Friday, December 25, 2009

Thoughts on Christmas

I woke up earlier than I expected to this morning- 7:30 AM. This isn't early on Christmas morning for most people, but it is in my family. I laid in bed thinking about how it was Christmas day and I thought about how there were lots of people I know who were already done opening presents. Some people just wake up early and quickly open up their presents before anyone else wakes up and gets there to join them. Why do they do that? My family doesn't and why is that? There may be many reasons, but there is one reason I thought about the most.

Today is the day we celebrate Christ's birth. We make ourselves busy buying gifts and spreading holiday cheer, but what is it really about? When Christmas day finally arrives, what do we do? We give and receive presents, but I think there is something more we should do. It can be the day where everyone can appreciate the gifts Christ has given us. It's simple, but how often, even on Christmas, do we actually take time to really think about and appreciate the gifts of Christ? How do I show my appreciation for the gifts Christ has given me? I shouldn't show my appreciation for Christ's gifts only one day a year; In fact, I think it is impossible to do so with a sincere heart. To show true appreciation, I have to show it everyday. I think that is a part of being a true disciple of Christ.

In heaven, time doesn't matter as much as relationships do. I like that my family doesn't care about time on Christmas day. We take our time getting up, eating breakfast, acting out the Nativity, and opening presents. We know that what matters most is that we are together. Whatever way it's done, I think the gift-giving tradition at Christmastime is a symbol of how I can show appreciation for Christ's gifts to me all year round.

It's often said that it's more important to give than to receive. In giving gifts, we are like the Savior, although He gave the greatest of all gifts. However, I believe that receiving is a symbol of something equally as important. Symbolically, the act of receiving is the challenge and joy of discipleship. Receiving things with gratitude, humility, and faith (because we sometimes don't get what we want, when we want it) can be hard, but it can also be a great testimony and character builder. The scriptures talk a lot about receiving things, such as the gift of the Holy Ghost, the commandments, blessings, gifts of the Spirit, light, and knowledge. What I do with my gift also matters. If I set it aside, throw it away, reject (or return) it, I am not really appreciating the gift. Using the gift, especially sharing it with others, is how I show appreciation. That's why we are taught we should share the gospel with everyone. That is a big way to show God that we appreciate the gifts He has given us. Sharing my testimony is another way to show appreciation. There are many ways to share the gifts Christ has given me.

Here are some ways I thought Christmas giving/receiving can be a symbol for how we should give/receive throughout the year:
  • Take time for Christ everyday through prayer, scripture study, and temple service.
  • Expressing/showing gratitude for all things-being grateful for what given. Receive and not be bitter about what don't receive right now because we don't always get what we want, when or how we want it.
  • Making sacrifices to give gifts that show love (just like Christ did).
  • Give meaningful gifts to others-Service, time, etc. without thought of price or self (only the heart)
  • Use gifts/talents we have to build up Kingdom of God, uplift others, give small acts of service and love

Last Sunday one of the speakers at church talked about how we spend so much time and energy buying gifts to give others on Christmas when it is really Christ we should be giving gifts to because it is His birthday. I believe we give gifts to Him when we appreciate and receive what He has given us. It's like what my mom always says when we kids want to give her something for her birthday or Christmas--just me doing right and being good (and now me coming home to visit and make cinnamon rolls) is a gift to her and she is happy. I think it is safe to say that Christ is just as satisfied, if not more satisfied, as my mom is when He sees that I am trying my best to be His disciple, share my gifts, and do all that He needs me to do.

I am grateful for my family traditions that help me to see and feel the true meaning of Christmas. I hope that by sharing these thoughts here that someone will get something from it and be made better by it.

Merry Christmas!

Thursday, November 19, 2009

IN-N-OUT, A Taste of Home

IN-N-OUT in Orem! I was in the drive-thru for 1 hour, but it was worth it for taste of home.





Saturday, November 14, 2009

The Oscars 2009

The night we'd all been waiting for finally came. That's right, BYU 83rd Ward's third annual Oscars Night and my final activity as ward activities co-chair. A few people have told me that I saved the best activity for last as it went off without a hitch, with special thanks to the committee and Sis. Meservy, the Bishop's wife.

Oscars Night is an opportunity for members of the ward to create movies together and get to know one another's talents and share them. It is a semi-formal/ formal activity, with dinner, movies, voting, dessert, and dancing. We had a red carpet, paparazzi, and great music. The lights were low and excitement was high as we met together to watch and vote movies made by our very own friends.

This year we had nine movies turned in, which is the most we've ever had. These movies were also the best quality movies we've ever had. There was great competition for best movie this year and that was fun. Each FHE group was asked to make a movie that was no more than five to seven minutes long. People were also allowed to make movies separate from their groups. They turned the movies into me and I put them onto one DVD to be shown on Oscars Night. After the movies were shown, they were given time to vote for the movies in eleven different categories on papers provided at each seat. My committee and I tallied up the votes and announced the winners. We gave each winner a certificate and a trophy. The trophies were actually random stuffed animals and other objects from DI. My co-chair and I were the MC's for the night, so we were running around making sure everything went smoothly and it did! We did finally get to dance for the last hour of the night and that was really nice.

