And so it begins!

I am back up at BYU and two days into my Junior Year of college! I am so excited for this semester, which is a huge comfort to me because I was pretty nervous and worried before I started. I am now officially in the Program for Elementary Education and all of my classes are classes for my major. I have no more General Education classes, no more pointless classes, no more classes where it is meaningless to me. Everything is for ME and what I want to do with my life. I LOVE IT!

This is the "Arts Semester" of the El Ed Program, so my classes are: Dance, Music, Art, Drama, PE Teaching, Math, English. I have been to most of my classes* already and I think I am really going to enjoy them all. [*Art is only on Fridays so I'll have my first day of that later, and I missed my first Drama class for a concert which I will explain in a bit! :)]

Not only are my classes great, but I am in a great new apartment this year with some awesome roommates! Karina and I were assigned to live with random people and we lucked out big time! Clarissa and Ashley are super nice and fun and we get along so well! Karina and I feel like we have known them for much longer than 5 days. Apartment 1 has already had some fun times and I am looking forward to much much more!

Here are some pictures of my apartment:

My apartment building on the right with the Y on the mountain

View from the front door: living room

View from window: kitchen/dining area

Karina's and my study room

Our vanity/bathroom area

My half of the bedroom

Closet area

It is not super nice like my apartment last year, but it is a lot more affordable and way closer to campus which is so much better! It takes less than 10 minutes to get to campus, which is less than half of what it took last year! :D

And now the reason I missed a class already is because Owl City came to Salt Lake City and played a concert with John Mayer last night :) My drama class was 4-5:50, but we had to leave to get up for the concert and so I missed the class. But don't worry about me, I emailed my teacher and told her I wouldn't be there and she informed me on what needs to be done to be sure I'm on track. It is all taken care of. It was such a great concert!! I'll blog about that later, but for now I am going to be a good student and do my homework first ;)

My Summer Vacations

Now that the summer has flown by for me and is rapidly coming to a close I am trying to remember all the time I have spent home and the fun I have had over this summer vacation.

There was my birthday

I attended a Renaissance Dance where I got to see my brother and one of his students do a sword demonstration/skit


The epic Wedding Roadtrip and all that jazz

My friend Reed and his brother came out to California for a wedding and we met up so I could be their LA tour guide


I spent a lot of fun times with my nephews Ethan and Tai and my niece Evey


Attended the Midnight Premier of Eclipse with my Mama


We made a few trips to Dry Town Water Park in Palmdale with the kids


I had an amazing 12 days on a houseboat with my extended family at Lake Powell


Karina and her family go camping at the beach every summer and they invited me to come camp with them for a few days in San Clemente


After a few days camping, Karina came back to Palmdale with me and we had fun with my family despite the fire that came up over the hill right behind my house [thankfully it was all under control and the fire didn't cause any big problems]


And that Goodreads tab on the side of my blog is a small sampling of all the books I have read this summer- 38 total, and I'm hoping for maybe 2 more before I head back up to Provo :)


Even though it seems like the summer has flown by, I now realize that I have done a lot! Its been a great summer and now I am excited to go back up to school and have a lot more adventures!

I have the best of friends!

Saturday was a pretty epic day for my best friends. They are amazing people and on Saturday Karina ran a half-marathon and Sam was married in the Los Angeles LDS Temple! Super exciting!

I wasn't able to be in Utah for Karina's race, but here's a picture of her and her sister after they finished! :)

These girls are so amazing! I am definitely not a runner, so running for 13.1 miles for "fun" is amazing to me!!

I was able to be at Sam's wedding reception and here are some pictures from the beautiful evening:

One of the first things she said to me was "Its ok. I'm still Sam" And this proves it :)

She is so gorgeous!

I am so proud of both these girls and I am so grateful to have them as my best friends! :D

My number 1 Hobby

Summer 2010 has been dominated by reading for me. DOMINATED. I mean I have had a great time wakeboarding, hiking, camping at the beach, watching fireworks, playing with the kids, and all that, but lets just get things straight- those are all things that happened here and there between books [or possibly just between chapters].

I have read 33 books as of tonight. THIRTY-THREE! And we are talking chapter books, not just little things.

