Amidst Chaos

Wow this week has been insane (and it's not even over yet!) I am sure everyone in my classes feel the same way.

Amidst (I've looked up how to spell this word a couple times now...) all this chaos of final assignments and death projects I have come to find myself again.

I have been calmer than I have been all semester, with the occasional meltdown. The weird part is that these last two weeks have been the busiest yet...am I learning how to balance my life better? I am not sure about that. I have been doing nothing but homework for what seems like forever. This past week I have literally stayed up all night and worked every second of the day until this very moment when I decided to blog about my experience.

Lets just say I have been doing much more praying than I do on a normal day. Every second of the day I have a prayer in my heart to be calm and that my writing will be concise. I pray for health that it will not fail me last minute and for the courage to face whatever happens.

Don't let this post fool you into thinking I am the calmest person in the world...inside I am FREAKING OUT! So much to do in such a little time! AAAAGH!!!! ..Now that that freak out is out of the way I can face reality and know that I have approximately 97 percents in all my classes at this moment and just a little more work is necessary to keep these grades. I CAN DO IT!

I am a little obsessed with caps locks right now. haha.

I also realized that not only is prayer an extraordinary comfort, but so are the scriptures. I haven't had much time to read, but as I am practically asleep around 2 am in the morning I pull my scriptures out and blow off the gathering dust to sit down and read a couple verses....normally just one or two.

I am just so grateful for the gospel in my life and for the comfort I receive when I follow His teachings.

How Have you Been????

I love when people ask "how have you been?" And all I can think of "oh you know, just homework and work especially since these are the last weeks of the semester." I wish I could tell them "Oh yeah, so I stayed up all night with not a care in the word, then I slept in this morning and we were able to just relax all day without having school enter in my thoughts once." nope sorry, but that's life.

This semester especially when people asked how I was doing I wanted to answer with "I am doing great, school is school, but I am having a blast on my free time."

What FREE time?! Sure I have had a day or two or free time this semester...let me repeat ...a day or two....not my weekends off or enjoying all the "breaks" we have. Let me just say this:  BYU starts earlier, has maybe 1 or two breaks (short), and ends later than other universities I know of. During the semester it's cramming this and paper that, and project up the wazoo.

I am feeling this way because I know people are sick of me saying that School is keeping me busy instead of something interesting...but what do they expect from someone who takes their education VERY seriously.

I love my major and sure it's a lot of work....I just don't know what to say when people ask me what I am up to or how I am during the semester (especially when I am nearing the end of the major), because it will always be the same "School. work. exhaustion. frustration. fun occasionally. more exhaustion. more school. more work..."

It's a very merry Christmas tree....or so Daniel says

Today was meant to be spent as a homework day...well two tired college students decided that was all fun and all.....but we'd rather spend it putting up our first Christmas tree.

I debated back and forth whether we should spend the money on a tree..........A tree would make December feels a little more like Christmas......but do we have to funds. If I was going to do a tree I didn't want to do the tiny 3 footer ones....I wanted something about the height of Daniel. These are hard to find in a decent price range.

Until I went to Target and there was a nice one for 30$....sold out. A bit bummed (or Daniel would tell you I was VERY bummed) we went home and I grumbled a bit about "no money anyways..." or "Christmas is still Christmas without a tree.." etc etc etc.

This morning I woke up and I was like "gosh darn it, I want a tree!" So to Wal-Mart we trudged and a 39$ 6.5 ft tree we bought (pre-lit).

After decorations and such it was around 80 dollars. Not too bad. The tree isn't extremely full ...a little sparse in some spots, but you know what?!.....it's my tree and I love it! For goodness sakes I live in an apartment and anything would liven this place up for Christmas. Plus, we only wanted something that would last for a few years and be good for when we started a family. This tree is sturdy and the perfect size for a starter family. And, to make it even better, I have woolen mushrooms (a few are up "high" for Daniel's drug joke...) and sock monkey ornaments I got for Christmas last year and it is the little touch of home that makes it perfect.

