Spring Break

It was so nice being home over Spring Break. I saw a lot of people I had been missing very much and was also able to celebrate my grandmother's 80th birthday with her, but the best part of being home was being able to watch my brother open his mission call for The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Most of my time at home was spent getting preparations ready for my grandmother's birthday party. She, reluctantly, let my mom and me be in charge of the decor. Knowing that she loves lighthouses and wind socks I thought it would be fun to incorporate both things into a garden theme. So while we had family around we let everyone paint their own lighthouses. As you can see, it was a great success.

Originally, I wanted to have two large hoops for the wind socks with progressively smaller hoops to represent my grandmother's children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Unfortunately, I ran out of time, but the idea was still there in hoops that did get progressively smaller; I just didn't have the right number of hoops. The end result was still very nice and gave a great feel to the space.

But as I said before, the best part of being home was being able to watch my brother open his mission call. He has been called to serve in the Cincinnati, Ohio mission and will report to the Missionary Training Center on May 13, 2015.

I'm going to miss him like crazy, but he's going to make one incredible missionary!

Putting the dead in dead week

First off, I need to apologize for the amount of time it has been since my last post.  Dead week really killed me.  In addition to being sick, I had two big projects to get done and also preparing for my friend to come visit during finals week.  Since then my life has been pretty hectic but I've finally found some time to sit down and write a new post. :)

Rather than tell you all about how awful finals and final projects are I'll just talk about how amazing it was to have my friend here for finals week!

I picked him up on a Sunday from the Portland airport and we immediately drove to Seattle.  While in Seattle we visited the Space Needle, Pike's Market Place and took a ride in an enclosed Ferris Wheel gondola.

(the rain was falling in my eyes...)

While he was here we also went into Salem and spent some time at the capital building, we visited both the OSU and U of O campuses and wandered out to the coast.

Somewhere in the midst of all this fun I did manage to take a final and complete an 18-page paper.  The biggest lesson I learned, though, is that if you have to go through final's week, it's best to do it while you have a best friend by your side!