Realizations

Every once in a while I realize things about myself that I didn't really know before.  Well I knew it but keep realizing new dimensions I suppose.  I get Bored.

Often.  I have brief, intense obsessions with things and then I am so bored I can't stand it.  Happens most often with food actually but really everything.  Today I realized that I am completely bored with my computer.  I've had it for a little over a year and a half and now I'm done.  I want a better one.  Or just a different one.  Granted this one has been annoying lately with its randomly turning off... but I'm pretty sure I shouldn't be bored with it yet.  How long is long enough to have a computer.... I am pretty sure it's somewhere along the lines of a couple years but I'm not sure.  I believe that perhaps I should be my own master and try harder to not be bored.  It is satisfying though to call someone a dipwad.

My second realization is that occassionally I have no control over the random thoughts that come into my head.  For instance, today I thought about the pondering I had as a child that the more keys you have, the more important you are.  I always thought that about my parents because I'm pretty sure my dad had about fifty keys on his keyring.  Today I added an eigth key to my keyring and started thinking about this again. And if I use virtually all the keys on a daily basis would that make me more or less important?  Now that I have this many keys though I'm pretty sure it doesn't make me more important it makes me more annoyed.  I have to carry all these keys around with me and in my pocket.  I hate keys in my pocket.  Lame.  See, no control over the incoming thoughts.

Instead of pondering civil rights

Just quickly some more pictures. For MLK day I decided I didn't need to go to work since I was out of school (although I went anyway later...) and instead spent the day with my ahmazing cousin Julie. She took to this sweet place called Kensington Park. Apparently Detroit metro area has like 17 of these "metroparks" which are just giant natural parks as far as I can tell. But this one is truly awesome, there were tons of lakes and miles and miles of trails and I decided that next Fall I definitely had to go back because just the sheer amount of trees is going to be beautiful. But this day was awesome because it was snowily overcast so it was just pure winter.

Um we saw wild turkeys. It was fascinating. Two of them started fighting and you just couldn't look away.

I was experimenting with the aperature preference feature on my cam

We saw this great tree, it looked like it was glowing. We just ignored the fact that it was probably dying...

Took my pic on this little outlook over a marsh...

There was some random tree that still had their leaves, kind of created a surreal image in the middle of bare trees

And with all the water around there were picturesque streams where you could see deer had been running through

And our last activity of the day was walking out on the frozen lake to take pictures. Julie kept stopping and saying "do you hear that? The ice is cracking!". When she took my picture (now my facebook profile pic) I told her I better not fall through and she responded that she'd give me a nice funeral if I did. Ha so glad we didn't fall through!!

Were I an administrator...

I would outlaw 3-day-a-week classes. And it's for actually more reasons than it's the most annoying thing to have classes three days a week and not have a three day weekend. Seriously though, not even teachers want to teach that many times a week. Trust me, I know many many teachers. But let's put that aside for the moment and look at this from a teacher/student/learning point of view. For a three credit hour class that is three days a week, the classes are 50 minutes long. This is such an awkward amount of time to teach. I have never had a 50 minute class that didn't seem rushed. Currently I am in a math class that is three days a week and it's not good. It's almost not worth it to go to class because it takes me longer to get to and from the class on the bus than I'm actually in class. Classes which are two days a week are an hour and twenty minutes long. It works out to the same amount of time but with two classes you can actually get into a topic and even (shock idea) have a disussion about the topic that is longer than two minutes. It all works out to the same time but I truly feel that if you only had classes twice a week which were longer people would learn better. So were I to be a university administrator - classes two days a week, not three.

Takin' the new Cam for a spin!

I'm sure at some point someone will get sick of all my pictures. But really I won't so....tough. You will take what I give you! Hahaha. So here are my adventures of today with my new camera. Today we investigate the use the 'landscape' scene mode. I took some self portraits but I wasn't centered in the pictures so the camera focused on the landscape no me......and I can fix that but it was really bright, really cold, and I look like I have black eyes so perhaps this was a blessing in disguise. Or even not so disguised : ).

So here we go. This first pic is of one of the bridges that crosses the Huron river at this point. There's actually like 10 that look like this but as I mentioned it was cold....

I love the wooden bridge look though. It fits so well into the landscape.

This pic is on the previous bridge. I was completely fascinated by the ice and this was one of the few points you could see through it. I was somewhat conflicted though. On the one hand I was fascinated by the ice but the other I was terrified of the bridge randomly collapsing and plunging me into icy cold water. My thoughts were something like "Whoa how cool. Please don't break creepy bridge. Oh man what would I do if it broke? This looks so awesome. Okay I need to get off this bridge."

