Christmas Break... YESSSS!

Wow, so much fun in so little time!

Aaron's b-day celebration was on Monday... Mom and I made an amazing milanesa dinner and instead of cake we had a double layer chocolate caramel brownie creation (extremely rich but delicious of course). Tuesday my family and my uncle and his family fulfilled our annual tradition of visiting Longwood gardens. It was pretty cold, so I put on a couple layers of clothing, which I was extremely grateful of later. The gardens were worth every second that I had to brave the cold. I wish I could give each of you a feel for it, but it's beyond words... the perfume of a thousand flowers saturates the warm moist air, and the flowers' brilliant hues with the winking Christmas lights compose an atmosphere awash with ethereal beauty. Pictures are much better than words, so here are some links to see what I'm talking about: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=76713&l=7e6a9&id=586571018 and http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=1791901&l=16a8d&id=586571018.

Wednesday we went caroling and I had to do some last minute shopping (yes, I was shamefully behind with my Christmas purchases), which was luckily mostly successful. At home I experimented with a new recipe for marinated chicken for pita pockets, which luckily turned out well and became the main course of our traditional shepherd's meal that we all enjoyed on the floor. The mellow light of the candles, the familiar carols, the nativity story (that we acted out) and the Christmas tree gave the evening all of the magic that rightfully belongs to Christmas Eve. Afterward Laura and I prepared a double batch of cinnamon rolls and set the table for breakfast the next morning.

It was the first year I didn't get up at the unearthly hours between 2 and 4am. It was 7:30 before I opened my eyes on Christmas morning, and I must say, an unbroken night of sleep wasn't all that bad. Breakfast was heavenly, but torture for my brothers. Presents were opened, and I set to work right away with my new knitting needles and yarn to make my roommate's Christmas present. Later we went to the Ebeling's house for a Lamb dinner, followed by Muppet's Christmas Carrol and some delicious cake and pie. Quite a comfortable Christmas.

Friday I got to relax, knit, read, play games, and just take it easy. Saturday we took a trip to the mall and played basketball as a family. I can't believe I have less than a week left...

I hope to hear from you soon, that you all had a very merry Christmas, and that you have a wonderful new year!!!

Love,

Margaret

Thanksgiving - Christmas Summary

Okay, so I had started a weekly email a while back, but life has been unbelievably crazy lately and I just never got around to finishing it/writing my next emails... now that I'm home and finals are over I'll try to fill you in...

This is the start of my letter from two weeks ago:
OH MY GOSH IT'S ALMOST FINALS WEEK! HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEELP! So much to do and no time to do it. I had a tiny break over Thanksgiving, which was good... after a review session for German 330, a wonderful FHE about hope + an episode of Planet Earth on Mon., and a Tuesday that felt like a Friday (we had Friday classes), and some very soar shoulders from our dance routine practices (our routine is going to be AMAZING!!!), I got up early Wednesday morning to pack, make a quick stop at the library to look for some books for my research paper, and get on a bus heading to America Fork. I had brought a ton of homework, but I decided to just take the time on the bus to think. I think it's important every once in a while...

Aunt Heather picked me up at the bus stop; after a delicious lunch she surprised me by taking me to a salon to get my hair deep conditioned. It felt UNBELIEVABLY good... almost like most of my stress went down the drain with the shampoo suds for a while. That evening I helped make some pie crusts while Holly and Brett made some filling - pumpkin and pecan. Their neighbor invited us over to taste-test a new culinary creation of his - a pumpkin with an interesting stuffing in it. Although I usually don't like pumpkin, it tasted pretty good. Jacob and Sarah got out one of the I spy books... one of the ones that even I have trouble with sometimes. We sat contentedly on the couch finding candles, stars, 56 people and other objects on the pages. To finish the evening we all played a game called "Would you rather..." in the basement, and by that time I was quite ready for bed :-).

Okay, here is my add-on today:
Thanksgiving day was full of excellent food and fun family time. We took some crazy pictures at the end to commemorate a day of just relaxing. Granny and Robyn took me to their house in Sandy where we sang and listened to Christmas music together before I went to bed so I could get up to catch the bus the next morning. The rest of the day I spent doing all my little homework assignments so I could do the real more time-consuming task (writing my 12 pg paper) on Saturday. Saturday I went to the library and was in the basement for a full 7.5 hours without a break; I got the outline and the intro to my paper done. Lillian was there most of the time too, working on some of her assignments, which made it easier. We did take one or two ten minute breaks to just chat, and she gave me lots of helpful advice on the paper.

The whole next week all I could think about was dance sport. Practice on both Monday and Wednesday was intense; we learned the last few bars of music in the last five minutes of class on Wednesday, so I practiced them in the apartment until I could dance them without thinking about it. Thursday I was running short on time as I had predicted. Classes went till 5:15pm, then I rushed home to get ready, wolf down dinner, and then briskly walk back to campus to be there for our last-minute run-through. Our Bolango was AMAZING!!! There's a video on Facebook of the whole dance. The dancing afterward was naturally also incredibly fun, and I think that is when I decided Tango is my current favorite dance (Viennese Waltz a close second).

Friday we had our Bolero test, which went well for me even though I hadn't practiced following for a while. I was kind of already stressing out about Saturday at that point, which you will understand when you hear what happened... the day began at 5:30am. I took one of the fastest showers of my life, blow-dried my hair in record time, then hopped into the car with my exhausted roommates to go shopping. Yes, it was our week to cook again. Contrary to my expectations, I almost enjoyed shopping that early when the store was completely empty... no lines, no rush.

We got back around 7:30am, and I was on the road again by 7:40 jogging to get to campus at 8:00am for a movie filming session. We had decided to finish all of the filming for our final project for our 310 German pronunciation class that morning. Luckily everything seemed to go splendidly, and we shot all of the scenes with me in it before 10:30, when I had to leave to head for Brick Oven. At that lovely little restaurant Brett, Heather, Granny, Robyn, cousins, Rachel and I all had lunch to celebrate Rachel's birthday; the food was simply scrumptious, the company just lovely. When I finally got home with a box of delicious leftovers, I collapsed for half an hour before I started my homework for Monday. I just barely finished when it was time to leave again. I walked to campus where I met my date; we headed to the JSB for a hilarious production of Divine Comedy. It was extremely entertaining... just good times in general.

Monday another date took me out to lunch after a long day at school, which was also good times. The last day of dance class was a little sad, as always. We learned some West coast steps and, to my surprise and delight, some Viennese waltz steps instead of two-step. I'm just praying I can make it into 380 this semester again... I've been told lots of people drop over break, so hopefully I can add it soon. Thursday I got my 12 page paper done five minutes before our last class, where we had a small class party, looked at some interesting old books and got some last words of wisdom from our professor.

Friday and Saturday were reading days that I put to good use; Friday after the study marathon my roommate Kelly and I decided it was high time to pass our pets along. Saturday night I had come back to a sign on our door, saying that we had been "ducked". I didn't quite get it, until I opened the dish-washer and found it overflowing with rubber ducks. They had been circulating throughout the FLSR for a few weeks, but hadn't affected us until then. Kelly got out some of her amazing fish line, and we tied all of the ducks to it in regular intervals. It was incredibly long by the time we were done. Next step in our scheme was tricky... the ducks tended to want to slip out of their knots and fall to the ground if we lost tension in the fish line, so we carefully threaded the whole string up one story and started dragging it through the common room where we got a hoard of curious people to be our helpers. My height was extremely useful when it came to the artistic draping of the line. It looked absolutely beautiful when it was done, and it has become one of my favorite college memories so far.

Finals week wasn't really that stressful, surprisingly enough. I had a test a day Monday through Thursday; my favorite was naturally our dance final (Tango!!!), my least favorite was probably the German 320 final, although I'm pretty sure I did well. It snowed most of the week, so one of the most unpleasant parts of the whole ordeal was walking through the dirty slush in the icy wind to get to campus to take tests. Luckily I only got my foot completely soaked once - on my way home from my very last final.

