National Peanut Butter Appreciation Day

Today (well yesterday technically) I discovered that it is National Peanut Butter Appreciation Day via someone's thoughtful post on the Book.  I had been feeling guilty about consuming large amounts of peanut butter the last couple of days but now I know it was for a good cause.  It was all leading up to today.  And then I had the desire for some peanut butter cookies.  Luckily I have a roommate who is a peanut butter cookie maker extraordinaire and she quickly whipped up a batch ... at 11:40 pm.  If you're jealous that is understandable.  But don't be too jealous because I am currently sitting here with a queasy stomach filled with delicious (or it was delicious at the time) peanut butter cookie dough.  So here's to a fabulous National Peanut Butter Appreciation Day.

P.S.

Today Utah decided to become an ice rink.  Walking to and from different classes was the most entertaining thing of my life.   Even being yelled at by a formidable man in a trench coat for walking on an unsalted piece of sidewalk was comical.  

The university thought to send out an email out warning us about the severe conditions.  However I didn't get the email until 10:00 tonight while everyone else received it in the morning.  I'm glad technology works so well for me.  Hopefully when a real disaster hits I will get important emails like this one real quick since they are so helpful.  The email went a little something like this, "This morning's freezing rain has created very slippery conditions on parts of campus. Please use caution as you make your way to and from classes."  ..... I would've appreciated an email much more that went a little something like this, "Since people are tripping, getting hurt, and essentially looking like idiots every five seconds... class has been cancelled."

-- Nat --

Just a Few Thoughts

What do I desire?  To love and be loved by everyone.  That….. is one very difficult, heart wrenching, beautiful, trying, happy, depressing, and exhilarating task.  I can’t make someone love me.  And to truly love someone takes more effort than I feel I have sometimes.  There are those that are easy to love. Because they love me back and it is apparent in their every word and action.  And then there are those that do not love me back, and if they do it is nowhere close to apparent.  But I want to love everyone.  The Savior did and I am to follow His example.  The only feasible way to do this that I can see is to continually become more like the Savior.  As this occurs I will be able to find a true, heavenly love for every person.  Every single person.  What a beautiful picture that is.  And one I never want to forget.

Bear Stuffing and Children Watching

I think everyone has a plan or idea of what their future will be like.  Why we hold onto these ideas with such a firm grip I'll never know since the projected future is rarely a reality.  Life holds so many dead ends, new roads, etc. that one could never predict.  My last blog posts were from nearly 4 years ago.  Looking back I have realized that my life, which seemed normal at the moment, has taken me on a course that was never charted.  But it's been wonderful and changed me in ways I never would have thought possible.  And so... from this reflection I can see that life cannot be our projected realities.  If so... how would we improve and change and become better versions of ourselves?  We would never grow because everything would be predictable and in our own hands.  The beauty of life is learning how to travel the unknown... learning how to chart our own path in our own individual unexplored wold.  Listed below are the unexpected events that have occurred in the past 3 years that have altered my life beyond my idea of where the future would take me.  And looking back I can see that each of these events built on the past making me a stronger person.

1.  Working at West Marine:  West Marine is a store that sells boat parts.  I have never worked on a boat and have ridden on 1 boat in my life.  Enough said.  Needless to say I learned how to say, "Let me go get my manager" ... and how to keep people entertained with boat talk while we waited for the boat expert.

2.  Peer Mentor:  I used to be shy.  However... being in charge of 80 freshman and speaking in front of all of them changed that quickly.

4.  Living in Monticello Apartments:  To move in I had to camp out to get the apartment... with people I had never met before.  I also moved in with 4 girls I had never met before.  Talk about getting out of your comfort zone.  However.... because of this I have met some of my best friends that I know I will have for the rest of my life.

6.  Telefund:  Have you tried calling people for donations?  It's an interesting experience let me tell you.  But boy did it teach me about making conversation with difficult people.   And the importance of thinking of other people and their needs.  Also it taught me a new appreciation for telemarketers   It did.

