Shut Up, Brain

best kept secret on I-15

2011-12-29T14:55:00.000-08:00

I have road rage. Nothing makes me more aware of how many idiots there are in this world than driving on the freeway (except maybe reading the comments at the end of online newspaper articles or youtube videos...but that's another blog post entirely).

Guys, I'm going to tell you the best kept secret on I-15: the right lane. No one drives in it! It's the best! I just drove from Provo to home and any time I tried to pass someone on the left they either sped up and wouldn't let me pass or I got boxed in by other cars. But, every time I passed on the right it was a breeze. No cars for miles. I could go whatever speed I wanted.

Someone needs to find the Utah Driver's Ed manuals and tear out the chapter that teaches everyone that the right lane is secretly lava and if you drive in it you'll burn burn to a firey crisp. Same with if you get passed. I know that there is a chapter that teaches that if it looks like someone might be trying to pass you then they are clearly pulling up next to you to aim a gun at your face and kill you, so the only reasonable thing to do is to floor it and never let any other vehicle in front of you.

I am full of rage.

Bloody Mary

2011-12-27T10:58:00.000-08:00

This blog post is legitimate because I did some research. According to this site the top 10 most common fears are (in descending order because that's more exciting):

10. Commitment

9. Spiders

8. Rejection

7. Failure

6. Death

5. Intimacy

4. The dark

3. Heights

2. Public speaking

1. Flying

What?! That list is ridiculous. I am not even remotely scared of the top 3 things on it. I mean I guess the dark is scary and so are spiders, but on the whole that list is lacking.

I will tell you what is really scary: Bloody Mary. (Click on the link. Do it.) When I was like 8 years old (I made that age up, I have no idea how old I was) the babysitter gathered my sisters and I in the living room and told us ghost stories. One of the stories was about the time when she went into the dark bathroom and looked into the mirror and chanted "Bloody Mary" three times. Bloody Mary appeared and reached through the mirror and scratched her up and she ran away. I knew the story was true because she showed us the scars on her arms from it. (It's probably needless to say mom never got her to babysit again.)

Sometimes when I am leaving the bathroom I accidentally turn off the light before I open the door and I have a 3 second HEART ATTACK while I try to get the heck out of there before Bloody Mary shows up. A few weeks ago Stefanie got new glow-in-the-dark nail polish and she had to ask Sarah to come in the bathroom with her to look at it so Bloody Mary didn't get her. Yesterday Stefanie was doing her hair in the bathroom and Candace walked in and turned off the lights and said "Bloody Mar--" then Stef tackled her and ran upstairs and refused to go back in the bathroom alone, which is TOTALLY REASONABLE if you ask me. Bloody Mary is not someone/thing to be messed with.

My mom, however, does not agree. After hearing about the Bloody Mary episode she decided the fam should take a field trip to her bathroom where we will turn off the lights and taunt Bloody Mary and she won't come and we can all grow up and move on with our lives. It would be nice if I could say we all maturely agreed and took care of our (unreasonable?) BM fear. In fact, this post would probably be funnier if we followed through with that but I am 23 years old and I still run and jump into my bed at night so the ghosts don't grab my legs, and I definitely refused. In Stefanie's own words, "The hilarity of your blog is not worth inviting that evil spirit into my life."

So the moral of the story is this: if the entire Franc Family goes missing at some point in the near future you should look in mom's bathroom first. Probably Bloody Mary got us.

I'm a grad student.

2011-08-29T10:29:00.000-07:00

I'm a grad student as of 9:08 this morning. (I started counting when I got to campus.) It's weird. But cool. I have an office. That's such an adult thing. Adults have offices.

Okay, I guess technically I've been a grad student for more than 3ish hours. I had orientation Wed-Fri last week. That was coooool for the first bit and then once we established that I was a grad student and that's cool then it was boring. But if you're a grad student at orientation they feed you lots of meals, so that's nice.

I'm super duper excited to be in the math ed department. I already really love the faculty. Everyone is so nice and smart and awesome.

Speaking of what an adult I am, Stef, Sarah and I (okay, mostly Sarah) made the most amazing Harry Potter mural on our living room wall. It has the whomping willow and Hogwarts and the quidditch pitch and everyone awesome. I'll post pictures after Sarah does so I can steal them from her.

I'm proud to be an American

2011-07-05T16:48:00.000-07:00

...where at least I know I'm freeeeee! And I can camp out all night long to watch a really awesome paraaaade.

(If you are lucky enough to be one of the select few who gets to read Sarah's blog just read that because she is far more hilarious than I am.)

Apparently the parade in Provo is big deal. Who knew? We arrived on Sunday around 2:45pm to set up camp. According to the rules (which it seemed no one but us followed) you weren't allowed to reserve any space until 3pm. After fighting off some huge guy (all by myself....thanks Stef and Sarah) we had a prime spot. We threw down some blankets and set up the easy-up and settled in for a looooong night. It was awesome. I think it says a lot about the kind of friends you have if you can be together for almost 24 hours straight with little to no sleep, suuuuper hot and sweaty weather, and surrounded by the most obnoxious people in the universe and still have a grand old time.

After lots of talking, reading, drawing pictures, playing Bananagrams, stuffing our faces, shooting off fireworks and just generally enjoying ourselves we finally decided it was bedtime. Luckily I have been blessed with the ability to sleep through anything. Normally I don't think of this as a blessing (like when I fall asleep during every movie ever , or when I realize how incapable I am of waking myself up in the morning) but tonight it was definitely a blessing. I just curled up in my sleeping back and was fast asleep. It wasn't until I woke up the next morning that I heard about the craziness that went on all night. These were the type of crazy things that normal people wake up for (fights across the street, sirens, ice cream trucks, loud rock band playing, sprinklers going off) but I slept like a log.

I just need to take a moment to brag about how cool I am. At about 6:30am the sprinklers on the lawn behind us came on. We mostly chuckled to ourselves at the justice. (The people who set up camp there were the same people who played rock band all night keeping the whole street up.) What we didn't realize is that we would be next. About 7am the sprinklers on our camp spot came on. I was home showering when that happened so I missed the drama but imagine tons of sleepy people frantically throwing everything they own into the street to avoid getting drenched. Hahaha. When I showed up I realized that my past experience in the lawn mowing industry could be of some use here. I climbed through the garden near us and located a sprinkler box and promptly figured out how to turn the sprinklers off (after I accidentally turned them on another group of people...oops). Then everyone on the street applauded me and I felt soooo cool. Thank you lawn mowing job!

The parade was seriously awesome. It was like 2 hours long and had cool floats and giant balloons and lots of interesting things. I loved it. It was totally worth the intense wait. Especially because the second it was over I went home and crashed for about 5 hours.

When we finally all woke up we headed to the festival thing and ate ridiculous amounts of fried foods and listened to mediocre (at best) bands and looked at all the booths. After about an hour of that we decided we were tired again and headed home to watch the Patriot and fall asleep.

Overall it was a glorious 4th. America is awesome.

It would be nice if I wasn't a crap blogger.

2011-06-26T22:45:00.000-07:00

Things happen in my life. I'm sure they do, because it's not like I sit around every single second being like "I'm so bored. I wish things happened in my life." I only do that every few seconds. But when I sit down to write a blog my mind goes totally blank and I can't think of a single interesting thing that has happened to me in the last few months.

I graduated! That's a BD, right? It was surprisingly fun graduating. I highly recommend it. Don't worry, my life isn't changing much though. I am getting my masters in Math Education at BYU and that starts in the fall so my life will stay the same for two more years.

I'm mowing lawns again. Goodness. It's a good thing I love my crew so much or I would be having a bit of a miserable summer. I think 4 years is the maximum amount of years you can mow lawns before you don't want to anymore, and this is my 5th so.... I'm done. But for reals, my crew is awesome. I think it's a really good sign that we work all day together and then we still want to hang out every night.

I spend my weekends in Provo which is awesome. I at least go to church here every Sunday and then depending what's going on at home I am here randomly Friday-Monday. I got called as the FHE mom which was problematic because I have to mow lawns on Mondays so for a while I drove home late Sunday night, mowed Monday, then drove back to Provo Monday after work for FHE then back home late Monday night. It was rough. Luckily working at the same job for 5 years has a few perks (seriously, not as many as it should) and I talked to my boss and I don't have to work Mondays anymore.

Stef is in Uganda. She's been gone for 2 months and gets back on Thursday. (Anyone and everyone is invited to the airport.) Here's a little background on us: We have never been apart. Seriously, we have never spent more than a couple of days apart, and that has only happened once last year. So her going to Uganda was kind of a big deal. Except, strangely it wasn't. Don't get me wrong, I've missed her and I am excited for her to come home, but I'm not dying. In fact if I'm being perfectly honest I'm a little bit bummed about not having my own room anymore. Juuust kidding Stef.

My family is slowly but surely making its way into the world of farming. We have a cow! And by "cow" I mean "steer" but it's hard for me to remember to call it that. It's sooo adorable, but don't let dad hear you say that or he'll say it's not adorable, it's delicious.

I promise to have a more exciting life, or at least become a more exciting writer.

Stef in Africa

2011-05-09T09:58:00.000-07:00

I don't have anything exciting to blog about so stop reading my blog and go read the blog I made with Stefanie's emails:

stefinafrica.blogspot.com

I'm doneeeeee

2011-04-11T19:11:00.000-07:00

Okay, not actually done. I mean, I haven't walked. I don't have my diploma in my hand. But my last day of student teaching was on Friday and ooooh it feels glorious. Don't get me wrong. I loved those kids. I am definitely going to miss them. But I am sooo okay with being done.

I will tell you what is hilarious. Junior high kids. They constantly cracked me up. And here's something I wasn't expecting: they are a LOT of fun. A few days in, my university supervisor told me I had a personality that was very suited for a junior high. I wasn't sure whether to say thank you or to be offended.

This is one of my classes. Just one of them because I totally forgot my camera on the last day.

In other news I am having the best life ever now that I am doing nothing while the rest of the world is freaking out about finals. I think I'll go lie in my hammock for a while.

A shortish list of reasons why birthdays are amazing:

2011-02-19T09:49:00.001-08:00

-You can eat as much cake as you want and no one judges you. In fact, they all encourage you to eat the biggest piece.

-The same goes for ice cream. (Yes, they each get their own spot on the list.)

-If you have a class of 7th graders they will sing to you and tell you that they will behave today because it's your birthday.

-You can check your facebook every hour and still have a new notification every time you check because billions of really cool people write on your wall wishing you a happy birthday.

-If you have an awesome sister she will send you flowers at your school and sign the note "Love, Your Secret Admirer" so your 7th graders oooo and ahhh.

-Your really awesome friends will throw you a birthday party and make an amazing basketball cake in honor of Jimmer and the rest of the boys.

-You can go 80's dancing all night long.

-Everyone is really nice when you sleep in and are an hour late for teaching school the next day because you stayed out too late and didn't get enough sleep so you slept through your alarm.

-Your family lets you celebrate your birthday again when you come home for the weekend and your mom knows to use at least 2 cans of frosting on the cake.

-Your dad gets up early the next morning and makes you his derrrlish breakfast burritos just because he knows you love them.

-Sometimes (and this is only if you're reeeeally lucky) your parents totally surprise you by buying you a new laptop for your birthday because you dropped yours off your bed and it died.

A short list of reasons why birthdays are not amazing:

-I am getting so dang old.

My school is haunted.

