Family Family

Well now, my family came into town so I guess I will put up a little post for you. There was much laughter, much winning of games (mostly by me ;), some tears and blowouts (mostly by my nephew) and lots of love.  

The best of friends.

We're on each other's teams.

Graduation Day

Big News! Today I graduate high school. It's a little weird that they would let a girl with the maturity of a 10-year old graduate high school... but I'm not complaining!

I'm not as young as I was, I'm not as brave as I thought

Hello there blogosphere! Currently I am writing to you as a woman who has 1 more day (1!) of high school left forever. Isn't that crazy? Tomorrow is my last day of school! I guess life is getting on pretty fast! I'm not sure exactly what to write about finishing high school, so I will let you in on my moving on to bigger and better things playlist:

1. Be Gentle with me: The Boy Least Likely to
2. Tell the World: Eric Hutchinson
3. I will survive: Gloria Gaynor
4. Good to be Alive: Regan Rindlishbacher
5. Hello Goodbye: The Beatles
6. Afterlife: Ingrid Michealson
7. Borders: Feeder
8. The Brightest Lights: King Charles feat. Mumford and Sons
9. Movie Loves a screen: April Smith and the Great Picture Show
10. No Matter Where you are: Us the duo
11. Lifting the Sea: The Hunts
12. Light outside: Wakey!Wakey!
13. A Wink and a Smile: Harry Connick Jr.
14. You're only Human: Billy Joel
15. Bet on It: Zac Effron

I'm kinda a fan of it. If I had more space on my cd's I would probably add, like, all the other High School Musical songs, but I guess that kinda defeats the purpose of a playlist for the end of high school...

So I guess I should finish this up with some kind of narrative with a good moral that everyone can take into their lives (you can totally tell I've been watching too much girl meets world), so I wanted tell you the most important thing I learned in high school:

"The greatest thing, you'll ever learn is just to love, and be loved in return"
ok, ok, so that's not from me, it's from Moulin Rouge! But it is my plan to write it somewhere in the high school to leave my mark (insert maniacal laugh here).

I guess the most important thing I learned in high school is to be kind, love others, and feast on the knowledge presented to you on a free public school platter. Love to learn, but more importantly, learn to love. Find a place in your heart for Christ-like-love for everyone around you. Don't compete, help each other, but don't stop taking care of yourself to make others happy. Forgive readily, and don't forget that being nice makes you cool. Don't fake who you are to please the people who are acting fake, and always carry emergency lady supplies.

Anyway, adios for now blog, I guess I will let you know how it is to step off into the unknown;

Turn the hour hand back to when you were holding me.

Story time!
Once upon a time I had a really great story that I held out on my blog because I'm lazy and nobody reads this anyway, then one day I decided to share this mysterious story
Today is that day.
The boy kissing me in front of that dolphin is Mr. Noah. I am absolutely positively crazy about him. It all started when he asked me ( a complete stranger) to prom last year, I couldn't help liking this crazy, funny, cute boy who made me eat my steak with chopsticks, and tried so hard to out-dance me, and blasted Back in Black, and destroyed everyone at paintball, and opened all my doors (which he has continued to do every time we drive for 1 year).  And for some reason he fell for my terrible flirting techniques, outrageous dance moves and not-so-lady-like ability to plaster him with paint. Next thing we knew he was chasing me until I caught him. Noah introduced me to kissing with a magical first kiss slow dancing in the moonlight that knocked the strength out of my knees, turned my entire world upside down, and managed to redefine "home" as wherever he was. And then he went and moved.
Early December the boy who had come to know me in a way no one else ever had moved away to Saudi Arabia. ( I promise I'm not making this stuff up!) and took my heart in his suitcase. Winter was a dreary time trying to figure out who I was and where I was. I knew I couldn't just go back to the girl I was before Noah, and without him I couldn't be the girl I was when he was here, it was a weird time in which I was wrapped in a cocoon of confusion and heart break.
Noah and I decided we should break up. Long distance is much too hard and weird and different. About one week into that we realized breaking up was 100 times harder. So we stayed together over facetime and texts and letters. In that time our relationship was very hard and sometimes we tried to quit, but each time we overcame the stupidness of a 10 hour time difference, and our relationship grew into something even sweeter and more worth it. And I guess that's where I am now. I haven't seen my best friend in person except for a 4 day visit over prom (which was amazing-story to come) but somehow I am even more hopeful about it all. So there you have it. The story of my first love. May there be much much more to come.
The end.

Power pony-tails and some goals

Hey there blog! So I have to be honest, this year, 18 is kind of a weird one. I'm only in high school for a few more months, but then I am too young to leave for my mission, so I just have about five months that aren't high school or summer or mission. I know I can't start college, but it's such a weird amount of time to start and then defer. Anyway, although this is a weird year, and basically I'm just ready to be 19 and go serve the Lord, I want to make it a great year, so I'm gunna makes some goals. Usually I do this on a piece of paper and put it in my wallet, but with my 17 goals to do as a 17-year old, I lost my wallet and thus have no idea whatsoever what I planned to do, so we're just gunna shoot my goals out into cyberspace and hopefully they'll still be here when I'm no longer 18. Here we go!

