attitude of gratitude {days 9-19}

I'm super behind with this project...but here's the next section anyway.  {click here for part 1}

9 - friends - I'm grateful for all my friends, no matter the length of the friendship.  They have gotten me through the good and the bad times and have shaped much of who I have become.  They teach me things I never knew about myself.  They keep my thoroughly entertained.  I love them.

10 - indoor plumbing - Who honestly wants to squat over a hole in the backyard?  Or run outside to an outhouse?  Especially in the middle of winter.  No thank you.  Whoever invented toilet paper?  Genius.  Also, never having to share bath water with siblings?  Awesomeness.  I like showers.

11 - government and military - I am so blessed to live in a place where I am free to choose what to do with my life, have guaranteed rights and liberties, and the opportunity to have a say in how our country is run (aka the right to vote).  I grateful for those who sacrifice their time, and even their life, to serve this country and its citizens to protect their freedoms.

12 - cell phones - I complain about how much I hate my phone often-- how slow it is, functions it doesn't have, and just how crappy it is in general.  But really, it does so much for me.  I take pictures on it more than I do with my real camera.  It helps me to keep in touch with family and friends through phone calls, texting, and social media apps.  It prevents me from getting completely lost with navigation and answers stupid questions with Google.

13 - ducks {and geese} - Ducks are pretty much the greatest animal on the planet.  They are definitely in my top three favorite animals.  For some reason, they make me unexplainably happy.  I haven't been infatuated with them as much this school year, but I still think they're pretty awesome.

14 - zumba - So if you know me, like, at all, you know growing up I was not athletic at all.  I hated sports.  I hated gym.  Being athletic was NOT my forte.  Then, one of the summers after high school, I decided to give AquaZumba a shot.  My mom and her friends (who are pretty much my second and third moms) were doing it...so if middle-aged moms could do it, a nineteen year old could, right?  Right!  I fell in love.  The next fall I signed up for a normal Zumba class for school and the love has continued.  Who knew exercising could be fun?

15 - shameless self-photos - If somebody was to look through the pictures on my phone, they would probably tell me the amount of pictures I take of myself is obscene.  Honestly, I just get bored....so this occasionally provides a form of entertainment.

clothes AND shameless self-portraits....embarrassing eh?

16 - clothes - Granted, a small percentage of the population could probably walk around without clothes and nobody would complain...but for the majority clothing is a good great thing.  Clothes cover up some of the scars, flaws, and imperfections I don't wish to share with the world.  It allows me to express myself.  I definitely am not a pro at throwing outfits together, but knowing how I used to dress, I can say I am significantly better at it.

17 - Aggie Athletics - I don't care if you have a card proclaiming you are a "True Aggie" because you kissed somebody on the A at midnight the night of a full moon.  You are NOT a True Aggie if you do not support Aggie sports.  Last Saturday some of my roommates and I sat in the Spectrum for over six hours watching the football and basketball games.  The football game was crazy.  I'll admit, I got worried.  I lost hope even. The last half we weren't doing so hot, so how could we win?  Whelp, we went into overtime, and guess what?  The Aggies pulled through, won, and now are ranked #25.  Basketball did not disappoint either.  I love screaming and cheering on my Aggies.

18 - parents who love each other - It's often easy to take something like this for granted.  It's just life to me.  But then life sinks in and I see friends whose parents are divorced.  Or have friends say they think their parents should divorce.  As a kid, I know I played out the scenario of "which parent would you live with if they got divorced?" in my head (did other people do that too? or was I just a weird kid?), but ultimately, I knew I would never have to choose.  Ever.  I was certain.  I always knew my parents loved each other.  I still do.  And I hope that one day, I'll be able to have a forever marriage like theirs.

19 - creativity - My creativity lacks a lot of times.  But I'm thankful for those who are creative...and even more thankful for those who share their creativity on the internet.  Because, then it allows others, such as my only-semi-creative-self, to get ideas and do awesome things.  Pinterest has allowed for new crafts ideas galore.  Every once in a while, I do create something with my own imagination, but, by golly, others have such nifty ideas!

life as of late part 2

Life has been a whirlwind lately.  It's been happy, sad, confusing, chaotic...just about everything.  But mainly happy I'm glad to say!

1. Big Bang Theory = addiction  2. dart failure...
3. and 4. Pinewood Derby with our Ratatouille cheese car. 5.  MLK day all nighter with Austin and Sarah
6. Coloring fairy pictures at Jared and Derek's. 7.  Yesterday's snow.

