College life!

It has been way way way too long since I posted, and so much more has happened than I will even be able to remember. College is great, but it also comes with it's challenges. I would prefer to focus on the good rather than the miserable, but I will still touch on some of that to keep the picture of my college experience fairly accurate.

First off, There have been many fun times between my roommates and I. One time, it was pouring rain on the day that we had a campus wide devotional. We hurried home from the building so we wouldn't get soaking wet. My wonderful friend and awesome roommate Emily is an usher for the weekly devotional, so she had to stay after, and thus got stuck in the worst of the rainstorm. Because of this, she took cover in the apartment of some of her other friends that was closer. She waited there until the storm calmed down, then came back home. While she was gone, I had been telling another roommate of mine, Kami, about working for Tracy Jewelers. This led to us both looking at engagement rings. Emily came home and I said to her rather excitedly, "Emily, you missed it! We were just looking at engagement rings!" She just heard the "engagement" part of it, and automatically assumed that I was engaged. Needless to say, the whole apartment was in tears since we were laughing so hard! There have been several other experiences like that, but I think that one alone perfectly illustrates the mood of the apartment...for the most part that is. I would rather not go into the other side. Let's just leave it at that because that's a whole lot easier.

Schoolwork isn't necessarily harder, but there is a TON of work. I agree fully with this pic that I found online

It's seriously ridiculous. All of us just hope to "defy the laws of physics" although we feel that it is utterly impossible. I know that as I get minimal amounts of sleep, yet still do my very very best to maintain good grades and have a social life, I do end up like quite a bit of a zombie. With me though, this usually results in more giggling with my favorite roommates than anything, which tends to make us stay up even later since we can't stop laughing. There have been far too many funny instances of that to even start listing them off.

Yesterday was an interesting day as well. It started off with an experience that I will never forget. I woke up, and went into the bathroom. I went to unlock the door and open it, and then things got interesting. As I grabbed the doorknob to pull the door open, the knob came off the door. That's right, I was holding the doorknob in my hand, and it wasn't connected to the door. I was locked in the bathroom. I tried using pressure to put the knob back into place so I could forcibly unlock the door and pull it open by grabbing the bottom of the door and pulling it open. This proved to be futile, and I had to come up with another idea. Thankfully at that moment, Kami came by, so I knocked on the door. She had seen my hand at the bottom of the door and wondered what in the world was going on. We ended up getting a screwdriver sent under the door so I could completely remove the door handle and get out of the bathroom. We now have a doorknob sitting on our bathroom counter.  

Being a music major has been stressful as anything gets! I have just about had it! Music is great and everything, but it has been far too frustrating. I have been putting in the extra effort to learn the music correctly, but it has made it so much more difficult as of the past two weeks. My first week learning the song, I was able to learn the sections of the piece perfectly. Since then, I have practiced twice as hard and long as that week, but have accomplished way less. In the hour that I have practiced so far today, I have only been able to learn one more measure. For all you out there that don't know what that is, it's about 3 seconds worth of music when played. This is not fun to handle at all. I will figure something out though.

All in all, life has been super fun, but I'm not sure I will be involved in music on the academic level for much longer.

I'm Finally Here!

After all the wait, I finally am all settled in to my apartment, and will begin classes tomorrow. It is a new experience for sure, but I LOVE it! I have already made several new friends, my roommates are the best, and I am super excited for this. It is still kind of frightening, but I will feel much better once I get settled into a schedule. It is still pretty darn nerve racking though Orientation this past weekend was a BLAST, well I-Night was probably one of my favorite parts, next to spending time with my I-group (orientation group). I am excited to see what life here at BYU-I has in store for me.
Everyone has so much energy and is so kind toward everyone. This is truly the place to go if you ever want to feel like a part of something that's important.

It was quite the hectic day on Friday while moving in, but we finally all got settled, and now I'm ready to begin my new adventure. We made several good friends from the apartment just down from us, and I made some friends in the music/art department as well.

Here goes nothing! I start everything for real tomorrow!

Four More Days...and a Social Media Rant

With less than a week to go, I  am having a hard time believing that it's here already. I'm leaving on Thursday for my new grand adventure. The preparation is practically done, with just a few things left, like packing up my clothes (which I will be doing tomorrow) and loading up the car. I also have a random boxes to pack, but that shouldn't take long. I am excited to move on in life, but at the same time, it's pretty daunting. I can't go back now, and would much rather go than stay at home and not progress in life. It's just new. Not that I don't like change, but I have never done anything like this. I mean sure I have moved before and had to deal with that, but I have never gone to live on my own (kind of, I mean there are five other girls in the apartment and I already know two of them) and I will get to see a different side of life. It will be fun, yet stressful. I feel like I'm ready for the challenge if anyone is though. So on Thursday, we will embark on the six hour journey to Rexburg, Idaho, the place where dreams begin...but really, it is going to be the start of something new. I will be able to develop skills that I have, learn new ones, and learn more about my various artistic passions while at school.

Gosh, I don't know what else to say. I love my new computer, I just bought a mouse for it on Friday, the screen protectors for it came in the mail yesterday. I don't know. I am just to busy thinking about getting ready to think about or do anything else.

