September and October Life

Just some random stuff that's happened in September and October!

My little brother Cee Ryle is a sophomore in high school and on the cross country team. He had an invitational at BYU and none of my family could drive down and go, so I went and supported him. He did great!

I realize my fifteen year-old brother is taller than me and we look the same age (especially in this picture)! Haha it's kind of ridiculous how young I look in this photo. But I swear I'm eight years older and not one of his classmates. Nonetheless I love him so much and am glad I got to see him race.

My aunt Zildy face painted at the State Fair and was able to get some free tickets so I went with my parents and sisters to it. Haha it was a pretty regular state fair...dirty, lots of rides, crazy people, booths, photo ops, interesting animals and vegetables, a very ...interesting freak show, and an awesome face painter! Haha. We had fun.

I got to go to Chalk the Block with some of my best friends (l to r: me, Lauren, Jessica, Alyne, Cameron (alyne's husband)) and we had a great time! The chalk was cool but the company was even better.

I face painted a TON during August and September, which was really great considering I don't have another job, and I face painted at Tracy Aviary three times, so I got pretty good at doing birds hah.

I got to go with my mom and my sister Sidney to the General Women's Meeting! It's held by our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (we're also known as Mormons!), every six months for every girl and woman eight years and older. It was fabulous and we had a really fun time going! It also rained like crazy getting there so that was definitely an adventure too.

After the meeting, we met up with the rest of our family to go bowling. We had passes to use at this one place and it ended up being kind of lame and crappy but we made memories and had fun, which is what really matters. Also, I bowled the first strike I have ever bowled in my life! It only took me 23 years to get there.. ;)

I often force my family and friends to take pictures..sometimes on self-timer haha!

 I'm taking a public speaking class right now and we had to do a demonstration speech. I decided to show how to face paint a skull and my roommate Carli was kind enough to let me practice on her! We also had to give a handout so I put this picture on there too. If you want us to come face paint for you, you can go to our business's website HERE!

This past Saturday was the Cougar Run at BYU, due to it being homecoming. My parents, Cee Ryle, and Gracie all signed up to run so I went to cheer them on (clearly there are some fun times to be had at the BYU track). Sidney and I weren't running so we each ran a lap of Gracie's race with her. That poor girl was dying by the end of the race but she was a trooper and ran and finished the whole thing (it was twice around the track--I think that might be a 400 meter? Don't count on me for that though!)! Cee Ryle and my parents all placed in their divisions which was pretty awesome of them! My dad got first in his, and my mom and Cee Ryle both got third in theirs.

Later that day I took a test and did poorly on it :( No worries, I'll scrape out a good grade in the class! And then I met up with my mom and Sidney again where we volunteered at the US Junior Figure Skating Championships! I think it was for like the Pacific Northwest division or something like that but some of those girls and guys were really really good! We volunteered for a bit and then when they didn't need us anymore we got to watch which was fun.

I took a picture of this because I LOVED the back of her costume! Isn't it gorgeous! It inspired me :)

On Monday, my roommates surprised me with a PUPPY!! You're probably like, wait what?! No, I don't own a puppy. Here's the story:
Jessica asked me I was going to be home on Monday at 7 and I was like "do you want me to be home?" and she was like "yes!" because apparently her friend Reese was coming and she thought he and I would get along well. And I was like ohhh a set up, but okay, whatever. So Monday at around 7:15 this guy came to our door and I thought it was Reese, but then he left and Jessica brought in a puppy! My roommates rented me a puppy for an hour for a birthday gift! (Can anyone say best birthday gift ever?? Yes!)

Haha Reese actually turned out to be a girl (and a dog, but whatev) and she was so cute and fun! She peed twice under our watch and she was quite a handful, but so much fun. We were all sad when she left. But we had fun watching her tug on Jessica's shoelaces and putting her head into a mug on the floor and just being so darn adorable. I took some pictures, but the lighting in our apartment is terrible, so I had to use the flash.

