Christmas

Will and I had a great Christmas. His day off was Christmas Eve, so we opened presents from each other that morning. I attempted to make chocolate waffles with caramel syrup like my mom used to make sometimes, but...unfortunately my syrup didn't work out so well. I cooked it for about as long as they said, but it got rock hard. Then I tried to get the wooden spoon out, and it broke. Maybe next time!
We went over to Will's parents' house at around 6 for dinner, and opened our gifts that evening because Will had to work from 8-3:30 the next day. We both got some clothes, Will got a soldering iron and I got a necklace with scissors on it (that one made me laugh, I can't help but wonder where you would find one of those), some dishes and a few other things, but the most exciting thing we got...was Will's Wii back, and the Wii Fit!! It gets very good use around here. I'll say now that the Wii Fit is one video game (if you can call it that?) that I don't mind at all if Will plays a lot, hahah!! On Christmas morning, we all woke up at 6 and got our stockings, ate a small breakfast and then everyone else opened the rest of their presents. Will left at 7:20 and called at 8:40 - they let him go home early because no one was calling in! So that was a VERY nice surprise.
For Will, I did a "12 Days of Christmas" thing for him, starting on the 14th and ending on Christmas. I wrote 12 poems to go with each day, explaining the gifts. I had a hard time deciding whether to post this or not because it's awfully goofy, but maybe someone will enjoy it...

I tried to catch that partridge bird,

But higher and higher she flew.

Then I found this handy tool,

Hope it works to get her down for you! (Bouncy ball)

I looked up and down at every store,

I couldn't find them, such a chore.

Turtledoves are so small and rare

That I had to improvise, I hope you don't care. (Turtles and Dove chocolates)

Flying to France took quite a while,

To find those French hens, just to see you smile.

But when I got home I was starving, it's true,

I can only hope that you're hungry too. (Chicken pot pie)

The four calling birds flew to my window,

They were quick and soon had to go

But they sang to me these songs just for you

Flew away and they were gone (Christmas CD)

The cost of gold rises every day,

Not to mention so many other things we must pay.

And what would you do with those pointless things?

So instead I got you these delicious rings. (Donuts)

The geese-a-laying already flew south,

But left a gift for you - or rather, your mouth.

These are quite unique as you can see,

Chocolate eggs for you and me! (Melted white chocolate with an M&M in the middle)

The swans are swimming and having such fun,

But soon winter comes and they have to be done.

Their feet get so cold, they can't swim in a storm,

So here are some socks, to at least keep your feet warm. (Socks)

I found the eight maids-a-milking in Belgium,

But they were too busy, and couldn't come.

They gave me this as in despair I wiped my brow,

I guess they must have been milking brown cows? (Hot chocolate mix)

You'd love to go dancing and learn from 9 ladies,

And take out your wife in the new Mercedes.

But working all day, now you feel like a mess,

Here's something to wear so you look your best. (Tie)

I discovered the lords the other day,

Leaping and bouncing and hopping away.

When all of a sudden, I had a thought,

They leaped to the stars, and for you, this they brought. (Starbursts)

I called 411 to ask, really I pled,

To book the 11 pipers for piping.

They heard me wrong and sent instead,

To my dismay, 11 rolls for wiping. (11 rolls of toilet paper)

I found the drummers drumming booked 12 years in advance,

Begging and pleading didn't earn me a glance.

But as they drove off, they threw this my way,

And I filled it with things for you on this the twelfth day. (Small drum filled with kisses, hugs and 50 reasons why I love him)

Piano, Lights, School

Will's parents just moved here to Provo a couple of weeks ago, and had a lot of things that they didn't want, need or have room for, including a beautiful old upright piano. Two of the other daughters really wanted it, as they both play the piano very well...however, I came out lucky because Will and I were the only ones that had enough room for it. I'm so excited to have a piano again!!!

Last Wednesday, Will and I made a trip up to Salt Lake City to see the Christmas lights on temple square, as a celebration for our two-month anniversary. It was pretty funny, as on that day we'd been married as long as we were engaged and as long as we knew each other before we got engaged. It was cold (around 0), but it was a lot of fun to walk around and see all the lights. Some of the trees there are just incredible and have thousands of lights.

