So fast!

My life is going by way too fast! I cannot believe we are well into April 2010 already. I write the date in a little Secretary's project book at work every morning and I have made mistakes every day this week... I am convinced it is still March. And I am just barely starting to get the hang of writing 2010. I feel like my life is racing by and I am just watching it and hoping that I am doing things right.

This was a crazy week which probably didn't help the feeling of life flying by. I got back from my spontaneous Spring Break trip and had a lot of work to do to catch up. I spent Wednesday and Thursday in the library doing projects and assignments.

Then Thursday night I went and picked up Megan from my parents. They were driving back from Southern Utah and Spring Break and Megan spent a couple of days with me while the rest of the family was with Grandpa Stuart. We didn't get ANYthing accomplished Thursday night, just talked and laughed. Friday I had to finish a paper and then Megan and I went to Cafe Rio (Megan hadn't ever been there - I know!) with Patrick and Heather. After dinner we dropped Heather off to bed and then went over to the boy's apartment. We watched America's Funniest Home Videos with Austin and Victoria and then when Isaac got home from work we watched 21. It was a good movie, I really enjoyed it (especially thanks to some good editing by Patrick). We talked for a while afterwards and then went home to bed. We slept until just after 9 and then watched the first session of General Conference. In between sessions we made a yummy lunch, got ready for the day and cleaned up the whirlwind mess that were the kitchen bathroom and bedroom. We watched the afternoon session and then after I did a little bit of homework we went out to Fuddrucker's for dinner. They have some dang good hamburgers if I do say so myself. Then we went to the movies and saw the Last Song. Cheesy I know but it was a sister's night out! We were a bit early so we did some shopping first! Here are a few pictures documenting our night out.

We love eachother. We have fun. And we don't care what anybody else thinks.

Sunday morning we got up and got ready and watched the morning session of General Conference at home. Then we drove up to Salt Lake City and watched the afternoon session in the Conference Center. It was the first time my family had gone and it was so sweet to see Luke be SO excited. He told all of the volunteers that he was so excited to see the prophet.

It was such a wonderful Conference. I had about an hour in the parking garage trying to get out and so I had a really good chance to ponder about Conference and my thoughts about it. It was such an incredible conference. It was so themed about Family and the Atonement. I felt really at peace about my choice of major and think that I really need to spend my time strengthening the youth right now! I want to be a parent some day but I have a role to play now. The best chance the Adversary has to win is to destroy us in our families and I will do all I can to prevent that.

Monday I spent at work, in class, giving a presentation and working on a group project. Then I went to Patrick's and had fhe with his group. We studied for a couple hours and then watched 24. I was amazed that we could get so much homework done with all of us sitting together in a room... girls never do that. It was also really fun because I got to talk to Carly about our major a little bit. She is a Marriage and Family emphasis and it was so refreshing to hear someone else expressing many of my same passions and frustrations. I love my major. And there really is a huge need for it. Society places no value on marriage and family anymore. And our culture is deteriorating because of it. But. At the same time because society doesn't value family they really don't value a family life major. This is hard sometimes. Even here at BYU I often get the reaction of raised eyebrows and with almost a mocking tone, "What are you going to do with that... be a Mom?" Actually, yes. I am going to be a Mom. But before, during and after that I want to be able to stand for the family, strengthen it. There is a need for pre-marital education, strengthening healthy marriages and therapy when problems come. I can help with all of that. And hopefully my efforts and the efforts of people like me can help our culture understand how truly important the family is.

Tuesday I woke up and got ready. I had a couple presentations to give so I took some time and actually got ready and I looked pretty cute if I do say so myself. :) I had a group presentation on teen suicide for my adolescent development class. It went really well I thought. It was a hard presentation to prepare for and give. My heart was broken with each story I read and every statistic I heard. Here is something we noticed in our research and case studies. For many people depression was a common risk factor. Most were suffering from it. But what triggered their suicide was the actions of someone else. Some were bullied, ostracised, others were neglected, some had histories of abuse, and some were exposed to the suicide of others. What it came down to was that the actions of other people, or lack of action was the deciding factor for many many cases. On that note, what we focused on in our presentation and what I would like to submit to you now is that we, as a peers, friends, parents, neighbors, siblings, have a huge role to play in preventing suicide. We need to be attentive to the people around us. We need to notice people who are having a hard time. We need to not make fun of people, not bully others. We need to be careful to not ostracise, ignore or neglect people. And when someone asks for help, we need to take it seriously. We played this clip in class. I think it's worth watching. There are a lot of different meanings you can find in the song but today I hope you think about ways that you can save a life.

We also had our Stand for the Family closing social Tuesday night. We had a presentation about the symposium, heard from the past officers and then the new officers were introduced. I will be serving as the secretary for the year. I am really excited. There were a lot of things that were amazing this year as the club got on its feet but there is a lot that we can continue with for next year. If you are interested in getting involved please let me know! Stand for the Family is multi-disciplinary (that means you don't have to be a family life major!) club focused on understanding the family as the fundamental unit of society, increasing awarenessess about issues facing family, providing knowledge and language to articulate these issues and helping students to get involved now to help stand for the family. Last year the club, with the Family Law Society, put on a Symposium, to present many of these issues and bring people together. We hope to do that again as well as provide other opportunities but we need help so if you'd like to get involved we'd love to have you!

Yesterday was just an all around great day. We watched President Hinckley's talk ,"The 6 Be's" in my parenting class. I miss that great man. He was the prophet while I was growing up and I really felt like he was almost a grandfather to me. I felt he knew me and loved me. I ran into Patrick after class and had a good chat. I love running into my friends on campus. It always makes my day a little bit better. Then I had nutrition. Then I studied and studied and studied. I got to take a break around 6:00 and I had dinner with Heather Jean. She really is my favorite. Then I studied and studied and studied. Just before 9:00 (the deadline to get your test) I went into the testing center and took a test for work and relationships (note: why do you assign a test just days before finals?). I was a little bit nervous about this test. I really didn't feel quite prepared going in but when I came down the stairs to my thrill... I got a 100%! Perfect score! You had better believe I did a happy dance right then and there. :) Then when I got home I found that we had a new dishwasher! Seriously. It does not get much better.

A note about spring: Apparently she decided to pull an April's fool's joke and invite Mr. Snow out just for the day. But the Mr. Snow didn't leave and he invited Mr. Rain, Wind and Jack Frost out too. So Sunshine went into hiding and we a couple of miserably cold days. But Mother Nature got them all straightened out and Sunshine has come back and the next couple days look to be absolutely wonderful. :)

Other notes about life: Still nothing from EFY. I'm really getting kinda impatient. Actually not kinda. I am impatient. Lyss and Dan make me really happy. It looks like I am working for Statistics during Spring Term. And probably Fall too?! I miss London desperately. I'm craving sorbet.