Friday I cleaned the apartment, watched a movie, sent Kelly off, shoveled some snow in front of the FLSR, then turned off the lights in our beautifully decorated, festive apartment to load my bags into Robyn's car. The roads had cleared somewhat luckily, and Rachel, Robyn, Robert and I all made it to Sandy for a scrumptious ham dinner Granny had prepared for us. Early the next morning Rachel and I entered a CRAZY airport terminal, waited in three lines, and finally got baggage checked and boarding cards figured out. After security, everything went very smoothly... we even got to sit next to each other hand have a good long talk. The wind was blowing in our favor, which cut the flight time by about a hour (we made it in about 3hrs 20 min) and before I knew it Mom, Laura and John were there to take my bag and drive me home where there was another scrumptious ham dinner waiting for me, with apple pie for dessert (Mom knows me well :-)).

That should bring you all up to date, hope your holidays are full of happiness, friends, family, good food and fun (alliteration!!)

Love,

Margaret

Thanksgiving... already???

The days are just flying by so quickly... it's simply unbelievable that the semester is drawing to a close and that it's almost Thanksgiving... this is where finals stress begins. Over Thanksgiving I have a couple of projects I need to finish up, like a movie for 310, a 12 page paper for my honors Civ class, and the other half of my online health class in addition to normal finals prep. It'll be a marathon alright...

I don't think that anything really interesting happened this week. In dance we started learning our routine for the dance lab... it's going to be a tango bolero mix and I'm already having a blast dancing it. Betsy said we'd be testing bolero on Friday, so I went to the social dance club on Tuesday to practice. Sadly they didn't play a single bolero, but I had fun dancing anyway. Betsy ended up moving the test to Friday, so it didn't matter. Yesterday I took 2 tests, one for German 320 and one for HEPE... no idea how I did. Of course I also had a research paper for German 320 to write... after all that time in the testing center/doing schoolwork I really needed a break, so Kelly and I watched Mulan, and Laura and Darrin joined us.

I know that's pretty short, but that's all I can think of for now. Hope you are all doing well and that you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

Love,

Margaret

Dancesport fun!!

Monday John and I practiced/perfected our waltz for a while at the dance lab, and we both felt good about it. We settled on 4 of our best steps: wing with curved three step, develope, pivots and a syncopated turn that I forgot the name of. For FHE we went to Brother Blackwelder's house (he's the second councilor in the bishopric) where we had an excellent lesson on spiritual mobility, and faith vs. blind obedience. Sister Blackwelder had some hot ginger cake with baked apples for refreshments... the cider set it all off to a perfection.

Tuesday we had a cleaning check, and Candace, the RA who checked us, said we had the most beautiful apartment she had checked so far. It did look wonderful.

Wednesday we had our mock competition for dancesport, and I felt a little conspicuous in my bright blue dress. Betsy (our teacher) filmed the class dancing, which was really helpful to see what we could improve on.

Thursday I went wedding dress shopping for the first time in my life with one of my room mates Allyson who is getting married in April. We found a gorgeous gown for her, and it made me want one myself (don't worry anybody, I won't rush anything). I also set in my DAAD scholarship application. It felt so good to have it done and in the mail.

Friday I got dressed and applied makeup in the WSC after class, and found my partner. I didn't expect to make it very far in the competition since many of the competitors were quite experienced, had taken 380 a couple of times and were on the dance team, but we did amazingly well... we danced the quarter final round (the farthest I've ever gotten!!), which means we're one of the top 20 gold waltz couples at BYU!

Saturday I got up early to do some last minute studying for my Honors Civilization test. I took it and I think it went pretty well... it only took me 2 hours this time instead of 2hrs45min. Afterward I drove Angela to the grocery store so she could buy food for her day to cook (I don't completely understand the cooking schedule now... there have been a few changes and they don't make sense). I didn't really have time for it... I have SOOOOOOO much to do in the next little while (papers, tests etc)

Today after church and dinner some of the people from the German house got together to sing... we had a violin, a cello and a piano as accompaniment, and we sang for two and a half hours straight. Singing is wonderful!!

Anyway, better go now, hope you're doing well!!

Love,

Margaret

Graduating? IN APRIL?????

Well, there is a lot I should let you all know about... I know I missed last week, but that's because I felt like I needed a week to digest what was happening. Two Sundays ago Tanner and I had a long talk, and we both felt we needed to date other people for a while. That doesn't mean we won't go on occasional dates or never speak to each other again... in fact, these past 2 weeks we've still talked quite a bit and spent some time together.

Let's see, what else has been happening in my life? Well, I had a waltz test this week and it went really well and we started learning the Tango which I'm very excited about. Friday Rachel and I saw one of the art exhibits in the MOA together, then went to the FLSR to make some broccoli soup and talk. It did me a world of good... I'm going to miss her so much while she's serving her mission in Portugal, but I'm sooooo excited for her! If we both go on missions, it will be two whole years of not seeing each other :-(!!!

I'm starting to get some ideas for my honors thesis project and getting ready to apply for another scholarship for study abroad this summer. There are so many things I should start doing that I just haven't gotten around to yet, like doing some background research on Germania by Tacitus which I'm going to write a 10 pg research paper on, or reading for HEPE (a health class online)... it'll probably be Thanksgiving break before I get around to that.

Dance sport is coming up next weekend, so I'll be practicing for that, plus I have an Hon 201 Civilization test again (very time consuming preparation). College life is so busy, but good. I've registered for classes and it looks like I will be graduating next April with a Bachelors degree in German Literature. At that point I will be 21, and I will go on a mission unless I get married before then, in which case I will start my PHD. It's pretty scary. I feel like I just started college, and now it's halfway over!

It's time for church, so I have to go...

Hope you are all doing well!

Love and miss you,

Margaret

These Happy Golden Busy Days...

Monday I spent 3 hours dancing, which exhausted and invigorated me at the same time. At the dance lab I taught a guy taking 280 how to dance the Viennese waltz and was surprised at how quickly he picked it up. Later we had an awesome German house family home evening with fun Halloween activities... we had a "spider" game where we got spools of thread and mittens and we had to race to unroll our spool the fastest with our oven mitts on, then we had a toilet paper mummy game and a cookie decorating contest. I won the prize for the prettiest cookie... it had beautiful fall leaves in icing on a white background:


Tuesday I realized I had three tests, a women in German conference and a test to grade for 330 all packed into the coming weekend, which started worrying me quite a bit. However, my religion Professor announced he was going to push his midterm back a week... truly a miracle! Then I got my Honors Civilization test back and walked home glowing with excitement - 198/200 (99%)!!!!! I just felt so blessed, and loved by the Lord... He helped me with my test and things fell into place so beautifully. I know He's watching out for me.

The temple Wednesday morning is one of the best parts of my week. It's also good because it gives me an early start on my day. When I got back I did some laundry and got my presentation for German 310 ready (mom helped by sending me some pictures). I really don't remember much else from Wednesday though...

Thursday I got up early to go to take my German 320 test... I hadn't had as much time as I could have wanted to prepare, but it seemed to go pretty well. I sent my final draft and a short abstract for my project to Professor James for review. There was also a German event in the Wilkenson center that Professor Kelling had asked me to attend. It had general information on all the German programs and activities going on like study abroad, German house, major requirements, scholarship opportunities and more. I think I might try to apply for another scholarship from DAAD for my study abroad soon. That night I submitted my ORCA, and felt really good about having it done. Now all I have to do is wait and see what happens!

Early Friday morning Tanner and I braved the icy cold to go to the Women in German conference, along with about 12 other BYU students who had been invited to participate. This was a symposium where we listened to 8 speakers presenting on different topics, from educational developments that need to take place in the German field, to the role of skin or taxidermy in German horror movies. Some of the topics were extremely interesting... I especially enjoyed one on the role of Muslim womens' scarves and how they can prevent women from participating in politics. When we got back I attended part of a symposium on the Doctrine and Covenants where my religion professor spoke. Needless to say his remarks were fascinating. Back at the apartment I did some homework and made an apple pie while Tanner worked on getting the rest of his ORCA project figured out (ORCA projects were due at 12pm). It was pretty late, so we ended up calling it a day after that...


Saturday I graded all the 330 tests and started studying for my 310 test I'm taking tomorrow. I also did some good clean up... it's so nice to have a clean apartment. Tanner and I took a short walk to enjoy the gorgeous weather and fall colors, then we watched Charlie Chaplin's City Lights and ate apple pie. Who could wish for more?


That's all my news for now, hope you're doing well and to hear from you soon!!!

Love,

Margaret

I love fall!!!!!

