Summer Days

Sadly, this summer has been flying by and I have not been able to really experience it! Summer school does that, I suppose. First off, an update. My tomato plant. I have a tomato! Only one, so far, and I am crossing my fingers that more start to grow. I have a ton of flowers on the plant, but only one tomato that is growing every day. It makes me happy to see it!!!

THE Tomato!
Also, my flower boxes have been going crazy!! They are so full of flowers, it is awesome! I have discovered that petunias are growing better and bigger than marigolds. Lesson learned. Both my boxes are packed with flowers, and they make me smile every time I see them :)


The last weekend in June my mom's family had a family reunion in Evanston. (This was the event my sisters and I made the pine wood derby cars for...). It was good to be with family and see relatives I have not seen in years. As for the pine wood derby...my car beat everyone in my immediate families....except PJ's. The zamboni killed me. But, its okay! I totally didn't even win the whole thing, but it was kind of a fun activity. The reunion was filled with talking and laughing, lots of food, crawdad fishing, watching of old home movies, and visiting. It is amazing how different the weather up there is. One day it was really pretty nice outside, and that night was the coldest night ever!!! Overall though, during the day it was really nice and not stifling hot (thank goodness!). Needless to say, we spent alot of time outside to enjoy the weather.
My red family at the park during the reunion.
The Perry Family

For the 4th of July, I spent the weekend with C and P. We bbq'd hot dogs, went to an Orem Owls game (they got beat HORRIBLY!), watched fireworks, had a bbq with P's family, played outside games, and watched more fireworks. It was a really fun weekend, and honestly, the first time that I have felt that it was summer this year. Too bad that got replaced by another week of school!!!

Speaking of school...only 3 1/2 weeks left in my semester! Holy cow summer semester goes by super fast. Out of control. On one hand, I am super stinking excited to be done!!! On the other hand, just thinking of all the stuff I have to do and get done before then is a little overwhelming. Take the bad with the good I suppose!!! Now, if only I can get through these next few weeks in the scorching heat! We are supposed to be up to 100 by Saturday. Bring back winter!!!

Busy busy weekend

This last weekend C and K came to visit and play. We had quite the exciting time :) We each have to make pine wood derby cars for a family reunion coming up this weekend, so we decided to make them together. We sure had a fun time sanding our fingers off, painting, waiting for paint to dry, dealing with superglue and all the little accessories required for these cars, all the while talking and laughing and having a good time. I decided, since I bleed blue, to make my car true blue. I think it turned out really good!


Here are all three of our cars, mostly finished. Mine is the blue one, C's is white with lady bugs crawling all over it, and K's is maroon with white racing stripes adorning its hood. Pretty spiffy, don't you think?

The next day after I was done with class C, P, and K came up again and we went to "This is the place" Memorial park. It was Studio 5 day (A morning tv talkshow), and they were giving out free Creamies! So good! It was definitely a warm day, I even have the sun burn to prove that! But we had a good time walking around the park, seeing all the old buildings and monuments.

THE Monument


They have different crafts and whatnot that you can make while you are there. We decided to each make a candle at the candel making station. We are pro-candle makers, let me tell you!

It was not the most exciting park, but it was fun to visit and say that I have now been there.

For Father's Day, C was in charge of providing dessert to her in-laws family dinner. She found this way cute idea online and enlisted my help to make it. I think they turned out super cute!! Really they weren't all that difficult, but we did split the work up between two days and three helpers. Here is how they turned out:

Burgers and fries, for dessert!! Fun, isn't it! Amazingly, they are made from cupcakes, brownies, and cookies. ALL in one dessert. Can you say sugar?? The hamburgers are cupcakes and brownies (for the meat), and the fries are sugar cookies. It was fun making them and I am really glad with how they turned out!!!

Green thumb

For my birthday, my grandpa gave me one of those upside down hanging tomato bags. I was definitely excited to try it out and see if maybe I can grow my own tomatoes, without a garden. Again with procrastination, I did not get the plant and get it in the bag until yesterday. But here it is!
The only downside: My roof and eves are made of metal and have no place for me to be able to hang it on my porch. So, I had to go buy a shephard's hook. Yes, I realize the pole it is on is bending. Alot. Its suppose to be flush with the brick. Hopefully it can support this poor plant!! Now if we can just get some sun to help this little plant start to grow!!

