In which there's lots of random news of the positive sort.

1) I'm narrowing down my major options. It makes me excited. I know Environmental Science and Geology are going to be the two main competitors.
2) I finally got my hair chopped and I love it. Goodbye annoying long hair that is not conducive to my lifestyle.

3) This girl goes home the second day of finals week. Yes, yes, YES. Thank youu BYU for giving me an incredibly easy finals schedule.
4) I 92%-ed my first final exam last night.
5) The South Denver Colorado mission finally decided to give back one of my best friends, and this morning I got to see his face for the first time in two years. Skype is a wonderful thing.

The end.

Supermassive update via pictures

My life in a nutshell:

The end!

You know you're homesick when

you creepishly stalk your own house on Google Earth. [:

This Washington girl misses her trees.

The definition of tragedy

When your FAVORITE PEN RUNS OUT OF INK. ): 

For me, seeing this is like a combination of homeless kittens and the day you found out Santa 

wasn't real. Thank goodness I've set aside a portion of my monthly budget for my pens. [: 

{Before you judge me: It's really not that weird if you think about it. Other girls do it for makeup or shoes or some 

other guilty pleasure. I do it for pens, okay? It's cool, trust me.}

It's beginning to feel more like home here.

 

 

Cute little Spitfire just down the street from me!

I love running here.

     Balancing all the parts of college life is hard. There are new responsibilities. New things to worry about. New things to take care of. New things to think about. Am I doing this right? Am I going in the right direction? Finding my major. Grades that really matter. Friends. Remembering to feed myself. Keeping my room somewhat organized. Laundry. Grocery shopping. Budgeting. Sleeping enough. Visiting teaching. Exercise. Boys. The future. And as a result of all these wonderful things, I get to come home every night at eleven o'clock and fall into bed dog-tired, emotionally wrung out, physically exhausted and sore, and mentally overloaded. Lately it's been almost more than I can take. Seven classes, a church calling, making time for just me and personal study, still maintaining a social life, weight lifting twice a week and running every day. These days I'm being stressed harder than I've ever been. I can confidently say I've learned two things - First, that I can't do this without help from people who know more than me and are more experienced than me {TA's, friends, my parents}, nor without the strength and guidance lent to me by a higher power. And second, I have so, so much to learn, so much to improve about myself, and so far to go until I've become who I'm supposed to be. I have been blessed with so many second chances and growing experiences. My life is sometimes a little rough, but my life is also very good. I have so much, but a few things in particular have been on my mind lately.
     I get to go to Brigham Young University, where church leaders and apostles come speak to us. Where I go to class in dedicated buildings. Where there's crazy good clean fun going on every night. Where the Cougar Fight Song becomes engrained in one's brain. Where I get to learn by the intelligence of man and by the Spirit. Where I'm three minutes from a temple. Where I get to serve my friends and serve strangers. Where I learn lessons that will remain with me for the rest of my life. I get to learn how to be the best me, the person my Heavenly Father needs me to become. This can definitely happen at any university, but little by little I'm growing to know this is where it's supposed to happen for me in particular. And that's a really nice assurance to have.
     I get to live with five other beautiful, wonderful girls who make my life easier, funnier, simpler, and fuller. I get to have friends who care about me and know me. We can talk about everything and anything till 3am. I get to have multiple full-blown, can't-catch-your-breath, laughing-so-hard-that-nothing-comes-out belly laughs a day because of them. I get to have friends who make it easier to live the gospel and easier to be a better person. Friends here, plus friends who are all over the world serving the Lord and bringing people to Him, friends who share their testimonies with me and help mine to grow. Friends who teach me through their example and words.
     I get to have a body that is adaptable and strong and capable of doing hard things. My body is my friend, and I'm starting to realize that more and more. Even when I only give it four hours of sleep and a snarfed-down bowl of hot cereal for the entire day, it keeps going with me, without protest. Even when I work it hard and make it hurt, it rebounds and regrows and becomes stronger. And not only does it let me do, but it enables me to learn. It lets me become more aware of this world, the people in it, the current events, the movements, the philosophies, the sciences, the possibilities of it. It lets me analyze and organize and apply. It lets me grow. It houses my mind, and my spirit. It is such a blessing to have a body.
     Sometimes my life is kinda rough. Kinda stressful. Kinda sleep-deprived. Kinda frustrating too. But I have so much. I have the eternal perspective that the gospel brings. I have a firm foundation. I have potential. I have life. I have my life. And my life is so good. It is so, so good.