Goodness gracious! I can't believe it's already Sunday again!
I think I'm going to try a new method of remembering the week: working backwards. I can't seem to remember Monday, but hopefully something will spark my memory while I remember the rest of the week first...

Yesterday about 15 of us from the German house got in two cars and drove down to Salt Lake City to see temple square and the Joseph Smith movie (I've seen it at least 4 times now). The weather was PERFECT... the leaves are just starting to turn colors, the sky was deep blue and the sun was actually warm (I didn't need a coat!). It was nice to look at the sights without shivering and listening to my teeth chatter. When we got back Jen, Angela and I made a quick run to the grocery store, which I'm very excited about... I got all the ingredients for apple pie and I can't wait to make one... after that we watched a chick flick and I did some homework...


Friday after school Tanner came over for a spaghetti dinner, then we went to see a symposium on D&C. We entered an empty theater and realized I had mistaken the date by a week - it wasn't till next Friday. So we went right over to Erin's apartment (the Erin from freshman year). We met Erin's boyfriend Shelton, and one of Shelton's old mission companions Stew who took Laura (a girl I met in one of my dance classes who is now living with my friends from freshman year) with him on our triple date. It was good we got there early, because we had just enough time to do everything... make chocolate caramel brownies, go ice skating, then eat the brownies with hot chocolate. Needless to say it was SOOOOO much fun! I think I can officially claim I can skate backwards now, which is exciting...

Thursday my classes were all canceled so I cleaned from 9am-1pm for my cleaning check (I still wasn't done after that). I went up to campus for an ORCA meeting, but Professor James left a note on the door saying she wouldn't be able to make it. I spent the rest of the evening studying as well... it was a long evening :-)...

Kelly had a date with one of the guys from the German house (someone in Tanner's apartment actually) on Wednesday. Tanner and I were teasing her about it a little at dinner. She had to leave early to get ready. A few minutes after she left Tanner slyly asked me if I felt like being a spy. I asked him what he had in mind, then laughed and wholeheartedly agreed to his scheme. We left the table and set out to follow them (Kelly and Pat) to the international cinema, in other words stock them for fun. It was hilarious. The movie was starting when we walked in, so it was really dark. When we finally found a spot, we realized we were almost directly behind our targets... they were sitting two rows in front of us. The whole movie we'd nudge each other when their heads moved in closer together. We left a few minutes before the movie was over so they wouldn't see us and so Tanner could finish the last bit of cleaning before his cleaning check. Afterward we went on a short walk and had a really good talk. When I got back I asked Kelly about the date and apparently it had gone really well. We didn't tell them we had watched them till the next day at dinner, then we all laughed about it...

Tuesday I still can't manage to remember for some reason, but on Monday I danced my heart out for 2 1/2 hrs... one hour in class, then 1 1/2 hrs in the dance lab. I was able to practice some of my 380 steps and learn some new foxtrot steps from a guy in my class... it was a little challenging since He's probably 1 1/2 ft. shorter than me, but it was still so much fun and I LOVE learning new dance steps!!!!!

Okay, that's all for now... love and miss you all!!!

Margaret

Caramel Popcorn and Monkey Bread (a good week...)

I guess I should say a little about conference weekend (last weekend) before I move on to the present. I watched the Saturday sessions with Tanner, then on Sunday I caught a bus to Sandy where I spent the day with Robyn, Granny and my cousins. After conference Granny put a scrumptious ham in the oven and about 20 people came over to participate in/witness my cousin Robert's ordination to the Aaronic priesthood. There was a wonderful spirit present as so many great men gathered around Robert to give him the priesthood and bless him. The dinner afterward was delicious... ham, salad, rolls, and some of the lightest fluffiest potatoes I've ever eaten. It was actually Robert's birthday, so we had a birthday cake, ice cream and a treasure hunt as well.

We had an excellent discussion about conference in our FHE group Monday evening. Elder Uchtdorf is now my favorite speaker of all time.

We've been doing some awesome Bolero in dance class... it's a mix of Latin and standard which makes it very unique. Then we're also working on getting waltz ready for dance sport which is coming up in about a month I think. I just love dancing! It makes me so happy...

Thursday I talked with my ORCA mentor (Professor James) again, and showed her my proposal (a solid first draft). She said I was making excellent progress, and gave me a few suggestions to change/improve what I'd written. I'm really excited about it!!

Friday I took an Hon Civilization test that I've been studying for for two weeks... It went really well I think, but it took me a good 2hrs and 45 minutes to finish. My head hurt after that, and it was swimming with people like Aristotle, Hammurabi and Cicero and the main contributions of Hellenistic society to the world. It was such a relief to watch Enchanted with Tanner afterward (he'd never seen it before). I made caramel popcorn too, which was excellent...

Yesterday I had Tanner over for breakfast. I don't know why, but I've been in a baking/cooking mood this week. The fresh steamy monkey bread with scrambled eggs was the highlight of my day. The rest of it I spent grading tests for German 330. Yeah, I'm really not a fan of grading, but it wasn't to bad this time since Herr Kelling had taken half of the tests to grade himself (I told him I didn't think I'd be able to finish them all). In the evening I went with Kelly, Pat and Brett to see a movie in the international cinema. It was edited for BYU audiences and was basically the Chinese version of Hamlet. It started snowing on the way back. Tanner and I went for a short walk in the snow, and he said something to me about being a meteorologist, which reminded me of my high school English teacher Mr. McHugh. He had an excellent extra credit policy... if we saw it snowing outside and went to him and recited the last line of James Joyce's The Dead, and we were the first ones to do it, we'd get extra credit. I managed to do this twice, and thus Mr. McHugh reccomended that I consider a career in meteorology. I did recite the line for Tanner after I told him the story.

I think that was everything... I miss you all!!!
Write soon if you can!!!
Love,
Margaret

ORCA and Tanner

Oh my goodness... busiest 2 weeks of my life and I'm pretty sure I won't have any time to document them tomorrow. So even though I'm about to collapse forward onto my computer I'll try and give you the rundown:

First things first. Tanner and I are official. That happened last Saturday night, and right after we decided to date exclusively he asked me if I wanted to go meet his family with him the next day. Sunday morning I sang in church (How Can I Keep from Singing again), and it wasn't as pretty as the practice, which was disappointing. Could have been worse though. Right after Sunday school his Mom picked us up and she had Tanner's two little sisters with her... so cute! We drove to Bountiful where we slipped into the church meeting, joining the rest of Tanner's family. In Sunday school the teacher looked at Tanner and me and said "Welcome Brother and Sister..." waiting expectantly. Tanner quickly introduced himself as Tanner Hardison, then introduced me as his girlfriend Margaret Ebeling. Kind of weird to hear my new "title" for the first time in Sunday school :-). After church the whole family went to the park where we celebrated Hannah's (I really hope I remembered the right name) birthday with some good food and presents, and I met the whole family including one set of grandparents. It was a lot of fun, but I was pretty exhausted by the time we finally made it home.

Next huge thing going on in my life: ORCA. Professor James gave me a ton of reading and research to do last Thursday to prepare me to write my project proposal. Of course, they were some of the busiest weeks of the entire semester. I did read, but not as thoroughly as I would have liked. This Thursday we had a second meeting, and she'd like me to have a very solid draft done by Thursday. I've got a 330 test to grade after Wednesday, a huge civilization test to study for and tons of other homework to do. It's going to take a miracle this week, but with all the conference talks today about not letting anything bring you down, I think I can just have faith and move on. If all goes well with ORCA though, I'll be coauthoring the introduction to a section on Elisa von der Recke's travel journals (yes, I'll be published!!), plus I'll be able to use it (with a little extra work) for my capstone paper, and with a lot of extra work for my honors thesis. Professor James said they'd then publish my capstone paper as well since it has so much to do with the topic, so I'll be published twice!! Professor Kelling said with the kind of research experience I'll be getting he thinks I might be ready then to move straight to a PHD and skip my masters, and that I could probably apply and be accepted anywhere I want. So cool... sounds just too good to be true.

It's midnight... those are the current highlights... maybe I'll have time for more tomorrow.

Miss and love you all!

Margaret

Dance, ORCA, Dinner, Goodbye Summer

Wow... busy week, but so much fun!

