End of the year

2012 has been a roller coaster for me. Here is some of the ups and downs from the year.
1. Started off the year with getting dumped on Jan 1... Great start right
2. Worked crazy hours for five months, picking up teaching an extra class
3. Volunteered at an Ironman that my brother was doing
4. Went to the temple
5. Got to experience the hottest week in South Carolina history when I visited in July
6. Fell in love
7. Paid off my car
8. Had my heart broken, with a terrible experience I hope nobody has to deal with
9. One of my tennis players came in second in region
10. Another made Academic All-State
11. Finally got cable in my home
12. My dishwasher broke
13. Lived through another end of the world scare
14. Got to spend Christmas with my amazing parents
15. Crossed off two things off my bucket list.

I hope 2013 is a great is I dream it will be

Here are a few of my favorite pictures of 2012

Christmas Time

I love Christmas time, it is one of my favorite times of the year.  I look forward to putting up the tree and listening to wonderful music.  I have always been more of a giver than a receiver of gifts...this year more than ever.  I can think of perfect gifts for everyone but me, I literally can't come up with anything for my parents to get me.  A couple of days ago I think I figured out why I don't even want to think about gifts for me.

Few times of the year are harder for me, that reminds me that I'm single than Christmas.  I have been making or buying gifts that would be great for my sister's family or my brother's family and I don't have anyone.  Knowing this, my mind protects me and just won't allow me to think about gifts for me, because everything just seems so silly.  I know I have had an amazing life, I have a great career, a home, a car, etc., but to be honest...it is getting tough to not have anyone to share my life with. I have even been in a tough stretch where I don't have many friends, for one reason or another they have disappeared over the last six months; so I literally don't have anyone to share experiences with.  My family is great and they do their best to make sure they know I'm not alone, but some days are hard...especially this time of the year.

On a brighter note, I can't wait to see my dad open his perfect gift.  I really do think I hit a home run with his present this year.

Leo the Lion

Yesterday Real Salt Lake had an open house at there stadium, and it was so much fun. You got to go all over the place, including the locker room and tunnel to the field. But my favorite part was the mascot Leo the Lion was dressed as Santa and I got to take a few pictures with him.

Real is by far my favorite soccer team, so I was excited to get a behind the scenes look at the stadium and all things Real. It was a great day...and completely free. Thanks Real Salt Lake for being such an amazing club.

Month of Thanks

I have taken the challenge to post something that I am thankful for every day of November...I have done this on Facebook and it has been a blast.  I try to come up with something unique every day to be thankful and not just the normal things.  Don't get me wrong, I am very thankful for the normal stuff, but it makes it more fun to think of crazy things to be thankful for.  Today I am thankful for getting to sleep on Batman sheets last night.  I love Batman and getting a great nights sleep on them was pretty amazing.  It has been great thinking of all the way the Lord has blessed my life.  I sometimes focus on what I don't have, but then I miss out on all the amazing things I do.  If you have never tried this in November, or any other month...give it a shot.  You never know, it could change your life.

Election 2012

So on Tuesday, Nov 6, 2012...I finally did something I have tried to do for the last two elections.... VOTE.  I know, I'm a history teacher how could I have never voted?  I have ok excuses, but non that really mean anything, mainly I didn't care in the last election.  This year, even though I again did not have strong feelings for the people running for president I did have a decent opinion for my Representative in Congress.  One person running wanted to pretty much get rid of the Department of Education, as a teacher that scared me.  So I mainly voted for that reason, and the person I wanted won.

What scares me is the reaction people have had over the outcome of the election.  I understand that I live in a very Republican state, so most of the state was disappointed in the outcome of the election.  But I heard all kinds of statements from my students that shocked me.  I know they only said it because they heard it at home.  I had to explain to several students that even if Romney had won that President Obama, would still be president until Jan.  They were in total shock...and were still planning on moving to Canada.  Others were bragging that Obama won, then I would ask them why they liked Obama and they couldn't come up with anything real.  Sometimes I worry about our future.

