It's been a minute!

oh wow

here I am

nearly 8 months since my last blog post

I HAVE BEEN BUSY OKAY

but I'm glad I'm here now, documenting and such. This is basically my journal, so as long as I manage to be consistently inconsistent and write posts, then I'm happy for posterity's sake. ;)

SO we left off at the beginning of June...a LOT has happened since then. It's going to be interesting documenting our life, since I've organized it around semesters and classes and I haven't paid any attention to anything like that in almost a year (now THAT is a weird statement). So we'll go by chunks of time I guess? heh

JUNE
So I've been working at my same job still--and the summer time is very slow, so it consisted of a lot of "manning the desk". I don't mind, though. It could be so much worse, and I am so thankful for the job and the boss I have! June's main dealio was Girls Camp, and it was the stake's turn this year to plan and execute, so my duties as president was basically to show up and have fun! It had been so dry this past summer that Camp LoMia was closed, so we ended up just having the activities at the stake center. All things considered, the stake leadership did an AMAZING job. They decorated the entire church building to make it look "outdoors", like set up tents, signs, and naked Christmas trees. It was just so stinking hot. But we still had fun! Well, I did for the most part. I tend to put the people I'm responsible for before myself, which isn't a strength when you've been in the sun in the middle of an Arizona summer for nearly 6 hours of the hottest part of the day, so you get heat exhaustion! yay! It was so much fun!

not really. nope.

We went from hiking a "mountain" (glorified hill next to the Phoenix temple) early in the morning but it was still stupid hot by the time we got done around 9am, and then we were at Big Surf from about 11:30am-3:00pm. During that time, I was starting to feel lightheaded so I tried sipping water and cooling off in the shade, but it wasn't helping a ton. Then on the car ride home, my car overheated on the freeway and I followed suit. It was not an exaggeration to say that I myself was a hot mess. Poor Claire was in the car with me while my sanity melted away with my body's ability to cool down. It was awful, because when your body gets to that point of overheating (and looking back I probably should have gone to the ER for fluids), your body kind of "resets" so I couldn't hold anything down for 2 days during camp and I missed all the fun parts like lipsyncs. My fantastic leaders were there to make sure the girls had a great time though, and that's all I wanted anyway!

JULY!

July was a pretty fun month! I got to visit my mom and sister in Hunstville, AL for a whole week! Allegiant flies pretty cheap out there during the summer so it only made sense! I had a blast. I definitely understand the draw to move there...it's green EVERYWHERE and the weather is fairly mild (even with the humidity). We went shopping, at great food, and I even got to go spelunking for the first time---which was my favorite part of the whole trip! I slid down a mudslide, waded in 4.5 ft of ice cold water, did the "polar bear" challenge in a deeper part of said ice cold water, and army crawled through the cave with my mom and my sister, and her in-laws! I wish AZ had caves like that, because I'd be going all the time!
I don't like that half my family moved across the country...but where they moved to isn't so bad. ;)

 before!

after ;)

Twas a very good trip. :)

I also threw a really cool Harry Potter birthday party, which included an Azkaban mugshot photobooth, Ollivander's wand making station, goodies (including a Hagrid's birthday cake), and movie marathon. It was quite epic if I do say so myself. :)

AUGUST

This was a weird month. Ian was gone for half of it (Annual Training with the Marines), so I spent most of this time not doing much since my adventure buddy was gone. I did, however, sing in a vocal jazz group for the first time in yeeaarrsss! It was weird and fun all at the same time. My voice doesn't bend that way as easy as it used to, but the music was mostly Beatles and other fun standards so I didn't mind the change of pace. :) I have an even larger appreciation for "jazzers" than I already did--hats off to you! I will gladly sit in the audience and just bask in the skill that it takes to be good at that sort of thing. ;) 

Now this next part, I am a little uncomfortable sharing, but it needs to be shared because I know that now that I'm out of school I know there are a fair amount of people wondering--when are y'all having the behbehs (babies)? Truth be told, I found out I was pregnant the beginning of the month. I had a happy 7 days of knowing and keeping a fun little secret with my husband and close family, until I miscarried on the 13th. It was a "chemical" pregnancy so to speak, and fortunately my body recognized it quick enough to terminate it on it's own, and I do find that to be a blessing. Sometimes you aren't "lucky" like that, and you go on for another couple weeks making plans and looking forward to the next 9 months until you find out otherwise. 

