Mom for a Weekend

I had my hands full watching the three Perkins kids while their parents went away for the weekend. What an adventure! We did a lot of fun activities, and even managed to get through sacrament meeting without a fuss from Avery. Mission impossible: accomplished. Some of the fun things we did:

• Antelope Hills carnival. We walked to the school across the street and had a blast at this free carnival going on. The kids got their face painted, ate ice cream, played on the big blow-up slides, and danced on stage! Those three kids have some crazy dance skills!
• Walking Oreo. A visit to my house proved eventful when we took Oreo on a walk to the park by my house. We took turns holding the leash and then ran around with Oreo once we got to the park. Brayden had fun going down the slide with Oreo.
• Mulligan's. Lizzie and Tony gave me some free miniature golf passes before they left, so we went down to Mulligan's to make good use of them. I told the kids we could do mini gold and ONE other thing only, due to the outrageous prices. Of course, that never satisfies anyone. Brayden didn't wear socks with his shoes, so he got a blister and that sure didn't help his mood when I said no to the arcade games. We did come to a compromise though. Camden could do the rookie go-carts for his "one other thing" and Brayden could have a few bucks for the arcade for his "one other thing." Brayden exchanged his tickets for a "go go ninja" which he took practically everywhere he went for the rest of the weekend. I made sure we didn't lose that little guy...or else the world as Brayden knew it might as well have ended haha. Mini golf was a blast! Avery was so cute with her golf club as she followed the boys and tried to get her ball into the hole.
• Playdate with the Dyer's. The boys were asking me all day "When can we go to the Dyer's house?" So it was a nice break for me when they went over there for a while. After Avery woke up from her nap, I took the opportunity and went and picked up a few things at the store-dinner for that night and breakfast the next morning. Then the Dyer's came over to our house and we all ate dinner and then the kids played outside for a while. They all play so well together! It made my job a lot easier!
• Church on Sunday. I guess I kinda just wanted to prove to myself that I could get three kids ready for church by myself and sit quietly through sacrament. Success! I packed a bag with extra diapers, paper, and toys for the kids. We were a little late, despite my efforts to get there early haha. Avery had a cold and so she didn't go to nursery. So she rested in the foyer with me while the boys were in primary. She started getting fussy toward the end of the third hour and had no problem going down for a nap when we arrived home!

It was definitely a busy weekend, but it was a good experience for me, and the kids too (I hope!). It was cute, Brayden didn't want me to leave and tried to block the door so that I couldn't go home.

**Wish I had pictures! Unfortunately my memory card for my camera is not behaving.

New Lyrics!

Where You Belong

Wake up and feel the sun shining on my face
Another sunny day
In Californ-i-a

But though the weather's nice, I've got nothing to do
Wishing I was with you
Hoping you feel the same way too

[Chorus:]
I've been to the beach a hundred times
Felt the sand between my toes
Hollywood, Newport, and San Diego
It's not bad I suppose
But with summer so near and you so far
Baby I can't wait that long
I want you back in California
Back where you belong

I dream I'm walking along the coast with your had laced in mine
That would be just fine
I think about it all the time

We'd laugh as the tide comes in from the sea
You make me so happy
I need you here with me

[Bridge:]
'Cause I'm out here all alone
just waiting
Underneath a cloudless sky.
I'm out here all alone
just praying
That soon enough you'll arrive
And we can finally start our life...
-----------

Very rough draft of course! But a good start I'd say. Now I just need to write the guitar part...

