News Junkie

So, I've been a news fanatic lately. Being such, I have also been becoming increasingly opinionated. So I am going to share my thoughts on a few things here.


First of all, this "stab-proof" knife

Now my first thought was, they need to change the title because..that just sounds like a challenge like the sword in the stone. If you say it can't be done...people will try to prove you wrong.

Then I thought, that's just stupid altogether because..you CAN stab someone with that, you just have to exert extra effort.

Even if you couldn't stab someone though, it still has a little thing called a "blade" with which you could slit someone's throat.

And what if you were being attacked and you NEEDED a knife that could stab someone? That would be frustrating.

All in all, what we need to do is wear protective forcefields. Because the truth is in this world, that you just never know when someone is going to stab you or throw acid on you or kidnap you.

But wouldn't the forcefield be a challenge also--oh yeah, you think you're safe behind that forcefield?? I'll show you!

So what we really need, is "love sweet love:" we really need people that won't stab each other, and people that won't attack other people so that people have to stab them out of defense.

What do you think?

NEW BLOG

Ok, so I'd been thinking about doing another blog, a more specifically themed blog for a while, and I finally decided to make it happen. It's a blog about the little things in life that make me smile, trying to help other people notice the little things in their lives that can make them smile, even when skies are not so blue. Please check it out and share it with others! And please feel free to share your little daily happies with me too!


justonerayofsunshine.blogspot.com

Decisions, decisions!

Remember that whole growing up thing I've been referring to? Well it doesn't stop. Ever.

Lately I've really been loving learning. My mind has been like a sponge lately and I can feel myself getting smarter and smarter!! It is so cool, but at the same time it's frustrating because there's so much I want to learn and so little time to learn it in! Well folks, today for the first time I seriously considered Grad school. I would do either teacher education or perhaps humanities. I would really really love to do religious education and be an institute/seminary teacher. I was looking at the courses for the MA in religious education and I was drooling over the list of incredibly interesting coursework!!!

Also today, I don't know why today was marked a special day in my life exactly, but nonetheless I also reconsidered going on a mission today. I am 99% sure that I am going to serve a mission at this point. How could I not?? How could I know what I know and not go share it with other people?? Jesus is the Christ! He lives! And He has restored His Gospel to the earth!!!! We can be happy, come what may! Families can be together beyond the grave! It's amazing! So come September/October I will be putting in my mission papers, and hopefully leaving in January for 18 months!

Confessions of a single college student

So I put together this photo montage for the world of Facebook. But it was humorous enough I thought I'd share it with the non-facebook world.

Basically, it was inspired by all the pictures people kept putting up of their trips to Europe and other various places while I sat and did homework. I am so glad I have a sense of humor!

Click here to see the photos.

Happy Mother's Day

Mallards make good models.

So I came home from taking my 8am final and there was this mallard couple in my front yard. So I went inside, grabbed the camera and a waffle (for bribing purposes) and these are some of the shots. Kim laughs at my duck pictures. I like them. These ducks had personali-tay!

New song

This is a song that I started working on some time last week or something. It's very simple,and by no means polished or even finished. The hardest part about writing songs for me is being able to play the same song twice. This is why I record myself, to help me remember what I just played until I actually learn how to write music out effectively. It doesn't have a title so I think I'll spontaneously give it the title "The Song that I Sing"

OH and sorry for the lack of sleeves. I was supposed to be out jogging, but I got distracted. But I did go jogging later!! My Saturday night date with my tennis shoes...


Lyrics:
No matter how many songs I sing,
One song I'll always come back to;
One song will always before you.
It's the song that I sing when I look to the moon,
and I wonder if you ever think of me too.
It's the song that beat deep within my heart,
and I secretly pray you'll hear it apart
from all the other noises;
from all the other voices.
It's the song that I sing when I think of
what we were and what we could become.
It's the song that I sing when I think of love
and how I found it in your arms
that fit me like a glove.
And your stare, that gaze that I still dream of.
It's the song that sings of my desire
just to own your smile for a little while longer.
So just know that no matter how many songs you hear,
mine will always be here,
in my heart,
where it belongs.

Photography Pt. 2

Photography Pt. 1

I am babysitting Spencer's camera while he serves the Lord and the people of Germany. Here's what I've accomplished with it so far!

Holi Festival of Colors

So Kim and I went to the Holi Festival of Colors. It's an Indian thing at a local Indian temple. I wish I remembered more of the specific cultural details. Anyway. You go and there's dance/music performances and other cultural whatnots. Then you throw "color" all over each other.









