Twenty-One-Year-Old

I meant to post this on my birthday, but of course it was a usual blogger fail on my behalf when I realized two days later that I never posted it. I really need to learn to utilize my ability to schedule posts in advance.
So, here it is: 21 goals for this next year. These aren't in order except for the last one :)

21. Laugh everyday.
20. Learn to control my anxiety a bit better. (No more panic attacks!)
19. Learn to hem my own jeans.
18. Read 50 books (including Catcher in the Rye, Devil in the White City, and 1984).
17. Talk Adam into swing dancing with me or going to the school's masquerade again.
16. Go into the Salt Lake City LDS Temple.
15. Go on a mini-vacation with Adam. Just the two of us.
14. Successfully make a batch of cookies. Puffy, not flat. Sweet, not salty. AND definitely not burnt.
13. Go to Baby Charlotte's temple sealing.
12. Keep my side of the room spotless for minimum two weeks (don't judge haha).
11. Up-cycle a piece of clothing.
10. Get a pet!
9. Graduate from BYU-I with my degree in English Education Composite Degree.
8. Stop chipping at my nail polish.
7. Write our "love story."
6. Sing karaoke and record it
5. Go camping and this time actually cook (last time we just ate junk for two days)
4. Get rid of 3 trash bags of clothes before we move away from Idaho.
3. Successfully grow a plant and keep it alive for at least a month.
2. Learn to play and memorize Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring."
1. Do something nice for Adam everyday.

9 Month Anniversary

Today we will be spending our nine month anniversary on a plane to Los Angeles, California to see our families. Do I mind? Not one bit. :)
I know nine months isn't significant. The only thing that I can think of is babies when I think of nine months, which is scary because that leads to the realization that had we gotten pregnant right away we'd be preparing for a baby. Uh, thank gosh for birth control.
Anyways, I'm sure sitting next to this super handsome man for a few hours on an airplane without having to do homework will be a breeze. I mean look at him...

So cute.

Honestly, how could anyone not love that. But, really... I am so grateful to have made it through the first nine months of marriage and be able to say I'm still in love with my very greatest friend. I love him now more than ever.

Here is to you, you zombie loving, laughter inducing, kind man. Thank you for a great nine months.

Love,
Evi

Quiz: A Lil Bit of Christmas Spirit.

1. Egg nog or hot chocolate? Holy heck. What a dilemma! I'm going with egg nog, even though I'm lactose intolerant. That stuff is better than anything I can think of right now. Too bad it wrecks me!

2. Does Santa wrap presents or just sit them under the tree? Santa puts them under the tree. Too many elves were getting paper cuts from the wrapping paper.

3. Colored lights on tree/house or white? Colors!! Especially the retro glass ones on the house. I also love color themed trees :)

4. Do you hang mistletoe? I bought some this year. I wonder where it went. haha. 

5. When do you put your decorations up? Right after Thanksgiving. You need at least a month of Christmas decor enjoyment.

6. What is your favorite holiday dish? I REALLY love baked brie, as I discovered last year. But, our family does Christmas tamales and I totally am in love with those, too.

7. Favorite holiday memory as a child? Every year we do a giant Christmas Eve party. All of my favorite childhood memories are centered around the laughter floating through our house. Moments that include karaoke, joke-telling, dancing, playing the piano, etc. I am so excited.

8. When and how did you learn the truth about Santa? Santa is totally real. Don't even pretend like he's not or I'll make sure I tell him to give you coal.

9. Do you open a gift on Christmas Eve? Nope. But, sometimes the three of us girls get matching Christmas pajamas :)

10. How do you decorate your Christmas tree? We love colors, the more the better. Adam likes putting random things on the tree for me to find. Like a rubber band, or a random candy cane, or sword toothpicks. I love that guy.

11. Snow! Love it or dread it? It is a love/hate relationship with snow. I hate that the first snow of the year, I inevitably fall while on campus. This year it happened while walking down stairs. It hurt. However, I love it because that means it is ski season!!!

12. Can you ice skate? Yes, I can. I LOVE IT.

13. Do you remember your favorite gift? The first gift I remember was probably when I was five because I was kindergarten age. My grandparents bought me a pink bike. I still remember walking down the stairs and seeing it. It is probably my favorite. 

14. What’s the most important thing about the holidays for you? Honestly, it is spending time with family. Now that I have grown up and moved away, nothing means more to me than seeing my family.

15. What is your favorite holiday dessert? Egg nog and pumpkin pie. 

16. What is your favorite holiday tradition? We have SO many. But my favorite is the Christmas poppers. It is British. You pull the tabs and out pops a paper crown, and a joke, and a treat--then we wear the crown the whole Christmas Eve dinner and tell each other our jokes. 

17. What tops your tree? A green star-shaped ornament.

18. Which do you prefer: giving or receiving? Giving. I love seeing faces light up!!

19. Candy canes: yuck or yummy? Yuck. They get gross so quickly.

20. Favorite Christmas show? I love the original Grinch cartoon, Elf, and White Christmas.

21. Saddest Christmas song? I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day. Darn you Longfellow!!

22. What is your favorite Christmas song? Silent Night. I can sing it in English and German. Plus, I know an awesome descant. Yes, I'm a choir nerd.

