Utah Trip: Day 4

Happy Birthday to me! And what an awesome birthday it's been so far...

Went to Stake Conference with Maddie and her family, and my gosh there were tons of people. I'm pretty sure at least 2 and maybe even 3 Vernon Stakes could have fit into the Regional Centre...and there weren't many empty seats. Maddie was just one of a few incredible speakers there...but she's the only one who made me cry (and I was doing so well...until she got a little choked up haha). Met her Grandparents (and her Grandpa Ray came up and introduced himself to me by saying "Hi, it's nice to meet you...I just met your husband Adam, he seems like a great guy!" with Adam standing a little awkwardly between us...haha. I had to try so hard not to laugh as I explained that we're just friends... Not sure if he heard me or if he was just doing the smile and nod at that point :) ), and her Aunt and Uncle and Cousins.

Came back to the Brian residence and ate some lunch...and then did lots of laughing over some YSA Christmas bloopers. Hung out and had some great times eating Fun Dip (yay!), playing Mario Kart on Nintendo 64 and just visiting.

After this Adam and I went out to Ryan's house for dinner and to meet his family...(Gretchen came too which was cool). They were super nice and there was some great Apple Crisp! We sat and just visited and joked afterwards. Gretchen gave me a really nice scarf for my birthday (which was my first gift of the year!), and Ryan surprised me tons and he got me a nice gift set. They're both so sweet!

Just got back to the Brian's again and I'm smelling something yummy...just waiting for Maddie and Ann to get home. It's really hit me today how much I'm going to miss everyone down here... It's quite bittersweet visiting people, because it's awesome to see them for the first time in a long time, but sometimes it feels like it's tougher to leave after visiting than it would have just not to see them at all. Oh well, opposition in all things I guess hey? It'll give me a good reason to come back again...

Until tomorrow... (or Tuesday possibly...I don't yet know what our plans are for tomorrow or if I'll have computer access at all.)

Z

Utah Trip: Day 3

Another incredible day! This will be a short one, but some fun things from today were:

- Going for lunch with Matt and Theresa at an absolutely amazing Mexican restaurant in Provo

- Going to the Provo Farmer's Market...so many cool things were there!

- Getting to Maddie's house and enjoying some fun times carving pumpkins (or in my case...taking pictures of the others doing it...)

- Celebrating Utah Halloween! Seriously, all the kids Trick-Or-Treated today instead of tomorrow...it was awesome!

- Watching Hocus Pocus

And all kinds of other fun too.

Tomorrow will be excellent as well I'm sure. Looking forward to it...

Z :)

Utah Trip: Day 2

I'm beginning to think that this is going to be one of the best trips I've ever taken!  Yesterday was such a great day.  We started off by making Pancakes and Bacon for breakfast (mmm...), then took our time getting ready and helping out at Gretchen's before taking off.
We went to the bookstore (where I got 2 new Jack Weyland books...I'm so excited!), and then to In-n-Out Burger for lunch.  I have to admit it was an experience like nothing I've ever had before.  The menus only had about 5 choices, and there were probably 60 or more people inside the restaurant eating or waiting for their order.  It was crazy!  There were no tables inside, so we ate outside.  Fun Fact:  Did you know that the Burger wrappers and drinks all have scriptures written on them?  It was kind of neat.
After lunch we came back to drop off our bookstore treasures.  After meeting Gretchen's dad we were back on our way again.  We did a Mad Lib story on our way to downtown...and it was fun.
When we got to Temple Square it was even more amazing than I remembered it!  We reflected in the reflecting pool for a while waiting for Maddie to be done with her tunnel guy...and then just enjoyed some time all together.  We went to the JSMB (see...I feel like a local...I know all the cool abbreviations lol), took some cool pictures...and talked to a really interesting guy who told us a bunch of cool stories.
We took a tour of the Conference Centre next.  Saw the huge auditorium, some awesome artwork, and the super cool roof.  Then came the North Visitors centre to see the Christus...which was pretty much the most amazing thing ever.  We met some really nice Sister Missionaries there...from Tahiti and Samoa (I think).
From there we jetted off to Cafe Rio to meet up with Ryan and Kevin.  It was a blast, just enjoying talking to everyone and laughing together and having a great time.  We said goodbye to Maddie and Kevin there...and went off to find the Manor Massacre zombie movie production of Sicks.  It was pretty fun...and Ryan's date won a t-shirt as a door prize which was pretty awesome.  After the movie I returned Ryan's cds...Promise Kept!
It was late when we got home...but we still stayed up to watch an episode of Community...which seems like a pretty awesome show!
The new day is beginning, and I'm looking forward to seeing what it holds...