So here is the temple behind us.
And here is Kim and me after being colored! Woohoo! It was so much fun! I will have purple boogers for days though.

Positive Psychology

So today I went to the campus forum with Martin Seligman as the speaker. He is a super famous, renowned psychologist for his work in postive pscyhology. It was aMAZing.

He talked about Postive education, how schools can and SHOULD be teaching not just facts, but also well-being.

He talked about how we shouldn't just focus on taking out the bad, but building up the good. We should build up our strengths, and use them to tackle things that we don't enjoy. Every night we should write down 3 things that went well that day.

He talked about how much our world has grown materially, along with the rise of depression. He also commented on the fact that economists measure the GDP as a basis for how well the nation is doing, but everytime someone commits suicide that number goes up and it's a "good thing"...wack? yes.

He talked about so many good things and I was trying to soak it all up, but I didn't do a very good job. Or, at least I'm having trouble doing it justice as I try to relate it here.

ANYWAY, it was brilliant and so applicable; we could all use a little more happiness, no?

I think what I loved most about it was that it gave me teaching ideas. Sometimes I have the flash-forwards into my teaching career and the kinds of things I will implement into my classroom. This was definitely one of those times. I want to have positive education happen in my classrooms. I don't want my students to just have knowledge, I want them to have happiness and hope in the world! Dr. Seligman talked about how typical high school literature is all so depressing! Lord of the Flies, Romeo and Juliet, Hard Times...the list goes on. But if we can teach this and back it up with positivity, the students could have a totally different experience!

For instance, take Lord of the Flies. This is a book that would make one want to loose all hope in all goodness of human nature. What if when we discussed this novel, however, we looked at qualities within ourselves and those around us that would prevent this story from ever coming true? What if students were assigned to search out positive news articles that capture human good? See there are bad things in the world: there are people that murder their wives and children; there are people that make rape-simulation games. No matter how much bad there is, however, there is still good. The goal here is not to ignore the bad, but to counteract it with good. : )

I believe in hope and happiness. Lately I've had a lot of reasons to be sad and to lose hope in people. As I have searched for good, however, I have found it. It only takes a little good to weigh out a ton of bad.

So if you've read this, here is your assignment! Comment back, sharing 3 good things that you have experienced today. : )

Here are mine:
1. I woke up on time and had a good hair day.
2. I called my dad today and had a pleasant conversation.
3. I saw a devotional speaker from a few weeks ago and got to tell her face to face how much I enjoyed her talk.

Have a wonderful day!
Oh and here is a link to the associated website!
www.authentichappiness.org

Bring on the spring time!

I love sringtime in Utah. I love the bright blue skies. I love the mountains. I love the sun. I love how the bugs don't bug me like they do in Texas, and they aren't as big as they are in Texas. Overall, spring time is good for the soul. Except I do prefer the Texas bluebonnets over all the spring flings popping up all over campus... haha. No worries, my spring fling will be with the mountains. I can't wait to start the hiking season!!

I love music.

I cannot tell you how much I love learning the guitar. I love having music as part of my life again, although it is extremely tempting to play guitar all night instead of studying. My assignment for this week is to write a song. At first I was nervous, but that nervousness very quickly turned into excitement because I have been writing song lyrics for the past few weeks anyway and this gives me a good excuse to swallow my fears and give it a shot! So I sat down and tried to strum out a song and by the end of it I decided I wanted to quit school and just sit and write songs and play the guitar all day!! Ok, not really...but I love it. Music really is one of my gifts and I thank God for it. I didn't realize how much musical experience I had had in my life until I started learning the guitar. I had choir, voice lessons, band (percussion), piano, conducting in church. I am just so grateful for the opportunity to put the "musical" back in "musicaljensen;" music really was a part of my life. I feel complete again.

Pictures/video will be coming soon hopefully!

Elder Rogers

About 3 years ago, I started dating Spencer Rogers. About 4 months after that, in June, he had obtained a copy of the Book of Mormon and started meeting with the LDS missionaries. By October, he had decided to get baptized, but was not able to until the following June. He was baptized on June 23rd 2007. The next June (2008) made him eligible to serve a mission. He worked full time to raise money to get on that mission. Through frustration, discouragement, and all the other struggles, he finally made it. Elder Rogers entered the Missionary Training Center in Provo, UT today!!



This is Elder Rogers with some of the missionaries who taught him!

On a happier note!