2011-01-22T17:35:00.000-08:00

Just thought you should know. My mentor teacher told me that last weekend she was at the school late Saturday night and heard water running. She followed the sound to the boys bathroom and found the door locked. She called the janitor but he wasn't there so she opened it herself and found every single sink on full blast and the toilets running in continuous flushing cycles. Um. TERROR-FRYING. (Reasonably) she high-tailed it out of there. Now I am terrified to go to the bathroom by myself but sometimes I have to and then I just be super speedy about it because GOOD GANDHI that's scary.

You don't have to push a handcart to be a pioneer.

2011-01-16T11:35:00.000-08:00

Guys, guess what! I am a pioneer! Don't worry, this isn't going to be some deeply spiritual blog post (not that I really have anything against those) I just need to tell you that I am officially a (student) teacher at Lehi Junior High, home of the Pioneers.

Right? As if it's not enough that their school is named after a prophet in the Book of Mormon, they decide the best mascot for them would be the pioneers? It's not like this is a Mormon school. It's a public school. The pioneers? Fierce. No offense to the pioneers, I mean pioneers are definitely more hard core than I am. But so are most things that become school mascots.

Silly mascot aside, I am pretty confident this is the best school to be student teaching at in America. The teachers and faculty are amazing. I already feel so welcome, I love it! Everyone is so nice and so willing to help me and support me and be there with whatever I need. I can tell that the teachers really care about the students too. The kids are awesome and I love love love spending time with them. I think I can actually use my incredible immaturity to an advantage here. And, bonus: the boys all like to talk about Jimmer Fredette just as much as I do.

I just need to have a minor spaz about how in love with BYU basketball I am. ksldjfoisjiorj e90wr jopfjs!! That's all I can say now because those boys deserve their entire own post.

Growing Up

2011-01-04T15:20:00.001-08:00

I have felt like this all day long:

(if you can't read it click here)

I had an all day orientation meeting for student teaching today. Ooooh boy I am SO excited and SO terrified. And really, why are all these people treating me like I'm a grown up? I can't do things like run a classroom! That's the kind of thing an adult does and I still wear Spongebob underwear. (Is that inappropriate to admit on a blog? I would probably know if I were a grown up.)

But I'm excited. I will learn! It will be great! But don't worry, I'll never be a grown up.

A list of things I did over Christmas break

2011-01-03T11:42:00.001-08:00

-almost never change out of my pjs

-go to my uncle Spencer's wedding in Las Vegas (I did change out of my pjs for this)

-read for fun

-practice the piano for fun

- cheesy Christmas movie marathon (word to the wise: avoid Santa Baby 1 and 2)

-sleep A LOT

-reunion with the fab 5 at Mimi's followed by a trip to B&N (it's tradition)

-get ridiculously sick and throw up (a lot. ew I know) for the first time since I was 8

-mow crew gingerbread house making/Just Dance party

-study for the GRE (and by "study" I mean "flip through the practice book I bought and be appalled at how ridiculously tiny my vocabulary is")

Great news: I took the GRE today and didn't fail. I am soooo happy and soooo glad I didn't waste all my life studying for it.

I'm back in Provo and ready for the new semester of student teaching! (ready=sooo excited and sooo terrified)

Get up and shake the glitter off your clothes now

2010-12-19T19:35:00.000-08:00

Finals ended Friday (woooohooo). Let me take a brief moment to express how I feel about this: ecstatic. Also terrified. I start my student teaching next semester and I'm scarrrrrred. But also thrilled and just so excited. I feel so conflicted.

Anyway...Friday afternoonish the whole fam piled in the car and headed to Las Vegas for my mom's youngest brother's wedding which was on Saturday. Friday night we had dinner at my dad's brother's house. We don't get to see them a lot so it was good to catch up and say things like "I can't believe how much you've grown!" (even though I hated when people said that to me when I was little) to the cousins. So, we got to see both families in one weekend. Fabbity fab fab.

I will tell you what is fun: weddings. It was a lovely time and everyone looked fabulous and it was so fun seeing everyone and eating derlish food. Then after the wedding we all piled in the car again to drive home so we could make it back in time for the ward choir Christmas program. Yeah, my family is dedicated.

Now I will tell you what is not fun: driving in the car with my family. We all went completely bonkers, and not the good, entertaining kind of bonkers either. We did come up with a new family game though. It's top notch comedy (but only if you've been in the car for 3 million years). You say a sentence over and over and each time you say it, you put the emphasis on a different word. For example: WILL you wait for Winnie and Willy? Will YOU wait for Winnie and Willy? Will you WAIT for Winnie and Willy? I think you get the idea. The best kinds of sentences to use are actual phrases that get shouted at you by the parents when you're in trouble. (Ex: WILL you shut the h*ll up? Will YOU shut the h*ll up? Will you SHUT the h*ll up?) Try it on your next forever long car ride. It's sure to be a family favorite.

Gaping Hole

2010-12-15T09:43:00.001-08:00

My lack of blogging quickly (like less than 24 hours) left a gaping hole in my life. And what have I filled that hole with?

MarkReads.net

You guys, I love it! If you've already jumped on this bandwagon then I am not jealous of you because I just finished as much of The Hunger Games as he has and I am positively dying for the rest. I'm glad I can spend my life reading through Harry Potter and even Twilight if I so desire while I wait for more chapters. A chapter a day, really?! How does he do it??

I have a couple warnings though. The first is that his language isn't entirely the cleanest. The second is that if you are a busy person with lots of responsibilities and such then you probably shouldn't click that link because once you do there is no going back.

THE END!

2010-12-14T08:21:00.000-08:00

Day 29 and 30 were stupid on the list I had so I am using day 29 and 30 from another list (a much superior list that I wish I had used from the start but I didn't discover it until around day 15).

So the new Day 29: Something you could never get tired of doing.

I never get tired of blogging.

Okay, okay, that's the biggest lie. In fact, I am so tired of blogging that I'm not going to put any effort into that question because I already put waaaay too much effort into day 30. So without further ado...

Day 30: Plans/Dreams/Goals you have.

Let's play "If my life went exactly the way I wanted it to..." In no particular order (in fact kind of in backwards order because the pics stupidly uploaded in the backwards order I expected them to)...

-I would spend my summers (because I chose the best career ever...summers off for the rest of eternity) doing various humanitarian projects all over the world with my family.

-I would be the world’s best math teacher, helping kids everywhere see that math isn’t a bunch of nonsensical rules and that it can actually be useful and (dare I say it?) exciting!

-I would have several of these (3-6? That sounds good.):

-I would get married here. (Though really my decision on this changes every 3 months or so.)

-I would graduate with my masters degree from BYU (but be a little more excited about it than that guy).

-I would learn to do these things:

I already know how to run, obviously (well maybe that's not so obvious...) but I want to learn how to not hate every second of it.

Once things are growing I can use my years of lawn maintenance experience to make them beautiful but I have noooo idea how to make things grow.

I don't even care what language I learn, I just want to be fluent in some language other than English and Pig Latin.

I am really amused that this sewing machine is outside in the backyard. That's probably where mine will end up when I realize I don't actually want to learn how to sew because it's hard.

There you have it. It's THE END of the 30 day blogging challenge. See you again in 10 years or so! Hahaha just kidding! (I hope.)

Day 26-28

2010-12-12T14:25:00.000-08:00

Day 26: A picture of something that means a lot to you.

I know this picture is kind of obscure but it represents my education. (Don't worry, I'll replace it with one where I'm in the cap and gown in front of the Cosmo statue next April.) My experiences and the education I'm getting here at BYU really do mean a lot to me. I don't want to get all deep and cheesy but this next week will possibly be the last few days I spend on the BYU campus because I'm doing my student teaching next semesters so I am feeling awfully sentimental about it all. I have learned so much in all aspects of my life and I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to come here and get an education that will let me go out into the world and change things for the better.

Day 27: A picture of something you're afraid of.

I'm afraid of getting shot in a drive by shooting.I know it is completely ridiculous. I don't even remember how old I was when someone told me about the possibility of it, but for as long as I can remember I have been terrified of it. Even now if I'm walking outside at night and a car drives by I have to fight the urge to hit the ground and crawl to safety.

Day 28: A picture of you last year and now. How have you changed since then?

I feel like I still pretty much look like I did in high school, so not much has changed... The pictures aren't exactly a year a part but I'm wearing the same dress and am posed the same way in both of them so you can better see the (lack of?) changes. The pic on the left is from last Halloween and the other one was taken over Thanksgiving break. Anyway, my hair is a different color of blond (thanks to the amazingness of Rachel) and apparently in the picture on the right it had been longer since I've gotten my hair done because my roots are atrocious. Also it seems I lose any skin color that isn't pasty white from October-November. I wish I could tell you that's a camera lighting thing, but I really am unfortunately pasty right now.

Is this looking for a deeper meaning when it asks me to reflect on what has changed? Even so I still don't feel like much has changed. I feel more like I am who I've always been, but I'm just figuring out who that is as life goes on. How's that for deep and cheesy?

Day 25

2010-12-09T12:45:00.001-08:00

This blogging challenge thing is stupid because it had the same thing on day 24 and day 25, so I am going to choose this day to blog about anything I want...which is my besties the FAB 5.

That's right, we call ourselves the fab 5. It's because we're fabulous and there are 5 of us. We came together in high school and got along because of our mutual hilarnosity. We quickly became inseparable. We spent all of our time dressing in random costumes and causing havock. As we've all grown up and gone our separate ways our friendship has had some rough patches (what lasting friendship hasn't?) and we don't get to see each other as often as we'd like, but in the end I love these girls with all of my heart and I plan to stay friends forever.

I feel like this picture describes our friendship ridiculously well.

This is the most recent pic of the five of us (plus Troy) at my birthday last year. Yay!

♥Fab 5 Forever♥

Day 24

2010-12-08T10:50:00.000-08:00

Day 24: A picture of yourself and a family member.
I only have two family members that haven't been featured in the blog at some point yet (besides my dog Tramp):

(Jake is usually more attractive than that...usually.)

My brothers are pretty dang cool. They're good at doing things like killing spiders and carrying things out to my car for me. Somewhere along the line they got it in their heads that older siblings have some sort of authority over them so they actually do what I tell them to most of the time, even though I have no real authority (shhh).

Day 23

2010-12-07T15:41:00.000-08:00

Day 23: A picture of you and the person you have been closest with the longest.

Easy peasy lemon squeezy. I already wrote this post HERE.

Day 19-22

2010-12-06T09:22:00.000-08:00

Okay okay okay! So I'm a slacker. I think everyone knew that about me already. Besides, I kind of got bored with the whole blogging-every-day thing and I assumed that if I was getting bored of it then probably everyone else was too so...I took a break. Catch up time!

Day 19: A picture of someone you miss.

One of the reasons I procrastinated this is because this is such a hard one! There are a lot of people I miss in my life all the time! I constantly miss friends and family that aren't around. I even miss my roommates when they're at class all day.

This is my mow crew (or at least most of them. I don't think we've ever gotten a picture with all of us). Goodness, I luff them. I feel like there aren't a lot of people in the world that I could spend 8 hours a day every day with in the hot summer sun doing ridiculous manual labor and still love every second (or at least the majority of the seconds) of it. I kind of go through withdrawals once school starts and we all go our separate ways and we have to wait until next summer to see each other again.

Amber, from the mow crew, wrote a funny list of things we learned this summer while spending our time together. It probably won't be funny if you weren't on the mow crew and it's going to make this post reeeeally long, so feel free to skip the next huge section.

-No matter how many times you listen to Taio Cruz, it never gets old. (Break Your Heart or DYNAMITE)
-It's completely reasonable to strip if a spider is in your shirt.
-Singing at the top of your lungs over loud equipment will definitely make construction workers stare at you.
-Basically doing anything for our job will make construction workers stare at you.

