I Went to Bear World

After driving past it for years every time I went to Idaho Falls I finally got to visit Bear World this past weekend. I'm normally not a zoo person because I feel bad for all of the animals. (I have written multiple research papers about the benefits of zoos and do understand the good they do. Particularly for endangered species.) Bear World was cool though because it was a slightly more natural setting where you would drive your car through and spot the bears along the way. They also had a gift shop filled with every Idaho souvenir known to man,a petting zoo, and two small enclosures that each contained three bear cubs. The petting zoo contained the most darling ugly/cure pig ever and I make me feel a little guilty about the bacon I had for breakfast that morning. The bear cubs were so playful and I watched them until I got too cold and had to go inside.

 I took a little bit, but I convinced the pig to be my friend

 I know the pictures don't show it, but theses guys were so playful and tons of fun to watch

Things I Overhear on Campus

Two girls talking over lunch: The Provo Temple looks like a spaceship. It's not cute at all!

I personally think that the Provo Temple looks like a cupcake with an candle on top

A girl telling her friend about her mission call to Toronto: Toronto is near New York right?

My professor talking about how gasoline is highly taxed in California: I wish that I were a young single man in California. Then when I would take a young fox on a date I could tell her that because gas is so expensive that we can't drive so then we'll just have to sit in the car and fog up the  windows. 

Girl at the nail salon: Your boyfriend served his mission in the Philippines? So he speaks Spanish then?

It's all golden and I love it

Now we can talk about incredibly silly things I've done the past few weeks:

-Walked into the wrong classroom, sat down, and pulled out my books. The professor told me that they were having a class in that room and that I had to leave. I don't think I've ever turned to red.

-Discovering in yoga that I had terrible balance. Enough said.

-Forgetting my new phone number every time someone asks for it.

Weekend

On Friday night I went  to Idaho Falls with my lovely roommates were we consumed burgers at Five Guys, window shopped at the mall, and then went to go see The Vow. I'm still now sure how I felt about The Vow, I felt the the entire movie built up to a moment that never happened, but I also thought that the ending of the movie was super cute.

On Saturday I went out for Thai food with my best friend. When we were eating this guy walked up us and asked us what we has ordered, because he thought it looked good. Talk about awkward!

I also tried to dedicate a large chunk of time to homework on Saturday, but it didn't go too well. For my first two years of college I have done a pretty good job of keeping up on my homework, and have been able to spend hours everyday in library getting all of my work done. I was also attached to my day planer and wrote all of my assignments in it religiously. Now it feels like my focus has thrown window. After about 20 minutes in the library I start to think about when I can go home, and have become a master procrastinator. It's driving me crazy! I feel like I have switched from one extreme to another! Does anyone have any ideas to help me focus?

Big Yellow Taxi

Today in world religions class my professor asked us why we need to see someone who is blind to be grateful that we can see? 

That question has been on my mind all day 

Why is it that we need to see what others don't have to make us grateful for what we do have?

I don't have a good answer to this question. I think it is human nature to not know how much we have until we see something different. The chorus to Big Yellow Taxi by Counting Crows says:

Don't it always seem to go,

That you don't know what you've got 

Til its gone

It's true a lot of the time we don't know what we have until its taken from us, or if see someone who doesn't have it. I think that this is a good thing! Last year I spent 5 months working with individuals who have disabilities. I learned so much in that five months that it would take me hours to list, but the most important thing that I learned was to be grateful. I learned to be grateful that I could walk, see, put my shoes on, zip up my coat, drive a car, eat without help, read, jump, dance, run, cook, sing, paint my nails, ice skate, brush my hair, buy a soda out of a vending machine, grab the change out of my wallet, type an email, and make my bed in the morning. 

This experience made me realize that I needed to work on being more grateful, and lately I have made an effort to do so. I am amazed at the impact that is has had in my life. I find that the small things that go wrong in my day are not a big deal, I see beauty wherever I go, and find it easy to love the people around me. I am so glad that my job gave me the nudge that I needed to make a change my outlook.

Since it has been stuck in my head all day here is the Video for Big Yellow Taxi

Has Spring Finally Arrived?

The sun is shining, the snow is melting, and it rained last night. This can only mean one thing:

SPRING IS COMING!

No more frozen toes, fingers, or noses!

No more wearing a scar wherever I go!

No more wool socks!

In other news....

