singles wards....

Singles wards are great most of the time, don't get me wrong.  It's nice going to church with people your same age.  Ward prayers are great.  Everyone working together, fulfilling their callings, and supporting others as we're each trying to find our way in the world.

However, sometimes I get tired of singles wards.

I miss the cute little children and the adorable elderly people.  I miss the variety.  I miss the moms and the dads and familiar faces that I have known for years.

I miss not having talks about marriage and dating what feels like every Sunday.  It gets old having it rammed down your throat week after week.  Yet some weeks the message is "don't worry about not getting married.  there are worse things in life than not getting married."  But a lot of weeks it seems to be "make lists of all the qualities you want in your future husband"  "don't date a guy if he's a jerk" "here are the red flags" "be the kind of person you want to attract" etc etc etc....

And don't get me wrong.  Those are valid subjects and great lessons for many people.  But really...it gets tiresome.  And a sensitive subject.  Plus, I like to keep things simple and say I'm not getting married until I'm 78.  Yep.  It's a great age.

Oh and at ward prayer tonight my apartment was in charge of introducing ourselves, giving the thought, and the prayer.  My favorite part was trying to come up with ideas of what to do.  Someone threw out the idea for the thought to be "date and get married."  Yeah.  It was great.  And Sarah really said it.  And people laughed and it was great.  And then she gave a real thought :)

I quite enjoyed her saying that.  I wasn't sure if she would.  In my intro I included that I enjoyed baking.  Afterwards, some of the E3 boys told me that if I ever feel inclined to share they would be happy to take some off my hands.  Typical boys...but I'm not against sharing :)

Oh.  My roommates are using a cootie catcher.  Apparently I'm not marrying "boy" but I will marry a hot man with glasses.  Of course I will.  Almost all old people I know where glasses.  I'll be 78.  He'll be old too, so therefore he will wear glasses.

Sorry for the rant...but well ya know...sometimes you just have to vent.

my week in pictures

So the last week has been pretty great. :)

Last Sunday Katie and I went to game night at the Trophy House.  We got there a little late...so we only played Lap Tag.  Katie bruised my arms with her "dagger hands."  I also ended up with rug burn, a broken toenail, and sprained(?) toe.  I don't think it was broken...but maybe it was?  Anyway, it was a poor little pinky toe - blue and gross and didn't like to be walked on.  I think it's almost better, although I can definitely tell it's not all the way there.  BUT it was worth it.  So super fun.

Monday and Tuesday nights were full of homework...and I have a feeling Disney movies too.  Oh and Tuesday Katie and I went over to the Trophy House to play Just Dance 3.  Those people are a bunch of fun :)  I felt pretty awesome when I beat some of the best "dancers."  That game is great.  And so are those boys.

Wednesday...hmm...I can't remember.  We probably watched. a movie?  I honestly don't know.  Our movie collection is quite embarrassing.  Except not really.  We just like having options :)  I think that's the night we watched The Hunchback of Notre Dame.  And I wrote some computer assignment while watching it...It was one of my favorites when I was little.  I still remember my family teasing me about it when I was little.  I would say it one way and they would say it another....and I would correct them the best little Kelly could.  "It's Dame!"  Yeah...only we would get that I guess.

We also went to free pie night at Village Inn with random neighbors that Shayna had met earlier.  Heather was making brownies when they came over...so we turned the oven off and locked our door on our way out.  When we got home, we stopped by to talk to Brian and Craig.  Sarah and Katie went home while the rest of us stayed a few minutes longer.  When we got home, we noticed a brownie sitting on a plate on top of the stove.  We pulled them out of the oven (who knows why it didn't click right then) and that piece was cut right out of the middle.  We just figured Katie or Sarah really like middle pieces and went about normal life.  So we're sitting around...and someone asks who cut the middle piece.  We assumed it was Katie since she was sitting there on the chair eating it.  No one would admit it.  If I had come up with the idea, I think it would have been pretty funny and I would have kept going with it too...so naturally I figured someone was lying - after all the windows were shut and the door was locked.  So we go back to I1 and start talking to them...and they broke so fast.  Apparently, they originally wanted to take our front door, but decided against it...which was extremely smart of them.  So they went to take our oven door...and discovered the pan of brownies inside and decided that was a better idea.  Anyway.  If they had to do anything I'm glad they did what they did...because I have a feeling if the door was gone there would have been police involved before we even found out who took it.  And now we deadbolt our door.

