KOBE TODD HAGGERTY!

Miraculously, I was finally able to go home again (first time this year!) and saw my most favorite family. It was also extremely fortunate to be there right when my new nephew Kode Todd Haggerty was born and to get to hold him before I headed back up to Logan. It was such a blessing to be there with my family and to be apart of their life again. Especially since I knew I was going to miss out on Thanksgiving since I would be working. Despite all the fun I'm having in Logan, I have truly missed seeing all of them. It was good to get to talk to my mom when I needed her, go flying with my dad, and I got to play with my cute nephew Dayton! I even got to catch up with some old friends. :) Much needed vacation!

Ballin' at the Military Ball

Back in my AFROTC days... yeah I'm trying to make it sound like I'm an old lady now... I was assigned to be in charge of the Military Ball and since I was given a medical release I was pretty dang happy to get out of planning the ball. BUT I did still want to attend and see how everyone was doing! Fortunately my good friend Owsowitz gave me an invite and I was able to go this time in a pretty dress. WOOT! It was way too much fun and I loved seeing my Air Force sistas and bros. It's been far too long for sure.

Kelly Clarkson Look Alike!?

So this last Wednesday I went to the doctor in Murray and when I went up to the check-in desk the receptionist couldn't get off the fact that I looked like some famous singer. After a few seconds she yelled out, Kelly Clarkson! I told her that I had actually heard that a few times before but I wasn't sure how true it was since I hadn't ever compared. So I put the two of us side by side and I was quite surprised to see that we do in fact look alike!? Craziness. What do you think!?

Nameless Duo

Two of my really good friends Greg and Ryan put on a show recently at Hastings. (Yeah they are pretty legit. Both play the guitar, piano, sing, AND write their own music. Sick I know!) The guys had joked with the twins and I about making groupie shirts ever since we had made the Swine Flu ones. Our big problem was that they didn't have a name and never seemed to agree on one. They threw out options from Just Heather to Sewer Rats. A- we didn't want to make a shirt with a girl's name on it that wasn't ours :) and B- Sewer Rats Really!? Yeah it was totally a joke but I was still tempted to make a shirt with that on it. Ha! The night before the concert had come upon us and we were forced to make something up or not make shirts. As you can see we went with Nameless Duo and we were pretty dang proud of our shirts. The concert rocked our world and the shirts made every girl there super jealous! ;)

The Aftermath of H1N1

May I pose a question? Can you have too much fun? I say you cannot! This is just a brief look of what I've been up to besides working (yeah I know working... I got a job at Chrysalis! Good place) and school!

Yeah, we totally made a hut and watched Iron Man in it. :)
Next night we played Farkle in the hut and I accidentally called it the Fut. Yeah that stuck. Farkle in the fut... Haha
What is more fun then driving up the canyon to drink Martinellis and listen to awesome music!? Good times! :)

Lions and tigers and bears! Oh, my!

Halloween is one of the biggest event for me and every apartment I've ever lived in since going to college. My first year we dressed up as the epic Clue gang and I was Colonel Mustard. Fitting then for sure.The next year we lost some roommates and had to find a theme that only fit three people- The Three Blind Mice. Funny but not as funny when you have a blind guy in your ward. Still cute though. I'm just saying. :) This year we took it to the next level and after Jessica's inspirational thought we went with THE WIZARD OF OZ! We combined my apartment (Jessica, Sam, Alicia and I) with my good friends Hilari and Kierstin to think of fitting roles for each of us. Kierstin- short hair equals rocking mane. Lion it is. Hilari- blonde hair equals perfect good witch. Alicia- just has the perfect Dorthy look and even made her own costume. Yeah she rocks. Jessica- LOVES acting out the part of her character and wanted to be the bad witch. Sam- just had an amazing scarecrow feeling to her so we ran with it. Me- I'm made of tin and have a boot so the Tin Man seemed ironic. We had WAY too much fun getting these costumes put together and even forced our FHE grandparents to have a Halloween costume party WITH a costume contest. Jessica has real good persuasion skills. Naturally we won. :) For your enjoyment-

H1N1

Activities on one seriously epic night-
Start- 6:30 PM
1. Get music from Greg
2. Eat Taco Soup made by Greg and Ryan
3. Check out B-Land for things to do
4. Blow fire
5. Disney SceneIt
6. Pretend to go to the Quad to play Frisbee but instead find Jessica and Christian in car and get in with them.
7. Get quarantined in said car with sick Christian
8. Joke about Swine Flu and decide to make shirts
9. Rock out in car to Wal-Mart
10. Pick out sick t-shirts and letters
11. Wash shirts
12. Watch half of Wolverine
13. Make epic H1N1 shirts
14. Finish Wolverine
End- 3:30 AM

Boating & Rockclimbing...Perfect Activities for a Gimp!