The reason I'm sharing is because, to be honest, I don't know when (if ever) naturally bearing our children will happen. This isn't meant to make you feel sorry for me, but hopefully it does quell any questions/assumptions and it avoids us from having to keep hearing/answering the same question over and over again. ;) 

anywayyyy

SEPTEMBER!

My favorite month of the year! Our anniversary AND my birthday month. :) I turned 25?? What even is that? We also celebrated FIVE FREAKIN YEARS. I don't feel old enough to have been married that long. #teenbrideoops 

We had plans of taking some pretty pictures for our anniversary, but money has been tight so we'll get to it eventually. Maybe. ;D I guess you can count our new car as our anniversary gift? It was out of necessity, but I'll take it. Ha! It's a beautiful 2015 Dodge Journey that was a Craiglist unicorn find. I'm in love with it. It only had 40k miles on it, and we got it for a screaming good price. 

It was also YW in Excellence, which I was super proud of how well it went! It was an awards theme, so we went all out--fancy decorations, red carpet, dinner, little Oscar trophies, the whole nine yards. My presidency and I ended up getting released a week later, so we definitely went out with a bang! :)

love every single one of these ladies

OCTOBER/NOVEMBER/DECEMBER!

I'm jamming these all together because honestly that's how these last three months have felt. Jam packed and kind of a whirwind. 

During majority of this whole time, I was actually doing keto--which was amazing and awful all at the same time. My body feels a lot better after doing it strictly for that long (and to be honest, I miss how I felt so I'm trying to incorporate a less strict version of it for maintenance), and it's amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it. I have an assortment of imbalances in my body and doing keto for a few months helped me out (er, at least I'm pretty sure it did. I still need to have bloodwork done again). A bonus side effect was losing somewhere in the 15-20lb range--it wasn't my intention but it was a confidence booster getting back to where I was when I got married! I haven't weighed myself because #triggered but I fit in my wedding dress with some wiggle room so I'll take that as a win. Cutting out foods that are inflammatory to my body really help how I feel overall. I got my first headache today since September, which is a huge deal for me! As long as I feel good and not losing my sanity, I'm good. :) Halloween was a little hard since I love me some twix, but good company made up for it. :)

During this whole period of time since I graduated, I've also been taking lessons twice a week--Lots of work has been done! I've pounded opera repertoire like nobody's business and I can hear a significant change in my voice. I still have a lot of improvement to make, but what's nice is that there's nowhere to go but up from here. :) In October, I had the opportunity to sing a few of his art songs for Morten Lauridsen himself (cute the choir nerd fangirling hardcore here). 

I also was able to sing for two separate Messiah (Handel) performances, which has been a bucket list item for me. I love that music and I was finally able to study and then perform it! 

Definitely the highlight of my Christmas season. Thanksgiving was fun spending time with family, eating super yummy food; including a keto friendly French Silk pie that was surprisingly delicious! ;) 

This year was potentially our last USMC ball as well, and may I say, I looked FINE. 

And Christmas was filled with plenty of yummy food, even better company and lots of fun memories. :) we had our last hurrah as our annual NYE party, and though it was smaller than usual, it was still just as fun. I'm just glad I have Ian beside me every time. :)

In addition to the holiday festivities, we've decided to sell our house and move back to Mesa! It has been a bittersweet experience but I'm very excited to be closer to family and to be able to be financially more secure. We're currently in the middle of all of it, so odds are you'll hear all about it in a couple months. ;)

Anyway, this has gotten long so I'll wrap it up. Thanks for reading the novel. 

Goodnight my lovelies. xx

Summer Shenanigans 2017

Hey y'all. Currently jammin to some new music from Superfruit and I thought "I should write another blog post"! It's been about three months so I'm due for another one anyway.

So here we are. :D

Last time I checked, it was about a week or two before the summer workshop I did started up and lots has happened since then! So we'll just go through it.


CGCC SUMMER OPERA WORKSHOP!
Huzzah! This definitely took up a good portion of my brain space this summer. Twice a week for a few hours I went to a workshop held at the community college I used to go to and it was seriously so much fun! I strengthened some friendships I already had as well as made some new and valuable ones! I definitely came out of it a better performer than what I was when I went into it. It was also exciting to be coached by people you have never really been coached by before. I knew Jen and Jeff already because I had gone to CGCC but neither of them were my voice teachers and I don't think I ever sang in one of their masterclasses over my time there, so it was a new and educational experience for me!

