December 31st.  It blows my mind, but today is the very last day of 2012.  I honestly don't know how this came to be, but life simply spins way too fast.  And now, as I wait to join my friends in a celebration of the year that's passed and the year that's to come, I sit here tapping away at the keyboard, watching music videos for all these songs I love listening to and reminiscing in these last moments of a wonderful 366 days.  Soon, high school will be over, the real world will snatch me up, and I wonder-- will I be ready?

  You know who you are.  And honestly, thank you.  Thank you for being so kind, for treating me so sweetly at the same time that you make me feel like melting, make me laugh out loud and be myself and feel like, in general, I just want to be a better person.  It's my turn for a compliment streak, and you know you are so smart, so athletic, so musically talented, and so dang attractive.  You know your position in life, and you teach me, even when it's hard, how to keep my priorities set straight.  You teach me the fun in closing my eyes and indulging in the daydreams of a happy future.  Seriously, thank you for being you.   

      2012.  A year unlike any other, unique in its opportunities to learn and grow and experience the world.  It's a year I will never forget, a year I deserve to thank.
      Janurary-- For the first time in my life, I was able to find a group of friends that I can partyrock with whenever I feel like without fear of being abandoned like so many times before {for various reasons such as moving, finding a new group of friends, or just plain not clicking}.  Chelsea, Bryan, Karisa, Lindsey, Haley, Paige, Sam, and Tesah, later joined by McKay, Anthony and Zech. The group keeps expanding.  And honestly,I don't know what I'd do without this group of wild ones to keep me on the constant run for adventure.
      February-- This month of love I had the opportunity to sing a duet in Sacrament meeting.  Though I had performed a little bit before, this helped prove to me how much I enjoy singing and really want my future to involve musical performance.  This year was also leap year.

      March--Apparently, it was a very happy month.  Reviewing over old posts, I had a kind of screw everything -type attitude, and it somehow actually helped boost my grades as well as my smiling.  With three friends' birthdays, a few dances to crash, The Hunger Games finally coming out, and an opportunity to sing backup for Firefly, it was quite an enjoyable 31 days.
      April-- Easter month, making the cheer squad for my fourth year in a row, and... drumroll...I got my permit!  Now, if only I would just get up and take the test for my driver's license...

      May-- This month called for the glorious end of Freshman year and oh yeah, Trek!  Definitely a challenging experience, pulling handcarts 19th century style, one that made me very, very grateful for those faithful people who came before us and paved the way for the life we can now live today. 
       June--  I had the fantastic chance to snatch up my passport and hop on a plane with Dad and Rachel to Peru.  This was the first time I could actually remember leaving the U.S., and as we traveled to Lima, Cuzco, Machu Picchu, Paracas, and Iquitos, visiting the modern city, the poverty-filled outskirts, the Amazon jungle, the equator, and ancient ruins, I basically has the best learning experience I could ever hope for.
       July-- Cheer camp, Girls Camp and San Clemente, California.  Basically, summer.
        August-- My sophomore year of high school began.  A full schedule {no lunch} with lots of honors classes including duel credit Spanish III, and also the football season started for cheer.  I also learned from my extremely-intelligent English teacher that Destiny, the book I had been writing for the past two years, was terrible, so I ditched over two hundred pages and started a completely new novel.
      December--Obviously, this has been a month of festivities.  With Christmas, the air has been filled with lights and music.  It has been a month filled with love as well as learning.  With the Connecticut shooting, it has been a time of tears.  The 21st was dubbed the end of the world, but fortunately, that never happened. And here we still are. 
     Seriously, this year has been spectacular.  And I can only cross my fingers that 2013 can even come close to matching up.

  Today, Olivia Grace is 11.  It's unbelievable, but now this little girl is blossoming into a little beauty that won't be so little much longer.  With her blond hair and blue eyes and skin so tan we don't even know how she can be classified as "white," I just know she'll be a draw-dropper in the next few years.  But for now, Livy Lou is a fantastic sister who is sweet as sugar, always ready to care for wild Sophie, or braid hair, or give massages.  She is naturally peaceful, crafty, musical & is such a fine baker I definitely will have to start working out more.  Basically, this girl has got it all!  So happy birthday.

