Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!! We interrupt this blog to announce the creation of another one! If you are bored, have nothing better to do, or are simply trying to kill time then we've got the perfect solution: http://www.anneliesstories.blogspot.com/ Its just a blog that has Dolly's first attempts at writing...(heheh). Critiques desperatly needed, Compliments naturally wanted. There's also her friend's stories on http://www.deidrahansen.blogspot.com/ which she highly recommends! (But hey, I'm just lucky you read this one. I probably shouldn't push it.)


Anyways, Halloween has been great this year! I dressed up like a viking, using my dad's real deer fur, lots of leather belts, my boots, a borrowed hat, and a borrowed toy sword that goes from the floor to my shoulder! My inspiration...


I took my little brother trick-or-treating since my mom had to help my other brother with his class station at the carnival and some maniac in a mask really scared him. I'll just say I began to feel my big-sisterly instincts creep in and I almost wanted to tear his mask off and say, "Hey, the kid's four; give him a break!" But I figure that's just part of Halloween.

After everything, I went with some friends to a church dance where you got to wear your costume. On ladies' choice I asked a guy who was dressed like a missionary and discovered he likes to write too :) Two other people asked me to dance and four people asked if they could play with my weapon. My conclusion of the night, "They only like me for my sword."

My one friend (the one who's blog I just advertised) was driving and when she dropped the other one off we began talking about one of the guys who had been following her around at the dance--the newest member of her fan club. I jokingly told her that and she chuckled mirthlessly saying she wasn't even in her fan club. My humble friend then began to tell me of the trial of being the girl who somehow always got the guy. With a roll of her eyes she explained how they didn't know the half of her and how awkward things can get. She described annoying text messages, unwanted drama, and how much she couldn't wait for the goofy highschool stages to be overwith and for everyone to grow up.
Call it hormones, teenagers, drama, or all the above, by the end of that ride I suddenly didn't feel so bad for only dancing with a few people. I had a paradigm shift.

I once heard a quote, "If the grass is greener on the otherside it must rain a lot more over there." This seemed to illustrate it. We look around at some people and naturally think they have everything. But I've come to see what may be one of the reason's God is 'no respector of persons'. We all have the same amount of problems as well as blessings, though they may come in many different shapes and forms. I also heard someone talk of how if we all got together and threw our problems into a pile in order to trade them, we'd all rush for our own because we wouldn't want anyone elses.

So let us enjoy the blessings we have and problems that we don't.

Lessons I Learned as a Boy

I don't know about you, but I thought I could use some cheering up today so i visited good ol' youtube. (This may take a few posts and I originally meant this one to be last so if you want you can just go to the archives on your left and click on them from the bottom to the top.)

In the Spirit of Thanksgiving

Woodchucks - GEICO Commercial

Piggy - GEICO Commercial

VeggieTales - VeggieTales: Pizza Angel

Kid History - Episode 1

JULIAN SMITH - Brag Call

Mormon ad: Swasbuckling

"The best thing anyone can have up their sleeve is a good funny bone"

Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson were going camping. They pitched their tent under the stars and went to sleep. Sometime in the middle of the night Holmes woke Watson up and said, "Watson, look up at the stars, and tell me what you see."

Watson said, "I see a fantastic panorama of countless stars."

Holmes said, "And what do you deduce from that?"

Watson replied, "Astronomically, it suggests to me that if there are billions of other galaxies that have roughly similiar stellar population densities as represented by my view, that, potentially, trillions of planets may be associated with such a galactic and, therefore, stellar population. Allowing for for similiar chemical distribution throughout the cosmos it may be reasonably implied that life--and possibly intelligent life--may well fill the universe.

Theologically, it tells me that the vastness of space may be yet another suggestion of the greatness of God and that we are small and insignificant.

Meteorologically, the blackness of the sky and the cripsness of the stellar images tells me that there is a low humidity and stable air and therefore we are most likely to enjoy a beautiful day tommorrow."