Sunburned Never Felt So Good

California has been treating me well! The weather has been absolutely beautiful. After a long winter in Utah, I love just being outside and feeling the sun beating down on my face. Its been quite boring compared to my busy college life that I love so much. But last week, I had the chance to go to the beach with Rebekah. It was 93 degrees at the beach! Glorious. We only got waste-deep in the ocean because it was freezing cold. It felt good to be in the water again though. I definitely got sunburned, but it was just enough to turn my white Utah skin a shade or two darker the next day. The week got even better when we decided to go to Seaport Village and Coronado Island with Rachel and their friend Laura the following day. Seaport is one of my favorite places in San Diego, and San Diego is one of my favorite places in the world. I had never been to Coronado, however, and after only a few minutes after crossing that stunning bridge, I knew I had found a new favorite place. We ate dinner at Panera Bread, another new favorite! Then we went to visit the famous Hotel Del. We first parked right next to the parking lot, but Laura insisted she knew a better way. So we ended up parking by the beach and hiking the whole way in the sand by the water up to the hotel. Rebekah's dad was with us, not dressed in anything remotely close to beach attire haha. We laughed the entire way there about how silly it was for us to walk all this way. When we (finally) got to the hotel, we explored a little bit and looked at the shops and expensive restaurants. The hotel and its location was breathtaking!

Back to the beach!

Oceanside pier

By the time we got to Panera Bread, we were all starving!

Hotel Del Coronado!

And just like that, it's over.

I can't believe that I'm finished with my sophomore year of college! How have two years just slipped past me? Don't get me wrong, they've been filled with the some of the best memories of my life. Life at Liberty Square was definitely an adventure this year! I really miss it. I met some of my best friends and I'm realizing that life in California, although warm and sunny, is just not the same without the people that made my life so wonderful up at school.

Free hot dog Fridays
Roommate sleepovers
Guitar parties
Brownie Wednesday
Ward-greeting
Comedy Sportz
Dinner group
April Fools pranks
30 Second to Mars/Neon Trees concert
Staying up way too late laughing
Ab workouts
Jimmer
Liberty Square
Cameron and Kurt: "aye aye aye yo!"
Jack Bauer
Family dinners at Uncle Steve's
Temple trips
Learning how to dougie
Halloween party
"Blockbooster"
Friday lunches with the Gates sisters
Friendship

A few of the girls in our wonderful relief society

Ultimate April Fools

I have to give my roommate credit for her work today. Emily really pulled off the best April Fools Pranks. She managed to distribute flyers with my photo and number around campus in the wilk and the library. I've been getting calls and texts all day long! She also put up a poster of me in the testing center. The testing center actually called me tonight asking me if they wanted them to take it down and if I wanted it back haha. She also did a bunch of other stuff at the apartment. She taped the little sink hose so that it would spray automatically when we turned on the water. A bucket of water splashed all over me as I was opening my bedroom door. Twice. A stream of water poured from the top of the toilet. My milk is green. The shower head is filled with blue dye. And my clothes are mixed with Morgan's in our closet. The pranks keep popping up...I'm a little scared to find out what else she did! But I give her props nonetheless.

A Little Ice Skating

We had a fun stake activity tonight at 7 Peaks Ice Arena. Free skating and pizza? Yes please!

Festival of Colors: Kind of a Big Deal

Hare Krishna! It seemed like everyone was in Spanish Fork last Saturday at the Krishna Temple to be apart of the Holi Fest, or Festival of Colors. The idea is simple: throw colored chalk at everyone you see. Apparently it's a Hindu celebration to welcome the arrival of Spring, and its really caught on here in Utah. This was my second year going, and I plan to go every year that I can. Morgan and I went with Rochelle and Olivia from our ward. This year, they did a chalk throwing every two hours. When everyone threw their chalk all at once, there was just this massive colorful cloud all around us! It was pretty crazy. I hope I never miss this event while I'm up here. I really look forward to it every year!

First Post in 6 Months!

Sadly, college and blogging don't seem to work together that well. In the six months that I've been at BYU this year, I've only made two posts on here! I guess that's just how it goes. All is not lost though; I have been keeping a pretty updated journal while I've been here. But this post is my attempt to start, yet again, on the task of keeping a blog.

Park City for the weekend

I had one of the best weekends I've had in a while! Morgan and I got invited to go up to Park City with a group of people from our new ward. Our friend Andrew's family owns a condo in a hotel up there so we stayed there all day Saturday and then came back Sunday in time for church. The day didn't begin as planned; Morgan and I woke up about two hours later than we wanted to! We frantically packed our stuff and threw on clothes and then headed over a stake activity for some free breakfast. Then we made our way up through the mountains to Park City with Andrew and Nick. Once we arrived, we met up with the rest of our group and Andrew's brother Scott and his friends. There was a ton of people!