Things at school are going well, I'm making a TON more tips now that I'm a senior, mainly because we actually get clients!! I usually have one or two a day instead of maybe two a week. I'm really excited for my break though (the 23rd - 4th). Someone actually just bought the school and things are going to change very dramatically. It is going to be Aveda Institute, Provo, instead of Dallas Roberts. I think it will be a good change, but it's going to be hard to adjust to, especially for some of the girls there that always do whatever they want and get their way. For example, a lot of the girls don't come on Saturdays. When Aveda comes, if you miss a Saturday you pay $500, and you can miss a maximum of 2 for being sick or whatever. Like I said, I think it will be a good change, but the more I hear about Aveda the more glad I am that I only have 3 months left!! I feel bad for the guy that just sold it, our owner, because everyone gives him SUCH a hard time about everything, and says "He just doesn't care" behind his back when they're not happy with the school. But he explained to us why he sold, he said it was because he wasn't able to give us what we deserved, after having 4 back surgeries he just didn't have the time and energy to keep up with it. So I think they need to lay off and give the poor guy a break. This picture is my nail that I entered into the Christmas nail contest. I doubt it'll win (not to be pessimistic, but I never win anything, hahah), but it was fun.

Christmas and Kitty

  A couple of weeks ago, Will and I decided that we needed an animal - perhaps not needed, necessarily, but...really wanted. So we decided the cheapest, least needy animal would be a kitten. So the Saturday before last we finally found a pet store that actually sold pets (it's incredible around here, everyone has fish and lizards, maybe a hamster if it's a really big store, and nothing else), and bought Jasmine. She's about 2 months old and a little terror, but she's fun and according to Will I've been in a much better mood ever since we got her. Maybe we did need her after all. :P We also got our Christmas tree the other day, and she helped us set it up. Or rather, climbed up it and jumped out the side a couple of times.

Are all women created this way?

"Fashion Notes"

A couple of months ago at school, we started planning for our annual fashion show at the Scera Theater in Orem. The theme was music, and we separated into groups of music genres. They told us we had to find models and recommended we weren't models ourselves because we all had to work on one, and being one and working on one is a lot to do. A couple of weeks before the show, my friend who was in my group, which was Oldies, asked me to be her model because hers broke her arm and couldn't do it. I really, really didn't want to, but for her sake and the sake of my group, I agreed. I was Lesley Gore - think "It's My Party". We had to come up with some sort of routine for our 5 minutes of time on stage, so with all of our sub-groups in our group everyone got about 50 seconds. I was in charge of getting the music ready (cut and put together so it was the right amount of time for each one), so I made mine a few seconds shorter...I had no CLUE what I was going to do on stage all by myself. I am no dancer, and that's basically what I was expected to do. We never even ran through the thing before the day of the show. On that day, we got to the theater and found out the music wasn't working. Something went wrong with my burned CD, which I still haven't figured out because it worked on everything else, and I had to run home and get my laptop so I could give the DJ the original file. By the time I got back, it was too late for our practice and we had to wait. When we could finally run through it, it all went well till my song came on. In the middle of it, the DJ accidentally made it stop, so I didn't even get to go through the whole thing. Needless to say, I was a little nervous about going onstage, dancing in four inch heels and having no idea what I was going to do. It ended up going well though, I faked my way through it and didn't even trip!! I'm kind of excited to see the DVD later, and kind of...not...

This is me trying to get my updo out that night. The girls at school ratted and backcombed it until it was a giant mess, and the whole time sprayed the strongest hairspray we had into it. It was difficult.

Saturday

Being poor gets difficult sometimes. I wanted Will to hang up some Christmas lights before it got cold, so here he is doing that. We had to get a little creative, because we don't have a ladder and for some reason it was easier for Will to move around some furniture than call someone and ask to borrow one. Luckily there were only a couple of places he needed it, so he wasn't in this dangerous position for very long...

We also didn't particularly want to go buy big garbage bags for leaves, and had to get creative in another way. After me finally getting Will to call someone in our ward and ask to borrow a couple of rakes, we raked up all the leaves and had to put them somewhere. We ended up just crushing them into our garbage can. (No wonder the wheel is broken on that thing...)

