Starting a Blog

I decided to start a blog about my life at BYU. Since I have been at BYU, so much has happened to me and I figured this would be a good way of updating my family and friends on my life. I skype with my family about once a week, but then I only get to talk to whoever is actually there at the time. And while I check my facebook quite often, I don't post very often and when I do, the little box just isn't enough space to catch everyone up on my life. Hopefully this way anyone who wants to know what is going on with me can find out easily.
So a little explanation about my life so far at BYU:
I am staying in Heritage Halls. It is apartment styled so I cook my own food. As such, I have learned so many recipes and can honestly say that I like cooking now. I used to not like cooking because I always burnt or in some other way ruined what I was cooking. But now I cook all the time and I love it. I miss home food though. I can make hamburgers, pizza pasta, spaghetti, burritos, enchiladas, tri-tip, mexican chicken, fried chicken, fajitas, and more pasta, but I REALLY miss my mom's food. I've also learned how hard it is to eat healthy here as I don't have that much time to cook, and healthy food is so much more expensive than unhealthy food.
Well I either walk or ride my bike everywhere I go (no car). When I first came here, I thought campus was so huge and it would take me forever to get to my classes and I thought my feet were going to die from walking all over. Now I'm so used to it, it doesn't seem far at all. I have classes kind of on and off during the day so I walk back and forth from campus to my dorm all day long.
Well I am taking 17 and 1/2 credits. And it is KILLING me. Everytime I tell someone how many credits I have, they ask me if I'm insane. Seriously, no joke, they ask me that EVERY time. I just tell them, yes I am crazy. The honest truth is that I did not know that 17 and 1/2 is a lot of credits. Nobody told me. I took a year of college prior to coming to BYU, and nobody ever mentioned to me that 17 and 1/2 is an insane amount. Well you live and you learn. Somehow I'm not dead yet. Next semester I'm only taking 13 credits. I'm very excited for that.
I just got through a week of midterms. It was insane. I was so stressed out and I was so busy I hardly had time to breathe. Every minute of time outside of class was devoted to studying. At one point though I ran into my RA (Resident Advisor) and after crying to her about how stressed I was, she told me the most profound statement I had every heard in my life: "Homework and Eternal Salvation are not the same thing." My jaw dropped when I heard this and I screamed out "YOU'RE RIGHT! I can fail this class and STILL go to the Celestial Kingdom!!" It made me feel so much better. Of course I was still stressed (old habits die hard), but I kept reminding myself of this and it made Thursday (the day I took four tests in one day) slightly better.
Well I am so ready for the Hollidays. My roommate Lexi and I decorated our window with snowflakes. I can't wait for Thanksgiving so I can go home and eat, but I really can't wait until Christmas. Our dorm has been listening to Christmas songs since the day before Halloween.
Speaking of Roommates, I've got some really great ones. There are six of us altogether, two girls per room. My roommate is Alexis Berry (Lexi). She is my best friend and we went to high school together. We are all pretty crazy but awesome. Last Saturday we had a super bonding moment between all of us after Stake Conference.
Okay, so Stake Conference was all about marriage and how we all need to get married. And all the examples they gave were couples getting engaged one week after their first date. So after Stake Conference, we as roommates sat in a circle in the kitchen passing around a container of frosting and venting about how NONE of us are ready for marriage. Seriously? What is with the people here at BYU? I love it here and I love the people, but some times I think they are all just a little bit too obsessed with "I got to get married right away." Whatever happened to the courtship stage?! I want to make sure I know who it is I'm marrying!
Anyways, I'll move on from that topic because I could probably go on about that for a while. Seriously though, it's not that I'm against getting married, it's the idea of marrying a complete stranger that freaks me out.
ANYWAYS...BYU seriously is great. I love all of my classes, the professors are great, you feel the spirit every single day, we can talk freely about the gospel in the middle of class, we say a prayer before class starts (which is so great when we have to take a test), there is a devotional every Tuesday with an awesome speaker everytime. Last Tuesday, President Monson spoke to us. It was SO COOL! They always have some sort of activity going on too. Sunday nights is tunnel singing, where a huge group of people meet in this one tunnel and we sing hymns and it's really cool. I so encourage everyone to come to BYU. It is such a great experience.
Well I have to leave for class soon and this is pretty long as it is, so I will leave it at that. A little bit of what my life at BYU has been like.