I wasn't sure what to expect at first because there wasn't a definitive structure that was given to us beforehand so I went in a little nervous. I was certain there was going to be scene work because I knew there was going to be a performance at the end to show off what we had worked on, but beyond that I had no idea! We all started the class by taking turns singing a prepared aria (naturally) and then we got some coaching on a new aria of our choice. All the arias I had had already been coached with either Dale or Robert so I didn't want to do any of those, so the only one left was one I had been given ages ago and had been pretty difficult for me to do in the past. "Prendi, per me sei libero" from Donizetti's Elixir of Love. Greeeaaattt. It's exposed and way different than what I normally do EVER, but it is so beautiful which were all reasons exactly why I wanted to go for it. It still has a lot of work to do to make it truly perform-able as part of the whole role, but the improvement I made was satisfactory with all things considered. We were also put into scene groups and originally I had two scenes I was part of but one was dropped to my relief (they had me as Gilda in the Rigoletto quartet and I about passed out because that ish is like waayyyy out of my depth fo reals like call back in 5 years thaannnkss) so I was left with The Impresario Trio, which was much easier to swallow. BUT MAN that is a flippin marathon to get through! We had even cut out like a solid minute of it and it was still effin hard. It felt good in my voice which was a #blessing but figuring out how to pace myself was the real trick to singing it. Once we got the hang of it, it was my favorite thing to sing! I am all about the over the top crazy and kooky characters, and Madame Herz/Goldentrill was right up my alley. The performance went swimmingly and we all received wonderfully positive feedback about just about everything. I'm glad my voice teacher and her husband were able to come see what I had worked for.

The Impresario Trio (Logan, Me, Stacy)! 

Me:"A dog, Joe"

 Logan: "Enough about the dog, Susan" 

Stacy: "It's not a dog...hehe"

Logan *might* cry

The letter read "To whom it may concern, Nemorino is now in the army, k? lawlz, Belcore"

"My ears are ringing"       "I know, just smile through it"

Lots of laughs were had for sure and I learned a bunch. I think this was the perfect way to spend my summer, especially since this is the first summer program I have ever done!

{Girls Camp 2017}
I'm grateful that my first girls camp as YW president was ward camp. It was a wonderful experience for everyone involved and I feel like I really connected with my girls. They are so special, intelligent, beautiful souls inside and out. I would do anything for them! We held it up at Camp Brentwood about 30 min outside of Alpine, AZ. It was about 5 hours away, but it was so worth it! The weather was gorgeous the entire time, and we even got some rain! My camp directors and cooks went above and beyond in their assignments and I couldn't have picked anyone better to execute the best girls camp I've ever been to! I also got to know my first counselor and secretary much better....what happens in the tent stays in the tent. ;)

We went on a beautiful hike and stopped at this small river/creek, we had a luau with a whole roasted pig(!!!), made adorable crafts, grew spiritually together and had the best time. That was just a portion of everything we did and I won't ever forget it. :)

our little set up, the girls' tents were further down

BATTLE BUNS!

The Kakamora came and attacked us with water balloons. ;)

Luau Time!

Aside from the workshop and girls camp, I have just been hanging out at home. I have thoroughly enjoyed being able to do whatever I want for once, instead of being restricted by summer camp and the madness and stress that came with it. Yikes. It is a double-edged sword though, with so much freedom comes much boredom majority of the time. That was the only draw back...I can only watch so many movies and clean my kitchen so many times. haha

I did have fun outings though, like Wet n Wild with Kelly and Brent. Guys. My life has changed. That's my new favorite place! It's way the heck away, but it's so worth it because it's so much fun!! Ian and I made the mistake of thinking we'd be alright without water shoes or waterproof flipflops but we ended up getting small blisters on our feet by the time we left. We even had to cut the day short because of it! The pavement is HOT! Sorry guys. Next year though, we'll invest in something to protect our feet. ;) 

Now I'm just waiting for school to start in about two weeks...Getting that chorus music learned isn't that difficult, it's fairly repetitive and we only sing for like two minutes at a time. I'll have it all memorized by next week. 

OH I got a new job! You're looking at Studio 3's newest voice teacher! I'm pretty excited to start. It's like part part time, only two nights a week! I have 3 students so far who want to do a trial lesson next week, so that's exciting. Teaching privately will give us an extra $200/month with just 3 students, so it's definitely a good thing. I feel sometimes I'm not qualified to do this, but then I remember I've been at this for 4 years now and some choral ed students start teaching well before they're graduated so it should work, right? RIGHT?! Gah. It'll give me experience regardless, so that's the up side. My students also won't be over the age of like 16 so it's not like I'm teaching people my age. LOL I got this....?

