Oh Christmas Day...yuck

Yes for Christmas morning, getting up super early with Julia's kids, feeling the santa magic in the air, and opening up all of our presents!! We did all of this and had a great time just being with the family and seeing all of the kids get really excited about their toys. They got some pretty cool stuff! But my dad and I unfortunately got a gift we weren't expecting, or wanted at all for that matter...

So our whole family got sick this weekend starting with my mom, then Aiden, Landon, and Julia, Tim got sick yesterday, and then my dad and I got the worst of it today. I had gotten a sinus infection from my mom early on while everyone else got the 24 hour flu. It wasn't until today that we got that sicky too. I felt fine opening gifts and stuff, but after that I was upstairs in my bed for a good portion of the day. I came down every once in a while, donning my plague victim mask, and hung out with the fam, but I just couldn't stay for long. I'm feeling pretty good now, just my stomach is upset a little still. I think I'll be ok though as I fly out tomorrow to go to Oregon.

But yeah, Merry Christmas to us!!! Despite the sicknesses, I'm glad we got to come and spend time with Julia, Tim, and their kids. Hopefully the next time we see them a sickness will not be involved in our visit! I hope you all had an awesome Christmas Day :)

In the famous words of Strongbad...IT'S OVER!!!

Christmas break is here! I never thought this semester would end...it just kept dragging on and on....BUT it's over :) This finals week was different than past ones. Maybe it was because I didn't really care about my classes much so the grades weren't that important to me, or maybe I finally learned how to manage panic! It's probably the first one. I don't think I did that bad on them though...I guess the final grades will tell all.

One thing I am truly grateful about the end of this semester is the change of clinical assignments in my athletic training program. Don't get me wrong, I LOVED working with the women's basketball team here at BYU, but I did not love working with my clinical instructor that was in charge of them. Let's just say she hasn't developed very strong communication skills and it's caused a lot of trouble for us. Not even when my partner, Tyler, and I approached her did she acknowledge the issues. She would just come in the next day and act like nothing was wrong. She also liked to lie to our faces because I don't think she can handle confrontation. Man up and say it to our faces!!! I would rather hear it from her than hear about it from someone else or read how she rated me online later that night. Anyways, Tyler and I are both done with her and moving on to bigger and better things. We both got transferred to high schools, me at Lone Peak, this next semester and I'm pretty excited about it. I'll have a ton more freedom there than I did on campus and the clinical instructor is really chill and willing to work with my crazy schedule. Bonus! I'll let you know how the new site turns out.

In other news, my really good friend Emily got married right before I left for break. I was honored that she asked me to be a bridesmaid and that I got to take part in her wedding. It was fun hanging out with the other bridesmaids and trying to figure out what we really should be doing during the reception, or trying not to freeze our ta tas off when we took pictures outside right after her wedding!! haha, good times. Thanks Emily for asking me to be a bridesmaid!


Also, my "little sister" Kalani surprised me a couple of mornings ago with the news that she is pregnant!!! How crazy awesome is that?! What a week it's been...And now I'm in the beautiful 80 degree Texas weather hanging out with my sister Julia and her fam bam. We are all coming here this year for Christmas and it should be a lot of fun :) My friend Keilani is down here too at the same time and it would be really cool if I could see her too while we're here. After Texas, I'm off to Oregon to spend the week with my friend Janelle and her fam bam for New Years. Lots of traveling and lots of fun!

Struggling...

This semester has been THE hardest one I've had thus far. Who knew getting into your major would be so time demanding and frustrating! I have super early classes everyday, I have clinical that eats up three or more hours of my life everyday, there is no space for me in my classes for my major next semester, I don't know if I should take spring or summer classes, I don't know my assignment yet for next semester and I need to in order to prepare my classes, hardly any of my classes really interest me all that much, I'm tired all the time, rugby takes up a good portion of my life as well, I'm out of town a lot for rugby, I currently am working diddly squat at Sports Authority and not making very much, I have a lot of expenses regardless...the list could seriously go on and on as to why this semester is so rough.

But here's the thing! I wouldn't trade any of it and here's why. I love the people that are in my semester of my major. We got along so well and so fast and we love helping each other out. I love my clinical assignment now and the girls that I get to hang out with everyday. My instructor is also really good at teaching us new things so it hardly gets boring. I also get free clothes from it so who can complain about that? I LOVE LOVE rugby and would never trade it for anything. I often think about what my life would be like if I had never joined and I can honestly say it would have been boring and sucked. Well, ok it wouldn't have sucked but it would have been bland. My job at Sports Authority has been one of the greatest jobs I've had thus far. I wish I could work there more and make the money that I need to, but I'm ok with it right now. I'm glad I kept the job there so that I could work more if I wanted to, and when I want to. The people there are so fun and great that it doesn't even matter that I'm making a half hour commute to work. Earlier I listed off a bunch of really negative things about this semester that have been driving me crazy, but really they are all blessings in my life. I know that if I just put all my trust in the Lord that things will work out. Everything happens for a reason right? Sure does :)