2.  Build-a-Bear:  I stuff bears currently.  I get to make children, adults, couples, etc. happy.  Have you ever tried stuffing an octopus?  You have to remember to stuff all eight legs!  That is hard!  This job has taught me how to keep a smile on your face at all times.  It has also taught me that people are more similar than you would think.  I have seen so many different types of people in the store just wanting to build a bear for a loved one.  It's a beautiful thing. :)

5.  Teaching:  I have successfully learning how to control a class of 22 first graders.  Sound easy?  Try it sometime.  :) I have also learned that it's impossible not to love these little people.  I will never forget the impact they all made on my life for good.

In conclusion, I'm excited to see what comes next.  And I hope in four years I can look back and say that I've become a better person then I am now.

Don't you dare touch my candy

Summer is almost over. This statement brings a lot of mixed feelings. I'm sad to leave the mountains..but so excited to move into an actual apartment and start classes and my new job. We have our last full group of kids this week. Hopefully it will be a good one. Then I'm trying to get the last week off so I can get ready for school. A day and a half is definitely not enough to move in and get books and everything. Doable…but not fun. Quite a few events have occurred this week. First I had this brilliant idea that I would surprise my family and come home and see them during Thanksgiving. The only problem with this is that tickets are 500-600 dollars. Not exactly in my budget. Then I had this brilliant idea to email the airlines and see if they would give me a discount :) I told them that I am a hardworking college student and that I would endorse them by wearing their shirt and telling everyone that they were a great airline. Sadly….I was not effective enough. They told me thank you for my heartfelt letter. And then kindly shut me down. How rude haha. It was worth a try! The next thing that happened was so weird. I had gotten a roll of rollos from my boss but I couldn't eat them because they have sugar in them. I decided to put them on my shelf and save them for when I can eat sugar again. Then a couple of days ago I woke up and there were these wrappers all over the floor. I couldn't figure out what they were and didn't really pay attention to them until I realized the were rollo wrappers!! They were completely shredded up in little pieces with no chocolate to be found. It was the weirdest thing. I think the mouse or a potgut age them. Some of my friends think that I was craving sugar so bad that I went and raided them in my sleep. I'm pretty sure I didn't since I did not wake up with chocolate all over my mouth. Then today I was cleaning out my bottom drawer and found rollos hidden in my clothes!! So bizarre! And creepy. So who knows what happened..I blame it on the mouse though. I got to watch a meteor shower this week. That was so cool!!!! There are so many stars up in the mountains .. It is so pretty. We went out at about 12:30 and just watched the meteors flash across the sky. Well that's it for now!

Peanut Butter and Jelly

The summer is going by so quickly. I can't believe that it is actually August. I will be starting school in less than a month. A day and a half after this job ends. I get quite the break. I'm living with three girls that I knew from last year which will be great. And then my roommate that I will share a room with is someone random. I won't be meeting her until the day I move in. We'll see how this all works out! Meanwhile I am still quite occupied here up at Aspen Grove. As you can see from the picture..we had an eighties night. It was time for the dance and some people decided we should dress up. We made quite the entrance...it was sweet. As we ran in they were playing the song Freak Out. By some of the people's faces when they saw us they definitely were. It was funny. Luckily my kids weren't too embarrassed of me. Although one girl was running away from me. Hopefully that was a joke and not serious :) So the summer ending soon also coincides with me being able to eat sugar again!!! I'm trying to decide if I will keep not eating sugar or start right back eating a bunch of sweets. The hope is that I will just hate sugar and deserts when I get to have them again. But knowing me it will be quite the opposite. We have another huge group this week but so far they seem like well behaved kids which is great! But you never know...one of the guys was miming today soooooo who knows. One thing I can't wait for in the fall is being able eat my own food. I have discovered that I am such a picky eater. I really didn't think I was until I came here to Aspen. For a lot A LOT of my meals I end up having peanut butter and jelly or cereal or something. There's great food don't get me wrong but I just don't like most of it. I end up making the weirdest combinations. But hey it is free food so I can't complain. My co counselor was telling me that going off sugar and getting 200 dollars is a waste of money because up here the food is free so the more food you eat... the more money you "gain". While this is a clever idea...I don't think they understood the point. If you count food as money...you would blow up like a balloon. I will justify this 200$. It is definitely worth it....it better be :) Anyway life is great. I have the greatest friends up here. And even though there have definitely been ups and downs, I have no regrets about taking this job. Besides the fact that I miss my family. But other than that it has been amazing.