I had quite the little saga happen this week with my purple computer. On Sunday night when I plugged in my computer to charge nothing happened! Worst feeling ever. As a student my laptop is extremely important to me. I think I would die without it. So I spent Sunday night running around the house testing every outlet to see if my changer works in any of them. After much distress I found an outlet that worked.....in the bathroom. Ya, not cool. Unfortionatly it only worked momentarily, and I was left with no way to charge my purple computer.

On Monday Drizzle drove me over to Radio Shack to see if they had a charger that would work for my computer. they did but it was $100. So we ended up going to Best Buy in Idaho Falls to get a charger there. The sales people assured me that the charger they had would work with my computer, so I bought it. With eagerness when I got home I tried out the new charger and it worked! The only catch was the it only POWERED my purple computer, it would not CHARGE it. Having to constantly be plugged into a wall is no good, sometimes there just isn't an outlet around to plug your laptop into!

I finally ended up calling Dell and had a lovely conversation with a person in India who had poor English skills. Despite the language barrier I was able to order a new charger. It arrived yesterday and works perfectly. Crises over!

Halfway Done

Today marks the end of first block. That means the semester is HALF OVER already. It also means that I am done my math class. I am absolutely ecstatic about this; it will be such a relief to not have to worry about math homework every night! I am also looking forward to having more time to study for my other classes.

It's also Presidents Day weekend (Family Day in Canada) and we get Monday off so I am going to Provo to visit Sheilagh. I'm really excited to to get out of Rexburg for a few days and to have wonderfully fun times with Sheilagh. It sounds like she has an incredibly fun weekend planned for us.

January's Happenings

I've been back in Rexburg for just under a month. Here are some of the highlights:

Living with one of my best friends Jenna. I love sharing a room with her and discussions before bed. It's truly a miracle that we get any sleep at all!

Hanging my map of Canada poster. It seriously took me an hour and half a roll of tape to get this poster on the wall only to have it fall down on me at 4:00am.

Attending LeeAnna's mission farewell in Utah.

Jenna's car breaking down on the highway in Utah.

The tower of stools. I'm pretty sure I didn't shut of door completely when I left for FHE. Someone came into our apartment and made this lovely sculpture for us.

The consumption of many Animal Crackers. I added chocolate to the mix this year. They have popular, and I have been told that they are delicious with peanut butter.

Rain Boots

In the slushy Rexburg winters there is really nothing better than rain boots! They allow me to walk though every puddle I see on my way to class, and keep my toes warm and dry. I adore them and wear them nearly everyday.

And they are just so cute!

Living at Nauvoo!

Pictures of my apartment!

“I hear it’s kinda weird in here. Can I take a look around?”

Since we live in the wheelchair accessible apartment our layout is different from all of the other apartments, we don't have cabinets under our sinks,the counters are lower, and our bathrooms are bigger.

The other day we had a girl over and she said, “I hear it’s kinda weird in here. Can I take a look around" I have to agree with her, it is kinda weird in here, but its not the floor plan, its the people, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

BYU IDAHO-DISCIPLE TRANNING CENTER

My math class wasn't challenging enough so I switched in to a more difficult one. I had to go buy I new textbook for the class and on my way to the bookstore 2 people said good morning to me. I love living in a place where everyone is so friendly. I got to the bookstore and BINGO! They had my book, it's a used damaged book so I got it for ghetto cheep, but when I got to the checkout I realized that I had forgotten my wallet in my purse at home. The cashier was really understating, and even set my book aside so I could just come back and quickly pay.

In my math class my teacher didn't have an extra course syllabus for me, and I didn't have time between Math and Humanities to run to his office and get one. I wasn't too worried about it. I was just going the assignment off of my roommate who is also taking the same class. Near the end of class the girl sitting behind me tapped on my shoulder, and handed me a note. She had written out today's AND all of the assignments I had missed the first two days of class! It was honestly the nicest thing a stranger has ever done for me. I cant believe that she remembered that I didn't have a syllabus, and took the time while the professor was lecturing to write everything out.



You can see on the picture of the note that some of the assignments are EOO, it stands for Evey Other Odd. She Even wrote the every other odds up to 21 for me! This girl went above and beyond, she didn't have to do this for me at all. Her actions were truly Christlike. I was told that BYU-I is a disciple training center. I encountered many of these disciples today. I feel so blessed to be here.