And It Begins...

Goodbye summer...

And hello to a new school year.

A new school.

New friends.

New memories.

And an extremely busy schedule.

I'm so anxious.

Switching schools is so nerve-wracking, but I'm excited too.

I can't wait to see what this school year brings.

Along with new everything else... I'm trying to make a new me.

(Don't worry, I'm not going to change completely.)

I want to be:

-More spiritual

-More friendly, less annoying

-More fit

-More stylish

-Less procrastinative

Here's to the new.

August Is Over

August is Over, We the Kings.

August IS over... it's crazy.

Summer flew by so fast!

School starts on Tuesday.

My last first day of high school.

And I'll be at a new school.

Well, half new.

It's kind of nerve-wracking.

And I still have my summer reading to do.

Whoops!

Better finish that up.

Lightning Storms

Anna!

Tonight after Legoland we went to Denny's.

And my fantastic friend Anna from EFY drove 40 flippin minutes just to see me!

We talked about school while getting stuffed on too-big-meals.

It was so great. :)

The Happiest Place on Earth

Disneyland with the fam. :)
And (not as fun or important) Legoland.  But the SeaLife aquarium was pretty cool.

Becca hugging a lego wookie.

Silly Becca, sharks don't have claws!

Random super cool picture of fish.

This ginormous crab freaked Becca out.

Nemo tank!
It had ALL of the fish from the fish tank in Finding Nemo
(plus Marlin and Dory)
except for the puffer fish.  Super cool!

DARLA!

Oh car rides.

Photobombeddddd

Danny had no idea what was going on.

Hannah was so concentrated on
covering the table with blue legos.

Epic Perry the Platypus jacket.
It even had a tail on the back.

With Ariel. :)

A shooting star!

Yay for fireworks!

It's a small, small world.

Hello, Mickey!

Me and Belle

King Arthur's Carousel

The maximum age for this ride is 12.
So Mikey decided to enjoy it while he still could.

Why are my brothers so crazy?!

Awwww!

Rapunzel!

Jacob is cool.
He eats string cheese while watching Bob the Builder in 4D.
Whaddup.

This was an interesting Perry-the-Platypus-with-mouse-ears hat.

Tower of Terror

Splash Mountain

Jacob loves his horsey.

Jacob was determined to pull the sword out.

Horrible quality... but
SPACE MOOSE!!!!!!

Definitely Not a Farm...

So, my mom decided that during the summer we would go on "fieldtrips" every once in a while.  And she had heard from a friend that there was a hummingbird farm 45 minutes out of town.  So that's where we went.

I was actually kind of excited for this!
A hummingbird farm... I hadn't ever even heard of one of those!
I was imagining a little place like a butterfly pavilion, but filled with hundreds of hummingbirds.

So we drove.

And drove.

And drove, and drove, and drove.

Until we were out in the middle of nowhere.

And it had been an hour and a half.  NOT 45 minutes.

But we knew we were going the right way.

There were landmarks.

Like, a cattle guard.

Or a lone tree.

Or an extremely large rock.

Because that's all that is out in the middle of nowhere.

And we arrive.

I thought that there was no way we were in the right place.

All that was there was...

A couple trees with hummingbird feeders by a little stream.

WOW.

We drove an hour and a half into the middle of nowhere for this?

So not worth it.

There were hummingbirds... like twenty.

And they were cool.

But it was definitely not worth three hours of my time out and back.

What a disappointment.

Especially for Me!

EFY = Especially For Youth

-which is the purpose behind the blog post title.

EFY is definitely the best thing that happens to me over the summer.

And this one was by far the best I have ever been to.

*Insert pictures in a random order here.*

These are the boys of In the Midst.

Wearing bow-ties made out of M&Ms.

We girls gave them to them. :)

RayLyn was aware of the picture.
Alana was not.

This is the famed Joshua.
Listen for the name.
Someday he will be an Abercrombie model.
He was also my COW.
(Crush Of the Week)

My awesome counselor Jessica!
Who I will hopefully see at the Twin Falls EFY session!
Even if I don't go to EFY here... I'll still go see her.
She said that I am beautiful and elegant. :)

And Jensen!

Ryan.
AKA RayLyn's cousin
AKA Russell from UP!

And Jason!
Other awesome counselor.
Who told me that I remind him of his favorite aunt in teenager form.

 They will get married.
It would be the perfect company reunion.

 Morgan and I.
With our sexy attitude poses.
This was Wednesday night.
When we won both the skit and the poster competitions.
And then we watched fireworks.
(Another post coming for those.)

Meg!  She is such a sweetheart!
I love her so much.
I really hope she goes to BYU so we can hang out and be besties.

On Friday the boys gave us roses.

It was great!

They sang to us too!

And Joshua gave me my rose! ♥

With a little note. :)  In the note he complimented me on my singing voice and cello skills.  And he says I am a great example and have a strong testimony. :)  I just wish he had a Facebook or texting.  Just my luck that he has neither, huh?

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4222601412924

^That should be a link to a (bad) video of when the guys gave us roses.

But I'm not sure if it'll work without my Facebook logged in.

My room mate was RayLyn Bryant.  And she is fantastic.  I'm so glad she came; she almost didn't!  On Saturday we threw bars of soap at each other. :)  It was fun.  We were so tired.  I was on 3 hours of sleep.                                                                          <----- And then she squeezed me half to death.  I miss her. :(

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4222583852485

Some of the boys didn't get escorts in time and had to sing Baby.

And Ryan said he didn't know the song... bullcrap!