Monday Morning

This is normally me every morning, but especially on Monday mornings.  I have always struggled to get out of bed in the morning, my parents would have to fight with me like crazy to get up.  Now I get up, but I still don't like it.  My favorite part of the weekend is sleeping in until after the sun comes up, so when Monday morning comes around and it is tough.  Today was totally different...I woke up and I wasn't exhausted, I didn't mind getting out of bed, I didn't even push snooze (BIG accomplishment for me).  I have no idea, I was able to sleep in a little bit longer today, but no enough that it would make a big deal.  I got up and got ready for work and was actually in a good mood.  Normally I am kind of in a haze until about 9:00, which is tough because by 9:00 I have already taught one whole class.  I'm hoping that this a new start of me not hating every morning of my life.

Update

I know it has been FOR-EV-ER since my last post...trust me I have good reasons.  The first six weeks of school are crazy busy for me every year.  I work insane amount of hours and I don't have much time for anything else.  The tennis season ended up very well, we went 6-4 as a team and qualified for State.  We aren't good enough to compete in the playoffs, but we were excited to represent Taylorsville.  We actually had a girl in JV go undefeated this year, so I'm super excited to see her improve and play next year.

After tennis was over I had a small nervous break down.  I learned one more way that guys can be not worth the time or effort to get to know them.  I don't want to get into the details, but I have had a rather unlucky streak of really bad guys in my life.  But I do believe this last one takes the cake.  I'm glad I found out about everything now and not later, when it would have been incredibly awkward.  I'm very thankful for all my family and friends that have helped me through this crazy ordeal, which I hope nobody else every has to go through.

I am re-focusing my life, and I am finally feeling better about the situation.

Back to School

It's official, summer is over.  Tomorrow starts the first day of the 2012-2013 school year.  Honestly I have mixed emotions...the biggest pain will be when my alarm goes off tomorrow morning at the crack of dawn.  I really don't know why I picked a profession that would require me to get up early when I am NOT a morning person at all.  After I get up, it takes me forever to actually wake up.  I hope my body adjusts quickly or these first few weeks are going to be painful.

Last week was spent "preparing for the new year", which is code for a massive amount of meetings. I have not finished putting my room together because I didn't have time, I even came in an extra day and I'm still not ready.  Thankfully Monday is late start so I have a little bit of extra time to finish everything up before students start showing up.

One good thing is....it is football season.  Even though my team struggles at football, I love going to football games.  I really wish more students and teachers would realize how much fun it is.

Sick

Being a teacher, I am exposed to just about every sickness out there... and for the most part I stay pretty healthy.  I really don't get sick very often, this year I have been "blessed" to get two different stomach viruses in the same year.  Before this year, I can't even remember the last night I had a stomach sickness.  Sunday night began my most recent experience.  I had gotten about an hour of sleep before I was forced awake by a pain in my tummy.  At first it wasn't bad, I spit up a little, nothing much...I thought that I was done with it.  Then about twenty minutes later it really hit me and I was in severe pain for the rest of the night.  Now for those of you that haven't had the pleasure to be in the same country mile as me when I was sick you wouldn't know that I am extremely loud when I throw up.  I think this one though was a new all time record...I actually lost my voice.  I think this is the first time that I lost my voice ever in my life and it wasn't even from anything cool.

Normally after you are done throwing up you start feeling better right?  WRONG!!!  I still had major stomach pain all day, it got so bad that I actually went to the doctor.  That is a pretty big thing for me, I have to be on my death bed before I go to the doctor.  After getting some medicine I finally got some sleep, Tuesday morning I woke up feeling much better...but my voice was almost completely gone at this point.  Today, I'm still a little weak, but I would say I'm at about 85%...and my voice is getting stronger.  This is one of the worst stomach viruses I have ever had, I hope I have hit my quota for the year.  Being sick is the worst, but being sick while alone is just about the worst thing I can think of.