-There is actually a trailer button you're supposed to push when your truck is pulling a trailer!
-Eating stuff off the asphalt isn't too weird...
-Billiam Ford is my eternal BFF.
-Maddie and I obtained a lot of balls.
-Every person has fundamental differences in personality and the way

they live their life and most of the time you just gotta swing with it!
-I love edging Northridge.-My right arm got a lot more buff than my left.
-Every laser has its pros and cons.
-Usually when we go do extra work on a school they are just going to tear it up the next week.
-No matter what color our shoes started out being, by the end of the summer they were all the same grossness. (Grossness is officially the name of a color)
-Everyone thinks their university is the best. Unless you go to Weber. Ha ha!
-It IS possible to fit 10 girls in a truck.-Although Maddie never wanted to listen to California Gurls and changed it every time it came on the radio since June........we still knew all the words.
-It is possible to have spiritual experiences while weedeating.
-I sing randomly WAY more than I ever thought I did. The girls made sure to point that out to me quite frequently!
-Everyone has a catch phrase that they say all the time, even if they don't realize it. "What a hoe!"
-I will forever hate Holt. I don't care what you say!
-Paul kind of made me like mullets. (don't tell Stefanie)-Mikayla is a chronic food sharer.
-Some people just don't like Josh Groban and I find them clinically insane. :)
-I love weedeating blacktops. It hurts. But I love it!
-I can't get married till Nicole does!
-August 13th will forever be some kind of anniversary for me.
-The fact that I can fix sprinklers won't ever really get me anywher

e in life, but it still makes me feel cool.
-Amy is quite literally the nicest person on the planet earth.
-It much easier getting the laser stuck in stupid no brainer places than actual difficult areas.
-The girls I worked with aren't very recognizable when I see them in real life. They are SO beautiful with makeup!
-Tara knows everybody. Seriously, ask her!
-Aly's legs shine slightly unnaturally, but it's cool.
-There is usually a reason if I Amber wears her hair down at work...-We are all talented in unusual ways, but that makes us work together all the better!

MCF!

Day 20: A picture of somewhere you'd love to travel. Day 21: A picture of something that makes you happy.

These are the same. Though really both of them have millions of answers.

Day 22: A picture that confuses you.

Aaaand I'm just going to skip this one because this post is long enough as it is.

Day 18

2010-12-02T10:43:00.000-08:00

Day 18: A picture of the cast of your favorite show.

I feel weird about this picture because everyone is so smiley (except Joss and Tara). I feel like they all need to stop smiling and go save the world or something. I mean look at Spike! Spike doesn't smile like that! And I almost didn't even recognize Xander.

Day 17

2010-12-01T16:26:00.000-08:00

Day 17: Your favorite song.

This is tough one. I have way too many favorite songs. I'm pretty sure I do have a favorite band though, and they're called Ludo. It's impossible for me to pick a favorite song, but their Broken Bride rock opera is waaaay up there on the list of things that are awesome in this world. Here's one of the songs from that (it's called Save Our City):

I know, I know. You're like "whaaat?" That's what I thought when I first heard it too. You have to listen the whole 20 minute thing...which I really doubt anyone will do. In fact I really doubt anyone will get through this 6 minute song. It's amazing. Once I drove all the way to California just to see Ludo play this live. It was soooo worth it.
P.S. I've never seen this animated music video before today. I don't love it.

Day 16

2010-11-30T08:40:00.000-08:00

Day 16: Someone you want to switch lives with for a day.

I want to know what it's like to be homeless. I might need to do it for more than a day though. A day would be just like an camping trip or something. I'm thinking like a week would be more accurate. It would be so crazy just carrying everything you own around with you everywhere you go and never really knowing where you'll end up. And really, as finals get nearer and nearer, I'm thinking the homeless life has got to be better than this constantly-studying-never-sleeping-don't-even-think-about-eating kind of life.

(Just to clarify: I would never really think that my cushy college life is worse than being homeless.)

Day 14 and Day 15

2010-11-29T10:27:00.000-08:00

I feel like this goal of blogging every day is going to the opposite of what it's supposed to do. It's supposed to make me into a better blogger, but instead it's going to make me not want to blog again for the next three years. But we're half way there!

Day 14: A picture of someone you could never imagine your life without.

My parents! That makes sense, right? Because I wouldn't even have a life without them.

I have pretty cool parents. They're always doing hilarious things (sometimes it's intentional) so they're good to have around for entertainment, but beyond that they're really good at knowing what I should do with my life and how I should live, etc.

To demonstrate how my parents are of topmost hilarnosity I will leave you with some words of wisdom from them:

"Candace, don't honk at the cows. You look like a city girl."--Dad

"Jaxon, the boomerang is NOT a bath toy. It's a lethal weapon in Australia!" --Mom

"Jacob, stop cleaning your toe jams over your brother."--Dad

Candace: Mom, what's for dinner.

Mom: Uuummm...I think there is some cake on the counter.

*next day*

Candace: Mom, what's for breakfast.

Mom: Uuummm...I think there might still be some cake on the counter.

"I found out why Jake and Jaxon's TV isn't working. Jaxon chewed right through the cables." --Dad

"Natalie, your shirt is frumpy. You should wear shorter and tighter shirts."--Mom

This quote requires some setting. We've all been stuck in the car for hours and hours (driving home from California). Of course everyone is quite annoyed with each other and has been fighting for the last few hours. Someone is whining to dad about someone else and dad, having had enough of all of this, tries to yell 'I don't care' and 'I don't want to hear it' simultaneously which results in this:

Dad: I DON'T WANT A CARROT!!!!!

*silence in the car*

Candace: That's okay dad, we don't have any.

*uncontrollable laughter from everyone involved...except dad.

Day 15: A picture of something you want to do before you die.

Oh my goodness, I want to travel. I really want to travel everywhere in the world but if I had to chose one place I would say I want to go on a Mediterranean cruise (which is possibly cheating because that's actually a bunch of places, but at least I narrowed it down from the entire world!) . I really think I deserve to go on a Mediterranean cruise if for no other reason than I can spell 'mediterranean' without a spell checker.

Day 13

2010-11-27T10:07:00.000-08:00

Day 13: A picture of something you hate.

I don't know if it's just the Christmas season, or maybe spending time with the fam, or what, but whatever it is I am feeling awfully sentimental. I'm sure I could write a rawther amusing post about all the random things I hate in life (like people who clip their fingernails in public and when I get to McDonalds for breakfast 1 minute after they stopped serving breakfast) but I don't really feel like thinking about the things I hate. I don't mean to sound preachy at all, I just feel like I need reminders more often about how there is way too much hate in the world.

“There is no peace in harboring old grudges. There is no peace in reflecting on the pain of old wounds. There is peace only in repentance and forgiveness. This is the sweet peace of the Christ, who said, ‘Blessed are the peacemakers; for they shall be called the children of God’ (Matthew 5:9)” (Gordon B. Hinckley in Conference Report, Oct. 1980, 88; or Ensign, Nov. 1980, 63).

Day 11 and 12

2010-11-26T08:05:00.000-08:00

I think it's reasonable of me to not blog on Thanksgiving. It's a holiday! This blogging every day thing is way more difficult than I thought it would be. But don't worry, I won't give up. Buffy would never give up.

Day 11: Your celebrity crush.

I have waaaay too many celebrity crushes to actually choose one. I went to see Ta

ngled with the fam last night and this is my most recent crush:

That counts, right? He's totally a celebrity, or at least he will be after you all go see my new favorite movie, Tangled. And look what a stud he is! His smolder totally m

elted me.

Day 12: A picture of something you love.

I luh-hove the Christmas season. Oh my goodness. It's so lovely! I love how beautiful everything is and how cheery everyone is and how there is constantly music everywhere and lovely snow falling from the sky... And most of all (okay, maybe not most of all, but way up there on my list) I love the cheesy movies on TV.

Yeah, I do watch all 25 movies on the ABC Family countdown. And I love every single one.

Day 10

2010-11-24T10:46:00.000-08:00

Day 10: A picture of someone you see yourself marrying.

Now this is just silly. Clearly if I knew who I was going to marry then I would just marry them and be done with it.

I am faaaar too lazy to think about things like blog posts over the holiday break so instead of using my brain I googled "Who will I marry?" and clicked on the first link that came up which happened to be a quiz promising to tell me "Who will you marry, what will your kids be like, and where will you live???" There are a series of statements that I have to rate on a scale of 1-5 on whether I agree or disagree.The first question is "ROOTBEER!!!". This seems legit.

You Scored as Happy Harbor

That's right. You'll have a lovely relationship with your spouse and have 2-5 kids. Your kids will be nice all the time. Your life will be nice. It will be virtually perfect...or so it will seem, until your husband (or wife) turns out to be gay and runs away with your uncle ( or aunt), and your kids all have emotional breakdowns, and your mother calls to tell you that she's moving in with you....

The unfortunate thing about this scarily accurate quiz is that it doesn't have a picture of what my future spouse will look like. So I googled "happyharbor" and chose the first picture of a man. Clearly he is my soul mate.

Day 9

2010-11-23T16:18:00.000-08:00

Day 9: A picture of the person who has gotten you through the most.

Hahahahaha just kidding (mostly). In all seriousness, the person who has gotten me through the most is....

...my lovely twin, Stefanie.

There are so many reasons why being a twin is amazing. These reasons range from things like being so unique (according to Wikipedia, only 1.9% of the world's population are twins) to the fact that you don't have to stand there awkwardly when everyone is singing happy birthday to you because you can sing along to your twin. I won't go on because I really have always felt genuinely bad for everyone that doesn't get to be a twin. I don't want to rub it in your face. But, when I create my world someday I am going to give everyone a twin. It's really the way to go.

I don't want to get all mushy on the blog, but my twin is awesome. You can see a really awesome slideshow of all the pictures I have of the two of us if you click here.

Day 8

2010-11-22T15:10:00.000-08:00

Day 8:A picture that makes you laugh.

I read the title of today's post to Stefanie and both of us instantly knew exactly which picture to choose.
Hahahahaha, right? It took me months before I could look at this picture without laughing out loud. Ahh shake-faces. You never fail me.

Day 7

2010-11-21T15:36:00.001-08:00

Day 7: A picture of someone/something that has the biggest impact on you.

Okay, okay I know you're all offended that I didn't put someone like my mom or Ghandi, but bear with me on this one.

Buffy was a part of my life for 7 years! And those were some pretty important years. I was 9 years old when I saw my first episode ("Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered") and was instantly hooked. I was amazed at how quick witted and hilarious everyone was. Even now, years later, if I say something extra hilarious you can probably safely assume it's a quote from Buffy.

Even more than that, I think devoting my Tuesday nights to Buffy kind of shaped me into the independent, ambitious girl I am today. Buffy is so hardcore. She showed me that girls are cool and really can do whatever they want. She was my role model and I think I'm a different person than I would have been if I had someone like, say, Bella Swan as my role model. (Oh my goodness, I am not even going to go into what a horrible role model she is.)

So thank you Joss Whedon, the WB, Sarah Michelle Gellar and everyone else who helped shape the person I am today. I owe you.

Day 6

2010-11-20T11:30:00.000-08:00

Day 6: A picture that shows your true self.
I am not a normal person. I really never have been. I suppressed it for a while, but I've finally accepted it. Here's my life motto:

"You're entirely bonkers. But I'll tell you a secret. All the best people are."-Alice from Alice in Wonderland.

