laundry and planned my Sunday School lesson (which went pretty well for my first one ever).

Today I drove home in the wee hours of the morning (9 am) and went to church. Now it's time to prepare for school to start on Tuesday. Yuck. You know, I'm only in my third year, but I'm considered a senior because of all the credits I have and could graduate in April. UGH! Two more semesters - I technically graduate in December and then have student teaching. Go me! I can do it! Huzzah.

Signing out.
Me.