The Close of a Beautiful Summer

     The end of summer is a bittersweet time. It means moving back to college and leaving my best friends-my family. It also means I get to move to a whole town of people my age. :) While I loved *almost* every minute of this summer, I was still so excited to move back to Provo. But not before finishing off the summer with a few last hurrahs!

     First of all, I got to run my first half marathon with my good friends Kirsten and Jessica. It was a beautiful, cool run at night, and quite possibly the best run of my life. 

Then my cute cousins came and stayed with us for a 

couple days. It was so much fun to have them here!

Braiden is the King of funny faces!

Blake is such a sweetheart :)

I turned 19, finally! :) This is at my last week of work.

Do I look older? Hah! I wish. ;)

     And now, I am all moved in to my new apartment. Luckily goodbyes have never been too hard for me, my mom, and Allie, because by the time we are all unpacked and done shopping, we are too tired to care! But I sure will miss these two--my favorite girls in the world!

Mmmm. :) I guess my family wants me to get the 

freshman 15 as a sophomore. But I am very thankful 

for all the delicious birthday treats.

Here is a picture of my desk, all moved in!

And now the new adventures begin! Starting with making

homemade peach cobbler (which turned out to be delicious)

and a late night swim in the cold pool. I can already tell 

that this is going to be an awesome year. :)

California Girls

      A couple of weeks ago, me and Ms. Al Bal were lucky enough to be invited to California with Kat and Patti!!! :)  Everything ended up working out just perfectly so that we could go sort of last minute. And let me just say, we had the time of our lives!

     We loved swimming in the ocean at Newport Beach, riding on a ferry, looking at creatures in the tide pools at Laguna Beach, eating at delicious places like Bubba Gump's, The Rainforest Cafe, and The Cheesecake Factory, walking around Downtown Disney, and of course....

...going to Disneyland and California Adventure! Oh how we loved this magical place. I haven't been to Disneyland since I was seven, so it was practically a new experience for me. There were so many fun rides (my favorites? California Screamin' and Tower of Terror, of course!), beautiful princesses, and neat things to look at. I also LOVED the parade.

     Oh, and I almost forgot! Here are some cupcakes me and Allie made to celebrate our trip.

     Thanks a million for letting us tag along, Kat and Patti. :) We loved every minute of it!

Lagoon

Oh man, I love Lagoon. I even considered getting a season pass this year, but decided I wouldn't be able to go enough times to make it worth it. Allie, Nate, Seth, and I went a couple of Saturdays ago. It was one of the best trips to Lagoon I have had! We had a great time running around the park with each other.

Last Saturday, we bounced back with the Goodworths and Kristy! Once again, it was a fun-filled day. But this time my feet were a little more sore and I got a little more tired. Maybe it is best that I didn't get a season pass. ;)

There are a couple other new posts below, just fyi. :) Happy Summer!

Sleeping Beauty

     I don't know why, but one of my hobbies is taking pictures of Allie while she is asleep. Somehow, she still looks just as gorgeous asleep as she does awake. Hopefully you enjoy looking at them as much as I do!

Adventures Here and There

     I love summer! Here are a couple of pictures to highlight some random fun things that have been going on.

Me and my friend Charlotte got to cruise around in this for a while!

 Thanks to her parents for letting us feel cool and ride in it. :)

 Fun night out with Bonnie! The sunset at the Great Salt Lake was breathtakingly beautiful.

Harry Potter 7 Part 2 was a blast! We didn't go at midnight since I had to work the next day, but we went right after I got off work on Friday. I thought they did a great job and I loved the 3D glasses. :)

My Glamorous Job :)

     As promised, here is a picture of me in my lovely work attire. :) On this particular day, I tried to help push a four-wheeler out of the mud, and it ended up all over me! Just another day at work, right?

Independence Day Par-TAY!

     I love the fourth of July! It is always such a fun day. We went to the parade in the morning with Debbie's family, and later Kristy came over and we made shish kabobs! We just relaxed all day, ate good food, and of course watched fireworks at night. :) I love America!

