I'm Not So Poor That I Need Your Two Cents

Yes, I am poor. I know that. My husband and I both work hard at our jobs every day like almost all other newlyweds to make ends meet. We do what we have to do. We make sacrifices and go without a lot of things just so we can put gas in the car and food on the table. We made the decision together to buy our condo in Payson. There are no places to rent in the valley that were cheaper than a mortgage, which is incredibly ridiculous. We made an investment. Payson is exploding right now with the temple being built and all the houses and businesses that are going up. The housing market is going up which means the value of our condo has already gone up in the couple of months that we have owned it. Our condo is in a supreme location and a great neighborhood. We had to move out and rent it to other people because we can't pay all our bills right now, but guess what. That just means that other people are paying our mortgage FOR US and building our equity while we use our hard earned money to pay the rest of our bills. 

Michael and I made the decision to invest in real estate TOGETHER and we don't regret that decision. We don't need people putting in their two cents saying how big of a mistake it was or how stupid we are, etc etc. We know what we are doing. Keep your nose out of our situation if all you are going to do is judge us and put us down. If you are going to be like that we don't need you in our life. Yes, the timing of us buying our dog Rosie was not the best. Did we find a suitable home for her and not lose a bunch of money in the process? YES. We wanted a dog so we got a dog. We took care of her and then sold her to a nice, loving family who could take care of her better than us at the present time. Don't say we are animal abusers, impulsive, ignorant, immature, etc. We don't need to hear any of that. We are good people, we have a great marriage, and we are happy. That is all anyone outside of us should care about. If you have any supportive remarks you want to make, then great. If you are just going to make snide comments and go on judgmental rants, save your breath because we don't want to hear it. 

Thank you to everyone who has been there for us and helped us out along the way. We appreciate all of you and everything you do. 

I Know How You're Operating

Oh Three Days Grace. You read my mind. 

Three Days Grace - Operate

I know how you’re operating

Only come around when you know that I need it

Cut out my heart and you leave me bleeding

But you’re the only one that brings out the demon

Like pills you make me righteous

Like I can rise above it all

Like pills you leave me lifeless

Shaken in a bathroom stall

Why you wanna do this

Don’t want to see you in my phone

Leave me alone

I know how you’re operating

Only come around when you know that I need it

Cut out my heart and you leave me bleeding

You’re the only one that brings out the demon

You bring it out

You bring it out

Like pills you grab a hold of me

One hit just makes me want you more

Until we’re in a motel room

Locked up behind closed doors

Why you wanna do this

Don’t want to see you in my phone

Leave me alone

I know how you’re operating

Only come around when you know that I need it

Cut out my heart and you leave me bleeding

You’re the only one that brings out the demon

You bring it out

You bring it out

You’re doing it now

You’re doing it now

You’re doing it now

It used to be

You brought out the best in me

Now it seems

You bring out the beast in me

I know how you’re operating

Only come around when you know that I need it

Cut out my heart and you leave me bleeding

You are the only one that brings out the demon

You bring it out

(You bring it out)

You bring it out

(You bring it out)

You bring it out

(You bring it out)

You're The Man

This is exactly how I feel right now.

Rev Theory

"Falling Down"

Goddamn, you're the man

Higher than the world around

Goddamn, you're the man

Watch him as he holds you down

Black pants tailored man

All your words are so profound

Black pants superman

With the self-inflicted smile

Stream line so refined

Fell into yourself and drowned

Walk tall, no remorse

I'm about to lose it

Take your money

Take your empty dreams

Break the cycle

Cut the cord that feeds

I'm out here standin' on the

Edge of insanity

So take your money

Take your empty dreams

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

Goddamn, you're the man

Higher than the world around

Goddamn hypocrite

Acting like you feel concerned

Neck tie, inside's

Darker than the desk you ride

I can't understand

Why you let them do this

Take your money

Take your empty dreams

Break the cycle

Cut the cord that feeds

I'm out here standin' on the

Edge of insanity

So take your money

Take your empty dreams

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

It's the blow back

It's the premonition

It's the contact

It's the termination

It's the blow back

It's the premonition

It's the contact

Only if you breathe

Only if you breathe

It's the blow back

It's the premonition

It's the contact (Only if you breathe)

It's the termination

It's the blow back

It's the premonition

It's the contact

Take your money

Take your empty dreams

Break the cycle

Cut the cord that feeds

I'm out here standin' on the

Edge of insanity

So take your money

Take your empty dreams

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

Cause I'm falling down

Falling down

Election Day 2012

This is how I'm going to feel if Obama wins the election:

I had that exact reaction when I found out one of my friends was dating her ex again. And when I got home to find my little sister had gotten hot pocket cheese and muffin crumbs all over the carpet. It's been a Toby-comes-back-from-Costa-Rica kind of day. Go Mitt Romney.

