The best friends wedding

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a bit of a basket case yesterday. Tori and Billy were wed in the SLC temple and it was just a perfect day, minus the ice covered roads requiring us to drive 30 mph from Provo to Salt Lake.
They are such a pair; so happy together and such quality people. It's exactly the way that things should be.

Yeah this is really the best picture I got of them from the day haha. Her dad conducted a really eloquent ring ceremony. Something he said that stood out to me was that it is great to be in love and in that state of complete happiness and infatuation but that thankfully it doesn't last. It develops into something much deeper and longer lasting. And sometimes, you don't feel that strong sense of attraction etc at all and that's when it's important and necessary to remember that you've made a promise to that person, that you're bound to them by your choice and by a covenant. That might not sound very romantic the way that I worded it but I was really impressed by it. And honestly I think there's not a lot that IS more romantic than the responsibility that comes along with that bond to another one person. Anyway, I'm so excited for them and feel so blessed to have them in my life!

 I had a nice date too

Pardon the fact that my dress is so short, I'm tall enough that all bridesmaid dresses look a little scandalous on me, even when they don't on the other girls.

Happy new years!

Chance meeting

I love when you meet someone and you can't help but think that it was somewhat fateful.. The mom and I were in WinCo today, browsing the great selection of giy spices and met and spent an hour talking with a lovely southern belle. I think that it started off with me asking my mom what would go well with fried green tomatoes and said lady piping in.. How did you come to know about fried green tomatoes? Well, I was born in North Carolina of course so I can and do hold some claim to knowing the basics of fried cooking. (Even though honestly I'm a little morally opposed to it--public health major)
Anyway, long story short we quickly learned she has quite the adventurous spirit and then drank in everything she had to say. Getting to the point.. She told me about something her daughter, Claire, (a great sign already because I love love that name) had done where she moved to New Zealand for a bit and worked a few hours out of the day to earn room and board and spent the rest of the time exploring etc. One of the families she stayed with completely took her in and the woman spent hours every day teaching her how to cook. Could this sound any more appealing to me? Nooo it could not.

I've been toying with so many different ideas like this I just need to do it. Or something like this. Now.

But we had such a nice time chatting we're meeting up for coffee and cupcakes next week. Yay.

Those Christmas Lights

Give it a listen

If you love Coldplay or you don't
(I know there is a better way to post this as a video on here but I don't know how)

Weird thing about finals week this year is everyone I've ever met seems to be coming out of the woodwork. People I haven't seen in years popping around the corner every five minutes. It's been fun. But the fun ends there, finals are finals and when your mind has the attention span of a three year old it always complicates things, esp studying.
I'm curious if this is something unique to BYU, girls are always real dolled up when they come to the library. And they like to come in packs. Girls in Provo never miss an opportunity to impress men, you can't go to the grocery store in a sweatshirt and shorts or people will assume you are married.. or a lesbian. It's so draining sometimes. Plus there is no competing with these women, they make it their full time job to be as attractive as possible on every level. I commend them for their diligence but forr real..
Despite all my complaints, I have true love for this town. It's an awfully weird place but it is home and I can appreciate it 99.9% of the time.

So it's been said

A million times and in a million different ways. But, exercising my civil liberties, I'm going to take a crack at it and give my two cents.
Driving today I was cut off by a truck bearing the bumper decal:
So how's all that hopin' and changin' going for ya?
And I had to wonder whether the manufacturer of this particular message started making these stickers before the new president was even put into office.
I appreciate that there are real issues that lead a person to choose a party to affiliate themselves with but I have to ask myself whether politics has become much more trivial than that. Have we started to view something as serious as the direction and state of our nation for ourselves and our successors (not to mention our effects on our brothers and sisters of other nations) as something that could be likened unto our affiliation with a favorite sports team? I worry that we view the leaders of our country with the same bullheadedness that is admissible when dealing with our alliance to the Colts or the Lakers, but inexcusable when a real problem has presented itself and we refuse to reach across the table and compromise.

I'm not going to pretend like I know enough to divulge into any particular issues, rather leave it at that and hope that we can separate ourselves from the political chains binding us to one mindset and halting our progression. The political standstill we've come to based on poor (not to mention stupid) attempts to please the other party is another issue entirely.. and not the solution or the path of which I speak... ha ha

Demoted

No I haven't reverted to horses and stuffed animals, Hannah has claimed my room for her own. And painted it purple.



I'm not upset about it at all.. Not even a little. It doesn't make me feel super old, or like a stage in my life has completely closed. And it definitely didn't bug me when I had to sleep on the floor at the foot of my old bed because our guest bedrooms were being used.

Ya, it kinda makes me feel all those things. And it really just put the icing on the cake when my dad told me today was the day for me to go through all my old boxes and throw things out because "we aren't storing it anymore" haha it's about time I suppose!

And I can't stay sad because today marks the start of Thanksgiving cooking :)

On a second, unrelated note: My hair is orange. Next Monday's cut and color cannot come soon enough

And I was worried today would bring bad news

Ring around the moon last night... (for anyone who has good taste in movies-- Practical Magic)

I made a bridal bouquet this afternoon

and some really yummy quinoa

Yeah I really did take a picture of everything I put in it haha, and I had to get the black olive can out of the trash. I just have too much energy and nowhere to put it right now.