Christmas List

I got this idea from my sister-in-law, Tiffany, to make a Christmas list online for our families. The only thing we ask is to please include gift receipts or anything we need to return or exchange in case we get doubles. Or keep in close touch and tell other family members what you bought. Most of it is available online. Here goes...

For Becky:
This sweatshirt in yellow, size medium
This camisole in black, size small
Giftcard to Michaels
Fabric shaver (at Target)
Slippers size 9

For Will:
Giftcard to any bookstore - Amazon.com, Borders, and Barnes and Noble are some good ones
Slippers size 12
His Wii back
WiiFit, if we get the Wii back
Winter coat size large tall, in navy or black
Pajamas size large tall, in dress gordon (green/white plaid)

For both of us:
Flannel sheets queen size, in grey, cream, or white (in that order if they don't have the first choice)
Winter survival kit
The Work and the Glory movies
The Book of Mormon for LDS Families

OR...just send money. :)

Halloween

On Thursday, Will and I finally got around to carving pumpkins. I carved the faces out of the big one, and he carved a cat face in one of the small ones...the other small one, as you can see, is in the mouth of the big one. It was pretty sweet.


On Friday, I did Kim's hair for our Halloween party at school - it was definitely the coolest hair there:


We washed it, blew it dry upside down with a ton of gel, back combed it, bobby pinned it, straightened it and hair sprayed the heck out of it and this is what we got. Now you'd think at a beauty school they would have prizes for things such as "Best Hair" but no, there were only dumb ones like most creative and scariest. It's really too bad, because she would have won hands down. It's missing a little bit, after I took that picture we sprayed bright pink hairspray onto the tips, which made it look even better. Definitely the most amusing hairstyle I've done so far on someone, and also probably the worst to take out that night...

Trunk-or-Treat

Will and I went to our ward Halloween party this evening, which was a lot of fun. We both gave talks on Sunday, so a lot more people are starting to recognize us. It was weird to hear when they announced that "Sister Castrey will be speaking" and then "And her husband", I still go "Huh?" every so often. ;) There are a lot of really great people in our ward, it's hard to get to know so many people at once...we're working on it though. For the party, there were hot dogs and a few other things to eat, a couple of activities for the primary kids, then there was a trunk-or-treat. There was also a doughnut eating contest, but the doughnuts were hung from a volleyball net and you had to eat it without using your hands at all. Will had to try when it was the Elder's Quorum and Relief Society's turn, and of course, he won. All the fat guys thought he had no chance.

People thought we weren't dressing up at all, because we weren't dressed up inside. However, we had the perfect idea for the cold weather (it was about 30), and it would have been a little warm inside. It worked perfectly and we got a lot of compliments. I think people were jealous because we were quite warm and comfortable. Yes...we dressed as Eskimos, ice fishing. It was awesome. :)

Mrs. Castrey

It has been quite a long time since I've updated, so I'll have to condense this just a little bit. Will and I were sealed in the Draper, UT temple on October 8th. I absolutely love being married!! Things are still a little bit crazy right now, with writing thank you notes and getting my name changed, which is partly why I haven't updated.

We live in a two-bedroom duplex just a few blocks from my school. It's nice - I love the kitchen, and we even have a washer and dryer, which is very handy. Someday I'll get around to taking some pictures and post them, for now I don't think I have the energy to do that. :P I'm going to school for 9 hours every day, which probably isn't quite as bad as it sounds but it sure eats away my energy, even when I just sit there and wish that clients would come in. I have about 840 or so hours left out of 2000. So I'm on the downhill now!! I've considered going to night school also to get extra hours, which would mean 14 hour days, but after calculating my graduation dates according to the hours I'd get, it's really not worth it. I would only graduate about a month and a half sooner...and never be home. I don't think that Will would like that very much, no matter how badly he wants to get out of Provo (which is pretty bad). Anyway, that is all for now. :)

I'm ENGAGED!!!