You Get What You Pay For......Or Do You?

I am in disbelief right now. As I am trying to force myself for the third day in a row to study for the Contemporary Art midterm I have tomorrow, I am stuck focusing on one thing: my Contemporary Art teacher is a moron. 

I don't say this to be mean. I am stating it as a fact. My teacher is a first year teacher at BYU. She's never taught before, but she teaches three different subjects. She's young, and the more I'm around her I realize she has no idea what the hell she's talking about (excuse my french). Here are some examples:

1. She said Machu Picchu is in Mexico. False. It's in Peru. 
2. She referred to "Gumbi" as "gumbo". False again. Gumbi is a stretchy man and gumbo is a Southern stew or soup.
3. She was teaching us about one of Rene Magritte's paintings that says "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" underneath an image of a pipe and told us it translated to "This is not a penis." 

HUGE FALSE. It translates to "This is not a pipe", which plays off Magritte's idea of no matter how realistic a painting looks, it is not actually the object it is depicting. It looks like a pipe, but it isn't an actual pipe. I don't know how she got to teach at BYU without knowing this BASIC concept from one of the most famous artists there were during the 20th century.  He did a whole series of images based on this idea of "Ceci n'est pas.....". She's a moron. 

If she has gotten all of these things wrong in the 3 times we've had class, I can't imagine what else she has taught us that has been wrong that I haven't caught. What makes me even more mad is that I was signed up for this class for last semester with a teacher I had already had before and really liked, but the time it was conflicted with the class you have to go to before you go on a study abroad. I was gonna do that study abroad in the spring but then ended up not having enough money so I ended up having dropped it for no reason. Then this semester there was only one teacher available for this class so I signed up for it. And now I'm mad at myself, even though I had no way of knowing that my teacher would be such a moron. She is completely unorganized, scatterbrained, rude, and full of herself. She is making me hate learning about art, when normally art history classes are some of my favorite classes. I can't believe I'm paying to learn from her when all she's doing is teaching us false information. I guess this is why I'm so worried about my midterm tomorrow. I could get all the facts right but she might not know they're right so I could get a bad grade haha. But seriously. I'm having such a hard time focusing and studying cause she has given us no real direction of what to study and what is expected of us. I hate this. 

100 Ways to Get Rid of An Obnoxious Roommate

To all of my facebook friends who may be reading this.....you probably know by now that my sister and I DESPISE our roommate. I nicknamed her FON the first week we lived together (stands for Freak of Nature). The list of freakishly obnoxious things she has done grow longer and longer by the minute. 

FIRST OF ALL.....she is dating the definition of a hipster and he is at the apartment more than my sister is. He sleeps over on almost a daily basis. They giggle and talk late into the night while taking over the whole first floor, which consists of our kitchen and living room. Leann and I have to stay in our rooms to avoid the awkwardness. I can constantly hear them while I'm trying to sleep and it makes me so frustrated and mad that I want to run down there and force feed her gluten until her irritable bowel syndrome acts up and turns her intestines into Old Faithful. 

SECOND OF ALL.....she thinks she's God's gift to this world and acts like the princess of our castle. She clips her toenails in the living room and leaves the clippings all over. She leaves her billions of dirty dishes around the kitchen along with her mountain of garbage. She leaves all the lights on in the apartment all the time and doesn't care because her parents pay for everything for her. She isn't in school right now so all she does is work 5 hours a day and then hang out in our living room with her stupid boy toy ALL THE TIME. When Leann and I have friends over, FON hovers with her boyfriend, awkwardly standing in the doorway, until we vacate the premises because of how awkward it is. The list of obnoxious things she does goes ON AND ON. 