Utah sunsets. Makes a girl happy to be alive [:

Scenes from the weekend

1) Probably the most exciting college football game I've ever been to. BYU vs. Utah State on Friday night. Our seats are three rows up from the field, right smack dab in the northeast corner, so both the game-changing touchdown AND the amazing game-winning touchdown with 10 seconds left in the game happened right in front of us. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. I don't think I've hugged so many strangers in a single evening as I did that night. When the clock ran down we rushed the field, had a dance party with the team and got a picture with Graham Rowley. Both Molly and I had sore throats the next day. One of the BEST DAYS of the semester so far!

2) General Conference and hanging out with my FAMILY. What else is there to say?! Absolutely, positively inspired and amazing. The thing I love most about conference is how each of us can receive so many personal answers and comforts specifically for our own lives and circumstances, all from a conference broadcasted all over the world to millions of people. I am so thankful for the blessing of continuing revelation from God to His prophets today. Plus I am psyched out of my mind to have so many new talks to listen to and study for the next six months.  

3) I got asked to one of the homecoming dances. All I gotta say is that I accidentally stuck my hand in that blob of umm... unpleasantness and it's not something I ever want to do again. I'll give that boy props for creativity. Needless to say I answered yes - by smuggling an alarm clock into his room and waking him up at 3 in the morning with my answer [: Cruel, yes, but hilarious. Any guy who wants to take me on a date'd better be prepared for my sense of humor. Should be fun!

Goal for the upcoming week: don't let midterms kill me.

PS: ITS OCTOBER!!!! I'm so happy. I love fall.

10 facts about my life as of late

1) My classical music Pandora playlist and the library = what I've been living off of for the past few weeks. Hence the absence of blogging in my life. Or anything at all that doesn't have to do with math, chemistry, or sleeping really. Including cleaning my room. Melissa was very patient with me about that and I'm so thankful to her for it. {For the record Dad, the room is now clean. Despite what you may think, I can't function in a room like that for long!}
2) I've come to realize that I have the best roommates ever.
3) Also, there are so many people here that are so, soo much smarter than me.
4) Automatic flushing toilets scare the beans out of me. They are evil and I hate them. {Whyy on earth are all the toilets in the hbll automatic?!}
5) For the past few weeks I've had to be on campus from around 7am till midnight every day, and for reasons that aren't so fun. But at the same time, I love it. BYU campus is so beautiful and holds this feeling of learning and bettering one's self, and I can't help but be happy and excited about my life and future when I'm there. Even when the only reason I'm there is to sit on my bum in the library for forever and a half to study imaginary numbers. I really do love this university.
6) Last year I started this weird thing of keeping ongoing lists of random things on my phone, serious and funny - names for my future kids, things I'm thankful for, funny things friends say, things I like about myself, things I want to change about myself, qualities I like in guys, words I really like, Chuck Norris jokes, etc. Whenever I see or think of something regarding one of them, I just plug it in there. And now I'm really glad I've gotten in the habit. It's kind of therapeutic in a weird way and fun at the same time. Maybe I'll post some sometime.
7) The leaves are changing. [:
8) Today I spent 9 hours of my day in the library catching up in the math and chem classes I added late. One of my roommates guessed I probably hadn't eaten dinner yet {which was correct - I hadn't eaten since breakfast} and came all the way from our apartment to the hbll with a pb&j, granola bar, part of her emergency stash of chocolate, and a hug, and then kept me company and studied with me till midnight. Further evidence of why Miss Molly is probably one of my most favorite people in the WORLD. Seriously that girl is an angel in disguise. My Heavenly Father always makes sure someone's lookin out for me. Always. What a comfort that is.
9) A good hug can cure anything. ANYTHING.
10) My family is on their way down to Provo as we speak. General Conference is this weekend. Dinner date and football game against USU tomorrow night. Life is good.

Apartments > dorm rooms.

Living room, plus my homework pile. Also please notice the sweet sound system,
which you can see on either side of the cabinet. Our apartment is pretty much
dance party central. Noo big deal.

The kitchen, which last night survived the first roommate dinner of the 

semester before we ran across campus to hear Elder Oaks in the Marriott Center. Molly and Melinda

 made fajitas, Melissa and I did the rice, and Whitney and Tonya supplied chips and salsa. It was perfect.

Our lovely two-bathroom prep area.

And the best part: Melissa's and my room!

And that's about it! Living in an apartment is SO DIFFERENT from living in the dorms, 

and I love it. I love my roommates:

 I love the other people in our complex, I love my ward, I'll try real hard to learn to love

 the hassle of making food, and of course I love this school. 

Anyways, there you have it. My home away from home. A real live apartment.

{I'm a sophomore... That's weird to think about.} 

Life is gooood.

