June 24

I figure today is a good day for looking back at the past year and thinking about life. It's interesting how much can happen in just 365 days.

For example, in the past year I chose a major and a minor. I got the best grades yet and raised my GPA by a lot. I moved three times. I made the decision to go on study abroad and applied and was accepted to the program.
I held two callings in my ward and learned a lot from both of them. I learned how to drive a stick shift car. I painted and finished a nightstand. I spent a day hiking in the sand in St George with a really great friend. I watched the US win a World Cup football/soccer game.
I went visiting teaching almost 100%. I made more new friends than I can count, and re-made friends with a lot of old friends. I ate a lot of ice cream. I learned how to play the guitar. I had one of the best, and most different, Christmases ever. I re-developed an interest in art and started a picture I've wanted to draw for a long time. I ate macaroni and cheese almost every Sunday. I learned just exactly what love means.
I made friends with a few people in other countries. I had a sleepover in a blanket fort with some of the best friends I've ever had. I watched a lot of Disney movies. I worked more than I ever have in any given year. I ran the most I ever have, getting clear up to six miles. I watched NFL for the first time and discovered I love football.
I learned that sometimes being right isn't actually very important. I went to the temple every single month. I read my scriptures every single day, except for a couple of days where I was really sick. I learned how to cook and discovered I really enjoy it. I developed an interest in sewing and made some fun projects. I read the Book of Mormon all the way through again.

I read this quote just a couple of weeks ago. "It is only possible to live happily ever after on a day-by-day basis." I think this is the most important thing I've learned this past year - that life is meant to be lived. I have learned, more than ever, to wake up each morning infinitely grateful that I have another day to live, learn, love, and experience the joy that comes from living life to the very fullest.

Sometimes I wonder what the next 365 days will bring. Something amazing, I'm sure.

I love life :)

Today I put the toothpaste on the wrong side of the toothbrush, fell off my heel while walking down a level sidewalk, accidentally stepped on the power strip and turned off all the computers in the office, tried to check out a book with the wrong library card, made friends with the ant that kept crawling on the book I was reading, went to lunch with some friends, wasn't very hungry at the lunch with my friends, came back and scanned several documents upside down, rescanned several documents right way up, got told that I was a magical person, and am now struggling to keep my eyes open at work.... some days I just love my life :)

More yard makeovers

More summer home improvement adventures: New porch and driveway. My mom and I came home from vacation to find this waiting for us. For free. Apparently it was a whole ward project, all secret and everything. People were up at 9 am on Memorial Day working on it for a lot of the day, and they repainted the posts on the porch, and patched up the grass around the edge of the driveway and everything.

See that stump? There was this obnoxious Chinese Elm tree on the edge of our property that overshadowed the whole front of the garden and dropped millions of seeds every year. They took that out, too.

This whole thing really made me appreciate the fact that I belong to this church. The gospel is focused on serving others, and being the recipient of such service made me want to serve more, because you never know how much it's going to mean to someone.

Feeling better

So as I was sitting on my uncomfortable leather couch, I heard the sound of cheering from a room across from me. I poked my head in the door and saw this. That made all the waiting worth it. GO USA!!!!!!

I hate visa rules...

So I'm sitting on a nice, uncomfortable leather couch waiting for a travel agent who forgot about our meeting and decided to come to work "late" (meaning, she'll show up when she feels like it and didn't tell any of her coworkers when that time would be) and wondering how I got into this mess... And since I have nothing else to do at the moment, lemme tell you about it!

So I'm going on study abroad, and we were going to stay 9 extra days and travel around Europe after, because they told us we would be able to do that, only now the visa rules have changed, and we aren't allowed to fly out of the US if our return ticket is more than 90 days out, so I have spent 1300 dollars on a plane ticket that I now have to change, only the problem is that the day I have to come back is the day before Thanksgiving, and nearly every flight is pretty much gone, so I'm going to have to pay a change fee for my existing flight, and possibly have to rebook entirely, on a flight that is guaranteed to be significantly more expensive than the flights were back in March, and will more than likely include millions of hours of layovers. I will probably see every major airport in the US before I make it home. And therefore I am sitting on this uncomfortable leather couch, waiting for an MIA travel agent, passport and credit card in hand, missing work, all because somebody told us we could do something that we can't, because it's actually illegal.

And I'm not particularly thrilled about it. *sigh*

My Favorite Things

I was reading a friend's blog... well, actually an acquaintance... okay, so I don't actually know the person whose blog I was reading (blog of a friend of a friends, okay, anyway) SOOO I was reading her blog, and she said a friend of her friend had posted a blog of 10 things that make her happy. And I decided to do the same, because it just sounded like a happy thing to do, and the world could use more happy in it. And maybe someday my blog will have more than three followers and people will read mine, and also be happy... haha. Anyway, here goes (in no particular order).

