the graduate

he did it! i'm so proud of my hubby who is a first-generation college graduate. he has worked hard to get here. we tried to drag out the celebrations over a couple weekends. last weekend, amanda hosted a get together with all the kropfs and we were glad to have bethie and jacki there. last night, my parents treated us to dinner at maddox, and tonight we have one final shin dig to finish off the parties. way to go, mike. sure am proud of ya ;)

a week of firsts

*mike's first day of his last semester of school. yipee!

*for the first time in months, and perhaps years, we stayed awake for a whole movie. usually we start it one night and finish it the next because we fall asleep, but we made it all the way through the proposal in one. night.

*i got a new calling as the first counselor in relief society! i put an exclamation point cause it's kind of funny. i have no clue what i'm doing. it will definitely be a learning experience, and i feel completely inadequate, but when i was set apart i felt that there is a reason i have this calling.

*i had my first go at making homemade gravy. it turned out pretty okay! at least it wasn't bland, which has always been my fear with making my own gravy. i get nervous with the salt & pepper, afraid that i will add too much. i used the pioneer woman's recipe which also involved chicken fried steak. it was gross. really gross. i think the cube steak was old or something because it was really chewy.

*my little brother is living in logan for his first semester of college. drew has been a welcome houseguest, though feeding two boys proves much more expensive than feeing one. coco LOVES when drew comes over. she paces between the front and back door all night just waiting for him to walk in.

*i took coco running for the first time this winter. it was a red air day in logan, but it was so nice to get out and run. a really weird thing happened while i was running, though. i felt like i was in the middle of a scene from 24. a few blocks ahead of me, this cop had parked across the street from an old beater car. 4 teenagers were standing around the car, and as the cop is walking towards them, one of the kids pulls a gun on the cop. the cop put his hands in the air and started walking back towards his car. i look up and realize i'm running towards a kid standing in the middle of the street holding a cop at gunpoint. all sorts of things start going through my mind. this kid is going to hold me hostage! i'm really tired and i won't be able to run fast enough to get away from him! he's going to grab me and tell me to control my dog but she will be too excited to sit still! then i realized i should probably call 911 or something so another cop can come help the situation. i wasn't very close to any houses, so i turned the other way and kept running to find a house where i could knock on the door (note to self: run with your cell phone from now on). when i turned back around, the cop was inside of his car and the kid wasn't holding his gun out anymore, so i figured the situation was under control, and i just kept running home. it was crazy.

and it's only monday! it's going to be a good week.

your mom goes to college

ah, graduation. the day you think will never come. you spend four + years of your life on what feels like a never-ending road to nowhere... but alas, there is an end, and it has finally come for muah.

i received my bachelor's of science degree in english with an emphasis in professional and techincal communication. when you tell people you have an english degree, they assume you're going to be a teacher or jobless. i hope to be neither. professional and technical communication involves a myriad of things, including website design, document design, writing grants, proposals, and even exciting things like instruction sets. for now, i'm going to keep working at my current job as a contract administrator because a) i love my job, b) logan doesn't believe in paying college graduates what they're worth, and c) we may not be living in logan once mike graduates so why search for a new job only to leave it in a year? ultimately, i would like to assist the state in writing their construction proposals or find a job that will allow me to work from home. so for those who care, that's what i want to be when i grow up.

suzie is probably going to be disappointed in me, but i decided not to walk and go through the traditional graduation hooplah. i figured, why PAY money to rent a cap & gown and sit through a painfully long, boring, and based on feedback from last year--somewhat depressing--graduation ceremony? seems like a no-brainer, right? so mike and i decided to go play in salt lake. we did a little shopping (found a season of 24 and er for 15 bucks! i heart target), a lot of eating, and enjoyed spending a whole day together.

we met my family and grandparents for dinner at macaroni grill. i love my family and definitely got spoiled by my parents and grandparents. i love kennedy very much, but the real reason i took this picture is because megan joy (from american idol) is sitting behind her. people kept bugging her to take pictures with them, so we didn't want to bother her. instead we just tried to sneak in a picture without her noticing. on sunday, mike and my sister-in-law through a "surprise" party for me. (note: one of the many reasons i love mike is because he cannot keep secrets from me. i usually know what i'm getting for birthdays, christmas, and anniversary presents because he gets so excited that he can't wait to tell me. when he had to make a mysterious trip to the store on saturday, i only had to do a little questioning before he gave in and told me what was going on) it was fun to have an excuse to get together with everyone.
so there it is. the graduation celebrations. thank you to our families and mikey for making it a great weekend for me. it felt like my birthday, only without the getting older and wiser part. oh wait, i am much wiser now, right? i'm a college graduate!