Anyway. That's been the summer shenanigans I've been up to over the last few months. Hope you all have had an enjoyable summer! Goodbye, my lovelies!

End of Semester Catch Up

Hey guys! It's finally May, it's finally summer. That is so strange to me! The semester felt really long, yet it flew by. Basically up until spring break, time seemed to mosy on and take a relatively slow pace, but after spring break came and went, it's like I blinked and it was suddenly over! The latter half of the semester was filled to the brim with seemingly endless deadlines and performances, so naturally it whizzed by faster than its preceding half.

Surprise Party Shenanigans!
One of the first eventful things to happen post-break, was my incredibly successful secret scheme of throwing Ian a surprise birthday party! Ian isn't one to make a big deal of himself, let alone his birthday, and I felt that he should be made special on his special day. Considering how terrible I am at keeping something like this a secret, and Ian can read me so fast, it was a huge success! We had a good 20ish people show up, including friends from out of town. I lured him out by getting a birthday dinner at Serrano's (one of our favorite restaurants) and stopping at Walmart to get Moana to watch when we got home. My mom had picked up the groceries I had ordered for party refreshments and with the help of party goers, decorated our living room in time for when we arrived back at the house. Ian had no idea! I actually surprised him! And I think he felt very loved. #bestsneakywifeaward

School Shenanigans!
With Ian's party done, it became a mad dash of finishing assignments, memorizing music, and learning staging. My aesthetics (read: philosophy) was probably the hardest class I have ever taken in my education career and I somehow managed my time beautifully during the chaos of the last few weeks of the semester {which NEVER happens} and I think I did a bangup good job too. [I got an A, so I will definitely take it]. It was a split undergrad/grad class, and based on what my friend Tyler told me, if I was able to be successful in that class then I can definitely do grad school. *phew*

The rest of my classes were a breeze compared to that beastly aesthetics class, and I know I was able to keep up with everything. Music History was fine enough, though the TAs were tougher than the actual professor {my bet is that it's an ego thing but maybe that's just me /shrug}. My Jazz in America class was awesome, considering it's geared towards non-music majors, so I had zero problem acing that class. I did get to go to a really great jazz performance for my final report, and I actually came out of it really glad I took the class. I love it when that happens!

At The Nash in Phoenix 

Opera Scenes was downright the best class I had this semester. My scene consisted of all-star castmates and we had the most fun scene! We did the opening bit of Bernstein's Candide, and yours truly got to sing Cunegonde. Dream come true! Everyone was hysterical in their roles and as a whole sounded pretty darn good. Robert even said he really liked it, so you know we did a good job. Upon listening to someone's recording, I wish I had worked on my part with Anne in hindsight, just because I heard myself fall back into some bad habits that I had worked so hard to try and press out of my system and I think she could have cleaned up my high notes better than I did on my own. I wanted to surprise her, and though I did well, I am a little frustrated that I know I could have done better. C'est la vie! Now I know for the future. :) I wish I had taken some photos of us in costume because we all looked fabulous! The rest of the scenes were also so impressive, and there wasn't one weak scene in the whole program. It's seriously so incredible how many talented people are here, and we're not lying when we say we have the hottest MT program in the US. ;) I managed to end the semester with good grades, all As and one B. The B was in music history, and as mentioned before, the TAs were really hard so I will consider that a success.

Summer Shenanigans!
I have some good plans for this summer, which include not working. BLESS. As fun as the kids are most of the time at VIK, working for VIK is not for the faint of heart and I was tired of being treated poorly and then blamed for circumstances out of my control, as well as a lack of organization and respect from people above me. One of my bosses straight up through me under the bus on multiple occasions because of mistakes she made and that was the last straw for me. I got the email about working summer camp, and I just ignored it. I don't know if I'm brave enough to just email them and tell them to take me off payroll (there are people who "stay" on payroll so they don't have to reapply every summer) but I haven't gotten there yet. Maybe she'll just assume I'm done because I won't ever come back? Is that bad?

We also held a very successful Bollywood night (and ironically on Cinco de Mayo ha) with my dear friends Taryn and John, and their significant others Jared and Kylie. We made curry and naan, watched "Om Shanti Om" and had a jolly time. It's been decided we shall do this more often because too much fun was had. Also those people are some of my favorite people so that's always a plus. 