1. Friends. Okay, I know everyone says that, but seriously, I'm my happiest self when I'm in a group of friends, a ward activity, FHE, whatever. I'm a people person.

2. My guitar. I'm not very good, and I've only been playing a year, but I absolutely love sitting down and just playing and singing along to myself.

3. My job. I'm a front desk secretary in the HR department, and I really love it, especially when I get to solve problems and work with people.
4. Dressing up. I really like formals, and fancy hair, and doing my nails and wearing sparkly jewelry and heels to some event. Definitely not every day, but occasionally.

5. Watching football. So I'm not great at playing sports, and I don't even pretend to be knowledgeable about them, but I LOVE watching it. Especially BYU.

6. Dancing. Clogging is for sure my favorite, but pretty much any kind of dance except for modern or ballet is the best!

7. Disney movies. When I was little, my family wasn't big on TV, so a lot of the animated Disney movies didn't enter my life until... recently. I LOVE Tarzan, Mulan, Toy Story, Lion King, Finding Nemo, Ice Age... the list goes on.

8. The temple. I'm lucky to live so close to a temple, and I try to go at least once a month. I can't wait for the day I can actually go upstairs and not just to the baptistry, but until then, I love going as often as I can! (And my favorite is San Diego, if you can't tell...)

9. Spaghetti. Preferably from Brick Oven, Olive Garden, or Fazoli's, but homemade is fabulous too.
10. Sunshine. I'm pretty sure it's not even possible for me to not be happy when I'm lying on soft grass in the sunshine reading a good book or having a picnic, or just staring up at the sky thinking about life.

This list is certainly not all-inclusive, but it's a start. What makes YOU happy?

Mexico and what it means to me

First off, the vacation was fabulous. The first night on the ship I had food poisoning, which was not so fabulous. A nurse had to stab me with a needle to give me something to make me stop throwing up, and that was not particularly enjoyable. But the sun always comes up after the dark, and we had a beautiful day in Mexico!

Mexico itself was cool. It was interesting to see as our tour bus drove through town in Ensenada, it was interesting to see and hear about the people there. The economy isn't very good, and most of the people rely on government aid to get housing, and they live in government housing rather than buying from a third party, because they simply can't afford the interest rates. The government housing is "very, very nice and clean" according to our tour guide. Most of the houses are 200-300 square feet. This is considered good. Less well-off families live in campers, trailers, small one-room homes, etc, in fields or in large "subdivision" areas - essentially a large plot of dirt with a lot of shacks built on it.

We passed several blocks of really trashy looking condominiums/apartments. Our guide insisted that "we don't live like this. Mexicans don't all live like this." These condos were built by the government in the 90s, an attempt to provide even cheaper housing options for the working class. However, land was still available for affordable prices, and the apartment-style housing ended up attracting the very lower classes rather than the working class they were intended for. They have since turned into essentially an Ensenada ghetto.

We passed fields of asparagus, tomatoes, and I think melons. (I forget exactly what - most of the plants were still just tiny). Our guide told us that in the central and southern areas of Mexico, the economy is terrible, and many people travel to the northern areas, particularly in Baja, as seasonal migrant workers. The government will provide them with free transportation north, then they have to pay for their trip back.

The main road through all of Baja is called Road Number One. This highway stretches throughout the entire peninsula, connecting the major cities in the peninsula. We drove a little way on this road on our way to La Bufadora.

La Bufadora is a naturally occuring "blowhole" on the coast south of Ensenada. There is a cave along the edge of the cliffs, and as the tide comes in, the air pressure in the cave causes the water to spray up into the air like a geyser. It's similar to Old Faithful, only every 15 seconds or so instead of having to wait around. Our guide referred to it as the 'Natural Phenomenon." It was pretty funny the way she said it.

Near La Bufadora is a small community or settlement. There are no services available, but probably 50-100 people live their. Most of them have wells, but there is still no electricity (I think... I'm struggling to remember exactly what essential utility they were missing). I'm not sure if they have generators or they just do without. More likely the latter.

We only spent a day in Mexico, and granted, Ensenada is pretty close to the border - you almost can't consider it "real" Mexico. However, the little bit of time we were there really made me appreciate what I have! My house is pretty small according to our standards, but it's three times the size of most of the houses in Ensenada. I have a great, air-conditioned office job that I complain about all the time, but I make three or four times the amount most of the workers there do. It really makes you count your blessings sometimes.