Today was a breaking point. After her boy toy constantly being here and her doing all the obnoxious things she does, Leann and I finally decided to do something about it. So we are currently blasting rock and metal from the top of the stairs hoping it will force their anything-but-folk-music-intolerance to act up and leave so we can actually go downstairs. If that doesn't work, I guess Leann will just have to confront her since I am completely non confrontational and get anxiety at the very thought of having to deal with that awkward situation. OR.........we could try any number of the 100 Ways to Annoy Your Roommate that we found while googling how to get make her move out!

Here are some of my favorites:

1. Get some hair. Disperse it around your roommate's head while he/she is asleep. Keep a pair of scissors by your bed. Snicker at your roommate every morning. 
2. Every time your roommate walks in yell, "Hooray! You're back!" as loud as you can and dance around the room for 5 minutes. Afterwards keep looking at your watch and saying, "Shouldn't you be going somewhere?"
3. Every time you see your roommate yell, "You son of a..." and kick him/her in the stomach. Then buy him/her some ice cream.
4. Set your roommate's bed on fire. Apologize and explain that you've been watching too much Beavis and Butthead. Do it again. Tell him/her that your not sorry because this time they deserved it.
5. Eat lots of Lucky Charms. Pick out all the yellow moons and stockpile them in the closet. If your roommate inquires, explain that visitors are coming, but you can't say anything more, or you'll have to face the consequences.
6. Draw a tiny, black spot on your arm. Make it bigger every day. Look at it and say, "It's spreading, it's spreading!"
7. Buy a Jack-In-The-Box. Every day, turn the handle until the clown pops out. Scream continuously for twenty minutes.
8. Buy some knives. Sharpen them every night. While you're doing so, look at your roommate and mutter, "Soon, soon..."
9. If your roommate comes home after midnight, hit him/her on the head with a rolling pin. Immediately go to bed, muttering, "Ungrateful little..."
10. While your roommate is out, glue your shoes to the ceiling. When your roommate walks in, sit on the floor, hold your head, and moan.
11. Make a sandwich. Don't eat it, leave it on the floor. Ignore the sandwich. Wait until your roommate gets rid of it, and then say, "Hey, where the hell is my sandwich!?" Complain loudly that you are hungry.
12. Collect potatoes. Paint faces on them and give them names. Name one after your roommate. Separate your roommate's potato from the others. Wait a few days, and then bake your roommate's potato and eat it. Explain to your roommate, "He just didn't belong."
13. Cover your bed with a tent. Live inside it for a week. If your roommate asks, explain that "It's a jungle out there." Get your roommate to bring you food and water.
14. Talk back to your Rice Krispies. All of a sudden, act offended, throw the bowl on the floor and kick it. Refuse to clean it up, explaining, "No, I want to watch them suffer."
15. Sign your roommate up for various activities. (Campus tour guide, blood donor, organ donor)
16. Hit your roommate on the head with a brick. Claim that you were trying to kill a mosquito.
17. Instead of turning off the light switch, smash the light bulb with a hammer. Put a new bulb in the next day. Complain often about the cost of lightbulbs.
18. When you walk into the room, look at the roommate in disgust and yell, "Oh you're here!" Walk away yelling and cursing.
19. Buy a watermelon. Draw a face on it and give it a name. Ask your roommate if the watermelon can sleep in his/her bed. If your roommate says no, drop the watermelon out the window. Make it look like a suicide. Say nasty things about your roommate at the funeral.
20. Drink a cup of coffee every morning. When you finish it, gnaw on the mug for about ten minutes. Then look at your roommate, immediately put the mug away, and quickly leave the room.
21. Hold a raffle, offering your roommate as first prize. If he/she protests, tell him/her that it's all for charity.
22. Watch "Psycho" every day for a month. Then act excited every time your roommate goes to take a shower.
23. Go through your roommate's textbooks with a red pen, changing things and making random corrections. If your roommate protests, tell him/her that you just couldn't take it anymore.
24. As soon as your roommate turns off the light at night, begin singing famous operas as loud as you can. When your roommate turns on the light, look around and pretend to be confused.
25. Late at night, start conversations that begin with, "Remember the good old days, when we used to..." and make up stories involving you and your roommate.
26. Sit and stare at your roommate for hours. Bring others in to join you. Eat peanuts, throwing a few at your roommate. Then say, "Boy, these zoos just aren't what they used to be."
27. Buy a lobster. Pretend to play cards with it. Complain to your roommate that the lobster is making up his own rules.
28. Make pancakes every morning, but don't eat them. Draw faces on them, and toss them in the closet. Watch them for several hours each day. Complain to your roommate that your "pancake farm" isn't evolving into a self-sufficient community. Confide to your roommate that you think the king of the pancakes has been taking bribes

And this one I just want to do for fun :)

   29.  Buy some turtles. Paint numbers on their backs. Race them down the hall.

I'm hoping the blasting music thing doesn't work just so we can try some of these things.