18 goals for my 18th year of life:  

1. Let the Lord be my best friend. 

2. Drink more water.

3. Dress well, modestly and with care.

4. Get ready for a mission!

5. Let people talk about themselves.

6. Get pictures with all the temples in Utah. 

7. Don't ever be ashamed of being sad. 

8. Care more about being kind than funny

9. Seek after virtuous, lovely things.

10. Chase what I love. 

11. Just sit in the sun sometimes. 

12. Learn to cook well and not poison myself!

13. Have more patience and faith in others. 

14. Think fondly of my past, look forward to the future.

15. Invite others to be confident in Christ.

16. Always be gentle with myself.

17. Mourn with those that mourn. 

18. Be happy and help others do the same. 

17 things I learned from being 17

Wow guys. Guess what? I am officially 18! that's insaine! I'm a grown-up I guess is what they call it, I think it's pretty misnamed though because I'm pretty sure as I got older the less mature I got. I also haven't grown up since the 8th grade, so...
Anyway, although I like to joke about living in neverland and never getting older or wiser, I have to admit I have learned some new things this year, I will share.

17 things I learned  from being 17:

1. You are never to young to be in love, or too old to play with mermaids

2. Everyone you meet has their own stories and battles they are dealing with

3. Good writing isn't always the stuff your english teacher has you read

4. Nobody can tell you how much you should or shouldn't care about something or someone

5. Wearing skirts is not only adorable, but also liberating

6. The best thing to be is kind

7. There's a reason to be in every moment. Even if you feel ready to move on to the next stage of life, if you have to wait, then there's more you need to learn

8. If at first your cake comes out really dry, try, try again

9. A good cuddle is sometimes (always) necessary

10. Crying is good for your body and releases pain killers

11. The right people can make any situation wonderful

12. Sunshine is the proper medicine for any ailment (except for sunburns)

13. Kissing is... not hard ;)

14. You should never have to convince someone to treat you the way you should be treated

15. Sometimes it takes a challenge for us to listen to what the important people are saying

16. Sometimes people change us just by being kind and wonderful and ours.

17. If you are having problems, it's probably because you haven't made a blanket fort in a while. Just saying.

Anyway, I hope this post was more than a waste of 30 minutes (I kept getting distracted ok!) and that I may remember the things I learned as a 17 year old. I guess it's time to move on to bigger and better 18 year old things, but don't worry, blog, I promise I won't grow up, I'll just make it seem like I am, and then everyone will be fooled but you and me, then we will have a good laugh and drink our juice boxes. THE END

My Fam> Yours

So you know how it seems like I'm an only child? Well I'm excited to inform you that I'm not! This week my wonderful family came to town and we basically had a wild rumpus. We played games, we watched a ridiculous amount of The Great British Baking Show, we fought over my oldest sister's adorable baby, we made some great food, and we talked a lot of baby talk. It was incredibly wonderful to be with my favorite people in my life. The great thing is our family is forever and we can have lovely weeks like that for eternity. 

The pros and cons of Neverland, and the truth about leaving it

Ok, here's the scoop: I turn 18 in one month exactly. That's 31 days from now. One month is not very long, especially when it's your last month as a child. Truth is: I'm very, very nervous. It seems to me that being an adult is something I never was going to do! The other day my mom said, "it's ok, she's basically an adult, she can hang out with us." Basically and adult? Time is trying to kidnap me from neverland! I don't want to grow up! I wand to be 7 forever! And play pretend, and use the foot of my bed as a horse or a motorcycle or whatever I want. I want to steal the tablecloth and some paper clips and make myself a princess dress and crown! I want to give my barbies makeovers, and make blanket forts, an not worry about college, or living on my own, or making the wrong decisions and putting myself on completely the wrong course forever! Ok, drama time over. I've had enough of that today. I can't lie though, and say I'm not also a little excited about turning 18. Adults can do a lot of things I can't that I wish I could, the most wonderful one being going through the temple, something I would gladly drop everything and do right now if I could. I'm pretty excited about going on my mission, and going to college, and becoming a wife and mother and who I was put on earth to be. I guess the point of this post, and the reason I wrote 500 more words than I would normally even read on a blog, is to say this: I'm nervous, and excited, and anxious, and hopeful  about the future and what is to come. And that's really all I can say about it.

Because words are hard.

Not gunna lie. I'm not really feeling like writing blog posts lately. Especially when I already have to write six BYU essays, three essays for English and one ridiculous essay for Student Council. I guess you could say all my writing skills have been taped out. So let's try something new. A video! My family went to Bryce Canyon over New Years and so I made a little video of the trip. Hope you enjoy!