some other stuff

A few weeks ago, I started tutoring a boy in Korea in English through Skype. It's a pretty sweet gig - I do it in my pajamas. The only problem? It's at 6:30 in the morning. Come daylight savings, it'll be 5:30. Yuck. It especially sucks on Wednesdays and Thursdays when I have to leave for the MTC at 7 to get to work on time. So I have to be ready before the tutoring. That's a 5:30 am alarm time, folks. Goo. To make matters worse, our house is really open. That's not worse - that's actually fabulous. The problem, though, is that no matter where I go to do the tutoring, my roommates can hear me and I wake them up. So I have resorted to the only place I can find in the house that is secluded enough to let all my roommates stay in their blissful little dormant state: the downstairs bathroom/laundry room. That's right. I sit on the toilet and put the computer on the sink and talk to my little buddy in Korea. That's actually where I am right now but he hasn't gotten on Skype yet. Our lessons are only 30 minutes long and he's already 20 minutes late. The great thing? If he's late, I still get paid. So I've been getting paid to sit here for 20 minutes looking at facebook. I think that's a reasonable trade for making me get up at 6:15 when I normally wouldn't get up until 8:30.

The following picture is of my dear friend Angela. She doesn't live with us and on a regular basis she's pretty bitter about it. When we first moved in, we noticed this little ledge in the living room that seems to serve no purpose except to offer an unreachable decorative nook. We've never put anything up there but we decided that was Angela's room. If she ever comes to visit, that's her space. Now I'm going to seemingly go off topic, but don't worry. It all will tie up in the end.

Since we moved in about a month and a half ago, we have had to replace the batteries in 3 or 4 smoke detectors. Ridiculous. One of them happens to be at the very top of our slanted two story living room ceiling. Read: impossible to get to. We endured the supersonic beeping for several days and finally decided to take care of it. Angela was the brave volunteer who mounted the decorative nook to replace the battery. Getting her up there was probably the best part. After some failed attempts at what seemed like pretty safe means, we finally got her up there through a good ol' cheerleading move. She stepped into mine and Aubrey's hands and we lifted her up. That's right, I was a cheerleader in 5th and 6th grade, and yes, I was a base for the mounting. And yes, I was awesome.

So here she is when we finally got her up there:

We then realized it was her room and that she should probably stay there and enjoy it for a minute.

An equally funny part was trying to get her down. She wanted to just jump onto the couch but it's pretty far and we were pretty sure she'd either break herself or our couch. So finally, she turned herself around and slid down into our arms. What a team we are.

Last week was my beautiful, loving, kind, helpful, funny, wonderful roommate Aubrey Shuler's birthday. To celebrate, I made some de-lish veggie pizza, which is not pictured. What is pictured, though, is her accident with a package of melted chocolate. Oops... You can't tell, but she got it all over herself - hair, face, clothes - and on the counter.

Afterwards, we surprised her by going to get pedicures. While the lady was working on mine, she asked me who did my toenails last time. I responded that I did. She said (in her fabulous Asian accent), "Oh. Look like." Then laughed. It's ok. I'm not offended. They look fabulous now, though!

It is now 7:00 which means my Korean friend never showed up. And I just got paid for blogging. I'll take it.

sweet home indiana

As I previously mentioned, two weekends ago, my wonderful and generous father flew me home so I could be with my family. My mom and my sister Tessa planned a weekend full of fabulous family activities, starting with dinner and a bonfire at my parent's house on Friday night.

This is Isaac's girlfriend Dominika who I just barely met but has long since become part of the family. She fits right in! That's Holden who...I don't even know what to call him. He's part of the family, too!

Yeah, they are the cutest ever. I was so excited to see my nieces and nephews! The twins weren't really big fans of me, though. They take a little while to warm up to me and four days just doesn't cut it. Especially when they're sick.

Tessa got the twins ready for bed before they loaded up and drove home. Cooper very obediently posed for pictures.

The next morning we all went to Jonah and Emerson's soccer games. The only ones we were missing were Dad, Jacob, and Thomas. Pretty good turnout for kids' soccer!

Both Emerson and Jonah are pretty quick little kickers.

After the soccer games, all the girls went to lunch and did some shopping before meeting up with everyone else for the main event: Thomas' football game in Lucas Oil Stadium. I'd never been to the stadium; it is AMAZING. It's huge and fancy and very cool. Indianapolis is hosting the Super Bowl this year, which the building totally deserves. Too bad this is the first year in a long time that there's pretty much zero chance the Colts will make it.

Thomas is number 56. He plays offensive line, defensive line, and special teams. No wonder he's so exhausted after his games! They played valiantly and really hung in there a lot longer than anyone expected with a very good team, but they couldn't quite finish it. They ended up losing by one touchdown I think. Thomas held them in there a little longer, though, when he scored a safety in the last few minutes. The Bull Dogs got two points and the ball back. Unfortunately, they couldn't get a touchdown out of it. We were VERY vocal about our support of Thomas, though! Our entire family made it to the game. I love, love, loved it.

When we sat down before the game, we were kind of our own little island in the middle of nowhere. There was no one around us for the entire first half. Then right before the half, a bunch of students dressed in construction tape started sitting around us. Before we knew it, we were completely surrounded by students from one of the schools that was playing after our game. It was so strange. They were all vying for our seats as soon as we left.

After the game, we hit up T.G.I.Friday's to have dinner with everyone. Nalon and Holden didn't quite make it awake long enough to even eat their food.

Sunday after church, we went out to my grandma and grandpa's house for a little visit. They live on a huge farm out in Hope - about 15 miles from my house. I grew up out there and we used to go to my grandma's every Sunday after church to play with cousins. Some of my best childhood memories are from that farm.

Thomas got some scope or something so that's what he was doing the whole time...

My dad took Nalon outside to see what Thomas was doing and Nalon ended up getting chased by a rooster. Scared him to death I think.

We ended Sunday by playing games. Just for the record, we also played games on Friday night. Settlers, to be exact. And I whooped everyone's trash. Including Isaac's. He always wins. Sucker. And I should've won Rummy on Sunday night but I totally failed to notice an obvious way to end the game. I would've won. That would've been a little win sandwich.

Monday I ate some Big Cheese, a must every time I go home, and visited my old high school. They've made some big changes since I left. I could barely even recognize it.

The weekend was pretty much one of the best ever. There was actually a moment on Friday when I thought I might cry from sheer joy. I love my family more than I can say and I am so grateful to have been there for such a fabulous weekend.