14 days

things i will miss-
*using "i have homework" as an excuse for not cooking dinner or folding laundry or cleaning the linoleum floors
*free admission to basketball and football games (while understanding that i really paid $300 for the "free" admission)
*psychology classes
*the variety in my day. . . at work from 8 to 5 is going to be a hard adjustment

things i won't miss-
*trying to find parking
*paying for books and student fees
*get-to-know-you games on the first day of class
*group projects
*shook, hailey, and parisi
*dreamweaver
*finals week, although as an english major, finals week is surprisingly uneventful. i just feel that anyone who's been to college should say they hate finals week.

here's to being a college graduate in 14 days!

i'm sick of looking at the giveaway post. but i promise ya, i'm going to make something really cute :)

-spent the weekend in AF with bethie and jacki. we spent the whole day scrapbooking and got a lot done. i got to meet jacki's family; it's no wonder she's so sweet. her whole family is sweet, too.

-had to console the husband after the aggies lost by 1. very traumatic. and i'm very ready for march madness to be over.

-got a body wrap. so cool. i liked being all seran-wrapped-up. not sure if i lost inches, but my skin does feel much tighter.

-went to tai pan with my mom and grandma. surprisingly we only spent three hours there. for a girl who hates to shop, that's a pretty painful amount of time to spend in one store, but i was glad to spend some time with them and i found some cute things.

-got really excited to learn how to sew this summer.

-made a super long list of spring chores, including planting a garden (but the yard needs a lot of work before that can happen) and painting our bedroom, living room, and washroom.

-procrastinated homework until approximately 8:55 p.m. on sunday evening. i really need to stop doing that.

-realized i only have a month left to finish my online portfolio. but before you can finish something, you have to start it. so i have a month to start AND finish. i hate online portfolios.

-read in a magazine that 1/3 of your life is spent sleeping. what a waste.

not too much to say today, but for some reason i can't go a week without posting something on the blog. what's wrong with me?

i was too lazy to fold the laundry on thursday night, so i took it out of the dryer, put it in the laundry basket, and set it in our room so i could fold it friday. i came home on friday to a very proud husband who had started the clean laundry sitting in the basket. the funniest part is that he can probably count the loads of laundry he's done during our marriage on one hand but he saw the basket sitting there and figured he'd wash it. he was pretty proud of himself for starting that laundry. so was i. and we had extra clean Gs this week since they got washed twice :]

*

i'm on a reading kick still. i have a couple hours of free time between classes so instead of studying i have used the time to read. my sister-in-law recommended The Book Thief; i'm so glad i listened to her and read it. there is a quote on the cover that says this is the kind of book that is life-changing. it truly was. and that's all i can say about it.

*

61 days left until graduation. i don't know if i should be excited or scared. the more people ask what i want to do once i graduate, the more i have no idea.

*

thanks for all the advice on the ipod. i remain undecided. mine still works, so i will probably keep using it until it stops playing music. maybe by then there will be another version out and my decision will be even harder to make.

what's happenin'...

i may or may not have stolen this post idea and some of its contents from my BFF.

+started school. i have zero motivation. the good news (insert sarcasm here) is that there are a few tech writing jobs in logan and they'd like to pay you $7 an hour. glad all my hard work is going to pay off.

+loving anna karenina. it's really an amazing novel. more to come once i finish.

+went to the dentist for the first time in 2 years. OUCH.

+so excited that 24 is back, even though watching it makes me have crazy weird dreams. i love you jack bauer.

+weight loss to date: 12 pounds. i'm feelin' good but nervous to weigh in tonight. couldn't turn down a free phzookie this weekend and i think i'll pay for it at the scale.

+trying to teach myself how to play the organ. the foot pedals give me anxiety.

+obsessed with eating sweet potato fries, caramel apple popcorn, and pears. mmm.

+dreaming of the day when i can have a cute and organized craft room like this one.but i'd also settle for this cart at ikea. how awesome would it be to have baskets full of your supplies, use the top for crafting, and you can wheel it wherever you want? pretty awesome, i say.+thinking of starting a recipe blog. i love recipe blogs. i know several of you already participate in one, but would anyone be interested in doing a group recipe blog?

Instead of going to class yesterday (going to class is overrated, right chels?) I decided that I needed a new skirt for my brother-in-law's wedding. Then I decided that I need to make more money so that I can buy all the cute skirts, dresses, and jackets at Down East. I love fall clothes!

it's your party you can cry if you want to

Paige and I cried a lot yesterday. It shouldn't have been a sad day for Paige because it was her birthday! My parents are in Palm Springs so I drove to Ogden and Kennedy and I took her to dinner at Rumbi.

Paigey turned the big 1-0. It seems like she was just barely turning 2, repeating everything everyone around her said and finding it very entertaining to say gogey gogey gogey over and over again.

