Scrapbooks - College - Sophomore Year - Food

So food was a big part of college life. (Actually, when is it not a big part of life, amiright?)

Despite being the tiniest in the apartment, Stacey was well known for her eating powers. Chris was also known for the major quantities of food he could consume. (I wonder if his metabolism is still as fast as it was in college? If there's any fairness in the world then it won't be...)

Stacey once challenged Chris to an eating contest.

She lost. But we all got a free meal out of it, so really we all won! (Or, as my crazy roommate from my junior year would say, "Friendship wins"! More on her later...)

Once when my mom and brother were in town we talked her into ordering a ginormous pizza from Pizza Pipeline, which was just down the street. It was awesome.

Scrapbooks - College - Sophomore Year - Valentine's Day

Oh man. Valentine's Day.

By this point none of us were dating, so we had to take matters into our own hands. And we did. I had such awesome roommates!

At this point you might be wondering what had happened to Chris. Back in November (shortly after Homecoming and Halloween?), we finally broke up. It was one of those situations where we either needed to get married or break up. And I didn't want to get married; I knew neither one of us was ready and I also knew that he was not the eternal companion for me. It was hard. We tried to stay friends. And we kinda did, but not really. I mean, we didn't hate each other or anything, but we didn't see much of each other anymore either. Which was weird because we had spent so much time together for so many years. But it was also one of the best decisions of my life.

Kindergarten

So I've been volunteering in Cole's class once a week this year. I'm usually there for a couple of hours and I do all sorts of stuff, like working on sight words, corralling kids during bathroom break, and helping with random things like that.

Today the kids were all on one because of daylight savings. Lots of grouchiness, lots of outbursts, but also lots of silliness. I got to help them with this project where they wrote down what they wanted to be when they grew up and why. Several said doctors or police officers. Here are some of my faves:

• A marine - so I can drive a tank. 
• A home worker - so I can help clients like my dad. (When asked I figured out that what he meant was he wanted to work at home like his dad. And wear jammies. Goals - he has them!)
• A priest - so I can help people be nice. (This was a new one; I don't think I've ever heard a kid say they wanted to be a priest. So I asked him about it. He said "I was talking to my grandma and I said I wanted to help bad people be good, like her (I have no idea what his grandma does), but she said no. So then I said I wanted to work at Taco Bell, but she said NO. And then she said I should be a priest so I said okay.)
• A custodian - so I can help places be clean. (Just say mom, kid. Same difference sometimes.)
• A mommy - so I can be the boss. (**Might be my favorite response ever.**)

Later the cutest little girl in class, who happens to sit next to Cole, told me that she and Cole were going to get married when they grew up. Cole looked at her like she was crazy, but she came up and gave me a great big hug. (As she is wont to do. That girl is a hugger!)

Me: You're going to marry Cole? Does he want to get married? 

Cute Little Girl: Yes! But only when we are old, like 18 or something.

Cole: NO. *growl*

Me: I think that would be lovely. But maybe when you're a little older.

Cole: NEVER. 

Kindergarten can be hard, but it can also be very, very entertaining.

A Day

Yesterday was just A Day. You know - one of those days. Where you run around like a crazy person from one thing to the next, without any sort of break and with plenty of surprises.

It started at 3:00am. Something woke me; I'm still not sure. But I had a really hard time going back to sleep. Then, around 4:00am I know exactly what woke me up: Tess screaming. Loud enough to wake the dead - and her brothers.

I rushed into her room to find Cole staring at her and Tess and her bed covered in vomit. Tess was freaking out because she's a four year old drama queen and that's what she does. She excels at it.

It took Lance and I a while to get her and the bed cleaned up. Lance went back to bed just before 5am; I opted to stay in Tess's room because I knew she'd keep throwing up and someone needed to hold the bucket. Plus, I knew I wouldn't be able to go back to sleep. (I was right on both accounts.)

As I sat in her room I just fumed. I was SO MAD. SO UPSET. Why today, of ALL DAYS, did Tess need to be sick?!?! I wasn't mad at myself and I wasn't mad at Tess - I was mad at Heavenly Father. Why? Because the week before a dear friend who I had visit taught for 6+ years had passed away. Linda was never active in church, but she always so welcoming to me and whoever my companion was. We had grown close; I had grown especially close with her daughter, Lori. Linda had always had poor health, and she had finally succumbed to a lethal combination of infections the week before.

Didn't Heavenly Father know what a big day it was? Didn't He care that now I wouldn't be able to go to the funeral? (Lance was speaking at it, so he couldn't stay home with a sick child.) Growl growl growl. I was not a happy camper. I'm pretty sure "petulant" could have been applied to my overall disposition.

Tess finally fell asleep at 6am, which was good because I needed to get up to make breakfast and get kids off to school.

