Simply Me Here: Recapping Freshman Year

My freshman year at BYU turned out to be better than I could have imagined. I met so many wonderful people that impacted my life for the better. Living at Wyview was the best of both worlds. It was off campus, away from school so that I felt like I could get away. At the same time, I was surrounded by friends and often times felt like I couldn't find a little peace and quiet anywhere. I loved it. :)

The room Jess and I shared after we had packed up and moved out. What a great room full of so many memories!

Last Sunday with these lovely girls.

When I first moved in, I couldn't imagine myself living there for a year, but now it feels like home. Sitting in my new apartment for the spring semester, I know I'll learn to see this place as home someday. I lucked out to get the greatest roommates a girl could ask for last semester. It was so hard to say goodbye to these sweet, fantastic girls. They will be friends for life. :)

Would ya just look at us??

First, there's Jessica. This girl is the kind of girl that makes you want to be a better person. She is always so encouraging and uplifting and boy is she dedicated to her school work. I don't think I have ever met someone who could live off as little sleep as Jessica could. She would stay up till midnight and be up by 5 or 5:30 to read her scriptures and study Preach My Gospel before she went to work. I don't exactly know what she did in the wee hours of the morning because I always slept straight through the noise. Jessica was the first person to catch my sleep-talking habit. I suppose this is what college roommates are for! :) The funniest incident was when her alarm went off and she had her radio set to a country station. (I like to think that my love of country rubbed off on her but she swears she liked country music before) She didn't get up right away to turn it off, but when she did she heard a faint "mmm...country" coming from the top bunk. (I'm from Texas! What can I say?) :)

Apparently, when Jess found out that her soon-to-be roommate was from Texas, she imagined a tall, red headed girl with a thick Texan accent...instead she got me. :)

On another occasion, Jessica was deep in dream mode, having a nightmare about a blue blob chasing her. At exactly the same moment when the blob leaped at her to attack, I kicked my blue blanket off the top bunk. She woke up instantly, surprised and confused until she realized that it was only my blanket. After calming her breathing down she was finally able to fall back asleep. I slept soundly throughout the whole thing.

Dainia also taught me how to be a better person. She was the spunkiest of us all! She was so much fun to live with. Not only did she introduce us to the beautifulness of the Pazookie and the cupcakes at Cocoa Bean, but she gave us the idea to roll in the snow in our swimsuits (and we did it!).

During finals week, we decided to take one last trip to the Cocoa Bean. When I got up to throw my trash away, I said, "I'm gonna go..." and Dainia finished my sentence to say, "take a dump?"....not exactly Dainia...

What's a Pazookie?? A piece of heaven on a cookie sheet. :) Lay out cookie dough, bake, and pile with ice cream. Grab a spoon and eat off of the cookie sheet.

Dainia and I felt like decorating our apartment for weeks until one day we finally went out and bought a nice coffee table from target, purple pillows, the softest blanket we have ever felt ( "the baby maker"), a picture frame, a cute plaque that says, "Friends are the family you choose for yourself" and dandelion stickers for the wall to signify our hopes and dreams for the next few years.


The story of "the baby maker": One day, I called it the "blanket of love"...it was just so soft!!...but Jess didn't like me calling it that because she was reminded of the quilt in The Proposal...so of course we had to call it that just because it bugged her...hence the name, "the baby maker" :)

When Dainia and I found out we both played softball for years, we wanted to go out and throw a ball so badly, but alas, the multi-purpose building didn't have gloves. So, we bought ourselves some cheap softball gloves and headed outside during finals week to see if we still had it in us. In about a year and a half when I get back from my mission, we plan to play on an intramural team. I can't wait! :)

Our game faces.

We got along really well with two of the girls that lived across from us, Kiersten and Anika. One Sunday, we decided to have a girl's party. Dainia did everyone's hair and we painted each others' nails and talked about...well, probably boys.