I don't have much time, so I'll go for the highlights. Wednesday we started the waltz in 380. I love waltzing and am so sad we don't do Viennese waltz in the fall curriculum (I'll just have to to take 380 again in the winter :-)). In German 320 I gave a presentation about the German perspective on our elections that went pretty well, and after classes were over I picked up the 330 tests at the testing center to grade. In the evening Tanner took me to World of Dance. World of Dance, for those of you who aren't familiar with BYU dancing events, is a showcase of all the dance teams and the amazing, awesome things they do. My favorite dances were definitely the Viennese waltz by the ballroom company, the clogging team and then another one and I'm not even sure which team it was by. It was hilarious... they were all dressed in neon suits and they used exercising mats in ways I never would have imagined.

Thursday I attended an internship/study abroad fair, which has gotten me very excited about study abroad. I spoke with Professor McFarland from the German department and he told me to come see him so we could talk about getting an ORCA grant set up for me... that's where you set up a research project that correlates with you study abroad and they pay $1,500 to help you finance it. Then, if I can get a spring/summer scholarship (I think my GPA is good enough for a full tuition one) that will also go towards the trip and take care of tuition. I'm going to talk to him hopefully on Monday... we'll see what happens.

Friday I got the tests finished and handed them back (always a relief). It was odd not to have anything planned. Allyson got a call from a friend of hers from her stake at home, and he invited her to the October fest on campus. She didn't want to go alone, so I accompanied her. We got there just in time to dance the last dance... or not dance the last dance. We were both out of practice since we've discovered the superior pleasures of ballroom dancing to jumping around to music (this can still be fun too, just not as fun). When that was over we watched a movie and went to bed (late :-)).

Saturday I got lots of homework done which was good. For the evening Tanner and I had planned a double date with one of my roommates Laura and one of his friends Jason. The plan was to do a cooking duel (iron chef competition), but we ended up just working together to make a beautiful delicious meal... pasta with sauteed mushrooms, onions and sausage, a fruit platter, fresh tomatoes and mozzarella cheese with chocolate chip cookies for dessert (I had made those in advance). That was followed by a nice long game of charades. Later Tanner came back over and we took a walk to enjoy the last little bit of summer. We ran through the sprinklers, relished a thunder storm, watched the moon rise, rolled down a hill and found shapes in the clouds. Why are weekends always so short?



Today I was officially called as the Relief Society compassionate service coordinator, which means I make sure that all the girls in my ward have their needs met and if not I organize service to help them. I'm also supposed to organize some community service projects. It should be very good for me, but also a challenge.

That's all for now. Hope to hear from you soon and that you have a wonderful sabbath!

Love,
Margaret

This and That

Hello!! Hope you've had a wonderful week... I sure had a busy one...

Monday was pretty stressful, at least the beginning was. I had gotten kicked out of my German 310 blackboard quiz, so I had to go ask Professor Lund to unblock it for me. I realized I would still have to take it before 12 (that’s when it was due), that I had forgotten my books at the apartment (it’s an open book quiz) and that I’d have to redo the whole thing without help. I didn’t get a very good score because I spelled a few terms wrong, but my memory served me pretty well. Quickly I finished my remaining two errands: dropping by Professor Schultheiss’s office (she wasn’t there) and taking a current report card to the foreign language office.

Dance class was as fun as ever… we learned another fun step, and I wanted to practice it after school in the lab. Sadly the labs hadn’t started yet so I couldn’t. My first voice lesson went well, and I have several pieces to choose from to work on this semester. I’m singing in church in two weeks as well, so I have to find one pretty soon.

After dinner Jen, Tanner, Angela, Stephanie and I all piled into Jen’s VW bug to go to FHE at the stake center. Each member of the stake presidency spoke, and as the talks progressed they focused more and more on the importance of being social and dating for fun so you could eventually get married. Tanner and I laughed about it afterwards, and then he asked me out. How ironic, right?

Tuesday there was a bunch of yellow flowers in front of our door without a note. They could have been for someone else in the apartment, but I think Jonathan put them there for me. He’s the only one I could see doing something like that. They did make me smile. In the evening I hitched a ride w/ Jen who was going to study on campus and went to the social dance club. It was really good to go through all the steps again slowly, but guys were scarce and I didn’t get to practice as much as I would have liked.

Wednesday I had the most intense dance class of my life. It was a lot of fun, but I was literally dripping with sweat when we were done and I felt disgusting. There was nothing I could do about it though, because I had classes from 11 (dance) – 2 without a break (this is the case every Mon, Wed and Fri). In 320 we worked on our stupid pre-assessment test. It does have a purpose I suppose… it should help the teacher figure out what areas we need to focus on the most, but I’ve never learned all of the terminology for German grammar, so I couldn’t really answer the questions properly. I want to actually start learning the terminology instead of trying to figure out where everyone is. That evening I went to see a German film “Nirgendwo in Afrika,” but I didn’t really like it.

This is getting to long… I’ll skip to Friday. After classes I went to the library and held 2 review sessions for German 330 (their first test is tomorrow). My German was good, and I felt like I presented the material in an understandable way. I had just enough time to get ready before Tanner arrived. We drove into the canyon which was gorgeous, had a lovely picnic near bridal veil falls, then watched “Life is Beautiful” in the open air theater there. It was an excellent Italian film, one that made me want to laugh and cry all at the same time.

Saturday was full of homework… I think I’ve got almost all my homework done till Wednesday, which is good because I’ll need extra time to grade tests this week…

Love and miss you!

Margaret

I'm officially back into the swing of things... sort of :-). It was nice to have Monday as a buffer to psych up for school once again! I made chocolate chip cookies for my dinner on Wed. and Kelsey (one of my best friends from freshman year) came over to visit. We had a lot of catching up to do, and what better time to do it then while you're waiting for cookies to come out of the oven? It rained in the morning, and by the afternoon our floor was looking pretty gross with all the muddy water on the floor. Screwing up my courage I got out a bucket and found that our mops didn't work. I used a sponge instead on my hands and knees, and imagined I was Cinderella to help the work go faster. Yes, I know I'm a hopeless romantic :-)... our whole ward was at FHE and we played a game of something similar to fruit basket. Everyone in our ward is so cultured. I love it!!

With Tuesday came the overwhelming feeling that I always get at the start of a new school year. Lillian took me to her new apartment at lunch time and we commiserated together over our chaotic lives. I felt a lot better after that. I could tell my two classes were going to be good. Doctrine and Covenants with Professor Fluhman is going to be so good... he doesn't ask us to get a Manuel for the class since he wants us to spend more time actually reading the scriptures and seeking our own inspiration. He's really excited about what he's talking about, and he looks at you in the eye with an unusual intensity. Honors Civilization 201 is going to be tons of work, but fascinating. We're studying writing from the beginning till 1450 when the printing press was invented. Our topic this week was structured around an article by Hugh Nibley (a well known LDS scholar) versus a secular text. Nibley debated whether writing evolved or whether it could have been divinely inspired, while the secular text supported the evolution of writing... I hope you get the picture. It's a TON of reading though...

Wednesday morning Erin and I made our trip to the temple. It was soooo good for me to just take deep breaths and get back a more eternal perspective on what I'm trying to accomplish this year. Most of the people who were working there were familiar... it made me so happy! My classes went pretty well. I'm still a little nervous about my huge German 330 class... I'm really going to need the Lord's help to keep up with that. Dance 380 is going to be fun, but a challenge this year. Usually we just read the syllabus the first day, but this time we learned a new step right away... it's a step I still haven't quite figured out yet. German 310 (Phonetics and Pronunciation) doesn't seem like it will be to bad, just lots of busy work. German 377 was intimidating. I was definitely the youngest one of the class, and everyone was making extremely insightful comments I didn't think I was quite capable of yet... we got a ton of homework for that class too. That evening I walked back to the apartment as fast as I possibly could so I could start my chili dinner for 30. Luckily everything went smoothly... the only problem was the rice. It didn't cook properly... half was mush and the other half was crunchy. Live and learn I guess :-). The cookies were delicious of course.