On Thursday Tyler brought her bunny Merv over.  He's a cute fluffy white bunny.  He's potty trained and can be on a leash.  But he doesn't walk (hop?) on the leash very well.  He likes to do his own thing.  People got into a big debate over taking him for a walk vs taking him for a hop.  Any ideas to what it is?  Anyway, our neighbors picked up a puppy for their family.  So Old Farm really was a farm that day.  That puppy was adorable.  I can't wait to have a dog again.  So help me if my husband is allergic.

Oh and I made my family's favorite chocolate mint snow-top cookies.  Let's just say my siblings weren't very happy with me...They got demolished pretty quickly...

And then later that night I went over to Blake's and watched How to Train Your Dragon on bluray.  It was pretty adorable.  For some reason Astrid reminded me of my roommate Tyler.  Plus.  Bluray is quite awesome.  Especially when you watch a VHS the next night...you can see a huge difference.

Friday.  Friday I went to my one class.  And found out that for fall break next week...since our Friday classes are moved to Thursday...she cancelled class!  Exciting! :)  That means I get an extra day!  I also got some homework accomplished - I had to go to the major fair for one of my classes.

The pretty sky on my way to school :)

As I was sitting home on my bed, my phone starts ringing!  Okay.  So the ringing part isn't that cool.  But it turns out it was one of my awesome friends coming to visit me!  Sometimes he's a cool kid.

Later that night we went to the hockey game.  I thought I didn't have a heart.  But apparently I do.  By our fifth point I just felt bad.  I felt bad to cheer.  I didn't even want to clap.  The cheers were mean.  It didn't feel like the basketball and football game cheers.  Those ones seem more general and not as mean-spirited.  These were all pretty directly aimed at the goalie.  And maybe because it was close enough that they could actually hear everything.  I don't know.   I wasn't a huge fan.  We left early...and on our way home we saw the Easter Bunny crossing the street.  And then we watched Aladdin.

He's by that car...

Driving a Zamboni might be cool. Literally. Haha.  Dad joke. 

On Saturday I felt super productive.  I decided to stay home while my roommates went hiking.  I figured I should do some of my Monday homework considering I have like 5 assignments due Monday (today...).  So I got a few of those knocked out of the way.  Then when they got home, Tyler and I went to Violet Hill Boutique.  I bought cute flower earrings and a really comfy brown shirt that has buttons on the sleeves.  It's pretty rad.  I like it.  There were some dresses there that I really liked...but were just too short, especially going into winter.  Oh well.

Later that afternoon, Heather, Tyler, and I went to deliver my visiting teaching assignments...I'm a slacker.  I had them almost a week.  One of the girls reactions was so funny.  It looked like she was heading out on a date or something...and she was like "Is that our visiting teaching assignments?!"  So she takes the pile (it had hers and all her roommates) and starts digging through it excitedly.  Needless to say, I know she'll get it done. I need an attitude more like hers!  I at least have an awesome partner named Heather!  We will be much better than I was last year where I only went a handful of times...because Shayna was the one who cared and got us to do it.

Oh and Tyler found a leaf bug on her truck.  She named him Ginko.  He lived on my nose for a minute.  And we had show-and-tell at I3 (Brett, Matt, and Cody) with him.  And invited them to a movie night.

Anyway, after we did that...we went to the store and I bought all the stuff to make my fabulous pumpkin roll, the treat for our visiting teaching training, and our (me and Heather) crayon art.

I really like Pinterest.  It's where all "my" great ideas come from.  It's the greatest time waster.  But maybe someday I'll make a dent in actually doing what I pin...not just look at it all pretty and forget about it.  You can see my boards *here*.  Oh and if you want to join the addiction, I'd be more than happy to send you an invite.

So anyway...to sum up Saturday night, Heather and I did our crayon artwork while Tyler and Matt and Sarah watched us.  For the gist of how to do it, click *here*  Then we stopped by some dance party the Pie Night boys were holding...for all of about two seconds.  And then played Just Dance 3 over at Brian's because his living room set up is more spacious than ours.

Sunday morning I woke up and started making the pumpkin roll.  I had never made one before.  Or seen my mom make one.  In fact, I had never had one until a supervisor meeting at work when Nikki made it.  Anyway, it was amazing so I figured it was worth a shot.  If I failed, I had at least tried.  I guess I didn't fail though.  Because before the night was over it had somehow disappeared...for the recipe click *here*

And I made homemade oreos (except they weren't really homemade...I bought a boxed mix) for the visiting teaching training we had last night.  I was little miss baker extraordinaire yesterday.  I wanted to make Halloween funfetti cupcakes...but haven't seen the mix lately.  What the heck?  It's not even  Halloween.  You can't be out Walmart.