Day 4 and Day 5

2010-11-19T13:09:00.000-08:00

Day 4: A habit that you wish you didn't have.How ironic, my habit that I wish I didn't have is procrastination. I would have blogged yesterday but I procrastinated everything important in my life this week so yesterday was crazy. I really need to learn how to do things on reasonable time tables but instead I just wait until the absolute last second to do anything.

Day 5: A picture of somewhere you've been to.

What kind of prompt is this?! How will I ever decide? I have been to many, many really awesome places. I guess in honor of the Harry Potter midnig

ht showing I went to last night I'll have to show this picture:

That's right. I've been there. Platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross Station. Dobby must have been hanging about while I was there because I ran at that wall as hard as I could and I didn't get through.

Sorry this post is boring. I'm waaaay too tired to be clever. But let me tell you: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was amaaaaazing. Totally worth my complete lack of sleep. Uuugh, I'm getting too old for things like midnight showings. I always use to make fun of my parents for their inability to stay up late into the night but now I'm seeing it. It's rough. What's happening to me? I think I might be growing up. How embarrassing.

Day 3

2010-11-17T09:39:00.000-08:00

Day 3: A picture of you and your craziest friends.

This one is hard because I only accept crazies to be my friends. Sane people are far too boring. But honestly, if I made a list of the crazy people in my life, my herms would definitely be at the top of it. (Note: Yeah, we call each other "herm". This comes from our random and very limited knowledge of Spanish. We realized that hermana (which is sister in Spanish) sounds a lot like Herman so we called each other Herman for a while and that eventually shortened to "herm". Now we don't even think about it and we always forget how weird it must sound to everyone else.)

I know, I know. Aren't we presh?

Speaking of presh...

To illustrate how crazy we are I'll add some of our favorite quotes of each other. (If you stalk our FB's regularly then none of these quotes will be new to you.)

Natalie: Stef, you should do the most because you're the oldest.
Stefanie: I do do the most!
Candace: You doo-doo the most? That is SO true.

"My freaking foot itches so bad that I just might change my facebook status about it!"-Natalie

Stefanie:"Friendliness is a sign of rabies"
Niccole:"Fomaing at the mouth is a sign of rabies"
Stefanie"...There is more than one sign."

"Dad turn the lights back on, I can't tell the difference between my marshmallows and my mateys!"-Candace

Natalie (while watching President Packer during conference): This guy rocks!!
Julie: That is great!
Natalie: Yea, he is totally hitting all the words in conference bingo.

"I don't think the rules about popping your boob out in public should change just because there is a baby attached to it." --Stefanie

A letter to the family from Candace:
Dear Family
I have friends coming over tomorrow and not like Amanda and Liz, new friends that still think I am normal. Let's keep it that way. I would greatly appreciate it if you would be fully dressed at all times (mostly directed to Jake and Jax). DO NOT CURSE MY FRIENDS!!!! Don't throw things, burp, fart or anything else that could embarrass me or them. We are having a sleep over so Natalie make sure you don't come tromping in our room naked or in a towel. Also, please sleep somewhere other than our bedroom. Don't ask them if they are bad kids, they're not. Thanks. I'll tell you if I think of anything else.
Love Candace
PS. To clarify: "Don't curse My Friends" I mean with your magic wands using the killing curse or something. DON'T!!

I can't take credit for the editing of this pic, that was Candace. But I love it. And I love my herms.

Day 2

2010-11-16T09:05:00.000-08:00

Look at me! 3 blog posts in a row. I am clearly turning into a pro.

Day 2: A really good memory.

I have spent a significant amount of time considering this. Well...to be honest I really only thought about it during my 8am class this morning. But that class is an hour and 15 minutes long so it gave me tons of pondering time. I filed through my memories of life and realized that I pretty much only have good memories. There are soooo many. I decided I needed to be more picky than just a "really good" memory. This memory needs to be the one I bring to mind when I'm feeling sad or bored or whatever and need a really great pick-me-up. Then it was obvious what memory I should write about. It's great. Unfortunately for you I have zero writing talents so there is no way I could possibly portray the awesomeness of this situation for your reading pleasure, but I will try.

Setting: It's the fall of 2004. We are in the commons at Layton High School. It's Back to School night or something and the show choir that I spent my life in in HS just got done performing.

So. The girls choir (aka Lace) had these horrific belt sash things that went with their outfits. We spent a lot of time making fun of it. Two of my friends (Can I say names here? I don't know how this cyber world works. I'll just call them R and T.) were just playing around and decided to tie themselves together with R's belt sash thing. So T put the sash through one of his and one of R's belt loops and tied it in a knot. R and T spent the next bit wandering around tied to each other, tearing down the sound equipment, etc. Very entertaining.

The night was winding down it was getting time to all go home. R and T started trying to untie the sash. It wasn't happening. We got all sorts of people working on it, we even resorted to trying to saw it apart with my keys. Nothing. After a significant amount of time trying and failing it is suggested that R and T just run in opposite directions and rip the stupid belt sash off. We're all in favor of this because no one likes the belt sash anyway so R and T position themselves back to back. On the count of 3 they're going to run in opposite directions as hard as they can and rip the sash off.

1...2...3! RRRRRRRRIP Oh my goodness, I wish I had a picture of this moment. The picture isn't for me because the image is seared into my brain forever but I really wish I could share it with you. I look over and see T with this absolute look of complete shock on his face and look down and see that his pants have ripped all the way down the leg and he is just standing there in his little fluffy sheep boxers with his ripped pants gaping open. Then I see R standing there with the same look of complete shock but her pants and her belt loop and the stupid belt sash are completely intact. I have never come so close to peeing my pants from laughter in my life.

T instantly hit the ground and scuttled behind the nearest garbage can until someone could find him some pants. (Thinking back on it I have no idea where the extra pants that saved T came from.) I was literally rolling on the floor laughing. Upon closer inspection it appeared that T's belt loop ripped off, tearing his pants all the way down the leg. Somehow R's pants and sash were secretly made of steel and were not even kind of affected. Hahahahahahahaha

Day 1

2010-11-15T15:34:00.001-08:00

Day 1: A recent photo of you and 15 interesting facts about yourself.

This picture is from Halloween. That's recent, right? It's like 2 weeks ago. Aren't we cute?!

15 interesting facts? Holy crap, this blogging thing is going to take some actual dedication. Laaame. Lucky for me I already wrote 25 interesting facts about myself on facebook ago. I'll just go pick some of those...

Huh. Apparently I have changed a bit since February 1, 2009 which was when I made that list, so here is a slightly edited version:

1. I have a serious phobia of ants. Lots of people think I'm joking when I tell them this, but no. I seriously can't handle ants. I am terrified of their tiny bodies that could climb anywhere and bite me. I would rather have 3 million spiders in my bed that 3 ants. Plus I'm pretty sure I am allergic to them. I don't know if I am actually allergic to them or if my brain just decided I am allergic to them but sometimes when I find them on me I convince myself they bit me and then my body swells up. I'm not joking.

2. I hate playing sports. I can't think of anything I would rather do less. But, ironically, one of my favorite life activities is attending sports events, particularly BYU ones.

3. Buffy the Vampire Slayer is my all time favorite TV show. I think I got my sarcastic type personality from it. I have all 7 seasons on DVD so if anyone wants a marathon I am always down.

4. I am completely incapable of waking up to an alarm clock. Completely incapable. If I have to do it then I have to set it for an hour before I actually need to get up and I have to set it to go off every 60 seconds and I will probably still sleep in at least a half and hour. Luckily God knew this would be problematic so he gave me a twin sister who wakes me up every morning without fail.

5. I hate being late for church. I am consistently 10 minutes late to every class or meeting I ever go to, but I refuse to be late to church. I always allow myself a couple of hours to get ready just to be on the safe side, even when my church starts at 8:30am like it does now. I don't really know where this tendency comes from because it's not like my family was ever on time to church.

6. I love mowing lawns. It's what I spend my summers doing, and I even get paid for it! *Shout out to my mow girls! I luff you!* I love being outside in the sun and getting tan and blond the natural way. Plus I love the way the grass smells after it's just been cut and I love the perfectly green color. I plan on having the most beautifully manicured lawn when I grow up.

7. Disneyland is my love. I'm pretty sure that if I moved in there it would take me at least 3 years to even consider getting bored of it. Unfortunately I have this curse that makes it so I rarely get there. I've blogged about this curse before. I'm far too lazy to link to that blog so you'll have to just go find it if you're interested. Luckily I never blog so it shouldn't be too hard to find.

8. My favorite food is pizza. I will choose pizza over everything always. My favorite is when I buy enough pizza that I can have hot pizza for dinner and then cold pizza for breakfast and lunch the next day. Mmmmm cold pizza. My all time favorite pizza is the chicken alfredo pizza from Papa Murphy's. I also love just plain old cheese and olives.

9. I can type super fast (somewhere around 95wpm--I just took a test) and get this: I love it. If you ever need your papers typed or something I am so there because I really love typing things.

10. I color code my closet and I'm rather obsessive about it. I spend far too much time making sure the reds fade smoothly into the oranges and pinks. But other than that I am a HUGE slob. I can't keep my bedroom clean for more than one night and I honestly can't remember the last time I made my bed.

11. I love love love reading. The only other thing that competes for "Best Lazy Day Activity" is napping, which is also great. My favorite kinds of books are young adult fiction. I'm lucky because my mom was blessed with the amazing ability to just buy the most amazing books anyone has ever read without knowing anything about it. She has this 6th sense for it. This section of the facts would not be complete if I didn't mention my love for Harry Potter. And while we're mentioning favorites I should also mention the Bloody Jack series and the Hunger Games.

12. I want to be a math teacher when I grow up. Aren't I such a nerd? I do my student teaching next semester and I am STOKED! (Except for the part where I am slowly turning into a grown up and it's terrifying!)

13. I can say "Shut up and kiss me" in several different languages. (I don't know how to write or spell them, just say them, so I can't type them here. You'll just have to believe me.) I can say it in: English, Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian, German, Sign Language, Chinese, Korean, Bulgarian, Creole, Danish, Tagalog, Swahili...I know there are more but I can't remember them right now. If you know it any other languages please let me know.

Oh my gosh, can I just give up?

14. I don't like drinking things that aren't water. And if there is lemon in my water then I am in heaven. Sometimes when I get a meal or something at a fast food place I just fill the drink up with water because I like it so much more than anything else the soda machine has to offer.

15. Ok, let's be honest. I am a procrastinator extraordinaire. The only reason I am actually making an effort to think of 15 things about myself is because I have a 5 page paper on Aristotle due tomorrow morning at 8 that I haven't even started yet. I live my life by the motto "Why do today what you can put off till tomorrow?" and I'm serious about it. I know if I started my paper this morning then I would have been working on it tonight anyway. So why don't I just not work on it all day and only work on it at night. That way I make sure to spend the absolute minimum amount of time on it possible. It's takes skill though, this procrastinating thing. You have to have a sense for how long you can push things off because there is nothing worse than pulling all nighters. Ew, I shudder just thinking about it. Good thing I can type fast.

World's Worst Blogger

2010-11-14T16:25:00.001-08:00

I recently decided that I am the world's worst blogger. What the heck? My life is entertaining and full of hilarnosity, and somehow I can't manage to write it down. I have hundreds (okay, that's an exaggeration--it's more like tens) of blog drafts where I started blogging about the most recent hilarious even in my life and then two paragraphs in I realized I have absolutely no talent for writing and no matter how hard I try I can never make the events in my life seems as funny as they really were when I write them in a blog. So then I just feel stupid and get frustrated and give up. I was going to hire someone hilarious to write about my life but then I remembered I have practically no money. So someday when I am rich and famous I will hire people to blog about my life but until then you're going to have to put up with the world's worst blogger.