I was wishing there was more snow on the trees but it's been a little warmer the past couple days. I still think it was so pretty though.

Around this park there are also like millions of wooden benches and I thought they looked so cute just looking over the water. There was one man just sitting in one but I felt weird photographing him.

I then trecked down to the bridge that takes cars across the river (there's a dam which is why it's incredibly wide here) because I loved the look of the rocks with the snow and ice around them.

Again I was just fascinated with how the ice looked. Looking at how the ice formed is like just sitting watching water rush by and how the little eddies and currents form; completely mesmorizing.

In the fall when Abbey came I took a picture of this same spot with all the fall colors. I like the symmetry of seasons and the new tradition I just created for myself.

You may have noticed that I haven't taken pictures of people with my camera... Well here's one. Again we had some issues with the point of focus : ) But I'm working on that and meanwhile that one part of my hair it focused on looks amazing right?!

Fail.

I discovered something today that perhaps I have always known and just couldn't admit.

There is no dignified way on earth to eat popcorn.

Let me run down what happens for you. First you can't just eat a kernel at a time, that makes you someone I would make fun of. So basically you're eating 4-6 kernels. So that's a pretty good amount for all your fingers to hold. And you're trying to shove that in your mouth, which is in itself totally attractive. Mouth open wide shoving your fingers into it. Then it happens. A little piece breaks off and you can feel it falling out. You can't just let it go so you move your lips not unlike a camel does when it's eating. Well that never works so you're also trying to suck the piece back in. And the wind going through the popcorn makes a sound eerily like slurping soup. And you still can't save the popcorn. The seemingly harmless piece is falling and you think to yourself "ah well it's just a little piece". And then it goes down your shirt. They all do. No matter what shirt you're wearing.

So there you are, mouth wide open with four fingers stuffed in with your lips moving like a camels, making a highly appetizing slurping noise and you just got popcorn down your shirt.

You're done.

Fail.

You just have to move on because there's no saving your pride now.

So what do you do?

You go back for another handful.

Because let's face it, buttered popcorn if taken with time between doses is right up there with manna from heaven.

Maybe this is why we only eat this stuff in dark theaters where no one can see you obviously digging for things in your shirt/bra.

My efforts into Photography

I don't know if I mentioned it before....but I really love to take pictures. Since my decision to procure a fantastically nice camera I have become even more into it. Until I got my camera I was priviledged to use my Papa Bear's nice camera. That's where most the pictures from Thanksgiving and Christmas came from. But then I got MY camera!! My most favorite gift/purchase this Christmas was my new Nikon DSLR. I'm pretty sure I could gush about it but I really shouldn't because I'm still learning all about it. So the pictures my not be so awesome yet. But they'll improve I promise. But in the mean time I just have to show off some of the ones I've taken.

My most favorite thing about Christmas decorations are the lights. Really in any form. I could drive around for hours just looking at lights. But the best lights are the ones that light up my Christmas tree. I love sitting with all the other lights in the house off and just the tree on and watch how the light goes off the ornaments. So this year I wanted to take some pictures of it.

I love pictures where one point is in focus and the other points are not so I'm especially fond of this pic. I also love the look of the pearls that my momma always puts on the tree.

The gold sparkly is so pretty in the lights.

And this one just looks like candy which I also adore : ).

As a treat for actually finishing my finals I bought myself my favorite flowers. Lilies. These ones were perfect because they happened to be pink and I couldn't resist taking a picture of them.

I thought this one was pretty. It captured the color well and I love the look of the wood behind it.

This is tag that I got on my Christmas present from Abbey and I thought we should take a picture to remember even more.

And with the end of these pictures so ends my year. I do know it's past New Years but I've just now caught up. And I will also stop talking about Christmas now. But I won't stop taking pictures : ).

New Year's Restitutions

I think that the word restitution can be used interchangeably here. Well to a certain extent.... We make New Year's resolutions to make ourselves better right? So in a way it's restitution for things we haven't done as well as we could have, either for ourselves or for others. Anyway, I was looking back at the resolutions I made last year and sadly I only wrote down two (well on my blog for the public anyway). They were to do well in school and to be more social. I'm pretty happy to report that I accomplished both. I could have done better in school this past semester but I did try really hard so I'm going to count that. And I've actually been a lot more social since I moved to Michigan. I suppose it was a little bit out of necessity but the result was really good and I've been able to meet a lot more people and make many more friends. Joy!

