I Stand All Amazed

I stand all amazed at the love Jesus offers me 

Confused at the grace that so fully He proffers me

I tremble to know that for me, He was crucified,

That for me, a sinner, 

He suffered, 

He bled, 

and died.

Oh it is wonderful that He should care for me

Enough to die for me!

Oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me!

I marvel that He would descend from His throne divine

To rescue a soul so rebellious and proud as mine;

That He should extend His great love unto such as I,

Sufficient to own, 

to redeem, 

and to justify.

Oh it is wonderful that He should care for me

Enough to die for me!

Oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me!

I think of His side, 

pierced and bleeding, 

to pay the debt.

Such mercy, 

such love 

and devotion, 

can I forget?

No, no! I will praise and adore at the mercy seat,

Until at the glorified throne I kneel at His feet.

Oh it is wonderful that He should care for me

Enough to die for me!

Oh it is wonderful, wonderful to me!

Fun Fun Fun!

Can I just say: Jordan and Justin Orton are amazing. End of story.


Okay not really the end of the story.  Just the end result.  The full story goes something like this...


Justin and Jordan asked my amazing friend Lauren and I to go on a double date with them.  Ooobviously we said yes because Saturday night at 7 PM, two sharp lookin' boys showed up and my apartment to pick us up.


We did the whole "get pictures before the date" thing and this was the end result:

I stole this from Facebook...

Ok so I promise there were many awkward pictures but apparently they aren't on my camera... Anyways.


Then we left and in the car, we were told that we were going down to Utah Lake to make gingerbread (graham cracker) sculptures.  This was super awesome because earlier that day I was telling everyone that I had never made a gingerbread house and that I really wanted to!


When we got to the lake, though, there were crazy mutant mosquitoes that swarmed around us and chased us whenever we'd move.  It was kind of scary but really funny at the same time.  We gave up at being artists there and made our way over to the Provo Tabernacle.  It was really pretty as we sat on the lawn and made these wonderful creations. 

Lauren and Justin made this one... 

It's a plane.

Jordan and I made this one. 

It's obviously a submarine...

After we got done sculpting, we went to a frozen yogurt place (earth something... I can't remember what it's called!) and took our treats to the base of the Y to eat!  While we were sitting up there, everyone convinced me to finally give in and hike the Y at night.  So the boys drove us back to our apartments and let us change into more appropriate clothing.  We then headed back to the mountain and began our trek upwards.

I'm not going to lie.  It was really hard, mostly because I'm not really used to the elevation yet - but oh well! It was still fun!

We took a few pics along the way and at the top where Justin, Lauren, and Jordan decided to be insane and chill upside down on the Y.  I was too scared of dying to try it out!

As you can tell, it was LOADS of fun!  It was definitely a date catered to what they knew we'd like to do and because of that, at least on my part, it was the best date ever!  

Marvelous Epiphanies.

Tonight we (our group of girls) were discussing our woes, crushes, and frustrations when it comes to certain boys.  As we were talking about everything and analyzing every single thing these certain boys did, it finally hit me:


We were being completely ridiculous.


We are young, fun, crazy girls.  We don't need to worry about finding the perfect guy, or any guy for that matter, right now.  We are at college and need to be making awesome memories together while we're single.  


I realized that it was silly to wonder why other girls have already had 8 bajillion boyfriends in the three weeks we've been here while we can barely manage to talk to guys.  I finally understood that it's because we don't need to be making memories about lots of boys.  When we find the right guy for each of us, the memories of past guys won't mean anything; the only ones that will matter will be the memories made with each other.  


We all have been promised that we'll get married at some point in time when we're ready.  Why are we making it our responsibility to decide when exactly it is that we'll be ready?  All we need to be doing is having fun, being ourselves, and developing ourselves and God will do the rest.  If we put ourselves out there and don't try to be something we're not, God will lead the right person to us and we'll be ready for him when he comes. 


It is so nice to finally have this hit me.  I am so tired of wondering why no boys show interest in me past the point of friendship and it's because I'm not ready to find that one guy yet.  Yeah, it would be nice to go on dates and know that boys like me, but for me, it may not be time for that.  This is the time that we need to be having fun and discovering who we really are.  I love epiphanies like this!  They make life so much easier!  Granted I may forget this, but that's why I am writing a blog - so that I can't forget the little bit of knowledge I received tonight!


Now I can go to bed :]




P.S. If any boy reads this, don't think I mean I don't want to date.  Feel free to ask me out ;]

Best weekend in a while!

While every weekend that I have been out here for has been fun, I'd have to say that this weekend was by far the best!  It started off Friday night at Erika's apartment.  Justin came over to hang out and we played CatchPhrase, Man Hunt, and got frozen yogurt from Spoon Me (so good!).  


When he left, we discovered a huge RED spider in Lauren's room.  I, of course, had to kill it!  Sarah gave me her tennis shoe and when I hit it, the spider exploded! It was SO gross!  I screamed and ran away and poor Sarah had to clean it up!  Then Lauren was too scared to sleep in her room alone so we moved Sarah's and Erika's mattresses into her room and Erika and I slept in there with her. 


On Saturday we woke up and got ready really fast so we could make it on the next bus to the most magical place ever: Fortune's Chinese Buffet.  We seriously ate SO much and it was only $6.50 for each of us! When we got home, we moved the mattresses into Erika's living room and collapsed so we could digest.  The BYU v Air Force game was playing on tv but the lack of skill and beginnings of a food coma overcame us and we ended up napping for the most part.  