I'll start from the beginning. First we rode the alpine slide. I'll admit, I could have gone a whole lot faster. Morgan ended up on my tail for more than half way down the slide haha. We did the alpine coaster next, which is basically like a roller coaster that goes down the mountain. Morgan and I doubled and went down pretty fast! So I guess you could say that made up for my lack of speed on the alpine slide. All of us then went back to our hotel and did some swimming (and sunbathing) action and attempted some underwater photos. After we swam, we decided to go to the outlets and get in some shopping (or in my case, window shopping). But first, Morgan, Lynne, Scott (Andrew's brother), Jenn, Tyson, Andrew and I ended up going up to Olympic Park on the way to see the ski jumpers train for their events. The skiers go off these big ramps and do their crazy flips and then land in a huge pool. It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen! We made our way over to the outlets, which were pretty nice. Morgan bought some new clothes. Taylor apparently spent over $400! And Andrew bought a pair of sunglasses for a "screaming deal" of $120 haha. After our shopping excursion, we went over to the other hotel that Scott and his friends were staying at and had a BBQ outside by the pool. The pool area was really nice. There were like seven hot tubs with rock waterfalls and the pool had a volleyball net that we used. It was tons of fun! I can't say that enough! We went back over to our hotel and played catch phrase and psychiatrist. So fun! Then we watched a movie, although by that time I was exhausted. The girls slept upstairs in the bedrooms and the guys stayed downstairs for the night. I woke up the next morning a little on the tired side to say the least. But we all made it back to Provo in time for church! And I am proud to say that I stayed awake for all three hours. I did, however, take a two and a half hour nap when I got home. I really hope we get a chance to do something like this again. It was such a fun group.

Back in Provo!

I've been in Provo for about a week now and it sure feels good to be back. Don't get me wrong, I love California, but it is nice to be back here with all my friends and to be doing my own thing again. I never thought I'd say this, but I've missed Provo! On top of that, I've missed school in general and always being busy. I drove up with Corinne in her little buzz box and we managed to somehow fit a bunch of stuff in her car. I still have a few more things on the way that Brooke will bring up tomorrow on her way to BYU-I. The drive was fine, we got here safe and sound. We stopped at the Carpenter's house on our way up and visited with them for a little while. That night we went over to Courtenay and Andrew's apartment and they fed us dinner. Potstickers and rice! I slept over at Corinne's place and helped her move in the rest of her stuff the next morning. Then it was my turn to move in. I met my new roommates, Emily and Kellie, who I LOVE! The next morning, Corinne and I went to the airport to pick up Morgan. And yes, Morgan and I are roommies this year! Corinne dropped Morgan and I off at Buba's house and we went shopping for some stuff for our apartment and had lunch at Cafe Rio. Soo good. I hadn't been there in four months! After our little expedition with Buba, we soon realized that none of my family members would be able to take up home to Provo. I called Andrew Glenn who lives in Salt Lake and he was kind enough to give us a ride home. Thank goodness!

I've been getting back into the swing of college life and doing the whole school thing too. My classes this year: Elementary skills and activities, stats, world civilization, Book of Mormon, child literature, world religions, and TELL 410. So far, I would have to say my favorite class is world religions. Morgan and I are taking the class together and it seems really interesting! Our professor is great too. My world civ professor seems bland so I really hope she finds a way to spice things up. Its fun running into people on campus who I haven't seen in a while. As much as I love meeting new people, I hate to part with old friends. So I always love it when I see someone from the old ward or an old class. Speaking of wards, our new ward (the BYU 165th ward) is having a ward party tonight. Finally! I feel like I have barely met anyone from our new ward. I hope a lot of people show up.