We put the star up last and wallah it was complete. Sure it's a want more than a need....but Christmas doesn't FEEL like Christmas without something so traditional. I do place the real reason for Christmas above else, but this gave Daniel and me a day of fun to say goodbye to break and finally start to feel in the holiday spirit.

Before any decorations....I was not a fan of the gaps, very Charlie Brown like.

Daniel channeling his inner child. 

Finished tree with ceiling lights off.

Finished tree with Daniel for height comparison and ceiling lights on.

Did I hear a "Gobble Gobble?!"

Yes, it is Thanksgiving day at last, also fondly referred to as Turkey day. It was a day I have been dreading all semester. This is the first Thanksgiving as a married couple for Daniel and me and we were spending it as a normal day. In my mind I always wanted to spend this day with my incredible family by my side, enjoying their company, joking, and eating a deliciously prepared feast.

Alas, it was not meant to be. This whole semester I would get a little down in the dumps when people talked about travelling to see family, or getting together for Thanksgiving. I wanted that. When people asked what my plans for the holiday were I would just put on a smile and say "oh, nothing is planned, Daniel and I will just have a turkey and spend the day like any other day."

When I thought of Thanksgiving this year I would think "oh, it will be nice since it will be Daniel and me hanging out ....just like everyday...except with turkey..."

Well, let me tell you all something dearest stalkers, it was the most amazing Thanksgiving EVAA! Boy have I realized that I can be grateful for the little things. I am excited for Thanksgiving with family, but occasionally it is nice to just be with the love of my life.

We woke up around 10:30 am (so nice to sleep in without an alarm) and Daniel made waffles. We then had the adventure of making our first turkey ever. Daniel and I were both disgusted with the preparation of turkey making. ewww.....Giblets and gooey raw turkey is not what I calla fun time..until I squirted Daniel with turkey juice on accident! haha. he was not amused, but ....I WAS! haha....it was at that very moment I realized today was a bonding moment we would cherish forever.

We had green bean casserole, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes and gravy, turkey, and stuffing. We also had an apricot drink that was introduced to me through my in-laws. We also had a chocolate pie. The turkey was a tad dry, but hey, it was amazing anyways!

Before the food was done we were able to skype my family who I love so much. We talked about all things that remind me why I love my family-- basically we can talk about everything from turkey testicles to joking about farts, to work, and just regular family news. I am so glad that my family can talk about anything. It was so niece to see my nice and nephews. Dirk was so funny joking around with me. I can't wait to visit for Christmas.

Daniel's family called a few minutes after I got off skype. They talked for a short while to Daniel while I prepared the potatoes. It was nice to hear from family. :)

We also watched  "Roxanne" with Steve Martin...hilarious. This in turn got the song about a prostitute named Roxanne in my head haha.

Today was awesome. :)

Here are some pictures....

This is from Halloween, PUMPKINS! ask us about our pumpkin -table endeavor sometime...

Trick or treater time, is Daniel eating all their candy!!!!

A birthday cake for me and Daniel. 22+24 = 46  :)

And the Thanksgiving pictures!!! Turkey butchering time!

Daniel's a TURKEY!!!! who knew???

Only picture of the two of us for Thanksgiving and it is blurry....oh well... I hope you enjoyed the pictures   :)

Happy Thanksgiving!!!!!

Schist is not Gneiss (pronounced nice)

That's basically how I feel today. Sometimes I wish that schist would just leave me alone. I feel like I can never do anything right even when I am putting in the extra effort. I am sick and tired of feeling like people who should care don't. Lets just say today isn't the best day in the world. It's not even a bad one really...all this is just coming from a semester of no sleep and constant running around. You would think thanksgiving break would be a great time to relax and be thankful...Well I am thankful....but just tired so it appears I am cranky.

This thanksgiving will be spent working on schoolwork. yay....
Then it will be Christmas break"shortly" after, where it will be spent trying to enjoy the time I don't have to worry about school...but in reality I will be thinking about school because I am already nervous about winter semester.