Yup...it finally happened. I had been expecting it relatively soon, but I had no idea what day. Will kept going and spending hours at his sister Tiffany's house, saying that she needed help with her 3 young kids, but I was pretty sure he was planning something (he is really bad at lying). On Saturday the 8th, Will proposed. He started out in the morning at around 10am by giving me a puzzle piece and a note in a little plastic bag. Throughout the day he took me to various places around Provo, such as Bridal Veil Falls, Y Mountain, Zupas (our first date) and gave me other pieces that represented my qualities associated with the different locations, all with a note explaining the quality on the piece.

That evening, after I had all but 5 pieces, we went to a ward talent show and we sang a duet. He had told me the day before that he had to go to his sister's place for a little while again, so I was convinced that he had to finish whatever it was, and propose later. However, by the time he had to go to Tiffany's after the show, I was only missing 3 pieces and getting a little suspicious. Driving from the church building to my apartment (I thought), I suggested just going to Wymount, where both Tiffany and Andy live, and dropping me off at Andy and Steph's while he went to Tiffany's. He got a really solemn look on his face and I thought something was wrong or I was messing up his plan, but he said it was fine. So we went to Wymount, but Andy and Steph weren't home yet, so he suggested we walk to the temple to kill time. We did and he gave me another piece. I couldn't help but wonder how it was working for him because I felt like I was messing up his plan. We went to Andy and Steph's, and Steph had yet another piece for me. Then I was expecting Will to leave and go to Tiffany's, but instead he said I had to come too...and that's when I got really confused. We went to her apartment, and her son ran up to me and handed me the last piece. Apparently he had been expecting me to suggest going to Andy and Steph's and had given them one of the pieces the night before. The reason he got solemn was because I was doing exactly what he wanted me to and I had no idea. I guess perhaps he knows me better than I thought. The piece that was at Andy's was "Family Oriented" so that kind of made me laugh.

After I had all the pieces, we drove back to my apartment and finished the puzzle. Will looked at me and asked if I wanted to go for a walk. We walked down the bike path behind our apartment to the beginning of the path, and stopped on the bridge that started it. He got down on one knee and asked me if I would marry him, and of course, I said yes. :) It was the best day of my life.

Open House

Yesterday, Will and I went to the Oquirrh Mountain Temple open house. It was very cool. It's one of the smaller ones, definitely the smallest in the area. Standing in front of the temple, you can see 3 other temples. It's crazy. It's the only place in the world where there are two temples within one city's boundaries. We almost didn't make it to the tour in time, because we got confused and at first went to the wrong temple. Usually it's not that hard to find the temple, but when there are so many in one place...yeah. I can't decide which one is my favorite in the area. They're all really pretty here.

Summer Adventures

I can hardly believe it's the 24th and it's almost August. Crazy, crazy...school is going by fast too, I only have a little over 6 months left. That is, if I keep going at the rate I am. I may be taking a leave for a couple of weeks this winter sometime, but we'll see what happens. That will just push my graduation date back a couple of weeks. Will's family is in town this week, so we've been spending time with them. It's very stressful for me, because they love games so much, and I am not so good at games and don't enjoy them nearly as much. :P It's fun though. We went bowling last night (I have bowled 2 times in my life before last night, and the last time was almost 4 years ago), then today we played Ultimate Frisbee, which I had never played before. I did alright, the best part was when I won the game for my team...I was pretty proud of myself, I must say. Then tonight we played a game called Celestial Companions. Will and I came in second place only to his brother-in-law and sister that were cheating. This picture is Will making fun of my dirty feet...this is about what they look like at the end of every day. Yuck.

Happy Freedom Day!!

So I just realized I've had my blog for more than a year now because I remember blogging about last years' fourth. Weird...
Look at my *AMAZING* toenails I did for today!!! I am very proud of them. :)

My plans for today include watching the parade, hiking up the Y and watching fireworks from there, and other than that I don't know. It's gonna be a good day! :)

Long enough hike?