Ok so I have been going to the gym a LOT lately and I am stocked full of natural energy! I can't make myself sleep or stay asleep! I think I scared Kim this morning, I was bouncing around all morning. Long story short, I feel great. I love working out. AND ALSO ever since I started working out more consistantly, my body has been craving fruits and veggies which is WEIRD, for those of you who don't know my fruit and veggie quirk.

In other news, aside from my body freaking out, I have decided to revive my musicality by learning to play the guitar!! Whoohoo! So I don't have to worry about finding a piano, I can just pick up a guitar and sing/play my heart out! So yeah, that's what I'm buying with my tax return, a guitar. So that's what I'm doing this weekend, guitar shopping. Yippee!

Happy Valentine's Day

AKA Singles' Awareness Day

This has been my first Valentine's day in seven years not to have a "valentine". Not really sure how I feel about it. It's not like I was ever a huge fan of the holiday, I just always happened to have a boyfriend when they day rolled around. I was actually looking forward to today though, I pre-made the decision to revel in it and be my own valentine and go out and clean my car or shop or something. When I woke up this morning, however, I had a sore throat, and it was more or less a blizzard outside so that knocked out about half of my plans. On top of that it turned out to be a pretty emotional day, with my own issues and those with my parents. Well I finally decided to pick myself up and do some of my homework which included reading selections from Margaret Fuller's The Great Lawsuit. It's early American women's rights literature, a lot to soak in. Anyway so I was reading it when this statement slapped me in the face:

"If any individual live too much in relations, so that he becomes a stranger to the resources of his own nature, he falls after a while into a distraction, or imbecility, from which he can only be cured by a time of isolation, which gives the renovating fountains time to rise up... Union is only possible to those who are units."

How true this statement is. The past few weeks I have really done a lot of praying and trying to figure out what it is the Lord wants for me/from me right now, and this statement really does sum up a lot of what I have found He wants me to do. I need to be on my own for a while, learning and growing, "renovating" if you will. I know I used to be a whole and complete person, a "unit" but somewhere in the past couple years at BYU I kind of became complacent, it's ridiculously easy to do at BYU, believe it or not. Last night I completely finished a journal for the first time. I started it 02-13-06 and finished it last night, 02-13-09-- three years. The beginning of that journal records me at my worst, the middle records me at my best, and the end records me at some sort of plateau, in a rut, trying to make my way back to where I was in the middle, if not higher. Man I used to be on fire! Even just last spring I had such a great relationship with the Lord and such a huge desire to serve. Last spring I got a phone call asking me to take a girl to the hospital and I sprinted all the way across campus to get to her and stayed at the hospital all night with her. This semester, I was put "on call" to take a roommate to the hospital if it were necessary, and I...didn't find myself quite as willing; I know I would have done it, but I would not have been happy about it. I don't know what happened to me! Or how I let it happen! But I've got to fix it.

Here is comin', a better version of me.

GAH! I can't get the italics to go away! I just wanted them for that one quotation!! Sorry, it's really bugging me!!!

I almost forgot

I got accepted to the English Ed program! I was too bogged down last week to really get excited, but now that my burdens are lifting I'm pretty stoked. This fall I get to go out to schools and be in classrooms doing teacherly stuff and that excites me because I am, admittedly and proudly, a nerd. : )

St. George Adventures

This weekend I took a spur of the moment trip to St. George. It was way fun. The only thing I had planned was the hotel and a haircut. The rest was just me, Lisa (my car), and my camera (who doesn't have a name) exploring, taking random roads, and seeing what there was to see. It was relaxing and liberating and warm and beautiful and much needed.

Well I guess this is growing up

When you find yourself
In some far off place,
And it causes you
To rethink some things.
You start to sense
That slowly you’re becoming someone else
And then you find yourself.

When you make new friends
In a brand new town,
And you start to think
About settling down,
The things that would have been lost on you
Are now clear as a bell.
And you find yourself
That’s when you find yourself.

Well you go through life
So sure of where you’re heading,
And you wind up lost
And it’s the best thing that could happen.
‘Cause sometimes when you lose your way
It’s really just as well.
‘Cause you find yourself;
That when you find yourself.

When you meet the one
You’ve been waiting for,
And she’s everything
That you want and more,
You look at her
And you finally start
To live for someone else.
And then you find yourself;
That’s when you find yourself.

We go though life
So sure of where we’re heading,
And then we wind up lost
And it’s the best thing that could happen.
Sometimes when you lose your way
It’s really just as well.
Because you find yourself;
Yeah that’s when you find yourself.

Snowshoeing.