In other news...rain. Everyday. For the past week and a half. Every day. Its really crazy!! Our monthly rain total so far (and its only the 11th day of the month!) is over an inch and a half. That is alot of rain coming down! A lot of houses just down the valley a little ways have been flooding becuase of all the moisture. I must confess that I have been enjoying it. I guess the desert girl in me is loving the moisture she never got growing up. Its supposed to continue this way (rainy) for the next while at least. Bring it on!!!

School is going well. Just got done finishing a big research paper that was a pain in the neck. This semester is going by really fast, if only for the reason that it is so short. Even though its going fast, we still have a long way to go. Tomorrow I get to lead my first large group therapy circle at the preschool I am working at. Nervous? Yes. Very. Why? Its just 4 4-yr olds for fifteen minutes. I can do that, right? Cross your fingers for me!!! I am really not appreciating having to be in school during the summer. It is SO hard to be motivated to do any work! Everyone in my program is feeling it, even my teachers. Just gotta keep pushing on I guess.

Oh, just looked out the window and surprise: its raining. again.

Flowers Galore!

Can you believe its June already? Not only that, but its nearly the middle of June! Holy Cow!!! Things are going by so fast, its incredible. Last Sunday after church I drove to the temple to walk around, look at the flowers, and take some pictures. The flowers had just been replaced and were really pretty. My favorite area was this patch that was FILLED with poppies. So cute!!

Here is my attempt at photography. Lately I have been into taking pictures from different, unique, and fun angles. Moreso than just the regular front on shot that is usually taken. I really like how this one turned out.
Again with the flowers, this little beauty is growing outside my front door. Fun lilly and I love the bright vibrant color. Makes walking to my door happy :)
I found some planter boxes a while ago and had been planning on buying flowers and filling the boxes up. I just haven't gotten around to it, till today. I finally put off my procrastinating and bought the dirt and flowers and filled the boxes. I got enough flowers to fill all three boxes, but only enough dirt to fill two. Whoops. So tomorrow I get to go back to the store and buy more dirt. Then I can plant the last few flowers to complete the set. I really think they are going to be cute once they grow in a bit more. At least it will be some color on my porch.



For my birthday I got one of those hanging tomato planters. Again with the procrastination, I haven't gotten a plant for it yet. So I got a tomato today at the store as well. How in the heck are you supposed to choose between all those varieties of tomatoes? There's like twenty of them! My porch doesn't have any good place to let me hang the bag, so I also need to buy a shephard's hook to put the bag onto. Once I get that, the tomato can start to grow. My own little one person garden of flowers and tomatoes. What fun!!

Memorial Day

I was so thankful to have Memorial Day weekend!! I got a day off school, which is ALWAYS great. Yes, I know school was only in for one week. But still, it was nice. I spent the weekend with C and P. It was fun just getting to relax and enjoy the time off. Saturday we kind of hung out and then in the afternoon we went to a canyon to go shooting and have a picnic. The weather was beautiful all morning. About a h alf hour before we were going to leave it got really cloudy and windy. We decided to just go for it and drove to the canyon. It started raining on the way there and was raining at the place we were s topping at. So we decided to take a little drive down the canyon, for about an hour. We went back to the spot and it had stopped raining, so we got out and set up the targets and started shooting. We were able to get in shots for about 15 minutes when the rain started up again. Quickly we packed everything up and headed home. What a bust the rain was!! Once we got home we had our picnic, just indoors. It was still a fun day even thought we got rained out.

Sunday afternoon we went up to Odgen to a cemetery. There, the National Traveling Vietnam Memorial Wall was being displayed for the holiday. It was a really cool site to see. They had the wall and then a bunch of army vehicles surrounding it for people to look at. This is me and one of the tanks. Looking inside, they didn't have very much room. Its amazing to know that somehow people with all their gear stuff themselves inside these vehicles.

This is a picture of the wall. The wall is one half the size of the real one in Washington. Amazing. There were so many names just on this replica wall, I can't even begin to think how the real one looks. (We went to the real one in Washington when I was little but I don't remember it at all. This was great to see what I saw back then but didn't remember).


