Monday, March 28, 2011

Monday Memories - 2nd grade crush

When I was in second grade I had a HUGE crush on a fellow classmate. Around this time, my mom made a cool shirt that had pink hearts on it. I decided to wear it to school to show my 'love' for this classmate of mine. I knew he would know how I felt the minute he saw it. When I got to school, I decided I was too shy to show my shirt. I was afraid of how he might react. I kept my jacket on for a few hours. After literally sweating it out for a couple of hours, I finally realized that this guy wouldn't know that I was wearing the shirt for him. It was just a shirt....right? I finally took the jacket off. And of course, no one took any special notice of the shirt. Did anything come of out my wearing my heart on my sleeve? Nope. I don't think he ever took notice of me....thank goodness. He didn't turn out to be the kind of guy I would like to have as a significant other.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

If I had a wish...

Then it would be, a happy, happy birthday to Sandy from me.

Happy birthday to one of the sweetest people I know!

Okay, it was her birthday YESTERDAY. I'm a bit slow lately. It's the thought that counts, right?

Sunday, March 20, 2011

Older and Wiser

Happy birthday to a great friend and sister-in-law.
Hope this year will be a great one for you!

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Happy Birthday!

To a little princess.

Monday, March 14, 2011

Monday Memories: Singing on Valentine's

I was in Swing Choir all four years in high school. Each year we did singing valentine's in order to raise money for our uniforms and music. One particular instance happened my senior year (I think...they all run together). I just remember that Kyle L. was in my group and we went to sing to someone in our ward. (I think Carlee was in our group, too.) We were having such a great time in the car, we laughed so much in between stops. As we went to this house, I got the hiccups. I thought I'd be done by the time we got to the door to sing. Wrong. It was so bad that I had to turn around so I wouldn't laugh. I felt so bad because someone didn't get their money's worth. But I sure had a great time.

Another time, I think it was my junior year, my group was my cousin Richard and Wendy M. We had to sing somewhere downtown. As we got back into the car, Richard backed up into a car. No damage. Just a memory to add to the list.

The experience I remember the most was when we went to sing to my Grandma Mayes. She always got tears in her eyes and gave us each a great big hug, even if she had no clue who the other people in my group were. I miss my grandma so much!

Monday, March 7, 2011

Monday Memories: Pie with an Apostle

After graduating from Ricks in 1998, I went to work for the Church in Salt Lake City. While working there, I was able to see a lot of the church leaders walking around. When I had worked there for quite a few months, one of my coworkers won some money by submitting a joke to 'Reader's Digest' and he took us all to lunch at the Lion House. I designated myself as a helper to a lady in the office who had cancer and really wasn't strong enough to carry her own food. As picked out some nice chocolate pie to share. As she was fairly week, we decided to take the elevator to the second level where we would meet up with everyone else. After we got on the elevator, we turned to the front. And in walks Elder Perry (or as I called him when I was younger, Elder Smiley). Of course he was super friendly. He looked over my tray of food and saw the pie. He got a great big smile on his face and said, "Do you have a fork? Your pie looks mighty good." Me, being the nervous 20 year old that I was, stuttered that I had already promised to share the pie with someone else. He just laughed and said it was too bad. Afterward I could have kicked myself. Just chalk it up to my stupidity.

Friday, March 4, 2011

Titles

Some of my current titles:
daughter
sister
aunt
cousin
friend
niece

Some day I hope to add:
mother
wife

Starting summer 2011:
Ph.D. student at USU!!!

Thursday, March 3, 2011

San Francisco

I was able to go to San Francisco last week (for the first time) for a training seminar. All expenses were paid by my adviser (except tips). I attended a training on NVivo, which is a program to help code anything from documents to videos to pictures to audio files. It really is an amazing program, and nothing like any program I had used previously. My adviser felt it wise to send me to the training as I'm using the program to code my thesis data. At first I was hesitant because I thought I could figure it out on my own. (I'm pretty proficient at computer programs and can figure most things out.) But like I mentioned, it's nothing like any other program I've used. So off to San Fransisco I went. (It was originally going to be Tampa, but that conference filled up too quickly. San Fran was a nice consolation prize.)

Day 1
I woke up at 3:45 a.m. in order to get to my shuttle at 4:30. (Thanks to my friend Daylee who also got up at the crack of dawn to give me a ride to the shuttle.) The shuttle arrived at the airport around 6 a.m. That meant I had 3 hours to kill before my flight. After checking my suitcase and waiting through the huge security line (tip: don't travel the morning after a 3-day weekend), I went into Burger King, got breakfast, and did some stuff on my computer. I then went to my terminal and watched shows on hulu to pass the time. I could have been doing homework, but that wouldn't have been any fun.

My flight went through Vegas, where I connected to another plane. On the way to Vegas I had a nice chat with the guy, Jeremiah, next to me. He was on his way back to LA from Provo. His wife lives in Provo and is still attending school at BYU. He graduated last year and is working in LA. Talk about a long-distance relationship. Ug.

I get to San Francisco around 1:30 p.m. their time. That means I'd already been up for 11 hours. My hotel shuttle arrives promptly and I head to the hotel. The shuttle driver was super nice and answered all of my questions. He got a nice tip. After checking in, I headed next door to Max's, a very eclectic restaurant. I indulged in a cheeseburger, as it had been MANY hours since my last meal. Afterward, I thought about going into the city to investigate, but was so tired. I fell asleep around 5 and slept straight through to the next morning. (I don't think I've slept that well since my mission.)

Day 2
Holiday Inn's have a GREAT breakfast. I was super satisfied every morning. After breakfast, I caught the shuttle back to the airport where I got on BART, the area transit system. It took me all the way to the financial district, where my training was.

I sat in training all day. My brain was overloaded with information on the program. I sort of felt like I did after my first week of grad school....too much information and not sure what to do with it.

I thought about hitting Union Square on the way back to the hotel, but I was tired again. I pretty much fell asleep when I got back to my room.

Day 3
Pretty much the same as day 2. During lunch I had the most amazing wrap from the food court downstairs from my training. (I think it was the highlight of my day.)

I did hit Union Square on the way back to the hotel, but wasn't too impressed. There wasn't anything there that I couldn't find anywhere else...expect the interesting people. :) After getting to the airport (the final stop of BART), I tried giving my ticket to some men because I still had money on it. They acted like I was trying to sell them drugs. Such a different environment! I decided I'd keep the ticket as a souvenir. (Silly men.)

Day 4
Get up at the crack of dawn again to catch a 6:30 flight home. While waiting in the SLC airport for my shuttle, my cousin Eli (who works for Skywest) came and found me. We were able to chat for about 30 minutes before my shuttle came.

I only took one picture the entire time I was in San Francisco. It was of the interchanges outside of the airport. I get so excited when I see roads over roads...I'm weird, I know. I didn't do any of the touristy things to do in San Francisco. It's hard to investigate a city when you're on your own. Next time I'm there, I'll be sure to plan some 'fun' time.