My roommates and I were involved in three movies this year. My FHE group's movie was called "The Hodgepodge of Horror" and that is exactly what it was. It was a collage of creepy and kind of funny horror-esk things. The more I watch it, the more I love it. The second movie was called "Der Erlkonig" and was based on a Danish tale about an 'Elf King' who's living in the forest whose touch is lethal to mortals.  It was really fun to film. I was a minion to the 'Elf King.' The third movie was called "The Minefield"and was based on a comedy routine done by one of my friends. It demonstrates how dating is like a minefield. In this one I was the girl that got the guy out of the minefield. Too bad that hasn't really happened yet!
Here are some of my pictures. My roommate took a lot more and better ones, but I don't have them yet.

My co-chair and I


 
My roommates and I. I really didn't sit down all night... only long enough to take this picture.


Tallying the votes

Teaser picture for Der Elkonig


This is NOT real. This is a creepy part of our Hodgepodge of Horror.

And the Winners are...
Best Movie: Funkademic
Best Director: Lafe Peavler, “The  Minefield”
Best Editor: Tyler Brinton, “Brett’s Game”
Best Actor: Brett Peterson, “Brett’s Game”
Best Actress: Savannah Woods, “The Hodgepodge of Horror”/
             “Der Erlkonig”/ “The Minefield”
Most Creative: Funkademic
Funniest: Perfect Situation
Best Costume Design: The Hodgepodge of Horror
Best Soundtrack: Funkademic
Best Sound: Perfect Situation
Best Visual Effects: The Hodgepodge of Horror

Monday, October 26, 2009

My Best Friend's Wedding


This past weekend I had the opportunity to go home to California to see one of my best friends get married. It was awesome! She was beautiful and looked like a princess. Over the two days I was there, I had some time to reflect. Kristen and I have known each other since we were about 14 years old (that's about 10 years!). Our families knew each other, but we didn't meet until she started attending our ward. Our friendship really started one Young Women's make-over night where she reached out to me because I was shy. Since then we have shared many fun, special, and even sacred experiences together. We've also had our fair share of near accidents on the road together. We had our friendship tested, but we learned from those experiences and came out better as a result. Some of our favorite things to do together were bowling, eating mint chocolate blasts from Baskin Robins, taking weird pictures, eating food abnormally, and just talking.

Somethings I thought a lot about this weekend were a youth conference dance and sleepover we had where we shared with one another our hopes, goals, and dreams for the future. It's funny, and kind of ironic, how different our paths have gone, but how we are both happy all the same. Although our plans did change, we both accomplished what we wanted to. I tend to accomplish things about a year after she does, so we shall see if that is true about her accomplishment this time. :)

I am very happy and excited for her and her new husband, Bryan. I am glad that they are living where they are so I will still see them around when I go home again. It's not like here in Utah where when my friends get married I usually don't ever see them again except on facebook. Sad, but true.

Something I really enjoyed this weekend was staying the night in a hotel across the street from the temple with Kristen and the other two bride's maids. It was fun staying up to talk, do her hair, and celebrate her last night being single. It was very convenient to be staying across the street, too, because there was two hour drive with traffic for everyone else to get to the temple the next morning.



 

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

True Blue, Through and Through

Who said college graduates can't still show school spirit and have some fun?!



Monday, September 7, 2009

Spelunking!

Spelunking is cave exploring. Me and seven of my friends went to the Nutty Putty caves last Saturday. It was my first time ever spelunking and I loved it! We were in the caves for about five hours. We came out sore and badly bruised, but it was worth it!

 
  
 All the dust nearly destroyed my camera, but I still managed to take over 100 pictures and have it functioning.

 
 This is the entrance to the cave after you go down a hole surrounded by rocks in the middle of no where. The gate to the cave opening is on the over end of this tiny opening. 

 
 Coming out of what is called the Birth Canal. It is a really tiny space, kind of like... a birth canal.

Thursday, September 3, 2009

From College to Preschool

Yep, that's right! The job search is over and I am going back to Preschool!! I am now officially a Teaching Assistant at the Mountainland Headstart Preschool in Provo. I feel very lucky to have this job. I know that it is a result of my hard work all summer, faith, and the recommendation of a friend who worked there already.

Way back in May I went on a hike with this friend that worked for Headstart and she highly recommended that I apply for a job there. She warned me that they take forever to hire people and the interview is intense. She was very accurate about both!! After I gave them my application, I called Headstart every week asking about the status of the process. My friend made one phone call and recommended me when she knew they were beginning to look at the applications at the end of the summer. Then they finally called me in for an interview. I am grateful I was forewarned of what it all involved because it gave me greater peace of mind going into it. The interview involved being asked questions by a panel, filling out an intense test-like packet, and reading a children's book to stuffed dolls while being recorded. I didn't think I did well on the packet, but a week later they called me and offered me a part-time teaching assistant position in the morning. Even though I would rather have full time and I had some other options that would make a part time afternoon position better, I took it. I am lucky that this position was at the Provo center, too, because there are 8 centers all over, including in Heber. This center is about 5-8 miles from my apartment, so I am not complaining.

