a maaaajor overload of christmas snapshots

Currently, I am sitting in my office and I'm aaaalllmost positive I'm the only person on campus? Which is probably best because every few minutes I pull out my phone, open up snapchat and make faces to my camera. So that's a pretty good indication of my morning. Otherwise, I'm entertaining myself with Besty-Tacy books and Scandal  on Netflix, and trying really hard to decide if I look better with mascara on my bottom lashes or not. 

Besides my slowly-ticking hours in my office, Christmas break has been a real peach.  Because I'm the youngest in my family, I never really experienced watching little humans opening gifts on Christmas morning. I was missing out because watching my little niece hug her pillow pet the minute it came out of the wrapping and exlaim "how did you know this is JUST WHAT I WANTED!" was enough to get me through until I can have little babies of my own. Which, lets be real, is years away. By default. Not by choice, I assure you. Can you tell I'm baby hungry? Those kids just get to me. Their little waves and their excitement to share literally anything (including the food inside their mouths that they are currently chewing) is to die for!

Anyways. Here is a large amount of pictures with no rhyme or reason, jut a peek into my past week.

 + last week, taylor and i hit up pop n sweets per tradition to catch up on dating and...dating? oh, and huckleberry soda. we then took seth up to the airport and it made me oh so nostalgic for our seattle trip.

+ this cat. just doesn't like me. wtf. 

 

+ sethy boy, post knee surgery!

 + smith family tradition of sunday night walks and snowball fights (see: chris' back. courtesy of yours truly).

 

+ on monday night, we met up with G&P&kids in salt lake for a walk around temple square and dinner at my grandparents. it was less of a scenic walk of temple lights and more of shoving elbows to get through and constantly counting heads to make sure we had the right children. we didn't want a home alone situation on our hands. kevin's not here! yeah. 

 

 Christmas Eve and Christmas Day was a blur of pajamas, naps, walks, gingerbread contests, naps, and lots of hugs with the littles. And now that I'm looking at the picture below, I'm really sad I didn't take more advantage of all those treats at the time. I am hungry and stuck in here SOS! Ok that's dramatic. I'm getting paid to be here. Alone. 

-__-

Oh hi kitty. 

harold b lee + m + caesar = the men in my life

What a week, am I right??

I have spent the majority of my time this past week either on mega-bed - the bed Mimi and I made downstairs per finals week tradition - or in the library studying my brains out for finals (and, this just in, I only have one left so feel free to start slow clapping).

Scratch that. I have also been spending a lot of time with a boy. I know, guys, I KNOW. More on that later.

Aside from a plasma-gone-wrong situation that I had on my hands (er, my arm?) that left me with a giant bruise and a reprimanding from Pam and Chris, my weekend was great.  I mean, I didn't really sleep much last week on account of school work and boy time, so I typically spent most of my mornings on campus playing "I wonder if I could fall asleep on that" in my mind.  On Thursday night, after all assignments had been turned in and I had wiped away tears of joy for never having to do math homework again, M came over for a night of cuddling and bonding.  3 hours of buzzfeed and a movie later, I was one happy girl.  When he got home that night, he sent me a text and let me know that I would be going out to dinner with him that weekend.  Cue swooning.

So on Saturday, after a day of music practice for our ward Christmas program and constant stress over what I would wear on my date that night, he picked me up and took me to a Thai restaurant.  Which, along with donuts, is another of my love languages. It was such a good time - I felt so comfortable around him right from the start, and as soon as we got up from the table to leave, he put his arm around me.  We then went back to his apartment and met up with his roommates and their girl (space) friends, followed by a night of walking around the Riverwoods and stopping in at Nickel City, just for good measure. (sidenote: we played a game there that was so hard - it's a one-player game and you put your head into this helmet that's attached to an arcade game, and it zooms in on the planes you are supposed to shoot down. the helmet rotates 360 degrees and you have to turn in circles all the time to hit all the planes coming at you. when i got home that night, i saw that i had a snapchat from him from a few hours earlier...IT WAS OF ME TURNING IN CIRCLES AND DODGING FAKE PLANES and i looked like an idiot. just...no). It was so fun - he was holding my hand and he made me feel so comfortable it was just a perfect night. We all went back to their apartment where we had hot chocolate and played the funniest card game that I probably won't ever recommend to anyone that flinches when they hear "closet hanger abortion." Because that's just not a laughing matter.

But it actually is. 

Then, after hours of being together, he took me home and we made out in his car like we were back in high school hugged goodnight. Only then did I look at my phone to see that we had been together for 9 hours. NINE. And it was perfect.

Other than a few run-ins at the library, we haven't seen each other since then. Because finals are driving us all to the breaking point. As you can see below.

And yet another library picture, because other than watching The Carrie Diaries on mega-bed and the occasional night with M, the library is all we do. 

Which brings us to today.  This morning at 10:30, I left to go pick up a friend and take him to an auto shop.  While I was out, I called Mimi (who even though was in the shower still answered her phone) and told her I would pick up a pizza for us.  I guess I forgot, however, that most people don't need pizza at 10:45 in the morning, so Little Caeser's doesn't open until 11. 

