a swingin' fourth

To celebrate the independence of our great nation, a few of my friends and I went down to Mona, Utah where they have some sort of pond that has some great rope swings rigged up to it. I'd never been before and had wanted to go so I was super excited. It did not disappoint.

Here's Adam getting ready to go.

Very focused.

Let's just stop for a moment and marvel at my amazing photography. Do you see how he's silhouetted against those clouds? Impressive stuff.

I was pretty nervous at first but then I just climbed right up there and went for it. It got easier the second and third times. I only ever went off the lowest platform, which was ok because I was still having fun. I don't need to push myself to dangerous heights just for the thrill. That's not necessary for fun.

Ok, so I'm not quite as graceful as Adam. And maybe every time I hit the water I got so much liquid up my nose that I came up sputtering. But that's ok. I'll work on it.

Here I am on video. Intense action right here, folks.

Next up was Angela. I think she may have actually gone before me. I can't remember. Anyway, she'd gone before and actually went off the higher one but this time she stuck to the lower platform like me. I also got a sweet vid of her.

Aubrey wasn't sure she even wanted to make the trip down to Mona in the first place. Then when we got there she wasn't sure if she wanted to actually go on the swing. We finally persuaded her to do it, though, and she admitted that she did, in fact, have fun.

Lovely background, right? I loved the scenery that accompanied our jumping jaunt in the water. Here's Braden:

I was supposed to get a shot of him in the air, too, but I missed him and ended up just getting the tree. Oops. Sorry there, French Brade. But just believe me, he actually did swing out. A few times. This is the lovely scenery I was talking about. Utah really is beautiful.

On the way back, we stopped at what seemed to be the only restaurant in Mona: Big Burger. It wasn't the cleanest. Well I guess it was the cleanest because it was the only. Under those terms, however, it could also be classified as the dirtiest. That's a dead fly stuck there between the glass and the menu. Yum.

The man running it was...Indian I think and had an awesome accent which Angela so righteously mocked to his face. It took about a half an hour to get our burgers and we realized that we'd ordered at the drive-up window...on foot. But when the burgs came, they were totally worth it. I was craving a little Big Burger today, as a matter of fact.

I had to work last night so I missed out on the 4th of July barbecue, but I was around for the fireworks show. We all pitched in and bought some fireworks and lit them ourselves. I generally don't like spending money on anything I can't eat, so I committed to only buying a firework that cost one dollar. I actually found one, and it was a great disappointment. But the fireworks my friends bought were much cooler and we enjoyed running around while holding them as they...umm...discharged? Is that the word for it? I've heard it's dangerous to hold them while they're going off but it was much more fun that way. We even relayed them for a while. I'm sorry I didn't have my camera for that part.

Happy Independence Day, everyone! God Bless America!

temple tour

Since we were on our missions in Argentina three years (oh my gosh) ago, Jaime and I have been talking about visiting each of the temples in Utah. I'm leaving at the end of the summer so we figured it was now or never. For more information about what temples are and what we do there, visit http://lds.org/church/temples?lang=eng. There are currently twelve operating temples in Utah, with one under construction, one closed for remodeling, and one announced. On this trip we hit ten of them and will be hitting the final two within the next few weeks.

We started our journey at the Bountiful, Utah temple. 

The  next day we headed up to Logan but we stopped to see the Brigham City temple (on the left) which is still under construction and the Ogden temple (right) which is closed for remodeling. And by remodeling, I mean it's closed to be torn down and rebuilt and will look nothing like it does now.

The Logan temple was super busy since it was a Saturday. We also saw lots of weddings, which I hadn't even thought about. It made me want to get married really bad. What does a girl have to do to get a husband around here? Geez.

Right about this time is when my car started having some serious issues and then eventually died right before we got home. You can read all about that story in my previous post. Lovely. We took a one-day rest so Jaime could teach and I could get sick (Not because of her teaching. I didn't even get to go, sadly.) then continued on.