Although the position is called Teaching Assistant, I usually tell people I am a preschool teacher because I WILL be teaching 4 days in a row every 4 days, excluding Fridays and weekends. Pretty much I'm a teacher without being responsible for filling out all the paper work like the teachers have to do. There are other things they do, too, but that is the main difference. When I teach I am responsible for deciding which activities are available to the kids to do. I really wish I new more about what that involved, but I don't yet. When I am not teaching, I am responsible for getting the snack ready and observing the kids and writing down how they are meeting our developmental goals that we have for them. I am really excited for this experience. The funny thing is that I still don't know exactly what I will be required to do because I haven't been given a job description yet. They are a bit slow with paperwork stuff at Headstart... I should get it next week during pre-service training, hopefully.

This class is a full day preschool, meaning the 4 year old kids stay from 9:30am-3:30pm. In the middle they are put down for naps. :) I work from 8 am- 1 pm  and then another part time teaching assistant comes in. We also have a classroom aide who is responsible for developmental activities with the kids and not teaching. The way the schedule is set up, I will be doing the most stuff with the kids and the other assistant mostly helps at lunch and puts them down for their naps. It's a little sad because she has been a teaching assistant and teacher before, but it's okay. She has a baby of her own and that is why she chose to be only part time now and she is why I am not full time.

The best thing so far as been running across toys that I remember loving to play with when I was a child. Colored shapes, Lincoln Logs, colored bears, a brown Fisher Price house, rubber band board, etc. I have to be honest, I am pretty excited to play with those toys again.  :)

My first week was full of boring meetings and starting the set up of the class. This week we went on "home visits" where we meet the kids and their guardians and get an idea of where the children our developmentally. The kids I've met so far are really good and so I am really excited to play with them and teach them. We have a few kids who will be turning 5 years old this fall so they are much more advanced than the others, so it will be interesting... and fun! We are still working on setting up the room. We have to have it done by next Tuesday when we have an open house for parents. School won't start until Sept. 15th. Next week we have MORE meetings where I hope to be given more instruction so I know what I am doing. :) I am just really grateful to have a job and a car to get me there.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Reality

I can't believe how fast this summer has gone by. It feels like just yesterday I was stressing out about how to take the technician calls at APX and here I am training someone on how to take those very same calls. It has been a great summer for me. At the end of last summer I decided that I needed to move on from being an EFY counselor and finally get a "big girl" job. APX isn't what I call a "big girl" job, but it was a start. I thought that not doing EFY this summer would be really difficult for me, but it turned out to be just the right thing for me. I will never regret my decision. The experiences I've had this summer have given me the opportunity to make new friends and learn more about myself in ways and places I wouldn't have if I had worked EFY. Don't get me wrong, I love EFY, but I see now why I needed to move on. I have made many great memories from this summer that I am so grateful to have.

In the next couple of weeks my roommates will return and start school again. I am incredibly excited about this because I've really missed having them around. Right now I still feel like I am just on summer break, but then reality hits and I realize that I now have to make my way in the real world. Yeah, now that I am graduated the world is open to so many possibilities... but this is hard to see when faced with reality.

I'm starting from scratch, literally. I know that I can make something of myself and accomplish many great things in my life if I work hard, trust the Lord, and do my best. I can dream big and do anything I set my mind to. Yet, here I am, in a situation where I feel like everything is out of my control and about to crash at any moment. Deep down I know everything is going to work out and things will be fine, but in the mean time it is scary and, at times, even depressing. The long and short of it is that I need a job. I was blessed throughout my college career to be completely supported by my parents, and I will be forever grateful for that. However, I want to begin being financially independent from them; I can do that if I have a job. The problem is that I don't have a job after the summer and my parents are in a situation now where they cannot help me even though they want to.

I KNOW that everything is going to be okay and it will all work out for my good. I KNOW that I will still meet my goals and do great things in my life. Starting from scratch isn't a completely negative idea. This is just a rough spot and it's a time to prove to Heavenly Father that I can endure things well. I still have so many things in my life to be happy and smile about. For one, I am surrounded by such great friends who I know love me and will help me through this difficult transition into the adult world.

So, my focus right now is applying for secretarial and preschool jobs in the Provo/Orem area. I'm still not sure what I ultimately want to do, but I am hoping these could help me get the experience I need for whatever job I do figure out I want. In reality though, at this point, any job would do.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009



I currently have some really cool friends in the ward right now. On July 9th a bunch of my friends rode Razor scooters 40 miles to Mona from Provo. I was the Minister of Magic who drove ahead of them and provided water, food, and hope along the way. I had a blast! It took them 9 hours to get to Mona. This is the slide show I made of all the pictures that were taken on the trip.