So I am going to change. I have the serenity to accept the things I cannot change so I'm not going to try to start being hilarious, but I can change the fact that I have been averaging about 2 posts a year. I'm going to do this 30 day challenge thing, inspired by (and by "inspired by" I mean "exactly copied from") my friend Megan. I don't really know where she found the challenge but so far I love it and I'm just going to follow in her footsteps. Hopefully that's okay... I haven't asked her.

Starting tomorrow I am going to blog every day for 30 days. I know, right? I am so ambitious. I can feel the excitement in you building. I'm not actually starting today because I am the procrastinator extraordinaire but tomorrow! I will for sure start tomorrow.

P.S. Do a google image search for "world's worst blogger" (or just click here). How did google chose those images? None of them have anything to do with anything. Hahahaha I love it.

I broke world records.

2010-07-24T15:21:00.000-07:00

If any of you are on the fence about which university in Utah is the coolest then this will definitely push you onto the right side. Yesterday BYU broke the record for the WORLD'S LARGEST WATER BALLOON FIGHT. It was phenomenal.

Tahoe Time!

2010-07-24T15:04:00.000-07:00

I'm annoyed with the way this blogger editor thing is set up so this time I decided to upload the pictures before I wrote the blog so I didn't have to deal with dragging the pictures around all the text and having them out of order and such. That just made me realize that I have no pictures of Tahoe so maybe I shouldn't blog about it. But I already put in all the effort of uploading the three pictures, so it's getting a blog entry. Plus, these days exciting things so rarely happen in my life and what's more exciting than a family reunion? It deserves to be blogged.

Dad and Chree couldn't come to Tahoe because Chree had some youth extravaganza church music performance thing and dad had to stay home and babysit her. We were sad part of the family was missing, but only kind of sad because we really enjoyed the extra space on the 11 hour car ride.

I have always wanted to do this! It's still on my list of things to do because I didn't actually participate in this burial, I just witnessed it.

Hahaha. Swimming isn't fun if you don't have goggles.

Overall it was a super fun vacation. It's a lot of fun seeing all the cousins and once again reaffirming that my cousins are the cutest in the world . I realized that I need to take the time to relax and really enjoy my time floating in the lake because someday I'll have children and I'll be the one running around crazily gathering children and throwing sunscreen or fruit snacks at them.

Oregon!!

2010-07-19T18:42:00.000-07:00

I am the worst blogger ever but a large part of that is because nothing exciting ever happens in my life. You would think that when the few and far between exciting events do happen I would rush to blog about it, but no. I struggle.

Something exciting happened! I went to Oregon! Stef and I drove 12 hours across America to visit our lovely roommate Jamal (aka Janelle). It was SUCH a fun week. We enjoyed the wonders of Klamath Falls for a bit and then headed off to the Oregon coast for all sorts of excitement. It was such a blast! We took millions of pictures and when I made the FB album I filtered it down to every picture that I absolutely HAD to have in the album, and the album was still 104 pictures long. A 104-pictures-long blog post would be a bit tedious so I'll try to just pick out my faves.

Okay, whatAIR. The pictures are out of order and there's nothing I can do about it. I tried. If you want to know the real order of the pictures just watch for my increasingly unattractive hair. The more out of control it is, the later into the trip it was.

Crater Lake (which I continually call Glacier Lake)! I almost called it Glacier Lake in this blog until I remembered that I struggle with that so I should probably look it up. Good thing I did.

The yurt! Let me tell you something: I am never camping in a tent again. This baby had a heater. And beds WITH mattresses. AND a place to plug in my cell phone charger and my straightner (if I had thought to bring a straightner, which I hadn't (obviously--look at my hair) because I had never dreamed that camping and straight hair could be enjoyed simultaneously.)

This is probably my favorite pic from the trip even though it is obvious we have been camping for a few days and our hair is suffering. Lookit the lovely sunsetting ocean!

I'll bet you can't even see Stef and I in that picture. We went on this crazy hike around cliffs and jungles to get to a super cool island thing. You can't get to the island except through the crazy jungle/cliff path and most of the island is covered by water a lot of the time so there were all kinds of coolio tide pools and stuff to look at. It was definitely worth the life-risking hike. I think.

We went to the Oregon Shakespeare (Just so you know, it has taken me 22 years to master the spelling of 'Shakespeare', but I think I've finally gotten it.) Festival in Ashland. It was so much fun! We saw "Twelfth Night", which of course made me want to watc

h "She's the Man". I'm so cultured.

It was an excelllllent trip and totally worth driving all that way. It was so fun to see Jamal and now when she tells me stories about her growing up life I can actually picture the setting in my head. Wooo.

My Curse

2010-05-29T09:13:00.000-07:00

I have this thing where I love Disneyland more than most things in my life. The unfortunate part is that I live 721 miles away. I often try to overcome those 721 miles and make the trek out to Disneyland. Sometimes I make it and sometimes my curse rears its ugly head. Here's the story:

Attempt 1 (April 2009):

This story is looooong and complicated but we met this boy who claimed he worked at Disneyland as Price Eric and that he could get us in for free. We made plans to finish all of our finals during reading days and head to Anaheim during finals week. At the LAST SECOND (When I say "last second" I definitely mean last second. I mean literally 2 hours before we were walking out the door. My bags were packed and in the car.) he backed out. Saying I was upset is quite the understatement. I hated him and everything for a few days. I spent the rest of finals week floating around the pool and moping about how I wasn't in Disneyland. A year later I still haven't quite forgiven Prince Eric.

Attempt 2 (August 2009):

I have the coolest dad in the world and when he heard about the stupid STUPID boy ruining my hopes and dreams he said he would send me and the sisters to Disneyland and it would be even BETTER than it would have been with Prince Eric. Isn't that so nice of him? So we planned the trip, got the hotel, looked at ticket prices, etc. The night before we were supposed to leave I was at a slip 'n' slide party and BROKE MY FREAKING ARM. I don't know if you have broken your arm before but it really isn't something that you can just get over and go to Disneyland the next day. I was upset and was beginning to think that I just wasn't meant to get to Disneyland.

Luckily I've made it to Disneyland twice since that incident. I was beginning to think the curse was broken until...

Attempt 3 (yesterday):

I was completely packed and in Provo waiting for the last of our party (and the driver) to arrive so we could take off. Suddenly she remembered that she never completely got her car insured. We couldn't take an uninsured car to California! Time was quickly running out, we had to get to Cali before the girl we were staying with took off and couldn't let us in her house. None of us had another car we could take.By the time we drove back to West Haven to get my mom's car we wouldn't have made it to California in time so we had to stay home. The worst part is that this time I wasn't even that heartbroken. I had kind of expected it to happen. I am so jaded by my constant disappointment that I just went to bed. Now I am here writing this blog when I should be riding Indiana Jones.

*sigh*

Kitties!

2010-05-09T17:41:00.000-07:00

The Franc family added two new members to it this weekend: Lyle and Odette. Candace's friend's cat had kittens and gave us two of them. Candace and I instantly claimed ownership. (Lyle is Candace's, Odette's is mine.) The family is OK with that because it means they never have to clean out the litter box (which is surprisingly less disgusting than you might imagine).

This is Odette.

This is Lyle. I feel like I should point out that Lyle is a girl even though Lyle is usually (perhaps always) a boy's name. She was named before Candace knew the gender and then there was no going back.

Awww they are so tiny and adorable! The entire family is in love with the kitties! Okay, not dad. He's "allergic" to cats. I think that means he just doesn't like them. He continually points out how useless cats are and I just remind him what a go-getter (not) our lazy dog Tramp is these days. The rest of us can't get enough of them and are continually petting and holding and touching and watching them. They are supposedly outside cats, but for now they are too small to be outside so they live in a cardboard mansion that Candace built in the basement. We'll see if they ever actually move outside.

Goodbye Provo!

2010-05-09T17:15:00.000-07:00

I am the worst blogger. I am working on blogging more than once a semester. The semester ended fantastically. I didn't even fail any of my classes. I will review some of the major events that have happened since I last blogged (if I can even remember any of them).

I dyed a chunk of my hair purple. I luff it! Don't mind this picture, I'm too lazy to crop it appropriately. It's an embarrassing picture because it's a picture of my picture on the wall. Can you find me? Anyway...you can see my purple hair really well in this picture. I never even got in trouble for having purple hair, which is a little bit against the honor code.

On April Fool's Day Jamal, Emma and I played a fantastic prank. We broke into the boys' apartment at 4am and put 10 gold fish in upside-down cups of water all over their kitchen. We are HILARIOUS. The boys were not as amused as expected them to be.

I went to the Festival of Colors for the first time. It was spectacular and everything I wanted it to be. If you don't know what it is you should watch this video (here) and then think of me in the middle of the crowd trying not to die.

We played outside a lot when it got warmer. I swam in the Glenwood pool a lot and went in the hot tub for the first time in my 2 years of living there.

Probably the most important event was that Stef graduated! She is so cool. She was accepted to tons of really great law schools all over America with lots of scholarships and such. She chose to go to BYU Law School because really it's the best decision financially and it's a great law school.

Probably everyone wonders why I didn't graduate too and really that is a good question. Don't worry, I'm not a slacker. My program is just a little wonky and if you don't get into it right away it takes a while to finish. Since I started at BYU-Idaho it's taking me an extra year to finish. I'm okay with that because really I don't feel like growing up yet anyways.

Now I'm home! It's lovely being home. I'm mowing lawns again. Will I ever escape that place? I'm beginning to doubt it...

Catch Up Time!

2010-03-08T07:12:00.000-08:00

Wow, it's been a loooong time... My life has been very busy and full of complete awesomeness. I can't even remember what I've done since November, but I'm sure it's been great. Here's a quick catch up (in picture form, because that's much more interesting).

All of these pictures deserve a whole post dedicated to them, but this will have to do.
I had the loveliest Christmas with my family.

I had an awesome New Years in Salt Lake with lovely friends.
We had loads of dance parties...
And some hilarious photo shoots...
There was an amazing amount of birthdays this semester. Every week we were celebrating someone else, it was fantastic!
We road tripped it to Vernal to visit our good friend Zack. I thought Vernal would be boring (no offense Zack!) but it was an awesome weekend!
Of course I had to get a road trip to Cali in. I can't go more than a couple of months without one!
We did the Disney "Give a Day, Get a a Disney Day" where you do a day of service and get a ticket to Disneyland FREE. It was amazing. These are some of the blankets we made.
We spent some time at the lovely Seal Beach.
There were 12 of us total. We filled up the Indiana Jones car PERFECTLY. It was seriously the best experience I've ever had at Disneyland (even though I didn't get to drive). *sigh* We didn't get to stay for the fireworks because some people had to be to class early the next morning (we went to Disneyland on Monday...the free tickets didn't work any other day) so we had to leave by 9. It broke my heart, but it was still and amazing trip.
My birthday was among the many celebrated in the last couple of months. I'm 22, can you believe it? I can't believe how old I'm getting.
The entire fab five was together for my birthday. It might have been the best day of my life.
I spent a few weeks being utterly Jane Austen-tacious! (har har har! I love puns.) I was on the committee for the Jane Austen Preference Dance at BYU. It was SO MUCH WORK, but the results were totally worth it. We sold out, everyone had an amazing time, the location was breathtaking, I got to dance with Cosmo in Brigham Square...I wish I had written a whole post on this.
I spent a HUGE chunk of my time helping out these guys:
I've spent so much time with these girls! (They were on the Jane Austen committee too.) I'm going to have separation anxieties.
Chris and Sterling ran for BYUSA President and VP. It was a lot of fun, but a lot of work. I was outside on campus all day every day (seriously, 7:30am-5pm...then knocking doors at nights) telling people about how awesome Chris and Sterling are.
And good news...WE WON!We went to Music and the Spoken Word in Salt Lake with Jamali-o. It was so pretty and fabtastic! (Whoa, I meant to say 'fantastic' but I think I'll leave the 'fabtastic'. What a great word!)