We went to church...where I really had no attention span.  Except for Sunday school.  Normally it's the opposite.  I get distracted during Sunday school.  But we had a really good lesson taught by Shayna.  It went really well and there was lots of participation too which was nice.

I was all baked out when I got home...so I made soup and toast for dinner.  And learned how to use a toaster oven.  My roommates probably thought I was dumb.  But I've never used one.  I owned one for a minute when Heather (sister) moved to Maryland and gave me a ton of her stuff...but we just gave it to a guy at my dad's work haha.  Then we went to our visiting teacher thing.  And I taught my little rotation.  I always felt like I was rambling and saying the same thing over and over.  And would end early.  But I guess that's what happens when everyone else has two teachers and you are the only one for yours.  But it was cool.  I knew Kim had to work.  It was funny we had been paired together considering she was the only person I really knew beforehand.  I figure it went "good enough" for what I had to work with haha.

And now it's the start of another week....hopefully it can top the last, but the bar is set pretty high...so we'll see :)

advice to a friend...

Try not to let yourself be Satan's project.  ...He knows our insecurities and weaknesses.  He also knows our strengths and wants us to forget about them or at least downplay them into something insignificant.  ...Don't let him use those against yourself.

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"Please, never forget that you must be patient and compassionate with yourselves, that some sacrifices are better than others, that you need not wait for a golden ticket to be happy."
~Dieter F. Uchtdorf

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and some Pinterest love...

Source: iheartgifs.blogspot.com via Kelly on Pinterest

Source: hautelook.com via Kelly on Pinterest

Source: myblessedlife.net via Kelly on Pinterest

My Lovely Logan Home

Here's my lovely messy bed.  And my pillow pet Augustus that Sarah and Kylee bought for my birthday.  Kylee named him since she is pro at naming things like PillowPets and cars.  But notice...my bed is made...so does that count for something?  And see my Diet Coke addiction? 

My closet.  Guess which half is mine?  Yeah...I'm messy, I know.  I want to get crates like my roommate's...but Walmart only has ugly red ones left.  Red doesn't match my stuff.  Therefore...I stay messy.  I need to do something about it sometime though....

Our lovely vanity where we vainly look at ourselves in the mirror.  Okay.  Probably not vainly...but it is where we get ready for the day.

 Yep.  I made this beaut.  I love it.  I love when mistakes turn out better than the original plan.  It was supposed to be four squares...I like lots better though.

And the polka dot bow pillow.  Yep.  Adorable.

 And the button pillow.

 The arm chair...that the door runs into.

And our couch and recliner.  And my ottomans that are oh so great to have.  Perfect for putting your feet up.

 And my entertainment hookup.  Hello electronics.  Also, don't forget to say 'ello to Harry Potter.  He lives in the "cupboard under the stairs."

Somebody got angry and punched a hole in the bathroom door.  At least it wasn't my face this time ;)

 Monogram letters.  I think they're pretty fun.  They're above our HP closet.  If you're confused it's the first letter of the first name of the six of us.

 Our tiny kitchen.  If you look closely, you can see part of the blender in the sink.  I made a delicious strawberry banana smoothie this morning after Zumba.  Mmmm.

 When storage is minimal you learn to improvise.

 I love the stair rail.  I don't know why.  But it just matches our cute little place so perfectly.  Oh.  And I still leave my shoes in the living room like I did at home.

And this little gem.  Deliciousness in the palm of your hand.  Baby Ben and Jerrys.