Me and my friend Alex watched this movie, The other Boleyn girl, and it was about King Henry VIII and his mistresses. It reminded me a little of Vanity Fair in that things were soo lopsided for women. I'm no feminist but hands down between that and no tampons I'm glad I live in the 21st. You sure did know your place though, which is a good and a bad thing. A good thing in that sometimes I would love to have things spelled out for me so that I could feel the satisfaction of meeting the expectations people have for me. A bad thing in that I can't stand being told what to do or the hopeless feeling of having no control in my life. So I'd probably run away and then be in the same position I'm in right now, being responsible for making my own life. I think I would have sold those floral headpiece things at the market and fallen in love with some poor pauper. I'd probably hate the king and write political satires behind his back and teach my kids they had 10x the character and dignity he'd ever have. Kinda fun to think about.

My secret sin

I am the QUEEN of indulgence, let me paint a picture for you

(View from my apartment)

This morning I trekked to class through wet wet rain (have you ever noticed some rain and snow showers are wetter than others) went to class, took a test, then worked out thennn
took a hot shower, made some hot chocolate, lit my twisted peppermint candle and turned on Christmas music.. and here I am, in my leggings and sweater. I'm so good to myself.

Has anyone seen in the Anthropologie catalog the cool beaded scarf necklaces they have-they're on a llama so you'd probably remember- here's the link if you haven't. They're $48 dollars so I've set out to make my own, bought some great beads at Gardner Village, we'll see how it goes.

 smittenkitchen.com
Can I please drop out of school so I can cook all day? I'd probably be better at it than I am at school.
And one more thing that's on my mind...

Christmas in New York

Mom? Ha ha

Time of your life

BEST day
except for.. I'm getting really tired of dating, which leads me to kinda want to peace out of this town.
I have learned a lot about myself and dating from reflecting recently though, I have walked away from a LOT of really great guys that I really should have given a second chance. I've gotten tons better recently but I've been an idiot for a long time.

BYU 55 UNLV 7
TCU 47 UTAH 7
Jazz 109 Clippers 107
goooooooood day

Advice for all: rent Into the Wild. If you've seen it before, rent it again. Learned a lot watching the 3rd time, stayed up for 2 hours writing about it in my journal last night ha ha

Alright, alright, alright alright alright HEY

Go cougars

So I started feeling guilty about not blogging for a bit, kinda like how it felt when I'd forget to water my crops on Farmville. For my Halloween I opted out of dance parties (as previously foreshadowed that I might) and spent the weekend up at my darling friend Becca's cabin in Current Creek. Never heard of it? That's weird, there's a whole 200 people that live there. Favorite pic of the trip?



Some of the girls
So much fun up there, and an increddddible cabin. I have great friends.

So I'm in North Ogden today at my parents because it is election day!! And my dad is running for state legislature if you didn't know.. He's amazing, way too busy for his own good but really amazing. This whole election has been super stressful and truthfully it will be nice for this part to be over.

I came across some old photos and just enjoyed them too much not to share. This one is a classic because it really represents my adolescence.

I'm pretty sure that I'm fighting nature every picture I take that doesn't look like this, just an awkward person. I'm looking through photos on my mom's computer at my parents house and every one I'm smiling and posed like this. This is freshman year of college mind you.
No, no it's 8th grade but still!

Lastly, my mom and I made the BEST squash soup last night, it was perfect. The recipe comes from this English man, Jamie Oliver who is hard at work trying to improve school lunches. Admirable.
And anyone who doesn't visit this website at least weekly is missing out. Tell me how it goes if you make the soup! Really it is worth it, and you can substitute ingredients all you want (we traded canned green chilis for red chilis because we were out) but don't get rid of the coconut milk even if you're wary.

My beloved piece of space

Never before has 20 square feet (I'm not very good at gauging what that actually means) of shaggy green carpet been so appreciated. I don't know what it is but I just love my room at this my third Provo residence. I could spend all day in here. And I have! The past 3 days, which is what has probably brought me to this point.. and a blog. I've been sick with self-diagnosed (I can do that because I'm a public health major) acute strep throat. Probably not, but if I say acute does that mean that it's possible to only have strep for a day and a half?

So.. I don't feel like doing an intro, because I already know me, and since I'm the one writing I can do what I want. Instead I'm going to talk about Halloween. Why? Because I was just looking at DIY Halloween decor on Good Housekeeping and I'm wondering if it makes me the world's oldest/lamest 21 year old if I'm not really feeling the whole Provo Halloween party scene. Probably it does. I just always end up spending so much money and since my only income right now comes from selling my body I'm sensitive with how I spend it. Plus having plasma sucked out of you kinda hurts, and leaves an unsatisfactory scar.

I'm going to have to set up an outline for these posts otherwise it's going to end up a modern day Catcher in the Rye account. And to be honest.. That book kinda disappointed me