Fireworks

With yesterday being the 4th of July, I got to go see some fireworks.  I love the 4th of July, it is one of my favorite holidays...at least it is when you get to cook out, spend time with friends and family, and enjoy some amazing fireworks.  I love everything the day represents...freedom, independence, rights, honor, pride, etc.  I got to go watch the West Jordan fireworks with two friends and I was impressed with the quality of fireworks they had.  I got to see some really cool fireworks I have never seen before, like a smiley face and hearts.  And honestly I was just happy that they had fireworks with all the wildfires going on out here.

We had a really good view of the fireworks and as I was laying there watching them, I couldn't help but think about the universe.  Looking up at these huge amazing displays in the sky and I kept thinking about really how small I am.  My spot in this world is very small, but it also made me think about how could anyone think that this world was not made by a Heavenly Father.  I really do not understand how you can sit there and look and amazing sites and think this world just randomly came to be.  What is so interesting to me is, I have always loved fireworks and yet this is the first time the have effected me in such a profound way.  I can't wait for the 24th of July and see if I have the same experience or if I go back to just loving fireworks, like everyone else.

Vacation

I didn't go on a big trip this summer, but I decided to come home and visit my parents. Little did I know that while I was home we would experience the hottest day in Columbia's history. Think about that, the hottest day in the city's history. So crazy.

My favorite thing to eat while I'm home is to eat at a place called Rush's. It is by far my favorite burger, I must go at least once whenever I come home. Thank You Rush's for the best burger I have ever had.

Summer School

I am currently taking a summer school class about American history. I like American history, but I'm not super excited about spend all day for two weeks of my summer in a classroom. The first week of the class is about Western Expansion and the second week will be about Immigration. It has been an interesting experience so far, not as bad as I feared, but not exactly fun either. I'm trying to have as good of an attitude as possible. One of the hardest part of summer school I getting up at 7:00 during my summer vacation. I really struggle getting out of my bed each morning, some how I have to continue doing this for another week and a half.

Free at Last

Summer is officially here!!!  Well, I guess it has been here for a few days, but anyways...My summer is quickly filling up.  I have this first week free, kinda.  Next week I begin taking a two week long "Teaching American History" class, which means this week I am trying to get all the reading done.  I have like seven books to read, it is going to be tough to get it all done.  Every day I think of something else I am suppose to be doing, I'm trying to get most of the reading done before the class starts.  I really don't want to be in class from 8:00-3:00 every day and then come home to massive amounts of homework.  It would be easier if it was about topics that I enjoyed reading about in American history.  So far it has been about "western expansion", yawn...

Yesterday I woke up with a massive pain in my back, the night before my back hurt some, but not a ton.  The next morning was a totally different story though.  I spent most of the day laying around watching t.v. (I know I should have been reading), it was pretty miserable.  Thankfully this morning the pain had almost gone away, it was nice to be able to move around again.  I still have no clue what I did to hurt it, but I'm hoping every day it will get better and I can get back to my normal routine.

Last Monday

Today is the last Monday of the school year!!! Only seven more days to go. I'm excited to be able to sleep in more than anything else.

Ironman St. George

My brother has had a goal for the last few years to participate and finish a full length Ironman.  If you don't know what an Ironman is, you swim 2.4 miles then bike 112 miles and then run 26.2. We have all thought he was a little crazy for wanting to put his body through something that crazy, but we wanted to support him.  Since his family was not going to be able to come, I planned to take a day off of work and drive down to support him.  It turned out that my dad and nephew were able to come with me.  The three of us signed up to volunteer during the marathon portion of the race.

The race was on May 5, 2012...my dad got up early to see the start of the swim, since it was my day off I didn't really want to get up at 5:00am.  So I hung out in the hotel with my nephew until my dad returned.  I guess the swim was really tough, the winner of the race said that the swim was the hardest thing he has ever done in his life.  Around 12:00 we left the hotel to find the station we were going to be volunteering at, we stopped by early to make sure we knew where to check in and everything.  While we were there we got to see the first three bikers ride by.