If you made it all the way through that huge post then you must really like me and you might care that I'm still doing the Student Advisory Council and the Mathematics Education Association and loving it. My jobs are going well too (I'm a research assistant and a grader). I took 3 block classes this semester which was INSANE, but they are over now and my class load is significantly lighter. Hopefully I'll just keep filling that free time with friends and fun! ♥

Road Trip!!

2009-11-15T08:58:00.001-08:00

On the a scale of 1-10 for reasonableness, we I get at most a -17.
So Ludo. Ludo=my favorite band ever. Let me give you some background: When Stef and I were freshman living with Hannah she introduced us to Ludo. Ludo has this rock opera...it's amazing. The three of us would frequently lay on our living room floor with the lyrics to the rock opera in front of us and belt the whole thing (it's 1/2 hour long). We vowed that if Ludo every played the rock opera in concert we would be there, no matter how hard it was to get there.
Well Ludo did go on tour to play the entire rock opera. The closest concert to us was in Pomona, California. We were so there.
Except Stef and I are just a bit more unreasonable and thought "Well..since we're going to California anyway why don't we just take a quick stop up in San Francisco [you know, 7 hours away from where we actually need to be] and see Wicked!" So we did. We left Friday morning at 4am and drove all the way to San Francisco. (That's 12 hours.) When we got there we checked into our hotel which was surprisingly posh. We definitely did not fit in. For example, everyone else was pulling up in their limos. But it was awesome! We got ready quickly and headed out on the town to find our theater which was only three blocks away. Unfortunately all the crazies lived on those 3 blocks and after a few too many uncomfortable conversations with some of them we decided to head back to the hotel and take a cab to the theater.
OH MY GANDHI the show was amazing. Like, so amazing! People said it was amazing and I liked the music and all but...WOW. Stef and I had to listen to the album 16 times in the car ride the next day.
So the next morning (after ordering yummy room service) we got back in the car to head to Pomona (a 7 hour drive). On the way in to Pomona we found a palm reader and of course we had to stop. Apparently I am broken but not yet shattered and for a great price of $600 my psychic can lead me in the right direction because one more wrong step and I will be shattered. Mmhmm.
We stayed at Kyle's AWESOME grandparent's house in Pomona. When we got there we met up with Hannah and Emma and Kyle and Zack and headed to Downtown Disney to go to Rainforest Cafe. I cannot even tell you how hard it was to be AT Disneyland and not go inside. But dinner was lovely.
After dinner we headed to the venue for the concert. We waited in line and chatted with other obesive fans. The other bands that played were alright. Mostly I just wanted to Ludo to come on...and then they did. It was AMAZING. They played SO MANY SONGS! And then they played the rock opera. Oh goodness. It was glorious. I need some member of Ludo to marry me. Any of them, really.
After the show we bought shirts and got pictures with everyone then headed home. The next morning we got up early (ok, 8. Is that early?) and headed home (a 9 hour drive).

Have you been doing the math? 12 hours+7 hours+9 hours=28 hours of driving. Yeah baby. Best weekend ever. Here's what our driving looked like:

School is cool.

2009-11-02T11:01:00.000-08:00

I feel the need to give some updates on my life. First of all, school is cool. I kind of decided that graduating isn't what I want to do because then I have to be a grown up which seems lame.
I have an awesome and busy life. Classes are going really well. I'm taking less credits than I ever have. It makes me feel all relaxed and happy. I also have two jobs, one as a research assistant for the same professors I worked for last semester (different project though) and it's awesome. The other job is a grader for another professor. That's...alright. I think I will need to hire someone to do all my grading for me when I grow up.

I was asked to represent the College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences on SAC (the student advisory council) for BYUSA and it's really quite cool. I get to be a part of making important decisions about BYU like whether or not the library should allow food-friendly zones (seriously, my decisions are life changing!). Being on SAC has made me see what an awesome place BYU is. There are so many people working so hard to make everyone's experience awesome. Usually I don't feel like a blog is the place to get all serious, but I want to be serious for a mo. I read this really cool quote in my coolio BYU planner. It's by Jeffery R. Holland and this is what he said "Go the extra mile along the remarkable pathway that is so generously provided you here." I feel like that should be my motto here at school. It is such a great opportunity for me to be here at this awesome university, and so many people have sacrificed and are sacrificing for me to be here. I need to do more than the bare minimum. I need to go above and beyond and give back to the school as much as I can.

Ok, sorry about that boring bit. In other news, I have the coolest ward ever. I was called as the FHE mom which is stressful but I love it. If anyone has good FHE activities let me know.
My roommates are awesome. We spend every second together, even if nothing's going on and we're just chillin in the living room. We have made an awesome group of friends from the ward (the boys of 139--and a couple others that are honorary members of 139) and we love co-existing together. We accomplished many fun fall activities including camping, costume parties, pumpkin carving, murder mysteries, haunted houses, and scary movies.

At the beginning of the semester we had Jamal's awesome brother Brian take some sweet roommate pictures of us. All of them turned out FABULOUSLY. If you want to see more you can check out my facebook album and if you want to see even MORE (like 80 more) you can come visit my computer and I.

This picture doesn't really have anything to do with anything. I just wanted to show you how cool my friends are. That would be Harry, Ron, Draco and Hagrid.
This is the most complete picture of the group that I have. It's not all of us, but it's most of us. This is at the 60's esque murder mystery. It was SUCH a blast. Please notice my sweet go-go boots.

To sum it all up: life is good. I like it.

Oh, P.S. If Stefanie had a blog she would write about this but she doesn't so I will. She freaking ROCKED the LSAT. She got 165 which is in the 92nd percentile, which means she is the smartest girl I know. Now she is deciding which law schools to go to. Her options are Stanford, UCLA and BYU. Wowsa.

Ya see, the most fantastic, magical things can happen -- and it all starts with a wish!

2009-09-07T14:57:00.000-07:00

We did it! The Franc girls finally conquered fate and finally made it to Disneyland. Third time's the charm, right? (For those who are unaware: Stef and I tried to go to Disneyland last spring but...it's a long story. Basically everyone we were going with backed out about 4 hours before we left. It was heartbreaking. Then we were going to go in August but I broke my arm the day before we left. Obviously fate didn't want us at Disneyland. So this time we kept it a huge secret (at least as well as we could) and only planned on getting in the car Friday afternoon and just...seeing where we ended up. And we made it!!)

It was glorious, of course. We drove to our Grandparents' in Nevada Friday night and took a short nap before getting up in the way-too-early-unless-you're-on-your-way-to-Disneyland morning and headed on the rest of the way. We arrived just as the park was opening and ran (literally) in. It was the best day ever. We were full of good luck which was good because we were slightly worried fate would be bitter at us for tricking her. All kinds of awesome things happened like we walked up to the Honey, I Shrunk the Audience show right as it was starting and we walked past Star Tours just as it was re-opening after a break down so we got to walk right on the line. The result of all our good luck was that we got to ride every single ride we even kind of cared about and got to ride all the best ones twice. We even took a time out in our riding to watch the fantastic fireworks show.

The next morning we went to the beach for a couple of hours. It was beautiful and I can't figure out why I don't live by the ocean. Then we headed back to the grandparents' for some yummy food and some much needed sleep.

We woke up this morning and headed home. It was a very short trip filled with lots of driving but it was totally worth it. Sigh...I ♥ Disneyland.

And here's a shout out to the awesome Cougars who defeated Oklahoma on Saturday. Yeah yeah!!! I adore them. I wish I watched the game! My desire to have watched the game doesn't even come close to my desire to be in Disneyland though so.... does that make me a bad fan?

I ♥ summer.

2009-07-25T16:06:00.000-07:00

When I see people that I haven't seen in a long time I like to make them tell me five interesting things that have happened to them since I last saw them. I haven't blogged in a while so it's like I haven't cyber-seen whoever is reading this in a while so I am going to tell you five interesting things that have happened to me since I last blogged. Here we go (in no particular order)...

1. Family Time
I spent a lot of time with my family this summer. I feel like we are all finally getting to the point where we are mature enough to spend more than 4 seconds together without fighting. That's a big step for us! We did various activities like picnics and parades and fireworks and baseball games. We even went to a family reunion in Bear Lake. I would post tons of adorable pictures but they're all on my dad's computer which is not here with me.

2. Mowing Lawns
For the past three years Stef and I have mowed lawn for the Davis School District in the summers. It's secretly the best job ever. It's hot and sweaty and dirty and hard but the hours are good (6:30am-3:00pm every Mon-Fri) and I get all the holidays off. The people I work with are amazing and I get super tan and super blond as a nice bonus. Plus I get amused working with all the crazy old men.

This is my amazing mow crew with our awesoem tie-dyed shirts. We all wore them to work the next day. Do you think any of the crazy old men took us seriously ever? They didn't. Also we had 11 girls and one boy on our crew. The poor boy. He handled it very well though. He killed all our bugs and stuff.

3. Rollerblading
I actually accomplished one of the 3 billion goals I set this summer! I feel like one is better than none, right? Stef and I bought some sweet pink rollerblades and tried to restablish ourselves as the best rollerbladers in the neighborhood (a title we held when we were 8). I'll tell you what, rollerblading is much harder as a big person than it is as a tiny person. When you're short there's less room to fall. We struggled a lot at first. I'm sure the neighborhood loved watching these poor girls in their 20's dragging their feet around and around the block, tripping every other step. But eventually we rocked it. We are now rollerblading queens!

4. 80's Dancing
I have always maintained that everything in life is more fun if you dress up in costumes to do it but usually I have a hard time finding people to play along. 80's dancing is amazing because everyone else dressed up too!! There's this place in Salt Lake that has 80's dancing every Thursday night. You get to dress up in 80's clothes and dance your heart out to some rockin 80's music. I think I am addicted. It's reasonable to dance like crazy until 2am then get up for work 3 horus later. Totally.

Don't mind my face, it's ridiculous. Just look at our awesome costumes!

5. Broken
Le sigh. I broke my arm, Everyone always asks me what happened and I kind of have to tell them that I don't know. I was slip 'n' sliding but I didn't really fall on it I don't think. I think I was sliding down and stuck my arm out to keep me from flipping around backwards and it slipped behind me and twisted and snapped. It was at a work party so there were no parents there (at least not mine) and people may think I look like an adult but I am SO not one so I almost lost it (emotionally, I mean. I didn't almost lose my arm, it was very attached). I could feel it bent all wrong up behind me but I didn't dare look at it so mostly I just started yelling hysterically (I told you I'm not an adult, don't judge). Stef definitely came to the rescue. She was amazing. She remained so calm and called my parents and told me not to look at my arm. There was no blood or anything, it was just bent very wrongly. My boss's wife drove me and Stef to the ER where they asked me stupid things like what my pain was on a scale of 1-1o. What kind of a question is that?! How would I know?! That was the first painful thing that every happened to me! Anyway to make a long story short(ish) my left humerus is broken in a spiral type fracture. I had a splint on for 2 weeks that made it so I couldn't move my arm at all. I was completely useless. I couldn't even button my own pants. I got a different brace on it a few days ago that makes it so I can use my elbow but I still have to wear the stupid sling. I have to have this brace on for 6 weeks though. 6 freaking weeks! That is practically forever. I could die before then. It's still pretty sore but it's getting a lot better. I will never take the use of my left arm for granted ever again.