Thursday was the most chaotic and emotionally draining day of the week. I went to get a haircut with Kelly in the morning at the Paul Mitchell school. The girl who cut my hair was obviously inexperienced, and she completely messed up. She went to the back and started crying. A lady came out to check it, snipped a bit here and there again, then got another lady. My hair is now the shortest it has ever been... they had to cut quite a bit to hide the mistakes. I lost five inches of hair and I was about to cry. I started the reading for Germ 377 and was baffled... it was like reading an English dictionary without the definitions to explain what the words meant, and I had 40 pages to read plus 100 more Professor Lund wanted us to skim. My world was slowly slipping out of control. I went to 377 again, and realized I wasn't ready for the class. Although I generally use correct German grammar, I don't know why it's right, so I didn't feel up to trying to explain it to people who are just learning German for the first time. I knew I needed to change something.

Friday I got to campus early to talk to Professor Kelling about switching classes. He agreed that it might be a good idea to take the grammar first. In order to have 14 credit hours for my scholarship though I needed another credit, so I'm also doing a research project for Professor Kelling where I'm gathering common German idioms or important German phrases for 3 hours/week for him. I'm not exactly sure how that's going to work.... we'll see. I felt a lot better about. I went to 320 and realized I have a lot to work on in grammar. I don't like grammar, but it's improtant to know. I've heard my professor is really strict too, so I'm a little nervous. After that I went to the reception in the Dean's office for those who had been on the Dean's list Winter semester, and enjoyed getting to know the Dean and other excellent students, not to mention eating a doughnut and some fresh fruits and veggies. I barely got back in time to get ready for my date with Jonathan. We went to subway for some sandwiches, then went to the Kimbal building to watch the Japanese film "Shall we Dance." It was different, but also interesting, espeically how they utilized silence throughout the film. Yoasis was our next stop where we had some excellent frozen yougurt with fresh fruit (I got mango), then we just looked at the stars for a while. When I got back a group of people from the FLSR decided to go walk around the temple, then we watched Aladdin... it got to be pretty late, but it was all so fun!!

Saturday Kelly saved my life by inviting me to go shopping with her and her aunt. I was getting very tired of living off of bread. I stocked up on everything and felt much better about my food situation. The rest of the day was homework, broken only by a quick trip to the Creamery with Pat, Tanner and Alex for some ice cream ;-).

We had an amazing regional conference today with Elder Uchtdorf as one of the speakers. His talk was so powerful! After dinner Kelly and I took some picnic blankets out to the lawn to nap/read scriptures, and later watched the CES fireside with Elder Holland. What a spiritual boost for the week!!!

Sooooo tired, and Monday morning starts early :-)
Love and miss you!!
Margaret

BYU! BYU! BYU! YAY!!!!!!

I'm in PROOOOOOOOVO!!! But that's not where my week began, so let's start from the beginning:

I guess I really haven't written since Cumorah, so here's a quick update: A few days after we got back I got another assignment from the temp agency to work for Catholic Health East processing invoices. It was a real blessing that I found a job, but it was sometimes hard to be grateful. I've learned that I hate spending 8 hours of my day in front of a computer processing invoices. It sucks the soul right out of me. Towards the end I was making tally marks on a little scrap of paper for every hour I had left at work and coloring them in. Finally, although it seemed it would never happen, I filled in the last mark!!!

After that I had a few blissful days at home to get ready for school and spend some time with my family. I finished my dress except for the sleeves, printed out my cookbook, finished 1000 years of German Literature (that's a book my Professor lent me), went shopping, saw the dentist... all that good stuff. Tues. night Rachel and I spontaneously organized a picnic with Crosby and Camilie... we got some rotisserie chicken, potato salad, and Crosby brought some delicious cookies :-). We talked, laughed, swung on the swings, and ate good food. Need I say more? Well, that wasn't the end of the night. Rachel and I went back to her house where Laura and Cara were waiting for us. Soon we were all settled down to watch a movie with a nice bowl of homemade caramel popcorn (thanks sis. Jorgensen ;-)). Of course we talked for an hour or more (probably more) after that about our lives, and eventually went to sleep. Wednesday evening the Ebelings came over for Laura's birthday dinner of chicken cordon bleau (also homemade :-)) and a trip to Zwahlens, one of the best ice cream places ever!

Thursday morning my alarm rang at 4:10. After saying a few last goodbyes and shoving my luggage into the car, Mom took me to the airport. It was hard to say goodbye. I watched a beautiful sunrise while I was waiting in the airport, and the flight went smoothly. Robyn was there to pick me up, and I spent a few hours at the Lee's house eating some delicious food, talking with my cousins and helping Granny get gmail (it's very exciting!). They set me off with food and love, and I was ready for college to begin again! Two of my roomates were already there, and they helped me carry in a few of my things. I was so tired that I was extremely talkative, so we chatted in German while I unpacked my things. I love the new apartment. It's spacious, modern, and clean! The girls are very sweet... now I've met everyone... Angela, Jen, Kelly, Allyson and Laura!

The next morning I bought my books, got a locker in the library, talked with Professor Kelling, did a tiny bit of shopping and went to visit Erin, Natalie in Cami in their new apartment. Sadly, they live on the other side of campus in both directions, but it was a lovely walk. We baked cookies and talked over old times (freshman year seems like it was ages ago). Natalie took me home on her scooter, and I must say that her driving skills are much improved!

Saturday morning we had RF orientation. It sounds like it will be a litte more demanding then I thought, but still managable. I met the other German RFs... they're all native, which is slightly intimidating, but they're very nice. There's one for each apartment: Pat and Jens for the boys' apartments, then Christine, Maya and I for the girls'. After the meeting we went shopping for some food for the week. For some reason the idea of buying food for 30 people scared me, and I called mom for help and moral support. I decided on a menu, and luckily it proved to be a little easier to buy all that food than I thought it would be. We had another short meeting (just the German RFs), then we were free to go. Meg from Hill Cumorah called and said she was in town, so she came over and we walked around the temple grounds together. It was so good to do some catching up and just relax for a while. After she left I folded some cranes with Kelly and Jen, then we talked for a long time till we got to the silly stage and it was definitely time for bed.

Well, that's everything so far. Hope you're doing well!

Love,
Margaret

Hill Cumorah

Pageant was like a 2.5 week trip to Zion, but that doesn’t mean it was easy. Practicing and rehearsing in the blazing sun for five to six hours wasn’t easy. Staying up till 1am every night wasn’t easy… after performances there was a devotional, a clean up action in the house (the field where the chairs were set up), then a munch and mingle at Zion’s camp. All good and fun, but it would get late. It wasn’t easy to camp for the whole time… we lived in three tents and when it rained… well… we got wet. But without the trials, we wouldn’t have experienced the miracles. We had a lot of rain miracles, for example. It would rain while we were out proselyting right before the show, then stop before it began.

We spent a lot of time in our cast teams, groups of about 15 kids our age w/ 4 adults to make sure we didn’t tear down the camp or anything. I got to know so many amazing people in my team… Noelle, Gian, Spencer, Geordie, Annie, Sarah, Holly, Thomas, Danni, Clarissa, Jesssica, Jordan and Meg were all a part of my daily life. Meg became my second sister. We were companions every night when we went out to talk to the people who had come to watch the pageant. She’s really amazing… full of fun and the nicest person ever! Our leaders were great too… Rodger could make us all laugh, especially with his nerd impressions. Claudia did lots of crafts with us, and as a goodbye gift made us all a pillowcase with our favorite scripture on it. Wendy and her husband Michael were from Canada; I loved their accents and Wendy did all the worrying our moms weren’t there to do for us.

Our activates ranged from making a piñata, bracelets and little wooden boxes to swimming in a lake to pulling weeds at the Palmyra library as a service project. Once we had a YSA water activity where we tried to fill a holey pipe with water, catapult a water ball to hit a styrofoam head mounted on a stick, play water balloon volley ball with towels, fill a bucket of water using a ball as a sponge, eat ice cream Sundays and more.

Our cast teams also visited the church sites in the area like the sacred grove, the printing shop where the first Books of Mormon were printed and others. My favorite one was the sacred grove... Meg and I spent some time wandering down the well-kept paths, soaking in the golden peace we found there. I could easily see why Joseph had chosen that wood as I felt the light breeze whispering through the brush and felt the life of the forest flowing in, around, and through me. Sitting on one of the many benches near the path we pulled out our scriptures and reread the account of Joseph Smith’s first vision. It was beautiful.