And cancel my credit card. Yeah, I found a text on my phone about some questionable charges on my card. My credit card company is so awesome. They stopped my card, issued me a new one (which I received today, just over 24 hours later!), and I wasn't liable for any of the fraudulent charges. Sure, it was just ONE MORE THING to have to deal with, but it could have been so much worse. In fact, the worst part of it was getting the card today and having to go and update all my reoccurring payments and such online.

Despite the ease, I was still grouchy. This did not help my attitude at all. A sick kid and now no credit card?! (We only have one.)

I texted those who needed to know about my situation and about the plan going forward. (I was also heavily involved in the family meal planning and such.)

About an hour later, as I was resigning myself to my fate, a friend of mine offered to watch Tess. Was she sure? I didn't want her to catch anything. "You really need to be at this funeral. There's no way I'm not letting you go."

I was so relieved and happy and... a little ashamed. I had spent all morning stewing about this, praying that things could be different, but never assuming that they would be.

I was kind of a jerk. A then very repentant jerk, but still.

Lesson learned.

I was able to attend the funeral and then help with the family meal. I was able to say good-bye to Linda and also support Lori. I helped with the meal and enjoyed hearing a few anecdotes about Linda's life from her family and friends.

Char, our RS president, and Gigi, my visiting teaching companion and overall townie BFF, and I stayed after, washing dishes, putting away tables and chairs, and just cleaning everything up. It felt good to help Linda's family, even in that small way.

I didn't realize how tired I was until I got in the car at 5pm and drove home. Fortunately, I scored some of the left over lasagna from the family meal so I didn't have to make dinner for my family. Even more fortunately, I have an awesome husband who helped the kids eat and took the boys to piano lessons while I ran some much needed errands.

Yeah, despite the fact that I was EXHAUSTED, both mentally and physically, I had to go to Barnes & Noble. Why? I was put on the Easter party committee for Tess's pre-k class, but missed the planning meeting that morning because of puking Tess. So I got stuck with the Easter Book and Coloring Page station. Of which I had neither. (I know - I have like 30 Christmas books but 0 Easter. I'm a heathen.) All of the Easter books were checked out from the library, so my options were limited.

Spencer had received a B&N gift card for his birthday, so I offered to take it off his hands in exchange for putting the same amount in his Steam Wallet. (That's how he buys his online games.) It was a deal.

So Tess and I trekked out to Barnes & Noble - oh yeah, Tess? TOTALLY, COMPLETELY FINE the whole day. Thank goodness. But also, seriously? How can you be so sick at night and then running around all day? I'm getting old. Anywho, we found a book, then returned some shoes to Dick's Sporting Goods because we were in the area and because even though I was tired if you're by the mall and have stuff to do, you might as well just do it. But that turned out to be complicated because the card I had used was - haha - now closed. Trying to get a cash return was crazy.

We finished the day at DQ for some free ice cream cones. Because no matter what kind of crazy day you've had, if you can get 6 free cones for your family, you do it. It was a good ending to the day; I felt tired but happy, blessed beyond belief. Yeah, I'd had A Day. But I also had the world's best husband, 4 crazy (and rather sticky) kids, and a Heavenly Father who knew and cared for me.

Scrapbooks - College - Sophomore Year - Cinderella Date & Drive By Twinkies (you read that right)

As  you can see, we were into theme dates. As you can also see, my date was kind of a grouch. Actually, now that I think about it, he reminds me of Cole. (Grouchy, super smart, and just nice and interesting enough to put up with.)

Okay, see this is out of order again because we did Drive By Twinki-ings at the end of fall semester. Who knows what my thought process was in putting these scrapbooks in order? Oh well, I could rearrange them now, but I'd probably forget something and then have to go back and re-do stuff and whatever. I don't need that headache.

So yeah. We went around to people's apartments and threw Twinkies at them for fun. Rachel wouldn't do it with us because she thought it was stupid. We thought it was fun, and it was and was very well received. Because hey - free Twinkie!

Oh man. Life before Photoshop...

Scrapbooks - College - Sophomore Year - Christmas Break

For most school breaks I would get together with some old friends from high school. As we got older these get togethers would become more infrequent and with fewer people; internships, work, and just life got in the way.

Is it weird that I had more pictures of my friends and dog than my family? Also, not a single picture of Christmas morning?

Oh well. At least I had a copy of the Christmas letter, which was written by the family dog.

Scrapbooks - College - Sophomore Year - 20th Birthday & Heather's House

Ohmigosh. I was once 20 years old. And I wore a sombrero. I had awesome roommates. And short hair.

Heather's parents lived in Highland, so just a quick drive away. I'm not sure why we didn't go to Preference, since that's a girl's choice dance and we obviously had no problems asking guys out. Also, I have no idea why this was in my scrapbook here since it took place in March.