Love, 

Evi

seven thirty in the am on tuesdsay. concerned.

Check out my red eyes. Cute, right? 

Diet Coke should start paying me for all of these Diet Coke pictures.

So I'm worried about my well-being here. Not joking my left forearm is KILLING me, especially as I type this. I probably should be typing a paper, but honestly it hurts so bad that I need to blog it. Anyways, my eyes are also bloodshot. Maybe it's because collectively I have only gotten 6.5 hours of sleep over the past two and a half days. I cannot look at the computer screen without having my eyes water and worse my classmates are beginning to file into the classroom and look at me like "WHOA stay away from that girl." Let's just say, as of now, there is complete perimeter of empty desks around me. But, hey this might be my hardest day. I can sleep tomorrow (kind of) or tonight if I'm lucky. The way I see it is that this is my last finals week of junior year. Two more semesters. I wish I could chant it out loud right now. TWO MORE. Oh, and five days till I get to see my family in California!!!
Hooray for home. No hooray for finals.
Love,
Evi

Week One: Book Review of Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians by Brandon Sanderson

Like I told you guys on Saturday(?), I am starting to post a book review each using the 32 books I read this semester. So first up is Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians by Brandon Sanderson
If you could accurately judge a book by its cover, this book is not it. I saw the cover with a raptor on it and immediately dreaded reading. For those kids that have an imagination, it might make them very excited. For me, it didn't. Anyways...

Cover found here 

Here is the info:

Published Oct. 1, 2007
320 Pages
Genre: Epic Fantasy, Young Adult

Summary:
Alcatraz Smedry is always breaking things, in reality it’s a talent… according to Alcatraz and the rest of the "Free Kingdomers." It all begins when he turns 13. For his birthday he receives a bag of sand. The librarians are the enemy. The same librarians steal his bag of sand, which is not a normal bag of sand. Alcatraz is not an average foster child. He has been passed around because he always ends up ruining something precious to his foster families. In the book, Alcatraz is reunited with family—his grandfather, who teaches him that breaking things is a talent. It is from his grandpa that he learns that the librarians are trying to conquer the “Free Kingdomers.” It is in this book that Alcatraz fights to keep this from happening.
The Smedrys all have different “talents.” Grandpa has the power to arrive late to appointments. Sing has the talent of falling. Quentin has the talent of speaking nonsense. All Smedry’s have special unexplained talents. This idea is great for getting kids to see that even their “downfalls” are part of what makes them special.
This book was hilarious. I strongly recommend it for young adult boys. There will be a total of five books in the series. Sanderson has released three so far, and has announced a fourth to be released in 2012.
Recommended Age: 10-14
Rating: **** If you are interested you can buy it here

Twenty-Five Weeks of Books and then some!

Okay so this semester I read a grand total... ready for it?... Thirty-two books!
So since I had to write 25 reviews for a class for 25 of the books, I figured why not publish AT LEAST the reviews/summaries of those twenty-five. Twenty-five out of the thirty books are considered young adult literature. Three are psychology-related. The other four are postmodern lit. I thought it'd fun to post it for all of my readers and partially for myself. I will be posting a new book every monday for the next five or six months. I know I've been awful about posting this semester, but trust me if you knew my grades you'd understand why. So here is the list of what I will be posting:

Young Adult List
1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
2. Maus by Art Spieglman
3. Graphic novel: Beowulf by Gareth Hinds
4. Audio Book: Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo
5. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
6. I Know What You Did Last Summer by Lois Duncan
7. Monster by Walter Dean Meyers
8. Peter Pan by James M. Barrie
9. Alcatraz and the Evil Librarians by Brandon Sanderson
10. The 9/11 Report adapted by Ernie Colon and Sid Jacobson
11. When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead
12. Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney
13. The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares
14. A Long Way From Chicago by Richard Peck
15. Contemporary Realistic Fiction: Holes by Louis Sachar
16. The Giver by Lois Lowry
17. The Arrival by Shaun Tan
18. Second Star to the Right by Deborah Hautzig
19. Beauty by Robin McKinley
20. Charles and Emma by Deborah Heligman
21. Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
22. Elijah of Buxton by Christopher Paul
23. Beloved by Toni Morrison
24. Kissed By An Angel by Elizabeth Chandler
25. Incidents in the Life of Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs

Psychology List
1. The Hurried Child by David Elkind
2. Why Gender Matters by Leonard Sax
3. Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Postmodern Lit List
1. The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster
2. The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien
3. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
4. Interpreter of the Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

So excited for this lil project of mine you guys! Hope you are too!!
Love,
Evi

Flippin' Finals

Finals are super hard this semester. Things are getting done and my grades are holding strong, but studying this much is getting boring. Up side, I get to have as much Diet Coke as I want and have an excuse to not cook for us. This semester has easily been the hardest semester of my academic career and I have an inking that next two will be even harder, since I will be a senior at that point. Scary! I've noticed that due to the boredom over the last few years I tend to take pictures on my computer's Photo Booth. Lucky for you I'm willing to embarrass myself and show you. Enjoy!

Winter 2010

Spring 2010

Spring 2010

Fall 2010

Spring 2011

Spring 2011

Fall 2011 Midterms

Fall 2011

It's not that I'm self-absored; it is just that I'm extremely bored.
Love,
Evi