So a quick everyday life update...This last weekend my team and I traveled to Palo Alto, CA to play in a rugby 10's tournament. There were two pools so we entered two teams to see how good we could do and to gain more experience for everyone. We played some really good teams and had a lot of fun. I went in a lot as scrumhalf and it was AWESOME!! I got a few good hits on people, and they got a few on me haha. Even a nice try zone pole got a good hit on me! Anywho, so both of our teams were seeing a lot of success and doing really well. Turns out we did so well that we played each other in the championship game! Haha. So basically we went to Stanford, handed them a good butt whooping game (47-7 loss for them) and then turned around and took first and second at THEIR tournament. haha. It was a great feeling. So yeah, it was a very successful weekend for both teams. Our second team consisted of a lot of our new girls and they did SO well!! I was so impressed with how they played and held their own. I'm so proud of them!
This past Tuesday I had the opportunity to see Lady Antebellum in concert with my friend Janelle! It. Was. Awesome!!! They are such good performers and sound so good live. The girl in the group has some interesting (questionable?) dance moves and we loved to make fun haha, but it was seriously so good. We got there pretty early so we ended up pretty close to the stage, but we had to stand there for hours!!! Playing go fish/war/games you make up while standing can get interesting haha. At one point in time, Janelle left to go to the bathroom and I stayed to save our spots in the crowd. While there, the girls standing to my right got into a fight! It was so funny...but not at the same time. Fighting is wrong. Haha anyways, the girl in the front was mad because she felt like the girl behind her was pushing her and it got all heated, f words were flying, there was a little pushing, but that was it. No fists today! It made for an interesting evening though. To add to the evening, as we were trying to leave the venue and get to our car, we realized we couldn't...because there was a train blocking our way! Somehow and for some reason a train just stopped on the tracks and we had to wait a little bit for it to start up and move off the road. It was great.

Still alive...

I can barely believe it but I've managed to stay alive through this past month of school. Between work, rugby, school, clinical, and the tiny moments of eating and sleeping I was wearing myself out. Every sparing second I was doing something that NEEDED to be done. These past few weeks I realized I needed a change in my life or my grades were going straight down the poop shute. So I had to cut something out, and unfortunately work is at the bottom of my necessary list. I had full intentions of just quitting at Sports Authority, but the managers and I decided to try something out. So currently I am still employed there but I'm only working there a night a week. Hopefully this frees me up enough to bring my sanity back...

In other news...My coach switched me to play scrumhalf which is kind of like the quarterback in football. Yeah, talk about the scariest position I've ever played! My first game playing is tomorrow so we'll see how that goes...

BUSY!!

I can't believe how incredibly busy life has gotten since school started two weeks ago. Let me get you a little updated on my life since the last post...

I finally quit Domino's and got a job at Sports Authority in South Jordan!!! I love it there and the commute isn't even that bad. Way better than Domino's for sure. The people there are way nice and I've gotten the hang of cashiering I think. Then school started and with that came rugby!! We had our first game on Saturday and we won, but it was super ugly! We will probs die in practice today because of it but hey, we gotta learn sometime. School is going alright. I'm trying my hardest to get everything to fit in my life so it's been a little hectic. My classes are going good for the most part and my clinical is awesome!! My instructor is so nice and loves to give us opportunities to learn and grow in this field. It's going to be great! I can just feel it :)

In other news, my computer is retarded currently and likes to freeze on my when I'm trying to use it or the internet, so that's why there are no pictures and why I don't get on here that much anymore. Alrighty, well I'm out!

Stuck...

Yes. I am currently stuck. Where you might ask? In my best friend, Pam's, clubhouse at her housing complex. Why you might ask? Well it's simple...

I wanted to work out and they have a wonderful facility in their clubhouse for me to use. So I borrow their card key and get into the building before the doors all lock officially at midnight. If I get in before that though, I can stay in here as long as I want. So I get in the weight room (which I have to use the card key to get in there as well) and run for 15 minutes, do abs, and then start to lift weights. I go outside the room to get a drink and take the card with me. When I try to get back in there, the door is locked. Are you freaking kidding me?! They didn't tell me that door would lock at midnight as well! And why would it? It's inside the stupid building, so why would someone be able to break into that if they can't even get into the building? Needless to say I was ticked at first because not only was I locked out of finishing my work out, but all of my stuff is stuck in the weight room...like my phone...my ipod...everything!

So here I am now trying to pass the time until 8 am the next morning. Played four games of pool, watched shark week and whose line is it anyways, and am using their computers up to this point. I'll tell you how the rest of the visit goes :)

It's Hard But Then Again It's Not...

It's been a year or so since I've said goodbye to two people that I loved dearly and now life threatens to leave another one soon. It's hard, yes, but it is extremely comforting knowing that this isn't the end. I'll be able to see them again and they won't be in so much pain. The hard part for me is that I'm so far away. I can't be there right now and I wish that they knew how much I want to be. It's also hard because I haven't seem them for about a year I think...and I can't help but wonder if this time around it's my fault that I'm not there right now. I know they have loved ones with them right now and I'm grateful for that...I'm just going to miss seeing them. Miss their words of wisdom. Miss the visits to their house and the delicious dinners. I guess that's why memories can be so bittersweet sometimes. I'm going to cherish mine though, and hope for greater ones in the future.

Love you Aunt Marcie.