Our shift began at 2:00, we got our official t-shirt and a silly one that just our aid station was wearing.  As people ran by we would offer drinks to them, our table was "Perform", basically Gatorade.  We would hold cups out and as they went by some would take it and some did not.  It was a really cool thing to do and I got to see my brother run by several times.

Rob finished, which is his goal, in 13:48!!! I'm soooooo impressed.  I'm glad we went, I just hope if he does another one it will be in a cool location so I can make it a vacation.

Spinster in the Making

I've always had to the hope and dream of one day finding my "happily ever after," but today I came to a realization... it's not going to happen.  This has been a really tough year for me, I would say the second worst year of my life, behind 2009; and I'm done.  I'm done pretending to believe that I will ever find someone that will make me happy.  I'm done hoping that one day I will have someone to talk to when I come home, someone to eat dinner with.  I talk to friends and they tell me about someone they have met or someone they have a crush on, etc. and I'm here forever stuck in the same spot.  There is NO single guy in my life, every guy I work with is married, NOBODY talks to me at church or institute...where am I suppose to meet people?  I work 12 hours a day for five days a week for the last two months.  I would like to blame my crappy life on my work schedule, but it nothing has really changed.  Even if I just worked eight hours a day, I would still come home to an empty house, no missed calls on my phone, and nobody thinking about me.  I visited a friends ward today and it just came to me... I'm going to be single forever.  I'm so sick of hearing "you are so special and amazing, you deserve someone really great."  I'm sick of people giving me dating advice when they got married at 21 and have no idea what it's like to be alone.  I don't understand why none of my hopes and dreams can never come true.  Through out the years, I have tried to keep a positive attitude that one day it would be my turn and it would all make since, not any more.  I'm going to accept the fact that I'm going to be a spinster.  I'm seriously considering going to a family ward for church, why go to a Young Single Adult ward when nobody will talk to me.  Nothing says I'm giving up on ever getting married like going to a family ward before you get kicked out of a single adult ward.  Even my students see it, they want to make me an online dating profile so they can find me a husband.  It's pretty sad when sophomores are starting to feel sorry for you.  That's right sophomores can see how pathetic I am...my life is just amazing.

Let the Countdown begin/Master's

I am normally not the teacher that is counting down to the end of school super early, this has been kind of a rough year; so I'm counting down.  We are under 25 school days left until the end of school, and I can't wait.  Not that I have anything exciting to do, I just want to have a change.  In fact this summer I taking a history class and a couple of online classes to give me professional development credit.  My summer is already looking pretty busy.

I have been considering going back to school to get a Master's degree.  I'm debating two different routes. 1. An online degree that is fast and fairly cheap, it would be in some kind of education field.  Bonus, I don't think I would have to take out any loans if I go this direction.  2. Getting a master's in school counseling.  Counseling would be the harder, more intensive, and more expensive route...but it would give me a different option down the road in my career.  A counseling degree requires an internship, so I think if I do that, I would have to leave teaching for at least a semester.  I'm afraid of not getting a job again, it's scary. I know I need to start working on a degree, I could start option one almost immediately, but option two is at least a year down the road.  I hate making decision!!!!

Spring Break

This last week was my spring break. It came at the perfect time, I was worn out. My first day of my break I jumped on a plane and ran away to sunny Phoenix. When I landed it was like 90 degrees and awesome!!! I went to Phoenix to visit one of my best friends that moved in July. I have really missed hanging out with her, it was awesome to just chill with her again. We did some fun stuff, which included riding on a camel. Hopefully pictures will come soon, if Andrea posts pictures anytime soon. Haha, she is super busy so it might be awhile. Hopefully more details will come soon. If I ever have time to sit still for more than a minute