Christmas in July

I finally got my camera usb connector that I ordered from Hong Kong for five dollars!! So I will now be able to post pictures :) I ordered the cord off of Amazon and got free shipping. I was very proud of myself. The big news of the week: I GOT A JOB!!!!!!! I applied for a TA position for Physical Science. I was competing against 21 other people and did a phone interview because I wasn't able to get down to the place where they were holding interviews. It will be a job for fall and winter semesters and I get 8.12 an hour!! I am so blessed and I can't believe it!! Now I don't have to apply for any other jobs. I will be working somewhere around 20 hours a week. It's going to be crazy but it will be so nice to be putting my own money towards college. The group we had this week was great. There were 36 kids total. There were SO many kids. But I loved all of them. However .... I did have some interesting experiences including hitting a boy in the face and giving him a bloody nose. But let me explain. We were playing parachute games and I was under the parachute..I was the shark and was supposed to pull people under. You can only see the feet of everyone playing because they are on the other side of the parachute. I went to grab someone and on the way to grab them I hit their face on accident. I didn't think I hit him very hard and thought he was more startled than anything...when his nose started gushing. I felt so bad!! But it stopped bleeding quickly and he was fine. Quite the experience. The kids were also trying to set my co counselor and I up. I'm surprised it hasn't really occurred to other groups. One of the boys asked Brandon if he was single and he said yes. Then he asked me and I said yes. Then he said well you're both lonely so.....Yup my kids are great haha. Then at the dance when all of the parents were dancing they had us dance with each other and we had an audience of 12 of the kids watching us and applauding. We also had Christmas in July this week which was so much fun!! We got to ride the little train which was the "Polar Express" to the dining hall. Then we did a present exchange and took family photos.

This is a picture of the roommates and I :) They are the best. I can't believe the summer is more than half over! It is going so fast.

Potguts and Stinging Nettle

This has been quite the week. The group is a pretty good group which is nice..most of them listen to me..something I have to enjoy while it lasts. But holy COW are they slow at getting places. Brandon always leads the front of the pack and I take the back. And usually the back arrives a minute or two after. But this week..no no. We arrive probably five minutes after. Today I was trying to take the back of the group back to the lawn to meet their families. They apparently wouldn't have it. One of the girls hurt her ankle so it took her forever to walk and she was limping. Then one of the crazy boys I was trying to keep track of runs out into the road and starts stabbing this dead roadkill ( a potgut I believe) with some iron rod he found who knows where. It was gross I can tell you that much. And he of course ignored me as I was screaming at him to leave the dead animal alone. Fun stuff. Then we were playing this game called Castle Camo today. You have to run and hide in this wooded ampitheatre area. I stalked up on bandaids and alchohol wipes because so many people last week fell and scraped themselves up. However this week it was my turn. As I was running, being my graceful self, I slipped and cut my finger on stinging nettle. It started swelling almost immediately. Man that stuff is lethal. Luckily it wears off in about 10-15 minutes but for that time period the itch is intense. Lets see...oh! I also was able to go to my grandparents this weekend. That was really fun. They babied me and took me out to Village Inn. It was a great way to recover from the flu. The only problem was that when they dropped me off at Aspen, they drove away and my phone went with them. I had forgotten it in the backseat. I figured I would be fine without it but it is hard to get a hold of people when you don't have a phone or numbers. But luckily my friend Jena :) drove me down to Provo and my Grandpa was wonderful enough to come bring it to us. So the phone's now back in buisness. One last thing. In church this week one of my friends that was supposed to teach the lesson got sick so I offered to teach for her. My lesson was supposed to be next week and thankfully I had prepared a lot of it. I had one hour to get it all ready to go. That was quite the experience. But I'm grateful for it now that it's over :) Over all I will be honest. Life is nuts right now. But I still have so much to be grateful and happy about and this is still a wonderful job. Yes. That's all.