My dear roomy Jessica and I

Jessica, Nate, & Matt

Nate getting Carey ready!

Jessica, yeah she's hardcore!

Matt, Me, & Jess

FREEDOM! And back to booty...

MY CAST IS OFF!!! Woot! On the great day of 09/09/09 my cast was cut off and life become a little more "normal" again. I'm walking at 25% pressure on that foot with crutches. Naturally those will be my best friends for life... Oh crutchys how I heart you... NOT! But my good friends Hilari and Kierstin joined me for the trek down to Tosh in Murray. They were the best fake moms and took pictures of the whole ordeal for you to enjoy!
*Warning to small children- some pictures may be disturbing and graphic... :)

UTAH STATE HEY AGGIES ALL THE WAY!

Wow, what a roller coaster this summer has been for me! But with all of this one of my big decisions was what now!? What do I do with my life now? Okay so the Air Force is a no go so do I keep going to school at Utah State or is it time to mix EVERYTHING up!? It was time to get on my knees and after I had I was still clueless. This was obviously one of those things where I couldn't make a wrong decision so The Lord was going to let me decide for myself. But my new condition was also a worry to me and I felt it might play a big factor in getting to classes. Also, now that my scholarship was gone, I had no clue how I was going to pay for school. My next worry was SNOW, and we get lots of that in Logan. The image of climbing up the hill in the snow, with a broken foot was not my idea of a good time. When I first thought of other schools, I had made a list of schools that I would even want to go to. My list consisted of- going back to USU, U of U, SUU, and UVU. I didn't even consider BYU because it just wasn't something I could see myself doing. But as I kept praying BYU just kept to seem popping in my head and the walls that I had built toward the school started to be slowly ripped down. Why not apply and see what happens? In the end, I had actually only applied to BYU and UVU. Going to SUU seemed liked the ultimate back track for me (no offense to those that go to SUU! It's a great school but I can't see myself in Cedar right now!), and UofU just didn't feel right at all. I went and visited BYU and UVU to get an immediate answer that neither was right and that there was no denying that I'm an aggie through and through. So I've been at Utah State for the last three weeks and I LOVE IT! This is where I am supposed to be and what I am supposed to be doing. COME WHAT MAY AND LOVE IT!

Story of the Eggman

One dark and dreary night, during the year of 2007 at the Apt. of 23, girls were just plain frustrated with the men in their lives. They ate some ice cream and watched chick flicks in hopes that these things might subdue the annoyance that they felt. But nothing that they did helped at all. One dark brunette, who so happened to live there, decided she wanted to throw something off of a balcony and thought a Pumpkin might be effective. But then she also thought of the mess that it would make and decided against it. Next thing that came to mind was none other than…an egg. These two perturbed girls took two eggs and threw them in the street to then run away quite epically. But the dark brunette did not feel completely satisfied and with the other brunette devised a new better plan. What a superior way to release these irritations then by actually drawing pictures of these guys on the eggs and then throwing them of this said balcony!? Thus creating the eggman and happiness for girls all over!

But it did not end here! Girls continued to tell this said darker brunette of their own similar frustrations with the men in their lives. It didn't matter if there was one man in particular or just the entire male sex as a whole. They satisfied their annoyances by throwing eggmen and feeling oh so much better after!

But girls let me now leave you with hope as well... One day girls were enjoying in the ways of egg throwing when the darker brunette had decided to throw an egg that represented the entire male sex. But... the egg did not break after falling off the balcony. I know right! What have we learned girls!? Do not give up hope on the entire male sex there are some that we shouldn't give up on quite yet! :)

Two years of satisfied girls! :)

Frankenstein Foot!

Some pics from my last check up that I thought you might enjoy! Here are the X-Rays after the surgery and look at the crazy screws in my foot now! It's a crazy surgery for sure. They took pieces of bone from my knee and put it in my foot. And then... Put cadaver bones in my knee... Sick I know!

Time to Be Grateful!

Okay so I’m working on the being grateful thing when it seems like things aren’t exactly going my way! :) Here are some of the things that I could think of and I’m sure there are hundreds more! Oh and PS thanks Annie for giving me this idea. I highly enjoy your “Thankful Thursday” but I’m not good at keeping up with it every week so this will be an every now and again thing!