It's fine! I'm loyal enough that I will just sit here for 15 minutes until you open! 

-__-

And, just for viewing pleasure:

Mimi. In the shower. 

what the end of the semester looks like

the chipped nailpolish really adds to the i'm easy going and low maintenance look i've been going for lately, don't you think?

If by shower, you mean did I slap on some leggings and put on deoderant, then yes. I did shower today. 

See here's the thing, last night, after McDonald's with Jennae, Panda Express with Taylor and Seth at their apartment, and roommate bonding (+ Melissa!!) over the VS Fashion Show, I was about ready to turn in when a boy invited me over to watch New Girl at his apartment.  Two things I love:

1) boys

2) New Girl

So 10 minutes later, I found myself at his apartment.  After a night of cuddles and such, I finally made it home only to realize that I HAD A LESSON PLAN DUE TODAY THAT I HAD TOTALLY FORGOTTEN ABOUT. I had marked yesterday as my lazy day - I even wrote in my planner no work today accompanied by a little drawing of elephants and confetti. No. Joke. So you can imagine my surprise when I had to force my eyes to stay open until 4 am to do a lesson plan. Darn school.

So this morning, after I had slept for a good couple hours, I woke up to get ready for work and almost screamed when I saw myself in the bathroom mirror.  The image was frightening - bags under my eyes the size of actual grocery bags (that visual is actually disturbing so forget i said it), hair the texture of carpet, and mascara mysteriously spread all over my face. What had I even done in my sleep?? How did I have time to make myself look this way? Seriously, I have stored that selfie image away in the same mental filing cabinet that also stores me seeing a naked German grandmother in the locker room and photos of the Holocaust and every story of child abuse I've ever read and Janet Reno's picture. It was terrifying.

Speaking of VS Fashion Show, 3 things:

:: Mimi decked out and bought us yummy treats and decorated with her Pink dogs. 

:: I actually couldn't decide whether to feel self loathing and resentment towards the floating-rib-less models, or stoked on the fact that I get to eat and they don't. All the food in front of me made the decision for me. 

:: I don't have a third thing?? 

latkes, outfit repeater, whining about finals (but what else is new?)

Funny things about today (and it's not even 9 am!):

I woke up with one earring, I suppose, and am just now realizing it.  Here at work. Cool.

The items on my to-do before monday!! list that still aren't done. HA.

I'm re-wearing the outfit I wore on Saturday night (we all do it) to a Hannukah party. A party at which I spent the better part of two hours making latkes. So basically I smell like McDonald's. COME AT ME BOYS. 

Otherwise today is a pretty standard Monday in which I'm already dreading the rest of the week.  In the past, finals week has been stressful (and usually accompanied by a terrible sickness, but good thing my body just decided to be sick all semester so my body didn't have to adjust for just that one week that was already delivered by Satan himself) beyond belief, but this year, my finals week will be pretty tame. 

It's THIS week - the one leading up to finals - that is probably going to kill me. I mean it.  In fact, the other night when I went to Noodles&Co with Emilee, we started to devise a list of things we would rather do than finals prep, which included ridiculously reasonable things like chewing on teeth and eating an alligator (who are we??). Without further ado, I present to you my revised list:

:: peel 4,000 potatoes. with a spork.
:: read the collected works of snooki.
:: crawl a mile. around a track. made of gravel.
:: clean every bathroom in downton abbey.
:: listen to mariah carey sing the national anthem on repeat for 5 hours.
:: med school
:: shave 400 poodles with a razor in a hot, wet sauna
:: test the temperature of lava with my pinky toe
:: get trained in the Dewey Decimal Sysem. in braille.
:: literally anything.

But other than school anxiety, my weekend was great. It started on Thursday night, when Mimi and I attended the Christmas IDP (note: neither of us are big fans of idp's but we're big fans of our friends so we had a good time dancing in a parking garage to christmas dubstep).  The rest of the weekend was followed by lots of snow, cuddle time, [some] tears, dating talks with Taylor (always), dying Jennae's hari, netflix, a Hanukkah party, pot roast, the Christmas Devotional at Temple Square, and ended with story time at Emilee's. Needless to say, it was pretty great, so bring it on, finals! I can take you!






Literally.

latke queens. so yeah, if you see me on campus today, i'm wearing this exact outift. just fyi.

i love these boys. they make you feel like a million bucks. 

 

i have zero good feelings towards that girl in the background.

worst picture ever! but just an obligatory picture of temple square lights.

 

i can't stop

Baths are my time.

Not in some dramatic way like it's an escape from the world i need my alone time blah blah.
No, I just mean I am literally naked in a giant porcelain bowl and I usually end up turning out the lights in the bathroom due to the fact that I'm not super into my naked body.

So yesterday when I got back to my apartment and settled in, I realized that my bathtub was probably pretty lonely without me so I turned on the water and slapped on a shower cap and voila I knew it was going to be a good, albeit it overwhelmingly unproductive, evening.  *sidenote: doesn't it seem impossible to get the right water temperature in baths? like, all the time? like, when i first dipped my toe in, i thought i had blistered my toe off of my body it was so hot. so after very ungracefully climbing out from the depths of hell and hurriedly turning the nozzle, i waited a few seconds (seriously, probably 17 seconds at most) to allow the cold to infiltrate the hot.  again, i dipped my foot in it and i think my water had been imported from the titanic.  i just don't get it guys.