This is not the best picture of me...in fact it could quite possibly be the worst picture ever taken of me. I was not aware the picture was being taken and apparently my resting face is a scowl. Anyway it's the only picture I have of my injuredness.

The end! I guess on paper (or whatever this is--blog...land) my summer doesn't look very exciting but it really was. I love summer SO MUCH. But I'm definitely ready for some school now!

Shut up, Brain!

2009-07-01T18:27:00.000-07:00

It is entirely possible that every single person who has ever stumbled upon my blog has wondered at the title of it. niccoletobrain.blogspot.com with the title "Shut Up, Brain". I feel the need to post a blog with an explanation. So here we go:
There are these books. They are excellent. There are 9 of them. They are by Louise Rennison and are about a British girl named Georgia Nicolson. My friend Karen read these books and then was worried that I never actually had a personality, I just stole Georgia's. In these books Georgia is writing in her diary about her hilarious and oh-so-traumatic life as a teenager. Anyway, she is always telling her brain to shut up because her brain is crazy pants.
Here is a small section from book #4 "Dancing in My Nuddy Pants" which I think demonstrates quite nicely the hilarnosity of Georgia and also shows her telling her brain to shup up.

As I came into the main street I could see the Sex God was waiting for me by the clock tower. I ducked into a shop doorway for a bit of basooma adjusting and lip gloss application. Also, I though I should practice saying something normal so that even if my brain fell out (as it normally does when I see him) my mouth could carry on regardless. I though a simple approach was best. Something like, "Hi" (pause, a bit of sexy smile, lips parted, nostrils not flaring wildly), and then, "Long time no dig." Cool--a bit on the eccentric side, but with no hint of brain gone on holiday to Cyprus. I came out of my shop doorway and walked towards him. Then he saw me. Oh heavens to Betsy, Mr. Gorgeous has landed. He said "Hi, Georgia" in his Sex-Goddy voice and I said "Hi, Dig". Dig?? He laughed. "Always a bit of a tricky thing knowing what you are talking about at first, Georga. This usually makes it better..." And he got hold of my hand and pulled me towards him. Quick visit to number four on the snogging scale (kiss lasting three minutes without a breath). Yummu scrumboes and marveloso. If I could just stay attached to his mouth forever I would be happy. Dead, obviously, from starvation, but happy. Dead happy. Shut up, brain, shut up! Brain to mouth, brain to mouth: do not under any circumstances mention being attached to his mouth forever.

Hahahaha! I love it. So since Georgia and I share a personality I named my blog after our commonalities (we both have crazy pants brains). So read the books if you're looking for a quick and fun read that won't actually stimulate your brain in any meaningful way, it will just make you laugh your face right off.

I consider this big news. It was big to me.

2009-06-20T12:57:00.000-07:00

Hello blogging world! Stefanie here. I commandeered Niccole's blog because I needed to make an announcement and don't have a blog of my own. Perhaps I should get one but, frankly, why do I need one when I can steal Cole's any time I need to?

Anyway, on to the news: I got my hair cut short!!! Perhaps some viewers out there would not consider my current length short, but keep in mind that I have not cut more than 3 inches off my hair for my entire life. That is 21 years without a significant change in hair length. Would you like to see photos?

Here is the before, which is super nasty because I had just gotten off work. Seriously, I changed in a gas station bathroom and put makeup on in the car while Cole was driving. As Rachel was washing my hair she said, "You have something very strange on your scalp. What is that? Oh, it's grass." I wish the last picture of my long hair could have been beautiful, but oh well.Here is the after picture!!! I love it so very very much! I wish you could all see it in person because it looks even better. I'm not sure you can tell from the picture, but it is an A-line cut, so it's shorter in back and longer in the front. It makes me look so much older and professional, which is totally what I was going for.And finally, here is the picture that shows just how much hair was taken off! Eleven inches. The salon is donating it for me, so that's great.I am so pleased.I have always been an advocate of long hair and swore that I would never be one off those women who cut their hair off when they have kids. However, I have changed my mind! Long hair is still beautiful of course, but short hair is fabulous too! It still feels weird when I wash ot or brush it, but I have no regrets whatsoever!

New!

2009-06-18T18:38:00.000-07:00

I got a new laptop! Isn't it sad that my summer life is so boring that I think getting a new laptop is actually blog-worthy? Not that getting a new laptop isn't a big deal, it totally is, but it is definitely not blog worthy. What more do I say about it? I got a new laptop. That's it. It's pink.

I feel pressure to make this a more substantial blog. Summer is going excellently. I luuuurve summer.

Alright, fine. I have a confession: I have not accomplished any of my goals. I haven't even started trying to accomplish any of my goals. Don't judge, I work a lot! Mowing lawns is awesome. My tan lines are already strange. I'm also doing some work for one of my professors at school which is going well. So see? I totally have an excuse to be a failure for the summer.

Home again, home again, jiggity jig!

2009-04-25T08:52:00.000-07:00

Probably all of you (the millions and millions of you who read my blog because it's the best blog in the world) are impressed with my sudden blogging abilities. 4 blogs in less than a week!! That's borderline ridiculous. But I'm home for the summer now! It's excellent. I already slept in till 10am twice in a row.
Anyway, I heard once that "A goal not written down is only a good idea." Cheesy, I know, but I have several awesome goals for this summer that I would rather be more than good ideas so I am blogging them. I feel like if I have my giant blogging audience (ha) to answer to goal-wise I might actually work towards achieving these goals. Maybe.
Goal #1. Learn to play the guitar. At first I was going to try to learn on my own but then I realized I TOTALLY lack the motivation to do that so I chatted with me mum and found out there is a lady in our ward who teaches guitar lessons so I am going to talk with her this Sunday and see how it goes. By the end of the summer I want to be able to play "Walk Through the Fire" from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer musical episode. Oh, and also, I was playing some Guitar Hero yesterday and noticed that my skills have seriously deteriorated. I guess that's what happens when you don't play for four months. So this goal should include learning real life guitar skills and improving my virtual guitar skills.
Goal #2. Learn to roller blade. Ok, I already know how to roller blade. It was THE thing when I was 8. But it's been a few years and I doubt I can do it without looking like a foooool. The point of this goal is so that I can roller blade to class next semester which will cut down on commuting (walking) time hugely (hopefully).
Goal #3. Memorize awesome piano songs to play at the cafe. This is the only one I have worked on so far. I went through a lot of piano books yesterday and found some classical music that sounds really cool. I really am terrible at memorizing piano songs but I think that is because up until now I didn't have any reason to memorize them (besides boring piano recitals) so I couldn't be bothered. Now I have all this motivation!
Goal #4. Get my splits flat. I can't even pretend this goal has a point. I just think it would be cool.
Goal #5. Work on my basketball skills. This one is almost entirely for Jamal. She luh-hoves basketball and wants to play it constantly but I am so embarrassingly pathetic at it that I can never even try. So this summer I will practice and practice until I am not embarrassing. I don't even care about being good, I just want to be not embarrassing.
Mmkay, I think that's all. No, actually I'm sure it's not. I remember there being 6 but I can't remember the 6th one right now. I'll get back to you if I remember the 6th one. I should have written it down much sooner....
Work starts Monday. Stef and I are mowing lawns again. I really am excited for it, I just wish I could have a week to relax first. Then I think of the money I would not have if I took the first week off and it gets me all motivated to get to work.
I do love summer.

Artsy-Fartsy

2009-04-22T20:12:00.000-07:00

I feel the need to start off this blog with an amusing story that has absolutely nothing to do with what I was intending to blog about. I wasn't sure how to spell "fartsy" (is it an s or a z?) so I googled it. It came up with a definition from Yahoo dictionary. The definition said that it was a vulgar word. I'm not sure I would really consider "artsy-fartsy" vulgar, but whatever. The definition listed was "pretentiously or affectedly artistic". Then I started thinking about the word "pretentiously". I know what it means, I can use it in a sentence and everything but I don't think I could describe it to someone. So I googled "pretentiously". This is what came up (from wordreference.com):

pretentiously
A	adverb
	1	pretentiously
			in a pretentious manner; "this author writes pretentiously"

What a fountain of information, eh? I am pretty sure there is some rule somewhere that if you are writing a dictionary you can't use the word you are defining in the definition.

ANYWAY, you know how when you're a college student you have NO money and a constant need to be entertained at all times and the two things are hard to work out together? Well I have a brilliant solution. My roommates and I bought some $4 water colors (You can go much cheaper if you want. There were some for $2 that Jamal, our resident money saver, wanted to get but we refused because the $4 one was so much prettier.) and some paint brushes from Walmart. Then we dressed up in our most artsy attires (costumes make everything more fun) and headed to the park where we sat on a hill and painted the sunset. It was loooovely.

Stef, Jamal and Hannah posing artistically with their paintings. Please notice Hannah's AWEOME ...shoot, I don't know how to spell it. Hat. It sounds like boo-ray. How embarrassing.
Us with the lovely setting sun.
The results of our artsy evening.

(Obviously no actual talent in painting is required for this to be a fun-filled evening.)

The Royalpenny Cafe

2009-04-22T19:56:00.000-07:00

The roommates and I found a new favorite hang out. It's unfortunate that it took us until the last week of the semester but we can totally make it our favorite hang out next semester. It is THE ROYALPENNY CAFE. Let me tell you about this place. (But first let me tell you about how I didn't want to tell you about this place because I want it to be only my place because I love it so. But then I decided that was v. selfish of me. So here you go:) It's this ADORABLE cafe on University Avenue in Provo. There are several great things about it.

#1. None of the chairs match. How cool is that?! All of the decorations are awesome. There are chandeliers on the ceiling and strange couches (on the floor, obviously) and lots of modern art and this beautiful mural made out of pennies.

This is Hannah and Jamal with a chandelier in the background. Bee-YOO-tiful!

#2. They have a cereal bar. You can have all you can eat cereal for $4! And they have the good stuff too. Bring on the Capn' Crunch! And there's other food for the more normal among us. They have derlish sandwhiches and salads, all very low priced.

Stef and I with our yummers food.

#3. It's open until 2am. If I ever need some entertainment in my life post-midnight I am usually out of luck. But now I have the cafe for all of my entertainment needs around the clock.
#4. They have old-school nintendo. We're talking Super Mario Brothers--the game of my childhood. Jamal and Hannah were way better than Stef and I. #5. I feel like the list should be five things long but I can't think of a fifth thing so instead I will tell you about how I am going to have my birthday party here. Everyone is invited. I am already planning what to wear and what music should be played and whether or not I should require cocktail party-type dress. It will be sometime next Februrary.

We are a million ways to be cool.