Most of the temples are closed on Mondays; I guess for Family Home Evening which, in fact, is only part of the day. But whatever. The few that are open on Mondays are only open in the morning. So we headed up to the famous Salt Lake temple Monday morning, which was really fun. As a sidenote, a lot of the missionaries in my area at work go to Temple Square, since they have sister missionaries there from all over the world with their cute little nametags with their nation's flag underneath. Anyway, a few weeks ago I subbed in a class that had a lot of sisters who went to temple square. While we were at Temple Square, I saw one of them! Sister Feng, from China, was my favorite from that class because she was always so happy and thought I was super cool. Who doesn't like someone who thinks they're cool? We saw her! She'd only been there for a few days so I'm sure it was also fun for her to see a familiar face. It made my morning!

Since all the temples are closed Monday afternoon and evening, we took advantage and visited Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City. Neither of us had ever been. It's not a huge zoo, but my animal-viewing needs were satisfied, except that the elephants would not come out of the shade. I mean, I don't blame them really; it was super, super hot. But hello, they're from Africa. You'd think they'd be used to it. Geez. We did get to see some other quite large animals including gorillas, which are impressively ugly, and giraffes, which are impressively tall. We also saw many smaller animals but they're not quite as picture-worthy, now are they?

Don't be fooled. Not a real elephant. Those were keeping their distance.

That night we stayed with my fabulous aunt VeNicia and her husband Spencer who were very gracious hosts. We ate dinner, played a game, them Jaime and I went to bed. As I mentioned before, we both were still pretty sick so even though we were able to go on the trip, we were pretty wiped out for a lot of it. Early-to-bed for us.

The next day was our go-getter day. We were able to visit four different temples in one day. It helps that they're all within a half hour of each other. My uncle sent me twenty names from his wife's family history that we were able to do some kind of temple work for on this trip. That was really cool. We started with Oquirrh Mountain (left) and Jordan River (right), which are less than ten minutes from each other.

I've lived in Utah for a while now and I've come to the realization that if I were to get married right now, I'd probably get married in Utah since most of the really important people in my life right now live here, with the exception of course of my family. I decided a little while ago that if I did get married in Utah, I'd get married in the Jordan River temple. It's a great central location, but it's not so crazy like the Salt Lake temple is. I still have a hard time understanding why SO many people get married there when there so many other beautiful temples nearby and you don't have to wait in line to be able to get your pictures taken. I digress. Anyway, I decided I'd get married in Jordan River. Central. Not as crazy. Still beautiful. After visiting it, I still liked it. But then my mind was changed forever.

Enter Draper:

This is my temple. I'd visited it before when they did the open house before it was dedicated a couple of years ago, but for some reason I hadn't really thought much of it. Umm....I was blind. It's GORGEOUS. I like the outside, but the inside is amazing. The wood is dark and beautiful. The colors are cool blues and greens and greys that are calming and lovely. The windows are beautiful and all the rooms inside are so well-lit and very bright and have stunning chandeliers. The view from the temple is pretty stellar, looking out over the whole valley. Yep. I'm sold. If I ever decide to return to Utah to get married, this is where it'll be.

Our last stop of the day was Mt. Timpanogos in American Fork. Even though this temple is about twenty minutes from my house, I'd never been there. I'm still not really sure why. If you look closely, Jaime and I are really little at the bottom of the picture.

That night we drove down to Manti. I love this temple at night because it's up on a hill and you can literally see it for miles as you drive from Ephraim to Manti. It's like a beacon to the world- in more ways than one.

The whole trip Jaime and I joked about how all you need to do to feel good about yourself is go to the temple during the day. It was compliment city! This was true in most temples, but especially in Manti. I guess during the day it's usually just all these old people there so when they see two young girls, they're all impressed and would all comment about how wonderful it was to see these two young, beautiful girls at the temple. I think I had temple workers tell me how pretty my eyes were three times in one day (it must be the contrast against the white dresses) and in Jordan River there was even one temple worker who really wanted to set us up with some other guy that comes in every Tuesday.  It was definitely a feel-good experience!

Manti was super windy so it's really a  miracle that we even got a good picture. I was trying to keep my hair out of my face and Jaime was trying to keep her skirt down.