"Watson, you idiot, someone stole our tent!"

Patience and Me

Lately I've been feeling kinda...pathetic. I do things without thinking (which has yet to prove useful), break a lot of little promises to myself (which really add up), then there's always the self-conciousness of the three pimples on my chin among other silly things. So I guess I've been feeling like a teenager (nothing too unnatrual I hope).

I vented in my actual jounal about it and then kinda wished I didn't because if my posterity ever read it I'm afraid they'd say something along the lines of, "I'm related to this space case?" To which I would reply, concerning my three new companions, "Actually, its face-case."

My friend told me at a recent slumberparty that in China, blondes (like me) are considered lucky, to which I jokingly replied, "I beg to differ."

So while I was hopelessly spiraling down this path of...patheticness, I decided to go to a Halloween-themed church dance. I went dressed as a witch and actually felt pretty confident (meaning I asked the new kid his name, asked a couple of wall-plants to dance, and jumped into just about every line dance there was). But I think that was due to something that came to me in my car as I was driving there, muttering angrily to myself over some other choice that lacked the sufficient amount of brain cells to follow through successfully.

Then all of a sudden, a shred of rare intelligence came to me and I realized that though I was striving to follow my Savior's example in every which way or form, there was one I was forgetting--patience. If after the trillions upon trillions of mistakes I've made, I can still feel His warming arms around me after a heart-filled prayer and if my family and friends--whom I also look up to--are so patient and loving towards me than maybe I should follow their example and also be patient with me.

Pride and Batteryjuice

I have a car. A sweet one too. Maybe it's just because its mine and I left my own clumsy mark on it (the mirror is still in the process of being repaired), but I like it. I call it my Granny Car with pride--espeacially when I just feel like crusin' five miles under the speed limit because I know I can get away with it. My little brother illustrated this well when we couldn't decide what radio station to listen to, us having immensly different tastes, and so he turned it to some Beethoven mess saying, "it fits this car" and making me feel for the world like I was in one of those really old movies.

Yeah, I dig my Buick.

It also has this nifty little ability to keep its lights on just long enough for you to haul in the groceries or to avoid tripping over the neighbor's toy truck on your way the door. This was something I took for granted until the other day at school.

"Your lights are on."

"Yeah," I curtly nodded, "They'll go off in a minute."

A moment later,

"Hey, your lights are on."

"I know. They'll go off in a little bit."

"Your lights--"

"Yeah, I know."

What were these people's problem? I stubbornly thought to myself, I think I know my own car, thank you very much!

So imagine my frustration when, shortly after having gotten home from...something that's must've not been important enough for me to remember, my dear friend texts me and says, "Hey, ur lights r on."

"What the snoodles?" I asked aloud, drawing my Mom's attention.

"Actually," she muttered, "They should've turned off by now."

She had a point. So, rolling my eyes at myself, I replied with a "thx" and headed out to see that my lights were, indeed, on.

Later that night, after reflecting on my foolish pride over something so silly and taking my friends' concern for granted, I still found my thoughts wandering in the same direction over something else of little concequence. Then, from my good-natured concious came the thought: Gees, Annelie, turn your lights off.

Homecoming

As you can tell by the less-than-creative title, I shall be reminiscing about how Homecoming went, for all you who are interested. For those who aren't, bear with me; I should have a more profound post Wednesday-ish.

As the tradition goes, at least in my school, the girls where their date's practice jerseys to school and then to the game. I thought it no different for me so I got thinking. When it came to football, my date didn't play quaterback, runningback, or any other sort of back--he played the trumpet. (And he's stinkin' good at it to. Did I mention during one game our small band opted out on him and he had to play a solo?) Anyway, so I got thinking...

It was during my fitness class when I was doing yoga--I believe in the middle of the "boat pose"(not the shower this time)--that the idea struck. Afterschool I rushed to the small town choir teacher/band teacher/elementry music teacher/Local D.J./Jr. High Football coach to ask if I could steal one of those fancy, oversized, nerdy band jackets. He said "Yeah." I said "Thanks."

