As Bailey would say, "The Christmas 1/3 of the year!"

September 23-28
"Life sucks and then it gets better and then it sucks again. and then it just sucks." -Nick Miller, New Girl

This week has sort of been a roller coaster. Monday (I know I already blogged about it) was rough, Tuesday was better! So.Much.Better! Wednesday was meh. Thursday was a struggle. Friday was FANTASTIC!! Saturday was great! AND Sunday was pretty great! Therefore, the week was pretty good! :D

9/23 I went to Ashley's going away party because she is moving to Japan for a year for a Study Abroad. Jake and Jess had a contest about who could take the biggest bite. I think Jess won! :)

9/24 I worked the office until 10 and then we went to Jake and Charity's house. We made Cookie-Zookies! It was so fun! Bailey and I specialize in being attractive.

9/25 PREQUEND!!! We went to Fizz n Fry! It was delicious!! Then we watched New Girl for a while! P.S. 3 months until Christmas (You're welcome Bailey.)

9/26 Hannah came and visited! It was sooo fun to see her! We went to dinner at the Crepery and they had PUMPKIN CREPES! It was delicious! I wish this day could have lasted forever!We went to Nathan, James, and Speedy's house and played games and made cookies! It was pretty great! Then I had to say goodbye to Hannah for a bit. :(

Went to the General Women's Conference! It was so fun!

We ate dinner at the Cheesecake Factory.

Happy Sunday! I drove dad to the airport and went to Kyle Cooper's homecoming and Kira's homecoming! It was fun to see them!

9/21 & 22

I am trying to take my blog back to it's roots and really post a picture a day. :D I know I have said I'm going to do this for a long time, but this time is for real!! So... here we go!

9/21: This Sunday was special! It was the Re-dedication of the Ogden Temple! It was such a great and spiritual meeting! I am so grateful that I am blessed with the knowledge of the temple and the blessings they bring! Later, Brad Wilcox did a fireside at the tabernacle! It was so good! He is a great speaker and I love listening to him. I always laugh and still learn so much!!

{Bailey, Me, Jessica outside the tabernacle.}

9/22: Most weeks, Monday's are hard. This week was no exception. I had a lot to do. But by the end of the night. All was okay! Never underestimate the power of french toast sticks at Midnight Breakfast. They will ALWAYS make my day! I love them!

The OAFIG went rock climbing! We were gone for like 5 hours. It was a blast!!

Winning Team. Losing Team.

Sometimes, I feel like I am on the losing team. Probably more than I actually am, haha. But really, some days you win and some days you lose. This week (September 15-20) was mostly wins (which was a relief).
(15) Monday Funday? Mondays are rough. Every. Week. Seriously though. I have a bunch of stuff always going on on Mondays, but they are still fun days! Did I ever mention I am on a flag football intramural team? Well, I am. And we are THE underdogs. Seriously, if we score, we are lucky. Haha But we have fun! SOMUCHFUN!! We played this really mean team this week. They were cocky and knew they were good so they used it to their advantage and crushed us. They were rude to us when we scored. Let's just say, by the end of the game, we all wanted to punch their QB. He was a jerk! Then we had staff meeting and it was real long. So long. But I am in charge of the Haunted House! Yay!! Jess, Bai, and I went to Charity's for a while and hung out with her and Jake! It was fun! I like them! :)
(16) Tuesday! Tuesdays are pretty...meh? I worked and did homework. Talked with a resident. But the highlight was that we played Groundies! It was a blast!! We had a pretty large group and I didn't know half of them, which was great! I love playing Groundies. Then we came back and watched New Girl for like an hour. (When I say we, I am usually referring to Jess, Bai, and I because we do everything together!)
(17) Wednesday... EW. Highlight of the day? We had GenCow? It was long and boring, but I had to be there. If you don't know what GenCow is, you're lucky. Just Kidding. I don't usually mind it. Haha. The first one of the year is just usually long and I had a lot to do. GenCow= General Council. It is the RHA (Residence Hall Association) business meeting that happens every month. Its super fun! Then we went to Walmart to get stuff for Jess and Bai's program.
(18) Oh, Thursday... After a day of work and studying, I went to Caytee and Bryan's going away party. It was fun. We watched Despicable Me 2 and talked and watched some strange tv show that Sperry showed us and the Colbert Report. It's what happens when you are the only girl (other than Caytee).... you watch strange things. But it was nice to hang out with all those cool kids. (Cambam, Nik, Sperry, Caytee, Bryan, and Michael {Sperry's old roommate from Reeder}) After, I watched New Girl with Jess and Bai. It is pretty safe to assume that we watch at least one episode of New Girl every night. But it is usually more.
(19) Friday. I went to class. Then saw Grandma and Grandpa Anderson, Aunt Kris, Aunt Shanna, Aunt Denise, Chandler, Carly, Corbin, Cambry, and met Denise's man, Scott. It was unfortunate that they were here for a funeral, but it was very fun to see them! Then I went to Caytee and Bryan's to help them finish packing. They had run out of space so I called up Jess and Bai and we drove to Heber. Then we spontaneously stayed the night. It was very fun! Good bonding time!
(20) Saturday.We woke up really early to drive home. Jess and Bai had a program at 9. Then at noon we went hiking. The actual experience up, was pretty miserable. People complained the whole time and it was pretty hot. We got probs the middle of the Windcaves Way trail and decided to turn around. Then we hiked to the Windcaves. It was fun after that. Then later we went to Nik's apartment and watched the USU-Arkansas State game. It was fun. We lost. It was depressing. Then we went home and ended the night with a New Girl 3rd night sleepover!