Monday C and I made strawberry jam. I really hate cutting up all those fresh strawberries and cooking them into jam. But really, this stuff is tasty! I love homemade. So much better than the store stuff.


Also on Monday we ventured outside to play some competitive games of ladder golf. I can honestly say that I stink at this game! I think we played over 15 games and I lost every single one of them. Dang. Guess I need to practice more!! It was fun to play and be outside in the beautiful weather. My face even got a little bit of sun, yay for some sun!!

Birthday Extravaganza

Wednesday was my birthday! I woke up nice and early for class. M and D called and sang to me, it was fun to hear! I had to go to class that morning, which was not all that exciting. After it was over, I drove home. K was waiting in my parking lot (totally unexpected!!). She came to take me out to lunch and play. I went into my apartment to put my stuff away and found that she had gone in before I got home and redecorated, with balloons and banners. It was fun to have my room all decorated up.


K also decided to get me some flowers for my birthday. They are stinking cute!! Gerber daisies, tulip, and Iris's. Love the colors!
We decided to go out to lunch to European Connection (they have AWESOME crepe sandwiches and crepe's with ice cream. SO good). After driving over there, we discovered the place has closed! So stinking sad!!! We made a quick stop to Kohl's, where I got a new necklace. Then we decided on Rumbi Grill for lunch. They have pretty good rice bowls. After lunch we did a couple of errands and then drove down to C's house. We spent the late afternoon playing and then P met us for dinner at Zupa's (which was my choice for the meal). Had a great turkey-crandberry panini complete with a complementary chocolate-covered strawberry. Pretty yummy!! We went back to C's house and opened presents. This is me with my new mini muffin pan :)
The steering wheel cover currently in my car used to have lady bugs and things on it. It has gotten some major wear and tear, and most of the bugs have peeled off. Apparently it was time for a new one, as well as some new car seat covers. These ones are pretty darn cute and look good in my car!!

Other items on the present list: an ice cream spade and a "sick kit" (kit of things to help out when you are sick. These items included: jello, tissue, straws, a silver bowl, movies, gatorade, chicken noodle soup, and life savers). Now I am all prepared for the next time I get sick! I also got flowers and some candy from Ireland from some of my friends.


It was a really super fun day/night. The girls did a great job and I had lots of fun. After presents we had a cookies-n-creme ice cream pie (again, my pick!) which was AWESOME.

The day turned out really great and I am thankful to everyone who helped out and wished me a happy birthday!!!

Lovely feet

Three weeks ago I was on the tail end of the semester. I happened to have a day with no class, and C decided to come up and play. We, along with PJ, went to a little beauty salon. C and I got pedicures to beautify our feet and P got a haircut. It was so fun to play with them! The pedicure chairs were massagers, and felt so nice on my back. And of course the pedicure felt so good! I decided that we couldn't pick red or pink to paint our nails with, since that is so plain. We both went bold: I got teal and she got purple. I think mine is brighter than hers. After the lady first painted my nails with the color I was somewhat unsure and thinking it was too bright, but I have grown to really like it. Now we have cute little toes :) We deicded to both get flowers too, since that is the cute part. I think they turned out really well.


Last semester, aka Spring semester, is over with. It ended two and a half weeks ago. I was SO glad to be done with the semester! Final reports, meetings, projects and papers, and finals were all a bit stressful to say the least. As soon as my last final was finished on thursday the 7th, I hopped into my car and drove to the airport to catch my flight home. I was able to stay for a week and two days. It was SO nice to be home. Luckily, this time I was not sick :) I didn't get all that I planned on done, but was somehow able to fill the time! It was really nice to just be home and see m and d, even if we did have to empty the house to get the carpets cleaned. Now they are pretty again.

The break went WAY too fast, as they always do. I had to fly back on the 17th, and started the new semester today. Talk about getting right into things. It really feels like I didn't go home at all, so weird. Just in the same place I was, doing the same things as I was a few days ago. Class today wasn't terrible though, which is a plus. Hopefully it is a somewhat easy summer. Apparently the semester itself is only 10 weeks, which is shorter than the other semesters. It still feels like it is going to be forever haha.

M and D - thanks for letting me come home and stay last week! It was really nice to be home. Eating lots of yummy food and home made ice cream!!!