Another year gone by

I did it! It's over! Finished! SCHOOOOOL'S OUT FOR THE SUMMER! Sort of. My research project is technically "school" and I had to pay tuition fees so I can email reports to a teacher once a week. I do get school credit, so I guess that's what I'm really paying for.

I survived my finals. I got 13 pages done of the big paper by Thursday before finals started, then I took a break to write my 10 page paper on Friday and Saturday for my other class because it was due Monday morning. I turned it in and spent the rest of Monday finishing my final art project and then turned that in. Tuesday I wrote another 13+ pages for the big paper, spent Wednesday proofreading, and turned it in that afternoon. Yes, that means it was 26+ pages. Longest paper of my life. It could have (and should have if I had worked on it all semester like I was supposed to... oops) gone longer, but I had to turn it in. I'm sure it was enough to satisfy the requirements for the paper, but it could have been better. Oh well. It's kind of empowering, though, to write that much and have something to say the whole time. I didn't have room to BS anything. Most of the time I was trying to figure out what information I should downsize. I'm happy this school year is over. It was hard. When I finished my papers I rewarded myself with 2 new CDs I've had my eye on for a while. Small consolation for two semesters from h@*%, but they make me happy.

I am finally installed as a resident of Orderville. Mostly. I moved my stuff in, but I have yet to unpack. I hate unpacking. I don't have to officially start working on my project till tomorrow, so I'll spend today getting situated. I've ordered a voice recorder and I need to learn how to use my new printer/scanner/copier. I think Grandma and I will take a walk up to the Post Office later to make sure they know I'll have mail coming to her PO Box so it doesn't get returned to the sender. Oh the excitement of a small town!

If you are ever in the neighborhood, please stop in and say hi! I don't get cell service here, but I can use the neighbor's internet occasionally so you can email or call Grandma's land line.

I'm so close I can taste it...

Only two more days of classes. Then only 3 "finals". I insert quotations because one final is simply submitting a paper by the end of the day, for another I actually have to gather with the class, but it is to submit my paper and read others' papers, and for the last one my art class is having a party and picking up our graded assignments. All other classes either don't have a final or I don't have to take it. Sounds easy enough, but actually these two papers I have to get done are beasts and I have barely started them. Eek! But they will get finished well enough to pass and then I'm off to southern Utah through June. I'm conducting my oral history project for my major in Orderville, UT, during the spring term. It's still schoolwork, but it'll be a change of pace for sure.

I can't wait to finally be ALL done with this school year. It's been a hard one. I'm excited to come back to Idaho, mostly because I really need a hair cut! Jen Stone is the only person I allow to touch my hair and she's in Coeur d'Alene. Oh yeah, and I'm excited to see friends and family too...haha. My whole immediate family will be home this summer during the bi-annual Lee Family Reunion this July on the Salmon River. My brother Josh and his wife Chiu-Yi are coming from Taiwan. My brother Luke and his family will be there and will bring the newest member of the family (his wife Janna is having a baby in June), Benji will come from CA, Sarah from WA, Danny will be back from Mexico, I'll be home from UT, and of course Mom and Dad and the little boys will be there too. That's just from my family! Dad is the baby and he has 3 other siblings who will be there with all of their families too.

K, no more blogging. I really need to get to work. I haven't accomplished much on this paper today, and I really want to get it done. I promised myself a long-coveted Sara Barielles CD when I'm finished! Now that's incentive.

Spring is in the air

Spring is trying her best to break through. Last week it got up to 70 degrees. This week it snowed. Hopefully the sun comes back soon!

Life is still crazy busy, but rather than detail the stresses of my life which will only make me feel worse, I will only tell about the good stuff that has happened recently because there has been lots of that too.

Every year on March 14 my friend Jared W hosts a Pi(e) Party (3/14=3.14=pi). People bring pies which are then judged and awarded for different categories. Now, I have participated in quite a few of these parties and I've consistently had a good showing, but I've never won. My strawberry pie took third a couple of times, and the time I added other berries to it got me a second place finish. This year I was in it to win it. I went with a new recipe: Carmel Apple Pie. I found the recipe online a long time ago and saved it. It did not fail me, and I won first place overall! I was so proud. I wish I had got a picture from it but I forgot. Just know that it looked and tasted phenomenal. I'll post the recipe at some point.

A couple of weeks ago some boys decided to get people on more dates, so they took ties from all the single guys from church and had all the single girls choose an anonymous tie from the pile. Whoever's tie she chose was committed to taking her out on a date before the end of the semester. Being single, I participated. Last weekend I went on my "tie date" with my date Jeremy and two other couples. It was so much fun! We all had a blast playing like little kids the whole evening at Jeremy's family's beautiful home in Sandy, UT. Our activities included:

Dinner at Pita Pit
Girl Scout cookies
CRUD (a game played with a pool table)
Ping-Pong
Foosball
Sardines
Boys vs Girls keep-away
Indiana Jones movie in the theater room
Jumping off furniture onto giant bean bags
Sliding down stairs
Talking with good friends
Sleeping (not done as a group activity, don't worry! It was too late to drive home safely so we stayed the night and us girls shared a king size bed!)
Pancake breakfast


(remember you can click on pictures to see them bigger)

I had a lot of fun hanging out with friends and getting to know them better outside of church activities. I am surrounded by great people here.

The fun continued that weekend on Saturday. The weather was great and warm and I went running for the first time since last summer probably! I didn't last too long but it felt good to get out there. Afterward I spread out a blanket at the park and did homework in the sunshine. I got a little sunburn on my face but it was worth it! That night I attended a volleyball game with some friends, then made my award-winning pie again and had a little dance party in my apartment. We have good times.

This weekend was pretty stellar too. Friday night I went to a indoor water park with my old roommate Janae, and last night I went to the Festival of Colors. It's a festival to welcome in spring that they observe every spring at the Hare Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork, UT. It is celebrated through song, theatrical performance, the burning of a witch effigy, and rounded off with everyone throwning colored chalk dust at each other.


This was the first year I was able to attend and I was pretty excited. I rounded up a car-full of friends and headed up to it. We got well-covered in dust and I crowd-surfed for the first time! I lost my cell phone for a while in the process, but I eventually got it back when a nice person found it uncrushed and returned it when we called it. That's what I call good karma!





After the festival we went up to the house where my friend Missy is living and went swimming in the indoor pool (after showering, of course). It was a nice way to wind down the exciting evening.