Wish us luck with expelling the spawn of Satan!

This Sucks

You know what sucks? Being sick. Know what sucks more? Being sick for over two weeks and not knowing what the heck is wrong. Know what sucks even more? Going to the doctor and them not being helpful AT ALL, on top of having a really attractive male nurse come in and you have to tell him in detail all your symptoms. Yeah. That sucks. I just wanna get better and have life stop sucking. 

So This Is What Adulthood Looks Like

Oh geez. Facebook is getting kind of obnoxious. Every other day, and sometimes every day, another person posts that they are engaged, or married, or pregnant, or things related to these subjects. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against marriage or pregnancy, but when that is what almost EVERY SINGLE POST on my news feed is about, it gets kind of old. Especially when I am nowhere close to relating to any of those things. Don't get me wrong, I really am happy for all of them. I'm not bitter about it or gonna go cry that I'm not married, I'm just in a different stage of life. I'm sure that once I get engaged, married, and pregnant I'll post all about it all the time too. But it's weird being one of the last ones of my friends not married. Now I gotta make all new friends, cause for whatever reason, married people don't hang out with single people that much. Probably cause like I said, we're in a different stage of life. Oh well. 

I did, however, make a grown up move today. I finally signed the lease to my new apartment after trying to get ahold of the landlord for over a week. 16 days till I move with my sissy poo to good ol' Provo. I'm excited :) But nervous to see what random person gets put in the apartment with us. I'm hoping for either a really weird person or a really cool person. Either way it will be entertaining. And school starts in exactly 3 weeks. Super weird cause it feels like I haven't gone to school in forever. But I'm excited for that too. Finally doing something productive other than working. So now I get to pay for school and rent on top of my car and insurance and all that crap. Yay for being a responsible adult :) I'm glad I can take care of myself. Thanks, Mom, for raising me that way :) 

Being Mormon in Happy Valley

The current presidential race has shone a lot of light on Mormons, due to the fact that candidate Mitt Romney is a Mormon. While the light has been shone, it hasn't all shown truths. I really don't understand what it is about the world and media that devotes almost all of its energy on tearing other people and beliefs down, whether the stuff they are saying is true or not. Most of the time it's not. What blows my mind the most is that people don't see the hypocrisy of it all. If a Mormon is around a group of non-mormons who are drinking, more often than not, they will be asked why they aren't drinking. They give their answer. And then they get harassed about it (not all the time, I'm not generalizing, but a lot of the time). Think about if the roles were reversed. That Mormon, being around a group of non-mormons drinking could ask them why the ARE drinking, and then harass them about it. They could shove their point of view down the non-mormons' throats all night long. And guess what. That Mormon would be considered arrogant, preachy, judgmental, etc. So how come it doesn't go both ways? How come people who aren't Mormons can harass Mormons about their beliefs, openly and harshly, but nobody says anything? Why is it ok for people to shove their anti-religious beliefs down Mormons throats, but when Mormons try and say what they believe they are being judgmental, un-accepting, and arrogant? I really don't get it. The hypocrisy is ridiculous. 


I read a post on the internet that said "Mormons are arrogant". Come on. Really? You're going to stereotype every single Mormon on the planet because maybe you met a handful of arrogant Mormons? I have lived in Utah Valley my whole life, so I have obviously been around my fair share of Mormons. Are some Mormons arrogant? Yes. Are all Mormons arrogant? No. Generalizations and stereotypes are ridiculous. Try not to be in the high school mentality, okay? Realize that not all people are what ONE person is. That's like saying all Hispanic people are illegal, or all Black people are criminals, or all White people are racist, etc, etc, etc. It's ridiculous. There are endless amounts of stereotypes and generalizations that are completely FALSE. 