Moving on!

Yesterday, in the bathtub.  I brought in my current read Devil in the White City (thanks Michael!), my laptop for when I got tired of holding up a book, and left my phone in my room to charge.  A metaphor, of sorts, that I was leaving the world behind me.

Except I guess not because I brought in my laptop.

**this is an OLD jamba juice water cup. trust me, even if i wanted jamba on a sunday, i couldn't find one that is open in utah valley. 

But after a good half an hour of reading about a serial killer wooing women at the World Fair in Chicago (did that catch your interest? read the book - it's so good and spooky) and an attempt at watching a show, I, true to form, turned out the lights and turned on the music and closed my eyes.

And Can't Stop by OneRepublic came on, which lately I have been loving.

Because seriously it conveys my sentiments exactly.

I guess this is what it's supposed to feel like
When we don't talk, no we don't talk, we don't talk anymore.
I guess this is what it's supposed to sound like
The universe, the universe, universe is torn.

I know I can live without you
I can live without you half the day 

I know I can live without you
And put life off for another day 

But I can't stop
Thinking about.. thinking about us
Anymore

I said I can't stop
Thinking about.. thinking about us
Anymore 

I said I can't stop.. no
Thinking about.. thinking about this
Anymore 

And all I've got

Is nothing I want
Anymore. 

I know. Guys, I know.  I'm so so dramatic (cause obviously this is in reference to A, DUH) and why can't I just stop thinking about him?? But that's the thing. I can. And I have been able to.  In fact, ever since our talk, I have felt the closure I always needed. 

It's more that I don't really want to not think about him.  Remember how he's one of my favorite people?  Today, Jamie Taylor came into the office with leftover Carrabba's (for the fact that it's my favorite restaurant I sure need to learn how to spell it, I spell it differently every time) and of course I wanted to text him. Last night, he snap chatted me (like, it was a mass SC, but still) and when I saw it come in I think my heart kinda stopped? Just seeing his name on my phone still is such a fun feeling for me? 

Gosh dang it.  What's wrong with me.


Also, because I stayed up to an ungodly hour last night, this morning I wanted to put in minimal effort when getting ready.  Meaning I work up half an hour before I had to leave, showered, and put my hair in a bun. When I got to work, one of the student leaders walked in and, before even saying hi, she said "oh, so i wasn't the only one that didn't want to get ready today."  -__-  Then, my professor literally 4 minutes ago was calling roll and when he got to me, he said "whoa! i got scared by the new 'do. didn't recognize you."

What the what.

AT LEAST I SHOWERED.  In the spirit of Thanksgiving, let's all be thankful for that. 

fainting goats, swag, and an overall great holiday

I can't even begin to explain just how wonderful and overwhelmingly unproductive my Thanksgiving break was.  To sum it up: lots of sleepovers, mom food, and quality time with some of my favorite boys.  

The whole week of Thanksgiving was perfect, starting with cancelled FHE (sometimes being the mom requires making judgment calls liiiiiike...we all have lotsa stuff to do? no one would come anyways? etc. etc.?) which resulted in me going to my first official Fainting Goats hockey game. Which, let me tell you, was really fun. Albeit the club games lack in fights, they more than make up for it with team paraphernalia and a venue that offers hot dogs. Oh, and also skill.  They were good. 
  

The rest of the week seemed to follow a sort of pattern: days spent with the family, evening spent curled up in bed/on someone's living room floor watching a movie or (my new favorite) Revenge, and lots and lots of bonding with Emilee and some of my favorite boys.

les mis (sing-along version, of course, cause when is it not??) at emilee's

wedding reception with E!

pizzookie and cuddle night with taylor and berry (who i generally love, but she gave me a vicious scratch that makes me look borderline suicidal so we stopped hanging out after that night)

my mom was hanging a garland around the front of the house and she kept asking me and emilee if there was enough "swag".  We think she was going for "slack", but we didn't stop her.

i had forgotten about my love for cubby's until friday night, which was spent laughing over sweet potato fries and tri-tip steak.  we were then inspired to see the funniest movie ever, austenland.

after which, we invaded seth's friday night by waiting in front of his apartment until he got home from work, where we greeted him with a special pussycat dolls dance party. except do you know how actually hard it is to l"loosen up" a boy's top button on his collar?? so we called it good, went inside to eat pizza, start a fire and watch elf.

It was such an ideal week spent with some of my favorite people (although it does feel good to be getting my CT 29 girls back), and on Sunday morning, when I met up with the boys yet again to go to church with them, I became so overwhelmed with what good boys they were. I'm serious.  As we were sitting on the couch passing the time until church, they were just casually talking about gospel stuff.  It wasn't a big deal, but I love how it just came so naturally to talk about the Church. So, that being said, long live good boys.  Cause one day I'm gonna make one of them my husband. Except maybe not one of these boys in particular.






Just to clarify.