-Temple work. One weekend I was able to go to the Logan temple alone and was able to do work for an elderly couple that had happened to come in with names. The couple was extremely grateful that I was willing to be baptized for their girl names and it was very emotional for them. It was also the first time that they had brought names so they were over joyed! What a tender mercy from the Lord and it something I really needed at that time.

-Flowers. Woot! My mom’s cousin Debbie sent me these beautiful flowers after my surgery and my grandma brought me sweet peas that she grew in her backyard! I heart them (both the flowers and my family)!

-Pain pills. But only for like two days after surgery (or a really painful event haha) and then they have got to go. Then it’s on to Tylenol. Can I get three hurrahs for Tylenol!

-Random surprises from my father. Well I had lost my iPod at EFY and my dad knew how much I loved my iPod. Also, that I would miss it greatly cause I LOVE music! Well a few days after my surgery my dad came home with a present wrapped up all cute like. I opened that present to find another smaller present to then find another present. When I finally got to the smallest one, I opened it to find a brand new iPod touch! Wow, I was shocked and pleasantly surprised!

-Bear Lake. I spent a week recovering on the shores of Bear lake right after my surgery. It was our family reunion with the Hunter family and I love spending time with them. It was by far the best way to recover and I got a really sick tan line from it. We stayed in the old Rock Candy Store turned ridiculously nice lodge. We had a movie theatre that was bomb and a game room that I wish I could have used. It was real fun to watch the cousins play though. Sad part was not being able to actually get in the lake to ride the wave runner or go SDing with my girlys! Oh and I bet you will never guess what was all the rage there- that’s right bracelets, and rat tails. Woot. I made plenty more sweet bracelets there!

-Friends. I have had SOOOO much concern and support through all of this! My friends always check up on me, visit me when I’m bored (which PS is all the time so if you are ever in Cedar stop by!), and just plain chilling with me while laughing about stupid fun stuff. Everyone has been so helpful since I can’t really do a whole lot for myself anymore. Thank you oh so much for always being there for me and making me laugh. My friends are the greatest by far!

-My Momma. I know that she loves me lots and that she would do anything for me! She has waited hand and foot on me during all of this recovery time. She helps me do everything that before was just second nature. Best bonding moment ever- showering. Yep, enough said. :) Never thought we could get closer than we are now! LOVE HER LOTS!

-The Lord! He is always there for me and guiding my life. I am recognizing that more and more now. I need to work to let Him completely let me know what to do and to put my life in His hands fully! I love that I can pray to Him anytime and say stupid things and know that He still loves me for it!

Bring It On Surgery!

On July 14th I had my blessed surgery and everything went just as good as could be expected. It was a little worse off than when they got in there then they thought it would be so they had to fuse three joints instead of two which equaled four screws instead of three. Oops probably shouldn't have jump roped and danced in a boot... Not so bad at all. :) I'll just take it being over with!

(Above) This one's for you Jeff! Yeah I wrote on my right foot to make sure they only cut open the correct foot which is the left!

(Below) My cute visitor Ashley! Love that girl!

(Above) The best nurse EVER, Hazel. She took real good care of me. :) She was like an over protective grandma and I loved it!

Get me out of this place! :)

Homeless :)

Saturday night I had a how so much fun double date with Jeff, Emily, and Jeff's cousin Rob. Emily and I drove down to Kaysville to meet up with the guys and let them take over for the night. We went to the Drive-In in Ogden to watch the classic movie UP! We even made a beautiful fort in between the two cars and shoved all of us in to play speed scrabble. Golden in so many ways! We did substitute in a lot of things to make this happen like random rope from Rob's car, tons of blankets which yes did make our little fort a little hot, and one special blanket to turn into a table for us to play scrabble on. After we enjoyed the movie and then hit up Dees to get a tasty little treat. Oh and ps we did get pulled over for a front light being out (yeah I know there is some special term for that but I don't remember at this exact moment) on the way to the restaurant even though there was a vehicle that practically went through the gas stations window right across the street from us (oh you've got to love bored 15 year old looking cops), and yes we did indeed meet THE actual Dee. ;) So I thought it would be really fun to be totally homeless and just sleep on whatever couch I could find until Monday when my parents came up. I may have looked like a vagabond or hobo at church that Sunday and I may have been the weirdy in the background of the fireside at EFY even though I was done... Yep that was me. I probably said goodbye to people 5 billion times!