First of all, can I just say that I love life?!? I love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. I think too often we get too busy to stop and realize how beautiful life can be. I think we spend too much time looking down and fail to see the vivacity of life around us. A blue sky. Raindrops dancing on the car window. A child discovering his hands. A grown up discovering the hands of another. The sun shining through the trees. The sound of snow crunching under your feet. The sound of laughter. Anything. Life is beautiful; embrace it.

Ok, off my soap box. So yesterday I went with Reece and a group of his friends on a snowshoeing adventure and it was so much fun!! And it was so pretty.

My camera actually died about half way through. Once I get Reece to fork over the pictures from his camera, there will be more pictures. Again, it was absolutely gorgeous so stay tuned for Pt. II

Application is in!

So my major, English Teaching, is closed, meaning you have to apply to get in. The application consisted of a video of my teaching a lesson, a lesson plan for that lesson, and several essays including and autobiographical type thing, some reflection questions, and an analysis of a article from the English Journal. Luckily, I started this application before Christmas break so that it wasn't majorly stressful to get it turned in by Jan 15.

Good news is, it's in now! This is me about to go turn it in, all completed. I find out Feb 5. So if you don't hear about it, I didn't get in and I don't want to talk about. But there's really no reason I wouldn't make it, according to my adviser, unless the Lord just has other things in mind for me.

Not quite sure how I feel about this growing up business

busy busy busy busy busy busy.

decisions.
laundry.
work.
school.
life.

If life had a pause button, I would be all over that. I still haven't figured out the trick to planning for the future and taking care of the present at the same time.

Ok, enough whining. Really, I love life. I am applying for my teaching program tomorrow, so I am excited for that. In reality, I would get so bored if I didn't have so much to do. I would have to resort to like, watching TV or something. I much more prefer the busy life.


In the past 24 hours I decided to drop my Spanish minor, drop my Spanish conversation class, and cut up my credit card. I'm worn out. Yet relieved also.


Oh, I apologize for the randomness of this post. But it's a good representation of the current condition of my brain.

Yay for overcoming fears

So all the stories I had heard from skiing ended in broken bones or death. So naturally, I've always been horrified of skiing. Low and behold, however, Reece invited me to go skiing, so skiing I went. I totally pwned the bunny hill. But as soon as I got on the ski lift, I knew it was bad news from there. The worst part was there was no way out but down. I don't think I can say I skiied down the mountain; in reality I FELL down the mountain. hahaha. I'll laugh later when I'm not so sore, I know it.


It was seriously the hardest thing I had ever done in my life. The left side of my body is suffering from minor injuries from my thumb down to my ankle. I am just happy to be in one piece though.

Other than that, I finished my first week back to school and it was pretty good, though VERY busy. But I think if I keep being studious and staying on top of things, I can really learn a lot this semester. My classes all seem very interesting and my professors all seem really great! So I'm pretty excited.

Um well, I'm going to go listen to the Prophet now. So 'til we meet again!

Fall Finale

So I kind of...got busy with finals and all after my last post (20 is a busy age apparently), but I'll try to catch up.

So to finish out the semester and ring in the Christmas season, I went up to Temple Square 3 times: for the Savior of the World production, the First Presidency Devotional, and the Mormon Tabernacle Christmas concert thing. I just tried to upload pictures, but it took too long. It was really fun though, and best of all I got to enjoy it with my 3 favorite people at BYU: Kim, Paige, and Reece. Anyway, the semester ended finals went well, came out with all A's and B's for the semester.
Then I headed home to Dallas for Christmas. It was good to see everyone there and Christmas was really good! A lot of things about home are different for me now, but I still had a good time.


And now I am in New Hampshire with Jonothan and Leanne. We went down to NYC for New Year's Eve; that was a blast, but we were pretty dang tuckered out at the end of it all. Yesterday we went to Boston and Leanne and I went to the Chocolate Bar in the Langham Hotel, downtown Boston. It was fantastic. We were there for 3 hours eating chocolate and girl-talkin' while the boys were out walking around in the frigid coldness. Then we did some walking around Boston ourselves; 'twas good. Anyway other than those two big things, the trip has been a nice mixture of fun and relaxtion.

Tomorrow night I head back to BYU and oddly enough I am pretty dang excited to get back. Vacation is nice; I love seeing everyone from home, but my life is really in Utah now. Friends, boyfriend, school, job, apartment, all in Utah. It will be nice to go back.

Man I feel really boring posting without pictures. Sorry! I'll try to get some up when I can!