On Saturday, my family was here and we all went for a hike up to Squaw Peak. My mom and dad didn't want to go all the way up, because it's a 3 mile hike literally straight up a mountain. By far the steepest hike I've ever been on in my life. It was really hard, but we all - Andy, Paul, Will, David, Mary and I - made it. It was Mary's 12th birthday, and she said she wanted an "invigorating hike". I think it met her request. The red dot on the picture is approximately where we started from. So no, we didn't cheat and drive halfway up. It was definitely a legit hike.


We were almost at the top, so I got excited and started frolicking in the flowers!! Yay!!! I'm surprised I had enough energy at that point to jump so many times to get a good picture...

Attacking the mannequin

I decided to make it a man. :) Here I am giving it stubble with a pencil.

Not whiffle balls :/

Yesterday evening, I went to Trafalga, a place with mini-golfing, go-karts and such. This was apparently supposed to be my date to try new things, since I haven't ever been go-karting except around the yard in one that my brother made, I've never had Dippin' Dots, I haven't been mini-golfing since I was 15, and I've never hit a baseball or softball with a bat. I used to hit whiffle balls and bouncy balls around the yard, but that's about all. I was a little nervous because that is an AWFUL lot to do in one evening, when you're a chicken like me and afraid to do anything if anyone is watching, but I couldn't think of a single good excuse to get out of it, so I went.


The go-karts were fun, I liked them. They were pretty fast, I think they were about 0-10 in a minute or so.


The Dippin' Dots were good, of course.


The batting cage...well, I was scared, I admit. And for good reason. Apparently I don't know how to hold a bat right, and I ended up hurting my hand pretty badly. I think it's just bruised, but it's kind of getting annoying, Most of the time it's just a constant dull ache, but if I try to text or open door knobs it hurts really bad. It's still a little swelled up but I think it's going down. I can't decide if not knowing how to hold a bat proves that I'm a nerd or a girly girl. And the fact that I didn't do my hair for school for the third day in a row makes me think it might be the first one.

The mini golfing was relatively safe, except that part of the course was flooded and I accidentally stepped into the water and then I jumped because it startled me and I got even more wet. But all in all, despite the few little problems I had, it was fun.

Nerdish Tendencies?

So Will and I were talking last week, and I said something about being kind of a nerd. He disagreed, saying that there was no way I was a nerd. I didn't look like it, act like it, and I went to beauty school. I told him I was anyway, and he wouldn't believe me. A few days later, we were talking about what we used to do when we were kids. I mentioned playing Commander Keen, and he stared at me and was like "You played what?" I told him I used to play Commander Keen all the time when I was younger. He was silent for a few seconds and then said "You ARE a nerd." He said he never really played it because it was too hard. Then I got all excited and wanted to play it again. It doesn't run on Vista, so of course it was difficult to get it to run correctly on my computer. We had to get Dosbox and run it through that, which involved way more than I knew how to do. He figured it out for me and I played it right through without stopping (if I stopped I lost my game), and beat it in a few hours. Then today, I decided that I wanted to play number 5 too, now that I'd finished 4. I talked to someone who is a major computer and video game nerd, who also loved playing Commander Keen, and I said I wanted to play 5. He said "Oh, that one is really hard..." So after searching online for a while I finally found a version I could download, but by the time I found it, Will had to leave because it was midnight and he is a stickler for the rules, to put it lightly. So I was very disappointed and ALMOST cried because I wanted to play it so bad. Okay, maybe that's exaggerating a little bit. So I decided to take matters into my own hands and try talking to the computer myself. It took a little while, but I managed to get it to work, amazingly enough. Not only that, but then I beat it in two hours. No cheating. :)

Ward Glare

It used to be ward prayer, then it was ward stare, now we call it ward glare. That's not the point of this blog though. We have a "dessert club" every Sunday after ward prayer, and this week it was in our apartment. I took charge, of course, because I love making dessert and really, none of my other roommates can cook. One of them can't even make jello...no joke, but that's another story. I decided I wanted some variety for my ward, so I made German Chocolate bars, Special K bars and Snicker Doodles. Of course everything was a huge hit and those dumb guys that said I didn't know how to use an oven got totally proven wrong and they admitted it. So it was a good day. I spent a lot of my Saturday baking, and my friend Will helped me out. Or perhaps "helped" would be a better way to say it. Here he is making an elephant cookie.