First Dam and the ducks.
I love ducks.
If you want to win my heart...{which I doubt any of you do, but just in case}...take me to feed them.
I will be a happy camper.

Augustus was kidnapped.
He was almost baked.  And covered in awful smelling fish sauce.
And became a cowboy riding a motorbike-something?
Whist Terrence almost received a swirly.  Two can play at this game...

Darling Tyler's 19th birthday.
I created a giraffe-shaped cupcake cake :)
We drank non-alcoholic sangria.  None of us were really fans.
Kevin and Creighton had fun with our leftover bottles and birthday candles...love those boys.

it could use a lot more brown...but it gets the point across! :)

Now I'm back home for the weekend.  I needed a timeout from life and I love the simplicity of home.

Halloween 2011

So I was pretty excited for Halloween this year!  I liked my costume a lot.

You see...I'm kind of jealous of the fact that my niece Bailey has like five tutus and can wear them pretty much wherever and whenever she wants.  After all, she's five.  When you're twenty people kind of look at you funny.

And.  I have never had a tutu before.  But they looked so fun!  I had been pinning instructions and ideas on Pinterest for weeks, but when my roommate showed me her peacock costume, I decided that was it.  I had to have one.  I was jealous of her costume too.  You see, I have this thing for peacocks too.  But I figured I shouldn't steal her idea.  I just wanted a tutu anyway.  So I knew I had options.  I think I ended up being an autumn fairy or something.  Titles aren't important :)

my rad purple tights.  and my wand so I was actually "something"

So we went to JoAnns.  And I bought WAAAAAY too much tulle.  But I have projects in mind :)  After all, it's in such pretty fall colors.  I'm thinking an autumn wreath.  Or a matching tutu for Bailey.  Or both.

dark purple, light yellowish(?), sparkly orange, chocolate brown, deep red, and sparkly gold
the gold was my favorite :)

I got extra points in Zumba for dressing up.  I may or may not have looked {awesome} walking to and from classes.  Because if I dressed up for Zumba...it meant dressing up for computer science as well.  I did see a handful of costumes while I was on campus so that was fun!  However, I don't consider people in real costumes if it's something that can easily be shoved into a backpack or somewhere.  Sorry.  If you're only wearing Harry Potter/nerd glasses or the like...you don't count in my book.  Learn not to be lame.

Our ward also had a Halloween party later that night.  I stopped by for a few minutes before going back home to continue writing my huge paper {but I'm proud to say I cranked out an 8 page paper(...or if you count all the extra pages, 12) in two days!  I'm pretty sure my middle name is Procrastination...}.  

Here are pictures from the night! {courtesy of Heather's camera}  {and Tyler from the HOWL...because her costume is adorable}

Tyler the Peacock!

Savage the Old Man
Heather the Flapper

Sarah {the hippie}, Heather, and me

Heather and Shayna the Pirate

Katie was a pirate as well...they should have had a picture together!

That was our exciting Halloween.  Okay.  They had a more exciting one than I because they actually got to enjoy it.  But it's my fault I put my paper off.  They got to play games at FHE and watch scary movies when they came back home.

Maybe I'll learn to not procrastinate...but I have a feeling I won't.  Or it will take a while...because I tend to procrastinate dropping the habit of procrastination.

Crayon Art!

What you need:

• canvas (we used 8 x 10 I think)
• crayons (we used a 64 pack...)
• hot glue gun and sticks
• blow dryer
• and you probably want wax paper or newspaper...or something that can get messy

Basically what you want to do first is arrange all the colors in the order you want.  We used pretty much all colors.  I took out the ones that I thought were ugly because you will have some left over.  I've also seen some that are one color family or cool colors or whatever.  There are several options.  Just buy enough crayons to do what you want.

Then you will hot glue them to the top of the canvas with the points facing towards the middle of the canvas like so.

I also wanted all mine to have the logo facing the top.  Maybe it's OCD...but I think it looks neater instead of random.

Put your canvas on wax paper or newspaper and grab your blow dryer.

I started on high to get the crayons to start melting.  When they start melting, I switched to low.  It splatters a lot more if you keep it on high.  The splatters do look cool though.  I concentrated on a section at a time but would get impatient and switch around a lot.  Melt it down to wherever you want on the canvas.  You basically can't mess this project up.  That's the beauty of art. :)

You can hang it either way :)