Oh yeah, we are taking family pictures this afternoon. I guess that's something different than college prep and the stress that it entails. For me though, I would much rather be taking the picture than being in it. I think a lot of people are never really happy with the way they look in pictures. It doesn't help for me that I was on the yearbook staff for two years and spent a lot of time behind the camera instead of in front of it. I love taking pictures! I really do, I promise. There is something satisfying about getting an artistic "vision" of sorts and being able to capture it. I guess that's why I Instagram a lot too. I just get some crazy idea, or see something cool and try to bottle up the emotion and story of that thing. It's fairly addicting when it is a good emotional outlet I put way more on Instagram than I put on Facebook. I don't usually feel the need to tell everyone in Facebookland how I feel about what I ate for dinner. Unless it's in some amazing five star restaurant somewhere in Europe, I honestly don't think people really care. On Instagram however, I can share emotion through art, and let others enjoy it too. I mean, It's not like if I posted something about the previously mentioned restaurant on Facebook that everyone that saw it would suddenly be able to eat the food and enjoy it too, but with Instagram, I can let my audience see and enjoy the same thing that I saw. It's just different.

And sorry there are no fun pictures on this post. I put several on the beloved Instagram this past week though, and there is a link to my page off on the right sidebar of this blog, if you feel so inclined to view them I guess.

1.5 Weeks...and Other Cool Stuff

That's right! I have about a week and a half before I leave for Rexburg. I seriously can't believe that it has come so fast. I am pretty much done getting ready, I have most everything (including my new laptop). I just need to pack up my clothes, but that will have to wait a little bit. I had a wonderful birthday last Monday. It included FABULOUS homemade chocolate ice cream, made from a chocolate custard base. Follow this recipe for the best ice cream ever.

It really was wonderful, and I was able to share the leftovers with Emily and Madeleine when we got together the next day for pizza (and a movie) to talk about college stuff for our apartment.

For the last month or so, I have had the chance to go to the Spokane, Washington temple at six each Wednesday morning. It has been a wonderful experience. It was early, but the dedication it took helped me remember how important it is to me as well as what lengths I am willing to take for the things that are important to me. When I was done on this last Wednesday, the sky was one of the most beautiful things that I have ever seen.

I was just in awe at how gorgeous it is her in Spokane, and how much I am going to miss this beautiful part of the world while I am gone in Rexburg for the next bit of my life.

One thing my family was able to do on Friday was visit River Front Park. This park is in downtown Spokane, and was built for the 1974 World's Fair. I have so many fond childhood memories of this park. My family used to get season passes each summer when I was a lot younger, so I remember when several of the rides were put in, the fun rides on the Looff Carousel in the park, and viewing various IMAX movies in the theater in the park.

This is my sister, Julia, and I on the "spider" ride in the park. We were waiting at the top of the ride while others were loading down below us when I took this picture. I remember being so excited when this ride was put in the park. It is probably the best thing there, but I LOVE roller coasters, so I have a different opinion than a few people. It is just a ride that does a whole lot of spinning, and makes for a lot of giggles when ridden with your thirteen year old sister.

That same day, Emily got her wisdom teeth out. I wasn't able to see her until Saturday, the following night. She is doing pretty well so far. I took her ice cream and said hi. She is seriously one awesome person, and I'm so glad that I can call her my best friend, and soon roommate.

College Prep and Birthday

I feel slightly like a terrible person since I haven't posted in about a month, and I have spent more time updating the look of my blog than writing. Yes, it is the same quirky blog, but it looks different. I thought for the past few weeks that I didn't have anything to write about since I had spent all of my time getting ready for college and hadn't done anything "special" or "fun". Then all of a sudden, I had a super eventful week and realized at the same time that I could have just written about getting ready for school.

To get ready for school, I have spent time packing and all that other boring stuff, but I have also utilized my creative outlet and made canvas signs to decorate Emily's and my bedroom in the apartment. It has taken a while, but I am thrilled to have them. I used a Cricut cutter to cut each word out of card stock, then I modge-podged them onto painted canvases and modge-podged over everything to secure it. The signs all have something that will motivate me to keep moving forward and to enjoy life.

While making these signs, I had some fun and felt a little like Jackson Pollock while painting the canvases when I would initially put the paint on before spreading it around the canvas.

I am so glad that these signs are almost done! They have been lots of fun to work on, but I am ready, and my mom is REALLY ready to have the mess cleaned up.

Last Friday I had the chance to ride the famous Hiawatha Trail with Nathan and his family. This 50 mile bike trail truly displays the natural beauty of the inland northwest. Here is a picture of one of the tunnels on the beautiful trail that I found at the Hiawatha Trail website.

This picture was taken at the end of the first tunnel on the trail. That tunnel is almost two miles long, so it's pretty dark inside. I can now say that I know what "tunnel vision" is after riding through that tunnel with only a headlamp to guide me. It was absolutely stunning, and we had a wonderful time spending the day in this beautiful world.

Last thing, today is my 18th birthday. It's weird being an official adult. I got fancy notifications from Facebook telling me that they wouldn't automatically keep my things private, but I have them all set that way anyway, and I have to fill out my own paperwork for my orthodontist appointment tomorrow, and it just feels strange. I have had lots of wonderful birthday wishes and gifts from family and friends, and I got the best present from the sister missionaries that are serving in our congregation right now. I have spent a TON of time with them the last few months, and they have become some of my good friends. They left me this adorable heart-attack in my bedroom today while I was gone and left me a yummy bottle of lotion and some gum. I seriously love them and hope the best for them as they serve the Lord and live their lives both on and after their missions. I feel so blessed that I have had the opportunity to get to know both Sister Knowlton and Sister Clark. They have blessed my life so much more than they could ever imagine.