I've heard people say that being a non-mormon in Utah sucks. Well guess what. Being a Mormon in Utah sucks too. I can imagine what it would be like to be the minority somewhere. I've grown up in an environment where the majority of the people around me have the same beliefs. It's a weird way to grow up, considering that most of the other places in the US aren't like that. Except in the South maybe....anyway. I can understand why it would be hard for non-mormons to try and fit in in Utah. Mormonism isn't just a religion in Utah, it's a culture too, because it's so condensed. I'll tell you a secret. It's hard for Mormons to fit in in Utah too. The Mormon culture is definitely unique. There are a lot of desserts involved, along with a lot of overly friendly people and pot luck dinners. There's a lot of pressure. A lot of insecurities. But most Mormons really are just trying to be good people. Sometimes Mormons might come off arrogant, because they ARE overly friendly and cheerful. It might come off fake or condescending. But guess what. Every single person in this world is just trying to live life the best way they know how. Nobodies opinions and beliefs are exactly the same. Mormons try to be friendly because the religion focuses on service and helping the people around them. Cue the enormous amounts of food. And crafts. Some Mormons ARE self righteous. But a lot aren't. 


I don't understand why people have so many negative things to say about Mormons anyway. The religion promotes lots of service, families, education, travel, morality, health, ethics, etc. None of those things sound bad to me. When there are natural disasters, Mormons are usually a huge part of the people who volunteer to help. When people are moving, Mormons usually stop by to help whether they know the person or not. If your neighbor is a Mormon and they see your sidewalk covered in snow, they usually come shovel it. Mormons donate to charity. They visit old people. They travel to 3rd world countries and try to help the people there. I'm not saying all Mormons are good people, cause some aren't. But nobody is perfect. Mormons aren't polygamists. They don't wear weird clothes or eat weird food. They don't live on compounds. They are regular people. 


I have been a Mormon my whole life, and will always be a Mormon. I am sick of people telling me that I let other people make my decisions and think for me, BECAUSE I'm Mormon. Just cause I've grown up being Mormon doesn't mean it's always been easy to be one. We all go through stages where we try to figure out what we personally believe. We question things and try to make sense of the world around us. I questioned a lot of stuff. I studied scriptures, read articles, prayed, soul searched, you know the drill. I came to believe, BY MYSELF, that I believe in the LDS church (aka Mormonism). Nobody forced me to believe it or brainwashed me. I make my own choices. I'm not saying that I don't still wonder about stuff and question stuff, but everyone does. We are all just trying to find a belief system that works for us. I am not a lemming who just follows along with everyone else. So people, STOP SAYING MORMONS DON'T MAKE THEIR OWN DECISIONS. We are normal freakin people like everyone else. We just believe in stuff that maybe you don't. Big deal. You can go smoke, drink until you puke, sleep around, steal, do whatever, and I don't care. I seriously don't judge. It's your life. I don't want people judging me for what I do, so I'm not going to judge anyone for what they do. It's their life, and their decisions, and if they decide to believe in Buddha, Ra, nobody, the cult leader down the street, GO FOR IT. More power to ya. I'm not going to force my beliefs on anyone, but if anyone wants to actually have an open, intellectual, respectful discussion about religion or just beliefs in general I'm completely open to it. Just don't come bash my religion and beliefs when you wouldn't want me to do that to you. Simple enough concept, I think. 


If you come to Utah, don't automatically assume everyone is judging you if you're not Mormon. Or that they're judging you BECAUSE you are Mormon and you might not live up to their standards or expectations or whatever. Live your life however it makes you happy. Don't judge other people. We are all human beings on planet earth and that is one thing that ties us all together. You know the saying "I'm only human"? Well it means we all make mistakes. We all have things we need to learn. So stop judging people because of the ways they are different from you, and try to focus on what is the same. We can all learn from each other if we just try. 


And that is the end of this rant. It didn't quite go where I was expecting it to go since I just winged it, but you get what I'm trying to say. I hope. 

China Doesn't Deserve All the Credit

Made in China. That's what's printed, etched, stickered, etc. onto almost EVERYTHING.

While I was peeling off the Made in China sticker off the inside of my Converse I realized something. China isn't as smart as everyone thinks. While everything may be made in China, it doesn't all originate there. Countries all over the world send their ideas and products to China to be manufactured. China has tons of people, which means cheap labor. That means thousands of Chinese people see millions of products and ideas from countries all over the world. They are exposed to ideas from the entire planet. China isn't the smartest or most advanced. They simply have the most resources. They see everyone's great ideas and products, manufacture them, and in turn they know how everything works. Sometimes they use that knowledge to expand on already created products or it leads to new products, but that doesn't make them smarter than all the other countries in the world. It just appears that way. Who woulda thought? Maybe China won't take over the world after all.

