where i'm going, where i've been

We're coming up on that time of year...the one where I start making long lists of things ter-do. Today I was telling a friend that I may or may not be at a very important event in her life sometime in 2012. But it's hard to tell because my life takes me to very unexpected places. And she said "that's incredibly true." Yeah. See for yourself.

tehuacan, mexico.

an oft-used storage closet (for once the name "sardines" is appropriate for this game)

trees in the jungle. barefoot.

six flags...mexico...rollercoasters. psyche.

very slanted alleyways in taxco, mexico. it's like italy (ish).

on top of very famous, very old pyramids. obviously enthralled.

inside of very scary, very ghetto "hotel rooms," underground, on the outskirts of mexico city.

inside of classrooms, teaching hooligans like this.

the zocalo.

in front of interesting foods, like mole.

this little house for 3 months.

behind the church, playing futbol every thursday.

in a boat, by the beach somewhere in mexico, with some crocodiles nearby.

the rigby idaho tv museum. what? we paid for this?

the very last Harry Potter premiere. sniffle.

the ragnar.

still can't believe i did that.

the taco bus, some five jillion times. (ok, this isn't that surprising)

some lovely summery bike rides.

and other pretty places in Utah which are kind of hidden.

Do you remember how I had a feeling that 2011 was going to be really awesome? Well, it was. And I know the same thing about 2012. I'm already seeing some interesting stuff in my crystal ball...

• florence+the machine. I'm late to this party, but I came nonetheless.
• graduate school, huh?
• EFY counselor, perhaps, perhaps
• many weddings, many weddings
• south america por la primera vez. ohhh yeah.
• graduation-station!
• new music! aha! this will never change
• a concert. dang right
• an adventure to Zion's
• missionaries coming home (a.k.a. Chelsea Ann Bedke and Courtney Gopp)
• mucho happiness

MERRY CHRISTMAS AND HAPPY NEW YEAR, FRIENDS!

thanks for all who read this blog, stumble upon it by googling very weird things, and those who comment. I love all of you. Except for the creepstaches.

fridee

hooray for weekends, hooray for hot chocolate with chocolate chips stirred in, hooray for new mixes, hooray for doorbell ditching, hooray for little notes to people i love, hooray for the chilliness which means I get to wear scarves and boots every day, hooray for preach my gospel, hooray for baseball hats, hooray for babies and classes all about them, hooray for 12-year olds who can't stop talking about star wars, hooray for phone calls to connect me to parents, hooray for old journal entries which help me make sense of everything senseless, hooray for running into secret crushes all the time, hooray for letters from out of the country, hooray for soup, hooray for old friends coming to visit, hooray for the temple on the hill, hooray for everything, everything.

and while i'm at it, here's what else is making me happy this week.

1. passion pit, and this song.

2. hocus pocus, a classic. (yes, I am aware it is a halloween movie, but it's still october in my mind)

3. this post by sydney. baby hunger, get thee hence!

4.autumn bike rides.

5. this video--just too good to be true.

6. postmodernism, for making me want to cry every time i do an assignment. the stories are so stinkin' good. all of you should read this book.

7. newspaper poetry.

8. awesome/amazing/brilliant ideas that strike in the middle of the night (sound familiar? the same thing happened about a year ago....and strangely it had to do the with the exact same subject. see number 8.). this one is just...oh man, i don't even have words.

9. this idea to make popcorn, saved me moolah. and now i eat popcorn a lot more. hrm....

what can i say, it's friday and it's november and nobody is playing Christmas music at the moment, so i'm feeling snaaazzy. how is your weekend looking?

dance, dance, dance the night away.

first day of summer

Today I sat outside and read D.H. Lawrence.

I let the grass cram between my toes like furniture in a small apartment.

The sun was hanging very carefully behind some trees, almost like it was about to drop suddenly. I thought about the sunsets in Mexico. Good evening, Rexburg. Good evening, Mexico.

I went inside and ate a mango with honey on it. Then my taste buds composed a thousand Odes to Joy. I always knew my mouth liked classical music.

Only five more weeks 'til long nighttime walks, early morning hikes, and the sound of Catherine Creek in my ears.