Wednesday, June 24, 2009

All Work and No Play

Fortunately, that is not true. Even though I'm working, I still have a lot of time to play and do my own thing.
Here is a glimpse of what I've been doing this past month:
Winning Olympic Gold at FHE Olympics with my FHE family. I got 41 grapes into my mouth all at once. Definitely gold medal worthy, don't you think?


Hiking to Stewart Falls (my favorite), the Y, and Mt. Timpanogoes Caves
Driving home to California to:
Get a speeding ticket
Get Cronked
See Amanda get her girls' camp name, Flare

Do some drag racing
(I'm in the white car. The point of this was to see who, me or my best friend, could get the manual transmission car going into first gear the quickest)



And to see my Daddy on Father's Day

Thursday, May 21, 2009

APX For LIFE!!

Now that I am graduated, I have to somehow start becoming on my own, which means I have to make more than $2.30/hr as I have for the past three summers working EFY. I LOVE EFY, so the decision to not work it again this summer was difficult, but necessary. So what am I doing now?

APX, data entry.... First off, A-P-X doesn't actually stand for anything. It is a friendly atmosphere where fun and making friends with others in the company is encouraged. We are divided into teams of about 16 with a team leader. Our team lead meets with us all together for trainings and for doing fun things, like watching random funny ads or playing games like tag outside. He also helps us track our individual progress and helps us to make goals of how we can do better on the calls. Everyone is really friendly and in between calls people talk to each other and/or send and play games on the computer. They have weekly contests for employees to win cool stuff. On Fridays they have a crazy dress up day where they take pictures and reward those who win. They also have challenges and opportunities to do service in the community.When we are not busy, our team lead takes us aside and we all just chat or are "trained" in some way until it gets busy so we are not sent home early. Being trained in a flexible term in my team leads point of view. We just play games or chat most of the time in the trainings or "coaching" as they are called. However, now that it is getting busier, we are not playing around so much. APX has big parties at the beginning and end of the summer and they form teams of dodgeball, basketball, and volleyball. Some people got a free helicopter ride at the party they had a couple weeks ago. The food was amazing, too. I got a free amazing backpack from them, too.

As much as it is kind of a relaxed atmosphere, they are strict about everything else. I have to go to a shift briefing at the beginning of each of my shifts to be updated on things we have to be doing because things are always changing. They are strict about being on time from breaks and lunches and for bad attendance or forgetting to do something on a call, or doing something I shouldn't on a call. I can get what are called occurrences for any of these things. If I get 10 for attendance or 10 for the calls, I am terminated.

APX is an alarm company. Most people only work for APX during the summer, but it is a year round thing. They sell alarm systems (duh). So what I do is I receive three different calls. Two are from the salesman and one is from the tech who installs the system. APX installs the systems all on the same day as the sale, which is kind of neat. The first phone call is called the qualify call. Basically, I get the potential customers basic information and I run a credit check for the saleman who decides if they can have a system and what they will charge. That call is the shortest of all of them at about 2 mins or less. And no, I can't just run anyone's credit... someone already asked that.

The second call is called Rep Set Up. This is the rep calling in to tell me how much they are charging the customer, how the custumer will be paying, and how many points they approved for the customer's system. Each part of the alarm system is worth a number of points. At the end of this call, I do a survey with the customer confirming the info from the last call and the terms of their agreement. I've heard some really funny things on this phone call. The reps are usually in the same room as the customer when they call so they use all the flowery salesman language to make it sound like they are getting a good deal when really it is the same, or maybe even more expensive than others might get. I've had some funny things happen during the survey, too. It's fun hearing the accents of different customers. The southern customers are the best!

The next call is called the tech call. This can be the longest and hardest call. Now that I've been working for a couple of weeks, I look forward to these calls because they are always different and it breaks the monotony of taking calls. One part of this call is techs calling in to link a cell unit, which is a part of the system that either serves as an alternate number for the home for apx to contact, or just as the main number that is used. Normally tech's call to give the information about where the main panel is, what type it is, and all the parts of the system. I have to put all the different parts of the system in and say what their zones and functions are. This is also hard to explain in writing, so I will go on. Then I check to see if all the signals from the system are being sent clearly and correctly to the main hub of apx. This is the most important part of the call becaues this is how APX is contacted when there is an emergency. If something doesn't work when there is a break in, it's because a signal was either not sent or it was wrong. Very, very, very bad if I mess up here. I have only missed one signal so far, so that is really good. After that we just get other emergency contacts and do a final survey. Then we get their payment information so we can charge them.

Before a call comes in I hear a beep, then what type of call, then another beep. That is nice so I can at least know what to expect and so I have time to think about it before talking to anyone. When I was volunteering in the mtc referral center my freshman year, I would just hear them say hello and have to just start talking because by then they had already said hello two or three times. It's not like that fortunately.