Plan Ahead...Never

I filled out my time card on Friday for the extra class I teach and I worked an extra 38 hours this month, and that is just in the classroom teach. That doesn't include prep time before school, at home, or the two hours of tennis practice each day. I think I have gotten a little to used to working crazy hours because on the weekends I don't know what to do with myself. If something doesn't HAVE to be done, then it simply doesn't get done. I have gotten to a point where I only worry about today, and maybe the next day, but that is it. I've usually been a person that plans for the future, at least some what, but now, nope. For example, I have a "black-tie optional" event to go to tomorrow, I have known about this for a few months now, did I go shopping for a dress for it??? Nope, not until today. I don't know if my dress is "dressy" enough, but it will have to do. It was hard to shop for actually. I'm going to a wedding that is at the top of a mountain...which means cold and snow, but the reception is inside. I had no idea what to get, but I bought a really cute dress and it will just have to do. Well wish me luck

Indexing

I have been trying to find ways to keep me distracted on Sundays, besides taking a nap...about a month and a half ago I decided to try indexing. Indexing is when you look at different types of records (birth, death, passports, draft cards, etc) and type the names and dates. These are then uploaded to the church and are submitted as temple names. I have never really been interested in indexing, but with morning church that leaves me a long afternoon and evening to try and fill. It then became a goal of my ward and stake to index so many names a month and a year. So I try to do some indexing each Sunday. The problem is that I think every ward/stake is starting to really push indexing and the website can't handle everyone. I few weeks I have had it crash on me...oh well I will try to continue to find good ways to spend my Sunday afternoon.

The Social Butterfly

This week I did something crazy...I went to a ward activity!!! I will be honest I didn't want to go, but the idea of free food got me. I went and things started off kind of rocky, but after a while a friendly face came as well and we talked through dinner. After dinner they played random games, ping pong, dodge ball, basketball, pool...ok so I didn't play pool, but I enjoyed the rest of the games. I may not have found a new best friend or anything, but I left that evening feeling better about myself and the ward in general. I know I just need to give this ward a chance...it is just easier said than done. I am thinking of even going to Family Home Evening this week, I know crazy right.

Double Extended

This has not been the greatest of years for me and it is only half way through February, but I have coupled that with trying to keep myself busy. And boy am I ever busy. Three weeks ago I was approached by one of the administrators at my school about teaching another class and giving up my prep period. Of course they would pay me to do this, but many teachers have had bad experiences doing that so it was a difficult decision. But I decided to give it a try, really if nothing else to keep me busy so I would sit around thinking about rough times. Tomorrow will mark two weeks that I have been teaching this extra class, and it isn't too bad at the moment. Honestly I am really afraid of burning out during the tennis season (which starts in two weeks by the way), but I am going to try to keep a positive attitude. I know if I don't make a real effort to stay positive then it will be all negative all the time. One of the other administrators told me that I should take a vacation to Hawaii this summer with the extra money I would make. I would LOVE to do that, so anyone want to go to Hawaii with me. Sadly I still don't know if I could afford a vacation to Hawaii. But really any vacation would be nice.

Working Out

From Nov 2010 to about May 2011, I worked really hard to lose some weight. I would work out at home and I would use the gym at my school. Once school got out I lost most of my motivation. This year for Christmas one of my brothers, a sister, and me got together and donated to a fund to help pay for my dad to job a gym. He has been talking about doing it forever, so we figured if we helped pay for it, he would feel guilty if nothing else. Once I got home from my Christmas break I was having a really rough couple of weeks, due to many many reasons and I wanted a way to help get rid of some of my frustration. I out of the blue stopped by the Planet Fitness that is right across the street from my school (they are by far the cheapest gym around) and the next thing I knew I was signing up. I'm really glad I did it, I don't know if I'm losing any weight, but I at least feel better about myself. One of these days I will work up the nerve to weigh myself, I wanted to work out a few weeks before I weighed myself so I wouldn't know how much weight I've gained. Anyways, I've worked out six days a week for the last two weeks in a row. That is pretty big for me because I have been working some crazy hours recently. I just hope I can keep it up, the tennis season starts soon and I will have even less time to work out.

