Letters

Dear Sunshine:
I am so glad that we have been able to spend more quality time together lately. My skin has desperately needed that bit of color that you so willingly provide. However, I wish very much that you would rise earlier in the mornings (I know, it's hard for all of us to do), but I really love it when it's light outside when I run. 6:00am would be ideal. Thank you.

Dear Clean Eating:
We don't have a perfect relationship but when I'm good, you make me feel so great! And boy, there are so many options for delicious meals:

1. Celery with homemade natural peanut butter! So delicious and incredibly easy! (And we all know how much I love Peanut Butter. After having REAL peanut butter, I can never go back to the store bought kind. Seriously.) Celery is also wonderful with homemade hummus.
2. Yummy Lunch Salads: Lettuce, red peppers, chicken, carrots, celery and oil & vinegar dressing.
3. Cucumber Salad! My favorite! Cucumbers sliced, red pepper, chicken, 1 spoonful of plain yogurt and seasonings! (I used black pepper, onion powder, and garlic powder.)
4. Stuffed Red Peppers: red pepper stuffed with cooked and seasoned barley, topped with mozzarella cheese and broiled in oven until cheese melted. Tomatoes added on top. Could also put in cooked chicken or beef with barley.

Some of my other favorites have been: hard boiled eggs, Peanut Butter Quinoa Bites (sweet enough for me without agave or chocolate!), green smoothies, Plain Whey Protein Isolate (add to oatmeal, green smoothies, fruit smoothies, etc.), carrot chips, Cinnamon Quinoa Bars, and Banana Egg Pancakes.
And can't wait to try: Raspberry Eggs and Lemon Crepes!

Dear Weekend:
I want you to come faster. Conference, home, family, sunshine, sleeping in, and home cooked meals.

Dear Rue 21:
Although you drained a good chunk out of my bank account last week, I sure am loving all my new summery outfits. Most favorite--white pants, plaid shirt, tan flats.

Dear Race Training:
Unfortunately my sanity is not allowing me to run the Utah Valley Marathon (thank goodness I can defer my registration to 2014), but Ragnar here we come! I am ecstatic!

Dear Thyroid:
From the signs, I'm assuming that its you that's been giving me all the troubles lately--dry skin, breaking nails, falling out eyelashes, fatigue, and worst of all, forgetfulness--not acceptable in my job. Something will have to be done soon.

Dear Lake Powell:
I am desperately missing you these days. I can't wait to try out my new water ski on your beautiful blue waters this summer. Please don't miss me too much.

Dear Y Awards:
You are coming up so quickly! Amazingly, I am not feeling stressed yet. We have definitely done a good job of prioritizing our tasks. Can't wait for you to get here April 10th! Miss Gillian and I will be grateful when we pull you off successfully as the event of the century!

Dear New York:
Our plans to see each other are going to have to wait another year and a half. Some changes have come about. However...

Dear San Francisco:
I am now hoping to see you sometime soon instead!

Sincerely,

 

An Ode to My Closet

Dear Closet:

Do you see how full you are?
Do you know how much I love shopping?
Do you see how we have a problem?
Do you know that most shopaholic girls would just go buy more hangers?
Do you see how you are chock full and another hanger would not fit?
Do you know that I love having new clothes to wear?
Do you see that I have also bought a lot of the clothes on great sales?
Do you know that you also have to spend money to save money?
Do you see that your hanger rod might come out of the wall someday?
Do you know that all my dresser drawers and under-my-bed-totes are also full of clothes?
Do you see that I have more than 50 pairs of shoes?
Do you know that I pay lots of money for my tiny room and tiny closet?
Do you see how I have to get rid of older-much-still-in-style-shirts in order to fit the new ones?
Do you know that most of the time I don't really even miss those shirts?
Do you see how I have an absolutely first world problem?

Thank you. I appreciate you listening.

Christmas for the Masses

Remember how I got a new job?
Well, guess what? I LOVE it.
Just a little bit lot.

Starting in October, I was thrown into the fire of Christmas planning.
Yes. In October.

Christmas in BYU Athletics is kind of a big deal. And filled with lots of blue, silver, and white decorating. No red. Obviously.

Christmas planning has included:

• Department Party Planning
• Christmas Card Creating, Ordering, and Delivering (Total ordered: 6500)
• Kneaders Christmas Basket Ordering for University Contacts Gifts (Total ordered: 98)
• Poinsettia Ordering (Total ordered: 60)
• 12 Days of Christmas Charity Event Planning, Coordinating, and Delivering
• Athletic Department Gift Decided, Ordered, and Delivered
• University Gift Delivered
• Christmas Decorating

Yes. My Christmas has been busy already.
Not to mention a bazillion shopping trips. So many, in fact, that I have no desire to do my own Christmas Gift shopping. My Christmas Gift to you is this lovely blog update on my life. Conceited. I know.
But Merry Christmas.

With all of that ordering, my office, went from bad messy to worse messy.

But the decorating went underway, the cards were created, gifts were ordered, charity money started coming in, and and the poinsettias were delivered and are now dying. Gotta remember to water them...  

And of course major party planning proceeded.

1. Department Christmas Gift: Large Beach Umbrellas. Ready for the beach anyone? Yes.
2. Poinsettias
3. Small Christmas Tree
4. Office Decorations. Yes. Red. It's Christmas. Get off my back.
5. Christmas Card
6. Is decorating always this much of a pain??