Dainia and I also took Contemporary dance together. She is an amazing dancer! I was more or less dragged along. But I'm so glad that we did it! We worked on the dance for our final until 3 or so in the morning the night before we performed it. We made it up and perfected it in 7 hours or less. (and when I say "we" I mean mostly Dainia with me throwing out randomness in hopes that it sparks some genius idea in Dainia's mind). Our dance was about our friendship and about how we help each other through hard times. Fast forward to 9:04 :) You just gotta look at it!

SHOPPING! Dainia just got so excited about everything she liked and it was so hard to say no to a cute top or skirt when it had the Dainia stamp of approval. We splurged one day and got these Maxis after I told her I had been wanting one for months.We had so much fun playing with them. :)

Connected at the skirt :)

So, we had this tradition as roommates. Every time cleaning check came around we were rushing up until the very end to get it done and often wondered if we would pass. We passed EVERY. SINGLE. cleaning check. There were even times when we were complimented for being the CLEANEST apartment they had seen ALL DAY YET. So yeah, not to brag but we're pretty much professionals. So, each time we passed, we took a picture together. :) We had to get a little more creative each time.

Then, there were these three. Let's just say, I would not have survived freshman year without them...

First, I met Caleb. He was my roommate's (Jessica's) boyfriend's roommate. I tagged along with Jess to the get to know Wyview party, who met up with her boyfriend, Mike, who was joined by his roommate, Caleb. My first impression was that he was a really nice guy and easy to talk to. Before I knew it, he was my best friend. :) As freshman typically do, we were in a group talking about how we would manage to get around to go grocery shopping and what-not so I mentioned that I was getting a car in a few weeks. "You're my new best friend" he said. And so we went with it.


We took a cooking class together winter semester and learned how to make homemade pies...yummm :)

I learned a few things from Caleb:

1. Anyone who is not blonde is less than human.

2. Sometimes you just gotta look at it.

3. Art can be found in more places than in art classes and music performances...even a board game.

4. Movie quotes are important so get them right.

5. Some things aren't movie quotes, just Caleb quotes.

6. You don't want to argue with a Snedaker man!....man?

7. If you don't know the answer, look it up!

8. It's great to be a white (Caucasian and Color Code wise).

9. Nebraska is the best place to be...other than Texas.

10. German rap songs are the best kind of rap songs.

Caleb knew Mark from Nebraska so he quickly joined our group of friends. One night, Mark and I went to see Evidance and it seemed like we discovered several similar interests one after the other. We both wanted to learn how to play the guitar, we both loved dance, and we both planned on taking a cooking class. He's the kind of guy that you can trust with your deepest, darkest secrets...and he gives great advice. :)

Halloween was coming up and I still did not have a costume. I know lame right? Anyway, so we collaborated and came up with a few ideas. Even though it would have been great, I turned down their suggestion to die my hair red and wrap myself in a bed sheet.

We hit the mall. When we stopped at the Disney store, we found the cutest thing ever!! Three peas in a pod :) So we just had to take a pic...meanwhile, the greatest thing was happening outside...for a Texan.

When we came out of the mall....it was SNOWING!!! Perfect, beautiful, fluffy flakes of white snow. :) It was magical! I couldn't resist spinning in circles with my arms stretched out wide. While I was shuffling with my keys at the car, Mark was gathering some of this cold, white stuff and next thing I knew...

Oh, but this meant war. So yes, right there in the parking lot, snow falling down, three best friends threw snowballs at each other using a car as a barricade, laughing and shrieking (okay, the shrieking was mostly me). Magical right?! We decided that that was the picture perfect scene to start our movie, so some conflict must be coming...

Jessie, the Tardis, and Billy Butcherson

Caleb and Mark introduced me to Josh, another friend from Nebraska. He is such a funny guy! And, he can eat a 24 inch sub in 30 minutes so I'm pretty proud to be his friend. :)

I'm telling ya, you just gotta look at this sandwich.