I had been asked/hired to sing the "Pie Jesu" in Faure's Requiem (If you've never heard it, please go take a listen. It's truly some really beautiful music! Nothing fancy, but very pretty nonetheless) with a full choir and orchestra in Chandler/Sun Lakes. I was super excited for it because it was my first paid gig, and it was going to be really good. I had gone to a rehearsal on a Friday (5/5) and it went really well and was looking forward to the performance the following Friday. WELL that weekend is when things went towards a different...direction. Sunday was fast Sunday, so naturally I didn't have anything to eat all day by the time I got to my in-law's house for dinner. They had saved me some food (we get out of church later than they do) and I went to town. My stomach kinda started to hurt when I finished eating and my tummy felt a little tight. It was a little uncomfortable, but I just thought maybe I had eaten too fast or something. I felt it for the rest of the evening but it wasn't bad enough to warrant leaving early. We get home and go to bed and I complained to Ian that my tummy really was feeling really weird, but I was hopeful I would sleep it off. I was very wrong. I got a very poor night's rest, tossing and turning! I would lay still because moving made my stomach hurt, but then I needed to change position again and it would make me super nauseous and it was just a never ending cycle of discomfort. We woke up the next morning, around 7 and my stomach was feeling super weird and not good! I was getting a little nervous because it was something I had never experienced before. It was like I had done a really intense ab workout and my stomach was super sore from it. There was the tiniest pinch on my lower right side, which made me think appendicitis, but upon texting my sisters I initially didn't "pass" the criteria like hopping on one foot, or hurting after releasing pressure, etc. I thought maybe my digestive system was backed up so I went downstairs and started sipping on some apple juice to get things flowing. To my surprise that kick started my colon I guess, and I did my business. But it made it worse! I was starting to really not feel good. I hollered up to Ian to call our primary doctor to schedule an appointment (we had just taken Ian to the ER for his gallbladder and I didn't want to make that expense if my problem ended up being digestive). The earliest we could get in was 3pm that afternoon. I made my way upstairs and my pain started to really increase. I was in tears by the time we were off the phone making the appointment and within 5 minutes of that phone call, we decided to just go to the ER. We waited in the ER waiting room for about 45 minutes {read: 2 million hours} before I was seen, and by the time they got to me, my pain was at a solid 8/10. I felt absolutely dreadful, extremely nauseous, and straight up miserable. My ER nurse gave me some morphine and something for the nausea and the staff were pretty quick on all the registration/housekeeping. My time gets foggy at this point, but I think within the hour they had a urine sample, blood samples, all that good stuff and I was taken to get a CT*

              *Tangent: Getting a CT was kind of a cool experience actually! Uneventful, but the fluid they put in to see all your junk made it feel like you whizzed your pants. haha

Came back from CT, and hung out for a little while longer and my drugs were starting to wear off. They were really quick with the results and I was informed I had acute appendicitis and would have to have emergency surgery! By that point I didn't really care how they got it out, nor was I nervous about having surgery (I've never have had one before this), it just needed to come out so I could stop feeling miserable so they brought me up to the OR floor, (upon arrival, I vomited because without the morphine and nausea drugs my pain/nausea was def a 9-9.5/10 so it's good to know I wasn't exaggerating any digestive pain I guess). They put one of those little caps on me, I met my surgeon and anesthesiologist (who was like the nicest person) and then he put something in my IV, and I was out. I vaguely remember opening my eyes and seeing the OR light and them putting on the gas mask and then the next thing I know, I'm in my hospital room! I stayed overnight, and was home around 2pm Tuesday. It was crazy and kind of a whirlwind, and I kind of have a hard time believing it actually happened. haha It was an adventure, that's for sure. I was in the ER by 9, seen by about 10, and in surgery by about 1. It kinda went 0-100 real quick haha

I was still pretty drugged up at this point haha 

Recovery has been interesting because I don't know what to expect from something like this, but it's been fairly straightforward. They did the procedure laparoscopically, so fortunately I haven't had to deal with any nasty draining/stitches/etc. Just some small incisions down my lower belly. If anything, it's been more annoying not to be able to use my core muscles! You forget how much you use them by just...existing. haha Oh and for laparoscopic surgeries they pump you full of carbon dioxide so the surgeon can see clearly, so I was bloated AND couldn't use my abs for like 5 days, so I now I have a pretty good idea of what I'll look like when I am like 5 months pregnant, whenever that will be. xD I started to feel like myself on Saturday, and I've been feeling much better every day. Ready for the steri-strips to come off, but I'm not allowed to touch them till they fall out on their own. Boo. And even though I feel almost perfectly fine now, I can't lift anything above 15 pounds for another 6 weeks, and I don't know how long till I can workout. I was planning on totally getting in shape this summer, but now I'm set back 6 weeks! rawr.