Longest Day Ever

Today was the longest most exhausting day of my life...well in at least in a long time. I'm afraid this is just the first of many of these days too. I am now teaching four classes a day instead of three, which means I get no prep time at all. I teach from 7:30-2:10 with only a 35 minute lunch. After school I have to figure out what I'm doing for the next day, make copies, etc. So after school today we had this big meeting from 2:30-3:30, that put me behind schedule. I planned from 3:30-4:30, went to the gym at 4:40. I ran two miles!!!! Not all at once, but that is a big step for me. After working out that it was pointless for me to go home, so I got some dinner and went back to school. I work the girls basketball games so I ate dinner then worked the varsity game. I got to leave to go home around 8:30, which meant that I had about a 14 hour day. I'm exhausted...time for bed.

MLK Day Sickness

So I celebrated MLK Jr. day with having the day off of work and getting an extremely nasty virus. I went down to my sister's house to spend the long weekend with family, I haven't had the easiest of times recently and just wanted to relax. They didn't realize it but one of there children brought home a virus from school on Wednesday and missed school Thursday. They didn't think much of it since nobody else got sick right away. Come Saturday my brother-in-law got it and then Monday it was my turn. Thankfully I knew it was only a 24 hour bug, or I don't know if I would have made it. This thing totally kicked my trash...I even had to call in sick, which I NEVER do. There was a point last night were I was almost too weak to make it to the bathroom, at that point my family forced me to drink something, even if I was just going to throw it up. I spent the day laying on the couch, I took a shower and I couldn't do anything else for like two hours after I was so exhausted. Anyways I'm finally feeling almost normal again.

Who Needs Sleep

Ever since I returned home from my holiday vacation I have yet to get a good night sleep. It doesn't help that I have a lot on my mind and can't seem to turn off my mind in order to go to sleep. Anyways, this week has been exhausting simply because I can't sleep. I get into bed on time (well some days) and then I need up laying there for a couple of hours before I fall asleep. Then I'm a walking zombie the next day, I think there is no possible way that I won't sleep tonight since I'm so sleepy already....WRONG. Yesterday it got to the point where I had to take a nap after school or I really would not be able to function much longer. And of course because I took a nap, it meant I didn't sleep last night. Oh well, I guess my body just hates me.

New Year's Blah

I can honestly say I have never had an exciting or even real fun New Year's Eve; I know sometimes it has been my own fault, but this year totally the worst ever and not my doing at all. So it all begins at 1:00am on Dec 31, when I finally get home from traveling, learning they lost my luggage, and that my phone is a piece of crap and died again. I couldn't sleep because I was so mad about my luggage and phone (keep in mind that my body was on eastern time). Then I went to a get together that night where I was deadly tired from not sleeping the night before and a couple of my so called "friends" did some inappropriate things to get be pretty frustrated. I could never really get in the mood to celebrate after that. I get home and try to right to bed, but again for some reason I couldn't sleep, which makes things worse because my ward changed times to 9:00am. The time change wouldn't had so bad if it wasn't Jan 1, that is just mean....anyways my Sunday was pretty miserable as well, but I won't go into those detail. I guess this means the year can only get better from here

Most Admired

Dec. 15-18 USA Today/Gallup conducted it's annual "Most Admired" people. The poll asks Americans, without any prompts of who they admire most both male and female. Through out the history of this poll, which started in 1946, political leaders have been the most admired people in the eyes of Americans, then religious, a
nd business leaders. For the most part the top 10 list stays similar each year, with the same people moving up or down, there are very few new comers to the poll. This year on the male side of the poll, there is a new comer....Thomas S. Monson.

I think this is very cool, Thomas S. Monson is a mad I admire, and it is nice to see that other people feel the same way. I understand that it is mostly likely only members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints that came up with his name, but it is still awesome. The church has been in the news a lot recently and I'm proud that we are finally getting some good press.

Here is a link to the article about the poll if you are interested: http://www.gallup.com/poll/151790/Barack-Obama-Hillary-Clinton-Again-Top-Admired-List.aspx