College makes me look like this:

First day of school picture. Tradition must be maintained. And also because the "first day of school" picture my Dad snapped last week was actually of me at our front door with no makeup on & wearing sweats, about to get into my friend's car to begin the 14 hour drive to Provo. Not a proper first day of school picture. No. So this will have to do. {Sorry it's awkwardly ginormous... } 

This one's from BYU Photography's webpage and when I saw it in their slideshow of photos from the first day of class, it just made me happy. {They had photographers lurking all over campus trying to capture "candid" pictures of students on the first day, and one of those sneaky guys was creepin around my 8am New Testament class. Nobody dozed off during that lecture, lemme tell ya} These past two days I've been walking around this place with a huge silly grin on my face, and I really can't stop. Why? The feeling that hangs around this beautiful campus. My five wonderful, hilarious, beautiful roommates. Brand new classes and stuffing my noggin full of new knowledge. Laying out on the grass after class. The anticipation of upcoming sports games, dances, and devotionals. Spotting friends from freshman year. The resulting flying tackle hugs. New friends. A new ward. Running my old route through the neighborhood. THOSE MOUNTAINS. You get my drift.

Scheduled for someday = a post about Alaska / the end of summer. Maybe. 

But for the next four months I have other things on my mind.

This girl's life is super goood.

Things I want to remember: Kauai Edition

So I'm heading back to my other life {the college student one} in about two weeks and I've got unfinished business on here. Particularly regarding one of the defining vacations of our summer, which I've been putting off blogging about for quite awhile. And by "quite awhile" I mean almost two months... So today is the day I put the dang thing in the record book.

As you can imagine, two weeks in paradise produced a lot of pictures and a lot of memories, and I'll be honest - I am most definitely not gonna put all of em on here because a) my blog page would take infinity to the fifth power to load; I've already got enough pictures on here as it is, and b) that post would take forever to create and I really don't care THAT much about sharing every little detail. So, I'm just sharing the favorites - a handful of things that I want to make sure never ever to forget about my amazing vacation to the Garden Island. 

This one comes first for a real good reason. I want to remember how much fun it was to be with my Grandpa and Grammie, two of the most amazing people I have ever known. I could go on and on about them. I am so thankful to them for their examples to me of faith, selfless service in their church callings, of living within their means while raising four kids and managing their finances in a way that they can now spoil us grandkids like nobody's business {Like this trip for example!}.

Plus I also wanna remember this cute little chapel where we went to Sacrament Meeting.

I want to remember how pampered we felt at the gorgeous hotel we stayed in and the hours 

and hours we spent on the beach, snorkeling at the amazing reefs, and playing in the pool together.

I want to remember the incredible hike we did in Waimea Canyon and the

mini heart attacks I had every time we came around a bend in the trail. 

Not that we aren't cute or anything, but please take a moment to look behind us at the canyon. See what I mean? [: GORGEOUS.

I want to remember my first real scuba dive as a certified Open Water diver at 

Koloa Landing. Absolutely positively one of the coolest experiences of my life.

I want to remember how amazingly GREEN that place is. And that's coming from a Washington

girl who lives in the middle of the forest. Trust me. I know what I'm talking about.

I want to remember that wave boarding was one of my most favorite things we did, no

matter how many times my poor body collided with the bottom of the ocean. Sorry I suck at boarding, 

little body. I hope you'll learn to forgive me in the future.

Awesome bruise from the wrist strap of my wave board
after a particularly bad wipeout.  Not sure if I should
consider myself super hardcore or just a complete
failure of a boarder.

I want to remember the um, "adventure" we had camping the second week of our trip; the incredible

snorkeling, having a beach in your backyard, falling asleep to the sound of the waves... plus the never-ending entertainment that drunk natives provide as well. Every single night. Till 2am. Yep. Gooood times.

I want to remember the insane amount of wild chickens that were EVERYWHERE on the island, which gave me a perfect opportunity to use the chicken-catching skills taught to me in my childhood on my friend Dani's farm, as well as teach an apprentice of my own.

So fluffy!!

I want to remember the gorgeous hike through the jungle to Hanakapi'ai Beach, which seriously

looked like it came straight out of a National Geographic magazine or something. It was amazing!

I want to remember the fun we had goofing off and being siblings.

I love these guys.

We found seed pods shaped like smiles! As you can see,
 the picture's a total fail, but hey, we tried.

{UV shirts do much more than block sun.}

I want to remember how absolutely terrifying / insanely fun it was to stand atop

Kipu Falls, jump into open air and fall twenty feet into a river. Definitely one of the scariest

things I've ever made myself do, and definitely one of my favorite

things we did. 

I don't ever wanna forget those sunsets,

or the rainbows.

And I want to remember how awesome my family is and how much I stinkin love 'em. 

But I'm pretty sure that won't take too much work.

I'm the luckiest girl in the world.