That day we made the long trip down to Monticello, Utah. The temple there was the first of the small temples that President Hinckley announced in the late 90s. The closest temple to my house in Indiana is in Louisville, Kentucky which is also this same design so being in Monticello felt like being at home! It was even windier in Monticello so we didn't even try to be in the picture this time.

Monticello is pretty far out there so as far as lodging goes, there's not much of a selection. Because of this, they're all extremely overpriced. We found a cheaper alternative to the roadside motels: a cabin. We were kinda nervous about it at first but it turned out not being so bad. We just had to walk across this gravel parking lot to get to the bathrooms and shower. That was a fun time in the middle of the night when I desperately needed some ibuprofen for my throat and didn't have any water in the cabin. To the bathroom I went.

We had initially planned to stop off in Moab at Arches National Park since neither of us had ever been there. We ended up not having time but we were able to see some amazing scenery just along the road. Southern Utah really is breathtaking. It's the kind of beauty that makes you realize just how small you really are. I guess being in the temple so often made me even more sensitive to how much our Heavenly Father loves us and He's shown that by this beautiful home He's given us to live in. He didn't have to make it this beautiful. But I'm glad He did.

Finally, we  made it to St. George. We'd gotten a gift certificate off of CityDeals.com (If you don't know what that is, shame on you. Go now.) so we ended up getting a sweet hotel room there for only 45 bucks. I.love.hotels. It's kind of a strange obsession I have but I just really love any kind of hotel. Even if it's not fancy. But if it is nice, I'm even more excited. So I was pretty pumped about this one. I didn't even want to do anything else, so Jaime and I got some dinner and spent the night in our room catching up on our TV shows on hulu that we'd missed that week.

We saw this guy in the temple that was really cute. We were both a little distracted. But then we saw him again as we were leaving...not so attractive. Must have been the celestial glow that makes you much more attractive in the temple than you really are. Then we actually ran into him at lunch afterwards and his mom told us he'd gotten home from his mission literally that week. Read: 21 years old. Aaaaand interest is lost.

The only temples we have left are Vernal and Provo. We went to the Provo one on Saturday when we got back but it closed early for some reason. So now we have to wait three weeks because it's closed now for maintenance. So stay tuned for the last two stops on our epic temple tour.

I really thought this trip would be a huge spiritual high and I'd learn all kinds of new things or feel some great change in myself. I didn't. But it still felt good. I came away feeling completely confident that I spent my week doing probably the best thing I could do. And I was able to do temple work for ten women who have died and can't do it for themselves. It's an amazing feeling to know that you're participating it the eternal salvation of someone else. I know that temples are the closest we can get to our Heavenly  Father while on earth and I so enjoyed being that close all week. I was reading in the Bible Dictionary that only the home can compare to the temple in sacredness. I was really impressed by that and it makes me want to put even more effort into making my home a sacred place where the Spirit of God can always reside.

summer time

Well...it's summer. That usually means things slow down and I have much more free time. Not this summer. Here's what's been going on:

I finished my spring term a few weeks ago, which was magical. I still have an internship to do, but I am officially done with my undergraduate coursework! Taking those last two finals was absolutely exhilarating. Well, the finals themselves were actually quite boring. But the being done part was fabulous. No more homework for me!

To celebrate, my friend Jaime and I went on a short week-long roadtrip (because vacations in my mind should last no shorter than two weeks) to all of the LDS temples in Utah. I'll post more about that in a separate post. It was really fun, though, and so so nice to not have to go to work.

Just in time for the vacation, I got sick. Jaime had a sore throat and a cough before, and she ever so kindly passed it along to me. On Sunday my throat was hurting pretty badly, I was achy all over, and I was just feeling miserable. I knew I'd never get through the trip feeling that way. So I asked two of my friends to give me a Priesthood blessing. If you don't know what that is, or even if you do, you can find a fabulous speech about what Priesthood blessings are and how they can help us here. I'm so grateful to live in a place where I am surrounded by good, respectful men who recognize their Priesthood responsibility and live worthy to act in God's name for the benefit of God's children. The next morning, I woke up and the achiness was gone. I was still really tired and still had a little bit of pain in my throat, but I felt good enough to go on the trip. For me, that was a miracle, and I'm grateful to have a Heavenly Father who knows me, cares about me, and answers my prayers. The sickness continued throughout the week but was mild enough that I was still able to do everything we'd planned. I'm still rockin' a legit cough, but I'm doing ok.