Just so I don't forget...random fun this week: Let's see I went over to Kaitlyn, Hannah, LTA, and Kiersten's new apartment over at Campus Plaza to make cookies and write letters to Shmish! He leaves the MTC for Mozambique pretty soon. All our old roommates joined us and so did Jessica and Charity. Oh how I've missed the Kaitlyn cookies! Haha. Not to mention the LTA raspberry banana bread! We all got together yesterday for lunch and are going to make that a weekly get together since we all have a break on Wednesday at noon. The folk dance team was doing a presentation and asked for audience participation so Lisa and I got up at attempted to dance around the terrace. I also managed to look like a total freshman and walk into the wrong class a few days ago. So embarrassing. I sat there for about five minutes thinking about whether I should get up and leave in the middle of the professor's lecture and look like an idiot, or just sit there for an hour and no one would ever know. I decided on the former and left the class feeling really dumb. Haha. What else this week...Oh Andrew and Dan made a visit to BYU on Monday. It was really funny. We went grocery shopping with Morgan and Emily and parked out in "butt freaking Egypt." lol. Good times. Well this post has been long enough so I'd better go and get started on some real homework before the party at 7pm.

A day on a paddle board and bicycle

What an awesome day! Probably one of the best this summer! On Tuesday, I went to Dana Point with Sam Moreno, Nathan Beck, his wife, and their grandma. We started out the day on paddle boards, which are actually easier than they look and tons of fun. You stand up on an oversized surfboard and row with a big paddle. After I got used to the balancing, it was no problem. Sam fell off his board about 20 minutes in haha. It was so funny; I can't help but laugh every time I think about it. The funny thing was that he turned around to look at me and then just kinda fell to his knees and rolled off into the water. Very graceful! Before we returned the boards, we both decided to jump in. The water felt amazing! After our paddle board adventure, we drove up to Newport Beach where we rented bikes and rode to Huntington and ate lunch by the pier. Their grandma wore a bright orange vest when riding her bike, which made her look somewhat like a construction worker haha. We ate at a place called Duke's and apparently grandma knew the owner. Oh and she also knows my mom's side of the family because they all grew up in Riverside: funny story. Anyway, we rode to an ice cream place where we all got soft serve ice cream cones. Almost all of Sam's ice cream fell to the ground within three minutes of buying it! Sad day! We rode back to the bike shop in Newport where we realized we lost the yellow parking pass that we apparently "needed" to return the bikes. Nathan tried explaining the situation to the guy in the bike shop, but it was his grandma that set everything straight! Once we got everything worked out, Nathan, Ava, and grandma took their car home and Sam and I searched Orange County for the Ortega Highway to avoid traffic on the 91. It probably would have been faster to just take the 91 since nobody seemed to know where the Ortega was haha. We finally were headed in the right direction on the 5 but I guess we missed the exit for the Orgeta so we just took the 76. It was a fun ride though. I am so glad I got to go on this trip! I learned a few new Samoan words too lol. Some of them aren't very nice...I guess that's just how it goes hahaha.

Stopping for a break in Huntington

Nathan looked funny with his hat and sunscreen nose

Aww, poor Sam!

Orange Country to Studebaker!

Last Tuesday, Corinne, Brandi, Rebekah and I hopped in Coco's buzz box and headed to Orange County. The first stop: Yorba Linda for Corinne's horn lesson. This was probably the least exciting part of our journey. Next stop: Newport Beach Temple! Upon arrival, we realized that the temple was closed for construction. We still had a great time eating lunch on the temple grounds and taking pictures. Then we drove to Long Beach where Corinne picked up her new french horn case. I have never seen a girl so excited about a case in my entire life! haha. She was just thrilled! We went to a gas station to change into our swim suits and there was this strange man who was talking to us in line for the bathrooms. He reminded me of Kevin from the Office! Seriously, this could be Kevin's brother or something haha. He was telling us how he has been to Lake Elsinore and he would catch lizards and their tails would fall off. Interesting. Next stop: the beach! Well, sort of. We drove around Long Beach trying to find a nice sandy beach with waves. Our search was unsuccessful. It was just a massive harbor. So we just found a sandy area and chilled out there. It was a sad excuse for a beach lol. As Brandi said, "this isn't a beach, its a place of sand and water!" We decided to leave after about an hour or two in the windy hell of all beaches. We pulled into a sketchy looking gas station and Brandi and Bekah went in and asked the guy at the cash register how to get to the 55 freeway. Apparently he had a very thick Indian accent and told them to get on "Stew Baker" hahaha. We were laughing forever because we realized the actual street was "Studebaker" lol. I had a great time with wonderful friends!