The last couple of days I haven't had much down time at all between phone calls. Last week though, I would have numerous minutes between phone calls I receive. Luckily the time goes by really fast and it has gotten easier for me to do everything. I thought I would never get to be so comfortable and as good as I am already. I took calls for 3 hours straight without a break and had not problem. I then only took a ten minute break and started again because time goes faster when I just work and not stand around on my break. But it does get pretty tiring. By the end of the shift, I just want to go home and not talk on the phone or really be on a computer, although I still do it as you can see.

So really, it's not bad. Yesterday they changed everyone's schedules so they can meet the call demands better, so I am now working in the mornings during the week and the evening on Saturdays. This schedule works better for me because then I can pick up others' shifts when they want off in the afternoon. I am really sad that I won't be on the same team anymore, but we will still see each other and I will make more friends. :)

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Graduation!!

It's official!
I am getting some work done on my computer so for now these are the only pictures you can see for now. I will post more later.

Monday, April 6, 2009

The Best Girls' Night EVER!

Have you ever wondered what the best girls' night EVER would include? Well, here you go:

Chinese food


Getting my ears pierced for the first time (I'm all grown up!)


Awesome Roommates


Random Picture taking
 
 

A Chick Flick at the Dollar Theater
with Chocolate Mint Cookies and other Goodies

and a Slurpee for the ride home!

Friday, April 3, 2009

An April Fool... that's me!

Here is the account of the happenings in my apartment on April Fool's Day given by my roommate with permission:

It started with the stroke of genius. Dying Lynnae's milk green. See, Lynnae is a milkaholic, and her milk really means everything to her. It was a near guarantee that she would be having milk for part of her breakfast, because she always does, and lunch, and dinner, and snack. That girl goes through about a gallon and a half a week, all by herself. Anyway, I jumped up and hurried into the kitchen, trying to calm my nervously giggling self with the assurance that I wouldn't get caught, because Lynnae had been up until 3:00 with me, and would still be asleep at 9:30. Well... unfortunately, I forgot that she was meeting a friend and had to shower and do hair and makeup and all that, plus have time to get to wherever she was meeting him. So, she got up like 3 minutes after I had greened her milk. And I mean this was REALLY green. I accidentally put in more than just a couple drops, so it looked like homemade play-dough. Gross! Anyway, I had to leave before she did, so I was disappointed that I would miss her reaction. Lucky for me, she was in too much of a hurry and didn't eat breakfast! So, I came home from school at the same time as her... and I got to witness it. It went something like this.
“Yeah, I was telling my dad that... WHUA??? WHAT IS THIS???”
I had just left the room, and quickly jumped back, looking innocent and curious, and maybe a little confused. “What just happened?”
“Somebody dyed my milk green!!!”
I let my eyes widen and my mouth drop into a wide-open grin. “Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh! That is freaking hilarious! Who did that?!”
“I don't know!” she answered, then yelled, “Michelle! Was it you?”
Michelle came into the room and saw the milk. She half laughed in a, “Wow, that is kinda mean but really funny” sort of way and said, “No, it wasn't me. I swear.”
Lynnae set the milk down, firmly and resolutely. “Oh, I know. It was Angela. It was SO Angela. That is so something Angela would do. Alright, what can I do to get her back?”
And that, my dear brother, is what started it all. Lynnae embarked on a quest to avenge the dying of her milk, and began plotting evil things to do to Angela and Katrine, because I suggested Katrine might have been willing to do it to. She wasn't completely positive which one it was, but had pretty much settled on Angela, yet decided to get Katrine too, just for good measure. We plotted evil things for a while, before she came up with a stroke of genius. She took Katrine's shoes and loaded them into her bed, under her blankets, then slipped pennies beneath her sheets, for a sort of “princess and the pea” effect. Then, we combined efforts against Angela, Katrine and Janelle too, just so my dear engaged roommate wouldn't be left out. We took all the clothes out of Katrine's closet, and put them in Angela's closet, and Angela's clothes in Janelle's closet and Janelle's clothes in Katrine's closet.
Then came my brilliance. Michelle. In the process of loading Katrine's clothes into Angela's closet, (Angela and Michelle share a room), I noticed Michelle's teddy bear, affectionately named Belle, sitting on the edge of her bed. My first thought was to dress Belle in something funky, but I decided that robbing Michelle's underwear directly out of her drawer might make her feel just a little too violated. So, I came up with a much more brilliant idea. Kidnapping. Ransom. I took duct tape, folded it in half, and made hand cuffs, a blind fold and a gag. Then, I had to come up with a villain name for my dark deeds. With a little help from Lynnae, the resident “word nerd,” I became “The Nefarious Lady Death-Moon.” Next was the ransom note. It said, “Mommy Michelle help me! The Nefarious Lady Death-Moon wants a million dollars in quarters by sunrise. Leave it in the dumpster. No cops or I will get it!” Then, I took a picture of poor Belle, bound, gagged, blindfolded and holding the note, printed it out, and placed it upon Michelle's pillow. Then I hid the bear.
I almost blew it with the note. Michelle saw it and said, “Savannah, this sounds just like something you would do.”
I should have known that note was too much like my sense of humor. Lynnae saved me on that one, though. Our reactions to seeing the note were convincing enough that she wasn't sure, so she actually asked, “Did you guys do it?” Lynnae, who had nothing to do with it other than helping me figure out a name said, “No, I promise we didn't do it.” Because we didn't. I did it. Mua ha ha!
She is currently texting James, because I asked him to tell her he knows who did it, then pin it on our friend, Jonny Weiss. James is brilliant, because he played with her through text, answering all of her questions honestly but still not revealing anything. Well, all but one. I put her up to asking if the perpetrator's name started with J. He answered that yes, it did, which wasn't exactly honest because my name just doesn't start with J...
We are evil, no?
It gets better.
So, Lynnae decided, to further her vengeance against Angela for the milk thing, to ceran wrap her bed. Unfortunately, we had no saran wrap. So, it was off to the dollar store. We got ceran wrap... and silly string... and girls' underwear to dress Janelle's teddy bear with. See, she has this cute baseball bear wearing a flannel shirt and white shorts. I covered the shorts with pink underwear, then put the young teenager's bra under the shirt, which I left open.
Anyway, we came home with our saran wrap, then attacked Angela's bed. It was the funniest thing to watch Lynnae try to fit herself beneath that mattress as we wrapped it three times. But, we couldn't do it on our own... so we got Janelle to help. The three of us girls were in the process of wrapping her bed, when the door opened. We freaked out, because we thought it was Angela. You should have seen Lynnae, stuck beneath the mattress on the top bunk, launch herself out and over the side. Then Michelle walked in, and we realized we were okay. The look on her face, as she opened the door to discover three girls surrounding her bed, all of which had wide, guilty eyes, clearly said, “Oh no. What are they doing???” Followed by, “Phew! Angela, not me.”
Well, we're still waiting for Angela and Katrine to get home, and Janelle to get back home.
James just revealed to Michelle that the culprit behind the abduction of her darling Belle was the nefarious Jonny Weiss. She's plotting revenge now. I truly wonder how tangled this web of deception will become.
There was one more thing. James came over after sending some very suspicious texts. We knew he was up to something, but we got to him first. As soon as he walked through the door, we bombarded him with silly string. We quickly learned that we were right. He was up to something. He was bringing over a surprise loaf of caramel apple bread to thank Lynnae for her help editing his paper.
Oops. : )
This is a little bit later. Angela just came home. Actually, back up a little. Before she came home, James got his hands on my bottle of silly string. I mauled him. He won. : ( Dang guy dumped me over his head when I tried to tackle him. I got a rug burn on my elbow and skewered myself with my own fingernail.
Anyway, Angela came in. She went in her room. She came back out. She went back in. Next we heard, “I hate you guys.” Unfortunately, she'd had a bad day, so while she kinda laughed and said that any other day she would have been laughing her butt off, it didn't quite have the desired effect.
Katrine was really funny, though. She came in and saw what we did to Angela, then got wide eyes and said, “What did you do to me???” It took her a while to discover her clothes, and I never did see what happened when she found her bed loaded with shoes, but she had a good laugh.
Anyway, so Jonny came over later, and Michelle cornered him. I had sent him a text, warning him that I'd blamed him for a prank I'd played on Michelle, and the poor guy was like, “I didn't do it! I swear! I didn't!” Lynnae goes and gets the ransom note, so he can see what the prank was, and thrusts it at him with an accusatory, “Does this look familiar to you?” He read it and started laughing, but still insisting he was innocent. I started busting up. That was about the point Michelle figured everything out, that I'd set Jonny up. She was like, “I knew it was you! I knew it! That note was just like something you would do!” Yeah... I blew it with the note. Dang! Next time I pull something like that, I'll have to have somebody else write the note. Anyway, after that she made me take pictures with the kidnapped bear, and it was awesome. : )
So, that was my April Fool's day.
Oh, and just so you can get a visual, here are some pictures:
 
  
This would be the Nefarious Lady Death-Moon

 
I paid the random by finding a picture of a million dollar bill and cutting it in quarters. Then I stuck it in a mini dumpster.

 
Now, that just looks gross.
 
Janelle's baseball teddy bear

Sunday, March 15, 2009

Graduation Announcement

Whoa! Michelle's Clogging!!

Watch this video of me clogging in my ward talent show! I said, "Whoa!" because most of you know that I am not a very good dancer. This was a dance that I learned for a test in my class a couple of weeks ago. I didn't do so hot on the test, but I can proudly say that this video is the best I've performed it, so I am happy about my progress. Clogging is hard at times, but overall it's fun and good exercise! I received a lot of compliments after the show and people thought I have been clogging for a lot longer than I have, so that's good, right? I tried to post the video directly on here, but it's giving me problems, so just go to this page:

http://gallery.me.com/shell_belle/100272

Monday, March 9, 2009

Mid-Semester Madness!