Permed Eyelashes?

Yes, that's right ladies and gentlemen. Last week in school, we tinted eyelashes and eyebrows to make them darker. And this week, we permed eyelashes. The instructor asked me if I would be the model for the perming, I guess because my lashes are really long and she liked that, or something. I let her do it, but I was very scared, honestly, I think I would look a little goofy if all my eyelashes fell out or something...luckily they turned out fine and I still have eyelashes.

Inked

I got a tattoo!! The grayish marks are left over from the guide the tattoo artist used, I just need to wash it a few more times and they'll fade.

What did they DO to my hair???

Spontaneous Adventures :)

So on Thursday, my roommates and I decided it would be fun to take a random, spontaneous trip to St. George and Las Vegas. On Friday we went to St. George, not really knowing how to get there but assuming we could follow the signs...which we did, and we got there without any trouble. We went shopping, but no one bought anything except for a little pink pig that Kassidy fell in love with and three pool floaties at the toy store. Yes, we went into 15 stores full of clothes and shoes galore, but we only bought things at the toy store. Go figure. We went swimming and probably had way more fun with our floaties than any 19 or 20 year olds should. We slept at a friend's house there in order to save money, and left the next morning at 6 to drive to Las Vegas. If you're wondering why we went there of all places, we're still wondering too. We don't drink, do drugs, gamble, or other things that people go to Vegas for, nor did we have money to go shopping. So basically we wandered up and down the strip for 6 hours going "Wait, why are we here again?" and looking at things much too expensive for any of us ($2,200 purses). We finally came to the conclusion that the only reason we went was to get pictures and tell people "Oh yeah, we were in Vegas". And then (before all the really crazy weirdos came out) we went home!! It was a good time.

My Bicycle!

Meet my new bike, Amethyst Disaster:
I bought her yesterday. I've been wanting a bike for quite some time now, and I kept calling Andy and telling him to look for one for me since I don't know the first thing about bikes, and finally yesterday I called him and told him again that I needed one. He happened to be going to Deseret Industries (thrift store) to drop some things off, and told me he would take a look there for me. By some stroke of sheer luck, there was this one. Apparently it is worth quite a bit more than the $65 that I got it for...I do wish the purple was a cooler color, such as blue or orange, but it will do. It was pretty funny when Andy and Steph were telling me how to ride it, because I didn't realize you're not supposed to be able to touch the ground when you're sitting on the seat. So they're all telling me how to get on, and I guess I didn't quite get it, because I got on, promptly lost my balance, fell off and scraped my knee. I TOLD them that I didn't remember how to ride a bike anymore because it has been years (literally) and they didn't believe me. Obviously, they should have. But once I actually figured out how to get on without immediately falling off, it was fine. So, no worries!

Another week...

Almost the weekend again!! It's been an exceptionally better week then my last one. On Monday, I did gel nails (just a type of fake nails) on someone for the first time, and I did such a good job that the teacher freaked out (although she does that quite a lot, it still means something when she freaks out about something a student did), and I got another couple of people asking me to do theirs because they looked so good. So that was a good start to my week. And now it's Thursday and I've made $34 in tips from haircuts. If only everyone tipped like that, honestly. Today, I got my hair cut again!! Yay for going to beauty school and cutting your hair three times a month! There was a girl in my class that wanted to learn more about cutting A-lines, so I agreed to be the model for the class. It was scary, especially because the girl cutting my hair kept making funny squeaking noises, but it was just because she was cutting the cape around me by accident. As you can see...it is just a little bit shorter in the back than in the front. Not too dramatic or anything. I love it!

WEEKEND!

My bad week got worse. On Thursday, Andy came over with his brother-in-law, Roger, to fix our internet that wasn't working. We wanted him to come over because our Comcast rep. seemed a little bit dumb and kept trying to fix things over the phone, and telling us we had the wrong kind of router. He was really rude and asked the dumbest questions, like "is it plugged in?" I mean come on. For real? Anyway, so they came over and they were here for a while, and due to the extremely strict towing company, Andy's car was towed and he had to pay $120. Me and my roommates are going to pay him back for it, so we were all a little bit annoyed at that. And our internet worked for a few hours and then died again (at the moment it's working, finally). So that was like the grand finale to my bad week.

