FAN

I am not a fan of Halloween. I think it's a dumb holiday. I think it will be fun when I have kids that are under the age of 10, but anything other than that, it's dumb.

That being said...

I am a fan of FALL!!
I love fall for these reasons: the colors, pumpkin flavored everything, sweatshirts, college football, cool weather, Thanksgiving, the beginning of Christmas, crunchy leaves, scarves, back at school with friends, and Clayton's soccer games (at least when I'm home...)

Back to school

At this point, the semester is at the half way point. I have been in the ICU this semester so far. There are a few different units that we get to be on: Thoracic (any patients that had an open chest surgery), Cardiac, Shock/Trauma, Neuro, and Respiratory. I went into nursing school thinking that I was going to go into emergency. Well, this semester I have changes my mind. I am definitely more interested in ICU. I have fallen in love with it, in fact! Thoracic or Cardiac is my thing. I already knew that I loved heart stuff but I've had it confirmed to me this semester. I have just really loved my nursing classes this semester. ICU is my thing. My other nursing class is Psychiatric nursing. I will have psych clinicals starting in November until the end of the semester. This class is nice because it's kind of chill. It's not really demanding on time and the professors and pretty relaxed.

Football is in full swing also and I have had lots of fun going to the games and having parties during the away games. Unfortunately any chance at doing well nationally this season went down the toilet when we lost to Florida State. But it's been really fun. This upcoming weekend is Homecoming and we are playing TCU. It going to be a really good game because TCU is a legit team, a definite challenge. ESPN is broadcasting College Game Day from Provo this weekend too, so Provo going to be a party this weekend. I'm excited though. It should be fun.

There hasn't been a whole lot else that's been going on. Football and school is all that happens in the fall :) But if anything exciting happens, I'll let you know!!!

I love AMERICA!!!

England and Europe were amazing. I am so blessed to have experienced that, but the truth is: family is the greatest. My time at home this summer was the best! When I got home these were my feelings, a poem by Henry Van Dyke explains it:

'Tis fine to see the Old World, and travel up and down
Among the famous palaces and cities or renown,
To admire the crumbly castles and statues of the kings,--
But now I think I've had enough of antiqued things.
So it's home again, and home again, America for me!
My heart is turning home again, and there I long to be,
In the land of youth and freedom beyond the ocean bars,
Where the air is full of sunlight and flag is full of stars.

I learned on this trip to be grateful for the wonderful blessings that we have in America. The wonderful culture, government, people, and history that we have. I love it!!!

The rest of the summer...

I realized that I have put up pictures from Europe, but I haven't really updated much on what's happening right now. First I'll give you a quick recap of the summer. I got home from England on June 24. Janelle and Julie were in Connecticut visiting. I was home about 18 hours before the Pioneer Trek started for our stake. I was one of the camp nurses (still very jet lagged) but it was so much fun. I mostly just dealt with blisters and headaches, nothing too big. Except on the last night. I good friend that I go to church with brought her little boys to camp to see their dad and be with the youth, and one fell and hit his head on a rock and bled all over, he was okay and luckily one of the visitors in the camp that night was a doctor and bandaged him up real good, even though I could have handled it :) Just kidding, it was great fun though!

Hosing down as soon as I got home. (PS: check out the sweet sandal lines on my feet)

After trek, the family basically just played with Julie the whole time. We taught her to not be afraid of the "splish splash pool" that Grammy bought her. We also tried to get her walk, to no avail. They were in Connecticut for fourth of July. It was a beautiful day and we spent it at home playing Frisbee, barbecuing, and taking naps out on the grass. It was so much fun and so relaxing. I loved being home with the fam this summer. One of Julie's favorite new things to do was drink out of our drinking glasses instead of her sippy cup. She would dive face first into the glass and then latch onto the glass with her little teeth and the water would spill everywhere but she wouldn't let go and it was the funniest, cutest thing ever!!

I took a weekend trip up to Palmyra, NY for the annual pageant. It rained and the show got cancelled about 15 minutes into the performance because of the thunder and lightening directly over our heads, but luckily I kind had just gone for the fun social aspect of it, and not the show. I had seen in about 5 times already. We got really wet that night though, the tent, not so waterproof after all :) But no worries. It was way fun to spend time with my girls: Lauren, Kyra and Jolysa. It was really muddy and we played frisbee jumping in giant mud puddles. It was great!

Napping in the one dry spot out in the parking lot :)

Mom and I did some cleaning. Clayton and I did some tennis playing. I went to a bunch of Clayton's summer soccer league games. We also went to the midnight show of Harry Potter with some friends, and dressed up. Yes, I dressed up for Harry Potter. We also had picture parties, where I went over my pictures from the summer adventures. I never really got unpacked from England until the day before it was time to come back to Utah, mostly because unpacking and packing are my favorite thing ever! (Please note the sarcasm).

Mom and I then took a road trip out to Cleveland. We visited Janelle, and Julie and Ben for a week. I got to see the church history sites in Kirtland, which I'd never been to. I flew straight to Utah from there and mom drove back to Connecticut.

Spending time at home was so great. I wasn't really ready to leave (as I have been in the past). It was so nice to spend time with the people I love most in the world. The summer was relaxing and was exactly what I needed!

When I got back to Utah, I went on a trip with some friends down to Zion's National Park. We did an overnight trip, and besides the ants crawling on me night, and the gastrointestinal-challenging hot dogs, it was so fun!!!! Nothing beats 80 mph speed limits on open roads, In'n'Out, Matt Nathanson music blaring and great friends in a beautiful place on earth! It was a super fun time.
I have a couple friends that are AMAZING photographers, so I stole these pictures from them :) Not my talent.

We found this really sweet swimming hole that took about an hour of our time. It was way fun!!
School started shortly thereafter and well, I haven't stopped running since, but what else is new? Right?

PS: Sorry the spacing with the pictures and the text is all weirded out.