I love summer.

simple things

"And it came to pass that we lived after the manner of happiness." 2 Nephi 5:27

1. Old photographs

2. My kinda shoe closet

3. Traveling

4. Pretty hair

5. Naps

6. Mumford & Sons, in a boat no less

7. Mangoes

8. Just plain awesome

9. Fancy-schmancy shampoo, makes your hair smell like pumpkin pie (?!)

10. Farmers market berries

11. Beach campfires

12. Breakfast+peanut butter

13. Spring

14. Sweet chalk art

15. Pretty sure I could live in South America, no problem

16. Bobby D.

17. Mm soup

18. Manti

19. Longboards

20. Fro yo

21. Bike riding

friday list: currently diggin'

Um. Guys. I accidentally started watching prison break. bad idea. because guess what, wentworth miller is the bee's knees. he's only a genius, trying to save his innocent brotha from the electric death. oh yeah, and he makes paper cranes on the side. what the junk? can my future husband please be really manly and yet make paper cranes on the side? thanks. awesome. (that was on the off-chance that my future husband reads this blog. hah.)

AND plus when you watch the show you learn all of this sweet prison lingo like "shank" (a homemade knife) "fish" (the MTC equivalent of "greenie"), and "bust your grapes" (not sure what this one means yet but it's kinda funny).

oh...and it also makes me really grateful that I'm not in prison. Which I won't be anytime soon, unless taking mexican chocolate across the border is illegal.

Sooooo you guys know I like lists, right? Right. I should probably go to some kind of rehab for it. What would we do at this rehab exactly? Maybe they would force me to write all of my separate thoughts into one giant paragraph. Ugh. That would be torturous. I hate huge, long, never ending paragraphs. {yet I am an English major. Analyze that please.}

Anyway. I have conjured up another list of awesomeness for you, to congratulate you on making it to Friday. Not only is it Friday, but according to my calculations, it is almost spring! For all of you who do not live in Mexico (I promise I'm sorry for you), especially in Rexburg, you're probably thinking, "Geesh, when is it gonna be sunny already?" Or, if you are a glass-half-full person like myself, you are thinking, "Geesh, when it is gonna be sunny already?!"

Oh wait.

Those sounded exactly the same.

Guess it needs to be spring already, huh. I'm pretty sure when I get back to the USA in less than a month, it will immediately start acting like spring. I'll bring the Mexican weather back with me for you guys. You're welcome!

On to the friday likey-list. Saying "likey" makes me feel like I'm 7 again, p.s.

1. books. i have a very small library here in mexico. it consists of spencer w. kimball's teachings (good book but not when I wanna just plop myself in bed and read all night long, ya know?), a runner's book, and "1001 pitfalls in spanish." i'm dying. i have a few gagillion things on my must-read list when i get home. guess what, i'll probably finish them in a month. guilty as charged.

2. polaroids. just look at these beauties.

ahhhh yeah. call me shallow.

3. places i would rather be, a.k.a. a photographic "happy place," for those days when I just need to get away. but don't have any monayyyy.

4. the D.I. is so cool. I literally cannot wait until I get to go visit one of these again. Is it weird to miss a thrift store that smells like old books and musty clothes? Yeh. But I am the epitome of weird, soooo. Yeah. No me importa.

5. getting up early!!!! Once upon a time I wrote a journal entry and it was all about how much I wanted to be a morning person. I was tired of being the one who slept in and missed the good pancakes (or the good earthquakes for that matter...urgh). Then a miracle happened. I got up early for scripture study and everything else about my day was better. Guess what? Russell M. Nelson agrees with me. It's for real, folks.

6. funny things my kids say/do

(this is benji in a wrestling belt he fashioned out of his notebook. classy)

today i asked them, "do you guys know what happened in japan today?"

benjamin: "Oh I know!!! A SUSHI! A SUSHI!"

me: you mean...a tsunami?

benji: ohh..yeah...a tsunami.

i think he and grandma bonnie would be friends.

alejandro, when he walked into class today: "Today I am happy, teacher."

me: "Cuz it's Friday?"

him: "No, teacher, cuz I live."

me: "Because you're alive?" [as you can see I have to correct them a lot]

him: "Yeah, because I'm alive."

Always a good reminder.

I read to them from James and the Giant Peach today. The pictures are a little bit...unique. I opened to this page to show them what James looked like. First words out of Alejandro's mouth: "Whoa, he's very ugly, teacher. Verrry ugly."

These girls aren't in my class, but one of them (on the leftie there) is famous for a few lines:

"Some people in the world think that Justin Bieber are gay, because Justin Bieber are gay."

or, a really sweet one that she uses when Teacher Kaitlyn exasperates her:

"Aww, teacher, you are so injustice!"

Dontcha mean unfair sweetheart? Yeahhh.