This year I don't really know what resolutions I want to make for myself. I could say that I haven't thought about it very much but I really have and I just don't know what I'd like to do differently this year. Or maybe it's nothing I want to admit to myself.......
*thinking*
Well we'll just go with what I have I guess : ).

First, this year I want to not have regrets about school. I mean this in that I don't want to look back and think that there was more I could have done. Of course I'd like to do well but most of all I don't want to think I could have done more. Everything else I can deal with.

Second, I want to live in the present. If you've read the Shack then you know what I'm talking about. I don't want to worry so much about the future or dwell on the past. I want to be happy in the moment I'm in. I think that this will help a lot in making Michigan a place that I'm happy at and hopefully help me not miss my family so much.

Third, with all the craziness that I know will come from school and work and church, I don't want to forget about the things I love doing. These things include reading, working out, playing soccer, watching movies, and so many others.

And last, I want to USE the amazing camera that I just got to document all the fun I have with the amazing people in my life. I don't think there's been a year where I thought I took enough pictures so I'm going to work towards that goal!

I hope your restitutions are amazing and that you'll help me keep mine : ).

Holiday Lovin!

I feel like perhaps I have complained a little bit too much about the people I miss. Hopefully I only feel this way because I have been complaining mostly to myself but if I have gone over my "venting time" please forgive me. But in light of the fact that I really have been missing family a lot I thought I would visually explain who the people are I've been missing, then maybe it'll be more understanding that I miss them : ).

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These adorable little teddy bears are my three mini schnauzers: Button, Peanut and Kodiak (from left to right). Aren't they unbelievably precious? They are the reason I have been close on multiple occasions to going to the animal shelter and getting a dog in the last four months. Or just taking one of them back with me :)

This is my pretty pretty peanut. You can tell her favorite activity is to lay and just soak up the sun.

Kodi is the most snuggly dog I have ever seen. If you're sitting he's sitting with you

 This is Button. She is the oldest and pretty much keeps to herself unless she really wants to see you. Then she'll come sit next to you and 'allow' you to pet her.

This is my niece-y Kyndal rockin my dad's pajama pants. She's a trip this one.

One of her favorite activities at Thanksgiving. Jumping on the 'trampoween'. Couldn't get enough of it.

Her Christmas present was her addiction when I saw her a couple weeks ago. She can literally walk faster than this thing but that didn't matter. She rode it to her heart's content and then was perfectly happy letting Aunt Heidi carry it the rest of the way to the park.

Haha I got a camera for Christmas and she wanted to look at it so I let her take a picture. Then she posed herself like this and said "Take a picture of me right here". Completely priceless.

My momma and K's little brother Dev. He is happiest when he's being help by just about anyone. And grandma is happy to do it.

Here's they're examining his Christmas present turtle.

He was way more interesting in grandpa's (my papa bear) beard though. He couldn't get enough, completely fascinated by it.

This was the moment before I let K look at my camera, you can see just how much she wanted my camera.

I just had to take a picture of them all playing together. Dev fell but was happy enough to stay there as long as K and grandpa kept getting the balls for him.

Here's Abbey my sis right as my dad gave her a really awesome present of her own.

Hahahaha the hat craziness of my parents. Get's me every time and I love it. They both however were not cold on that night.

We were concentrating really hard on Super Mario Bros.....and failing badly.

This was all four of us playing so my sister Megan and my dad were also concentrating hard as well. You couldn't quite get us here yelling but we were.

Ben, Abbey's husband was waiting his turn....hahah and didn't know his picture was being taken.

Aside from blood family there's the family I miss that I've adopted. Such as Cory (on the right). It took forever for us to get this picture though because there were a bunch of little kids that wanted to go first......weirdos.

And my beautiful Sarah. I miss her mucho in Arizona. We used to have such fun times so we had to meet up again and try on weird hats. Ignore me in this picture.

So there you have it. The family I love and miss. Not all of them of course but a great many of them and our fun times. I love the holidays because we all get to be together and just hang out, play games, shop, anything. LOVE it and can't wait until next year!

Looking Back - 2009

This is incredibly out of order seeing as I haven't done Christmas yet but that one will take some time and this one I've been thinking about more. I decided I'm going to list all the things I can remember about 2009. I figure if I can remember them then they were important and meant a lot to me.