The Haunting Bracelets

The bracelet making fun for some reason seemed to follow me even during the weekends. I made bracelets with my bestest friends Hilari and Kiersten while being homeless with them on the weekends. I made bracelets when I went up to Bear Lake with Brad, Kathy, Kristen, and Kimber my awesome family when I found out all the girls were making hemp ones (so of course I had to join in). I even made a bracelet the weekend right after I was done with EFY when I went to my Aunt Elna's. She was babysitting these two cute girls and naturally she wanted a bracelet as well! :)

Rat Tails and Bracelets!

Two things started at EFY that I truly love now. Bracelets and rat tails. Bracelets were all the fad at EFY this year and it was all the rage to have tons of bracelets all over your arm. But how could it not be all the rage when you have hundred of 14-18 year old girls with nothing better to do during lunch or free time. Naturally I fell into the madness when one of the girls persuaded me in buying a bracelet that said "GIV ZUKA." (And when I say that I bought it I mean my suga momma (Ashley) bought it for me and then I paid her back) When Jeff and I realized we both bought one, we decided to make it a competition to get a new bracelet every single week of EFY. The only way I was going to complete the task was by buying some of my own string and making them along with my girls. My co's can testify that it started some great madness and I was very successful in getting some pretty sweet bracelets made. My latest bracelet being my hospital band. Top that one! ;)


Next thing on the list was to get the infamous rat tail put in my hair. To be completely honest with you, it is something that I have wanted for years and was never able to get one permanently with the whole AFROTC thing so it seemed like a good time to get one going now. Throughout all the weeks, I saw a lot of girls with one but was not able to get one going on in my hair until the final week. I cornered one of the girls that I noticed had one and was actually two girls that I had met at EFY last year! I talked to them about it and next thing I knew, we had some string out and my dream was coming complete! Sweet Success.

It's got to end sometime!

EFY was bound to roll to an end at some point even if I didn't want it to. What a better way to end it then at Logan 2! Woot! I was fortunate enough to get a "Sam"wich meaning that I started AND ended EFY with the great Sam. We also had the awesome Kristy join our team to make it epic. We lived it up with some sweet walkie talkies with wicked code names like Tropical Thunder (me), Maverik (Kristy), and Bad Mocassin (Sam). It was a blast all week and I learned evern more about myself. EFY ended with a bang for sure! New record for me! Six weeks in a row- SLC 1-2, Logan 1, SLC 3, Ogden 1, Logan 2!

An Added Surprise!

YEAH FOR WEEK OFF... NOT! So I was all excited to have an awesome week off and was getting pumped for all the amazing things that were going to happen. Saturday rolls around and Jeff says, "Hey we should go do EFY in Ogden. Well I am going to so you should at least check it out..." (sorry Jeff I just paraphrased haha) So I made a call to the coordinator Jill and everything just fell into place. They called me back a few minutes later and said they needed a new girl counselor so they would love me to pick it up. Yeah, you know me well. I picked up the session and then headed off to the soccer game with my cousin Brooke. That night wasn't my best night and around one in the morning I was pray/crying which we now call pracrying (or fill in other name here Jessica). Not my best moments but wouldn't take them away for anything!


Jeffrey! Lots of awesome adventures with him! :) Tricksy Hobbitssss


Next day rolls around and I headed on up to Ogden to start the great EFY. The session director gets up to give his fireside and says, "I don't know which one of you was praying at one in the morning but the Lord heard you and woke me up!" (I know right! I looked all around to see if anyone else was praying at one in the morning and looked really shocked. Nope. Just me. Haha. Jeff was even sitting next to me and leaned over and was like, "Did you pray at one in the morning?" I whispered back that may or may not have happened...) The session director, Brother Smith, then talked about how he was so excited cause the Lord then proceeded to give him exact scriptures, quotes, and even a title for his fireside. He even woke his wife up to show her cause he was so excited about it! You could imagine how closely I was listening at this point. So he says that the title of this lesson is "What I need to tell you about your spouse" and how I can also relate that to you being an amazing counselor. Naturally I went never mind. Not for me. :) Zone out. Someone else was praying. Haha. Long story short. He answered 90% of my questions and was a HUGE comfort to me. Man I love the Lord and when He answers my prayers!

Even though I only had five girls all week, everything was perfect and I knew that I was definitely supposed to be there that exact week. Everything just fell into place and I loved every moment! Way worth it!

A little soccer on the side

After SLC 3, Saturday came and I called up my dear cousin Brooke. She happened to have an extra ticket to the Real Salt Lake soccer game so I went down to Murray to spend the day with her. Real kicked trash and won the game 3-0! It was way fun and a good little escape from EFY!