In addition to cast team life, we naturally had rehearsals. My whole family got some interesting parts, and we were all wicked except John. My mom was a Doynne in Jerusalem who kicks Lehi out of the city with my dad who played a Judean prince. Laura was a ceremonial dancer in the same scene. I was a Tableau of Peace and War Lamanite Warrior Dancer which was awesome because I got to dance around a campfire and participate in the tsunami – where all the Lamanites jump down the stages and wipe the Nephites out. Daniel was a Lamanite warrior, Aaron was a slave and a Lamanite warrior as well, and John was a converted child in Alma’s scene. Our costumes were awesome, and you really have to see the pictures to know what I mean: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=47991&l=791da&id=586571018

My black mullet and Dad’s black curly beard were definitely amazing touches.

One of the best parts was the scene where Christ comes to visit the Nephites and the Lamanites. It’s the climax of the pageant and the only scene where the entire cast (just over 700 people) is on stage. It contains the whole reason for the pageant: to help people come unto Christ. Even though it’s only an actor portraying Christ, the spirit was so strong. As I listened to the words he spoke, I tried to think how I would feel when I someday see my Savior face to face. My testimony of Christ grew so much... I know that He loves us, and that He loved us so much that He visited the people in the Americas so that we would have a second witness of Him and receive clearer guidance from Him. There were two things Christ said that really struck me; first his invitation to “Arise, and come forth unto me.” We need to seek Him before He can step in and carry our burdens, and often that means taking a step into the dark with faith that His light will follow. Second was that he is “the God of the whole earth”. That just sends chills down my spine. It means he knows, understands and loves each one of us... and because we’re so different from one another and so weak (we all make mistakes), his love for us must be boundless and perfect.

I could feel that love so strongly. I felt it every time when we went to talk to people before the pageant. That was definitely my favorite part of it all. Every evening my companion Meg and I would say a fervent prayer that we would be led to talk to the right people, that we would have the spirit with us and feel a love for those we were teaching, give a little spiritual thought for each other, and go to testify of Christ. And it was amazing. As we opened our mouths words spilled out. Powerful ones. And I wasn’t making them powerful. The spirit was testifying with us that what we were saying was true. One evening we stumbled on an old lady who spoke German, and I was there to bear my testimony to her in her native language. We spoke with several non-members… one of them was an Asian reporter from Canada. The spirit was amazing. We knew he could feel it too as we testified of Christ, of the Book of Mormon, and of what we knew to be true.

Every single evening we had one of those very special experiences. I learned how to better recognize the spirit as we wandered through the crowds; I learned how the spirit communicates with me. My testimony of Christ grew a thousand fold as I testified of His love, mercy and atonement. The Book of Mormon is such a powerful tool! We would read one or two verses to those we talked to before we testified of the truth. Each night when we gathered to our flags for the processional the spirit testified again that we had done what we had been sent to do. If that's what a mission is like, I can't wait!

Brace yourselves for 2 weeks or more of no postings... horrible, right?

Oh my gosh I hope I don't fall asleep while I'm writing this...

It's been a really long week...

I'm just going to do random flashbacks as things pop into my head...

I had a work assignment for Monarch early this week which was pretty interesting... it was a kind of legal survey thing, but I'm not allowed to say any more about it b/c I signed some confidentiality papers... sounds shady right? It wasn't, I promise!

Anyway, we went shopping later that day for Hill Cumorah pageant gear and I didn't find anything. Oh yeah, the whole I'm-going-to-be-camping-for-2.5-weeks thing is starting to hit... The first week is going to be full of rehearsals, the next full of performances and service projects... I guess I will learn to truly appreciate AC and my own bed by the time this is over at the very least. There are a total of 6 toilets for the entire campsite (3 for boys, 3 for girls) so we'll see how that works out...We won't have internet access, so you won't be getting a weekly email... maybe I'll try and write one right before we leave (we leave on the 4th of Jul) so there won't be quite such a big gap. My Dad made a kind of blueprint for our campsite, showing how we should set things up so everything is under a tarp. I really REALLY hope it doesn't rain to much. We also made plans for an awesome family sign we're supposed to make for our site w/ all our names on it... we've also decided to add our family symbol to it... a rising sun.
For more info on the pageant:
http://www.hillcumorah.org/pageant/

Dad was in MI for most of the week and Laura was at girls camp... Mom the boys and I went over to the Hinkley's house to help them do some last min. cleaning before there move... Friday I babysat the three little boys for most of the day... poor things! They're all just tired and emotionally slightly overwrought with the move and everything, which lead to 3 temper tantrums, the first I've ever had to deal with. Although Jackson screamed till he was almost purple in the face we all got through it :-). Oh yeah, I also went to the Jorgensen's house to babysit while Sis. Jorgensen was at camp... happily it went pretty well, although I was exhausted when I got home. Rachel came back from London (finally!!) and we got to make a pizza at her house and just talk... soooo good! I went to institute on Wed for the first time and that went well too... afterwards Rachel Camille and I stopped at Rita's for some delicious dessert too so it was awesome... then yesterday Rachel and I were at Camille's house again for some of her amazing grilled chicken and a movie... another late night but totally worth it!!

Today I attended 2/3 of the family ward and all of the singles ward plus a much and mingle after that so I was at church for over 6 hours... yeah, and I'm exhausted...

Miss you all and write please!!

Margaret

Paradise in Port Aransas

Words simply can't describe this past week... it was... it was.... it was... just... so relaxing, fun, beautiful, laid back, glorious, even paradisaical... I hope you're getting the idea, although you really actually couldn't possibly get the real idea it was so amazing.

It was timeless. Living without time is really a wondrous experience. We were at a beach house in Port Aransas... spacious, beautifully decorated, air conditioned to the perfect temperature w/ lots of space... I don't think I've lived in a house that nice in a very very long time. We didn't even get to much sand in it since the house was equipped w/ a small shower right outside to get the worst of the sand off before you came inside, plus we had access to a pool with the house, so we could take a dip in the chlorine to get rid of the salt and sand as well. Days just slipped and flowed away like water droplets sliding down a windowpane, filled with simple activates such as painting, sketching, board games, cooking, talking, napping, TV (there were 2 big flat screens which my brothers enjoyed a lot since we don't have one at home)... and then of course the beach. A creamy sandy beach with a sea that was sometimes almost green, sometimes blue, always warm with playful, occasionally powerful waves crashing along the surf. I can still feel the waves that lulled around our feet as we snapped photos trying to capture the beauty of it all... one morning Laura and I got up early and watched the sun rise... the beginning of a brilliant day. I couldn't help but realize how hollow our pictures were... to actually be there and experience that beauty was beyond pictures and words.

I also got to spend some time with each of my family members that I haven't spent much time with... my uncles for instance. Uncle Mike taught me a few of his cooking secrets, showed us all his collection of knives, and told fascinating stories from his career as an amazing chef... Uncle Robert played boccie ball with us on the beach (one of my favorite games) and told us about his career in the shoe designing industry. We found out about my Grandma's high school days, and the pranks my Mom's siblings had played on each other. My personal favorite: smearing peanut butter onto each other's backs in a spot where they couldn't reach it so they could watch it slowly melting into a big mess.

There were a few things every once in a while that kept me on earth, reminding me it wasn't quite paradise... Mom was constantly reminding us to put sun screen on so we wouldn't burn... although I dutifully followed her instructions I got burnt anyway along the shoulder straps of my swim suit, and Laura had a much bigger burn... Dan's whole back was pretty red too even though he's naturally a lot tanner than either of us. Grandma had a pretty severe burn too even though she was under the umbrella most of the time. There were also some interesting creatures in the water sometimes... one day there were a lot of baby jelly fish about the size of well... small yo yo's or big buttons... there were always fish that you could see in some of the bigger waves... dead crabs lying on the beach, scratchy seaweed... after a while the salty water would start stinging my lips, my eyes and the back of my throat... but all of this was pretty insignificant... it hardly detracted from paradise at all. The only other drawback was the TV's in the house that seemed to be on to much, but again, this was only a minor irritation...

Anyway, now it's hit me... real life again. Right after we left the airport we went to a pack meeting for John where he got his bear, which officially restarted our busy life... today I took the bus into the city with Camille to the singles ward, after which I participated in the interfaith community choir's performance of a Requiem (Dad and I have been attending rehearsals for weeks). It went really well, although it was slightly intimidating to be singing right next to the soprano soloist...

It's late... Laura wants me to go to bed...

Love,
Margaret

HR, Dress, Kids, and TX!!!