I just feel wiped, drained, and like my brain has been molested. Yes, I said molested. Doesn't make too much sense to me either. haha

I know this sounds whiney and a "you have done it to yourself" moment, which is true, I chose my workload and even added to it when I picked up a job mid-way into the semester fully knowing that this semester would be best if I didn't work. I don't regret these decisions, just wish sleep would actually give me rest and that I would at least have my weekends.

This semester I have no classes on Friday...what do I do? ---Spend my whole day on campus working on work and Saturdays and just recently Sundays have been added to this disastrous mess.

I miss a lot of church, not because I don't have a testimony, but homework is slipping into my Sundays and I am having trouble feeling welcomed. It has been nearly a year since we have come to this ward. I would love to do VT, but I literally have no time. Maybe I could fit it in during my few hours of chosen free time, but right now that sounds like even more work and something else to worry about.

I am grateful that at least through all of this I am working towards something I love- Geology. Sure, I just spent this entire time complaining, but this semester has also been my favorite by far. I have great friends, you know who you are :) .....and I am learning so much. Geology is one of the most spectacular things about my life and I want it to define who I am one day. I have many goals to set to improve. One is to work harder in the week so I can have my Sundays...this may not happen until next semester, but it is a thought constantly on my mind. I love my job, though it is the extra chunk of work in the week that sets me over. It also helps me support my husband and myself and save for a future. It is also the step in my school career that will help me get a job once I graduate.

So if you read this I hope you read to the end....I know it was mindless rambling complaining about life being full of schist, but I do appreciate my blessings and I am grateful for the particular challenge this semester is giving to me because it is showing that yes I can juggle a large workload and still be successful.

Sarah

Awkward Moments

Lets just say I hate seeing awkward moments in movies where the main character embarrasses himself unnecessarily. For example in "Father of the Bride" when the character played by Steve Martin gets all nosy in his daughter's future in-laws home. Ugh!

Anyways, that's my small opinion of the day.

A Day of Celebration

And what did we celebrate? ......

Actually a lot. On the 29th Daniel and I had been married for 4 months. I guess it may be crazy to celebrate month anniversaries, but I would like to beg to differ. I think celebrating the first month of being together is a wonderful way to bond and to have something to look forward to each month. After our first year of being married we will go to just regular anniversaries and perhaps 6 month anniversaries, but for now I love celebrating  every moment I am with the love of my life. That sounds so gushy. :( I am not a lovey dovey person. I hate mush like that, but it's true and I can't hide those type of feelings.

We also celebrated our grades for this past semester. We both did really well and we were pleasantly surprised with the grade Daniel got in his dreaded organic chemistry class. If that wasn't a cause for celebration I don't know what is!

I sold my furniture that was in my bedroom at home. It was a sad day for me. I love my beautiful desk and the other furniture I bought when I was in high school. I have so many memories of eating cinnamon apple pie while doing calculus and differential equations on the desk. My parents paid me for it recently so we used this money for our small celebration party. And in a way it was a celebration since it was the end of our desperate attempt to stay living a normal lifestyle without money. 

Another reason to celebrate is that I am feeling much better. For those who didn't know I was going through a rough semester not feeling well and visiting doctors and such. I also hurt my back and even damaged my eye pretty nicely during the semester. For the past week I have been starting to feel like myself again. So time to celebrate!

And lastly and one of my greatest happinesses right now-- our employment. 

We went for months without a job which nearly sent us right into complete poverty. We fasted and prayed and I worried so much and the day Daniel was leaving for Denver we went to the grounds office and asked if they had any openings. We both got a job that day and we having been working for a month now. Sure we are still the newbies on the job and we may be seen that way for a while since everyone has been working there together for quite awhile, but we absolutely love the job. Mike, our foreman, is HILARIOUS! He reminds me of Hook from the movie "Hook." .....please don't ask me why, he just does. I love it because I love the outdoors and the other workers are funny and it makes me realize how much I miss having a social life. My biggest desire in the job is to make my lines straight when mowing. I have been doing decently until the last time I mowed.  :( ......I don't know what was so different, but I will keep working on it. The temple is so pretty with the canyon in the background, even when it is cold and gloomy. Lets just wrap this up by saying working Temple Grounds with so many nice people and with my hubby is one of the greatest blessings of this year and since I've been to Utah. I get so happy thinking about it. 