"BYU is going to have a pink hair rebellion on their hands this year" -Corinne

I guess you could call it the sisterhood of the traveling pink hair streaks...But yes, I now have a strip of pink hair. I've been thinking that it would be fun if the dhfbff's and I all dyed our hair this summer so on Monday we bought some pink hair dye and each got a streak! It isn't really that noticeable, but i think it is satisfying to know that we all have it. After we got our hair done, we did Corinne's dogs. Seamus has a pink happy face on his back and Mayzey has a four leaf clover on her back left thigh. We even convinced Corinne's mom to get a streak! haha. We took the leftover hair dye outside to find cats so we could get them too. Probably not the best idea haha. But not to worry, we couldn't catch any cats. It was a really fun night! I am so glad that Brandi and Alyssa are finally home from BYU-I. It is nice to have all the DHFBFF's together again! :)

Christine and Brandi plus seven

Last weekend Brandi and I had the chance to babysit seven kids while their parents were out of town on a cruise. It was a little crazy at times, but tons of fun too! We watched Logan and Thor Stucki along with their five cousins Sydney, Lexy, Rylie, Reagan, and Ryder. The kids spent the first few days of the week at their grandparents house so Brandi and I watched them Thursday, Friday and part of Saturday. A few fun activities we did:

Making maracas out of plastic cups, rice, and duct tape.
















Making Brandi's "Special treat" which was like a homemade pop tart filled with Nutella.
















Like the new look? Haha. Brandi and I tried on some funny wigs and took pictures.

Potatoes please!

I had forgotten how much fun I have with my old friends from my high school newspaper class! What a great group of people. We all came together my senior year during our 5th period. Brandi, Alyssa, Maddy Kozich and myself were seniors. Travis Tan and Mandy Lomnicky were juniors. And Many Speed was the little freshman. I am so glad we still hang out and can still find news things to laugh about. Its kind of tradition to make funeral potatoes at someone's house. So last Tuesday, everyone except Mandy Lomnicky (out of town) came over to my house to do the same. Alyssa came late because of work. We ended up going out to dinner at Alberto's, acting like middle schoolers whose parents had given them a night out alone haha. Sometimes its liberating to act immature. We had a blast though. After our Mexican feast, we went to Stater Bros to buy the ingredients for the funeral potatoes, nicknamed "Mormon potatoes." We stood in the middle of the magazine isle for probably a half hour just laughing and talking. Then we went back to my house and made the potatoes and watched New Moon and made fun of it, also tradition. This time we focused on the awkwardly tense kisses between Bella and Edward and also compared Jacob's climb into Bella's room to Mandy's boyfriend doing the same with a ladder. When the potatoes were done, we ate and laughed until everyone went home. It was a very fun night! I definitely will miss these guys when I go back up to BYU.


A few noteworthy quotes of the night:
"Brandi, where's all the avocado sauce?"
-Me to Brandi at Alberto's. Everyone thought it was funny I said that instead of guacamole
"She learned it in her grocery shopping class"
-Me to Travis regarding Brandi's knowledge of measuring units for the sour cream
"With all those sports and all those grades, she can't even buy herself some f**king peppers!"
-Maddy to Mandy. She only had 37 cents to buy her green onion with
"Damn look at those good quality baskets. I wove them yesterday."
-Maddy
"Christine has the best refrigerator water. AquafreakingFina!"
-Maddy
"What a marshmallow"
-Jacob Black. haha.