     This little babe, as of yesterday, is 15.  Yeah, we tend to clash more with every passing year, but she's cool.  This gal is  a talented actress, a lovely-- if shy-- alto, and an overall funny miss.
     Now that Kendall's got her license, us cousins were able to sneak off for dinner at Firehouse and Chipotle and then drive to the other end of town for milkshakes.  I figured out the hard way that milkshakes are not what you want in your mouth when Paige looks down and, in a panic, realizes that she somehow managed to lose her belt she had been wearing around her waist.  When we walked back to the car, nearly choking on the absurdity, Kendall joked that her belt was probably sitting in the parking lot.  I hadn't realized she was kidding, so thought it no big deal when I spotted it right there on the asphault and was confused when Paige continued to search the car frantically.  Of course, only Paige would do something like that, cause she is such a fashionable little cutie that losing a rhinstoned yellow belt is on the same level as losing an earring.  Still laughing, we thought we might as well watch White Chicks once we got back to the house and climbed into our PJ's, and boy!  that movie is...interesting...
    I diverge.  Rachel dear, happy birthday.  Enjoy the painful year called 15 as you wait so long for 16.

      My heart races in my breast, pounding with such intensity that my chest heaves and I'm shocked they haven't heard.  Quickly I reajust the black hoodie, pulling it down low and tucking my hair beneath with a last desperate effort to hide my face.  Distant voices call out.  They've yet to discover us, but the flashlights weaving through the cold, dark night pierce my nerves.  "Move!" someone hisses, and we bolt across the wideranged street, the no-man's land.  As the roar of an engine approaches, we dive into the shadows and press our bodies against the ground with adrenaline-induced speed.  One false move, and it's over.
      007 all the freaking way.
      Oh, and did I forget to mention it's the End of the World?  Last day of the Mayan Calener, I hear, December 21st, 2012. Oh deary me-- but at least we're goin' out with a party.

  Who knew it was possible to squash over four months worth of notes, formulas, and drawings, and examples into one tiny half sheet of paper?  It is.  And it's called: FINALS WEEK.  Or also just the art of surviving high school.  Wish me luck as I continue chuggin' along this these last few days of the semester.  Don't ask me why my teachers insist on having at least two huge finals for every class, but after this Friday at 11:30, I'm saying see-ya to this all and going to enjoy a fabulous Christmas break.
  Now for somthing more interesting, isn't this just adorable?

  1 AM and I was sobbing.  How could this be true?  As the tears blurred my vision, I could only pray that I was misreading the information somehow.  But I wasn't, and the salty droplets splattered onto my quivering palms.
  Twenty-six souls.  Twenty-six living, breathing, laughing, young, and precious souls-- shattered.  By just one man.  Just one gun.
  It sickens me.  This is children we are talking about!  Twenty children who, though wild and smiling when their mothers hurried them off to school Friday morning, are now being layed in the ground.  And the six adults who, though having woken up that just two days ago fresh and ready for work, will never again open their eyes.
  I don't understand.  How could this even be possible?  Yet this Christmas the gifts chosen and wrapped and slipped under the tree so lovingly will remain unopened.  I think of all these families and I am distraught.
  I hope these poor people know that twenty-six are now in God's embrace.
  Oh, pray for Conneticut!  

  Ain't I just psyched.  It's 12³, the last time we'll have a triple-digit-date for another 89 years. My social studies teacher has placed a bet that at least one of us students will live to see that day, and whoever does, he says, deserves a tootsie pop.  But really, can I make a wish?  Can I close my eyes and cross my fingers that this holiday season will be brinked with the wonders of a luminous, a chilled, a musical, a giving, a religious, and a downright romantic experience? No more time for daydreaming, but transforming beloved imagination into thrilling reality.

 Music flitting across the room.  Dancing lights.  Irresistibly naughty food. Warm snuggly blankets and Hallmark movies.  The scent of pine and peppermint. Romance.
  It's December and I am entangled by the wonder. Snatch me up in the grace the love and the beauty, if I am not already head over heals for the daring fun and excitement.
 

    I think there's a point of exhaustion one hit's where they no longer feel tired.  I'm talking, staying-up-till-two-AM-on-a-school-night-doing-homework syndrome.  It's a high school thing, and basically sleep-- wait, what does that word mean again?  It's a price to be paid willingly, though.  I knew what I was signing up for when I had to stay after school for cheer.  We had to wait before for tumbling coach, then tumbled for an hour before waiting for the freshman basketball game to finish.  That went into overtime, so our own didn't begin until over a half-hour past the normal time.  Our game was a blast, but it also went into overtime with more timeouts than possible to count.  My voice was probably destroyed by the amount of screaming for our Highland boys.  At least we won!  But then I didn't get home till past 8 {an hour-and-a-half late}.  Finally, homework!  Basically, I was high off my lack of sleep today.  I literally could not stop laughing in silent classrooms or bouncing in my seat or just plain demonstrating the effects of being four hours short of pulling an all-nighter.
    Three weeks from Christmas.  I don't care if December 21st is the end of the Mayan calender.  I will survive if only to see true relaxation!