2009-04-22T19:36:00.000-07:00

Seriously, I have the coolest roommates ever. My (awesome) ward put on an amazing Oscar-type talent show a few weeks ago. We decided to participate but couldn't decide what to do. Hannah somehow convinced us all to dance. Seriously, I am a somewhat talented person and there are a number of things I would choose to do over dancing but somehow we all ended up agreeing. We decided on Ok Go's "A Million Ways" dance. Check it out here. We spent many hours watching it over and over and over and over again until we got it down.
The night before the performance we took a trip over to the apartment building next door and knocked on random doors and asked people if we could perform the dance for them as practice since all of us were incapable of doing it without laughing. We needed an audience to practice in front of so we could keep it under control but we didn't want anyone in our ward to see. It actually helped a lot. 99% of the people were 110% weirded out but some of them gave us good advice and helpful hints.
Then the big night came! We dressed up in our best boy-like-but-still-hot outfits and headed out. I msut say, we looked AWESOME. We got some seriously weird stares as we marched across campus to the auditorium. We went 2nd and we seriously rocked it. The crowd went wild and we didn't even crack up or mess up or drop Hannah at the end. We didn't win though, which was a major disappointment. But we're over it because in our hearts we know we were the best. And every time anyone talks to us for longer than 7 seconds they tell us how awesome we did. Seriously all conversations go like this: "conversation, conversation, business, business, OH, by the way, you guys ROCKED the talent show!" Brother Peterson calls us the dancing queens. I appreciate that.

Anyway, this is us. We are definitely going to be famous someday so get your autographs while they're still free.

There is one MAJORLY sad part of this story: we didn't get it recorded. We were assured that someone was recording the show but we have not been able to find anyone who did. So if anyone out there documented that crowning achievement of my life in video form please let me know. I am willing to pay you for it if needed.

RIP Patty

2009-04-02T16:30:00.000-07:00

Our worst fears have been realized. One of our chicks has passed away. And not just any chick, it was Patty the Rooster! (Ok, ok. We all realize Patty is definitely a girl's name, but it's also the best name for a chicken [chicken patty...get it?] so we gave it to the rooster.) He was just too weak to survive and he died late Sunday night. The girls all lost it and turned into sobbing messes. We tried to be strong and reasonable but it didn't happen. The girls at home insisted that the family hold a small memorial. Candace buried Patty under the deck while Natalie and the boys whistled the funeral march. I don't know how dad things we will ever be able to eat these chickens.

This is Patty's final resting place. Oh, P.S. The other picture is not a picture of dead Patty, that would be too morbid. It's just a picture of Patty resting because he is too weak. :(

Hot Chicks

2009-03-26T22:01:00.000-07:00

You will all be glad to know that the Franc Family is well on their way to becoming a full blown farm. We have officially taken the first step: chickens! We (and by we I, of course, mean my father) bought 25 chicks. The first four were delivered today and we'll get the rest tomorrow. I guess oneof the chicks will turn into a rooster, though I have no idea how you tell which one. We are all madly in love with them all already. We have to be constantly reminded not to get too attached because some of the chicks won't make it and we tear up just thinking about it. Plus the ultimate goal is to eat the chickens when they are fully grown. I don't know how I feel about this. I suppose we'll cross that bridge when we get to it. ...Or I will run away to college and avoid eating our pets.

We are trying to come up with some clever chicken names. The best we have so far is Patty. If anyone has any great ideas be sure to comment away.

Such a lovely place, Such a lovely place

2009-03-03T16:10:00.000-08:00

Let me tell you the best way to handle winter in Utah: leave! That is just what my roommates and I did over President's Day weekend.
We left late Friday night and arrived back in Provo late Monday night. It was the best weekend ever and a fabulous way to celebrate the births of Stef, Jamal and I.

This is Stef and I flying kites at the Torrey Pines beach which was literally 3 minutes away from our AMAZING hotel (thanks Dad!).

I am probably WAY more proud of this than I should be. That mermaid that we created is HUGE. The "staff" that she is holding is about the size of me.
All of us (Hannah, Stefanie, Me, Jamal (more commonly known as Janelle)) being adorable.
Being adorable in the setting sun.
Our trip to the beautiful San Diego Castle...I mean temple.

Visiting Pacific Beach for old time's sake.

Stefanie is off to Zanzibar, to meet the Zanzibarbarians.
(If you can name that movie you are forever my hero.)

Now this picture is not in sequential order but I really feel like I need to end with this one. Our first night on the beach there was a sunset that you wouldn't believe. It was breathtaking, for sure.
Anyway, the moral of the story is that I am moving to California. Anyone wanna come with?

There's no place like home for the holidays...

2009-01-05T09:48:00.001-08:00

Christmas break is finally over and I could not be more sad. Here are some of the highlights of the break:

Playing in the snow
Stef and I had the high ambitions of building a snow-dino over Christmas break. We did it the day we got back and it turned out excellently. The siblings all helped occasionally (except Natalie who still had school, poor girl) but for the most part it was just Stef, Jake and I. Unfortunately, the second after we got done building it and went inside it started dumping snow and within minutes the dino was covered in inches of snow and just looked like a gigantic mountain rather than the beautiful piece of art it once was.

We rigged a sled so it could be pulled behind the ATV which was a BLAST. We spent many an hour either driving or being pulled around the backyard. Everyone loved it, even Tramp. Jake pulled Dad around for a little while and somehow managed to run over every pile of dirt or pointy rock or dog poop in the entire backyard. He claims it wasn't intentional but they were so scarce that we have to wonder...
Christmas
Christmas was fabulous, of course. I thought I was finally grown up enough that I would be able to stay in bed until a reasonable hour so I made a show of telling the boys they couldn't wake anyone up until 7am but then I woke up at 6:30 and was DYING to go upstairs so I guess I am still the 6 year old child I always have been. The fam got a Wii and a nice new TV and Guitar Hero, so as you can guess we spent every second from then on playing the Wii. All of us are getting quite good, even Dad who is finally passing songs on easy. The family's favorite songs are Living on a Prayer by Bon Jovi and Eye of the Tiger by Survivor. We all walk around singing those songs at the top of our lungs (even Jake and Jax), even when we aren't playing.
New Years
We started out the night with a family feast with festive New Years hats and leis. Eventually the fam all split ways: Stef and I to a bonfire, Natalie with her friend, Candace to Layton and Mom and Dad in bed. They boys were very disappointed that all the sisters abandoned them on the sea of life to try and have a fun New Years with the parents are not the biggest of party animals.
Spanish
The sisters have all decided to start speaking Spanish at random intervals. Or whenever we can. It is quite hilarious because none of us actually know Spanish very well. Between the four of us, we can pretty much say "I need your suitcase" "Help! Help! Where is my cheese?" and "You are fat and ugly." You'd be surprised how many conversations we can carry on using this limited vocabulary.

Now I am back in Provo and am trying to be very optimistic about the fact that the next time I get a substantial break from school it will be summer and I luuuuuuuuurve summer.

Robbie Franc

2009-01-05T09:18:00.000-08:00

I am pleased to announce that we have a new addition in the Franc Family. Last week we welcomed Robbie Franc in to our home. Robbie is great and has already done so much for the family. We love him so much and hope he never leaves. I am pretty sure that Mom loves him more than she loves her real children.

Robbie is our vacuuming robot. He is SO COOL. He crawls around the floor vacuuming up everything and he does a WAY better job than any of the children. You just set him in the middle of the floor and away he goes. When he is done he goes back to his "home" (docking station) and chills there until we tell him to clean something else. If he runs out of battery while he is cleaning he goes home for a bit of a rest and then continues where he left off. Our floors have never been so clean.

Wordle

2008-12-09T09:14:00.000-08:00

I am terrible at doing homework. I can't focus so I take breaks every 20 minutes or so, but then my breaks end up lasting at least two hours. So my "break" this morning resulted in my spending WAY too much time on http://www.wordle.net/. Check it out, it's so cool! I made a wordle for my family. This is the result. I really like it.
It's really small. Fortunately for you I am a genius and so if you click on it you can see a bigger version. Now I have to get back to my homework. I am getting angry glares from all the people wandering around the library wanting my computer.

Not to all: Pay more than $10 for your blenders

2008-12-07T16:05:00.000-08:00

Stef and I thought we were being really clever when we decided to have an entirely orange dinner the other night. The meal featured Mac and Cheese (the deluxe kind, of course) with a side of Cheez-Its (the Cheddar Jack kind, because they are the best), orange juice to drink and Orange Julius for desert. Somehow I ended up having to make the Orange Julius (probably because I ALWAYS lose rock, paper, scissors). Everything was going along fine except that I made a double batch because I didn't think one would be enough but then it was WAY too much and the blender was incredibly full. But whatev, it was working.

Kind of. When I tried to unhook the top part from the bottom part so I could pour it nicely into our cups the entire bottom came off the top part and Orange Julius went everywhere. I mean EVERYWHERE.

This picture does not even kind of do it justice. It took me an entire roll of paper towels to clean up. Needless to say, I was not pleased.

When I cleaned everything up I tried again with nearly the same disasterous results. I could tell the bottom was going to come off again, so instead of taking the top part off and allowing it to spill everywhere again, I just lifted the entire blender up to pour the Orange Julius into our cups. It worked quite nicely except that the blender wasn't quite done with the blending so there were large chunks of ice in our Orange Julius.

Irish Wristwatch

2008-12-02T07:02:00.000-08:00

Stefanie stumbled across this bumper sticker while "doing homework" last night. We then spent the next half hour trying to say "Irish Wristwatch" three times fast. We failed miserably and it was hilarious. I think this is a backwards kind of thing where the more you practice the worse you get.

Oh, say can you see those chestnuts roasting on an open fire...

2008-11-30T14:03:00.000-08:00

My two favorite holidays are the 4th of July and Chistmas. Seriously, what could be better than the 4th of July or Christmas? The answer you are searching for is this: the 4th of July AND Christmas. That's right, my friends, apparently the city of Ogden is way cooler than we all thought. Every Christmastime Ogden city has a Holiday Electric Light Parade, and it is amazing. It's like the opposite of Christmas in July.

This is the whole fam waiting for the parade to start.

Because my family is insane (the good kind of insane, of course) we had quite an enjoyable time. Here are three notable moments from the night:
1. The sisters and I were having a conversation about who to be in love with. After a particularly icky suggestion from Candace I said, "Death first!". Everyone laughed except Jaxon who didn't hear what I said. Jaxon kept asking "What first? What first?! WHAT FIRST?!" and finally the sisters and I turned to him and in unison yelled "DEATH!" which shocked everyone around us who probably thought we were being overly mean and wishing death on our little brother.
2. We had to rush from our spot in the parade to get to the park where the Christmas village was going to get lit up. Dad was holding Jaxon's hand and leading the way. At one point Jaxon stopped walking forward and tried to walk backwards. The whole family was tripping over him and getting pretty annoyed and Dad said, "Jax! Why can't you just walk?!" Then we found out Jaxon's shoe had come off quite a ways back and he had been trying to turn back and get it for quite some time.
3. There was a dramatic countdown for the lights to turn on in Christmas village. The lights turned on and everything was spectacularly beautiful. Then Dad looked around and noticed that our family was apparently the center of Christmas gloom. Every single tree and bush in a 5 foot radius of the family was un-lit. The lights didn't turn on for some reason. We were all very miffed and chose to walk to a more cheery part of the village.

After the lights turned on there was a spectacular fireworks show and the sisters were all so full of the Christmas cheer that we pretended like we like to hug.

This is the best picture of the whole evening. If you look at everyone's faces you can see that we either look a bit pained (mom, Stef and Cand) or we are dying of laugher (Nat and me). Now look at Jake's face. "Why is he making that face?" you may ask. Look at Jaxon's face. He farted.

Funny Words

2008-11-21T18:17:00.000-08:00

A list of the funniest words (*Note: when deciding funny words, all definitions are forgotten. Funny words are categorized as funny based soley on how they sound.):

clobbered
fork
quiz
bummer
iota