She has rightly earned the nick name of princess from Drew because she's the baby of the family, slightly spoiled, and the biggest drama queen I know. She is my favorite 10 year old sister because she is always laughing, she loves to sing and dance, and she could talk your ear off for hours if you'd let her. There's never a dull moment with Paige around. Paige and I are a lot alike. Besides the fact that we look exactly alike, we are both very sensitive, good pouters, and shy until we get to know people.

When I was dropping Paige off and her friend's house after dinner, she started to get upset and didn't want to spend the night there because she didn't feel welcome. (maybe she was being a bit dramatic here....) But she was crying so hard that she couldn't breathe, her shoulders were shaking, aw man that made me cry too so we just drove around the neighborhood crying :) She kept saying, "this is the worst birthday ever!" I think it was a combination of being tired and missing my parents but she did not want to go to her friends and I couldn't leave her there when she was so upset. Luckily Kennedy was happy to let Paige stay with her at another friend's house and that made Paige feel much better.

Every semester I have some issue at USU- holds on my registration, scholarship problems, advisor problems, full classes that I can't register for but are required for graduation. . . the list goes on. I've been to a couple other Universities in my college career and I've never had so many problems or been treated so poorly by employees of the University. If my degree was offered through night classes at WSU, I would not be finishing my degree at USU.

The problem this semester: I registered for a year-long online course and found out yesterday that because I have a scholarship which didn't even pay for the class, I only have 1 semester to complete it and I have to be done by august 1st. Seems a little asinine to me, and when were they planning to tell me that while everyone else has a year to complete the course, I, for some reason, now have 2 weeks to finish? The gentleman at USU told me that my only option is to withdraw from the course, lose the 600 bucks I paid to take the class, and re-register for it. Ummm, no thanks. I'm sure that you, Mr. USU man, would love to squeeze every last dollar you can from my empty pocket, but you can't take any more out of me. I will complete the course in the 2 weeks I have left. I will do well. And then I will sigh in relief to be one class closer to graduating.

may day

happy may day. may is a good month.

-we celebrate several birthdays, including my own :)

-mothers day and talking on the phone with drew

-school is over

-it stops snowing?

-memorial day weekend

-baby blessings for dylan, abbi, and mikaela

-national scrapbook day on saturday

-reading books that i want to read, and the pile keeps growing. . .any suggestions for other books to read this summer?

Quidditch, anyone?

Mike and I were at Wal-Mart today and the very friendly cashier (which is rarely found at Wal-Mart) told me my jacket looked like a Quidditch jacket from Harry Potter. She was convinced it was authentic and I'm pretty sure if I offered to sell it to her, she would have paid me mucho dinero for the cheap jacket that I acutally bought at Old Navy.

But does anyone see the resemblance?

Speaking of Wal-Mart, I just got done writing a 15 page research paper about Wal-Mart for a class that might be the death of me and will probably cause me to loose my scholarship. I've never worked so hard in a college class and yet my hard work is not helping much. Anyway, people have some very strong opinions about Wal-Mart. One guy says, "Wal-Mart is a vicious cycle: it starts with lower prices, and leads over time to a single player essentially rewriting the economics for everybody. Pretty soon there fewer employers, lower wages, less medical coverage, more poverty--this is a societal fight, and Wal-Mart destroys society." I don't love the store- it's busy, crazy, screaming kids everywhere, the store is ugly inside and out, but let's face it: as much as we all hate the place, we all shop there. Apparently I'm contributing to our society's demise because I shop at Wal-Mart and I look like I just walked out of a Harry Potter quidditch game. Wow.

Christmas!

I hate those weekends that go so fast you can't even remember what you did. This was one of those weekends. It was good, it just went too fast. We went to the Aggie game Saturday night, they won so Mike was in a good mood! They play the U Wednesday night and I'm torn. . .I love Aggie basketball but I just can't cheer for them when they play the Utes! It could be a rough night for Mike or I, depending on who wins :)

We also had a family party on Saturday with the Allen side. Here's my cute grandpa,
My dad loves to make Kennedy pretend to lead the music, he does this in church too. He's such a nerd.

And the best part of the Allen Christmas party is the singing, we go all out singing Christmas songs. These pictures are of the boys singing the "Christmas is upon us" song where every group has a part, their part is the elves, "We make the toys for all the girls and boys." And each time they sing it they get higher pitched and faster, or their voices go low and slow. They're quite entertaining!

My dad's part of the singing is to be a tree, "My tree, my tree, is such a sight to see." He's really good at dancing and shaking his hips, pretending he's a tree.


I meant to take a picture of the snow- I love it. It's been so cold and icy but at least we have a lovely layer of white on the ground.

This is the last week of class and next week is finals, I'm so glad because it never feels like Christmas until finals are over. I haven't even started doing my shopping, I've got lots to do in the next few weeks!