Our stake conference was this weekend so after napping for a bit, we went to the adult session and tried our best to gain some insight even though there were serious technical difficulties.  We planned on getting up at 5 the next morning for the general session of conference the next morning because Elder Holland, Elder Snow, Julie B. Beck, and President Packer were all going to be speaking.  Unfortunately for Cindy, Katie and I, we didn't wake up until 8.  By the time we got to the Marriott Center, it was mostly full so we had to make the best of the seats we could get.  It still ended up being really good and I was able to get some really great notes!


The plan was to have my party after conference.  My mom decided to be clever and send a box will all the makings of a party (including some gifts!) to Erika so that they could surprise me!  With my awesome luck, though, as soon as we got back, I had to go to a ward council meeting that lasted almost 2 hours!  When I finally got back, the apartment was awesomely decorated but everyone was asleep haha  I woke everyone up and we hung out and ate cupcakes and I got to open presents! They were awesome!

Later that evening after the CES Fireside (which was also great!) some of us went to Bridal Veil Falls!  It was SO pretty!  I guess there used to be a restaurant at the top and shops at the bottom and a cable car that would take people up to the restaurant.  When it was still running, the cable car was supposedly the steepest in the world.  Sadly, an avalanche wiped everything out a few years ago.  Now, there are some run down buildings and (as bad as this probably is to say) it looks really cool - almost like a ghost town!  

After we explored for a bit we went to Squaw Peak and looked at the city lights.  We were almost 7000 feet above sea level (Provo is about 5000 feet above sea level) so it was really awesome!  The weather was so nice and it was so great to be able to just relax with some of my best friends!

Sadly, it's a little blurry :[

That is basically the story of my weekend.  It was so much fun and even though it was kinda depressing to be away from home, my friends here made it really special for me!

I Love BYU

Basically, BYU is amazing.  I have (almost) all of my favorite here and we have so much fun together!  


We had our first football game last Saturday and it was so awesome to just be able to walk over to the stadium from our apartments!  Before the game, we had a little tailgate party and Erika and I got all sorts of decked out! 

I think it's safe to say we looked awesome!  At the game, there was so much blue that I couldn't resist taking a picture of all if it!

For buying the "cheap tickets", we really had awesome seats!  We were forty rows up and really close to where the players came out!  It was so much fun!  


Afterwards, we walked to the bell tower and toasted Pop Tarts on the lights!  It was pretty awesome and a really fun way to end the night!


Days go by really fast and I know that there is no way I could possibly write about everything awesome that happens!  I'm so glad I chose to came to BYU, even if being away from everyone back home is pretty hard sometimes!

Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.

Well, after almost 19 years, I am finally out on my own.  

And it's way weird.

My flight was really long and really bumpy.  There were a few times that I was pretty certain the plane was going to go down!  Obviously it didn't and I am now at school!  Sabrina picked me up and dropped me off at Erika and Sarah's apartment so I could spend the night with them.  After hanging out for a while, we decided we'd go see How to Train Your Dragon at the dollar theater.  

We walked there (weird...) and coming back, it was actually kind of chilly!  I was smart enough to take a jacket with me and it definitely came in handy!  For being summer, it's really strange to even think about wearing a jacket!

As far as my apartment goes, it's pretty nice.  It's kind of small, but for freshman housing, it's WAY better than a typical dorm!  It does stink though to have to buy all of the things required for living in a dorm!  I'll have to post pictures as soon as I feel like taking them!

Tomorrow is the beginning of orientation and I'm a little nervous because campus is HUGE and I'm not sure if I'm ready to walk around all of it!  Good thing I have my tennis shoes!

That's the end of my adventures so far, but hopefully some awesome stuff will happen soon :]

Am I a Freak?

Going to the doctor is always fun.  They always ask such awesome questions.  I don't know if boys also get asked, but my favorite question was: Are you sexually active?

Now I realize that this is an odd thing to blog about but it really struck me today.  When I told the doctor no, she said okay and then went on to talking about something else.  The conversation ended up looping back to that topic and I told her that I wouldn't be participating in that activity for quite some time.  She then said that that was good, that I should wait until I found the right person, to which I said "I'll have to marry the right person first."  I don't think she hears that very often because she kind of laughed and said "That's good, but that's hard."

It kind of made me a little sad that even a doctor was so willing to just give up and say "oh, it's hard to stay abstinent so good luck with that."  It's only hard because people make it hard.  I don't sit around thinking about how difficult it is to resist my hormones and go do the nasty.  I know I'm not going to do it so there's nothing to worry about.  There's nothing to question or struggle with.

Girls all around are getting pregnant and complaining about how hard life is and that they're getting kicked out of their homes and can't do what they want because they've got a kid to take care of.  Well, don't have sex.  If you're not putting yourself in the position to get pregnant, you're not going to get pregnant.  Teens are trying too hard to be adults and they think that having sex makes them grown up and mature.  It doesn't.  We're too young for that kind of commitment.  There's no need for doing any of that stuff.  It's ridiculous.

But it still goes back to adults letting kids think it's not that big of a deal if they've had sex.  It's the adults that tell teens that "it's hard to not have sex."  

You know what though?  It is a big deal.  And it isn't hard to be abstinent. I know lots of kids who have and are overcoming this "struggle."  They're just fine.