I made a little video too! The lighting was terrible and since I currently just use Windows Movie Maker, there was no way to correct that, but you can watch it and get an idea of Reese's cuteness.

Other fun little things from these past two months that I unfortunately have no pictures to document:

-School is grrrrreeeat!, as Tony the Tiger would say. I'm glad I have more time to focus on it now that Provo Fashion Week is over. I really do love all my classes to death and am really happy! Also I got a 93% on my last Statistics test, a 98% on my last Doctrine and Covenants test, and a 94% on my demonstration speech (that I did the skull face for above)! Boo ya! I don't always post about my grades, but when I do...they're pretty darn good!

-I discovered this wonderful thing that Carrie Underwood actually did TWO demo albums before American Idol. Which, can we all realize what this means? 31 NEW SONGS! They are albums of covers and some of them she did when she was 14! Geez she's so good! If you are wanting to know what they are, they're listed here and here and most are on youtube! Also I found out she waited until marriage (awesome!) and had a third nipple (interesting..and a bit weird, but we've all got our quirks). Learning new things every day, people.

-Have you seen Meet the Mormons?? I saw it last Thursday with Jessica and it was so fabulous! Maybe I cried... because yes it was good! If you are person living on this earth, you will like it. Oh hey, that's you! It's great. :)

-Provo Fashion Week has gotten a ton of press since it happened, and I got featured in two different articles! Both for BYU stuff so that's fun. One was for my department's (Family, Home, and Social Sciences) magazine here and the other was for the BYU newspaper The Universe here. I think that may have been my third time being in the BYU newspaper! haha.

-In public speaking, we have to make a video of a news report type thing and my group is doing it on Ebola. We filmed some stuff today and let me just say 1) I love my group and 2) I can't wait to edit the video because we got some hilarious responses!

-From Amazon, I ordered for myself The Parent Trap (Lindsay Lohan version, one of my favorite movies ever in this world) and Project Runway Season 4! (its the one with Christian Siriano and I'm dying to see it because I know his designs will inspire) The only problem is I haven't had time to watch them! Hopefully I'll get a break in the next few days that I can start.

Oh also on October 10, this one little thing called Provo Fashion Week happened :) and it was awesome! I can't wait to tell you all about it...later haha. It was a blast though. Man :)

Glasses

Have you ever seen the movie You Again? If you haven't, it is hilarious so go get it from Redbox or a movie store. The movie is about Marni Olsen, who in her high school years had an acny filled face, glasses, ugly hair, and was teased by the head cheerleader. Basically as sad and nerdy as you can get. But Marni gets out of high school and ends up changing how she looks and becomes the vice-pres of a PR company (don't worry, I'm not really giving anything away—this all happens in the beginning of the movie). She goes home for her brother's wedding, where he is of course marrying the evil head cheerleader. And in the course of about one day, one way or another things keep happening to Marni and she looks exactly like she did in highschool. See below:

So think of that image and then listen to this. Me yesterday...I was going to a face painting job with my aunt that we had to leave at about 9:15 for and I woke up late at 8:30 and still had to take a shower. I was rushing, and of course my eye got really irritated and since my contacts were old I just switched it and it still really hurt. But we had to leave so we did. My hair was just in a ponytail. We got back and my eye was hurting so bad and I had a headache from that, so I had to take out my contacts and put on my glasses (and they're not too cute) and also take off my makeup. No improvement on the eye pain. My hair was gross because I hadn't done anything with it after showering so it had a little kink in it and was kinda frizzy. Plus my eye was super puffy and red. I was quite a sight, and then I went to Target with my aunt last night to shop.


That's not how I usually look and I really could have let it get me down. But I decided I could go in that store feeling just as confident as I feel with my cutest outfit and best makeup face, and that's what I did. I didn't let it bother me (a ton...my eye hurting was kind of unavoidable).