If Only I Were a Child Prodigy

Today, the crazy old lady I work with showed me a video of a child prodigy artist named Akiane. She is AMAZING. She started painting when she was only six, and she is completely self taught. Her paintings are all spiritual, which is interesting since her mother was an atheist. She started painting pictures of heaven and Jesus and told her mom that they were from visions and that Jesus IS real. She had never been taught anything about religion or heaven since her mother was an atheist, so it's interesting that these images would come to her. She has full, hour long time-lapsed videos of her creating her paintings from start to finish. It's amazing. She really is an inspiration. Plus, she sells her original paintings for $5,000-$3,000,000 so that helps. I would HIGHLY recommend going to her website  by clicking HERE and looking through her gallery. It shows her paintings by the age she was when she made them and it is incredible. Here are some of my favorites:

This is a painting of Jesus entitled Prince of Peace. It takes my breath away. A little boy who came back from a coma looked through many pictures of Jesus and said none of them looked like him. When he saw this painting, he immediately recognized him as Jesus and said this is what he looks like. I heard that from the crazy lady so who knows if it's true or not, but it's a good story. 

This poem, entitled Prince of Peace, was written to go along with this painting of Jesus. 

Perhaps I wanted to catch it
perhaps not

But one morning
an eagle dropped a diamond

And right then
with my faulty brush
full of my own hair
I wanted to paint

I wanted to paint the wings-
Too late - they flew away
I wanted to paint a flower
Too late - it withered

That night the rain
was running after me
Each drop of rain
showed God's face
His face was everywhere
On homes and on me

I wrung out the love
to make the red

I wrung out the stumps
to make the brown

I wrung out the trust
to make the pink

I wrung out my own eyes
to make the blue

I wrung out the seaweed
to make the green

I wrung out the nightly pain
to make the black

I wrung out my grandmother's hair
to make the gray

I wrung out my visions
to make the violet

I wrung out the truth
to make the white

Today I want to paint God's face
IT'S NOT TOO LATE !

This photo doesn't do the painting justice but it's the best one I could find. This is called Forbidden Fruit. The description Akiane gives for this painting was beautiful. Read it below. 

...One morning I woke up earlier than usual, and right away I decided to paint, but I could not find any canvas in my studio. My family was still asleep, so quietly, still in my pajamas, I searched my art closets and found one small canvas that I'd worked on a few years ago, but later gessoed it in black.

After my prayer I began painting a young woman's portrait. next to a branch of fruit. Suddenly I felt God say, blend all the races, because this is Eve, the mother of all mankind.

Right then and there, I understood the meaning:
The tree of the knowledge of good and evil is full of forbidden fruit: red for the knowledge of evil, the green for the knowledge of good. It was created to be tempting, fragrant and easy to be picked. Although the fruit resembles the grapes, it was not.

At first, Eve thinks that she will gain wisdom by biting into the fruit of knowledge, but unexpectedly she finds the deception as the red blood of suffering drips from the green fruit. The knowledge of good and evil is simply too much to understand and experience for a human, and now Eve is looking up to God for forgiveness and help...

This is her self-portrait called Co-Creation

This is a portrait of Mary and baby Jesus.

I painted Mary in a silky blue robe surrounded by a background palette of cerulean, cobalt and Persian blue. This is how I interpreted the vision of baby Jesus and his beautiful young mother. The robe connects both of them as if there were one.

Mary is the symbol of love, warmth, affection, tenderness and devotion. Her story is the story of love and faith.

Mary with her tender love embraced Jesus at birth, embraced him on the Cross and embraced him on his resurrection. That is why the lower hand in a shadow is her witnessing the crucifixion, and the upper hand in light is her witnessing both the birth and the resurrection.

The quality of pictures on her website are a lot better than the ones I downloaded off Google Images so I would recommend going to her website to look at them. She has more portraits, landscapes, poems, etc. and they aren't all obviously religious. GO CHECK IT OUT. You won't regret it. 

This One's For the Girls

Fairytale by Sara Bareilles

Who Knew Star Wars Could Change Your Life

Within the past week I have watched every Star Wars movie.