Well, This is the first time since I started weekly emails that I've missed a Sun, but I couldn't get a hold of a computer (there is only one with working internet that belongs to my uncle, so I had to wait till this morning to borrow it).... anyway, enough excuses...

Monday I was assigned to work in the Human Resources department of Taylor hospital. Once I had figured out the phone system w/ the eight lines I had to keep an eye on and the transfer function, it was pretty easy. I did a lot of employee evaluation filing, the phones were always busy... the day went by very quickly.

Tuesday I finally bought the fabric for my dress that I'm making as a summer project. It's a bright turquoise blue, stretchy and a little shiny... that makes it pretty hard to work with, but it hangs beautifully. I was offered a long term job with office team during the summer, but had to turn it down because it conflicted with TX and Cumorah. In the evening I babysat for my former Laurel's advisor for the last time. Her husband works for the state department and they're moving to China for the second time. I really enjoyed watching her children... we went to the library for some books and movies, then played till bed time. I'm going to miss them a lot!

On Wed. I babysat Easton all day long... he is the cutest one year old you could ever imagine w/ big blue eyes, preposterously long eye lashes and the most adorable smile. To add to his virtues he was just very agreeable in general and pretty happy to play with any toy I offered him. During nap time I cut out and sewed a dummy bodice for my dress from an old blanket. The size was right, but the upper pieces didn't fit together quite the way I wanted, so it was good I had done the dummy bodice first.

Thursday I cut out my whole dress... that took a lot of time and patience because I simply couldn't get the material to lie flat enough to pin. There was a lot of it too, so half the time the fabric would slip off the table and I'd have to start all over again *sigh*. Sis. Janes picked me up later and I got to play with her three kids. They're very fun... we spent quite some time going through the year book with Daniel giving me detailed information on almost every picture. I got to know the class clowns, the bullies, everybody really...

Finally it was Friday, the day to get ready to go to Grandma's house... excitement/stress was in the air as Mom rushed to run errands, and make sure everything got packed in due time. Finally, Mom and Dad went to drop Laura off at Uncle Eric's... she was going to be flying a couple of hours later than we were because she had to take the ACT before she left (poor dear!!). While they were gone I attempted to teach John some of the cha cha... he learned the basic (I think), but a lot of it was his own made up steps :-). It was actually pretty late when we all got to bed even though we were getting up at 3:30 am to leave and catch our flight....

3:30 am came really fast... we loaded our bags, and I squeezed into the back seat between my brothers... my feet were on the seat since there were suitcases right underneath me. My uncle's comment when we picked him up was that we all sounded "pretty chipper" for the early hour. It was true... we had a lively conversation going on. No one would have guessed we had only gotten a few hours of sleep. Check-in went really fast since I had already printed our boarding passes, and before we knew it we were on our way. The most painful part was waiting in the St. Louis airport for 2 hrs for our Austin flight... John and I played every single clapping game we knew and invented a new one as well...

Finally we arrived, and we all noticed again that everything was bigger in TX... the airport just had a very big feeling with tall ceilings and wide hallways. Grandma and Uncle Robert were waiting for us. We grabbed our bags, loaded them into the cars, and went to find some food. It didn't take us long... we found a Mexican restaurant and enjoyed some food, then the boys set off for Port Aransas (that's where the beach house was) while the girls went back to Grandma's house to finish getting ready. I did some last minute errands with Grandma... grocery shopping, copying etc, then made a double batch of chocolate chip cookies. Uncle Michael was in the kitchen making roast for dinner. He's an outstanding professional chef and I got to hear some pretty amazing stories about some of his jobs. Dinner was scrumptious, needless to say. The apple sage sauce uncle Mike had concocted perfectly enhanced the roast... mmmm!!! I was sound asleep when Laura came in later that night...

Well, this is all I have time for... I love and miss you all!!
Margaret

A Talk

Another week gone! It's totally crazy, I'm telling you! It's almost 10pm, so I'll be brief. It's been extremely hot and humid... the Philadelphian summer has officially begun. The most exciting/involved thing that happened all week: I got a call ?Tues or Mon? night from the person in the singles ward who assigns talks. Yep, I was asked to give a talk in the singles ward and that confused me a bit b/c I had just gotten a visiting teaching assignment for my family ward. I told whoever was on the phone (I think his name is Bro. Johnson) that I wouldn't be able to make it since it was my Mom's b-day celebration, but he was desperate, and I ended up saying yes anyway.

I called a friend of mine to make sure she could give me a ride to church, and she said she could, and Mom said she could pick me up after the sacrament meeting in the singles ward was over so that I could come home for the celebration.

I wrote my talk, and my English was beautiful... eloquent with advanced vocabulary. I worked on it all week. My friend called me on Thurs evening saying she couldn't take me to church after all because she had a family function to go to she didn't know about, so I had to rearrange everything rides wise. Then on Sat. I read my talk to my parents to get some feedback. My Dad's comment: very well written; however, he had also zoned out while I was reading it. I presented it to my sister Laura and she told me I had lost her after the second paragraph. She helped me realize, that this was good stuff for an English paper, but not so good if you wanted to keep people's attention during a talk. We rewrote the entire thing in more colloquial language, and I felt better about it even though it was a little shorter than before.

Sun. Morning Dad told me that he was going to the Philly wards today anyway, and he could take me at 10am. There was one small problem... I had told a friend of mine we could take her and that we would pick her up at 1. I called her and she was a really good sport about being ready three hours earlier than planned. We both attended Sunday school and Relief Society in one of the family wards meeting in the building; we had a wait after that, and luckily I had brought some apples, oreos and sandwiches, so Camille (my amazing friend who got up to come with me) and I just chatted and snacked for a while.

Finally the time came. Overall it went pretty well. I discussed the first section of Elder Wirthlin's talk Concern for the One about how some people are lost because they are different. It was a really good topic for me since I've had lots of experience with being different... my German experiences came in really handy.

Dad and I made it home for a treasure hunt for Mom... she got the cutest outfit from my Grandma. I love it on her!! Eric, Rene' and family came over for a delicious meal of this fahita type stuff, then we topped it off with shortcake, strawberries and ice cream :-).....

Anyway, it's really late like I mentioned before, so I bid you adieu till next week!

Love,

Margaret

Summer Fun

I love Holidays! We should follow the Europeans' example and add some more. I'm sure there is plenty to celebrate if we really wanted to. Monday morning dawned, and our energetic patriotic song set the tone for the day. I volunteered to make our contribution to the ward picnic, and decided on apple pie. It took a little longer then expected, but it was well worth it as the heavenly aroma filled the car on the drive to Kent park. Hamburgers, hot dogs, salads, and plenty of desserts... what could possibly go wrong?

Around one o'clock we headed back home to grab a few things, then the girls got into Aunt Rene's car and the boy's went with Dad and we started the 1 1/2 hr. drive to Lancaster. Our car was pretty quiet... most of us dozed off or read. The contrast hit pretty hard when we finally entered the laser dome. Music, video games, and excited voices filled the air. I was slightly annoyed that this was what Daniel had picked to do for his birthday, but it really wasn't that bad. Cara, Laura, Mari and I played a few rounds of dance dance revolution, watched a laser show which was a lot like watching a screen saver, and finally played our first game of laser tag. Well, it's definitely not one of my talents, but it does get your adrenaline going... watching behind a barricade, waiting for the opportune moment to strike, getting hit in the back...

Tuesday nothing much happened, except that I finally decided on a combination of 2 patterns for my semi-formal dress that I'm making. I'm really picky, so I figured I should just make it myself exactly the way I want it and give up shopping. At the store I ran into Allie Stulpin, a girl who was in several of my classes in High School. It was great... we discussed our college lives, and life in general... we both agree it's so nice to know what we want to do. She's going to go into law, so she's majoring in history to prepare.

Thursday evening I attended my brother's piano recital. There were some very cute kids performing... two little boys especially. As they were playing they would always look over at their parents sitting in the audience and smile at the video camera. It was so funny I could barely keep from bursting out laughing... there were quiet chuckles throughout the whole room. Both of my brothers performed well; as the very last piece in the recital they did a duet on the organ which was really cool as well.