     This week I ordered my cap and gown for graduation!! I also had an ingenious idea! I decided that I want to start scrapbooking again! I haven't scrapbooked since my freshman year in college and so I decided to scrapbook college highlights and put my diploma at the end of it. I didn't realize how hard it would be to narrow down the pictures. There are so many good things that have happened each year. It has been a lot of fun looking through pictures and revisiting things that have happened, though.
     Good news!! I am hired to work for APX Alarms! Because there are so many people getting hired, for now I will have to take only 20 hours a week, but I am on a waiting list for full-time. I was just told that I am the next person on the list should someone drop. I have been hired to do data entry for them. I probably won't stay there forever, but it is a good job for now. It's something at least!! I plan to start the week after I graduate and I have training on April 13th. I am also considering volunteering as a mentor at the residential treatment center which is right next door to APX.
     Last Friday I went on a date to BYU's Hunger Banquet. It's purpose is to increase people's awareness of the poverty in the world and encourage people to help. The theme for the night was literacy, so they told us facts about education as well as telling us about what is going on. Basically, everyone buys a ticket for the same price, but they are randomly put into three classes, lower, middle, and upper--just as we are when we are born. When we came to the event, those with lower class tickets are seated on the floor that is covered with cardboard and newspaper. They are fed last and have to eat a bowl of rice, beans, and chips shared between five people. Sixty percent of those who bought tickets were placed in this class. This is the percentage of those in this class in the world. Middle class was 25 % of the guests and we (I was in this class) sat in chairs with no table and really close to one another. Middle class is living on the edge (anything bad happening could take them down to poverty) and they have only a little bit of education (we could read one sentence in a paragraph they gave us). We were fed second and we ate a slice of pizza and a hot dog (a really, really good one from a place called J-Dawgs). High class was fed first, a three course meal, including pulled pork, spaghetti, salad, mash potatoes, and ice cream. They were seated at tables and had servers. They were 15 % of the guests and educated. We, at BYU are a part of this 15 %. Before people were served, they asked those with stars on the back of their tickets to stand up and move over to the high class tables. These were all from lower class and they represented the few who manage to do something great to get themselves out of poverty. In addition to this, there were two people who went around named "greed" and "corruption" that did different things throughout the night, mostly showing off their food and stealing food. There were also two really funny people acting as tourists do in third world countries. It was interesting, funny, but kind of sad, too. As we were eating they had a bunch of performances and then a speaker who talked about a local program to help adults who are illiterate.
      Last Wednesday I went with my ward to the Draper Temple open house. It was amazing! It was so beautiful! The last open house I went to I was a junior in high school, so this time it meant so much more to me. I felt the spirit greatly while I was there. Going to the open house made my desire to go to the temple to receive my own endowments (and be sealed for eternity) increase tenfold. I could feel the power that was there and sensed how that power and the blessings could effect my life. The rooms that impressed me the most were the Celestial room and the Sealing room. The first thing you do when you walk into the Celestial room is look up at the huge, beautiful chandelier that hangs in there. It causes you look up at the really high ceiling that is decorated really nice, too. If you don't look up, you miss so much. The room looks kind of plain, but if you follow the light of the chandelier and look up, you take in everything.  It made me think about how it is important for us to "look to God and live" and to "look up" like it says in the scriptures. If you don't, you miss seeing the beauty and blessings that God has to give. The tour ended at the sealing room. This temple has the largest sealing room of all the temples in the church--it can seat 85 people. In a couple of weeks, I will have the opportunity to watch the temple dedication at my stake center. I am very excited to see another one.
     One last thing. A group of friends and I have a new tradition of going tunnel singing every Sunday night in the tunnel by the Marriot Center. I hadn't done tunnel singing since I was in Nauvoo. I think it may be a freshman thing to do because it seems like it's mostly freshman that go, but it has been a lot of fun. Afterwards, everyone comes to my apartment for hot chocolate.
 
Draper Temple

 
Adam and I eating middle class pizza.
Here you can see the lower class on the floor, high class at the tables, and middle class in chairs.

 
Jared, Stephanie, Lynnae, James, Me, Savannah, Janelle, and Jon.

Monday, February 16, 2009

SAD Day!

 
 

