a challenge

I was reading a blog today that told me to go write a blog post, and since I hadn't done one in a while, I decided to obey. 

Some things on my mind right now:
I am so so tired.

This semester has been the hardest four school months of my life, no comparison.

Hot chocolate or cookies sound good right now. Unfortunately, the no-bakes are gone.

I watched a movie tonight (La Pelota Vasca) for a class that's about the Basque Country in Spain + ETA (a terrorist organization there).  It was interesting to hear the different viewpoints on it, although it did get boring after a while.  There are a lot of sad things that happen/have happened in Spain.

Speaking of ETA, on March 11, 2004, there were some train bombings in Spain that were blamed on ETA (turned out not to be them).  It was the biggest terrorist attack in Europe, we learned in one of my classes.  Our teacher that day showed us a song commemorating the attack that is very beautiful.  It's in Spanish, so if you want you can search the interwebs for English lyrics or ask me to tell you what it means, but you should listen to the song no matter what. It's so pretty.

I finished Harry Potter 7!!  I loooooove that book so much.  Trying to decide what to read next. Any suggestions?  (I don't like Jane Austen.)

I keep thinking I see Dia Darcey and Erin Austin on campus.  I'm proud of them for being on missions, but I'm excited for them to come home.

I need to hang out with Carrie.

Finished my Spanish 101 teaching today!  Three of the five days went very well :) Hopefully a post just for them in the next couple of days. 

Did I leave anything out?  Have a good week, all! :)

No-Bake Cookies

(recipe from allrecipes.com)
1 3/4 c. white sugar
1/2 c. milk
1/2 c. butter
4 T unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 c. crunchy peanut butter
3 c. quick-cooking oats
1 tsp vanilla

In a medium saucepan, combine sugar, milk, butter, and cocoa. Bring to a boil... Remove from heat, and stir in peanut butter, vanilla, and oats. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto wax paper. Let cool until hardened. 


We made these yesterday. Yum.  I'm glad no one seems to have ruined no-bake cookies with some kind of weird fruit (quick about me: I don't like it when people ruin perfectly good treats with fruit.) but I realized while I was eating a cookie tonight that if you were to ruin a delicious no-bake cookie with fruit, using orange extract might not be so bad.  Kind of like one of these:

And I suppose maybe, just maybe, raspberry may also be acceptable.  Not preferred, but acceptable.

But really, let's just leave them the way they should be - chocolate and peanut butter.  And thank you for leaving them that way thus far.

What a Fool Believes

I love this song.

Credit to Kelli for reminding me what it was called. :) Thanks!

Lent

I like observing Lent.  Sometimes it's hard to work on a goal for a year or some indefinite amount of time, like ones we make for the New Year or things that I just know I need to improve on, but it's easy to set a goal for 40 days.  And after the 40 days (unlike a week or two weeks), often whatever I've chosen has turned into a habit... so I like Lent.  I keep track of every single day and how I've done, and I kind of feel like I failed Lent if I miss even just a couple of days.  I take it very seriously.

My freshman year, I gave up Facebook to keep myself from wasting so much time.  After the 40 days, it took me a while before I started using it again because I got so used to not using it.  I missed zero days.  It was really nice.

Sophomore year I gave up not reading my scriptures everyday.  I got that idea from my sister, to give up not doing something.  I should've made that a 40-day goal a long time ago.  I only missed two or three days.

Last year I gave up being negative about school because I recognized that my negativity was having negative effects on my husband's attitude and making me hate school.  For the first time (I think) since I started at BYU, I worked really really hard and got all A's that semester.

This year, I have given up dirty dishes.  Now let me just say that this semester has been the busiest and hardest semester I have ever had, almost without comparison.  As such, I don't always have time to do the dishes, and even with Lent, I still don't.  But I do try to make time everyday to do some dishes, and even just that much has helped.  Joel does a lot of them since I don't have as much time, but at least this way I feel like I'm helping contribute some cleaning.

Are any of you doing Lent?  What did you give up?  What would you give up if you were doing Lent?  You can always start late! :)

Vamos a hablar hoy de la casa de la maestra...

here

Today was my first time teaching a not-my-teaching-methods-class class.  It was a Spanish 101 class here on campus.  I was so so so so nervous!  Luckily, I wore a long-sleeved shirt and when I got in the room it was boiling hot..... :) You might be thinking, "What a random picture to use for this post," but you'd be wrong.  The lesson I taught today lasted about 15 minutes and was on furniture/"around the house"-type vocabulary.  I used that picture to help teach the word las sillas (chairs). 