(Nik, Sami, Bailey, Nathan, Sperry, Kassi, Speedy, CamBam)

Woof. What a week!

This week. (September 7-13) I can honestly say I am sooo beyond happy that it is over. It was definitely a really long week. It obviously was long because it was right after a short week, but it was also a pretty rough week for me. Starting with Sunday night, my week was already hard, but I got through it and ended the week with a bang!

I am so grateful I have good friends and an awesome family! I don't know what I would do without them! <3 I love them. If I could name them all I would!

Here are some pictures from this week! It was a blast!

On Friday night, we hiked the Windcaves! It was a blast!! 

(Nathan, Kassi, Me, Buff, Dylan, Tyler, Juel, Lindsay)

We are so cool! Then we drove to Bear Lake to see the north lights. We saw nothing.

Footballllll!!!!!!! The US refs. I wonder who they are cheering for? U-State!

Bai and I ate strawberries and LOTS of whipped cream! Then we had a sleepover with Jess and watched New Girl! Party!!!

The GREATEST 24 hours ofmylife!

This post is specifically about September 5-6!! But those skipped days weren't too bad either!

Before we get to the best 24 hours! On Wednesday, I went to the Ogden Temple Open House and it is a beautiful temple! It is really close to the top of my favorite temple list now! I am so grateful for the temple and all of the blessings it brings to me in my life! 

NOW: This weekend was spend with most of my favorite people ever!! Bailey and Jess. I am so lucky to have them! <3 The Power Row! I can't believe this actually happened! It was like a dream!!

We hosted a program together at the Redneck Waterslide! It was a blast!! After the waterslide fun, we went to the Institute dance where I met up with Megan!! I accidentally tackled her. It was quite a show I gave the millions of people hanging out there. For the record, I was running down a hill and just couldn't stop. It was super embarrassing and I injured both of us. But now she has something to remember me by! ;)

Then we headed over to Caytee and Bryan's house. There were soooo many people. 21 to be exact! New friends, old friends, SO MANY PEOPLE!! We got some pizza and talked and watched a movie. It was like we had been there our whole lives and nothing had changed, but at the same time, SO MUCH HAS CHANGED!! Two years is a crazy amount of time! I am a completely different person than I was two years ago. But I wouldn't change those experiences for anything.

On Saturday morning, we went to IHOP for breakfast! It was a blast! I am so glad I got to see all these kids!!

We met Charlie the Chocolate Chip Pancake! Haha

(Nik, Hannah, Megan, Sami, DeBryn, Charlie, Preston, John)

Look at how many of us there are!! I love these people!

I then hung out with Jess for a while! This picture describes us to a T.

Megan and Hannah came and said goodbye to me before they left! I love these girls!

Then Bailey, Jess, and I went to the Stampede and the football game. We met up with Nik, Preston, and John. Then we went to their apartment and watched a movie. They picked it. It was called Good Burger and it was pretty dumb. But really. The boys all thought it was funny and all the girls thought it was not. Haha But we can check it off our list. So whatere.They are cool kids. 

I love my life!

Umm.. Summer?

Welp. Summer didn't last. It never does, which is okay because... UTAH STATE IS THE BEST! During training, we went to the scrimmage one night. It was pretty fun!