I watched them all in order for the first time (and by in order, I mean by order of the story, not order of how they were made). Weird thing is, I have come to some very life changing conclusions because of this. In Star Wars, Yoda says that Anakin has a lot of fear in him, and fear leads to anger, which leads to the dark side. I never thought about it that way. I mean, obviously fear and anger lead you to do bad things. If you give in to your fear and anger you move further away from what's good and closer to what's bad. Solution: when you get angry, try and figure out what you're afraid of, since all anger stems from some kind of fear. If you figure out what you're afraid of, you can try and work on not being afraid, which will help you find peace. 

2 Timothy 1:7 says: "For God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind."

 I also found a quote by Gandhi on my friend's facebook page that says, “There is nothing that wastes the body like worry, and one who has any faith in God should be ashamed to worry about anything whatsoever."

Worries are just fears, so it's the same principle. If you're worried or afraid, you just need to trust in God more. He knows what he's doing. I have trust issues like nobodies business, but you can always trust God. He has your best interest in mind and knows what's best for you. There is one surefire way to make God laugh, and that is to make life plans. He will think it's hilarious, and then lead you to the life you're supposed to have. That is a fact. 

Another thing I learned from Star Wars was to focus on life in the moment. Yoda tells Luke that one of his weaknesses was always looking for a future time of when he would be happy. Once he got off Tatooine he would be happy. Once he got out of where he was and started  a life somewhere else, THEN he would be happy. I have the same problem. Once I graduate, I will be happy. Once I move out of Utah, I'll be happy. Once I get a career I will be happy. Once I get married, have kids, and a cute little house with a white picket fence I will be happy. Weirdly enough, Star Wars has made me realize that you really need to just focus on living in the moment instead of wasting time thinking about a future time to fix all your sadness and/or anger. Make the most of every moment because you're lucky to have every moment you get. Life is too short to waste it wallowing in what you hate about your life. 

I read this quote on this girl's blog I follow that says, "Don’t just hang in there, enjoy yourselves. Travel, learn new skills, serve, do something that challenges you, work on making yourself a better person, and don’t worry about the rest…don’t worry about what you can’t change, but do worry about (and do something about) what you can. And be happy now…don’t wait for some event to make you happy…happiness is not some goal to be reached or destination…it’s a way of life!"

My goal is to learn and do lots of new things. For example, I'm learning how to draw those 3D chalk drawings people do on the sidewalk. I wanna take a pottery class. I wanna go fishing in a row boat on the lake. I want to hike up Timp FINALLY. I'm getting in shape. I'm saving up to move out. I will eventually get a motorcycle :) And the list goes on and on. I started a bucket list a long time ago so I will start trying to accomplish the things on my list. The future is as bright as you want to make it, and I plan on making my future a good one :) 

A Glimpse of the Past

Guess what. I love black and white photography. Obviously I like color photography as well, but I love old black and white photos. Old photos are like time machines that allow us to see what life was like back then, which I am fascinated by. Removing color turns the attention to the lighting, shapes,and composition which are sometimes overlooked when there are colors involved. Here are some of my favorite photographs in one of my photo books called The Photographers Eye by John Szarkowski. These photos are examples of why I am so passionate about photography. 

JACQUES HENRI LARTIGUE: Beach at Villerville, 1908

(My favorite part about this is the boat on the left)

WILLIAM SMITH: View across Chain Bridge, Washington, D.C., c. 1863. The Library of Congress

CLARENCE JOHN LAUGHLIN: The Fierce-Eyed Building, 1938

HARRY CALLAHAN: Detroit, 1943

MATTHEW B. BRADY or staff: Conspirator Payne, 1865. The Library of Congress

BILL BRANDT: No. 43 from Perspective of Nudes, 1957

MANUEL ALVAREZ BRAVO: Eating Place, c. 1940

GARRY WINOGRAND: Untitled, 1963

"There is a terrible truthfulness about photography. The ordinary academician gets hold of a pretty model, paints her as well as he can, calls her Juliet, and puts a nice verse from Shakespeare underneath, and the picture is admired beyond measure. The photographer finds the same pretty girl, he dresses her up and photographs her, and calls her Juliet, but somehow it is no good--it is still Miss Wilkins, the model. It is too true to be Juliet."

                                                            -George Bernard Shaw

MAX BURCHARTZ: Eye of Lotte, 1930. Otto Steinert, Essen, Germany

RICHARD AVEDON: Ezra Pound, 1958. Made for Harper's Bazaar

ROBERT FRANK: Parade, Hoboken, New Jersey, 1955, from The Americans

CHARLES NEGRE: Henry Le Secq at Notre Dame Cathedral, Paris, 1851. Calotype. 