However...it got much better today. It was probably the most fun day I've had in a long time. Me and my roommates had a sleepover last night in Kassidy's room (yes, we pay so much for private rooms and then share them). This morning we got up and went to Babies R Us in our pamajas, then we went to a ward activity. We left early because we didn't want to play kick ball, and it was sunny outside so we went in the pool. After that we took a walk to Macey's, bought giant ice cream cones, found a random shopping cart near the Provo River and took turns riding in it on the way to my old apartment, where we found a new shopping cart and switched them. After that we went to a park and took tons of pictures, and then came home and made eggs, toast and bacon for dinner. So I am very grateful for my awesome roommates that I love so much, and I am so glad that they're actually fun to be with. By the way...that picture of us balancing, it was very difficult. Especially because I had to hit the camera button, run to the thing through the wood chips in my high heels, jump on and get decently balanced before it took the picture. Which was pretty hard. :)

Quite the week...

I don't have much to blog about this week. I would have, only everything exciting that was happening ended up not happening after all. I was going to have working internet in my room finally because we got a router, but it didn't work. I was going to go flying with someone I met here at Carriage Cove, but he ended up not being able to take me. I was going to play the guitar, but whenever I try to borrow one from someone it hasn't worked out for some reason (hopefully tonight Andy will bring his). Last night I was supposed to work on a duet with someone but he couldn't. Tonight I was going to Comedy Sports (which is my favorite thing in the world) but that also fell through and I won't be able to go. Oh well, it happens I guess. At least I finally got a letter from Nick after hearing nothing for a month!! :)

My Room

I finally got a hammer and some nails from Andy so I could finish decorating my room. So...here it is!

New home, again!!

I can't believe it's already Thursday, again. I feel like the weeks are flying by so fast I can't even think...which is alright with me, I have to say I won't mind if the next two years go by fast. ;) I moved into my new place on Monday, and I absolutely LOVE it. My two-minute walk to school is probably my favorite part...I love walking, but walking for a total of an hour and twenty minutes every single day was a little too much for me when I lived at Raintree. I also love my roommates, and I get my own room!! I ended up with the smallest one, but it's still a pretty decent size, it's not huge but it's definitely not too cramped or anything. All the rooms are pretty big, and we have brand new couches in our living room. I haven't taken any pictures of my room yet, but I'm waiting for Andy to come tonight and bring me a hammer and some nails to finish decorating and get my curtains up. Then I'll post pictures of that too!! The people here seem cool too, and I'm already met my bishopric and they're very friendly and seem like a lot of fun. I met a bunch of people my first night here and went over to one of their apartments to watch a movie, so I think it's a pretty good start to my summer. :)

Utah Flooding

North Dakota may have been almost totally underwater for the past few weeks, but I'm having my own small problems with flooding here in Utah. In the underpass, where I walk to get to school every day, somehow the storm drain got backed up and left a few inches of water in the way. A few inches sounds like it wouldn't be a big deal, but it's sort of a pain. At first I just ran through it as fast as I could, but when that made my shoes and socks wet, not to mention my pants and sometimes my shirt, I decided there must be a better way. I decided even though it took quite a bit out of me, I hoisted my huge bag up and jumped up onto the cement wall next to the walkway and walked over next to it. This wouldn't be a big deal, but it's been a week and the water hasn't moved an inch. I'm getting a little bit tired of jumping up and down walls that are just about as tall as I am. You might ask why I don't just walk all the way across up on the wall so I don't have to jump, but I would probably end up with a concussion, with the cement supports that go across at about 3 feet from the top of the wall. I am only hoping that it will go down soon. I don't know though, it's supposed to rain this next weekend, so it'll probably just get worse.