Valentine's Day around here is often called Single Awareness Day (SAD). I had the best Valentine's Day ever. For this Valentine's Day I decided that I would make myself up and look nice just because I could. Lynnae, Savannah and I were going to take "glamour" shots", but things happened (which I will explain next) that prevented it. So here is what happened. It truly has been a SAD day. Our plan was to go to Walmart to get groceries and stuff to celebrate V-Day. We got into the car and it wouldn't start, so we asked a friend to jump it for us. We did that and started on our way. Not even half way there, we hear a thumping noise and realize that we got a flat tire! So we pull over as fast as we could. Because of how bad the tire was and how the street was, we couldn't pull completely off the road. The battery was still weak, so we couldn't put our hazard lights on. We got out of the car and saw how bad it was--bad. We checked to see if we had a spare, and fortunately we did and it was a full-sized tire. Meanwhile cars are trying to avoid hitting us as they want to turn. A man pulled up besides us (with his wife) and asked if we could use some help and we told him yes. Thank goodness!! He changed the tire for us. Oh, an important detail I forgot to mention is that it was snowing and really cold. It snowed about four inches while we were there. Anyway, as he was changing the tire, I stood at the back of the car to try to direct the cars so they would not hit us. They came so close to me and car sometimes that it was really scary. We had a few others ask if we were okay, but we also had some others yell at us to move or turn on our hazard lights... impossible. After the tire was fixed and the man left, we were about to leave when Savannah said she couldn't find her keys. Even before this happened, I was laughing. I thought the whole thing was a bit funny and thought, "Bring it on!!" Savannah and Lynnae did pretty well to keep their cool, although Savannah did swear at a couple drivers who were really rude to us. We looked all over for the keys but couldn't find them. We each were saying silent prayers to find them. Keep in mind that every 2 minutes or so a large flow of traffic would come and have to slow down for us for seemingly no reason. Finally, Savannah called her brother, whose car it is, and asked him if he had a spare key, and fortunately he did. As we were waiting we had a lot of both positive and negative people talk to us. It was not so fun especially since we were freezing. I decided that I would go into the car because I was cold and knew that the keys had to be in there. I looked around and decided to look in Savannah's purse although both Lynnae and Savannah had looked in it. And I found the keys!!! Just before I found them, one of our other roommates drove by and stopped in front of us because she recognized us. When we got in the car, the other drivers were being horrible, but fortunately nothing happened and we were able to leave. This is not the end to the tale though. The spare tire was going flat, too, so we had to find a gas station. The first station we went to had a air pump, but it was out of order, so we had to drive further to another one. At first it wasn't working, but then one of the gas station workers came out and helped us. As we were driving to the gas station Savannah noticed that the emergency break wouldn't come off, so we were driving with that on, too. The engine light kept coming on and we could tell the the battery was still weak because other parts of the car that are electrically run were going really slow or not working. Scary! We decided that we would change our plans and go to Macey's instead. Lynnae and I went inside to get food while Savannah drove the car around for half and hour. It seemed to work and everything went well from then on. I was still tense from it all, but we got home safe. I was only tense after we left the side of the road because I was so sure that worst possible thing that could happen next is to hit another car or be hit by another car. Luckily that didn't happen.


A couple of weeks ago my roommates Savannah, Lynnae, and Monique made Valentine's Day predictions for everyone in the aparment. Mine were the following (neither of which came true): Michelle:  Will get a job interview and effectively forget it's Valentine's Day until 9:17 p.m.  She will then come out into the front room to discover that a secret admirer has left her a bouquet of lilies and white rosebuds. 

Michelle:  Will head to the Library for some dedicated studying around brunch-time.  While there, she'll turn a corner and crash into somebody.  Her books will fly everywhere, and her stranger will help her pick them up.  In a romantic gesture never before seen in the Harold B. Lee, they'll reach for the same book and their hands will meet.  Eyes will follow, and for the first time, Michelle will see the handsome, glowing young man with whom she collided.  He'll introduce himself as a BYU grad student and grandson of a general authority – an apostle.  They'll talk for a while, which will turn into a date.  By the end of the night they'll know they are meant to be, and Michelle will have a ring on her finger before I go into the MTC.

However, one of the prediction made for Monique, who will be leaving for her mission to Nauvoo in a couple of weeks, came true (with the help of her roommates and some good humored guys). Here is what hers was:

Monique:  Seventeen guys, whom she may or may not know, will propose marriage, presenting a real quandary.  How can she possibly have gotten seventeen marriage proposals!?! O_O  She's going on a mission for Pete's sake!  How can she tell seventeen guys that no, she can't marry them?!  She will politely refuse each one, then tell her brother about it, who will follow her around with a shotgun, just waiting for someone else to try it.  No, make that an AK-47.

They managed to get 17 guys to do it!! It was really funny to see how the guys did it. Our close friends did it in person. We recorded two of them. James proposed to Monique by giving her a rose made of foil and had music playing in the background. She said yes and hugged him, thinking that he didn't expect that, which he didn't. But she didn't expect what came next, either. Loud music came on and Lafe, a really funny guy in the ward who is in my fhe group, came out of a closet with a stick to duel James over Monique. James was defeated and Lafe proposed to Monique with other music playing in the background. Later Jared proposed to her with two rings. He left us when we went back to the apartment, but later came back with a letter written to Monique professing his love and explaining to her why he had to leave her right then. It was so funny. Later we all listened in on a phone proposal. This guy was so long winded and wouldn't let Monique talk. He was saying so many funny things. The the phone disconnected right when he proposed! She called him back and said yes. Then he actually set a date for two years from now, since she is going on a mission in a couple of weeks. He is the only one who did that. To see the video, look at my photo gallery by clicking on the recent pictures link.

After that we went to the tumbling gym that I went to on my birthday (where I sumo wrestled for the first time) and then ended the fantastic day with a toast (non-alcoholic Sparkling Wild Berry) to being single on Valentine's Day. We also enjoyed some tasty strawberries dipped in chocolate. Once again, if you want to see more pictures, click on the link.