Last weekend, Jaime and I started our temple trip by going to Bountiful and Logan. Since it was only a two-day trip (we came back for Sunday so Jaime could teach), I drove. I'd had some problems with my car before but my mechanic assured me it wasn't a big deal and even though we were having a hard time finding a part that I needed, it wouldn't affect the rest of the car. If any of you have ever been to Bountiful or Logan, you know there are some pretty intense hills up there. My poor little car just didn't have what it took. About halfway up to Logan, the check engine light came on. Then my overdrive light started blinking. The shifting was getting pretty hard and the wheezing noise from the engine was getting pretty intense as well. We made it all the way back to Provo, miraculously, and just as we got off the freeway, something in the transmission died and even though the engine was still running, we weren't going anywhere. I somehow managed to milk it enough to get it off the main street and off to the side of the road where I left it. I had to work that night so we called a friend to come get us, then Jaime took me to work in her car. Later that night, my fabulous and very manly friend Cody towed me to the mechanic's shop. It was pretty good timing since I was going out of town and wouldn't need my car anyway. On Thursday, though, I got the dreaded phone call: the whole transmission needs replaced. My car's not even worth as much as the cost of a new transmission, so my time with Sylvia has come to an end. Now I have to figure out a way to get her back to my apartment and hope I can sell her to some aspiring garage mechanic who wants to replace the transmission. In the meantime, I am accepting any offers for rides to and from work. =)

In the end, it's probably better that this happened now, since I was planning on driving my car across the country from Utah to Indiana in August. It would've been a lot less pleasant to have my car die somewhere in the middle of Nowhereville, Wyoming.

I don't have homework anymore, but my now full-time homework is figuring out stuff to get myself to Spain in two months. The visa application requirements are ridiculous and everything costs money. I had no idea it'd be this much work just to get myself to Spain. I'm trying to remind myself every day that on the other side of this crap is eight months in Europe. It'll all be worth it, right? Right.

mi padre

Today is Father's Day. This is me with my dad last year:

My dad's pretty fabulous. He's a great example of a hard worker and a good, strong, reliable, and generous man who I look up to a lot. In the recent years, I've grown to realize really how impressive my dad is because of his willingness to do the right thing even when he may not want to or even when he definitely won't get credit for it. He's very admirable.

Happy Father's Day, Dad! I love you!

turns out not where but who you're with that really matters

 I've mentioned it before, but it's worth repeating. I have the greatest friends ever. Story:

A little over two years ago, I was apartment hunting with my best friend and roommate Jaime and our good friend Leah, who we met in the MTC. Our group started out as five but over time, it had come down to just the three of us, which was fine with me since I didn't know the other two girls anyway. We'd narrowed our options down to two and Leah came over one day so we could all go look at the two apartments and decide. She got to our house and said something along the lines of "Have either of you looked at the Omni? I just drove past it on my here and it looks nice." We hadn't thought about it or looked at it so we decided to go by and check it out before going to see the other two. It was a cold, rainy February day and as the three of us stepped into that first apartment at the Omni, we were sold. It was a nice place and we all just felt really, really good about it. We called the next day and snagged the last few open spots.

A couple of months later, Leah announced that she was engaged and getting married in August. We were supposed to move in in August. Read: she's not moving in. So it was back to just Jaime and me. By the end of the summer, Jaime had an opportunity to go play basketball at a college in Wyoming (pretty much her life dream....except not the Wyoming part) and she finally decided to go up there for the year. That left me. For whatever reason, Heavenly Father wanted me in this ward, in this apartment so badly that he gave all three of us a for sure yes to ensure that I'd be here. I always assumed it was because I'd meet me husband here. I was wrong. But I did meet these incredible, life-changing friends. I realized recently that this is the longest time that I've been actively friends with a group of people since high school. Did that sentence make sense? I mean, we've been friends now for almost two years and that hasn't happened to me in a long time. I usually move or things change somehow. But these girls have pulled me out of some pretty dark places without even realizing it and have made my life an absolute delight. I don't have a boyfriend, but I never feel unloved thanks to these ladies. I'm so grateful for a Heavenly Father who loved me enough to send me to a place where I would find some of the best friends I've ever had. And I'm grateful to the incredible women who rose to the challenge and continue to impress me every day.