And this is what I did with it: (that's paper by the way. I would have my head through a trombone if it was permanent.)

And, just for the full effect, here's the front. I still haven't figured out what that little rope thing on the shoulder is for...

I discovered a social skill through all this--at least in my school. If you drive an interesting car to school on your first day of having a license, accidentally mix up nerd day with just an ordinary monday, or wear a blue and gold portable sweat room to class, you do it with pride! Then people will look at you and say--hey, that's kinda cool. If you do it with slumped shoulders and eyes down, then they tease you. It's just something I've noted throughout my highschool career--so I strutted this thing!

And it made my date laugh really hard and brag to someone about it who was wondering if I had a loose screw or something--making it totally worth it!

Then there was the dance. After rushing around like a chef without a salad, I thew on my outfit, plastered on some make-up, showered myself in hairspray, and practiced in my new highheels before texting him that I was ready. He was too and said he'd be there in a minute, opening the latch to my internal butterfly cage.

"There he is!" my mom greeted as she opened the door. I grabbed my phone and clip-clopped down the hall.

Now, ladies and gents, (especially gents) I really appreciated the slight rise of the eybrows and smile I got. It made stressing over modesty so worth it! It was the same with prom with the soft "woa!" or just the pleased grin. So go for it guys, compliment your wives, your daughters (I loved when my Dad told me I looked nice), your sisters, your friends--I'm sure they'll appreciate it too.

So then, after my mom's photo shoot (which I'm sure you'll see more of soon), we went over to my date's house for his mom's photo shoot--then it was off to the dance!

We were the first date there...its a good thing we established before hand that we both really like dances....

The music was...alright. There were a few good songs here and there, but otherwise it was just rap junk (no offense to those of you who like it, I just don't appreciate the lyrics.) So me and my date decided to reccomend the hokey-pokey. Yeah, we rock like that.

After the dance--which ended up really being a blast--we went to my ward's bishop's house for waffles! Him and his wife are amazing! Who stays up until 2:00 a.m. making waffles for a rowdy bunch of teenagers? They do. And they're good at it too!

It was then, after laughing and joking with our fellow attendees for awhile after having finished the best thing I've ever eaten that late, I discovered my date needed to get up at 7 for a choir thing. So, deciding I was tired too, we left. He walked me to my doorstep and I gave him a hug, as what happens on every other date I've been on. But I knew this one was fun because as I was getting ready to say my prayers and turn in, I saw the jacket hanging on my chair and felt kind of bummed that it was over.

But hey, I'd see him in Monday. And--my favorite part about dating--I just added another friend to my list.

Wind Speeds and You

A quote I heard today from a very wise (and hilarious) man named Deiter F. Uchtdorf said, "Its amazing what you can learn about life from nature." And I whole-heartedly agree!!

Like today, for example, I was riding my bike (against our small town's notorious wind) when I noticed a bird flying overhead. I love watching birds. If I didn't get so stir-crazy so easily I could probably be a pretty good bird watcher, but that's besides the point.

Anyways, I didn't just see the bird, I noticed what it was doing; flying with the wind. How smart, I noted, pushing my pedals even harder and ducking my head to get another foot or two. Obviously going against it wasn't working so well. Which got me thinking...

We have winds, if you will, or trials that come our way and we have two choices. Either we can fight and curse and spit and avenge and wrestle our way against them wondering why it had to blow our direction and how much we didn't deserve it OR we can accept it, spread our wings, and try our best. Afterall, its these winds that can carry us faster across the sky than we ever could in the first place. These trials, if handled the right way, can stretch us and build us into better...birds per say, and we can fly our skies at a better rate than we could before.

So, in closing, as another amazingly wise man, Joseph B. Wirthlin, said, "Come what may and love it!"