First Snow Fall

It finally snowed! It has felt pretty weird to going to christmas concerts and there is no snow on the ground. Especially when I performed in Chirstmas in the snow. It really does not feel like christmas is coming unless there is snow on the ground. But now the snow is here and christmas can come!
(Oh and of course this snow was celebrated with a snowball fight)

The beauty of the Temple

I had many firsts this Thanksgiving weekend. The greates first was getting to go through the temple. The Temple is a beautiful place and you don't really get to see and appriciate its beauty till you get to go through a session. I'm grateful and happy that I got to go and especially grateful that so many of my family was there to celebrate the occasion with me!

The coveted parking spot

For those of you who do not know, the parking lot for my complex is tiny. If you don't get one of the few right next to the apt you end up parking far away. Well, my apt is right next to the managers and they get 2 assigned parking spots. This leaves only 2 right in front of my apt. The coveted parking spot is the one right next to the managers spot, right in front of my apt door.
Some how this semester I have managed to get this blessed spot many times. I had one week when I left multiple times and the spot was always still available (even after being gone for more than an hour). Well, somehow I got it again! When I pulled in the parking lot from the glorious week long Thanksgiving break, it was so full that I just knew that I would end up parking far away. But then I got around the corner and there it was! The glorious parking spot empty in a sea of cars! I am grateful for many things, and right now that spot is towards the top of the list!

Turkey Weekend

One of many highlights this Thanksgiving Weekend happened the Saturday before Thanksgiving. To celebrate Jared's birthday we went bowling. For the first time in my life I bowled a Turkey (or 3 strikes in a row for those of you who don't know)! This also let me go over 100 for the 3rd time in a year. I also beat Jared who turned around and slaughtered me in the next game by getting over 200. But I am proud of my turkey and can't wait to do it again!

Called to Serve

The day finally came. My mission call came in the mail and the next day was able to open it with my immidiate family and roommates. I am going to Richmond Virginia Mission and leave January 7, 2009. I am way excited and can't wait to go out there!

Bad Days

So its true. We all have bad days. As much as we hate them, we need to take Elder Wirthlin's advice and just plain laugh at them. I can't do that for mine yet (still to fresh), but I hope you find a little laughter in it.
This morning, though starting out rough, went pretty good for the most part. I had enjoyed the weekend a little to much and had forgotten to do my religion homework. Since it was one of my first classes, that meant getting up early to do it. Usually not a problem, IF I go to bed. But of course I get to bed late. The joys of college you know :) Well, I didn't get to bed at a decent time, so I didn't get up this morning. Strike 1. Luckily I did wake up 30 to 45 min early and that gave me enough time to get it done (also luckily the assignment was about half the size it normally is and I'd looked at it earlier). No harm done and I get ready and to class on time. Then 11:00 rolled in. I didn't get enough sleep so I was EXHAUSTED! I even almost fell asleep in my first class. Since I'm also very hungry I go ahead and go home during my 2.5 hour break instead of heading to the practice room. I figure some food and a short nap would rejuvinate me. Didn't happen. That 15 to 20 min nap turned into a 2 hour long nap! I luckily woke up just in time to make it to my last class. Strike 2 for the day. So after class I head up to the library to rewrite one of my warmups before going to go practice. Technically nothing had to be done to it, but it would be really nice to get it from either the 1 page version that my teacher gave me or the 3 page version I made last year. Well, 2.5 hours later I cheatingly got it onto 2 pages and have a killer headache. Strike 3. By this point it is 6:00, I haven't eaten dinner, and still have to prepare the FHE lesson. So once again I don't make it into the practice room. From this point on the day is spent just trying to calm myself down. I went from a bad headache to very frustrated with myself to trying not to cry. Needless to say nothing has been accomplished today. I guess I did have 1 highlight for today. I got my very first letter from JC. I pray tomorrow will be much better since I now get to pay for my day of inactivity.

Don't Forget the Keys!

So me and Jannie (a roommate) leave for FHE and don't take our keys because Katie (the other roommate) has to stay and do her homework. So we come home and of course the apt is locked and Katie isn't home. Poor souls that we are, we got to go to the managers for them to let us in. So the moral of the story, always take your keys, even if you don't think you will need them.

Looking at the Stars

Probably the most exciting thing in my life right now is work. Last week I was hired to operate the school's telescope. I LOVE IT! It is only 3 nights a week but the joy of getting to look at the stars for 2 hours is just amazing. And each night the stars look different. The moon for example. There must be a fire somewhere because the sky is really hazy by the horizen. Well Thursday night the moon was this deep dark red. It was amazing to see it in the telescope. Instead of this bright yellow ball that you can see on the back of your eyelids it was the dim red ball of rock. It was just amazing to look at and only lasted about 30 min before it was out of the haze. The other big adventure for me has been Albeiro. Albeiro is a binary star system, meaning that you have 2 stars rotating around each other. There are many of these but Albeiro is the coolest because one star looks purple while the other is yellow. The other operator is a girl named Alyssa that ran the telescope last Fall and Winter. Well she couldn't find Albeiro and I looked at my map, made a guess, and found it on my first try! Now, two days later Alyssa still isn't sure where it is and I can look at the sky and find it almost immediately. I am very proud of how quickly I'm learning to run the telescope. And trust me, I'm not boasting. There are some thing Alyssa can find that I have no hope to. In any case, I am way exciting to see what happens next time I look at the stars....