 

Stadium of Fire: David, my love!

     Fourth of July weekend, Allie and I were lucky enough to get tickets to go to Stadium of Fire! Our awesome friend, Lance, gave them to us because he knew how much we loved David Archuleta. :) And boy did we love it. It was so much fun! I loved visiting Provo and some of my friends there, and I am getting excited to move back in a month. I'm sad too though, mom. Just so you know.

                                                 Hello Bekah :)

Just hangin' out before the show

It was SO blasted hot. Luckily slushies saved the day!

     Anyway, the show was so awesome! I want to go every year now. They had some really cool dancers who covered the field and danced with glow sticks, an 'America's Got Talent' competition, Brad Paisley, DAVID ARCHULETA, and an amazing firework show!

Here are the dancers... awesome!

     Although most people seemed to be there for Brad Paisley, we didn't exactly love him. We aren't huge country fans, though I have been listening to a little country this summer. The thing we didn't like was that he didn't even talk to the crowd at all... he just performed then left. He did have some funny songs still.

 We love David!

     David Archuleta was the highlight for us. :) I forgot how much I like that boy. He has such a good voice! Ya, make fun of us. We don't care. We love him!

Ragnar: Do you want to run a relay race?

     Last weekend I got to run the Wasatch Back Ragnar Relay. So much fun! If you don't believe me, this just might convince you. ;)
     For Ragnar you have a group of 12 runners in 2 vans. One van is resting and trying to sleep while the other is running/following their runners. It is broken into 3 legs for each runner, so I ran leg 6, 18, and 30 for a total of 18.1 miles.
     My second leg was the hardest for me, and through it I learned a couple of important lessons! I had been sick the day before Ragnar, and thankfully for my first leg I felt great. I started feeling sick again Friday night, and was not feeling super by the time it was my turn to run my second, 8.1 mile leg. But I learned some cool things. The first thing I learned, is that with lots of prayer, I CAN do hard things! This leg was so hard for me--it was uphill, in the dark, and I felt awful. I never thought I was going to make it to the end, but I did, and I only walked for maybe one or two minutes total (which I was still disappointed in. :/). The second lesson I learned is that it is okay to ask for help and depend on your team. I realized that I probably should have just accepted my teammate's offer to run part of it for me, because I was not feeling good at all. People are there to help you in life, and it is okay to admit that you need help sometimes.
     After I finished my second leg, I was walking around for a while trying to find my team in this long line of vans. One of the volunteers asked me to cross the street, so I did. Then a driver said to the volunteer, "Sir, I think she is drunk. She has just been wandering around for a long time now." Oops! I guess I must have looked a little bit out of it. :) I can assure you I was not drunk.
     Anyway, just thought I would share some of running's many life lessons with you and a funny story. :) Now for some pictures!

Warning: These pictures may frighten and/or scare you. We got up at 3:30 in the morning to leave and didn't really sleep much until after it was over, so do not judge us for the way we look. :)

Jessica, Hillary, and me

Coachie and Mrs. Coachie!

We made it to Paradise!

This is me during my first leg. I have a sombrero on because Cafe Rio passed them out for the last 1/2 mile.... if we wore them, we got a coupon for a free entree! YUM! I had the luckiest leg- no other legs got to wear sombreros or win coupons.

Jess, Rachel, Hillary, and me after my first leg.

***Then I was sick and didn't take any pictures until

 all of our legs were completely over***

After it was over, we went to breakfast at Kneader's. It was my first time, and I do believe they have the best French toast ever!

We survived!

Yay! Hillary got her car sticker. :) Hillary was awesome and was like my big sister on this trip while I wasn't feeling well.

I was craving grapes the whole time, and what do ya know?! 

At the finish line, free grapes. :)

Me and Jess :) Love her!

Also, check out this picture from last year's Ragnar of me and Jess--we didn't even plan it, and they are pretty similar pictures! Funny.

The whole team: Coachie and the Freaks 3

There are so many great people on this team! All part of our cross country running family.

 Ragnar was so much fun and I hope I get to do it again and again!