Friday was Anna day!!!! It was therefore pretty much amazing. For those of you who don't know, Anna is my best friend from high school although that is a very poor description. We did the whole day Anna style. We drove to Media, a quaint little town, and went where the wind took us, which ended up to be an Indian restaurant. To top it off we went to Rita's water ice... water ice, for those of you who haven't been to Philly, is like a slushy only more solid... I got a blendini, which is a mix of custard, chocolate water ice and oreos. MMMMMMMM!!!! I didn't realize how much I had missed it. We talked for hours catching up on everything. That evening Mom, Daniel, Laura and I went to see the musical Les Miserables at the walnut st. theater in Philadelphia. It was the first time I had ever seen it and it was amazing! I loved the actor who portrayed Jean Valjean, the main character. The whole plot is so compelling, so deep... what is the law? Is everything cut and dry? Can people truly change their hearts? What can be the impact of one small act? Where is the balance between justice and mercy? Whoever isn't familiar with the book needs to read it! I've only read an abridged version, but it is still amazing.

Saturday was just a general work day... chores, laundry, sweeping the garage etc.

That would bring you up to date!!! Love and miss you all!!!!!!!!!
Margaret

Reepicheep is my Hero!!!!!!

Time is short this Sunday since it's Daniel's b-day, so this'll probably be short... we just had a lovely meal of melanesa and we're preparing for the treasure hunt and carrot cake and I really need to finish my b-day card for my brother... anyway...

Monday evening for FHE we went and saw the new Narina movie which my brothers were ecstatic about... you'd think all they had to eat the whole day was sugar from the way they behaved! It was pretty good, but I didn't like how they kind of made it into an adolescence movie. Peter spends to much of the movie trying to prove that he's the High King over Caspian (just like a teen) and that's not in the book. It doesn't even make sense, since he already went through adolescence once before (he grew up in Narnia and then became a kid when he went back to our world) and would have learned his lesson. Same with Susan. She's not the inexperienced young teen they make her out to be, with a first crush on Caspian... she was almost engaged before for heavens sakes! Plus, Caspian should have been about 12 years old instead of more like 18.

Anyway, after that rant there were still parts I really liked... Reepicheep for example was amazing!!! I love his gallantry and his exploits, he's just what I imagined he would be. Of course, it's also C.S. Lewis, and even though it's not exactly the way I imagined there are so many cool parts about the story... I really hope you've read the Narnia Chronicles. They're amazing! One of the lines that stuck out to me in this movie was when Lucy remarks that Aslan has grown, and he tells her he always will grow with her. If you compare Aslan to Christ that's kind of how it works in our lives... as we grow older and mature, our comprehension of God's greatness increases. Anyway, we enjoyed discussing all of this over ice cream and brownies, and I went into way to much detail...

Okay. So Monday I also got a letter from BYU saying that I had made the Dean's list for the college of humanities because my GPA for the winter semester had been in the top 5% of all the humanities students, so now I'm invited to a reception some time this September when I get back from school. Just a little happy side note...

Tuesday was pretty uneventful except for some babysitting at the end of the day... it was the cutest little 1 year old girl ever and she was so good for me! I just played with her for a while showing her the wonders of a keyboard and talking on her plastic cell phone before it was time for bed. After she was in her crib I sat on the comfy couch and read the Count of Monte Cristo... for some reason I had never gotten around to it before even though it's one of the classics. That was enough to fascinate me till Camilla's parents arrived...

Thursday evening Mom was taking Laura and Daniel to a voice lesson so we (John, Aaron and I) hitched a ride to the library. On our way I saw my first triple rainbow, which needless to say took my breath away. At least I know there won't be a flood around here any time soon! We were joking about finding three pots of gold when we climbed out of the car. After selecting a movie (Pirates of the Caribbean) the boys and I ran almost all the way home... as we were running down the hills John and I went kind of crazy laughing and running at the same time... the setting sun and playful warm wind were intoxicating. Anyway, we had a fun movie night...

Friday everyone had off, and it was declared a family work day. Laura and I spent the morning thoroughly vacuuming and washing the cars; later I planted some tomatoes in the front garden and made a taco salad for lunch. That afternoon I measured the windows for curtains and made a double batch of chocolate chip cookies for the tired workers who had been weeding the garden or fixing bikes (sometimes it's not bad to be extremely sensitive to the poison ivy in our back yard). Putting a few fresh cookies on a flowery paper plate I drove to Camille's house for her birthday celebration. It was the first grill of the season w/ delicious hamburgers and a home made cake and ice cream for dessert. To top it off we watched a movie and enjoyed my cookies... mmmmmmmm.

Saturday we took a quick trip to King of Prussia mall to buy the curtains I found... Laura and I tried to find birthday gifts for Daniel and some shoes, but only Laura was successful with the shoes and neither of us could find something for our dear brother, so it'll be an 'I owe you' I guess. When we got back Dad had a picnic ready and we all went to the park, enjoyed some swings, sandwiches and frisbee...

Okay, that wasn't short, and I've really got to go, so...
Hope you had an awesome week and also to hear from you soon!!
Love,
Margaret

Cinnamon Rolls, Blueberry Muffins, Service and Shoulder Torture

Wow, it has been a long week! Let me see...

Monday I filled out a couple of job applications and gave a lesson for FHE on education, with an emphasis on academic standards required to get into BYU. That night I stayed up really late making cinnamon rolls as a surprise for Brother Brown and the seminary class. He was really an amazing seminary teacher, and I felt like I hadn't thanked him enough. He's been teaching for three years now, and he's being released, so this was like my last chance. I got up really early Tuesday morning to bake the rolls and smother them in frosting... their beautiful aroma filled the house and the car on the way there. It was so neat to see Brother Brown's face when I walked in w/ 2 9x13 " pans full of fresh cinnamon rolls. It was totally worth it!

Later I took advantage of the beautiful sunshine and rested in the garden reading more mythology. So far I enjoyed the Cupid and Psyche myth the best, because the gods forgive Psyche in the end for her curiosity, and forgiveness is almost never a part of the myths. Although she makes mistakes she can repent and be raised to the status of a goddess with Cupid. The names make the story very symbolic, Cupid (love) uniting with Psyche (the soul). It is so true that these two are inseparable; I believe that love is part of what souls are made of, and as I've been studying German literature we've talked about how love is what can encourage us to be better and come closer to God.

Wednesday my beautiful break ended after I got home from a refreshing jog. Maddie from the temp agency called and said she had a short term data entry position open. I immediately agreed to take it. Although it is better than no job at all, it really isn't fun to type over 1000 people's demographic information into a computer. The worst part of it all was the ache it produced in my shoulders. For some odd reason I tensed up really really bad every day and came home with huge knots in my neck and back. Wednesday after work I took the bus home and went in the wrong direction for a full 25 minutes or so before I realized that something was wrong... it took me an hour longer than planned to finally make it back.

Thursday I just worked all day really and came home exhausted. I can't even remember what happened. Friday just wasn't my day. It rained the entire time for one, and it couldn't have picked a worse day to do it. On my way to work I attempted to get into the bus, but managed to drop 2 of my quarters on the ground and collapse right along with them... one of those delightful moments where even I was impressed with my "grace". The bus home was extremely late, so I was standing on the bus stop for a full 40 minutes with my umbrella, slightly shivering with cold. Then I got to walk the mile home too since Laura had the car (she was taking it to one of her lessons, although I can't remember which). It did get better after I made a batch of chocolate chip cookies and watched Indiana Jones with my siblings for the first time.

Saturday was actually pretty fun... I'm still in the baking mode for some reason, so I got up early and made some blueberry muffins for the family's breakfast. Turned out great, but we kind of had a hurried breakfast because we were supposed to go over to a sister's house to do some service. The whole family got into the car and somehow Mom managed not to get lost (yay Mom!!). I enjoyed cleaning and lining cabinets, while Daniel and Dad took care of the lawn and Mom did some serious vacuuming. It looked awesome after we were done, and it just felt so good to see what we had accomplished (it's so scary how I'm starting to sound exactly like my Mom!!). Later the house was empty except for John and I, so I decided to show him the wonders of Audacity, a sound editing program. I half regret it now... he's pretty obsessed with recording his voice and my voice and any one else's voice that he can get a hold of and raising the pitch so everyone sounds like chipmunks. It just gets old pretty fast I guess...

Anyway, that was my week! Hope you are doing well and hope to hear from you soon!!
Love,
Margaret