I'm moving out tomorrow!! I'm kind of excited, but at the same time I'm really sort of sad. I've really liked this apartment complex a lot and I've met so many awesome people. Now that I finally feel like I have friends, I have to go make new ones again. Oh well, I'm sure it won't be too hard, and at least I'll be in my new ward for a lot longer than I was in this one (3 months). I think I need to make a goal to meet more people though, and really try harder to get to know them better. It took me the whole 3 months here to really start feeling like I had some friends, and it still wasn't quite what I wanted. But then I realized I never really tried very hard till a couple of weeks ago. So that's one of my goals for my new ward and apartment. Another goal is to actually do my visiting teaching. It should be so easy with my companions and teachees living within 50 feet of my apartment (just like the rest of my ward :P), but it's not. It's so hard to get schedules worked out and getting stubborn college students here to cooperate when they think visiting teaching is for old, lonely ladies. Yeah, life is rough, I gotta say...

So I got my nails done again, only they're all the same this time! I've never had fake nails before, and definitely not ones that look like these, but I am starting to kind of like them. I always thought that this style looked really weird, the colored french manicure, but it's actually kind of fun for summer and everything. I guess. The only reason I did it in the first place was because I was in a nail class at school the other day and I was supposed to do my nails. Another girl did something similar to mine and I decided maybe it didn't look too stupid and I should try it since it was free. So there ya go...now I just have to not get so addicted to them that I leave them on for 7 years, like one of the girls in my class. She doesn't have real nails anymore actually, her fingers literally grew into her fake nails and she can't take them off, she just does them every month or so. Gross, huh? I think so.

For Dad!!

We do math in beauty school. :)

We did cornrows in school yesterday, and it really hurts to have it done. It also makes me feel like I should either be black or going to girls' camp. It's much more fun to take it out and go hot tubbing!!! My roommate said it would make her week if I went out to the hot tub with my hair this way, so I did. It was pretty funny. :) Everyone stared at me, and then apparently they made fun of me behind my back. It was a good night. Luckily I'm moving in a week and will hopefully never see any of them again! Not that I would really care that much anyway, I would have done it even if I wasn't moving. It was a good time.

Are you KIDDING me??

Waking up in mid-April in Utah, where it's supposed to be WARM, and looking out the door seeing THIS does not make my day:

Ya gotta love it. Oh well, I guess it will get warm again soon. I hope.

The story of my chopped off hair

I told myself and everyone else that I was definitely not going to cut my hair. I was going to stay strong in beauty school and have long hair the whole time. Then one morning I was washing it and thinking how annoying it was. I was blowing it dry and thinking about how long it takes. Then I was straightening it and hating how long it was taking to do my hair. I went to school and thought it was looking pretty scraggly on the ends anyway, and that I should cut it. I convinced myself I would love to cut it. Then I decided it only looked scraggly because it was raining out, and I re-straightened it a little bit and it was much better. I thought about how much product I was using to protect it from all that straightening and how much it costs, so I decided to cut it. And then Cass walked into the room with her beautiful, long blond hair. And I thought, "Nah, I like my hair. I don't want to cut it." And then a few days later, I had just barely passed my floor test and my hair was in a nasty ponytail, not done that day because I was too lazy, it was frizzy and not cooperating (yes, beauty school students have bad hair days too, don't worry). Finally I thought about it once more and after completely convincing myself I didn't want to cut it, I changed my mind and got it cut that night. I LOVE it. Don't get my wrong, I liked my hair a lot and I'm glad that I had it so long, but it was definitely time to chop it off. So here I am!!! With about 10 inches less hair! :)

Celebrate!!!

My roommate just got engaged - she is one of the three out of the six that was engaged, but she wasn't actually engaged till Monday, he just hadn't quite proposed. But she is officially engaged now and her diamond is HUGE. There is a kind of contest here all the time, who has the bigger diamond...it's kind of funny in a way, but sad too. Personally, I really wouldn't want a big honking rock on my finger. Some people look good with the bling, but I really don't think I could pull it off. The morning after she got engaged we (some of the roommates - Ariel, Liz, Ashley and me) went to The Happy Sumo for lunch to celebrate. Or maybe more just to have an excuse to go out to eat, I don't know. I felt slightly guilty for spending too much money on food, but I usually feel guilty about spending any amount of money anyway, so it didn't really make a difference. I made almost as much in tips today cutting hair as I spent on lunch that day, so it's all good!