ELLIOT ERWITT: Fontainebleau Hotel, Miami Beach, 1962

HENRI CARTIER-BRESSON: Children Playing in Ruins, Seville, Spain, 1933

JACQUES HENRI LARTIGUE: Glider Constructed by Maurice Lartigue, Chateau Rouzat, 1909

EDWARD STEICHEN: Sunday Papers: West 86th Street, New York, c. 1922

There Is No [wh]Y in Happiness

Today has been a sick day. I don't mind sick days as long as they are only once in a while. It forces people to rest and take care of themselves, which many people can't afford to do on a regular basis, depending on their job, school, or family situation. Or a combination of two or all of them. Anyway, sick days give me a lot of time to think. The things I see, read, hear, or do provoke a more intensive, deep thought process than they normally would. That may be a side effect of whatever type of meds I take for that particular problem, but I like to think it's more of my brain being more active and compensating for when my body has to be  more inactive. I have read a few things today that really caught my attention.


Number One: I ordered a fitness DVD called BBX Hardcore that finally arrived in the mail. It comes with a booklet with an entire 90 day meal plan, recipes, life coaching, stuff like that. One part that hit me said:

"You can't focus on the negative. You can't dwell on the wrong that you have done, or what other people have done to you; how crappy you feel, or how bad you think you look, or how nothing ever goes right for you. By focusing on the negative, you keep yourself there and so continues a very vicious cycle. Change begins with, ends with, and can only happen within you." -Dede Barbantts

Pretty deep for a fitness DVD huh?

Number Two: I started reading this book called "Broken for You" by Stephanie Kallos. I am only 34 pages into it, but it has already got me thinking. One part talks about how one of the characters read a book about writing down affirmations and says:

"If Wanda felt like writing, 'Nobody will ever love me again,' which, according to the book's author, was a lie, she wrote instead, 'A loving relationship awaits me.' If Wanda felt like writing, 'All men are [messed up jerks] who deserve to die,' she forced her hand into a steady calmness and wrote instead, 'There are good men in the world, somewhere.' If she felt like writing, '[Screw] the survival of the species. The world would be better off if humans became extinct,' she wrote, 'Save the whales.' And if she felt her spooks coming on, those familiar voices that said, 'You're going to die alone. People started leaving you when you were six years old and they're going to keep leaving you, so why bother?' she would print, as if she were competing for a penmanship prize, 'I love myself. I. Love. Myself. I do not need another person's love to make me whole.'"

Stephanie Kallos used relationships in that particular part of the book to describe affirmations, but I think it is actually a useful technique that can be applied to any situation. If you constantly tell yourself you are going to fail or that you are going nowhere, then that it what will happen to you. If you tell yourself you amazing and will succeed at whatever it is you put your mind to, then you will. I firmly believe we are our greatest roadblocks in life. We are the only thing holding ourselves back from reaching our full potential. We can spend all our time blaming God or the people around us, but in the end, deep down we all know that the blame really falls on us. 

Number Three: I was watching Community since I ran out of other things to watch and the character Jeff, played by Joel McHale said:

"He has nothing to prove or disprove about himself or to himself. He has no shame because he didn't care if you knew. We can't keep going to each other until we learn to go to ourselves. We need to stop turning our hatred of ourselves into someones else's job and just stop hating ourselves."

Now, taken out of context it doesn't make tons of sense. And granted, Community is about stupid humor and being sarcastic most of the time. But what I got from it was that the reason we sometimes hate ourselves is because we feel like we have to prove ourselves in comparison to those around us. We constantly compare our shortcomings to other people's strengths and beat ourselves up for NO GOOD REASON. I read somewhere once something along the lines of, "Would you be friends with someone who talked to you the way you talk to yourself." Essentially, if someone criticized you and was as hard on you as you are on yourself, you probably wouldn't want to be around them. We should all cut ourselves some slack every now and then. Nobody is perfect. Everyone makes mistakes, and everyone has room for improvement, no matter how old they are. We should all try to be more positive and nicer to ourselves and the people around us. I think that is one thing that could help us all in the pursuit of happiness. And as Will Smith says ON The Pursuit of Happyness,

"There is no [wh]Y in happiness."