Z

Utah Trip: Day 1

What a fun day...and an awesome trip! (Yes...I did just use the word awesome to describe 17 hours in a car with only a few breaks) We left my house at 4:18 this morning, got interrogated by a grumpy border cop, and continued on. Some highlights:
- Eating Legendary Pizza (it was fate!)
- Learning about the oh so scary "Boo" mountains
- Singing along to Sesame Street
- Finding Coffin Rd (it was totally a Dead End...not even kidding lol)
- Taking a ton of pictures
- Spending time getting to know Adam better (and totally having fun just being ourselves)
- Making up funny stories with Mad Libs (Did you know that Adam is over 100 billion years old? haha)
- Finding out that I am not Smarter than a 5th Grader (but I got pretty darn close once!)
- Successfully navigating across 5 lanes of traffic (That's right...1 point for the Farm Girl!)
- Seeing the Boise Temple again for the first time in about 13 years
- Finding out that today was National Chocolate Day
- Watching a beautiful sunset
- Getting the most amazing hug ever from Gretchen (I've been waiting for that for a long time lol)
- Eating cookies baked in cookies that she made for us
And Finally
- Talking with her about non-mission appropriate things (hahaha)
 A Full Day of fun planned for tomorrow, so I need to sleep, but I will be attempting an update every day :)

Z

Thoughts...

Have you ever had one of those moments where something, profound or not, is said...and all ofa sudden you can't shut off your brain? It's like there's this spider on steroids that all of a sudden gets released inside your thoughts and he begins to spin this incredible web of thoughts that gets so tangled up in itself that you just can't stop thinking about that one thing?
That's been the way my last 3 days have been. I spent my days in an FASD conference, learning soooooo much. (I can't wait to share some of what I learned...keep reading for more details over the next little while!) I spent my nights with my little sister and her husband, my mom, my other "little sister" and my one of my other "mom"s, and just making new memories with many different people. Then today I spent some good times with great friends that I haven't seen in way too long. And now I'm home, and exhausted, and feeling so pumped with energy and excitement from the last 1/2 week that I can't unwind to sleep. It's like there have just been constant thought provoking moments in my life for the last 3 days, and my brain doesn't remember how to stop them from coming...which in many ways is great...but in other ways I just really need to unwind and sleep to prep for a long (and probably sleepless) '6 day weekend' trip coming up this week!
Anyone have any thoughts on how to stop the thoughts from continuing?...

Packing and Procrastinating...

...One's what I should be best at..one's what I am...lol

I do so much travelling you'd think I'd be awesome at at packing. I should have down exactly what I need to grab, throw it all into my bag, and be ready to go ahead of time. But that's not really me. Instead I know what I need to grab and how long it will take me to put it into my bag, and leave just that much time before I need to leave to do it then... At least I'm getting better at doing my laundry ahead of time now!

Procrastinating has always been something I've been good at...I've tried and tried again to rid myself of this terrible habit, but it just seems to take over at the worst times. Sometimes I am good at tricking that side of me, and doing things fast, or before they need to be done...but more often than not I find myself here: leaving for a trip in less than an hour and still not totally packed.

Guess I'll get off the computer now so that I can pack that at least ;) ...

Starting off...

So I'm feeling very inspired by some blogger friends of mine, and have decided to try my hand at this. I've never been great at keeping a journal, but always wanted to be, and maybe doing it online will help. So this is me, trying something new...

I'll do my first real post hopefully within the next couple days. Hope you enjoy hearing about my life and things that are important to me... :)