Back to School

This past week was my first week back to school in 7 years. And I think I'm going to like it... a lot. I was worried about being in class for 5 hours straight and only being split between 2 classes, but the professors do a great job keeping class interesting and discussion-based ... at least so far. 

Orientation the week before was a little on the excessive side - three nights of 5-9! But it was better than expected. I really got excited for school because of it. Maybe that is its purpose?

A Rainy but Awesome Camping Trip

Some friends and I enjoyed a camping trip up American Fork Canyon. It rained most of the evening - just while we were trying to roast hot dogs and make some dutch oven dessert, but Dave and David rigged a sweet tarp shelter for us.

And then in the morning we cooked up a dutch oven breakfast and went on a drive up a jeep road to an old mine. It was so awesome! Pretty narrow and very bumpy-rocky, but awesome.

Here is Dave, me and Ashlee in the backseat on the jeep road.

The TFS Party

I just realized that I never blogged about my family's TFS party! TFS stands for "thirty, fifty, seventy". Yeah. That's right: 30, 50, 70. Those are the 3 big birthdays that occurred over the past year among my sisters, mom and I. I turned 30. My oldest sister turned 50. And my mom turned 70. 

So like years past, when any of my sisters turned 40 years old... we girls got together! All of my sisters and my mom and I. At the end of July. We went to my sister, Joni's, cabin near Truckee/Tahoe area of Northern California. We window shopped in Truckee one day. And then hung out by the swimming hole the next day - read books, floated in the tubes, rafted the 20 feet of rapids that come into the swimming hole, and just enjoyed ourselves and the laziness. 

It is always so fun to get together with my sisters... I don't ever want that time to end!

My Own Version of FHE

Every now and then my friends will ask me if I go to FHE (Family Home Evening) on Mondays - since they are all still in the singles ward scene where they hold FHE. But I'm in a family ward with only a handful of singles. I always tell them that I do IHE, or Individual Home Evening, and love it. I love, love, love, not having a ward activity planned for every day of the week - FHE on Mondays, Ward temple night on Tuesdays, Institute on Wednesdays, and a ward activity on Thursday. Good grief! That's what it felt like there toward the end of my singles ward days. (I might have exagerated just a little bit.) But either way, it was overload. For sure. So I really, really love not having the guilt of not attending every activity planned. I love, love, love having a once per month ward activity and I love even more that they don't advertise it as: "come get your flirt on." Can you imagine that? Yes. My singles ward really used that as their hook to get people to come. 

But anyways!

Tonight it occurred to me that I really could do an FHE for myself: a Family History Evening!! Isn't that brilliant? And it couldn't be more timely. In the past few weeks, I have had several family history finds just fall into my lap - when I wasn't looking at all: my Great-Grandpa Jensen's mission postcards, a memory book of my Great-Grandma Halford's, and a member on Ancestry.com contacted me wanted to share her photos, stories and research with me on the White and Brooks lines. Oh my gosh! How many times does the Lord need to hit me over the head and say, "Get back into Family History! I don't care if you are about to start school." So I'm doing it. And I've dived in with a membership to Ancestry.com. I'm hooked. I was up until 12:30 am last night doing some research. So I've got a plan and I've got the means.... and hopefully I'll still have the time and the gumption to keep Monday nights reserved for my FHE. Watch my family history blog for what I'm up to and what I'm finding!

Falls & Furniture

My Saturday morning began with a hike to Battle Creek Falls: 

And ended with a trip to a furniture consignment shop with the purchase of these two darling pieces of furniture for my guest room: 

Now if only I can find a nightstand for my room or get the gumption to have a wall-shelf-type-nightstand made. I'm sick of using a desk chair for my nightstand.

Mini Backpacking

A new friend, Kari, and I went on a mini backpacking trip to White Pine Hollow this weekend. I love that trail. It is so beautiful, green, and full of wildflowers! It's also super close to home so we could get back in time to still have a lot of Saturday let to be responsible - hence the mini part to the backpacking trip. We loved it.

My Family History Wall

Well, I finally found something to put on the wall above my piano - a family history collage of photos! And I got it done! I looooooove it.