*School Update*

• I <3 my computer science class.  We really haven't done too much yet...but considering the majority of the classes I haven't looked at the clock I take that as a good sign.  And I find it interesting.  The only thing I don't like is that my computer is being ridiculous and won't download a program I need...and I don't really want to live in the campus computer labs.  I guess I should find someone to help me out.
• Computer science lab - I decided I think the lab instructor is pretty fun.  I think that what makes him so great is his accent.  Everything is more entertaining in an Indian accent.  Is Outsourced the show with all the Indian people?  I should watch that and I'd probably be entertained.
• I dropped Intro to Elementary Education.  The more I looked at what it entailed and I imagined being an elementary teacher, the more I didn't like it.  It's just not me.  And the class seemed like too much effort for having a lack of interest.
• Career and Life Planning.  Yeah.  I thought that class would be a joke.  But it turns out I'm learning a lot about myself.  Some related to careers and majors...and some things of just what makes me who I am.
• MIS - This class is okay.  I like the website stuff.  Except he's going really slow.  I thought Boog taught me nothing.  Okay he did teach me nothing.  But I understand these basics from my high school class.  But I think we might eventually dig a little deeper.  I don't really like the business aspects of it as much.  But you do what you gotta do.
• I like that "gotta" doesn't come up as a misspelled word :)
• Lifespan Development - I still think this class is a joke.  I still think my teacher doesn't know what she's talking about.  BUT I did realize it is going to be a really easy class which is pretty awesome.  Hardly any assignments.  Everything (tests and such) is open book, open note, and online.  I don't even have to go to class on test days :)
• Zumba.  Can you say LOVE?  Yup.  It's pretty fabulous.  I think I may get a Fun Fit Forever pass just so I can take extra classes.  That'd make for two Zumba classes in a day...but hey.  It's great.  I kinda miss Aqua Zumba because I thought that was fun too.  But this works.  Except I'm not too coordinated.  But it's coming along.  There's this foot thing I can do if we just do the feet...but when we add the arms...well let's just say all hope is lost.  Maybe one day I'll get the hang of it.

*church*

So I went to my ward up here in Logan.  I like it here.  I feel like it's really small though.  Oh.  I guess the downfall of sitting next to the Relief Society President in Sunday School is getting asked to say the prayer for RS.  I don't remember the last time I gave a prayer at church.  But hey.  It wasn't the end of the world haha.  I don't necessarily mind...I just choose not to volunteer haha.

Then we went home and ate dinner.  Shayna and Heather cooked us a fabulous meal.  We made roast in the crockpot.  Shayna made us "smashed potatoes."  I asked her the difference between "smashed" and "mashed."  I guess leaving skins on makes them "smashed."  Makes sense!  And we had corn on the cob. (Thanks Dan and Eryka for making me try it!)  Well it all was pretty much delicious.

This picture probably looks disgusting.  But I'm not a food photographer for Food Network or any food type magazines...so hey...it doesn't matter! :)

Then we went to the CES fireside at our stake center.  Can I tell you just how adorable Elder Oaks wife is? I think she's a bundle of fun.  I totally wasn't expecting her to be that funny.  AND I can't believe she was never married until she was 53.  Seriously?  All those boys were crazy.  Anyway.  I thought she gave a great talk.  It was just what I needed to hear.  After seeing all these people my age, older than me, and especially younger than me get engaged and married thoughts sure do run through your mind.  Anyway.  One of the points I took away from her is that the focus right now shouldn't be on getting married.  It should be on living a Christ-centered life.  And obtaining an education.  And just making yourself the best person you can possibly be.  Which is all stuff I need to work on.

So.  I should probably be a good student and do homework.  Especially since today is one of the days I actually feel somewhat productive.

Yokes

So today I went to my home ward for church since it's spring break. In Sunday school our teacher asked, "What is a yoke?" Funny Ray Lutz called out, "It's the inside of an egg!" It was pretty great. But we got into the lesson and explained it.

from here

So if you don't know, a yoke is a wooden beam that connects two oxen together. This allows them to work together and share the weight of the load they are pulling. The oxen don't have to be the biggest or strongest, what is important is that they work together when they pull. If one thinks he can do it on his own and gets out of sync with his partner, pulling the load becomes much more difficult and it takes longer to accomplish the task than if they cooperate and work together.

In Matthew 11: 28-30 it says:

28 Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

29 Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.

30 For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.

I have heard this scripture so many times and have thought about it a little, but maybe it just clicked a little more today. I think I've understood what it means, but it makes so much more sense when you hear it verbalized by people. It says take MY yoke upon you...for MY yoke is easy, and MY burden is light.

A yoke is made for two, not for one. We don't share it with just anyone. We share it with the Savior. He asks us to share it with him. We take His name upon us when we are baptized. Through the gospel we learn of him and through Him we find comfort and peace. Sometimes we become stubborn. We think we can do it on our own. We struggle and fight. We are falling out of step with the ox in the other side of the yoke. It may be through unconscious acts or it may be through deliberate actions. Either way life becomes more difficult.

Sometimes it becomes hard to get back in sync. We have developed our own pace. However, it is possible. You had to take a few awkward steps to get out of sync, so there may be some few awkward steps to get back in, but it's possible.

There's the part of Sunday school I remember in a nutshell...well a rather large nutshell. Plus a few embellishments of my own that hopefully add to and don't detract from what we learned.

California in 2.5 days! Less than a week for Dan and Eryka's wedding! Yay! :)