So basically what I'm trying to say is that no matter how we look, we are still the same person. I may have looked like the biggest geek yesterday, but I still shopped for the same clothes I would have with a pretty face and I still said the same things I would have with the prettiest hairdo in the world. I think that one of the most freeing things in the world is realizing that what we look like doesn't define us or make us who we are. I do believe that it's a great way to express ourselves and it's fun to look nice, but for the most part, it's not going to change us.


It's kind of great to think that, huh? The only thing that's really limiting us is our own judgments of ourselves. And if those judgments don't come from what we look like, that's pretty sweet.


P.S. My eye feels fine again, thank goodness! I have no idea what was wrong with it.

About Time Huh?

Hi bloggy friends. I'm back! Miss me? Let me explain my absence. I just stopped blogging for a few days...then I needed to read the whole Harry Potter book series before the movie came out, which was kind of hard because I had work, things to do, and people to see, so I was crunched for time. And then I went to Wyoming (and saw the HP movie in Wyoming and thought it was AH-mazing..anyone else agree? I MUST see it again!) for a week for a family reunion and to celebrate my grandparents' 50th anniversary. And then I got back and have been face painting with my aunt a lot and by that time I decided that I might as well wait until the month mark to blog again. Ha. Silly, I know. But it's July 27, and the last time I blogged was June 27, so I figured it sounds right. :) Anyways. I'm back in blogging business. Here's a few photos that don't even make up for the past month I've been gone...

Provo Rooftop Concert for Abbey Road with Jessica and Lauren

Going to see the hot air balloons with Jessica and Lauren

Face painting with my aunt and family on the 4th of July

Fireworks with our friends the Foutzes (Kyrie and I are almost the exact same age and have been friends since age 3 :))

Seeing a cool rainbow with Olivia and Katie and Heidi

Blogger lunch meet-up with Katri and Kelli at Chilis...soo fun! Lots of smiles and laughter involved :)

Hogwarts toenails

Watching a Harry Potter movie a night up until the midnight showing with roommates and people in my ward

Cute roommate pictures...love them :)

making harry potter t-shirts with my siblings

HP midnight showing :D

Fun with cousins in Wyoming

Lots of family pictures...this isn't the best one but its hilarious because of how awkward my littlest sister acts!

A trolley ride through Cheyenne where my grandparents told us all about where they lived, went to school, worked, etc.

I face painted all the little cousins a lot...I might be the favorite cousin now ;)

My adorable grandparents with their 50th anniversary cake

I tried on my grandma's wedding dress and my sister tried on my aunt's

A bridesmaid dress that my grandma wore in the 1960s that she let me keep! Such a cute dress and the picture doesn't do it justice!

Watching photos of my grandparents when they were dating and newlyweds

more face painting...

Enjoying the Wyoming air :D

My aunt and her kids came to visit because she's getting married on Saturday (!!!) and we got ice cream after face painting at a festival earlier and also to celebrate my cousin Jasmine's birthday

I hiked Bridal Veil Falls yesterday with some friends :)

My roommates and I all brushing our teeth at the same time

Life has been crazy. And oh so very fun :D

There is something else I should discuss. I think lately why I've had a lot of periods where I just don't blog is because I've really been trying to please other people with this blog and get lots of followers and stuff. The blogging world can be SO competitive and sometimes it really gets to you when someone else has more comments or followers than you and you don't understand why. It sounds kind of silly but its true. But I need to make this blog for me. That's how it began and that's how I want it to continue.
So thank you thank you THANK YOU to all who entered the contest but I'm unfortunately calling it off just because it was really stressing me out and its not what I need to do for myself right now. I really am SO sorry! And you have no idea how grateful I am to the people that entered. I think I might do it again soon, because its a fun idea, but maybe when I'm a little more stable with myself.

Either way though, I'm so happy to be back! I want this blog to stay a part of my life because its fun and I like it. It makes me happy. And that's all that matters. :D

P.S. Last night I watched my first ever scary movie, What Lies Beneath...all I can say is that scary movies are NOT for me. It might have been my first and last!