* At the beginning of the year I moved with my sister Abbey into a new house. This actually took place the previous November but January when I came back to school is really when I moved moved in. That was my favorite house to live in while I was in Arizona for many different reasons (living with Sarah is tied). First I love Queen Creek. I know it's way the heck out there but it was my favorite. And I loved that I had a huge room where I could work out in one part and not be working out on my bed. I also really like living with Abbey and Ben. I'm sure they weren't as happy about it as I was but that time especially was really good. I remember having a big conversation with my mom about me living with them knowing I would be leaving and how hard that would be. Well it was hard and Kyndal being really close to me is tough but I wouldn't have traded it for anything. Abbey was my best friend that semester and still is.
* I discovered that the thing I hate most in the world is trying to describe how awesome I am in personal statements for grad school applications.
* I flew to Michigan in March to look at the grad school and had a panic attack on the air plane about how far away I was going, how alone I would (I thought) be, and how I really wasn't good enough to go to grad school because Michigan was the only place that accepted me. That was also the weekend that I realized Michigan was where I wanted and needed to be and I was calm. Probably because I decided to shelve leaving indefinitely. I couldn't even talk about leaving. I left that all out. I planned for it but couldn't talk or even think about all I was leaving.
* I graduated. I spent probably 75 hours on 9 portfolios detailing my proficiency in those 9 areas to a specific level. They were awesome. I think I was more proud of them than anything else just because they took so much of my time and energy. And they were what was standing between me and graduation. I also graduated Summa cum Laude which I wasreallyproudofbutdidn'twanttoshowoff. It's been 7 months and it still hasn't hit me that I have a degree. But every once in a blue moon I think to myself huh you Heidi have a degree. This graduation was also way more exciting than high school graduation although my speech then was pretty awesome.
* I rafted down the Grand Canyon. Coolest thing I've done and one of the most fun. Such fun people to hang out with and a beautiful place. It's my happy place that I go to now.
* We had an awesome family vacation in Pagosa Springs. We spent one whole week there just relaxing, walking, getting yelled at by old men, and taking pictures. Awesomeness.
* My mom drove with me to Michigan the beginning of July and helped me move in. I was really grateful that she came up and was able to help me get situated. I'm sure I was probably not as good at showing that appreciation as I should have been but that was because I was really stressed. It was good.
* I tried to get used to Michigan. I have met so many awesome people and without them I totally would have fallen apart. I missed my family and friends SO bad. It has been nice to be on my own and getting to know new people and new things, but part of me really misses the comfort zone I had. Hopefully this will become another comfort zone for me.
* I wanted to quit grad school. I was terrified I couldn't do and I didn't know what to do. But then numerous people told me I could and I am living on borrowed faith until I believe it too.
* I learned how tragic some things can be watching some of my amazing friends. I cried with them and for them and prayed for them every day. They became my heroes and I hope I can be a good friend to them.
* I realized how much I love everyone in my life. Love them so much it hurts and I wish I could hug them all. I need them so much and I can only try to be as good a friend to them as they have been to me.

It had it's ups which were some of the best ever. And it had its downs which have been the worst. But if it taught me anything it was to cherish the good things while they're happening and save them up for when the bad things are happening. And no matter what smile, I don't know how but it helps.

My second favorite gift this Christmas

Well really I shouldn't rank them, it might make some of the other gifts jealous....so I guess we'll just say one of my favorites : ).
This year I was given the new old school Super Mario Bros. game for my Wii.

I was really excited about this because honestly I completely adore this game. I never get tired of it. I'm not very good at it but really I never get tired of it. Mario has always held a special place in my heart. I used to play it when I was really small (like 5-6) and I learned some valuable life lessons:

 - Turtles should always be jumped on and then kicked or they come back to bite you (unless they're spikey turtles, then you just run).

 - Creatures throwing things out of clouds are of the devil. Straight up.

 - Being small does have its advantages but not very often.

 - Flying is extremely helpful but never being able to master it makes it a hazard of the most extreme kind.

 - If you don't get the right pattern in the castle of life you'll be going in circles forever.

 - Boomerangs are also hazards of the devil and should be avoided.

The new game is especially awesome because you can play with four people at once in the same screen. The chaos that results from this is FANtastic. Since you're all there you can also push each other around, pick some one up and throw them, and jump on others' heads. The yelling caused by all this is absolutely priceless and playing with my family was the ultimate highlight of my Christmas vacation. Hearing the words "STOP pushing me!" and "Get OFF my head!" come out of my father's, my sister's, and my brother's mouth was the best ever. Laughing ensued.