So we celebrated all of this by going to Old Spaghetti Factory on Friday night and watching Rio. Saturday we celebrated by reading books at Borders and eating at Tucanos. 

Oh and one more thing before I close......Daniel thinks I have an addiction to otter pops. haha

Finally pictures of our apartment!

I haven't been able to take pictures of the back room or our bedroom mostly because it is now night time and the lighting is worse than that in the laundry room and bathroom. I will definitely be taking those pictures and posting them eventually. I know my mother has been itching to see where we live. I like our apartment. I am not the greatest fan of our neighborhood, but from our front room we have a nice view of the mountain.

Daniel has been so helpful today. I asked him where my camera was and he said "have you checked your temple bag." Sure enough it was there. Later when I wanted to upload I asked him if he knew where the universal adapter was and he just walked into the back room and brought it to me. I thought I was the one who was suppose to know where everything was in the house!!! haha... I guess I was wrong. :P

The Easter basket Bekka gave us!

                                                    The next couple pictures are of our front room.

                                                        
                                                        Can you spot Steve our sock monkey?

                                                    
                                                        I'm especially proud of our TV!

              That's our only arrangement of photos on our walls. One day our home will be more decorated.

                        
                            The design of the pictures is mine....the labor of putting them up was all Daniel.

                              
                                Our bathroom has a theme of many colors. I love our shower curtain! :)

                                
                                  My favorite room!!!! I am so grateful we have a washer and dryer.

                                                            
                                                              The bananas are hovering.

Our First Easter

        Ok, so I think I have decided on the types of things I am going to write about on here......basically....anything I can think of. I kind of want to make this into a journal of my education, marriage, and other adventures. I normally have been doing a weekly e-mail to two of my friends in Michigan....though I haven't been getting the weekly e-mails as often as I like from them I have decided that these blog entries will suffice and Daniel agrees.

     Today was my first Easter as a married lady. I loved it! Throughout the week we attempted to find lamb at  stores to eat today....lets just say we failed epically and move on. We will look harder for next Easter. Instead we settled for steaks, mashed potatoes, carrots, and a salad. It was delicious!!! And not only that but our General Conference tradition is to buy an ice cream cake. We missed it this past conference because of low funds, but recently decided to watch a talk from conference each Sunday, which therefore merited a conference ice cream cake. So we caught up on our new tradition eventually. The conference talk we watched today was President Monson's talk about marriage. I thought it was lovely but I understand why it would make a handful of young men squirm uncomfortably in their seats.

    We have a guest for a few days. And she left us an easter egg basket this morning on our couch!!!! It was so thoughtful and made our first Easter as husband and wife so much more special. So I will say a shout out to Bekka! :)

   For next Easter I think it would be cool to dye eggs, and maybe I will hide eggs for Daniel to find. :P
Sometimes he acts like a kid so why not treat him like one!

    Today we also played rummikub. (thanks to Jaren and Heather for letting us borrow the game.) Daniel won. The game was close so I didn't mind too much haha. In fact if I had remembered to move the wild chip I could have won.

   I am curious, what does everyone else do for Easter?

My First Blogging Experience

Hmmmm......so it seems like everyone I know has a blog or follows someone else's blog. I am not one to follow a crowd, but now that I have a spring semester free from time consuming classes I've decided to give it a try.

Wow, it seems like I have already ran out of things to say....

What does one normally publish in a blog? How much time should one spend on a blog? If someone could answer those questions while I continue living my life I would be grateful.

One more thing...why does everything someone says in a blog look amazing the moment it appears on the page! Someone could just be rambling nonsense and it still looks important! I thought of myself rambling and just had a small laugh. :)