Kellie, Stephanie, Kassi, Jess, Jasey, Rachel, Me, Bailey, Tyler..

I taught Jess how to be a rhino.

We (specifically Rach) are so cute!

Commitment. We waited in line for 2 hours to get a signature from each football player.

FIGs4Life

Let the fun begin!!

#RoadTrippinRoyalls

We spent the last 2 weeks of summer in the Midwest! It was a blast and we saw so much! I am so very lucky to have such a wonderful family!!

We started with eating dinner at Sonic in Sydney, NE. It was not good. BUT shakes were half price! :)

In the morning we walked across to Cabella's. It was an experience! 

Our next stop was somewhere in Nebraska. We literally just saw a campground and pulled over. Well, they had a pool, a park, beautiful sunsets, and FROGS!! So many frogs!

Like I said, SO MANY FROGS! We actually swam with frogs.

Also, our campground had a mini golf course, and everybody knows you can't play mini golf (or croquet) without flamingos!

We stopped at the Winter Quarters Temple! It is beautiful! I mean every Temple is beautiful, but seriously. Look at those windows!

Sadly, we were unable to go in the temple and do baptisms. But we were able to go to the Winter Quarters visitors' center and walk around.

I LOVE TO SEE THE TEMPLE!

When we finally made it to Nauvoo, we found out that the pageant was ending! :( But luckily for us, we were able to see the last night of the Brittish pageant AND the Nauvoo pageant! It was pretty exciting! We also saw the Epps family!

We drove off to St. Louis to pick up Katie from the airport. It was a long drive there and back, but I'd say it was worth it. Because....

We went to Pappy's SmokeHouse! It was delicious!! We waited in line for like 2 hours and it was so incredibly worth every minute in the heat! The food was to die for and my dad got to check that off his list! :) We even met the owner!

Megan and Katie were united again and spent their first night together at the Nauvoo pageant!

We celebrated Megan's birthday!

Once in Nauvoo, we dropped Megan and Katie off at EFY! It brought back some great memories! Which also brought back a whirlwind of things I learned when I was just 17! It changed me! This is in the Women's garden. It is gorgeous there! But really. I have never seen somewhere so green with flowers the size of my head EVERYWHERE!!! This garden has statues of women in every stage of life. My stage is pictured above.

We went to the Sarah Granger Kimball house. We found it on accident and the missionaries said that many people miss out on this awesome place, which also means they miss out on the fantastic story that goes with it! Sarah Granger Kimball was a marvelous woman! I can only hope to be a remarkable as her and accomplish such great things! If you don't know who she is, LOOK IT UP!! 

As we were crossing the river one day back to Keokuk, we saw some barges getting pushed into the lock. So, naturally we stopped and stood out in the rain to watch something, that is normal to people of the Mississippi, happen. It was actually pretty cool and amazing if you think about it.

One of those days, we went to Carthage. It is a cool experience to be able to see such a sacred place! It is also quite amazing that it has been preserved for all of this time! 

We were able to do baptisms in the temple and it was Jake's first time!! So cool! This temple is so different from all of the temples, but the same. 

In case you were wondering, Nauvoo is such a special place in my heart! I love it. Let me repeat that: I LOVE IT!!!! You can feel how it is a different place before you even get out of the car. You can feel the spirit everywhere you go. Everywhere you go, you have the spirit. And a strong one too! I wish everywhere was just like that. 

Isn't this breath-taking?

We got to go on a wagon ride AND a carriage ride. 

Sometimes, when you have siblings, you match them.

#selfienation 

We went to a show that all the missionary couples put on. It was cute.

Jake and I got to explore Nauvoo by ourselves while the parents and grandparents did a session at the temple. We went to the Brigham Young home and it was pretty good bonding time.

Just me. At the Snow White well. Wishing for my prince to come.

On our way home, we stopped in Hannibal, MO. Yeah, we hiked the stairs to that lighthouse up there. 244 stairs later, we were all pretty tired.

Megan and I in the performing square. Megan was giving me a monologue about Huck Finn when trolley of tourists came through and stopped to listen. It was pretty awk.

Hot kids we have problems too. Haha But really. IT.WAS.SO.HOT.

Liberty Jail was pretty cool. I can't even talk about how much I learned!

Megan. Doing (pretend) Yoga. In Independence, MO.

We stopped in Kansas and broke out the Red Solo Cup lights. :) And we completed our trip. 

All I have to say:

If you get the chance to go to Nauvoo, DO IT!!