This is what we do all the time.

This is what we do when Jason takes our picture.

Everybody!

This young boy inspires me for a variety of reasons:

1. He saw the challenge and took care of it like no one's business.
2. He cares about others and seeks their happiness and success.

3. He is a fat little boy with a lisp. Those are my favorite kind of little boys. He could only be improved if he had glasses. I'm choosing to believe that he does but took them off for the bike lesson so as to not damage them should he fall off the bike.

4. He wears a helmet for safety. I think thousands of other cyclists and motorcyclists should follow suit. In fact, I think it should be a law. As my good friend Jaime argued, if it's a law to wear a seat belt, it should be a law to wear a helmet.

Young sir, I, too, am very happy of yourself.

Rock and roll.

my beloved alma mater

I'm warning you now: this is a complaining post. And it's about BYU. If that hurts your feelings, stop reading.

I am so sick of BYU. Two weeks from yesterday, I will be done with classes there forever. Today I told Jaime on the phone that after I graduate, I refuse to step foot on that campus ever again. If someone has some kind of event there, I won't go. So all you Provo friends, if you love me and you want  me at your wedding reception, don't have it at BYU.

To be fair, I should specify the things that I'm sick of. Because it's not everything. I guess it's a fine school. I've had several years there and I actually have had one or two (or more...fine.) good experiences there. But lately the bad is outweighing the good. Allow me to elaborate.

1. Parking
Parking during fall and winter semesters is impossible. If you don't get there before 8, you should go ahead and expect to be following pedestrians very slowly as they walk out to their car so you can take their parking spot. The most glorious part of taking spring classes (because there's not very much that's glorious about taking classes when you should be out enjoying the summer) is that parking is so much better. There's a fraction of the people on campus so you can find a pretty decent spot at any time of day.

NOT TODAY. (If you were wondering, I just pounded that into my keyboard. Good thing my computer's young and new and can take that kind of abuse.)

I got to school today at 9:45. My class is at 10. I've gotten to school later than that this term and found a spot without a problem and still made it to class on time. Not today. The last couple of weeks, they've had about 3/4 of the parking lot blocked off so they can redo the tree planters in the parking lot. Umm...first of all, just take the tree planters out. They take up space that could be another much-needed parking spot. I don't need greenery in my parking lot. Second of all, I do not believe that you need to block off a couple hundred (that may be an exaggeration, but if it is, it's only a slight one) spots to work on maybe 10 planters which are about the size of half of one spot. When I got there today, it was as bad as it has ever been. Not only did they have 3/4 of the main lot blocked off, two of the three smaller side lots were completely blocked. No pasar. And if you were wondering...I saw three construction men working on one planter. The other 199 spots they'd blocked off? Totally necessary. Obviously.

So I spent about ten minutes driving around, with the other hopeless drivers in my position, hoping I'd happen upon someone who was leaving. No such luck. So I left and went to the parking lot on the other side of campus next to the Marriot Center which is never full. Not today. I don't know what was going on there today but it was competely full. And I was completely livid. So I drove back to the other spot and was able to catch someone who was leaving. Of course I did--my class had already started by that point. So my earliness this morning was for naught. I was still late. That'll teach me to try to be a good, punctual student. Or maybe that will just teach me to expect BYU to do something logical, such as only block off the needed spots or wait to do it until later in the day when everyone's gone. Silly me.

2. Umm..I can't remember. I got so worked up about the parking situation today that I just lumped it in with the other things I hate about BYU but now I can't remember what they are. I guess that's better. Maybe I should try to do a gratitude post so I can improve my very negative attitude about my school.

Not today.