Its been awesome! I love to read but I had lost the time/motivation to read for a while. This summer I gave myself a kick-start by making the rule that I could not re-read a book, which is what I usually tend to find myself doing (Harry Potter Series- 2-4 times depending on the book; Twilight Series- 3 times; Anne of Green Gables Series- 2-3 times... etc). No more of that for me.

I took a Children's Literature class last semester and it opened my eyes to the wonderful books that are filled with fantasy, clean fun, and adventure. I have frequented the Children/Teen section of the library this summer and have discovered some realllly good books. They aren't childish or too juvenile as some might think. I am 20 and I find them very entertaining- but maybe that just means I'm immature? Either way, I'm enjoying it and that is what counts.

I love how I get so absorbed in the characters and the stories as I am submerged in these new worlds and experiences. Sometimes I get a little too attached as I can't seem to accept when a book is over and I want more more more. Thats when I pick up another and start the whole process over again :)

Here are some of my favorites from this summer:
-Hunger Games Series
-Fablehaven Series
-Percy Jackson Series
-Uglies Series
-The Book Thief
-The Maze Runner

The Maze Runner is the one I just finished tonight. It is the first book in a trilogy, but the next book doesn't come out until October! I am realllly looking forward to that! And I am also realllly looking forward to the finale of the Hunger Games Series which comes out on the 24th of this month!! Yesss! I'm glad that I will be able to read that one before the semester starts so that I don't have to feel guilty about reading that one but not my textbooks... :)

Anywho.... I love books. You should read. You should read some of those books on my list. And feel free to provide me with any suggestions of your favorite books. There's always Thanksgiving and Christmas break to read once Summer ends ;)



Oh, and about all those other adventures of the Summer... I will post about them eventually.

My Apologies

To the few of you who actually read this, I'm sorry for my slack in posting on here lately. I have really been a huge bum for the majority of this summer, yet still I have not posted. I promise (to try) to be better in the future.

I did just return from a 12 day vacation to Lake Powell though, so that is both an excuse for not posting and a topic for future posts [with lots of pictures, yay!]


So don't give up on me just yet. I am still having adventures and I WILL post about them sooner or later :)

By Popular Demand

Here are the photos captured by Cody's iPhone after Evey marked me as her territory and Heather whisked her away for a diaper change

My thought process: "Oh snap... did that really just happen to me?! Yup... and Ileana is laughing behind us cause she saw the whole thing"

I attempted to cover up the giant spot with Evey's book

And here is innocent Evey the previous Sunday just after waking up in Sunday School

I love this little girl! :)

Playing Mommy

The first week in June my brother and his wife left on a trip to Virginia/DC for some business and some pleasure. Along with my brother's sword (its part of the "business" he was going for, he owns a Martial Arts Studio), some books for reading, and cute new clothes, they left behind their 3 children for my sister and I to have fun with :)

Heather was the main substitute mommy for the week and I just did what I could here and there. It was a long week, but it was a super fun week as well. For the majority of the week I stayed with Heather at Derek & Naomi's house with the kids where we had fun playing house. I love my nephews and my niece and it was so great to spend all that time with them! I miss them so much when I am away at school so I was relishing all of our fun and experiences of the week.

There were several moments throughout the week where I truly felt like I was playing mommy and that I was getting a glimpse of motherhood. It was an adventurous week!

-quieting children in Sacrament Meeting with books and cheerios
-holding a sleeping Evey in Sunday School
-vacuuming while holding Evey
-waking up to Evey and/or her brothers tip-toeing around with that just-woke-up-happiness and squinty eyes
-convincing Ethan to eat all of his food at most meals
-feeding Evey her "num-nums"
-buckling car seats
-changing diaper after diaper
-getting pee all over my skirt in Sacrament Meeting when a diaper overflowed

Yes, it was a very adventurous week... and I loved it all! When I happened to go home or go to work during that week I definitely missed the kids. It was a fun experience and I am grateful for the opportunity I had to spend that time with Ethan, Tai, and Evey! It was a fun glimpse into motherhood. And now, believe me, it will be quite some time before I have three of my own! :)