In other news, I was cast in this fall's LOT production of "The Bartered Bride"! I have a few featured chorus roles, like a waitress and a bride, and my personal favorite, Heidi the Yodeling girl!

I have no idea what that entails, if I get to yodel or not, or whatever but that is my character's name and basically means I get to have a lot of fun with it. Or I'll make it fun. Or both. Either way, it's a win. There shall be lots of stage time, and lots of folk dancing! Normally I'm nervous about choreo, but with my background in swing and country dance, I think I can actually offer something really nice this time around! Huzzah!

In the mean time, I have an opera workshop with Jeff Stevens and Jen Nagy to fill up my time, as well as some lessons with Anne to get a headstart on my recital. Because OHYEAH I'm delaying graduation till May just to make my life a little bit easier, and to have more fun.

I also have girls camp to do, but that is being planned by my camp directors for the most part, so not much for me to do there....so yeah. That's been my life in a nutshell since March.

Till next time, my lovelies!

Autumn-Nom-Nom-Nom

Hey lovelies. I am currently at home, delaying cleaning the guest bathrooms so like any responsible adult I will continue to postpone chores to write a blog post.

Summer has come and gone (kind of) and I am more than ready for fall to be here. It's my favorite season, even though here in AZ, it's rather warm for it to really feel like autumn but it's all that comes with the season I love. I love the start of a new semester, the slowly but surely cooling off of this desert heat, and all the holidays. ALL THE HOLIDAYS. Really though I need Halloween like right now. That being said, any fun couples costume suggestions are appreciated. We are not afraid to be silly and I'm still trying to muster up something because I like to go all out so I need to start preparing now! Anywho.

To help pass the time, let's fill the group in what my summer has been like.

VIK Summer Camp

Can't tell if this year was better or worse. haha I definitely liked my position as the music teacher better than assistant counselor. There were some organizational things that could have gone better but at least I wasn't chewed out for things out of my control this time. Overall, it was a fast summer and I am very grateful for that. I am very glad it's over. If anything, I'll miss my coworkers! We had some pretty awesome staff this year, including my parent table sister Maddie, the wonderful Misty, and my newest married-with-no-kids girlfriend Dani (PS we still need to go shopping!) and last but not least the amazing directors Jessi and Krystalyn who worked so dang hard to make it a good summer. Hats off to you for having the hardest jobs. To the rest of you, I enjoyed working with every single one of you. Thanks for making the job bearable. :)

TRIPS!

I was actually able to do a few trips this summer! The first time in a long time, really. For July 4th I drove with my family up to Boise, ID for my maternal grandparents' 70th wedding anniversary. Yup. You read correctly! SEVENTY! My Grandpa is 92 and my Grandma is 87. And they are simply one of the cutest couples I've ever seen.

I just love them so much. What was really cool, was that my sister and mother and I were able to sing some fun Andrews Sisters stuff at their party! Got to show off a little as well as give them a treat. We practiced our booties off and it was so much fun!

Then later that month I was able to drive to St George for my oldest nephew's mission farewell! Talk about feeling old! Granted, he's only 6 years younger than me, but that's just a technicality. haha He did great and he's going to love his time in Rancho Cucamungo, CA! It was also really nice to see my dad and my sister and the rest of her family. I want to visit more often, since it's relatively close! Also, big shout out to my homegirl Kelly for driving with me! Without her, I wouldn't have been able to go! You're the best, even if your dumb phone got us lost about 3 times. ;)


Now that the summer time activities are through, I am working at my old site Meridian for the next week and a half before classes start. I have decided not to work during the school year until I graduate. Straight up, my major is freaking hard without having to be at work every day and my classes are literally all day; so even if I wanted to, I am no longer available to work with my kiddos. Summer camp is so difficult but the school year is pretty easy sailing for the most part, and I'm going to miss my littles. They really are so much fun and I just love them.

Speaking of the upcoming semester, I am feeling a little overwhelmed. I have some kind of difficult rep that needs some real nitty gritty work and I feel anxious for my junior recital within the next few months. But I just keep telling myself it will work out, because it will, right? Now that I mention it, I better hook up my keyboard and get crackin.

Live long and prosper, friends.