There are some things that you just can't go through your college life at BYU without experiencing. One of those is hiking to the top of Y Mountain in the middle of the night to watch the sunrise. After the first snowfall, we realized we were losing our chance to do it this semester, so we hiked through the inch or two of snow at the top of the mountain. We were a little concerned because it was dark, we were alone, and we were hiking in exactly the area that mountain lions like to hang out. But we talked our way up the mountain and moved as quickly as we could. When we were just a short ways from the top I heard some kind of movement in the trees to the left of us. If I wasn't scared before, I was now. We back tracked a few steps and right there in the open clearing were tracks...mountain lion or not, they were pretty big. Over the summer, I went on a 10 day back-packing hike at Philmont Scout Ranch. We had heard stories of mountain lions stalking a ranger for miles. I had never heard of one actually attacking, so I wasn't too concerned, but when you're stuck on a mountain, you don't really want to think about whether or not an animal will attack you. I sure was glad to be with a couple of boy scouts. Josh kept scanning the area with his flashlight and we decided to wait until a group that we had passed caught up with us. They weren't too far behind so in a few minutes they came charging up the mountain not the least bit deterred by our story. So, we let them lead the way feeling better about having a larger group and we made it to the top without a single scrape.

Would ya look at that boulder??...that is a nice boulder.

I had always sort of known the girls that lived above me, but not very well. But it turned out that one of them was in my Music Fundamentals class. This was the class that I would skip at the slightest excuse I could find because it was an intro to music theory class and I was auditioning for the music program and I had taken AP Music Theory in high school...so sitting there for 2 hours to talk about things that I've known since 6th grade at least was not the way I wanted to spend my Monday evening. It wasn't until the end of the semester that I realized that Celestina was in the class. We had the opportunity to get extra credit by going to the teacher's jazz band performance and Cele wanted to know if I was going so she spent a whole day stalking me. She knocked on my door several times, left messages on my facebook, and called my dead phone but to no avail. When she finally caught up to me, I thought it was the most hilarious thing I had ever heard.

At the beginning of the semester, I did this stupid thing called signing up to be in building council. I had enough on my plate and I've never been one to like planning events or attending 80 billion meetings (yeah...that's an exaggeration). But I signed up so when it came time for our speed dating activity (another thing I don't like) that I had been volunteered to act in a skit for (not my favorite thing to do), let's just say I wasn't super excited but I did it because I had to. Meg, our RA, asked me to go door to door at the guys apartments to encourage them to come to the activity (wait, so I have to act like I really care if they come?). Since everyone else was gone, I went to the apartment of the girls above me that I knew a little, Cele and Kim. Turned out that Cele felt exactly the same way I did! Only she was a little less movable in her decision to refrain from any such activity that would place her in a situation where she had to talk with complete strangers, pretend like she was interested in their life, and play the role of a girl that is eager to go on a date with anybody. Since she refused after much attempted coercion, Kim and I went door to door inviting the boys to the activity and returned to continue our convincing. And it was a success! Cele came to the activity with us and I wouldn't even hesitate to say that she enjoyed herself...yeah...it wasn't all that bad as I thought it would be either.

I'm not really sure why, but after these two experiences, I felt like I could trust Cele with my life. So, as girls, it didn't take too long for us to become really close friends and soon enough she was an official part of our group of close friends.

It was a beautiful spring day in Provo, Utah so we went for a picnic, played some ultimate Frisbee and sandman. Watch out for the few puddles of snow leftover from winter.

mountains :)

Maybe, she shouldn't have trusted us so much...April fools day came around and we had to prank someone...You see, Mark came to college with this addiction to chewing ice and he managed to get us all addicted. Good news is we found a cure!...how does vinegar ice sound?

Just a few other pics of some great memories: Would ya just look at them??

We built the greatest fort in the history of mankind!

Color Festival :)

Duck face...Everyone needs guy friends like these. :)

Finals week makes people do some crazy things...It all started with a piece of paper that Caleb accidentally knocked off the table. Cele was using it. He didn't pick it up. So, of course, the reasonable reaction is to mark him with a marker. Thus, began the marker war. Mark and I were feeling left out so we decided to organize an event. We changed into clothes we didn't care about getting marked, went outside, and battled...to the death. Jess was there to supervise and keep score. :)