Thoughts:
Overall, I think it went pretty well.  I kept not being able to decide if I wanted to use tú or Ud. and for some reason randomly kept mixing up the difference between saber and conocer, but other than those things it seemed okay.

I wish I knew everyone's names so I could call on individuals more easily.

It was surprisingly easy to teach the lesson in Spanish the whole time, but from some of the blank looks I got and some of the "suggestions" that weren't really suggestions they gave me at the end that I maybe could've clarified a few things in English.  Not a lot - they seemed to get things pretty well - but a couple of things. 

I passed out notecards and asked that they write down any suggestions they had for me and didn't get many, so they either didn't understand what I asked or were so blown-away by my sweet teaching skills that they saw no room for improvement ;) 

I think it was a fun idea to use pictures of my own house to teach the words.  It's fun to see a little bit into the non-school life of a teacher :)

I will be teaching the same class again on Friday but don't know yet what my topic will be, but I'll let you know how it goes!

haircut: results

I hate to break it to you,

but I'm pretty good at picking out haircuts for myself.

:)

haircut!

I got my hair cut today!  Let's just say... many inches are gone and it feels awesome!  I will post a picture after I've had a chance to style it myself.  :)

trends

I don't like The Pioneer Woman.

blog

So sue me.

HP4: Part 3

I was just going through my drafts and found this.  Enjoy. :)

Chapters: The Rest

I LOVE reading about the tasks!  I
get almost as excited as if I were
there in real life!

"He says we is free to call him a... 

barmy old codger if we likes!"

"Percy wouldn't recognize a joke if it 

danced naked in front of him wearing

Dobby's tea cozy."

"Giggling should be made illegal."

"You'd think I walk around with my
eyes shut banging off the walls!"

I love the description of Christmas in 

the HP books.  It makes me so excited for 

Christmas!  She does a really good job of 

describing everything :)

I feel so sad for Ron and his dress 

robes :(

Why didn't Harry just take Mr. Crouch 

with him to Dumbledore's office?

Snape is so infuriating.

I love Ron's idea of what happened to 

Mr. Crouch :)

They're all puffy-eyed and pale 

becausethey stayed up late? I'm glad 

that doesn't happen to me if I stay 

up too late...

Goodnight, sleep tight...

I think I let the bedbugs bite.

So I have this little cluster of (probably) bug bites on my back.  Right in the middle.  In a very inconvenient place.  They've been itching the last few days, so I finally had Joel look and tell me what in the world was itching like crazy on my back.  I try not to scratch them (partly b/c it helps bug bites stop itching, I've found, and partly because if I accidentally scratch these right on top, it feels like someone putting needles in my back)... but it's just so hard!

They pretty much are in my thoughts all the time.

Finally, four days later, I had the brilliant idea of taking ibuprofen before leaving home.  It's been an incredible five hours!

Too bad I didn't have the foresight to bring extra.  But now that I know something works, you can bet I'll be taking it again when I get home :)

Welcome home!

My brother-in-law got home from Afghanistan yesterday morning, after being gone for many months!  We've been praying for several weeks, but especially this week, that nothing would come up that would keep him from coming home.  We're proud of you, Paul! and of your family for being so strong while you were gone! :)

Love, Joel and Alison

Paul & Shannon with their cute girls peaking in (from here)

Paul's mom (from here)

Here's an article, too, if you're interested.

beards

 I hope this makes your day.

quick update

I haven't blogged in a while - been super super busy the last two weeks - but here's a quick update!

*playing for a competition that's tonight and tomorrow - super stressful - teaching me to have faith*
*last Saturday, did a booth at the African American Children's Fair - really fun - reaaally cute kids :) *
*Friday class is canceled for three weeks!*
*canceled should be spelled with two L's*
*Joel got a promotion!*
*start my Mérida prep class this week - really excited about learning all about the trip*
*stressed about marriage license/passport/driver's license business*
*bought my ticket to Mexico!*
*saw a friend that I haven't seen since his mission - fun*
*excited for HP5 + oatmeal craisin patties + Mexico/New York/London party tomorrow to celebrate competition being over*
*got two bookshelves yesterday for $20 - really excited for the extra storage space*


Have a fun day!