The party was absolutely successful!
But wow, our group is growing. An expansion is definitely going to have to happen next year!

Party Decor and Tables:

A BYU Athletic Department completed with 500 Guests, Cosmo, Gingerbread Houses, Coloring, Sugar Cone Christmas Tree Decorating, and Minute to Win It Games.

After weeks and weeks of planning, coordinating, ordering, delivering, and decorating, my office is finally tidy, kind of. I'm almost Christmas-ed out, shopped-out and decorting-out, but boy,
I LOVE my job!

For the Love: Neon and Nail Polish

I'd say it's high time for an update on life.

Firstly: I am in love with my new Neon Shirt.

I know you are in love now too.
(Courtesy of The Gap. Gonna go back and get me more tomorrow.)


















Secondly: Who'da thought of all the possibilities of nail polish?

Surely pinterest...
Now my totally "un-smart" phone looks extremely legit.

Happy Tuesday!

A Run, Skip, and A Scoot

A Run:

With only 9 days left until the Wasatch Back Ragnar, am I fully prepared with the coolest, and hopefully fastest, new running shoes.

A Skip:

I'm skipping for joy in anticipation for when this new mode of transportation is complete.
Thank you Daddy for finding a smokin deal and for being such a great fixer-upper!
Even though you can't tell by the picture, there is wreck damage underneath that's being fixed.

FYI: Almost checking off #53: Own A Mazda.
(See right side bar. But with that, I might never check #55...)


A Scoot:

Let me just tell you a little story.

So remember back in 1999 when pokemon cards were the rage, Harry Potter's adventures had just begun, gas was only $1.22 per gallon, myspace became popular, we knew every word to any Backstreet Boy song, and life didn't get any better than when the Razor Scooter came out??

Well, back then, razor scooters cost like $200. And with as much begging that I did, I'm impressed that my  parents didn't cave and get me one. Instead, they taught me to be a responsible saver and save my money to buy one myself. But guess what? 75 cents a month just didn't add up fast enough before I wanted to start saving for a car instead.

However, now that I am an absolutely responsible, saving adult,
my childish dreams have not been deterred.

With the price significantly lowered, and my saving money significantly increased, this little beauty came today.

And I'm going to ride it every day to work until it's too cold.
 Yes, it will definitely enhance my youngest-employee-in-the-whole-BYU-Athletic-Department image.

Gotta keep up appearances right?

With all these new modes of transportation,
the world is just impatiently waiting to be explored!

On my Mind

1. Loved coming home to this last weekend. Oh how I love Sanpete.

2. These great boots that I ordered yesterday! Absolutely cannot wait for them to come in the mail!!

3. After serving the Lord for 18 months in Buenos Aries North, Argentina, this girl is finally home!! Can't wait to see her this weekend!

4. Thanks to BYU Gymnastics, this was delivered to me yesterday. It makes the anticipation of EUROPE even better!!

5. Loving this little candle. "Sparkle of Spring." Oh how I love warm weather. 

(Warning: do not try to blow out a candle really hard when you are 3 cm from it. Wax flies everywhere.)

6. Really liking my red and gray today. Right down to the red high heels. (Red ≠ support of Utah)

7. This little beauty is almost finished and ready to hang up in my office! Just needs a few more pearl button flower centers. (Thank you pinterest.)

An obession to confess:

I love being a girl and because I love being a girl it is unavoidably innate in me to

love love love shopping.
I am a college student with only a part-time job and this is not a good habit. I keep track of everything that I spend, but this is still not eliminating this wonderful/horrible obsession. As bad as this is, I thought all you bloggers would like to know
my secret to obsessed shopping on a budget:

1. This wonderful website: http://www.freebies2deals.com/ It is seriously amazing. I believe it is done by a lady in the Salt Lake area, but she goes to soooo much work to let us all know where the great deals are! Check it out. It's great!
2. By using the above website, last week I got this necklace online at Forever 21 for $4.50 and free shipping! I am wearing it today and I love it!
3. Also from the above website, I got jeans at JC Penny for only $18.99 after using the code GO4TEN to get $10 off an item over $10. You can also use the code CARING4U to get free shipping on a shopping cart with over $49 worth of items. (I think that promo only goes for a few more days.) And today, I got new leggings for only $4.75 after using the code FORUONLY to get 20% off any clearanced or regular item and SHIPFREE to get free shipping.
   
4. Last week I obtained a coupon for 25% off any item at Bealls from the website http://www.grocerysmarts.com/ . This website password for Utah is g84cjt. I mostly use this website to find all the great grocery shopping deals and print coupons all for free and no registration! I came across the coupon for Bealls and went and hit the store on Saturday. I found a few great things in the clearance racks that were discounted 65%. When I went up to the register, the clearance items were discounted another 20%. Plus, I had my coupon for one item 25% off which made one of my items almost free! Wahoo!
5. Like I mentioned, I use the website http://www.grocerysmarts.com/ to do all my grocery shopping. It takes a little bit of time to go through but I save over $25 a month, at least, on groceries. (Yes, I know, it's kind of weird to be so obsessed with it, but it's kind of a fun game to see how much you can save!)
6. I also use other websites such as http://couponcravings.com/http://www.cellfire.com/deals.php http://shortcuts.com/ to get more coupon savings as well.
   

Clearly, I need some help. But when I find great deals, it's hard to resist. If you have any suggestions (preferably not more great sites or deals to tempt me) to help me curb this habit, please share so my wallet does not end up looking like this by the time I am 21!