Logan 1 and then some Salt Lake City 3

Life rolled on and I just decided to forget myself to just concentrate on the youth. It made a huge difference and I had way too much fun with both of these groups. Yeah for Logan 1 and then Salt Lake City 3. I met one of my bestest friends Crystal and we have bonded from then on!

The start of Hobbles aka Hobs

I was introduced to these boys randomly one day and for some reason we just bonded! Their counselor got sent home for sick reasons and they were pretty much labeled the trouble makers so they were watched really closely. Well I just talked to them and loved them so they just kept coming back to me. They taught me how to "jerk" which ps not very good with a boot! But they decided to call me hobbles and sometimes to make it more personal they called me Hobs. All I had to do was yell "come to hobbles" when they were about to do something questionable and they ran right over stopping previous action. They were some of my favs and I still miss them!

Salt Lake City Week 2

Let the Booty Jokes Begin...

I came back from the doctor with a walking boot and the fun really started happening at EFY. I had zero desire to be the sad cripple counselor so my goal was to be as independent as possible and show all my youthys that I would be just as much fun with a boot on my foot. Well naturally it was raining all week and one day in particular I was walking up the hill alone when it started raining. Yeah I couldn't walk super fast in the boot at first so I got soaked and I guess I looked real sad when I finally made it up for Andrew to find me. This movie is what came from it! Gold in so many ways.

Yep, it started lots of "hilarious" booty jokes from the youth and even some of the counselors. Don't worry. I did actually think it was funny but it got old sometimes. Examples- Hey nice booty (yeah I got TONS of booty jokes). Hey look now you are in "boot camp" all the time (sooo funny/eye roll). Now you are like Dora the Explorer with "boots" and backpack (I did have some real fun adventures with those girls so that was gold). Oh and I was called the cripple kid a lot. :)

When the walls started to get ripped down...

Week 2! Salt Lake City here I come again! But I had a serious problem, my foot had started hurting so I called my mom to tell her that if my foot was hurting from EFY there was no way I would be able to handle FT (field training AFROTC's version of boot camp).

My next co's Ryan and Christie!

To make a long story short- (Ok so it's still long but it explains me!)
I hurt my foot in February country swing dancing when my partner dropped me and they told me it was just an arch sprain but... My foot is really messed up and I was totally misdiagnosed on what happened. My foot was really hurting from jump roping and walking and dancing with EFY (my summer job). I also knew that if it hurt just from doing EFY there was no way I would be able to handle FT on July 18th. So they made me go to a foot specialist in Salt Lake City and it only took her a few minutes to realize something was really wrong. I found out the bones in my arch are dislocated from the rest of my foot so they told me that I would need to get surgery on it. They are saying that I will probably never run again which equals me not being able to handle FT ever. If not best case scenario going to FT next summer which is looking like a very small chance at this point. They said it has been this messed up ever since it happened five months ago and that since the first doctor that I went to wasn't a specialist on feet they didn't catch it. Because of that they made me run and work out on it overall making it tons worse. In result something that could have been fixed in a surgery and me being totally fine now equals fusing my foot in surgery so that I can never move half of my foot again near the big toe side. End result being that I can never handle high impact on that foot. Yeah sadly the wellness center really did a number on me! We got some other opinions but this doctor that I went to was the best of the best so we pretty much knew it was what it was. My exact diagnosis is a non-union and dislocation of a tarsal bone. If that means anything to you! Let's just say life has been a little rough recently but I am closer to the Lord right now then I have been in a long time! Uh yeah touchy subject and I am really really really sad about it so yeah... But also I am still really happy if that at all seems possible! A lot of doors have recently opened up so that is good! :) Mostly I just need to find direction in my life and I have seemed to get a lot of that here at EFY so that has helped lots!


But through this all the Lord has blessed me very greatly and has been very direct that the military is no longer the right thing for me. When I found this whole dealio out, I was at the EFY dance and had snuck into the chapel where I could have some privacy to cry. The session director (the person over that week of EFY), Brad Wilcox, had a feeling that he needed to go into the chapel at that exact moment and found me there. He had me explain the whole situation to him and then gave me a priesthood blessing. In the blessing, it was very direct from the Lord that the military was not in my future. He talked about that sometimes we follow our passions and desires into a place that the Lord doesn’t want us so He has to stop us from pursuing. It also said that the path I was following wouldn’t lead me to eternal life. But also that even though a really big door was closing in my life, many would open up in its way. Overall, the blessing was a great comfort to me when I didn't know what I was going to do with my life!