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=4222575772283

We were on the top balcony, and the boys came under the balcony and sang What Makes You Beautiful to us. :)  And the funny thing is... it was right after breakfast, so some companies were still doing scripture study, and they kept shushing us.

~~~

Maybe if you were cooler... you could have been In the Midst.

EFY

Another post will totes be coming, but for now I just want

to touch on the highlights of the best week of my summer.

-Meeting a French boy named (yoo'-awn) and learning how to give high-fives in France.
-Hearing Ryan laugh.
-Watching the Stadium of Fire fireworks with thousands of other EFY kids in a field.
-Having a COW who could pass as an Abercrombie model.
-Making the Variety Show after four years of trying.
-Attending the most spiritual testimony meeting ever.
-Epically photobombing every picture I saw being taken.
-Being sang to and given a yellow rose by my COW.
-Getting three hours of sleep due to letter-writing.
-Throwing soap at/getting soap thrown at me by my room mate.
-The goodbyes.

I wish it hadn't had to end.

Gone again.

So... I'm aware that I just got back from Girls' Camp, but I'm leaving again.  To EFY.  So I won't be on to post for another week.  And after that we're going on a family reunion, so I might post on Saturday or Sunday, but then I'll have another week long break.  But that's what happens in the summer:  gone, gone, and gone again.

I'm so excited for EFY!  I really hope I have a great company and great counselors. :)  I'm sure I will! :D  I'm going alone, so hopefully my room mate is someone fantastic and wonderful!

The Best Girls' Camp Ever

My last time at camp.
And the best time at camp.
There is so much to say, I just hope I can fit most of it in a blog post.
But there is absolutely no way you will be able to comprehend the greatness of camp just through this one blog post.

~~~

Monday:  We YCLs went rafting.  It was so fun.  It was a little easy than I expected it to be.  I wish the rapids had been a little bigger, but it was hecka great nonetheless.  Then we went to camp.  And while at camp we did our toenails.  There were these cute little toenail sticker thingys, so my toes are supes cute.  Silver with pink.  They look like I am just a supes talented nail painter.  Supes.

Tuesday:  The other girls showed up.  I met my girls.  I was in charge of the 3rd years with Hannah, Emilee, and Kayla.  The 3rd year girls were fantastic!  All 20 of them were amazing!  I loved each and every one of them!  One of the girl's name was Natalie, and she was supes cool.  AND apparently her brother is on a mission in Chile... and he is David Archuleta's mission companion.  And pretty much, Natalie loved me.  So she is writing her brother and giving him my address and was going to ask if Elder Archuleta cuold write me a letter.  And apparently Natalie is pretty sure David WOULD write it.  And so most likely I am going to be getting a letter from David Archuleta.  EEEEP!!!!  :D  It's supes exciting!!  (Sorry about saying supes so much... that was one of the things I was doing at girls' camp... saying supes.  So I figured I'd say it while talking about girls' camp.)  And when I told my parents I might get a letter from David Archuleta they started arguing like I was actually dating him or something.  Awkward... haha!  And my mom mentioned that I might marry him... which was hilarious. :)

Wednesday:  The Walk with Christ.  It was so amazing.  I stayed at my one station and sang the same song six times, and you think that would get boring, but no.  Each time the spirit got stronger and stronger, and I was crying by the end.  And the girls who were sharing personal experiences and bearing their testimonies got more and more spiritual too.  It was so amazing.

Thursday:  The hike.  Oh poo.  They said it was 5 miles, but it was 8.  AND the entire 4 mile way back I had to poo.  Let's just say... I'm usually that last person finished with a hike, but that time I was the 4th.  I was booking it back to camp.  That hike didn't kill my legs or anything, it was just exhausting on my lungs.  Later that night we had testimony meeting.  I was one of the last to bear my testimony and I was bawling the whole time.  And then I was bawling afterwards as well.  I bawled for 3 hours straight.  I only stopped when I threw up from bawling so much.  Yup.

Friday:  We went home.  That's pretty much it.

~~~

I'm going to miss my girls so much!  I loved every single one of them.  ♥  I just hope they realize how much I love them.  There was also this one girl, Lexi, who loved me.  She wasn't even one of my girls!  But whenever she would see someone she would tell them something about me or ask if they could tell me something.  She was so cute.  We even had a 'secret handshake.'  (We would just point at each other with gun fingers and make a cilcking noise with our tongue.)  She is a special girl, and I'm sure she appreciated having me as a friend.  And everyone was so nice to her it was fantastic!

Lexi and me

And our handshake!

Off to Camp!

Leaving for Girls' Camp tomorrow.
It's my last year.  :(  I know I'm going to cry.  A lot.
But I'm so excited.

It'll be a blast. :D

Drive In

I had to leave after the first movie.
It was BRAVE.



I ADORE her hair.
And the movie was super great!  I loved it. :)


...And the second movie was the Avengers, which I had already seen twice, so I didn't mind having to leave.

Swim Team

Although I missed the first week of swim team for a Lifeguard course... I'm glad that I got to swim today. :)  Oh how I have missed swimming!

...But after this week I'm going to miss three more weeks.  Poo.

And it's sad that Joshwaaaaaa isn't my coach. :( More poo.

But I still like swimming a whole buttload.

Certified Lifeguard

This is what I look like after one day of a 10 hour Lifeguard course.

And of course... who just had to randomly be in my Lifeguard class?

Yup.  Him.

Really?  Oh well.  At least I got to spend the week with him!

And now I look like an oompa loompa.

Hopefully it will tan over.